Chapter Thirty Nine: Invitation.
Greg slowed in his approach to the infirmary. He arched an eyebrow when he spotted Shalia standing by the door to the building. This action, however, was hidden by the wooden mask attached to his face. This wasn't the CHARMING mask from the Eros shop. Instead, it was the mundane one that he got from the town's carpenter. Greg would never wear any of the title items in front of the healer. It was partly out of respect, the larger reason, however, was because he didn't want her to think that he was in any way trying to manipulate her. She'd already been betrayed by people she thought to be her close friends before. Greg didn't want to give her any reason to doubt the genuineness of their interactions.
From the way Shalia's eyes zeroed in on him, it was clear that he was the one she'd been waiting for. This struck Greg as odd seeing as other than the first day when she called him to the room where the healer was, they hadn't interacted with each other for the past month since. Why she would be waiting for him, Greg couldn't puzzle out. Still, he came to a stop before the girl, curious to hear what she wanted from him. "What? You are not going to greet me?" the girl asked waspishly, her snooty tone already halving Greg's interest in whatever it was she wanted to say.
Greg turned to look eastward toward the sun which was only just peeking out from the horizon. "I doubt you woke up at the crack of dawn and came to stand here just to hear me greet you. So, how about you just tell me what you want!" He said, doing all he could to keep his voice neutral.
"You should learn how to speak to your betters!" The girl snapped at him when she noted the complete irreverence in his tone of voice. She clearly was used to everyone trying to flatter her, if not getting tongue-tied, in the case of most guys Greg's age. That this guy seemed completely unimpressed by her, got under her skin in a way that no one else ever had, not even the healer. At the very least, the healer was beautiful, this guy had to walk around in a mask to spare people the sight of his wrecked face, and yet he acted like he was somehow her equal.
Without another word, Greg started to walk past the girl, the rest of his interest in whatever she had to say going up in smoke.
"Stop!" The girl demanded, stepping in his way to keep him from leaving.
"You have the next three breaths to tell me what you want," Greg spoke in a chilly tone.
Despite the displeasure that was clear to be seen on her face, she seemed to realize that Greg was being serious and as such, didn't waste any more of Greg's time. "My father, the Town-head," she began, putting extra emphasis on the title. "Invited you to dinner more than three weeks ago! He's curious to find out why you haven't shown up?" She asked.
Greg let out a sigh as he remembered the invitation by the Town-head. Part of the reason that Greg didn't go was because he didn't want to be dragged into the town's political games. The healer had promised to help him onto the road of magic, beyond that, however, Greg would have to find his own way. As soon as his foundations were set, and Greg was able to strike out on his own, he planned to leave the town to explore this new world. As such, the question of who the next town head would be was a moot one. It was of zero interest to him which of the three families took over after he was gone. So long as his family wasn't harmed in any way, then all three could take turns at leadership for all he cared.
The other reason for his failure to attend the Town-head's dinner was simply because of how busy he was. For someone with a powerful system to make use of, Greg hadn't anticipated just how hard the whole magic thing would be. His days started with him getting up at the crack of dawn to get to the infirmary. The healer had given him a token that would allow him passage through the wall into the small teleportation room. Channeling Olivia's mana, Greg would teleport over to the healer's cave where his morning infusion would begin. After getting the scroll from Olivia's original, the healer didn't immediately use it. Instead, she had said that she would need a few more days to finalize the details on it. Greg, however, suspected that she was going over the scroll with a critical eye trying to see if there were any hidden elements or traps in it. After being betrayed once, the healer wasn't one to trust easily. It was three days later that they began the actual training. Whether she found any issues with the scroll or not, the healer never revealed.
According to the scroll, the subject, in this case, Greg, could be subjected to three infusions of mana in a day, each separated by a six-hour gap in between. The infusions would only last for around ten minutes by Greg's estimation. Short as it may sound, Greg was glad for it. Any longer, and Greg didn't think he would be able to withstand the process. As it turns out, one's body being flooded by pure mana isn't the sweetest of sensations out there. When the process starts, it's usually painless. The concentration of mana in one's body is so low that one can barely feel it. As the build-up continues, however, it slowly morphs into a tingle all over one's body. The closest sensation that Greg could liken it to is when one sits in a certain position long enough for their legs to grow numb and then stands up. The tingling sensation that one gets as the limb wakes up, is the same sensation that Greg feels as the mana builds up. Only, in Greg's case, it's all over the body.
It's a little past the midpoint that the process starts to get uncomfortable. By this point, Greg would usually be feeling like an overstuffed toy. It is a lot like every single cell in his body had engorged on mana and couldn't possibly take any more. Only the infusion doesn't stop. Somewhere between the seventh and eighth minute is when the pain begins. As his body continues to be saturated by mana, it starts to feel like every single cell in his body is being washed in the purest form of energy there is. Each of his nerve endings feels like they've been doused in oil and set alight. Greg would have a piece of wood that he bites into to keep him from biting his tongue off. The screaming usually starts at the very last minute.
After the infusion, the healer will usually allow him fifteen minutes to get through the worst of it. It's not that the mana dissipates after just fifteen minutes. Instead, the fifteen minutes is the time given to Greg to acclimate to what his whole body had been thus far subjected to. Over the next six hours, his body will slowly be trying to digest the infusion of mana it's been subjected to and to get used to the feeling of the mana coursing through every cell in his body. Six hours later, after the former infusion had ebbed by about ninety percent, Greg would be subjected to another infusion, and his body forced to start the process all over again. The worst part of all this was that they were only employing first-tier levels of mana.
Given that Greg was just starting out, his body could only handle the lowest concentrations of mana. Anything stronger and his body would quite literally break down from the overload. According to the healer, it would take him anywhere between six to nine months for him to get used to the first-tier levels of mana. Only then would they move on to second-tier levels. Given how much of a challenge acclimating to tier one mana was, Greg shuddered to imagine what second-tier, or worse yet, third-tier mana would feel like.
Between the infusions, Greg would continue with his literacy lessons. Greg had been under the impression that forming his core and mana pathways would involve some form of meditation. He had been right. According to the healer, if they had been using one of the normal methods of forming a mana core and mana pathways it would involve Greg actively trying to circulate the mana throughout his whole body. In the method that the healer had devised, however, not only was this unnecessary, it was ill-advised. The mana pathways that formed as a result of the first method were usually closed circuits that didn't allow for the spillover effect that the healer had discovered using her new method. By refraining from any attempts to consciously control the mana inside his body using meditation, Greg would be allowing the mana to find the most appropriate pathways to take in circulating his body. Doing this would lead to the formation of natural mana pathways. And with the spillover effect, this would also slowly temper Greg's body as well.
The literacy lessons were the most enjoyable part of the day for Greg. With Olivia capable of communicating directly with his soul, Greg was able to imbibe the human tongue at almost twice the speed he otherwise would have. Whenever Greg read any words, the familiar would communicate the meaning directly into his soul making his reading comprehension almost as good as one that has been speaking the human tongue all their life. Speaking the language, however, wasn't as easy. To his ears, Greg felt like he was speaking the language okay. Given the way the healer was continuously wincing and sometimes even bursting out in laughter, it was clear that he didn't have it quite pinned down. The hardest part of the lessons as far as Greg was concerned, was the writing. Not only had Roka never written anything in his life, but even Greg from Earth was having a hard time with it. This is because he'd never had to use a quill in his former life. He could see the characters clearly in his mind. Whenever he tried to write it out on paper, however, it'd come out looking like chicken scratch.
Despite their relationship, the healer was a stickler for perfection! While she would praise him for his comprehension speed, and be encouraging when it came to speech training, she would turn into a demon instructor from hell when it came to writing. Greg had come to learn just how colorful the human tongue can be owing to all the cuss words that the healer had employed whenever she reviewed his dreadful handwriting. For all her castigation, Greg knew that she wasn't placing unrealistic standards on him that she didn't live up to herself. Greg had seen the healer's handwriting and for the first time in both his lives, Greg found himself just staring at a page for the beauty of the written characters on it as opposed to the meaning of the words. Holding the page with the healer's handwriting next to his own was almost a travesty in itself. If thousands of years later an archeologist came across the two pages, they'd probably be convinced that they were of two different languages.
Three infusions a day means that there is one in the morning, one at midday, and one in the evening just before Greg leaves. As painful as being pumped full of mana is, that isn't where his day ends. Leaving the infirmary just as the sun is setting, Greg would usually head straight home and give his mother the piece of meat he'd bought from the system that day. Greg knew that his mother was confused and wondering how he usually got the meat seeing as he rarely went hunting anymore. The woman, however, seemed prudent enough not to ask unnecessary questions. She'd only sought reassurance from him that he wasn't placing himself in undue trouble to get the meat. After Greg had reassured her that he wasn't doing anything that would land him in trouble to get the meat, she hadn't questioned him any further.
After having dinner with his family, Greg would head to his room for his willpower training with Olivia. Over the past month that Greg had been subject to these training sessions, Greg had had his eyes opened to all the ways that a man can be both tortured and tempted. Olivia was yet to have Greg do the same training activity twice. The familiar seemed to have an almost endless number of ways to torment Greg in the pursuit of forging his will such that it wouldn't be broken by anything. One night, Greg would have to ignore an almost mind-breaking itching sensation all over his body. In the next, Olivia would have him fight the urge to grope her. Only for the next day to have him fight his urge to attack her despite turning his violent urges all the way to eleven. In short, Greg never knew what he would be facing whenever he walked into his room for a willpower training session.
And despite being at it for about a month now, Greg was yet to make it through all the hundred breaths that Olivia had set as the duration of the training sessions. The closest that Greg had gotten to this goal was eighty breaths of time. This was during the session where Olivia had instructed him to resist the urge to attack her despite being artificially flooded with violent impulses by the familiar. Greg made it to the eighty-third breath before he cocked back and threw the hardest punch of his life aimed at the familiar's face. Of course, Olivia caught his hand in midair with almost humiliating ease. And despite all the force Greg had put in the punch, her hand barely even moved back an inch. As she always did, as soon as Greg failed to resist the particular test of the day, she withdrew her influence immediately. Greg was in the awkward position of not knowing whether to be proud of how long he'd managed to last or to be ashamed of how weak his attack seemed to be in the eyes of the familiar.
Despite how hard each of the willpower training sessions was, they weren't the end of Greg's day. After each session, Greg would next delve into the only dungeon he now had access to, A DINNER PARTY. And of all his daily activities, this was the most frustrating one. Over the several attempts that followed his first foray into the dungeons, Greg had come to discover just how lucky he'd been on his first run.
The first challenge had come in finding his way back to the merchant's house in the noble district. The first time Greg had gotten there it had been after being chased all over town by the spider gang. The dungeon shop allowed Greg the option of buying a map of the town. This however was one of the perks that would affect the assessment of his performance in the end. They placed restrictions on his ability to gain good results, or performance modifiers as the system called them. For example, buying a map would immediately place a twenty percent penalty on the assessment of one's exploration within the dungeon. The more detailed the map, the more expensive and, even worse, the higher the penalty placed on Greg's exploration assessment. In fact, if the map covered more than seventy-five percent of the terrain, then he wouldn't earn any exploration points. And there was no way of tricking the system. Greg had bought a detailed map on one run thinking that he could memorize it and use the memory on the next run to avoid the exploration penalty on the next run. Unfortunately for Greg, on his next run, the system had completely changed the layout of the city. The map he'd bought before became completely useless.
The next challenge after finding the merchant's house was timing. If Greg came too early to the merchant's house, he would find that the merchant was still home. Greg only needed to die once at the hands of his bodyguard to know that the man didn't appreciate strange men walking into his house asking to be employed as his wife's manservant. Arriving too late, however, also didn't work as Greg would find that the husband had already employed a servant for his wife, making it impossible for him to be hired. After repeatedly observing them, Greg had figured out that there was only a thirty-minute window of time in which he could make a move. Miss it and the chance of interacting with Zarra for that dungeon run is completely gone. Greg's troubles, however, didn't end there.
After figuring out where the merchant lived and what time to approach the merchant's wife, the next hurdle in Greg's path was gaining Zarra's trust. On his first run, the merchant's wife had been willing to recruit him because she saw that he was on the run from thugs and didn't think that he was in any way related to her husband. With him walking into her house looking for a job, however, the dynamic completely changed. First, Greg had to convince her that he wasn't some spy sent by her husband pretending to be unrelated to him in order to deceive her. As soon as that had been established, Greg would then have to explain why he wasn't dressed suitably for the position he was seeking. Greg hadn't even known that what he was wearing would matter. Although when he thought about it, the first place the woman had sent him the first time around, was to the tailor. Walking in while wearing 'commoner clothes', as the woman had called it, hadn't won him any points with the woman.
After another round of convincing the woman, Greg came up against another problem that rendered all his previous efforts pointless. The contract that he was offered by the merchant's wife was just as lopsided as the one he got on his first run. The only problem was that this time, all the positives were on the employer's end and he as the servant would be little more than a slave to serve at his mistress's pleasure. Now that he was the one asking for a job, she saw no need to give him a good contract. The thing wasn't even one percent as good as the contract that he got the first time around. There were no protections for him either from being randomly fired or from being put in harm's way by his employer or her family. After reading the thing, Greg threw it back in her face before turning around and walking out of the mansion.
On subsequent runs, Greg had tried to recreate the events of the first dungeon dive. He, however, had come to find out why the system considered the blonde girl he'd bumped into to be an elite thief. Repeatedly, Greg had tried to pretend to be a hapless bystander just walking by. She, however, seemed to be able to sniff out his pretense, no matter how convincing Greg tried to be. She'd always just run past him or cross to the other side of the road if she could. All this led Greg to believe that she hadn't really run into him by accident the first time it happened. Instead, she'd probably marked him as her target and used his inattention against him.
At one point, Greg had grown frustrated and desperate enough that he made the mistake of physically trying to stop her. Greg didn't see how she did it. All he caught was the glint of a blade in the morning sun. Next thing he knew, he was on the ground clutching at his slit throat, trying to keep from bleeding out… he didn't succeed.
This was the other part of the dungeons that made each run such an ordeal, the deaths. While the system wouldn't allow Greg to cause serious harm to his soul, it didn't spare him from experiencing each of the deaths. Bleeding out on the sidewalk was actually among the more tame deaths he'd experienced. The time the merchant had his bodyguard kill him for trying to become his wife's servant was among the most gruesome of deaths he'd experienced. It turns out that the muscle-bound freak that the man keeps at his side is a sadist. Greg shuddered every time he remembered the slow death that the man had subjected him to. Knowing that this was an imaginary world and that as soon as he died he would be back in his bedroom, was the only reason he managed to keep his reason despite the excruciating pain.
After that particular dungeon dive, Greg had come to thank his stars that his soul bow had become somehow corrupted. It had become his get-out-of-jail-free card. Whenever things started going in a direction that he didn't want, he would just summon it, and pull on the string for roughly three minutes before trying to let go. He would immediately find himself on the clouds above the city of Torrin with the message that he had died.
Greg knew that there were many other approaches that he could pursue to beat the dungeon. He, however, had a stubborn streak to him that wouldn't allow him to let this first route go until he'd beaten it. As such, Greg had spent the last month getting a PUTRID rating on each of his dives. Frustrating as it was, Greg also found that he loved the challenge each dive presented to him. The dives would have quickly grown stale and boring if it was easy to beat. To beat the dives he'd have to employ cunning, planning, and a generous amount of daring. That is what made each dive such an adventure.
Regardless of how each dive went, however, Greg would be completely out of it afterward. The toll that each dungeon run would take on him would leave him feeling like someone had taken a sledgehammer to the back of his head. A nasty headache, nausea, lightheadedness, deep fatigue, and so on. These were symptoms that Greg had grown used to experiencing over the past month. Greg had taken to diving into the dungeons only after he was on his bed. That way, when he came out, he would just allow himself to drift off to sleep.
———
"Extend my sincerest apologies to your father," Greg calmly spoke after a while of silence. Insufferable as the girl may be, her father was still the Town-head, there was no need to antagonize the man unnecessarily. His family was still part of the town, and Greg didn't wish to complicate their lives by making enemies left, right, and center. If a simple apology is all it takes to avoid future troubles, then Greg was more than happy to oblige. "I've been completely occupied training under the healer," Greg continued. Much as he didn't want to be the kind of person that hid behind the names of others, Greg knew that mentioning the healer would make it impossible for the Town-head to be too hard on him for his negligence. After all, it wasn't Greg that the Town-head was after, but rather, the connection to the healer that association with him would provide. "Let your father know that I'll be joining you for dinner tonight," Greg stated calmly before walking past the girl without another glance at her…
***
DO YOU WISH TO BUY SEXUAL INTENT PANTS FOR 30,000 LUST POINTS?
YES/NO
Greg couldn't help but arch an eyebrow at his familiar. It was once again the end of another taxing day learning from the healer. A day that involved being pumped full of manna, being taught how to formulate a proper sentence in the human tongue, and being reprimanded for his awful handwriting. Greg had managed to get in a few kisses and gropes between lessons, but much to Greg's disappointment, ever since the healer had established that there weren't any traps hidden inside the scroll and had begun to truly dive into its secrets, she'd been like a woman possessed. She honored her promise to teach him, but other than that, every other moment was completely dedicated to her research. And so, much as Greg would have loved to spend an hour or two extra with the healer, he was now back inside his room getting ready for the dinner he'd been invited to at the Town-head's house.
"What are they?" Greg asked Olivia.
"They may just be the thing that makes this night interesting while at the same time keeping your head attached to the rest of you," The familiar replied cryptically.
With his tally of lust points at close to eight million, Greg was willing to go along with the familiar's whims out of curiosity. Soon enough, Greg found himself wearing a pair of black pants that were made from a high-quality fabric that made this probably the most comfortable pair of pants he'd ever worn since coming to this world. But other than comfort, Greg couldn't see much else that was unique about the pants. Turning to Olivia, Greg had the silent question written all over his face.
With a smile, Olivia walked over and reached for his crotch.
Greg's eyes went wide, not because of Olivia's behavior, but because despite still having the pants on, he felt Olivia's warm palm come in contact with his dick. Turning to look down, Greg found that indeed, the feeling was no illusion, his familiar was quietly fondling his rapidly hardening cock. There wasn't a hole in the pants and his fly wasn't open. Greg could feel the pants still on and comfortably around his waist, they hadn't loosened even a little bit. And yet, he was looking down at his thick veiny cock being gently massaged in the familiar's hand. They might as well have been renamed 'Schrödinger's pants', the front part of the pants were both there and not there at the same time.
"The pants have two simple functions, master. The first as the name suggests, is to sense sexual intent. If someone reaches for your naughty bits with lascivious intentions, as you can very well see, the pants will grant them easy access. Say, for example, that someone seated across from you at the dinner table decides to play footsies with your little monster down there," Olivia whispered in his ear. Greg's eyes went wide even as his memories of his first meeting with the Town-head's wife and the implications of the pants' ability hit him at the same time. "They won't be impeded by some silly fabric getting in the way," She informed him in a sultry tone that sent shivers down Greg's spine. "The effect also applies to you. If you reach down for your crotch with naughty intentions in mind, then you won't have to bother with buttons or pulling your pants down," She explained.
"The second function, " Olivia continued, her hand letting go of his stiff manhood, "Is to hide what need not be seen," She declared. As soon as the familiar let go, the pants were once again whole, looking no different from any normal pair of pants. What caught Greg's attention, however, was the fact that there wasn't even a slight bulge in his pants. With how hard his dick had been and still was, he had expected the pants to be tenting out, and yet, they were completely flat. "The pants have a hidden space that allows you to be as hard as you wish without anyone being any the wiser. You could have a ten foot hard on, and it wouldn't even have a slight bump," Olivia explained. Greg couldn't help but reach down to pat where his dick ought to be. True to the familiar's words, it wasn't an illusion hiding his dick. The pants felt completely normal as if he was flaccid. The only reason he wasn't panicking was because Greg could still feel his dick attached to him, nothing had happened to it. According to the familiar, it was just hidden in another space.
"This way, even if you were to play footsies with the Town-head's wife under the table, you could easily get up from the table without having to fear revealing anything you don't want seen," The familiar explained.
It now dawned on Greg why the familiar had said that the pants could both make the night interesting and keep his head on his neck. With them on, should the Town-head's wife try anything, Greg could take things a notch higher and get to enjoy the full experience, rather than having to feel her ministrations through fabric. On the other hand, the risk of the Town-head picking up on what was going on because Greg was sporting a bulge in his pants was completely eliminated. The man's wife could be giving him a foot job in one second, and in the next, if she breaks contact with him, all evidence of what she'd been doing would be gone in the next!
"But what if someone touches my crotch without meaning to?" Greg asked. He could envision a scenario where someone brushed up against him accidentally without meaning to. What would happen if his dick was suddenly in their hands?!
The familiar just smiled and reached for his crotch once more. This time, however, her palm was stopped by the soft fabric of the pants. "Accidental touches won't trigger any reaction from the pants. In fact, Even if someone were to cup your crotch, so long as the act wasn't motivated by a sexual desire, the pants wouldn't react," She assured him. "That, however, doesn't mean you don't need to be careful. If someone that is sexually interested in you 'accidentally' brushes against you while you are in public, or are in a compromising position, things might get a bit… awkward," The familiar warned with a mischievous smile. Greg could tell that she wouldn't mind seeing the chaos that would follow such a scene.
"Now tell me, how do I look?" The familiar said before waving her hand over herself. Greg watched as her usually bubblegum-pink hair turned to a deep, raven-black shade, the jet black falling in curly locks just slightly past her shoulders. Her golden eyes turned a vibrant green that almost seemed to sparkle under the light. Meanwhile, the rest of her features softened so that rather than a woman in her mid-twenties, she looked no older than Greg who was just around eighteen years of age. The dress that materialized around her body was the perfect mix of classy and scandalous. It hugged each of her curves in an almost licentious way, teasing at what lay beneath while hiding it from view. There was no hint of overexposure anywhere on her. Nothing was revealed that shouldn't be and yet at the same time, it almost felt like it was covering less than it should. It perfectly walked the line of reserved and yet tempting at the same time.
"S… stunning," the single stammered word was all Greg could offer as he was caught up in the familiar's allure.
"Perfect," Olivia chirped as she looped her arm around his. "We'll have so much fun," She announced looking positively giddy.
"What do you mean?" Greg asked, his brain taking a second to put together what she'd just said. "You plan on coming with me?" He asked.
"Of course I am. The easiest way to ensure that someone doesn't see something that you don't want him to is to make sure their eyes are fixed on something else," She stated with a mischievous smile. "Don't forget what I once told you, master. Only a fool believes that everyone is a fool. Just because you got away with something once, shouldn't make you think that you can always get away with it. That's actually how most people end up getting themselves caught," She advised.
Greg could immediately understand what the familiar was getting at. She would be the distraction that kept the Town-head occupied in case Greg chose to fool around with the man's wife. Much to his surprise, however, a part of Greg was conflicted about this approach. Regardless of the complicated relationship he had with Olivia, Greg wasn't willing to have her use her body in service to another man just so he could fool around with another woman.
A smile crossed the familiar's face, his concerns not hidden from her. "Don't let the disguise fool you master, I am still a second-tier mage. No one in this town can get me to do anything I don't want to. Also, you underestimate me, master. As a creature of lust, I have an almost endless number of ways to wrap a man around my little finger, even without touching him," There was an almost dangerous gleam in the familiar's eyes as she said this. If the flames that drew the moth in could have eyes, they would look exactly like the two emerald orbs that were now fixed on him. "You don't have to worry though, master, I am yours alone. No man shall ever have the joy of touching me unless you permit it, " She asserted. "Now, let's have some fun," She urged as she ushered him out of the room…