631Chapter 68: I Bought a Whorehouse (Finale)
Cayman would give his companions credit, they did try to protect him from the homicidal Android. Violet lightspears sprung up around Penemue before lashing outwards, Till and Titania summoned glowing shields and even Touko raised up a hand before firing off a condensed blast of some kind of mana that he assumed was meant to be powerful and damaging.
Except instead of any kind of tangible effect he would have assumed they would have on the rampaging being they were completely and totally undercut. Penemue's shining spears deflected off the Android's bodysuit and wings with prismatic detonations that merely highlighted how ineffectual they were, Touko's mana bolt may as well have had all the impact of a bb pellet and the jagged sword tore through the Fairy shields as if they were no more durable than wet tissue paper, aiming to cut him from shoulder to hip as his own weapons were still woefully out of position, heart racing and eyes wide as the sword began a downward arc-
-that stopped just shy of his flesh, the room falling deathly silent aside from his short and rapid breaths as all eyes present focused on the placid Android, her expression having not shifted so much as a millimeter.
…Cayman reflected that he was just as fascinated by his own possible death as he was others, if his deranged and aching grin was anything to go by. Because wow he couldn't decide if he was more elated or terrified by the whole experience and how quickly it had come.
"...You are not at the required level for me to operate under your direction. I will resume standby mode until such a time has been achieved."
Blinking at the abrupt statement Cayman snapped out of his trance, quickly asking, "And what would qualify me, then?"
The woman tilted her head, eventually responding, "Considering class differences and the variances between them…fifteen to twenty additional levels of clearance would be acceptable."
With that she withdrew her weapon, wings and swords dissipating into nothing as Penemue affixed him with an openly scrutinizing expression.
"Just what, exactly, is your relation to Alfred Norman? Countless others attempted to interact with her and met with zero success."
Cayman could only shrug, reholstering his half drawn Castigator and taking a deep breath before explaining, "The best I could offer you is that we're from the same neighborhood. Honestly I'm just as shocked as you are that she seems amenable to taking my orders."
After all, knowing that Alaya would be calling for his replacement if he ever began to fuck up too badly and that they would likely be sent to personally finish the job he wouldn't have bothered making life easy for his replacement, if only out of petty spite.
…Then again Hoestia had given him that weird potion thing and offered some bits of advice before going out on his own terms, not to mention there was now the Android standing before him, offering her aid if he managed to break the assumed sixty level limit.
"Eh, maybe I would have cut them some slack, if only to continue the tradition. Although they would have to like animals, no fucking way am I giving Cerb and Oct to someone who would just send em' to the shelter."
Snapping himself out of those meandering thoughts the Surveyor returned to the conversation just as Titania was calmly stating, "It seems fairly obvious to me that we should entrust Norman's creation to the one who is capable of commanding it to protect itself in the case of another abduction, never mind make use of its talents for our cause."
"While I mean no offense, Queen Titania, are we truly going to trust someone cut from the same cloth as Norman or Hoestia? If anything this is a chance to launch this relic into the sun and avert any potential risk of it causing havoc."
Turning his gaze the Android's way Cayman noted that she seemed supremely unconcerned with their debate about whether her existence should continue, the male abruptly asking, "Do you have a name or designation? Feels kinda weird to just go 'hey you' all the time."
"I was given the name Prima. If my presence is not required for this topic then I shall return to standby."
Without a single additional comment Prima smoothly strode to her coffin and laid back inside of it, eyes shutting and turning motionless as all present blinked at the sudden action.
"...Well I guess that solves that."
Turning to Penemue he made his case by stating, "While I get where you're coming from with your reservations about me I would like to remind all present that my sponsor is the Vampire who's made it something of a calling card of his to fuck up anyone that does evil shit. And that I have two of his personally assigned wardens hanging around the base. At that point you have to wonder if I can get away with scratching my ass in peace, let alone using a super robot to conquer the world."
He smirked, hiking a thumb towards where Till had retaken her position on his shoulder.
"Besides, can I really be that bad of a guy with a leading lady such as this one hanging out with me all the time?"
Titania smiled, jokingly adding, "He is correct, my daughter does have an impeccable ability to locate and contract with remarkable individuals."
Unsurprisingly Penemue wasn't impressed, giving them a narrowed glare before she huffed out a breath, announcing, "I will have to speak with Azazel and by extension Sanctuary about this decision. If you'll excuse me."
She made her way back up the stairs, leaving Cayman alone with the Fairies as Titania sighed before dismissively saying, "Gracious, some people can be so unreasonably stubborn."
She floated over to Prima's resting location, gazing down into the box while musing, "It has been definitively proven that Prima is not safe or secure in any of the locations that she has been stored in. More to the point she can be activated and directed by you, that seems a more powerful and comprehensive defense than any other."
The Fairy gestured towards the insensate Android.
"Take her. I will argue on your behalf and while I imagine a great many will complain and resist they will inevitably agree that this is the safest course."
Hesitating for a moment Cayman eventually shrugged, deciding that he wasn't in any position to argue or turn down the offer as he strode forward, placing a hand on Prima's surprisingly warm arm before attempting to suck her into his inventory for expediency's sake-
-and had to blink as she vanished from sight, mind instantly racing at the implications of having a pocket nuke on demand before kicking it aside since the Android wasn't even under his control yet.
"Fascinating…well come along then, Till. Seeing as how this whole venture was a result of your selfishness it's only right that you see and partake of the aftermath and politicking that accompanies it."
"Ugh…alright."
Chuckling at his companion's obvious reservation the Surveyor was given pause as Titania affixed him with a small smile.
"Regardless of the reasons behind this quest or how small in the grand scheme of things it may seem, how few people you have spared from truly miserable states…take pride in having righted a wrong, in doing what no others to date have. A flap of the butterfly's wings may one day cause a storm further down a long and winding path."
Cayman found himself caught off guard by the comment, slight frown curving his lips as he gave those words careful consideration.
Should he take pride in what he'd done? On the one hand he'd been perfectly happy to do so because, well, why the fuck not? Offering a helping hand to those he had the capability to help was a sensible enough concept to understand. But the only reason he'd gotten started in the first place was because Till had wanted him to do so and the quest payout.
Not to mention he'd seen plenty of suffering in Yomihara and hadn't done anything about it despite now having more than enough power and influence to do so. He supposed the crux of the issue was whether he had the right to feel good about himself for this particular situation when he could easily be doing so much more. Be satisfied with a job well done? Sure. But hailing himself as some kind of hero?
Yeah, that felt more than a little off.
Titania suddenly bursting out into soft, amused laughter drew him from his thoughts as the Fairy Queen commented, "With an expression like that you remind me a fair bit of my old Contractor…he too was always performing great deeds but maintained that he was no hero or pure soul, maintaining that he could have done more or spent less time on his hobbies."
Till immediately perked, mouth opening in order to ask a question-
"I expect you upstairs in five minutes, don't be late."
-and was promptly stonewalled as Titania darted away with a cheshire grin, the younger Demon puffing out her cheek and complaining, "She always does this! Whenever I try to learn more about who her Contractor was she just ignores me or changes the subject. And not because she's ashamed or anything, she just likes to annoy me!"
Snickering at his partner's irritation Cayman remarked, "So I guess the guy would be like your equivalent of a father?"
"Sort of? We don't pass on genetic information or anything like that when we create a child but I guess it's not a bad comparison."
She shook her head, quickly changing the subject with, "That's not important right now. What IS important is me thanking you for what you've done."
Till floated so that she was directly in front of his face, meeting his gaze head on as she earnestly continued with, "You had every reason to not go along with my selfish desires, no reason to risk so much for me…but you did. And I think it's time I start truly pulling my own weight."
[The Fairy Champion, Extra!]
[Details: Gain control of Under Eden and implement changes both Till and yourself can agree on within six months of acceptance. Failure to complete quest will result in no negative consequences.]
[Rewards: 50,000 EXP, Under Eden as a source of Income and Base of Operations, Upgrade to Sybaritic Initiate Class, Upgrade to Contracted Fairy, 1000 Reign, greatly improved REP with various factions and decreases with others.]
[Status: Complete!]
Cayman Lute, LVL 51
HP: 3650
MP: 14,000 + 2800
STA: 7200
STR: 375
DEF: 385
AGI: 760
MAG: 1145 + 229
MAG DEF: 1500 + 300
REIGN: 2069
EXP: 2700/5200
Cerb, Hellhound (Summoned Companion), LVL 50
HP: 4500
MP:1900
STA: 2300
STR: 1100
DEF: 1100
AGI: 1900
MAG: 600
MAG DEF: 850
EXP: 0/5100
SKILLS: Odor Tracking, Hell Flames, Mature Breeding, Shapeshifting, Soul Tracking.
Oct, Injuu Prince (Summoned Companion), LVL 50
HP: 2000
MP: 12,000
STA: 6000
STR: 500
DEF: 380
AGI: 800
MAG: 1000
MAG DEF: 1080
EXP: 0/5100
SKILLS: Body Melding, Hypnosis, Breeding, Shapeshifting Illusory Magic, Female Seduction.
While the bevy of stat upgrades were highly welcome Cayman found his attention largely dominated by the sight before him as Till was engulfed in a veil of shining light, concealed from sight until a moment later she burst forth like a newly emerged butterfly, the Surveyor fighting hard to keep his jaw from dropping.
She was absolutely gorgeous.
Now about a foot tall and appearing even bustier with an additional set of glittering wings she took a moment to examine herself, stretching and contorting in outright unfair displays of innocent eroticism.
Till, Ascended Fairy Princess, LVL 45
HP: 700
MP:20,000
STA: 25,000
STR: 30
DEF: 100
AGI: 1100
MAG: 2000
MAG DEF: 2500
EXP: 0/4600
"Now that is an almost literal glowup of epic proportions. Holy shit."
And the surprises didn't stop there, a message flitting across his vision that read,
MAX DEV with Till [100/100]!
before a surge of additional information rammed itself into his brain, a new spell titled [Sanctuary of Tien] causing his jaw to drop for real.
Its effect was absurd.
There was an admittedly monstrous cost of 20,000 MP - a cost he couldn't even afford at the moment - but being able to revive anyone he had a maxed DEV score with?
That was cheap at half the price, once he grew more powerful and maxed out more relationship scores. Honestly, all he could do was simply shake his head and hold Till in his hands, the Demon all too happy to accept the action with a preening smile.
"You somehow blow my expectations out of the water yet again. Honestly, it's starting to become a bit absurd how gorgeous you are."
"Heh heh, I bet you're thinking of all sorts of perverted things you could do with me now that I'm a bit bigger, huh~?"
"Who are you and what have you done with my cute and innocent princess?"
"Maybe she was corrupted by you and your lustful habits?"
"Well in that case I'm very happy to be very bad."
A sultry giggle left the Fairy as she leaned forward, planting a long and intense kiss on his lower lip…before pulling away with a slight blush, Cayman smirking at the sight.
"I guess some of her is still there after all."
"Hey I'm getting better about it, all right?!"
A playful kick to his chin had the Demon idly floating in contemplation, once more looking over herself as she mused, "But this is still pretty surprising, most Ascensions for my people don't happen for a really long time, even if the bond between a Contractor and Fairy is highly potent."
"What can I say? We're a match made in Hell."
"Ugh, way to sap all the romance out of it!"
Another joking swat to the nose left Till grimacing, the Fairy grumbling, "Ugh, I really wish I didn't have to go and help mother right now…I just got this new body, I want to have fun with you!"
"Trust me, the feeling's mutual but once this mess is over and done with we'll have some time to ourselves before I head out on vacation."
"I'm gonna hold you to that, Cayman. Wish me luck, ugh, politics."
"Your suffering is appreciated."
With that his newly enhanced and absolutely Grade-A fuckable darling left, the Surveyor walking over to a nearby chair and collapsing into it with a sigh.
"What a fucking week. This mastermind shit is way too much for me."
He promptly snorted at himself. 'Mastermind' was too generous a term, since his only real showings of intelligence had been to think on his feet rather than plan out some elaborate and convoluted scheme. Sure, on the outside it looked absurd levels of preplanned but the reality was, uh…not so pretty.
Accidentally wandering dickfirst into situations that turned out pretty beneficial for him was nice and all but didn't make for the most riveting or heroic of stories.
"Well…back to fucking work, I guess."
Hauling himself away from his brief moment of coveted rest he trudged his ass upstairs, wondering if Prima's conditions for 'unlocking' were at all similar to the lifeform Hoestia had created. Which - if Prima was anything to judge by - was going to be just as much of a monster.
"Guess we're on the grind for level sixty now. Yay for milestones and player retention."
"Hmm, I have to say this is really fun, I can kinda see why you had a setup like this going for so long~!"
Real unleashed a muffled scream, fire racing through his body as an agonizingly sharp contortion and contraction of his muscles left the chair he was strapped to scraping across the floor, sharp pops and snaps filling his ears with now terrifying familiarity.
"Tormenting a restrained and helpless bug, watching them squirm and beg…not so fun now that the shoe's on the other foot, huh?"
Real could only drool and shiver as Yukikaze grabbed his hair and forced him to stare into her smoldering gaze, free hand sparking with electric discharge as a feral smile pulled at her lips.
"Alright, Sparky. Any more and this room is going to smell like a gas station bathroom."
A calm, lackadaisical voice proved to be his salvation as none other than Azazel himself strolled into the interrogation chamber, Real almost sobbing in relief as his Taimanin torturer finally relented, clicking her tongue in irritation.
"Dammit, I was just getting started, too."
"Oof, I'd hate to see what the follow up was if this was the appetizer."
A predatory grin full of sadistic rage was his only answer.
"It'd be something like this."
Spinning on her heel Real saw the girl's heeled boot streak towards his groin-
-and a wet thump followed by another equally moist squelch brought darkness, nausea and a pain like nothing he'd ever experienced as he only came to with a defeated whimper, bile and snot soaking his gag as he blearily stared at an amused Azazel and unimpressed Penemue, the two Grigori leaders the only other occupants of the room.
"How's it hanging, Real? I'd offer my condolences but I'm fairly certain this is karma cashing in one hell of a paycheck."
Any attempt at replying was ruined by another gag as his balls twisted and pulsed with debilitating pain, the Fallen cheerfully remarking, "Oh, right, let me take care of that for you," before snapping his fingers and letting the rag fall to the floor, vomit and other congealed fluids splattering across Real's thighs and feet as he wheezed like a stuck pig.
"Hmm, not a good look."
"Can we hurry this along? I'd rather not have to smell his putrid stench for any longer than is absolutely necessary."
"Oh fine, take all the fun out of a perfectly good interrogation session."
Real found his head hauled upwards by a stony-faced Penemue, one of the contracts he used to bind the women to Under EDEN dangled in front of his face as the Fallen calmly stated, "First order of business? You're going to annul these. All of them."
Glaring at a bitch that he would have in any other scenario had on her knees and begging for his dick Real forced himself to regain a measure of composure and control, weakly rasping, "T-that's doable. And before you ask, I don't know anything about the Old Satan Faction, they only used me as an intermediary, they never told me anything important!"
Azazel raised an eyebrow, remarking, "Oh? Well I appreciate you jumping right to the heart of the matter, we were going to ask quite the number of questions regarding that particular topic."
The leader of the Grigori adopted a neutral expression, idly musing, "Of course, the fact remains that all we can do is take your word for it, we don't really have any way to verify what you're telling us is true…unless we do a stress test, of course."
Freezing at the first Fallen's words as he turned to Penemue the man cheerfully said,"Bring out the gimp."
"...Really?"
"The proper response is, 'the gimp is sleeping', Penemue."
"I'll preserve what little dignity I have and not recreate your favorite movie scenes in real life."
The woman strode out of the room, speaking to someone on the other side as Real's eyes frantically darted to and fro, unsure of what he could say or do to avert his fate as Azazel groused, "Geez, that woman really has no sense of fun whatsoever. Wouldn't you agree?"
The fatter male made no attempt at reply, his heart beating faster and faster as seconds turned into minutes, minutes into eternities as Azazel seemed content to simply lounge in a chair, idly watching him without so much as a single comment-
-and the door abruptly clattered open, Real recoiling in his chair at the sight before him.
A tall, muscular man garbed in fetishistic leather, a mask, chains and bindings as eight raven wings sprouted from his back, slowly and purposefully striding towards the tied up Human before slowly kneeling at his side, an unsettling and aroused giggle filling Real's ears like the devil's own whispers.
"Now as much as you may think of this as some kind of joke, I assure you it's just a happy coincidence that one of our best interrogators is modeled after a setpiece of one of my favorite movies. So!"
Azazel leaned forward, Real unable to mask his terrified whimper as eyes that shone with millennia of intimate experience with depravity and hedonism bore into his own.
"Why don't you put that mouth of yours to work telling us anything and everything we want to know before the gimp finds a different use for it, eh?"
Nothing quite like waking up one morning to find more than 400 emails in your inbox. On an unrelated note this story just passed a million views! Feels weird to think that some youtube channels that create content for a living that I follow have less hits than I do. I mean, it's an entirely different medium that's consumed differently, sure, but still kinda wild.
And because I forgot to do this last chapter Prima's design courtesy of someone else entirely, go to gelbooru and in search enter id:7997342
post post script, how do people typically find new stories on this sight? I've found that the most reliable way is to go through the profiles of users that have favorited me and then see what stories are on their favorites list...provided they have less than 200 stories favorited. Quality over quantity.