[Exile duration: 00D:14H:27M:53S]
[Exile duration: 00D:14H:27M:52S]
[Exile duration: 00D:14H:27M:51S...
"Tee-hee!"
Giggling sounds from the half-naked ladies reminded him of his incredible luck.
This don't feel like any punishment author. Sucker!
After making it out of the surface, Arken, Rutma and Vizer had retreated underground.
Where the four maids who were forced to serve Hoza gathered around them in shock and immediately dragged them to a pool of water where they undressed them.
They took their sweet time to treat their wounds before submerging them to their shoulders in the spring waters and also getting in themselves. Partially clothed.
They had divided themselves between the three. One each for Rutma and Vizer, while two served Arken alone.
The pools were in an irregular shape, divided up into three sub pools that lined the walls of a hideaway from the main areas of their caverns that they called home.
"My robe..." he began to protest as it was taken away but the two thick ladies restrained him gently but firmly with kind eyes.
"Fret not savior," one of them batted her eyelashes to him as she scooped up the clear water and poured it down his head, "we'll have it cleaned and back to you in no time."
"Yes for now, just relax and sit back," her companion joined in bathing him.
Arken had less incentive to actually complain, especially when he was enjoying this preferential treatment and nodded.
His eyes went to Vizer and Rutma who were similarly engaged but had their backs to him.
"So is this a normal thing around here? Getting the women to serve like this?"
Vizer turned only a little while Rutma's chuckle wafted to him.
"Only reserved for the best of the males here, something Hoza had obviously hoarded for himself."
"But," the woman tending them, a tall dark beauty with freckles pouted, "we had no choice back then. Now we do. We're grateful to you and them," she tilted her head in the direction of the older men, "for not only putting down that scum but also bringing down the hitherto unputdownable beast."
For a while there Arken sat still as the two women who had chosen him for themselves to care for, massaged his hands, the scratches, the injuries slowly as they eyed him with almost a reverent gaze but also something sweetly lustful.
Ever since his time here, he had let himself close off against too personal an interaction.
Either thinking he was having too overactive an imagination, that this was all a dream to be woken up rudely from. That further developed to a nagging conscience that this wasn't his world and he was no one to be acquainted by it's version of 'humanity'.
Kalni came to mind immediately. Her caring, strong yet resolute personality that he often took for granted.
I wonder what she's going through now.
His mind seemed like a mess but right now, right here with them he finally let himself ease off a little and sighed much more happily than he cared to admit.
"Yes please," their tones spoke together, "sit back and relax."
When he dared to meet their gaze, their wide pupils holding him in an abyss of mature attraction he gulped and turned away, reddening.
"You should know, it was your men who did a lot of the work."
Vizer cracked a laugh, "oh nonsense. Please don't listen to him. Yeah it was Rutma's devices but without your shield boy, we would be toast."
"Ground meat to be exact," Rutma added.
"I'm curious boy, that shield. Is that magic?"
Arken sighed as his shoulders rolled under the women's handling and he stared up, "could be. I'm not so sure myself. But from where I'm from, magic is indeed what you would call it."
"Your world, wherever it is," the dark beauty descended, her naked thighs brushing his abdomen, "is it pretty?"
Arken scoffed first but then grew silent.
"It's not pretty but it's not bad either. It has its own issues of course but like always there's always a bright spot."
The other woman tending to him smiled and placed a hand on his hipbone while closing her face to his, "sounds wonderful to me."
"Are you sure you don't want to know our names?" They asked and he shook his head. It had been the first condition he had set when he entered the pool on their insistence.
Certain that he would go back and never return, he didn't want a solid reminder making him regret everytime he thought of this place.
But they didn't push. If it were some headstrong female like Kalni, that would be a different story. But these were more gentler women. Who had long faced abuse and more than anything, a lack of agency over their lives.
And the worst part was that it was to a child.
Maybe that's why when he didn't even bother to use the staff, they had taken an immense liking to him. That and giving them a chance to give a humiliating beating to their oppressor.
"Can you describe your world, Arken?" Rutma asked from across the room and even the women, along with Vizer, seemingly showed silent interest in that request.
Arken laughed as the women now went to his legs and lower body to soothe his aching muscles, "I'm a bad story teller, and it will get boring pretty soon."
"Try us, please," Rutma's woman spoke for him.
After a beat he thought hard. Wondering where to begin. There was only so much one could keep refusing requests after all.
He suddenly caught an interesting look pass between the darker woman and her companion in his service before their smiles turned into lopsided grins and they brushed their hands from his heaving chest lower towards his navel while their heads descended to his groin simultaneously.
That dual gesture from both of them made him flinch and though he tried to get up, they had their arms locked to push him down, holding him stiff.
"Hey...you know I'm aged.."
"Relax. You're our savior for now, continue your story Arken. Breathe free and let us show our gratitude," the dark one stuck her tongue out and her fingers groped his balls along with his cock to bring them up together.
Arken hissed in nervousness, not sure how to respond to the sudden move. Not from one but two eager women that too.
This would never happen to the real me, not in a millennia.
But for some reason he found a confidence at being treated this way and swallowed, choosing his words carefully.
"My world is a carefully constructed one. We are closer to our God, our maker, more than you can imagine. Our history clear enough like turning pages in a book. Our language not too different from yours because it's all one entity, one author's work."
The pale one pressed her lips together with wide eyes as the dark one pushed her with a mischievous look onto his cock's tip which was probably seeing the wet insides of a female's mouth for the first time.
The dark one extended her tongue after letting him grow hard and wrapped it like a coiling snake around his lower shaft, thus both of them completely playing with his manhood in their own pace.
"Ther....there's magic, there's monsters, there's discrimination. But there's also a strange beauty in the most saddest parts. More richness in the realms of despair."
"You saw my skills didn't you? It's nothing compared to what—"
Fucking hell!
He muttered under the dual assault on his body and looked down, gasping at the sight.
The two women had their palms underneath his ballsack to lift them up the water surface while running their tongues sloppily along his ridges, his veiny and meaty surface while his cock itself twitched in delight.
Their eyes met and they smiled so large their teeth shone and their wet mouths glided down on his unnaturally hard cock.
It seemed unnatural because it wasn't really his. Now that he noticed quite clearly. It resembled an older man's, not that of his as it should have been.
Wait, what's going on?
The women had faded long ago and he blinked as he jumped in surprise and sat up on a softer surface. A bed. Made from modern cotton and softened sheets.
"I know this place."
This isn't home is it?
☆
Arken walked or rather stumbled to the ajar door to his bathroom. Shower, faucet, sink, mirror, curtains, toiletries, fleshlight (one of five favorites) greeted him immediately. The stone slab glinting under the incandescent lights.
Everything is as it was back then. Nothing changed.
His hands traveled down his face as he stood at the entrance and he laughed maniacally.
"This is it..I've finally lost all track of my self, hahaha—"
"Stop laughing and turn to the mirror dickhead!"
A familiar voice made him jump and he turned.
Facing him through the mirror was Arken. The real one.
He stared for a whole minute before clasping the slab as he got close, "you're me!"
"And I, you."
"This is crazy," he said to himself and his other half nodded.
"How long have you been here?"
"Quite a while," came the reply, "while you were enjoying the other side in my body, here I was wasting away."
"You see where you are, this is where I lived for almost twenty years. Now tell me how better Earth is compared to whatever shithole the author made."
"So this is Earth?"
"Yeah," he sighed and turned around in reminiscent wondering, "god I miss this place."
The other side squinted and rubbed his nose, "too bright for myself."
"We exist as two parallels then, one body two minds. I seemed to have hijacked yours."
"Or are you living through me the same way as I am through you?"
The real one giggled in his adolescent tone, "this is a false reality, and I might not even be real. At least to your world," he leaned out, "you might just be dead."
Arken stopped scratching his neck and shuddered at the feeling. "This is getting very weird."
"God I actually feel sick for the things you did back there. It certainly wasn't me."
The real one boomed, "you're referring to threatening the monster's offspring, or the killing of the child?"
He stood perplexed at the nonchalant attitude of his other half, "um, both?"
The real one nodded as if agreeing before he snapped, "go screw yourself. This is my body you're inhabiting. My torture at the hands of the Temple, the nobles along with my people will not be erased for the mere whims of an outsider who's so used to luxury it makes me puke."
He backed off from himself, "ok, ok, I didn't mean to trivialise your life dude. Chill."
But he didnt. "You will never understand true faith, especially if you choose to remain ignorant to the temple's troubles. What I did was an awakening. Something that was torn down with scorn and now will be replied to in the same manner."
"Look," the milder half of Arken spoke softly, "I can't pretend to understand what you went through. Maybe that's why I can't see what you remember earlier. You blocked it out probably. But even if not, are you certain about the manner—"
"Fucking yess!!"
His screech turned him off and he closed his eyes as if he had just been spit off.
"Ok first of all stop using that word so much, where did you even get the idea to use it so liberally?"
"Again I say," Arken pointed to himself, "my body, my tongue. Your mind is a foreigner. And," he grinned, "it has the weird affect of shocking people. Good, I want that."
"If the Temples and their followers want a brutal enemy, I'll give them one. All this strange knowledge about your world, foreigner," Arken rubbed his head with delight as if it were a delicacy, "much of it is garbage for desirous tendencies but the vast parts are priceless to my rebellion."
Mild Arken stepped out and came back with a pack of cigarettes, tapping it with one he had pulled out and it instantly grabbed his other half's attention.
"What is that?" His tone full of suspicion.
"This," he replied with clenched teeth as he lit one with his lighter, "is better than sex."
He leaned back against the walls and puffed two, three smoke rings to the ceiling.
"Alright, you want a rebellion. But you can't close off people. I know you run the body but I can see stuff too. You need allies, mate," he flicked ash down, "allies to rely on."
"True. Disposable allies."
Arken first nodded before his eyes widened at the remark, "what?"
"I was always too close to a clown in terms of maintaining a respectable demeanor but not anymore. This cult, something I got from your repository, it will be useful to take us forward."
"Wait, wait, wait. Do you always go so extreme in your methods?"
"That question answers itself. You want to fight over that?"
"I'm not going to..but it will lead to your downfall. Everything said and done Arken," though it felt weird addressing himself he held on his composure, "you're still a kid."
"Ambrenia doesn't seem to think so. Neither did it's people. I won't either."
The bathroom shook suddenly as holes began to appear in every corner of the room.
"Can we agree on something in the end?"
"What would that be?"
Arken struggled to answer but he was losing time, "anything really. If we're to continue this tango."
The real one half-turned at the entrance, "we can. About control. You won't be in complete hold of the body or its decisions. The same goes for me. Despite all of it, I won't deny we share a strange oneness."
"So any decisions you regret now, later, pin it all on the other part. Me. Arken was always good at escaping. He can escape his own reality too soon enough."
With that the real one withdrew from the entrance as it collapsed after him and the other half of him waited for his turn, smoking with trembling hands.
What a weird fucking dream.
☆
GASP!
Arken sat up, with full body sweat and chills coating his temple as he gathered his wits.
He was enveloped or was till a second ago, by the two women whose bulging tits were plastered on his thighs and drooling in their sleep.
So I guess I wasn't sucked off then, huh?
They looked tempting in the low light but his mind held him back. Not after that mindfuck, he couldn't.
[Exile duration: 00D:02H:03M:03S]
Guess it's been hours then.
He looked around to find out where he was.
It was in the open area where he had dethroned that scummy brat. But instead of sunlight streaming through above, there was a wavy mist of whiteness coming through.
It was night time. And close to his time of departure from here.
[Consolidating achievements...please wait.]
DING
[Remarkable! You have liberated a forgotten chapter, along with slaying a ferocious foe.]
[You may choose three personas with you upon return to Ambrenia!]
Three personas?!
"Hey kid, can't sleep?" Arken heard Vizer's voice travel from further down.
He saw him stand and pull the women from him gently while they moaned and complained but drifted off soon enough.
Arken dusted himself, looking longingly at them on the ground before turning to Vizer. "Thanks for that." He wore the now cleaned up robe and reveled in its luxury.
"Time to return?" Rutma rubbed his eyes as he stumbled to them, trying not to crash on the sleeping bodies below.
Arken nodded and noted a hint of sadness in their eyes.
"Come on, if the author is cranky enough to send me for what I did then, I'm certain I'll be a regular visitor to this place soon enough."
They trekked quietly up the long walls to the top, as Arken took a last good look at the caverns below.
He wasn't sure but if he was dropped in the desert directly and not the cavern below it, then he felt he better not take chances.
Up there, the air was more cooler now that the sun had gone but it was brighter for night time.
"What's that?"
They quickly hid as a creature's moans traveled down their side.
Rutma squinted and gulped, "it's the baby. I think it's mourning it's mother."
☆
Both of them thought Arken was crazy but followed behind him nonetheless as they made their way to where the beast was hovering midair. Sometimes traveling in circles, sometimes looking down at the hole in the ground where it's mother had passed in a violent fashion.
It still smelt of burnt metal, rubber, flesh and something so horrid that all of them covered their noses from it.
But the creature paid no heed to their arrival. Only moaning in sad pain and longing to see it's mother again.
Rutma's eyes widened for a second before grabbing Vizer's cloth, who hissed at him, "what?"
"I don't know why but I think I can see the boy trembling from here, or am I wrong?"
Vizer turned his gaze to Arken who by now was almost underneath the creature who seemed so drunk in sorrow that it didn't even notice Arken's presence.
A slowly raised hand from him seemed to finally break its reverie but shockingly instead of charging or appearing aggressive, it began to whine and seemingly cower in his presence, drifting backwards slowly.
And Arken himself slid to the ground to his knees, in it's presence as he lowered his head.
"I think you're right, Rutma. And now even he's perplexed at his own reaction," Vizer said as he took a step forward to see the creature hovering a little distance away, training it's entire self on Arken in a cautious manner.
"There's two kinds of people Rutma. I'm talking of those who dole out death and final punishment. There are those who feel the fear of taking a life before the deed. There are those who feel fearful while doing the deed. And then there's the third kind," Vizer sighed softly, the night wind brushing his hair, "those who feel the fear after the deed is all done and dusted. They are the ones who don't hesitate in the here and now but somewhere in the far corners of their own minds, it pesters as another being waiting to be confronted. Till then they do what they do best. Seek."
Rutma didn't pretend to wholly understand what his lifelong, wise friend spouted but he understood the gist.
"Hey don't you think that thing is getting a little too closer to him when he's distracted?"
☆
Arken could feel a sense of dread overpowering him. The first signs of true remorse or guilt hit him like a hammer.
He had killed a kid. There was no going back from it. No denying it.
All he could wonder was why it hit him so late and why those two men were shouting at him.
He froze when he heard the gnashing sounds and immediately looked up to see giant blackness inches away from his face and then—boink!
When he opened his eyes he saw an unbelievable sight. There in front of him, like a little slithering dark worm was the once towering and all encompassing creature in it's tiniest form.
Moving in circles through the air all around him over and over till it seemed exhausted and rested on his shoulder like a pet.
Rutma and Vizer's hurried breathing didn't deter him from looking at his shoulder.
"We–we were...wait where did it go?" Rutma twirled around in confusion, "it was just here."
Vizer's jaw dropped and he struggled to hold Rutma still, bringing his chin to face what he was seeing and his jaw dropped too.
They both saw Arken scoop up the wriggling being in his palm, as it settled from hovering above and it's wide open front stared up as if gazing at it's new admirer.
It was like a giant ball of an eye without any resemblance to one, wagging it's tail end either in expectance or acceptance of it's fate at Arken's hands.
Finally Arken spoke, "you're not cute dude."
And the little creature whined while Rutma and Vizer's hearts imploded from the sudden behavioral change of their early tormentor.
[The baby bookworm acknowledges your prowess! You can name it and tame it to give its own unique persona!]
Arken eyed it closely and used his index finger to scratch his back, which made it wriggle to what he suspected was maddening glee.
"I killed your mother, dude," he whispered in a soft tone.
But seeing it's eagerness he felt obliged. Knowing full well it would hit him later.
"Fuck it then. You're Rambha now."
[Bookworm- Rambha has been named! It's persona will develop according to its namer's wishes and actions!]
[Persona 1/3 has been chosen for the return]
[Exile duration: 00D:00H:01M:30S]
He turned to both Vizer and Rutma who immediately looked away to hide their faces for some reason. He looked on puzzled but he didn't say anything.
"What do you two say to coming back with me?"