The morning of the hunt, I woke up with Yuna in my arms. Her fluffy ears tickling my chin and her nine tails covering the both of us. It felt so warm and comforting, Yuna nuzzled into me, feeling full from the night before. Our legs were wrapped around each other and I just didn't want to get out of bed.

‘Any more of this and you’re going to make me jealous.’ Amaterasu’s audible pout was clear as day in my head.

‘You know, I've said this before, jealousy is unbecoming of a lady you know. Even for Goddesses such as yourself.’ I couldn’t hide the grin on my face as it felt so satisfying putting my Goddess in her place.

‘I just hope I get the same treatment as her soon, you were mine in the first place.’ I couldn’t deny that. She’s allowing me to have other women, I suppose I should treat her in kind soon. Little did I know, my Goddess had a big grin on her face as well.

‘Well it’s almost time to get up. I have a job to do today as the new Lord of this town.’

‘Could you fill me in on this? As I have been resting I’ve not been able to keep an eye on your activities over the past couple of days.’

‘Sure thing, I’ll tell you as we get ready.’ I leaned over and kissed Yuna awake, her soft lips still mesmerised me. She leaned into me not letting go as she woke up, my warm aura filling her up completely. Her eyes were a little glossed over and shone a brilliant silver as she looked at me.

“Morning ‘beautiful’.”

“Morning.” Her response was short but soft, with the way I had hold of her and began to stroke her tails. She looked like she didn’t want to move.

“We have a job to do soon, we should get up and get ready.” Both Amaterasu and Yuna pouted at the same time as I said that, for completely different reasons but Yuna nodded and got up to get dressed.

I filled in Amaterasu on everything in the meantime while Yuna and I got ready, then we made our way down stairs to the main hall. There Ruby and Sophie were waiting for us.

‘Oh, the sisters have gotten much stronger in the past few days. I can already see they’re now almost at 2% each, with Sophie only a little behind her older sister.’

‘They’ve worked really hard, I’ll still have to protect them in the meantime.

“Gaël, what took you two so long?” Sophie was pouting as she complained. All I could respond with was a sheepish laugh and scratched the back of my neck. Yuna got closer to me and hugged my free arm while glaring daggers at Ruby. Ruby on the other hand had her arms folded underneath her chest with a frown on her face, the sparks flying off between the pair of them in their staring contest.

'Yuna must be feeling quite possessive over me now, does this mean Ruby has feelings for me as well? Why else would they be giving each other a death stare?'

'I guess not every woman is as content with sharing as I am.'

'Even if that's the case, I wasn't really that particularly attracted to Ruby anyway, she's still missing certain qualities in a woman that makes me attracted to them.' Amaterasu let out a light giggle when I said that as she knew what I meant when I said that.

Now knowing Ruby's latent feelings for me, I don't want any casualties so I decided to break up the staring contest before it got verbal or worse yet, physical.

“Alright, let’s go meet the Guardsman, we can't keep them waiting now can we.”

I was quite thankful that Sophie was just her usual happy self at this point. Hoping that she would never change, little did I know what would come next.

_________________________________________

I am now in front of a squad of Guardsmen outside the town. All of them were saluting, but not in front of me. They're saluting for a Short red haired bundle of life and quirkiness, whose firepower was so large due to her lack of control.

Apparently what happened according to Sophie, she used an arrow she happened to create under Serena's instruction. This came from her own source of magic, and with that arrow she blew the entire archery training hall apart and all of these Guardsmen were there to witness it.

They then found out what the mission was and they all volunteered to help. I was quite thankful for the extra pair of thirty hands but I felt really unsettled because of Serena's new right hand woman's popularity.

"Uhh, Sophie are you going to be okay?" She stood there, shaking, as the nerves got to her. Then she turned to me with a pleading look in her eye, clearly asking me to do something about this. The thing is though, I had never commanded a squad of soldiers before. It was clear that these men respected power, Serena had probably beaten that notion into them as well, forcing them into submission.

Still, I had to do something to alleviate her dilemma. I had given Sophie a nod of comfort and stepped forward.

"Alright everyone, can I please have your attention?" That worked, they lifted their heads up and looked at me. It wasn't exactly the warming reception I had hoped for though. All of the Guardsmen stood at attention and glared daggers at me. Some of them looked like they were going to try and kill me at a moment's notice. Still, I took a deep breath and carried on.

"I'm going to be assuming command of this squad and this mission will be solely my responsibility. As we go precure food for the town of Esta, your lives will be in my hands and it will be my mission to escort you all safely there and back. Now, I can clearly see you're not happy about this considering what happened to your previous Lord of this town and you probably don't trust me." They all gave an affirming nod, come on guys, I'm really trying here. There was nothing I could do though, these men were clearly against me, I guess trust doesn't form over a single night.

"Let's just go, the quicker we leave, the quicker we get back." At that moment, they all saluted and I gave the order to move out.

"Thanks for that Gaël, I don't know why they were all like that." Of Course she doesn't, she knows she has a lot of fire power under her belt. She doesn't know that Ruby has a little more than she does or that I could level this town in one go, but as the soldiers see it. She has demonstrated the highest amount of destructive damage out of the three of us. It was then that Yuna next to us decided to cut in with her own words of comfort.

“You should feel proud of yourself to command the respect of these men Sophie, you may not be ready right now, but it’s clear these men look up to you.” There was nothing I could say to add to that, Yuna said more than I ever could.

We were marching to the Forest of Saisei when I started over hearing the Guardsman’s whispers.

“Do you think this new lord is as awful as our previous lord?”

“I dunno you know, I have heard he threatened the captain to give him his rank.”

“I heard he controls and rapes his women.” This last statement did not sit well with me or the girls at all. It was the type of behaviour I expected from the garrison but the older girls clearly wouldn’t allow this to slide.

‘The absolute nerve of these men, they clearly don’t know how respectable you are as a man, what you’re doing right now is more than they ever deserve.’

‘I’m not too worried about it, and you shouldn’t be either Amat, we’ll show them how they should respect us.’ I was content and not too worried about it as I had a way to prove myself, there were some people who clearly weren’t content with the clear slander that was going on behind my back.

Yuna and Ruby both Stormed to the Guardsman who were whispering, drawing their respective swords to the necks of these men.

“What? Who do you think you two are, threatening us with your blades?” The first Guardsman spat out.

“Say one more word about Gaël in that fashion and we’ll show you how controlling he really can be.” Ruby was venomous with these words. Her Scarlet eyes had turned to pure Gold and her aura had surrounded her body and sword in flames.

I had to calm her down before she killed anyone. I sped to her in no time at all and hugged her from behind to try and calm her down.

Feeling my warm embrace, the flames died down.

“I couldn’t take what they said, I couldn’t allow them to talk about you like that.” The tinge of sadness in her voice had upset me now. I gave her a tighter hug of comfort and then I looked up at the three Guardsman, no aura, no golden glow and no flames.

“Do you have any grievances with me? I want you to report directly to me. If you doubt my abilities I will show them to you, I’ll even spar with you to prove myself. You don’t believe in my power as the Goddess’s chosen, I’ll bring her out now and I’ll get her to speak to you. If you have any doubts about my behaviour, attitude and Guardianship over the women I have with me. Well you can clearly see how they feel about me as of this moment.”

The three, gossiping Guardsman just saluted out of fear and from that moment on we started marching again. I held both Ruby and Yuna closely at the waist, the pair of them were content with that as they both hugged into me closely. I guess their rivalry formed a temporary truce with this incident.

‘I really would have summoned myself from your soul you know. You should have just said the word and I would have brought them to their knees in fear of you and I.'

‘As nice as that would be I don’t want to terrify or rule over these soldiers with fear. It would achieve nothing, no respect would be gained and morale would be at an all time low. Also they would probably grow lazy and complacent, look at them all now. They’re curious about these forests. Scared at the wildlife and the potential monsters that are out here. I bet most of them haven’t set foot outside the town borders… Also, you’re supposed to be a benevolent Goddess, are you not?’

She didn’t say a word to that last question I pointed at her. I had more questions for Amaterasu while we're walking. I wanted to know how I could further get stronger and I wanted to know what other kinds of abilities I would gain through my training. I looked at the back of my hands once as we were walking and I still only had 4 rays on each sun, frustration welling up on my face.

‘Amat, I’m going to use this hunt as training, how do I get to 9% now?’ Amaterasu had a smirk on her face now, she was still silent for a while longer, only humming every now and again while she thought. After a while, she finally responded:

‘You haven’t been using your magic as much as you should be. You need to be using it more, expanding the strength and power of the magic then condensing it, making it sharper. This means you’ll be pushing your stamina and muscles over the limits and still trying to maintain peak form. Are you with me so far?’

With the way she’s explaining it, it seems quite simple on paper but this kind of training is going to take its toll on me. I can't be doing that, not until this mission is over. I’m feeling even more frustrated as I want to get stronger but I still need to use it more if I’m going to get even stronger. Almost feeling like Amaterasu was reading my thoughts, she decided to weigh in her own ideas.

‘Come next battle, I have a few ideas to help you get to the next step of power. Trust in me on this and I’ll show you the way.’ I nodded internally at her proposal and we all made our way to the hunting grounds.

_________________________________________

It didn’t take us long to get there. We were almost there by the end of the day. There was no way we could hunt at night though, that was far too dangerous and everyone was tired from the walking we had done all day. I had given the order on Yuna’s suggestion that we make camp for the night. Of Course I had the girls sleep in my tent, given how shaky everyone was and the event that happened earlier that day. There was no way I would allow the girls to sleep in their own tents. If by chance something were to happen tonight, Yuna or Sophie would probably end up killing some of the soldiers by chance or with intent.

One person from each tent stood guard including myself, taking turns to keep watch. I sat there, a good distance away from the watch squad and just listened to the guardsman talk.

“I hope this isn’t for nothing. I wish I could be home right now with my wife and kids.” The first of the six guards complained.

“Don’t make us jealous about your happy family life, us lads here who are still single don’t even have that.” The sense of familiarity was strong with this one, I could have related to him at one point but that was no longer an issue for me. The third soldier decided to weigh in next after the second fellow.

“I don’t think I could be any more jealous of this new lord though. To have such beauties around him and Commander Serena’s protege as a family member. This guy sure has it easy.” I wasn’t sitting that far off from them, I could hear what this guy was saying pretty easily. Then again he probably wanted me to hear. Nothing I could do and say though, it wasn’t my place to butt in on their conversation. It’s clear that there’s a divide developing between us, something that I’m going to have to fix soon.

“Gaël, are you coming to bed soon?” It was Yuna that called out for me when I turned around to see who it was. I smiled gently at her, walked over to her softly and gave her a kiss on her forehead.

“I’ll stay on watch for a bit longer, the monsters around here are huge and incredibly vicious.” She smiled at me and gave me a nod.

“Both Ruby and Sophie are asleep, I can stay out to watch with you.”

“Do you have a way to monitor the back side of the tent in case monsters come round that way?”

“I can set up a tripwire around the camp.”

“That sounds really good to me. Let’s do that, also, let me know if the Guards decide to get friendly with you, if you know what I mean.” Yuna laughed at the thought of any of the men trying to get their hands on her, she gave me another nod and headed off to set up the defences.

‘Now who’s the over protective type, she’s stronger than you are at night you know.’

‘Can’t help it, it’s in my instincts to protect all of you.’

_________________________________________

Not long after Yuna had left to set up the traps, she was half way done. Yuna could clearly tell she was being tailed, she stopped what she was doing and unlocked the sword from her sheath. She turned around and saw two of the Guardsman, these weren’t the ones who were on watch with Gaël. They were the larger Guardsman who were spreading rumours. They had their leather armour on, armoured slacks and still had their short swords sheathed to their waist. Her conclusion led her to believe they weren’t there to attack her.

“Hold it there missy, we’re not here to attack you. We just want to talk.” The older Guardsmen had his arms up in surrender, looking at his younger companion, he slapped him over the back of the head to do the same thing. The younger Guard glared at his older companion but lifted his hands in the air slowly as well.

Yuna’s interest had perked up a little but she still had her hand on her Katana.

“What about?” She simply responded.

“I don’t know what kind of connection you and this new Lord have right now, but we find it awfully suspicious that he comes in out of the blue, overthrows our old boss and now becomes the new boss of the town. Nothing like this has ever happened before.”

“He’s far too young as well to be in the position he’s in as well.” The younger Guardsmen spat with grimace.

Yuna had a small smile on her face as the two men spoke in front of her.

“So what have you come to say to me then?”

“You shouldn’t trust him, to put it simply. It’s clear that this position is going to go right to his head. He’s probably going to throw all of us at the beasts while he sits there drinking his tea. Pretending to do a hard day's work and then reaping all the benefits.” The older Guardsmen pleaded with concern.

“We recommend that you get away from him as soon as possible and save your own skin, he’s not good enough for you, or for anyone in Esta as a matter of fact.”

Yuna couldn’t deny that they were practically strangers at this point. Her smile didn’t deter though, instead she just responded with full confidence.

“You two have not crossed blades with him, you clearly don’t know him like I do, I’ve fought him twice and he’s quite possibly the most admirable man I’ve ever met.” The younger Guardsmen didn’t know how to respond to this. The fact Yuna said what she said with such confidence actually threw him off guard.

“Very well, if you believe he’s the admirable man he says he is then we will no longer try to convince you. Just know that none of the guardsmen are going to trust him, we were ordered here by Captain William, who in my opinion should actually be the Lord running this town. If this current Lord is not up to the task, we will all abandon him and leave him here to die. That’s what we all decided.” Yuna nodded at this declaration, her counterpoint to it was very simple.

“Wait until tomorrow, I think you’ll all be pleasantly surprised at your new Lord’s attitude when it comes to the battlefield.”

“You better be able to back those words up girl, If he doesn’t do shit for us, or if he cowers behind you or anyone else then he’s done for.” The younger Guardsman couldn’t sit by when he heard Yuna’s bragging, he and the rest of his brothers in arms were only following the new Lord’s orders because their Captain ordered them to do so. Yuna just smiled and waved as he watched the older man grab the younger by the collar and shoved him forward, telling him not to cause trouble and with that she got to work finishing off the traps before she settled down for the night.

With full confidence in her man’s abilities she wandered back to camp. Unfortunately nothing happened and nothing had triggered her tripwire. She was feeling a little blood thirsty at the moment due to the younger guardsman’s aggression and The Older Guardsman’s warning but she put it past her. She thought to herself that she would take out her Frustrations on Gaël after this was all done and over with, when she got back, Yuna explained what had happened during her job.

“So that’s how they really feel, not like it’s unexpected, during tomorrow’s hunt I’m going to need you to protect the Guardsmen, I’ll show our abilities in front of them. Maybe that will put their trust in me a little. Even if it’s only a little, this is my job to do so to help gain Amaterasu her followers. Without them, my Goddess and I will remain weak.”

Yuna, huddling up to Gaël wrapping herself around my arm, she just listened thoughtfully until I finished.

“What abilities are you going to show them? Nothing too deadly, right?”

“No, nothing too deadly.” I had admonished the thought completely but with Amaterasu’s guidance, I could show them something impressive. “Let’s get to bed, the trip wires will let us know if anything gets close. That is if we don’t hear screams first.”

Yuna liked the sound of that, she jumped up and skipped to the tent and we slept soundly.

_________________________________________

The next morning arrives and everyone has woken up early to start the hunt. My small group worked faster than the rest of the men with our enhanced abilities and I made sure to join in with the clearing of the encampment. Yuna hadn’t slept much, she got up much earlier than I or the girls did to clear the trip wire that was surrounding the camp. After that, we made our way to the hunting grounds.

When we got there I quietly stopped the men as we saw a lone Liger in the field. Sophie was in awe at how big the monster was. Ruby was a little scared but I saw this as a training opportunity. Yuna looked at me with high expectations and she wasn’t disappointed as I looked back at the men with a smile on my face with a smug expression as if I said “watched this”.

Flames billowed my hands as it expanded, waved and lengthened into the creation of a spear that resembled a small Harpoon that could be thrown, I grounded my stance and moved into a form for throwing my spear, I put a bit more power into my arm and spear than usual and condensed it before I sent it soaring into the air.

‘I want you to focus on the spears path after you have thrown it. To get to the next step your form of control has to be stronger, what you have done now is good but I want you to control and guide the spear to your target next.’

Amaterasu’s guidance was as clear as day, I locked my eyesight onto the travelling spear of fire condensed the flames even further, sweat beading off my face this time round as I found it incredibly difficult to control a moving target. The spear looked like it was going to go wide but I shifted my left hand to the right and the spear had moved to the right and straight into the Liger’s head. I killed it instantly.

With a breath of relief I looked back at everyone standing behind me. They had a look of disbelief on their faces, including the guards that were spreading rumours about me.

“So how was that? Or do I need to prove more of my abilities to you?” Little did I know there was still some discontent in one of the Guardsman. Yuna recognised the man immediately. From my perspective, he was only a little shorter than I was. He was still taller than the majority of the guards though. His face looked worn down, His eyes were blue and they had a defiant look in them. Something I didn’t hate entirely though, they weren’t the eyes of some weakling. He was older than I was, even back when I was 21 years old on Earth as his stubble was coarse and his muscles were a lot more developed than mine. If I were to fight his man. I would have to use my magic; that was not my plan though, I had something else in mind entirely.

“What’s your name, soldier?”

“Kain.”

“Okay you clearly don’t look content with my demonstration. What’s the issue?”

“Didn’t look all that impressive to me, I find it hard to believe you’re our Goddess’s chosen with moving a spear to your target.”

“Are you insinuating that I should burn this entire forest down? Because that will not be arranged. I’d rather call Amaterasu here and talk to you directly.” Kain scoffed at that statement, almost bursting out into a laugh.

“You’ve threatened us with that before. Why don’t you put your money where your mouth is and actually do it.”

“My intention was not to threaten but only to prove my volition and to know everything I say is true.”

“Then prove it!” He spat in anger.

At that moment, My aura had shone even brighter than I had ever witnessed before. It didn’t take long until the ever so gracious Goddess herself appeared from my soul. She looked into my eyes, seeing my tired look, she turned back to Kain who was now at this point speechless.

“Do you intend to doubt my ‘descendant’ even further now witnessing my form? He truly is my chosen and through him, I can see and hear everything he can. Just so you know. He’s trying his best to not be a ruler of fear but if you carry on being so obstinate Kain, then you will answer to him. Not me, because I know my Descendant can look after himself. Understood?” Kain couldn’t say anything, In fact none of the guards could. What they thought was some bluff made up, turned out to be completely true. It was my turn to speak up now:

“Kain, do you have any more doubts or complaints?” Kain looked back at me, the fury in his eyes was gone and instead replaced with fear.

“No, I’m sorry I doubted you. I have to ask though, how or why are you so weak? In comparison to little Sophie there, who has demonstrated so much destructive power, who has already been blessed by the Goddess’s power just as yourself. You have not shown us anything as such to us.” I knew this would come up sooner or later. I sighed from that question. I told everyone to step back apart from Ruby, Sophie and of course Amaterasu. I held out my hand and emerged three giant spheres of fire, all incredibly smooth with little to no corona flaring from the balls of fire. They were much, much larger than Sophie’s demonstration when she first revealed her fire magic. It seemed like the Soldiers really wanted a dick measuring contest so I had to show I had everyone beat by a mile.

“I can only control 8% of my Goddesses power and this is all of it, this power at the moment could probably wipe out the entire town and this forest along with it, do you think it’s actually wise that I use this power?”

“9% my dear Descendant, look at your hand.” I looked at my free right hand and there it was, in the cardinal direction of North East, was another ray of sunlight emerging on my brand.

Turning back to Kain, he was now on his knee with his head bowed.

“If this was all it took I guess I really should have done something about this earlier. Just so you know I did not threaten William into giving me this position and I’ve worked hard behind the scenes, even taking on this mission personally to help the Town of Esta. Do you all still intend to doubt my position?”

“No sir!” This response was from every single Soldier. Satisfied with my demonstration they were all now completely obedient. I guess this hunt can go smoothly now. I’m honestly surprised no monsters had come for us as of yet. I dispelled the giant orbs and got back to the hunt.

_________________________________________

The hunt went smoothly this time round, Amaterasu stayed outside of my body to reassure the protection of the Guards, is what she said anyway, she never left my side and the growing Jealousy of Ruby and Yuna didn’t escape my watchful eye. It didn’t take us long, it was a small remedial task, we caught ten Ligers and just stayed away from the Brontosaurus completely. I had to guide everyone around with Amaterasu’s guidance since it was her land, she knew where everything was so it made the task easy to do. Amaterasu even took time out to teach Sophie and Ruby further about their own powers, Sophie is now able to control a small orb of fire without it going out of control, reigning in the corona so it didn’t give off its heat. Ruby is now able to create two of them. She needs to work on her control of the second now. If only to stop the unbearable heat that was coming from the second flame.

Yuna eventually got bored of standing guard with Amaterasu, to which she didn’t show so much as a hint of a smile to my Goddess, she ended up catching two of the beasts and brought them back without breaking so much as a sweat.

With all of that playing out, the guardsman hauled the beasts onto our convoy and made the trek home.

_________________________________________

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The trip was loud and boisterous on the way back, all the guards were laughing and joking, I was glad they were in such high spirits. The girls on the other hand though, Amaterasu was still clinging to my shoulder, Sophie was skipping around cheerfully. Yuna and Ruby were walking behind me giving me some kind of death stare now. Or at least it looked like they were giving me that look. When Ruby quickly moved up.

“Gaël, how long has Amaterasu been inside of your soul?”

Everything went quiet at that moment, I stopped and looked around. Everyone looked at me with inquisitive looks now. Kain didn’t look at me though, his mentor Angus who was the other guard who happened to speak to Yuna that night when she was setting up the trip wires. Well his life must be boring right now because he looked like he lived for gossip. I turned back to Ruby and Yuna, I guess telling them the truth now is better than later.

“Amaterasu has been around since the start. She didn’t come out right away because of the town brainwashing incident caused by Izanami and the Previous Lord. If they found out, or if anyone found out, they probably would have stopped at nothing to kill us.”

When Ruby heard this, she had her hand to her chin, seemingly contemplating what’s going on. Yuna, on the other hand, stepped forward with her own question.

“Have you had sex with Amaterasu?” Everyone, including myself. Our eyes opened in shock at the sudden request.

“He hasn’t had sex with me, no. Why do you ask?”

“That means I’ve staked my claim on him first.” I was speechless at this point.

“My Lord.” I turned to look at Kain. “It seems you’re in a bit of trouble, I will keep the Guardsman moving with the convoy.”

“Thank you, please notify me immediately if there’s any trouble.”

“We will fire a magical flare, I hope you can run to catch up in time with us.”

“It won't be an issue.”

“Then I’ll leave you to it, we will take Sophie away from this conversation as well as she’s clearly too young to listen in on this.” With that, he saluted and moved all the soldiers on with Sophie. When they had all left I sat down.

“So what’s this about staking a claim on Gaël?” Ruby had to be the first to question what was going on. Of course, she’s probably the most jealous one out of the three of them.

“I’ve made love to him, he’s also saved my life. So therefore, even if I can’t have him alone, I’m claiming to become his first wife at the least.”

“Now wait a minute you damn Kitsune whore. Who says you get to be his first wife? If it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t even be in this world right now, I’m the one who trained him how to use his powers and I’ve also helped you how to hone yours as well Ruby. Also him being here, he’s practically saved my life. So because he saved you both, doesn’t make you any more special than myself.”

“Girls, I appreciate how much you all-”

“Shut up Gaël!” They all interrupted me at the same time.

And with that, is where my dialogue ended in this conversation. I’m starting to regret ever sleeping with Yuna now.

“Yuna.” Amaterasu called out to her. “What’s your goal here? You’re a follower of Tsukuyomi are you not? You know Gaël is my follower, What caused you to fall head over heels for him? It can’t be just because he saved your ass. Correction, we saved your ass. If I didn’t know any better you were probably going to use him or manipulate him?”

Yuna was seething at this point and Ruby looked at her with a scathing look. As if she didn’t think of that until just now.

“Were you really going to try and manipulate Gaël? After everything he’s done to try and prove to everyone here?”

Yuna looked hurt with these accusations, she looked at me with pleading eyes, her tails dropped into a singular tail rather than waving around hypnotically. Then back to the other two before she spoke.

“Tsukuyomi asked me to form an alliance with you Amaterasu, with Gaël too. It was a part of my mission.”

“And? Just being a part of the team was not good enough for you? You had to go and spread your legs for him as well?” I looked at Amaterasu with scorn this time round. I had to remain silent though, anything I could say at the moment would probably put me on the firing line with all three of them at this point. I did not like what she said though, I wanted to say something.

“That was not initially part of the mission, no. These feelings for him came out of nowhere in all honesty.” She clutched her arm defensively as she spoke. “His natural leadership led me to follow without question, the fact he’s been so sincere, his honest personality. I expected him to act high and mighty when I first met him. I honestly didn’t want to do this mission as I was going to have to work with you, the oh, so, benevolent lazy Goddess yourself. The one who neglected your lands and my God had to clean up after your mess. Who in Tsukuyomi’s name are you to question my choices in who I want as my partner?! Huh?! Who was the one that practically caused this realm to practically fall into ruin?! My people had to flee to Tsukuyomi’s lands, those who couldn’t bear to live in the capital any longer. Those who got sick and tired of your shit. Your Priestesses have left your lands because you were pushed out of your region by your own followers. It’s your fault this domain is like this and you have Gaël here to clean up after your mess. I’m surprised he said yes to your proposition. Even with his old life, he could have still applied himself and made something of himself!” By the end of this speech all of her tails were on end, her Purple eyes had shone a bright Silver in this clearly emotional experience. Amaterasu and Ruby couldn’t say anything during it all.

There was a moment of silence that deafened the space.

“I…” Amaterasu’s voice wavered for a moment. “I couldn't do anything to save my lands, I needed intervention. I was locked out.”

“By who?” I jumped in immediately.

“I don’t know, it could have been my mother but she didn’t say anything of the sort, meaning someone else has to be the perpetrator, the cause. My mother was probably the enforcer to this rule that she has placed on my lands. One that stops my divine intervention to take them back. That’s why I needed my hero, Gaël, to jump in and to take the wheel to regain my lands back. The fact he’s doing all of this for me.” She turned to me. “The fact you’re doing this all for me, is why I want to give you everything, even my heart and body.”

My heart beat skipped from that statement.

“Gaël, I’m fine with you having other women, I honestly think you deserve that much. I just don’t want to see you hurt, call me over protective of my Hero. I’m just worried about you.”

I sighed from the relief, knowing that she wasn’t angry about it.

“Yuna, what about you? How do you feel about it?”

“I want to be the first Wife if I’m going to have to share you with Amaterasu and Ruby. I was your first after all.” I looked at Ruby after she said that.

“What?”

“You know I’m your Guardian right? In my world, being someone’s Guardian is like being their parent. I don’t know how to feel about that knowing I’m bound by contract to protect you.”

“You know we’re the same age right? On top of that I read that contract William gave you. It doesn’t say anything about me not being able to marry you. Just that you have to protect me. Ever since you saved me from those monsters and Bandits in the forest near here. You were my hero, I became attached to you. I started wanting you to myself. Hoping you would claim me for yourself but it didn’t come. I found out from training with our Goddesses power that I could change my body to how I wished it to be and my breasts grew in size. I hoped you noticed this morning and you would look at me in a different way but that didn’t happen.”

“Oh.” A smirk grew on Amaterasu’s mischievous face this time and at the speed of light, she practically teleported behind Ruby. She then groped Ruby’s breasts from behind.

“Whaa, what are you doing? Why are you touching them? They're still sensitive right now from their growth.”

I had to look away from this moment, I grew bashful at the sight, my cheeks reddened. I was also in deep thought about it all. All I heard was a seductive laughter and crying from Ruby and Amaterasu when I was hugged from behind.

“Even though I don’t fall in line with you, I don’t intend to lead you on. I meant everything I said. I want to help you, I also want to be your everything. I also want to repay you for saving my life. I could have died, you could have killed me to save the town but you didn’t. For that I’m ever grateful to you, my God Tsukuyomi doesn’t harbour any ill will toward you either, even with his past miss grievances with Amaterasu. He just wants this world to function how it was before.”

“If you’re happy with me, I’m happy with you too.” I turned around and gave her a soft smile and hugged Yuna softly for a moment. She then parted with me and leaned up to give me a passionate kiss.

“Er herm.” We split and saw Yuna and Ruby there, arms folded underneath the breasts and hips cocked to opposite sides, expectant looks in their eyes as they both glowed golden.

“Right, I’m going to have to give you two attention as well.”

“You better”

“That’s right”

Yuna let go of me and Ruby stood out first. She tipped onto her toes, brought her face close to my ears and whispered:

“I want you to treat me in the bedroom the same way you did to Yuna. Even if I am a virgin right now.” With that she brought her face around and gave me a passionate, hard kiss. Arms wrapped around my neck, one of her legs cocked upwards.

A moment later she had trouble parting from me but she did so eventually. I then turned to my Goddess who was standing there patiently, her hands behind her back, she pushed out her huge chest towards me as she leaned into me. With her own whispered voice:

“I know what Ruby said to you. I could hear what she said, and I feel the same way. I look forward to having your children in the future Gaël. Also, no matter who you claim as first wife, I’m still your Goddess, no matter what. I hold a higher status than any other women you claim in the future.”

My nerves were overtaken at this point but I didn’t have much of a chance. A bright explosion appeared in the sky not too far from the convoy.

“That’s Sophie’s arrow.” I pointed out. “Something must have happened to them.

“I hope Sophie’s safe.” Ruby’s worried voice carried a heavy weight.

“The convoy would protect her no issue, there are no strong monsters around these parts.” Amaterasu interjected in.

“Then that means something else worrisome must have happened between the Guardsman.” Yuna was the final one to interject her own thoughts”

“Let’s hurry and catch up to the convoy, we can finish our conversation later.”

“Right” All three of them replied at once.

_________________________________________

It didn’t take us a moment to catch up at all, the last one to arrive at the scene was Yuna but her speed was made to travel fast in the darkness and through the shadows. To her credit though, she was still plenty fast, it didn’t take her long to catch up to us at all. What I saw when I got there was Kain, and Sophie who in turn sped to me.

“Gaël, Gaël, come quick there’s a carriage here with people who are in dire need of aid.” The look of concern on her told me how serious this was.

“Right, take me to the people who need help.”

What I saw when I got there was quite a grandiose carriage, I was worried that this might be royalty of some kind. It had a golden carapace trimmings around the carriage, the horses had gash marks on their hide, like they had been clawed at. They were lying there, dead. Same with the driver, I almost keeled over at the sight of the corpses lying there. There were two people lying next to the carriage with deep wounds in their shoulders and legs, still breathing. Fortunately enough I moved quickly to heal them.

“Please, heal my wife! I beg of you, she’s with child.” I couldn’t deny the smartly dressed man who had a beard, soft eyes and a top hat. So I placed my hands over the wounds of the elegant lady, who wore a red dress. She had blonde hair and blue eyes and pale skin, practically starting to fade and grow paler from the blood loss. I closed my eyes and let my magic do the work, I wrapped her body in my aura, healing her as quickly as I could. Her wounds started close up, I could feel them all stitching together. The woman started screaming from the pain from the enhanced healing process as her nerves started to reattach themselves together.

“What are you doing?! You’re hurting her!”

“This is healing, remember, I told you this man saved my life when I was stabbed with a knife! Now quiet down!” Sophie berated the man. The soldiers, now scared, moved a couple paces away from her. Ruby laughed quietly to herself from the sight of it.

It didn’t take long for the wounds to close up, the woman fell unconscious from the blood loss but I could feel her heart still beating, same with her child. It didn’t take as long as when I healed Sophie, Having that extra bit of power unlocked must have strengthened my healing capabilities completely. I moved over quickly to the Ladies Husband, next to her and started the process before he could say anything. I could hear whimpers of pain escaping his voice as he breathed deeply but he refused to scream.

When I finished healing them both, The Gentleman as best as I could describe him as one breathed a sigh of relief but didn’t move, he must have been weak from agony.

“I thank you from the bottom of our hearts, but pray tell, is our baby safe as well?”

“Your baby is safe as well. I could still feel its heart beat. Your wife is currently sleeping from exhaustion and blood loss as well. She’s a fighter, kept hanging on to the very end there as well.” A soft smile crept on to my face as I spoke.

“That’s good… I’m… So glad… We met…” His breathing was ragged and the Gentleman fell unconscious.

“Is he dead my Lord?” Angus asked.

“No, he’s alive, just sleeping. Let’s load them onto their carriage, we’ll tow them along with one of our carts back to Esta.”

“Yes, my Lord.” Angus saluted and helped the Gentlemen back onto his carriage after calling Kain over. Yuna and Ruby helped with the Lady as well and got into the carriage with them to make sure they were safe on the trip back.

“I’m glad I chose you as my Hero, do you have any regrets about this?”

“I’d be lying to you if I said no, there were a few times when I felt like what I was doing was all worth it. I questioned my thought process at the beginning. Right now though, if I was never here. These people would have died, Sophie would have died, Ruby would have been made a sacrifice. Yuna would probably be fighting on the front lines. The darkness would have enveloped the world without you running the world any longer. This is where I belong. That’s for certain, I wouldn’t give this life up for anything so with that being said. Thank you Amat, you mean the world to me and I’m glad you picked me as your Hero.”

Amaterasu wrapped her arms around me, pressed to me closely and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

“Thank you for saying yes, my Hero.” Her smile melted, it reminded me of when we first met. So beautiful, so loving and caring.

“My lord, we’re ready to get moving again, what do you want us to do with the corpses?” I was genuinely confused at that point, I don’t know the rules of the dead in this world afterall.

“Forgive me, as you probably know I’m not from this world, what do you normally do with them here?”

“Well if it’s one of our citizens we would give them a burial but this is not one of our citizens, so we don’t really have a say in this matter.”

“We’ll take them with us then and see what our new guests want to do with them. Please wrap them up though so they don’t spoil our food.”

“As you wish my lord.” The guardsman Saluted and relayed my order. It wasn’t long before we got a move on again.

_________________________________________

Evening time.

We got back to Esta and I saw William standing outside. He was talking to new recruits, giving them a pep talk. Donning his usual Plated armour to signify his position, he looked really serious as I got closer. The five men he was talking to looked depressed as a matter of fact.

“These recruits happen to be conscripted?” With a shock William turned around to see me. A smile appeared on his face as he saw me.

“Gaël, welcome back I hope the hunt proved fruitful.”

“It did with a little benevolence here and there We caught 10 huge ligers without any issues.” William’s eyebrow peaked.

“Benevolence, what do you mean by that?”

“The Goddess Amaterasu joined us in helping out. She didn’t do anything much in particular besides scouting her monsters she created herself out. With this much food, we should be able to bolster the food resources we have until our trade Caravan’s get back with more business.”

“You mean, “the” Goddess Amaterasu joined you? You really are her chosen aren’t you.”

“You don’t believe me? I can call her over if you like.”

“Say it ain’t so? Really?” The shock didn’t leave his voice at all from what sounded like a really bold statement to him.

“Yeah, that’s no issue at all. She’s in a carriage that we happened to pick up on the way when we rescued a couple from what seemed like an attack on their life by wildlife or monsters. Stay here for a moment, I’ll bring her over for you to meet with her.”

A moment later I walked back over with the Amaterasu and not a moment too soon, William was on his knee, his head down and his posture straight. The gesture of respect didn’t fail to put a smile on Amaterasu’s face.

“You may rise Captain William Esta, I have to give you my thanks for doing your best for looking after this town as best as you possibly can while the situation was as dire as it was. I also have to apologise for my mother’s actions. Izanami-no-Okami.” William rose and he nodded.

“I am ever grateful for your kind words Amaterasu-no-Okami and please do not fret about my brother Winston, his judgement grew cloudy with greed and fear. He feared that his position would be taken away from those around him. His fears would not have been true if he had done his job properly. I have high hopes for your chosen Gaël, especially considering he’s so inexperienced with his line of work.”

“I do pray that he won't get too comfortable here. He still has work on liberating my other shrines, which are currently inactive right now. I do not know what has befallen them. So I will need him to visit them all. I trust him to come back to do his duties as lord of this town though if he wishes to make this place his permanent residence.”

I have grown accustomed to this town now that I think about it. It’s nice and out of the way, to settle down here wouldn’t be a bad idea.

“What do you say Gaël, would you consider making our town a home for you and your family?”

“Oh yes, I have grown accustomed to this place, I also have ideas on how to make this town grow bigger and to bring in more business. Speaking of family though, I do have words for you later. I trust that we can speak in private about it?

“Oh yes of course, let’s get everything business out of the way first and then we can talk about private matters later.”

“Grand, now come with me to this Carriage we picked up, I want to ask if you know these people we saved.”

We quickly moved over and I opened the door, William, took a peek inside and saw the unconscious couple on either side.

“Do you recognise these people?”

“I do, though I do not recognise the carriage, only that it comes from the Capital of Taiyo.”

“Who are they?”

“This is the Crown Prince Fumuhito and his wife Nobuko, the Duchess of Taiyo.”

“I’m sorry, you what now? Are you telling me, I just picked up and saved Royalty? What are they doing out here?”

“We’re not going to know until they wake up.”

“I don’t think they will be happy waking up at an inn or a Guard House, So I’ll let them rest at the Mansion.”

“They will probably expect that kind of treatment as well. I can have my Horses tow this carriage.”

“Thanks for that, Ruby, can you put these two very people into some nice rooms at our place? Ask Sarah if we have any guest rooms in particular for V.I.P.’s.”

“V.I.P.’s?” They both asked me at the same time. Remembering that acronym doesn’t exist in this world I silently berated myself.

“It means very important people.” They both nodded in understanding that explanation thankfully. William got his men to tow the carriage to the Mansion and with that we made our way to his office. On the way, Amaterasu asked me if she could attend her shrine so she could try and make contact with the other shrines in her domain to find out what she could about them and what kind of situation they were in.

“So what can I do for you, when you mentioned family I suspect it might be about future children you could possibly have, now I don’t have any children of my own so I wont be able to advise anything but I can at least listen to you.”

“It’s not about that, I’m not expecting any children yet. It’s about the Guardian contract with Ruby and Sophie.”

“They aren’t your family though, that contract is only there to ensure they are under your protection. It doesn’t mean you’re their Father.”

“So if Ruby proposed to become my Wife, that wouldn’t be strange?”

“I don’t see why that would be strange, she’s a very beautiful woman by her own right, she’s practically the Scarlet Jewel of Esta. Many men would wish to have her by their side.”

“Right, from how I interpreted it. Guardianship in the world I come from translates to adopted parenting. So I didn’t see her that way until she confessed to me earlier.”

“And you wanted me to clear this world’s rulings for you, is that it?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Well, have no fear. You will not be looked at strangely by anyone if you were to take Ruby as your bride.” I leaned back in my chair to breathe a sigh in relief. “Now Sophie on the oth-”

“Hey, hey, hey. In my world that kind of behaviour can throw me in prison.” William laughed heartily at my very concerned interruption.

“I'm glad both of our worlds have that in common. With that, and Ruby as her Sister there to look after her. I have nothing to fear leaving them under your protection. Though I was worried when they said they wanted to go out hunting with you. I was sure they would come back injured or crying.”

“They’re pretty strong now in comparison to your Guards; they might even be stronger than the majority.”

“Most certainly, apart from myself, Serena and Wraith. They have magic and a natural affinity to their weapons of choice. Was it the same for you by chance?”

“It was yes, I still needed proper instruction but the way to move, attack and defend came naturally to me. So I’m grateful to Amaterasu who gave me this gift to fight.”

“I hope Ruby can find a teacher of her own soon so she can make that sword become useful to you and herself.”

“She’s currently training hard with her magic right now, she’ll probably become a mage for now until she can properly find a swordsman who can teach her.” When I had finished what I had to say, we both heard a knocking at the door. William called out:

“Who is it?”

“This is Kain, I have the Goddess Amaterasu here with me, she wishes to enter.”

“Let her in.” William and I both stood at attention as my Glorious Goddess near enough waltzed into the office, walked over and sat down on the couch to the left side of the room, gracefully I might add. I don’t think I could ever get used to this side of her. Honestly I preferred her when she’s pouting or being needy.

“To what do we owe the pleasure of your grace? I heard you had gone to the Shrine in town to find out what was going on with your other Shrines.”

“I did, I came back to report to Gaël here of my findings. Thankfully the majority of them are under Tsukuyomi’s care. They are waiting for me or Gaël to make contact with them in person to transfer ownership to myself, though I had to promise them that I wouldn’t disappear again.” She looked pretty solemn at that last part.

“You say the majority of them, what of the others?” I wondered at that point.

“There are three I couldn’t get in contact with, two of them I just couldn’t reach at all and the last one is surrounded by a dark Malice. Much like the condition of this town when it was being controlled by my Mother.” William leaned forward in concern from what she said. Hands crossed over and covered the bottom half of his face as his fingers interlaced with each other.

“Where is this dark malice, do you know?” He asked.

“At the Royal Capital of Taiyo.”