The screen lit up, and a face appeared.

2fGK03m.png [https://i.imgur.com/2fGK03m.png]

"Hello." You straightened up. "Are you... Felix?"

"No," the woman spoke. "I am his alpha, Ysolda, Felix wasn't able to make it to the call, so I will be here in his stead."

"Ok," you shrugged a little.

Her brow creased ever so slightly. "Do you not care?"

"Should I?"

"Not a ruler, then," she nodded.

"A ruler?" You frowned.

"Master Felix had some questions for you." Ignoring your question entirely. "First, have you had the chance to tame and bond the Succubus or have you continued keeping her devoid of taming from yourself?"

"I've tamed her once so far," you said.

"Anything worth noting of the event? Did she appear to enjoy it? Any odd behaviour?" She kept an impassive tone as she spoke.

A slight sensation of wanting to roll your eyes passed through you, but you held back. "We passed out."

That cracked her face of impassivity. "We? Plural?" The monstergirl leaned marginally forwards. "Care to elaborate?"

"I don't really want to share the details," you answered back. "I had my girls help work her up, things got intense, I passed out for several hours, she did for several minutes."

"I take it she proceeded to exhaust your harem before exhausting you once you woke."

"It'd have gone against the rules. She's not allowed to initiate," you replied.

The monstergirl tilted her head slightly. "What's stopping her? I doubt you would be able to, at least considering your harem composition. Unless you engaged in actual combat."

"She gave her word," you replied feeling what little patience you had dripping away.

"An honourable Succubus." She cracked a smirk ever so slightly. "Now that's an amusing concept."

Her words made you hesitate for a second. "What if she is?"

"Then you're not grasping the situation," she replied. "That Succubus likely has only agreed out of some sense of amusement. Once you stop being entertaining, she will just toy with you, the same way she had with the boy."

Your initial reaction to her statement would've been to call her out. But a part of you had to agree; Kiara was clearly strong enough she could beat your harem however she pleased. Why stick to any rules? You were mostly sure she could even get the paralysis collar removed if she wanted.

"What is power?" You asked the monstergirl at the other side of the screen.

That caught her a little off guard, and she frowned. "Power is the ability to have control over any situation. Be it through your own strength or through the people that form a part of the given circumstances." She leaned back, arms crossed. "What do you think having a relationship with power means, Rick?"

"I'm not sure," you replied honestly, you used your elbows against your legs to get a more comfortable position. "I think that there's no way to truly, fully, consider another's strength as your own. Not for any circumstances."

Your statement made Ysolda snort and roll her eyes. "Would you consider the power of having a thermometer applicable in any sense when what you need are pliers? 'Any circumstance' is not real."

"You're speaking of people as if they're tools."

"What else are they?" She countered. "The shy strategist has no use in a brawl, the brave meathead has no use in the command centre. The saint has no use when the time to slaughter is afoot, the wicked has no use when it is time to give charity." Ysolda frowned. "To recognise the tools that are necessary and how much power one has at any given situation is the mark of a ruler."

"Ruler." You latched onto the word. "You said I wasn't a ruler. Because I'd accepted talking to you?"

"Because you didn't care." The monstergirl leaned slightly forward. "What power do you hold over Kiara? What have you done that would make her your power?"

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"Right now I'm not even sure I can trust-"

"Trusting is the mark of a fool. Control. Control is the mark of a ruler," she spoke with a tone that was almost like a bark. "Have you heard of the story of the Great Wolf Queen?"

You hesitated, not sure where this was leading to. "Can't say I have."

"It is from the dark times after the war. It's a story of the Great Wolf and how she became a tool for a meek human," she spoke with an almost detached tone of voice. "The Great Wolf Queen lived in a forest, all that approached would bow and pay tribute, or die. Hunters were also not allowed within her land, for all hunts were hers to make." Her head turned slightly, stretching her neck slightly. "The humans were troubled by this, for some of their goods would be lost as a tribute to the Wolf Queen. To say nothing that they could not hunt in her lands. They sent their mightiest, and each fell to the Queen's fangs. None could beat her, and none could convince her to stop either."

A pause as she made a dismissive gesture with her hand.

"The years passed, and a meek human male offered to make the Wolf Queen stop asking for tribute. The humans laughed him off but promised that were he to succeed, he would be paid handsomely. So the human went to the forest. With him, he carried but a meagre knife and matches." A smirk crossed her lips. "The Wolf Queen spotted the foolish boy, and demanded tribute. The boy agreed, but having nothing to offer, he instead promised he would cook for her. One hundred meals. The Queen was amused for she had never tasted anything but raw meat, and agreed."

There was a hint of something in her gaze as she said this.

"His meals were superb, she would bring him meat and from it, he would prepare exquisite dishes. The Wolf Queen came to enjoy them greatly. But time was finite, and within a hundred days, the boy packed up and left." A cruel laugh escaped her lips. "Oh how the Wolf Queen wept, fresh bloody meat no longer was to her enjoyment, too stale, too bland, too... raw. So she decided, she hunted the boy, sought him out, left her own forest to find him."

A distant look and a smirk- she looked at you.

"What do you think happened then?"

You frowned slightly at the question, scratching your chin. "She kidnapped him?"

"Ah, if only she could have." Ysolda leaned forward. "No, what she found was his corpse. The boy had come back and the humans, furious at not having stopped the Queen's tolls, stoned him to death. Want to guess what happened then?"

"She killed them."

"Every. Single. One." Her lips curled upwards. "And in doing so, she found the truth. The boy had lost his family to the cruelty of the humans and had sought revenge. Now. Consider this." She lowered her voice to a whisper. "Why didn't he ask for the Wolf Queen's help in this plan?"

This time you frowned, crossing your arms, leaning slightly back and furrowing your brow. A finger tapped your arm. "Because a hundred meals wouldn't be worth the effort," you muttered. "As tasty a meal they would've been, to slaughter all humans that paid tribute? It would've been a bad deal."

"And why did she slaughter them?" The monstergirl's eyes flashed as her smile widened.

Closing your eyes, you twisted your lips a little. "Because the boy's death meant a loss of all future meals. The Wolf Queen valued that more than all future tributes."

Ysolda burst into laughter, a howling sound that made shudders run down your spine. There was a flash of fangs as she smiled at the screen, gently crossing her arms as she calmed herself down. There was an orange glint within her eyes. "She killed them because they took prey that was hers."

"Then she was a fool," you said. "She lost both meals and tributes."

"A foolish inexperienced ruler." Amusement flashed through her features, a slight bow of her head. "And what would you have done had you been the Wolf? How would you have kept the boy and the tributes?"

"Well, if I'd been the Wolf Queen, the first thing I'd do is ask what the fuck happened to me," you commented with a loud snort. "And if I wanted to keep the boy, I'd just keep him."

"Ah." A little smirk. "And would that not mean you'd not follow your rules?" She caught the startled look in your eyes, smiling wider. "You see, Rick, rulers make the rules. It's in their name."

"But if people don't follow..."

"Then they didn't know how to make the right rules," she shrugged nonchalantly, and taking a glance down, she made a scoffing sound. You saw a burst of light and flames. "Ah, seems I lost the rest of Felix's questions for you. Oh well. They were boring anyway."

You had to blink a moment as you saw that.

"Well, be seeing you, Rick."

"Wait," you quickly spoke up. "I have a question."

Your words made her arch a brow, the silence the only prompt for you to continue.

"What would you have done had you been the boy?"

"The boy got exactly what he desired," she scoffed.

"No," you replied. "I meant what would you have done had you been the boy."

"Ah." Her face turned to amusement, and a soft chuckle followed. "I would've picked a better name than 'Ysolda'."

"Wh-"

Your words were cut off as the screen went black. You had to blink as you... sat there, trying to digest what she'd told you, looking at your face in the black screen's reflection and wondering what you could get out of the interaction. Your mind felt like it was trying to reach out at something that was barely outside your grasp.

Standing up, you were just about to leave when you noticed the dex screen was on with a notification. It had saved a copy of the conversation as a recording. Your eyes looked at that and you sat back down. Your fingers fiddled with the screen until you found the file and hit play. One half of the screen was Ysolda, the other yourself.

You truly looked like you'd gone through a week's worth of sleep deprivation.

Slowly, you watched it again. And noticed something.

How your gaze had sharpened when she'd asked you what you would've done had you been the one in the story. Was that a grin? You frowned slightly, as a new question was added to the top of the pile of questions that had been bubbling within you more and more.

Were you meant to be the boy?

Or the Wolf?