"I have to thank you girls for supporting me and helping in my research. Without any of you, things would have been much harder. Now, to success and glory," I say as I lift my glass. We clink each other glasses and drink, the green whiskey burns my throat hard.
Roxanne and Hana slam their glasses on the table. "Ohohoh, we just grow higher and higher, a gentleman and now a scholar," Roxanne says with girly enthusiasm.
"Took you long enough, eh? But I guess it was worthy. Depending on who you talk a Scholar title has the same weight as a knight," Hana says.
"Has more weight when you see his age," Alissa says.
Lina discreetly pours more green whiskey.
"But even on that he was cheating," Ciel says with a wry smile.
We eat gourmet hamburgers, it's incredible how they made something so common in my previous life taste so refined.
We go back home and the moment we take our clothes off a tipsy Roxanne throws herself on me.
-
Aoi calmly stares at us from the tub, her eyes show interest and amusement. Gify sleeps in her back and uses her wings as a blanket.
This evening I cuddle with Alissa while she reads, I brush her fluffy tail until it's fluffy again and [Massage] her ears.
She's reading an epic about a jealous prince who kills his brother, the king, and his descent into madness. His men desert him, his people get slaughtered by monsters and heretics, then he turns into a cannibal to survive.
When the monsters barrel down on the doors to his castle he prepares for death and kills the rest of his family by his own hands. Now alone, when the monsters break down the doors he charges forward unto death, but the monsters don't attack and instead kneel. They identify the hate for humanoids in his heart and deem him one of them, they feel his power and deem him stronger than any one of them, so they chose him as a leader and king.
This is a fiction about how the Monster King came to be.
Meanwhile Roxanne and Ciel start class for the golems and Aoi.
"Remember, the first rule is always re-pea-ta-bi-li-ty," Roxanne says and adjusts the sexy oval glasses on her face.
"You don't have the system to measure your own mana usage so you have to learn first your limits," Ciel says.
Both of them look like the - hot teachers of my dreams. I need fake glasses for Ciel too.
"Try to first apply the least amount of mana on this," Roxanne says and pulls a small piece of cloth. "When you have succeeded in barely moving it you have found your lower limit," she tries to lift Hana's halters but fails, eliciting chuckles from the others. Ciel comes and easily lifts the halters while smiling at Roxanne.
"Then you have to apply a large amount of mana and carefully lift this one. The more delicate the movement the better," Ciel says and brings the halters close to the students.
Aoi and the golems nod silently and start practicing. Aoi has the most difficulty maintaining the spell while the golems have the most difficulty adjusting their power.
Lina is cuddling with Hana while they casually try to complete the soul map. She lays back and enjoys the - pillows, she gets a flick into her temple when her magic pen falls from her hand.
"Not supposed to sleep yet," Hana says.
"Sorry…" Lina mutters and continues to work.
"Repeats these movements until you master them, then we can proceed into the next phase. We will observe the internal workings of the spell and discover which parts of them govern the control of the spell," Roxanne says.
Maybe I should participate once they reach this part.
Today is the 1st of the 10th month, the month of Death.
-
Lina beams with a smile the whole breakfast and pampers Ciel with many kisses.
"Me too," I say, feeling the jealousy. She immediately comes to sit on my lap -. "Oof, not like that, I'm still sore."
She puckers her lips in thought then she grabs my fork and feeds me herself.
"Say 'aah'," she says while approaching the fork with my piece of fruit.
The other girls stop and observe, I feel the room get warmer while they burn with jealousy, but I'm not sure who they are envying.
I gained the titles "Scholar of Rabanara", and "Golemancer", kinda neat. If I write a letter I can use 3 titles to pompously introduce myself, though neither of them sounds as cool as "Enemy of Wyverns".
"Who wants to go to the university's library?" I ask.
Only Ciel, Hana, and Aoi don't lift their hands.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
"We will stay here, I will take care of her," Hana says and sends a fearsome smile to Ciel, making her shrink her posture and look away.
"Make sure she yells a lot," I say and give Hana a goodbye kiss.
Ciel sends me a glare.
"You know I will. Give me the - rope, I want to tr-..."
Hana is interrupted by a sneak attack from Aoi, she jumps towards me with her long tongue ready like a spear. [Battlefield Perception] triggers, like a kung-fu master I grab Aoi's tongue mid-air and she crashes on my arm. I see her excitement deflate and her eyes turn round and sad.
I smirk and release her tongue. I hold her in my arms and lean my head closer to hers. She immediately turns happy again and her tongue invades my mouth, her thin lips touch mine in an attempt of a kiss but it doesn't really work since hers aren't soft.
What does work is that her tongue rubbing on my teeth, palate, and wrapping on my own tongue is giving me lots of happiness. -.
"Please stop, this is too hot," Hana says and squeezes Ciel's hand, who looks down in fear while Lina smirks.
"How long until you can take him in?" Alissa asks with a wicked smile.
Aoi breaks the kiss and looks into her own body -.
"Don't, know... not, yet," Aoi says.
Ciel escapes Hana's grasp and looks at Lina. "You okay with this?" She asks.
Lina shrugs and says, "She's family, and I want her to be happy."
"You okay with this?" I ask Ciel.
"I don't know, the Gods never said anything about loving monsters. Aoi is barely a monster though. If she doesn't hate humanoids she's basically an animal," she says.
"And what do the Gods say about loving animals?"
"Just to not do it with the ones who can rip your genitals out," she says and smiles wryly. "You can't have children with animals and the temple frowns at cruelty, so it's not normally accepted. Aoi is not only sapient and willing, but she's also a breeder, if her broken soul is inheritable then we can have a new race of sapient dragons rise."
"Won't she be considered like a dryad?" Alissa asks.
"I guess so. But she won't reincarnate, the God of Destruction doesn't let monster souls be part of the cycle."
"How are the dryads treated by society?" I ask
"Warily, they are not bound by the Humanoid Gods, so they can commit the Sins, which makes most people afraid of dryads and other Children of the Forest."
"Maybe if she converts..."
"Is that even possible?" Hana asks with anticipation.
"Not sure, there's the God of Animals that she can pray to, but he's quite obscure," Ciel says.
"I, will, pray, to, live, with, Wolfy!" Aoi says and flaps her wings in excitement.
"Gih," Gify says with a confident nod.
Ciel sits down and laughs, "We might end up converting the first monster in the realm," she says.
Aoi crawls up my chest, her pointy claws tickling my skin, and curls on my neck, then she gives me a lick on the cheek. "I, will, convert. Wolfy, better, than, Destruc-tion!"
"What about me?" Hana asks, feeling a pang of jealousy.
"I, love, Mom, too!"
"Awnn~…" Hana gets teary-eyed.
Hana comes forth and kisses Aoi's little head repeatedly. She seems to enjoy it, though not in the same way as she enjoys kissing me.
We go to the university while we leave Ciel alone with the Predator.
The wereowl librarian eyes Aoi suspiciously.
"If she taints any book you will pay for the repair," he says sternly.
"I, will, behave," Aoi says making the wereowl almost jump in surprise.
"O-okay," he says while blinking blankly.
"We want to enter the restricted area," I say and the wereowl snaps from his stupor.
He pulls out an Inspection Crystal and says, "Only those with the Scholar title can enter, put your hand on the ball please."
He checks the crystal tablet and then my face repeatedly. More specifically, he checks my age and titles.
"T-this way, Grand Ryder," he says and leads us to the elevators.
We reach the top floor of the library, quite the view up here where we can see the little people moving about and the flickering the magical lights. I will miss the smell of old books, the moody atmosphere, and baroque-like architecture, reminds me a little of New York's Public Library.
The wereowl takes us to the end of the corridor, after a heavy door there's a small room where they see my titles again, then we are let into a completely dark room, it smells of mold and dust. The books are chained to the shelves and I can see that at the end, there are even more books behind a section that's separated by metal bars. The bars glow faintly, the tell-tale signs of something magical.
Beside the entrance, there's a catalog of every book. We spend a long time perusing it while the bored librarian watches us, we casually converse about the topics of the books while hinting we are looking for old history books. Eventually, the librarian excuses himself and leaves.
We immediately flicker to the beginning and find the section where [Cursing Magic] books are. Lina goes towards an interesting historical section about the undead while me, Alissa, and Roxanne look for the Cursing books.
Cursing magic is altering someone's soul in a very slow and imperceptible way. You can curse someone's body directly but it's much more difficult and the person will also feel it if they are awake.
Most common spells alter someone's stats, making them dumber, weaker, etc. Those spells have two modes of work, one is the imperceptible but slow way, where you generally curse items and let the person touch it; the other is through the eyes like [Illusion Magic] but it's quite perceptible when you cast it, both because the person can feel the mana and see your eyes turn weird, horror-movie-possession weird.
Curiously, it's a complete magic school, which means it's rather safe to use. It's also easier to use in comparison to [Illusion Magic] because the eye-cursing-thingie only works with one person so you don't run the risk of draining your mana in a second if you cast it while multiple people look at you.
The last spell of [Cursing Magic] is called [Shackle Soul], it forcefully creates a Blood Slave without the possibility of escaping the bond and without the supervision of the Gods. Now I know why they are unsure this is considered heretical, while the magic school is not forbidden magic this spell will get you executed if it becomes known you used it. The concept of Blood Slaves is sacred to the temple and this spell is considered sacrilege.
I'm not sure which one of us would be better to learn this. I already have a lot of spells so "debuffing" people would just strain my already strained mana, Alissa doesn't have a lot of mana to keep spreading curses, Ciel has to save hers for healing, Roxanne already uses a lot of mana with her high-damage spells. So perhaps Lina? She has a little more MP than Hana so it could work for her, she's good at defending but not so much at attacking. Maybe this can push her to become more aggressive when she can control the power of her enemies more closely.
Roxanne ends up gravitating to some books about forbidden experiments and even I get a little queasy at what's in those books. The heretics have no chill, they do anything for power so they might as well have been the nazis of this world. Fortunately, their organization has been in shambles for the last generations so they don't have a proper foothold in the Bestiaram continent anymore.
Alissa and Gify end up teaching Aoi how to read since they can't really understand the harder parts of the book.
We manage to compile a lot of info that will take some time to process.
When we go back home we see a collapsed Ciel in the kitchen trying to resist a hungry Hana assaulting her -.
-
"I thought the strain on my body would decrease when they joined but I think that Hana has only grown hungrier," I say.
"Why would I contain myself when there are so many toys to play?" Hana asks with a fearsome smile.
"Are you trying to steal Wolfy's harem?" Alissa asks as she narrows her eyes in suspicion.
"Who's ever said about stealing? We have always been about sharing everything," Hana says.
"I tamed Hana, maybe you girls also need to do the same if you want to survive," I say.
"I'm fine being her - slave," Roxanne says and Alissa nods.
Lina and Ciel look at each other, Lina smiles like an imp and Ciel looks away in disbelief.
After lunch, we go see the Black Parade.