A few tense silent seconds passes by, then suddenly everyone cheers at the same time, a few laugh in disbelief, and a smaller number cry in happiness. As quickly as it came the crisis was resolved.
Hana grabs the dizzy Roxanne and makes her sit on her shoulders, with the other hand she grabs my arm and lifts me up, then she roars and a flame escapes her mouth. Ciel rushes to us and gives me a shoulder ride. The cheering men and women turn to us and clap, I spend a few awkward moments smiling and waving until the cheering dies down and I'm put back on the ground.
The stake in the Giant's head dissipates and Aoi rushes towards him, her target the spilling gray matter. Hana shakes her head and follows Aoi to keep her safe.
The meat-shields lay down on the grass while the soldiers come over for tight handshakes and strong slaps on our backs. If my hands hurt then I pity Roxanne's, might have to [Heal] her in a sec.
"Helios, eh? I think I heard about you guys once, the town criers were saying some things about extermination, right?" Says a rugged old soldier.
"Ain't them the ones who got the Symbol of Hate too?" Asks a mage.
"Guess sometimes rumors are true," says a female archer.
"They always have some truth in them," says another old soldier.
The watch captain comes to us, his face is drenched even though he didn't move that much. "Helios, I am captain Hazeez, me and my men have much to thank you. If your elementals and your mage weren't there to distract the Giant, the fast-response team wouldn't have enough time to set up. You have saved plenty of lives," he extends a rough red hand to me and I take it.
"I'm Wolf Ryder. And thank you, but we have to thank my nature's spirit too. If he didn't give us the early warning then things would have been bad," I say and scratch Gify's neck, he closes his eyes and his beak deforms into a smile.
"Gih!" He chirps happily and even the rugged captain breaks into a small smile.
"I send my thanks to the forest guardians, whoever they may be," he says and looks down to our caravan, then to the fast-response team that's approaching. "Now, there's someone over there who has the power to give you some measure of reward, not that it's going to be able to pay for the lives you saved." He sighs and continues, "And I also have something to do, the Giant was awoken by someone, even though we put up warnings about them."
He moves on towards the caravan, I see two weredogs with light yellow wavy hair, a young man and woman, they look like siblings. They are hunched over and seem to be crying while a few commoners try to comfort them.
Ciel casts a discreet [Heal] on Roxanne's hand, who seems to be fully regaining her focus. "My head still hurrrtss," she complains.
I walk over to her and pull her chin down so I can give her a soft kiss on her lips. "You did wonderfully, your use of [Heart Of Fire] was perfect."
She smiles adorably and holds my hand tight, her current headache must be making it difficult for her to try to tease us.
Rande and Osaria approach, both of their expressions seem to be stuck in disbelief.
"You did it, you mad man, you actually did it," Rande says lowly.
"Nothing mad about that, I knew our limits," I say with a shrug.
"Right."
Osaria starts to chuckle softly and excuses herself. Rande offers me an awkward handshake, "Thank you, I owe you one," he says and goes back to the caravan.
"Is he going to stop chasing Hana, now? It was kind of fun to watch his thirsty gaze," Alissa says.
"Roxanne is a bad influence on you," Ciel says.
"Ei!" Roxanne straightens and frowns at Ciel, "There's nothing wrong with feeling beautiful when you have men chase you."
"You enjoy making them suffer."
"Well..."
"Is that bad?" Alissa asks with the innocent voice of a maiden.
"Him trying to embarrass Wolfy would get tiring," Lina says and I pat her head as thanks.
Footsteps approach and a familiar face appears, captain Ansara. Brown hair, a handsome face, and a chin so sharp that it could open a can. His armor is a beautiful shining plate with the Lord's heraldry detailed on it.
"Captain Ansara," I say with a nod as he approaches.
"Wolf Ryder, from Helios," he nods back, "Surprised you still remember me."
Hard to forget his handsome face.
Giih?
It's just envy, not that I have much reason to be envious, but still.
"No reason to forget," I say.
He briefly greets the other girls. I see that Klein went to Hana, they are talking while watching Aoi eat some brains, the other soldiers are just watching the scene warily and slightly disgusted.
"So the elementals are yours?" Ansara asks while looking around, impressed.
"Yes, I'm an… accomplished summoner," I smile wryly.
"Well, I see that you are the reason we didn't come out of that [Gate] right below a Giant's foot. Can we speak in private? We have something important to discuss," he smiles softly, all that he needs is a shine in his white teeth.
I think about pulling my built tent but there's a good chance it's smelling of semen so... better not.
We walk back to the watchtower, it's as wide as a house and very tall, though most of the space is air since there are only 3 floors.
A table with drinks, cards, and turned over chairs waits for us in the middle. Ansara whispers something to a guard waiting inside and we are left alone.
We sit around the table and Ansara starts, "So, you and your fellowship deserve the most credit for the kill, you allowed us enough time to set up perfectly without a single casualty. Rabanara and my own team owes you a good deal, so ask me anything in my power and I will do it for you," he says and bows graciously.
"Thank you, but we didn't fight for fame or rewards, so we don't know what we could ask for," I answer and he slowly straightens again. I look around and the girls shake their heads.
"The corpse of a Grim Giant has a lot of value, could we get the money for the bounty?" Roxanne asks.
"We don't have a proper bounty for a Grim Giant since nobody hunts them, but we could still give you a good part of the expected profit," Ansara says, "If you don't want money then how about equipment? Since you are adventurers it never hurts to have more."
Ooh, I got an idea.
"How about an enchanted weapon or shield?" I ask.
"Oh yes, we acquired a few enchanted weapons from smugglers a while ago. We have a pair of shoes with [Weightless Bubble], a mage's robe enchanted with [Earth Armor], a greatsword enchanted with [Sonic Boom], axes enchanted with [Bleed], a few swords with [Double Strike], and a number of shields enchanted with [Dead Zone] and [Wind Shield]."
Jackpot.
I look at Lina and she nods to me.
"How about a shield and the axe?"
Ansara smiles wide, "You know the value of enchantments, don't you?"
"I have my own dwarven enchanter." I put a hand over Lina's shoulder and she smiles proudly.
"I'll take you to the equipment for you to choose then," Ansara says and rises.
"You can choose. Pick one for Hana, she's the most mobile and would benefit the most from the shield," I say and push Lina forward. She shyly follows Ansara outside and they disappear on a [Gate].
It's frightening to think she's suddenly so far away, alone, with a handsome man. After Alissa's disappearance on a teleport trap, I think I have gained a deep fear of being stranded due to teleportation.
We go outside and breathe in the fresh air, it smells of blood and I see Alissa puts a hand in front of her nose. The soldiers have started to cut down the Giant, they have to use huge saws to cut the limbs of the Giant.
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The Earth mages have begun dismantling the shelters they hastily built. They made underground bunkers for people to hide and thick pillars just like mine, this is the standard strategy against Giants, to abuse their clumsiness while preparing something to kill in one strike.
One by one I dismiss the earth elementals, the few people leaning on them quickly disperse once the first one starts to crumble. The earth quickly disappears into nothingness so it's not like they would be crushed by the falling earth.
Hana comes to us with Aoi on her shoulder and a very happy Klein on the other.
"What are you doing?" Roxanne asks.
"Giving her a ride, since she got jealous Wolfy got one," Hana says with a shrug that nearly makes Klein fall.
"Not jealous! I just thought it would be fun," Klein answers with a cute pout.
Roxanne is the one getting jealous of all the attention Klein is getting.
"Aoi, come here," I say and spread my hands to her. With a glide and a hint of mana being used around her wings, she falls softly on my hand and curls on my arms. She tries to shove her tongue inside my mouth but I turn my face away in time. "Not in public," I hiss lowly at her.
"Kay," she says with a hint of sadness.
Klein looks at me with wide eyes and a smile slowly forms. "Dragon f-..."
"No!" I interrupt her, "Not you too!"
She giggles and jumps out of Hana's shoulder. Roxanne walks over to Hana and wraps herself on her arms. We sit near the cliff and wait for Lina to come back.
When my jealousy starts to get uncomfortably high a black circle opens behind us, Ansara comes out of it and behind him, Lina appears, a long poleaxe in a hand and a long kite shield on the other. Both are too big for her so she awkwardly comes to us and Hana receives both.
"The axe will be difficult to use, but the shield is already perfect," she says while inspecting every inch.
The shield is pure black, it's made of wood, rimmed with metal, and it has a metal boss in the middle. Behind it silver lines and two small jewels, one yellow and one green, near the straps are hidden by a piece of leather.
The axe is what I would call "danish", due to its wide blade in comparison to Lina's, who also works as a hook due to the curve the lower, non-bladed part has. The [Bleed] axe has lots of silver lines at the blade, this means the enchantment might fade with time. At the middle point of the shaft, a small red gem is embedded.
"I can copy the ax's enchantment so we shouldn't use it much," Lina says.
"I'll send word to the Lord about what happened here if you don't mind, Mr. Ryder," Ansara says.
"No problem."
"Then that is all, I need to go back to work. I wish a safe journey to you," he bows slightly.
"Keep up the good work and stay safe," I say and wave. The girls give short goodbyes and Ansara leaves. The ballistas are taken back and only the grunts who are dealing with the Giant's corpse are left, a few are entering the Smirk to keep monsters away from the smell of blood.
We walk back to the caravan and see the two siblings who started this all looking like zombies.
Ciel gets closer to them and squints her eyes, "Nala, Orian?" She asks.
The two weredogs suddenly jolt awake and stare at Ciel wide-eyed.
"Ciel!" The two exclaim in unison and look at her like two lost puppies.
"You know them?" I ask Ciel softly.
"Orphans from the temple, they are all barely seventeen..." She says with a pained voice, then she crouches in front of them. "By the Gods, what are you doing here?" Her voice is full of grief.
"We..." Nala starts, her ears raise when she speaks but fall flat when she loses her conviction.
"Were exploring the Lapis Waterway when..." Orian Continues, his fluffy tail hangs limp behind him.
"We stumbled upon a nest of Hooknoses..."
"We ran and hid in a cave where they couldn't reach..."
"Then we explored that cave..."
"Where we found the Giant..."
"And we ran again..."
"But Alexa and Daiana couldn't continue.." Orian sniffs and tears run through his face.
"Then the Giant..." Nala's face distorts in pain, her voice cuts off and she cries loudly.
Ciel opens her arms and pulls both of them into a tight hug, making the three of them touch heads.
Captain Hazeez is awkwardly standing a few meters away, he walks a few steps forward and speaks, "Normally we give heavy fines to people who wake up Grim Giants but this time I think you suffered enough," he says with a sympathetic tone.
Ciel breaks the hug and speaks to them, "Let them rest because they will be waiting for you there, okay?" They nod weakly at her and sniff, she cleans the corner of her eyes and looks to Hazeez, "Captain, can you give them a [Gate] back home? And make sure they go back to the temple?" She asks with a very sweet voice.
Hazeez becomes even more awkward and his face cramps, "Sure..."
"Thank you, Captain," she walks to him and grabs his hand, giving it a squeeze and making his eyes twitch.
I see that the caravan is already moving again, we don't have time to stay and console them.
"Stay safe, please," Ciel gives a hug to each sibling and make them stand up, they nod silently at her but keep their gazes on the ground. Captain Hazeez puts a hand on each of their shoulders and leads them back to the watchtower.
"Sorry, Ciel," I say and grab her by the waist.
She shakes her head and grabs my waist, "They will be fine, they are old enough for that and we have our job to do," she says and smiles bitterly.
Lina grabs Ciel's hand and they both ride the same horse. Roxanne and Hana go for mine and ride together so Alissa and I get the second biggest one while Klein goes to the carriage.
Aoi happily stays in my lap while Alissa controls the reins from behind me. She's being obedient enough to not try anything else, maybe I should give her a little reward later.
"Am I going crazy or is she smaller than before?" Klein asks from the window while looking at Aoi, her large eyes look dreamy.
"Secret," I say and put a finger on my lips.
"Muuh," Klein puckers her lips and cutely and groans. Osaria lifts an eyebrow at us, Oura is asleep with a book covering her eyes, Laertes is maintaining his bow and his ears flicker at us, and Rande is just daydreaming, his eyes look forward without focus.
The commoners have been chatty and staring much more at the elementals, now with wonder instead of lewdness.
I see Roxanne and Hana are skirting around the line of "appropriate" behavior. Roxanne's robe has buttons to open the side, allowing her to sit properly at the horse. This also means that it gives easy access to her pants, which Hana has been taking advantage of.
They ride in front so only we can truly see what's going on -.
-
We continue our journey slowly. When night comes we can only see a single faint light coming from fortress Erda, we are too far to stay there for the night.
"Couldn't make it in a single day," Rande says with a sigh.
He dismounts awkwardly and barks orders for us to make camp. He shakes his legs, then walks bow-legged and hunched over for a few steps and slowly straightens. Yeah, he had a boner.
I pull out the foldable partition and the bath, I station an earth elemental outside just in case a little shit tries to peek on my goddesses.
Alissa doesn't come to wash me and instead scrubs herself as fast as she can, she only gives me an angry glance and I know what's coming. I scrub myself fast, matching her speed.
-
I feel a [Heal] on my shoulder followed by a [Clean].
"Thanks... my love," I say, catching my breath.
"You, uh, welcome, my love," Ciel says and enters the bath. Her face is flushed -.
Alissa's whole body relaxes and she slowly falls into the bath. She smiles, showing her bloody fangs -.
-
"I'm really sorry about showing my animal side like this but you teased me way too much," she says and blushes.
I kiss her cute nose and say, "I don't mind, it's nice to see you change once in a while."
"It's impolite to act like this in human form."
Hana snorts -. "Being part animal or something else is what you are, shouldn't be trying to hide it, you should push it out to let it help you get stronger," she says.
I see through Holly a group of boys sneaking to our position.
"Being animal or human is what we are. We need to learn how to have two sides before we can properly change forms," Alissa says with a frown -.
"Then after that you need to learn to be both so you can pick the best of the two sides."
"Hm..." Alissa slows down and thinks. - the boys outside stop and giggle. Her ears flicker, "I heard children, they are close."
"Yeah, just let them come," I say.
She looks at me suspiciously, "You want to add exhibitionism to your fetishes?"
"No, I just want to give them a scare."
Alissa snorts -.
Hana leans down on the bath and closes her eyes, moaning softly.
Suddenly the earth elemental turns to the children and stomps the ground repeatedly, the children yell in surprise and scatter, one even pissed his pants.
Roxanne surfaces and ends [Water Breathing], "I heard yells," she says.
"It was nothing, continue," Hana says and pushes Roxanne down again.
Rande decided to give a Great Boar to the commoners and make a feast. The large, spherical animal was spit roasted and booze started to flow.
Me and Ciel helped out by applying some [Heal]s to the older commoners to help with the pain of the trip. If they liked us before, now we turned into celebrities.
"Master summoner!" A drunk comes towards our table and gives me a cup of not-wine, or whatever this is, "For you! For your elementals are the finest piece of magic I have ever seen!"
He lifts his cup and I lift mine along, "Bottoms up!" Yells another drunk and we chug.
I put on 10 points into [Poison Resistance] so I won't get drunk because of this. More people come and offer me booze so I have to quietly cast [Purify Body] on myself. It seems this had the opposite effect as more people saw I was not getting drunk and decided to just give me more until I did.
I let a bit of alcohol accumulate and exaggerated my drunk acting, then I was finally left alone.
I started to feel bad about Gify eating as much as a grown person so I pulled out some more food for him. His early warning saved us so he at least deserves that.
Klein gets drunk easily and is taken away by Laertes. I see the husky weredog covering her with a blanket and then quickly getting out with a deeper frown than normal on his face.
Roxanne is being nearly molested by Osaria. She's touching Roxanne's hair, leaning dangerously close, touching her hand, letting their thighs touch, running her hand through Roxanne's back. Then Osaria's hand stopped on Roxanne's thigh and stayed there, slowly moving up -, occasionally her fingers rub softly and lightly.
The dark-skinned milf is wearing even less clothing right now, it's literally a bikini, smaller than the one before -.
I get an idea and whisper something to Lina, she frowns slightly, then looks at Ciel then at Roxanne. She bites her lips -. She finally nods shyly but I still see some fear in her eyes, fear that slowly gives room to lust and depravity.
Roxanne is getting drunker and drunker -. Osaria sends me a kiss when Roxanne is not looking and I get up. I walk to Roxanne and cast [Purify Body].
"Oh, Mr. Ryder, please join us," Osaria's voice is dripping with sensuality. She grabs my thigh and pushes me forward -.
"I apologize but I think she's had enough," I say and pull a sobering Roxanne up, she immediately casts [Conjure Water] on her own mouth and groans as the fog in her head dissipates.
Hana, that's sitting beside Roxanne, smiles and winks at me. Rande didn't back down and is now giving her expensive elven alcohol after expensive elven alcohol. I bring Roxanne to sit with us and the moment Rande's hand touches Hana's thigh she rises and comes to join us.
"I think I just drank a few gold coins," Hana says, gushing with happiness. She lifts me and lowers me on her lap, a hand immediately goes up my shirt to caress my body while the other rests on my thigh -.
I look at Rande and see his expression frozen, almost sour. Then he rises and finds Nito, they both go to the carriage where Oura is sleeping.
"Had fun?" I ask Hana.
"Yes, thanks Wolfy," she says and kisses my neck repeatedly. "Thanks for trusting me, too, not that many men would let another chase his wife like this."
I shrug, "Every once in a while sounds harmless, specially when you can use him to get free expensive alcohol."
"I would rather not play these games," Ciel says with a frown, "specially that one," she points to Roxanne, who jolts awake and takes a nervous glance towards Osaria.
"Alright, let's keep it contained," I say. Ciel softens, Alissa's tail stops swaying, and Lina looks troubled.
We retreat to our tent and I spread 7 elementals around: 2 fire, 2 earth, and 3 nature since they have good night vision. Holly is out and I'm feeling comfortable enough to not use a Shad.
- Ciel drops down on the bed, feeling a little too tired. I climb over her and fill her neck with kisses, then I lower to her back, [Massaging] her spine. -.
-
Roxanne turns Lina's head and kisses her, Lina receives the kiss and opens her little mouth. Their tongues entwine, - meanwhile, Ciel experiences first-hand the pleasure/pain/- of NTR.
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