Oritiki comes back, and we get ready for the bath. There are four of them for us to choose from, so we don't have to share one with Oritiki's husbands.
I invite Hukarere to join us, and she eagerly accepts. She's definitely not bi, but she doesn't mind watching - the girls play, and if she gets to drink some of my miraculous - juice, then it's a no-brainer for her.
This time, I focus my attention on Ciel. Just imagining using her and Osaria as my pillows makes me feel all giddy.
-
"What's up with them?" Hukarere asks as she points to Alissa and Roxanne, who are nearly passed out at the edge of the bath.
"Just another one of Wolfy's skills," Hana answers with a grin, and I stop sharing my pleasure with the two abused girls.
One of the advantages of [Bind] is that I can satisfy all of my bound women at the same time. If I had to do it one-by-one, then every bath would take quite a while. I can still extend lots of - toys from my body, but it's much simpler to just sense-share.
We're getting pretty skilled at dealing with Yunia's hair, so it only takes a short time for it to be brought back to its usual glory. Aoi also behaves herself, now that she's had her fill, and she lets us polish her scales without complaint.
"You seem to have enjoyed our bath," Oritiki comments as we sit down to eat.
"Bath time is sacred," Alissa says as if it were a teaching from a God.
"It's our special time for 'bonding,'" Ciel hurriedly adds and sends a brief glare towards Alissa.
"Oh, I see." Oritiki responds, then crosses her arms and nods in understanding as she says, "Since it's one of the few times that land-dwellers are naked in private, you have to take your pleasure whenever you can."
"'Few,'" Hana mumbles and snorts.
After dinner, I take my clothes off and don a lavish robe. Alissa makes sure that my hair is perfectly groomed, my skin is as soft as a baby's, and my body is completely perfumed -.
She kisses my lips, and I head out towards Taamu's again. I don't change - my member this time since I don't want to get cat-called by men right now.
The tavern is loud as usual, but I'm not here for the music. I quickly locate my prey, and she notices my predatory gaze, acting like a rabbit that trembles at the approach of a wolf.
Kai let her hair loose this time, displaying her beautiful, dark brown wavy hair. Her light brown skin is almost shining and so perfectly unblemished that I'm sure that she's wearing makeup. Her small antlers are decorated with two cute little red bow ties. So adorable.
Delicious brown… Ah, who am I kidding, every skin color a woman can have is delicious.
"Kai," I say in a low growl as I sit down beside her. Her cat ears and deer tail twitch as she hears me. I instantly smell her sweet, flowery perfume, paradoxically stirring images of innocence in my mind, but I know how - filthy she is.
"W-W-Wolf," she stammers, very tense.
I call the waitress over to order some snacks and light alcohol. "Would you like to eat something? It'll be my treat," I say.
She asks for some candied berry-like fruits and a strong drink. I order a cereal bar and a mild drink.
"You're not a drinker, are you?" She shyly asks.
"No, why do you ask?"
"Chaimde-waipi is a drink for non-drinkers."
Oh, I see. It's just tea with cheap alcohol added to it, so it's pretty mild in comparison to other drinks.
"I prefer to remain completely aware while in the presence of other people," I reply.
She smiles cheekily and says, "Getting just a bit drunk makes everything more fun."
"Perhaps, but if I overdo it, I could hurt someone." I grow a spiky - club and slap it against the table, making her jump in her seat.
She stares at it in awe as I slowly make it return to normal, then she breaks into laughter. "Is that [Mana Genitals]? I've never seen one that can change so much!" She exclaims.
"It's not, it's my special skill, but I do have [Mana Genitals], too."
"Oo~h…" She giggles adorably. "This must be why you're so… tasty."
"Are you hungry?" I ask, and she nods emphatically. I stand up and harden - myself. "Then come get your meal."
-
Our date ends with her breathless, a silly smile on her face. The Wolf Ryder standard.
I pay for our food and the cleaning fee, then I tell them to keep the change as a tip. There's no tipping culture in this world, but my gesture is well-known.
"It's been nice knowing you," I say gently.
"Thank you. I'll miss you," Kai answers in a weak voice.
I leave the tavern and enter an alley, then open a [Gate] back to Oritiki's estate. Alissa vacates my reserved seat, and I take it, then I bury my head in Yunia's fragrant and fluffy hair. Right now, it's her turn for some affection, and even though she didn't ask for it, she'll still be getting it.
"Ah, you're back. I see you're enjoying the wonders of our race," Oritiki says, then smirks.
"All races deserve to be loved," I say, and her husbands smile faintly, even Thor.
"All races deserve his - big 'heart,'" Alissa whispers.
Oritiki continues, "We were talking about our upcoming trip. There are a few interesting locations along the way, and some of them might be infested with monsters if the animals haven't reclaimed their territory yet. Also, I'll teach you the basics of how to fly in formation."
I already heard it all through [Bind], but I allow her to go over it all again with me.
Hukarere and Ririmu return to their homes to finish packing up, and we retire to our room shortly after that.
Alissa tells me what she wants as a "reward," and we all smile wryly. We make it a team effort to satisfy her.
Her nails are cut, sanded, and painted with cute patterns; any stray hair on her body is shaved off; her skin is oiled up and massaged; her orange bush is trimmed and maintained; her tail is washed and re-fluffed until it's as soft as Hukarere's cloud-like back fur; her hair is carefully tended to by Yunia, to whom I gave the [Hairdressing] skill because she has the highest "Dexterity"; and finally, we give her the drill-hair treatment, making her look younger and even more adorable than usual.
She puts on Roxanne's lolita outfit, and I use the gnomic [Instant Painting] tool to immortalize this moment. I'll definitely hang this one in our room in the castle.
"Who's being 'rewarded' here, you or Wolfy?" Yunia asks with a raised eyebrow.
"All of us," Roxanne replies as she admires Alissa.
Ciel definitely enjoyed Alissa's especially cute look.
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We don't stay up for longer than that since we'll be waking up early tomorrow.
Today is the 15th.
-
Lina learned [Enhanced Speed] with 1 point. My [Soul Manipulation] increased by 1 (now 6).
We get up and leave the room just as one of Oritiki's servants comes to knock on our door. The poor mouse-headed woman is spooked by us and apologizes for her brief yelp. We apologize, too, and continue on our way before we embarrass her any further.
"Oh, you're awake already," Oritiki comments as we enter the dining room for breakfast.
"We have our own alarm clock," I say and point to Gify.
"Alarm clock?" She questions.
"Gnomic mechanical invention," I lie.
"They use enchanted clocks here, and back on land, they go by the temple's bell," Alissa says through [Bind].
We eat our meal, then armor ourselves and wait for Oritiki to finish saying goodbye to her husbands. It'll take a while for her to come back because they'll be towing a farm island, and those things really don't move that fast.
We make our way to the Golden Docks just as the morning mist clears. Oritiki will be guiding us towards the Military Docks so that we can meet up with the other ships. She's wearing her white metal armor, but, thankfully, it isn't glowing. That kind of enchantment hurts our eyes.
My Hollys and Shads found the Light crystal protecting the town from the Vengeful Spirits, but there was no sign of anything related to [Spirit Magic], so I dismissed them.
We board our ship again and take off. I summon a few Hollys to keep watch around us as usual.
Chills run down my spine from the tension. We'll soon be in battle once again, so it's time to psyche myself up. I go through my memories of a few of the dragon visions just to make me feel motivated enough to overcome my anxiety.
The ship flies around the mountain town, attracting the attention of the populace that's just waking up. The Chimeras wave and cheer as we pass by. Our ship is of a different style than that of the Chimeras, making it instantly recognizable.
I recognize Kai watching us as we fly past. I briefly drop down to the deck and wave to her, hoping that she'll recognize me.
She smiles faintly, so I think that she might've noticed.
The wind picks up, and I squint my eyes to see clearly.
"Don't you have flight goggles?" Oritiki asks.
I think she means aviator goggles.
"Oh, I forgot to buy some," I answer.
She snorts. "I'll put in a requisition for you at the Carrier."
I nod and smile in appreciation.
After a few minutes, we reach the Military Docks. They appear to be the same as the Common Docks, just reserved for the military.
I see the Long Floater, a blimp, already floating in the sky. Its cabin is both twice as long and twice as wide as Earth's average bus. Above it, there's a large, cylindrical cloth tank with a pair of wings attached to it. Behind the tank, there's a long axle protruding from it with three sets of propellers with long blades lazily spinning along it. There's a second, smaller cabin at the nose of the tank, which I assume is the bridge.
The Island Winch is a huge, long ship the size of a cargo ship from Earth. It's basically just a long, wooden cylinder that's been reinforced with metal. It has over a dozen sails mounted on both the top and the bottom of the ship, and their masts seem to be able to fold on itself so that the ship can land. On the right side of it, there are six folded-up metal claws for grabbing onto the island.
The Carrier is currently taking off. It has a long landing strip on its center where three Floaters could comfortably park in a line. Below that are the crew quarters, which seems to span four levels. Two tanks like the one from the Floater are entirely embedded in the middle of the quarters. Five axles extend out from its back, and each of them have six sets of propellers with long blades along their lengths. Multiple small wings are arranged along the flanks of the ship, which flap in a wave-like pattern, exactly like a Kite Dragon. The bridge is seemingly positioned at the front tip of the landing strip. Cameras don't exist yet, so the bridge needs a clear view of where it's going if it wants to maneuver safely.
All these ships are black with white spots to camouflage them within the starry sky. It's difficult to properly camouflage something against the colored clouds because they keep changing as the day goes by, so the clear night sky is their best bet.
Oritiki positions us near the Carrier at the 4 o'clock position so that we don't get caught up in its turbulence, but it also allows their ship to maneuver without us getting in the way. The Floater will take the lead, and the Winch will take the lower rear position.
"Stay here, I'll get our communications set up," Oritiki says, then makes her wings grow larger and flies away.
Three groups of ten Wasps take off vertically and fly in a double column formation around the Carrier. I think they might be doing a test run.
A large manta ray made of cloth around a steel framework lands on the Carrier. It's approximately the size of a house. It has two small floating tanks flanking an actual catapult in the middle, and an axle coming out the back with one large propeller. There's a huge, cuboidal green crystal already loaded in the catapult.
I guess that's the Gull that I'll be flying. That crystal is green, so it's likely that it isn't the Light crystal, but why would they use a replacement?
"Wow…" Alissa mutters in amazement. "I've only seen one or two small imperial ships. These are really something else."
"There are a few troop transports in the High Forest, but most of them are owned by the Elder Council, and they aren't as big as any of these," Yunia says.
"They are larger than Earth's airplanes," Ted comments.
"But not as large as their water ships," Suzy adds.
"The Island Winch seems to be almost entirely hollow. I don't think it counts as a proper ship," I say.
"How do the Carrier and the Floater fight?" Lina asks.
"They have large enchanted crystals behind the windows," Yunia says.
On the sides of the Carrier and on the tank of the Floater are lots of openings where someone could hold an enchanted crystal.
"So, those cylinder things aren't hollow?" I ask.
"They're filled with gas, yes, but the gas is enchanted to push the ship upwards and help them float, so they don't have to be hollow for the ship to float," Yunia answers.
Dayum. So much magitech going on.
After about ten minutes of waiting, Paraaone, the brown bull Celestial Horn, comes to our ship. He flies over to the bridge and hands me a few sets of aviator goggles and a wooden box with eight small crystals protruding from it: two blue, two red, two green, two yellow, and two white.
"This is how you'll communicate with the carrier," he says and points to the box. "Have you ever heard about using signal combinations to represent words?"
"Oh, so the combination of the crystal lights represents a word?" I ask.
He nods. "Exactly."
He pulls out a paper with the Reo alphabet represented in binary using up to five digits. There are also some combinations that represent words like move left, move up, attack, run, regroup, dock, and a few others.
I take the paper and ask, "I'm a summoner, so couldn't we share summons for instant communication?"
"I was going to ask that after this. We have a light signal system, too." He activates a crystal and points at the Carrier. A light starts to blink in its southwestern-most window. "Flip the paper I gave you, the translation for the blinking lights is written there."
There's over a dozen variations of the blinking lights signals, but they're mostly going to be used like a car's blinkers.
He deactivates the crystal, then adds, "Send a small bird to that blinking light and share your sense of touch with it. A tap on the head will signify that you want to speak with the comms officer, and she'll be using the same signal. She'll send her bird to you soon."
I do as he asks and send the bird over. A minute later, another bird arrives and lands on the bridge, then mine reaches the Carrier and enters through the open window. It sees a simple room where Hukarere is seated on a comfy chair in front of a table. She has a pen, a few stacks of paper, a telescope aimed towards us, a magic tool enchanted with [Spirit Light], and a magic tool that gives her direct voice comms with the bridge.
"Hello, Ryders! I'll be your liaison today. I'll swap shifts with Ririmu every so often," she says in a cheerful voice to my bird.
"Wait, I didn't know you were a summoner," I say to her bird.
"I'm not, but I trained this spell just so that I could work in comms."
"Oh, that's neat. Glad to have you with us."
She grins. "Glad to be working with you."
She'll basically be our babysitter and make sure that we don't stray from the Carrier.
Paraaone then gives us a small piece of metal the size of my palm. It's a stadia rangefinder. I can observe the Carrier with it, and it will tell me how far we are from the airship. Since the height of the Carrier is known, it's possible to estimate the distance by comparing how large it seems in our view to a known measurement.
"I'll stay here and keep watch," Paraaone says and lands on the bow of the ship.
After that, we go through a test of all the comm systems and coordinate some simple maneuvers with the Carrier.
After two hours of preparations, we finish going through all the checks and tests, then we finally start to slowly move north towards the Looping Winds in formation.
Onwards, to adventure!
Intermission 17 - Vanea
The three men slide out of me, and I sigh in supreme satisfaction. Grosnok lays me back on the bed as I swallow, then I sit and cross my legs to stop - it from dripping out of me. I look forward to the broken thing in front of me that once called itself "Darean."
The last of his life fades away, and his spirit detaches from his body. But, before the process is complete, his spirit suddenly cries out, and in the next moment, it's simply gone, ruptured by Wicked spells.
"He thought he could escape Hell, but he didn't know that he couldn't escape his retribution," I say and let out the most sadistic laugh I've ever felt escape from my lips.
"Okay, and I thought that I was filthy, but sis, that was incredible," Haaran says as his little elven - slave cleans him -.
Loctar, my cute, loyal servant, licks my chin, cleaning - it from his own mess, then he sits down beside me.
I pat his head lovingly and run my fingers through his silky, black hair. Silvane finishes cleaning Haaran, then she goes over to Loctar next. She - goes too hard at it, so I roll my eyes and flick one of her elven ears.
"That's mine," I say, sternly. She winces, then grins and starts to clean Grosnok.
Now that she made Loctar become all excited again, I'll have to take care of him myself.
Haaran walks up to the cell and inspects Darean's body.
"So, he's dead?" He asks.
"Yes. Completely."
"And his soul?"
"Ruptured. I wonder where he found someone to curse him like that, though."
He cringes, then turns around and sits down at my other side. "You think his master was Wicked?"
I grab him -, too, and stroke it along with Loctar's. "No, his master was trying to kill him. I think it was Dawn of Fire."
"That's a bit… worrying…" Haaran -.
- I finish them, and their sauce lands on Darean's filthy body.
"Wasn't the hero Ryder targeted by them?" Loctar innocently asks.
"Indeed, he was. I guess I'll be paying him back for the favor," I reply, and a warm smile graces my lips.
Silvane giggles, having teased Grosnok enough that he tries to jump her, but the chains hold him back. I feel a little annoyed by how she never stops trying to play with my men, so I give Loctar the key and whisper an order in his ear.
When the chains clank loudly onto the floor, Silvane's sudden expression of fear greatly amuses me. Grosnok is a gentle, submissive giant, but even he has a limit.