Ryzan cracked his eyes open, struggling to see in the dark room. Attempting to prop himself up, he realized his right hand was being held. Glancing over, he saw a pair of fox ears rising out of the head resting on his arm. Reaching out with his left hand, Ryzan slowly stroked Liza's hair with a warm expression on his face. Liza, letting out a few cute mumbles, nuzzled against Ryzan's arm for a few moments before her eyes started to slowly open. After a few second, realizing Ryzan was awake, Liza's eyes began to fill with tears as she hugged him. Liza's voice rang out from the head buried in his chest, “Don't you ever do anything like that again! I won't forgive you if you ever do something so stupid again”.
Ryzan smiles a bit, resting his hand on her head and whispering, “Sorry to worry you, but no promises”. Hearing the soft words, Liza turns her head to look at him, an angry glint in her eyes. “What do you mean no promises?”.
(Ryzan) “Well if the choice is getting a bit banged up, or watching you get hurt, the choice is rather obvious. No man could live with letting someone they love get attacked in front of them while they simply watched.”
Liza blushed slightly, the word love sticking in her head a bit, “W....wha.... what are you talking about you idiot, and that wasn't a bit banged up! What do you think I would have felt like if you got crippled or ki...killed protecting me!?” she yelled, her silver eyes starting to overflow as she finished.
“I know, I know”, Ryzan whispered as he pet her head. “but regardless of what you say, nothing is going to stop me from jumping into that situation. Plus, getting rewarded with a such a beautiful girl fawning over me, is more than incentive enough to risk death”, a devilish grin spreading on his face.
Feeling a strange tug in her chest again, Liza was starting to get unbalanced, wahhh my face is heating up. I know he's just repeating what he's heard Rak say, but it's really irresponsible to teach your young son this kind of stuff. I know he doesn't really get what he's saying, but the first time he has a 3 minute conversation outside of his house he'll have girls completely fooled and clinging to him... why does that annoy me so much, ah it's got to be that I know they'll corrupt sweet little Ryry. I'm going to have to beat them back so they don't touch MY R
“Liza?” Ryzan interrupted, cautiously calling her name due growing concern, as her expression changed from a blushing teenager to Asura incarnate. Aw crap, did I say something wrong? Every source from my memories(light novels) made me think this would be a good time to lay it on as thick as possible
Snapping out of her internal ranting, Liza was momentarily stunned as she came back to reality. After a bit she noticed Ryzan's green eyes staring at her in concern, “Ah. s... sorry about that, I think I'm just tired, and you should probably get some sleep as well. I didn't want to disturb you earlier ”.
Relieved that the situation wasn't blowing up in his face, Ryzan heaved a sigh of relief, but despite his earlier fear a small urge to milk this for everything it was worth grew in his mind. “I don't know if I can sleep, but being around Liza always calms me down, can I sleep with you tonight?” he said, his green eyes shining in plea as they stared at her.
Liza paused for a few moments, trying to resist his eyes and failing. Ignoring her racing heart, she just wrote it off as something like sleeping with a younger brother, “O...ok but only for tonight, you're getting a little to old for it”
Ryzan's innocent face flashed a devilish smirk so fast that Liza could only think her eyes played tricks on her, “I don't think I could ever get tired of sleeping with a beautiful girl like Liza. If I could, I'd share your bed with you every single day of my life.”
Blushing furiously at the, supposedly, accidental reference, Liza just got up and hurried off to her room to calm down. How can he spout out stuff like that so easily. He should have got enough education from Rak to know what sh...sharing a bed as an adult would imply. Awawawa, I don't even know why I'm reacting so much. It's just his usual innocent comments, they never bothered me before, so why are they now?!
Just as she finished her thoughts, a small knock came from her door along with Ryzan's voice, “Can I come in Liza?”. Still panicked and confused, Liza could barely force out a “Yes” loud enough to be heard.
Walking into her room, Ryzan was definitely happy seeing the blushing fox girl wrapped in her blanket. He was pretty sure she still didn't consciously acknowledge him, but he could also see that her reactions were getting a lot stronger recently. Not waiting any longer, he joyfully approached and laid down next to her. Wrapping his arms around her stomach and snuggling close, enjoying the squeaky gasp as he first touched her.
About an hour later Liza was completely asleep, seems her tension had raised high enough that she had pretty much passed out, but Ryzan was wide awake. Still snuggled close, he genuinely enjoyed the comfort he felt from her, as he pondered through what he was going to do. Despite his time spent flirting, Ryzan had not forgotten his vow to stop underestimating his world. He had come to the decision that he would get stronger, but also that every bit of down time or recuperation would be wholly devoted to Liza. Partially for the fact that it made him happy, mostly because Liza was a beautiful girl, and he wanted to worm his way into her thoughts as much as possible before another guy in the village started making progress instead.
First and foremost on his list of things he needed to do, was to get some survival gear; a good hunting knife, a flint scraper, a sturdy set of clothes, a good axe, and some information on the fauna of this world. He imagined the blacksmith could handle the knife, scraper, and the axe. As far as he was aware the blacksmiths of this world were more than qualified to make steel weaponry, so it shouldn't be hard to acquire a reasonably good set. As for the clothes, there was a leather worker in town as well. Finally the fauna would be the easiest through his mother. As both a hunter and an alchemist, there was no way she didn't know every single plant that grew in the surrounding areas.
Outside of those, he could also check and see if any of the craftsmen had any good staves to make a bow from. Wood was used in a lot of tools, so it wouldn't be surprising if they kept a few piles around drying. Before he could even consider that though, there was the biggest obstacle in the form of convincing his mother. Getting the funds for all of the equipment probably wouldn't be hard, in fact his mother would probably insist on equipping him if he went out, but convincing a mother to let her, recently wounded, child to run off gallivanting through the forest... that was a tough sale. Regardless it was one that Ryzan had to make. He had to get used to this body, he had to explore and get used to the forest here, and first a foremost he needed better ranged weaponry. If he had a good bow when Liza had been assaulted, he would have put an arrow in all of them before they could respond, much less blast a chunk out of his arm.
Unfortunately, from what Ryzan had heard at the bar, and read in that book, it was less than likely to find any decent information on appropriate woods for bow crafting in this world. The only mention he heard of bows in this village, were people basically using it as a drinking game. Trying to hit targets only about 25 feet away, and usually failing even when sober. The bows were crude, warped, and powerless. This meant that Ryzan, more than likely, wouldn't find any bow that was better than what he could just make from a branch, and also meant there probably wouldn't be any appropriate wood for sale either. Thus his only option is to cut branches himself, and test each and every tree in the area. Find out what was flexible, find out what excelled in compression or tensile strength, and first and foremost what was unlikely to split and break. The stronger you make it with weak wood, the more you'll regret it when it explodes in your hand.
So that placed foraging on the highest of his priorities. After that he needed to find an appropriate place to make a small workshop. A Place to season(dry) the wood, appropriate space for his work and tools, a crude forge, and reasonably close to a river, without having a large increase in humidity. To find this location, or any of the materials he needed, Ryzan HAD to start exploring the forest. So his main goal for the foreseeable future is to get enough to buy his gear, and convince his mother to let him put it to good use. These plans swirled in Ryzan's head as drifted off to sleep, finding comfort in the feeling of Liza's steady breath as he sank into sleep.
----------Earlier That Day------------
A short time after Liza had brought the injured Ryzan back to the house, four bloodied and weary adventurers stumbled into the bar Rak was in, escorted by a few concerned looking villagers.
(Rak) “What happened to you guys” he said, mildly curious about what put 4 adventurers through the ringer near the village.
(high elf) “N...nothing much, we got assaulted by a silver monster on the road near the town. If these guy's hadn't shown up with a few health potions at least one of us would have been a goner.”
(Rak) *Whistles* “Sounds like quite a beast”, turning to look at the villagers who brought the men in, “Did you guys make out anything about it?”
(???) “Not really. It looked humanoid, but it ran off far too fast for us to really confirm anything about it. We started heading out there as soon as we heard the sounds of fighting, but by the time we were close enough to make out the details it was already gone.”
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(Rak) “Hahahahaha guess it really made short work of you guys, well grudging over it won't get you anything. I'm assuming they've already sent for my wife, so you guys will probably be fixed up in no time flat. Just thank your stars you survived, and enjoy a song.”
A few minutes later the door busted open, and a hulking figure stood in the doorway. This man was known as Max, which was short for Maxus Teach, and he made his living utilizing his natural strength and endurance for blacksmithing. Everyone in town knew him, which is why everyone in town was surprised to see such a dangerous glint in his eyes. After a few moments of shock, one of the villager's who escorted the adventurer's in finally spoke up, “So did you manage to speak to Kayla about this?”
Noticing the glare aimed their way from the hulking man, the adventurers all started to prepare to bolt, thinking that he had somehow found out what they had done. They had planned to wait for the healer and then run off as fast as possible to avoid this kind of backlash. Ordinarily they would have already ran, but trudging through the forest injured, and with no health potions, was something that was likely to be a disaster. They could only panic as the burly Max spoke up to answer the question, “Ah, I saw her, and heard something interesting while I was there. It seems that their maid got assaulted by 4 thugs on the road, and her little boy intervened, resulting in a pathetic bastard of a high elf almost blowing his arm off”.
As these words rang out, the tavern suddenly went completely silent. Knowing they had to get out, the 4 adventurers all bolted towards the door, but were met with an immediate resistance. The first to react were the tavern brawlers, not only were they used to combat, they had also spent a lot of time talking to Ryzan when Rak had brought him in. All of them immediately jumped onto the bulky henchman, crashing him into the ground. A few tried to latch onto the high elf as well, but he quickly jumped back to avoid it. Unfortunately for him, that put the entire crowd between him and the door. Just as this happened the two swordsman reached the door, and tried to duck out, but surprisingly Max was way faster than he appeared, and they ran straight into his clothesline. Not giving them time to get away, Max picked their dazed forms up off the ground, and launched them back into the tavern.
Seeing his companions taken out so quickly, the high elf knew he was out of luck. When the two swordsmen came flying in, he immediately took advantage of the distraction, and leapt all the way away from the door. As almost everyone had charged the door, that left him plenty of room and he suddenly held up his hand chanting “niar takrome” as a ball of water formed in front of him. Knowing he now held the advantage a sickening smirk adorned his face, “If you guys don't just drop this and let us leave, I'll blast my way out. Besides it's not even our fault, who told that snotty brat to attack us over trying to play with that barbarian bitc-” suddenly a loud crash and a twang sounded throughout the room.
Almost everyone had rushed the door, there was one man who hadn't. The bard always sat far away from the door to stay out of the way, and thus, as the high elf jumped back, he had actually landed right in front of the bard. The elf had completely forgotten about the unthreatening scrawny man, but this man was suddenly the center of attention in the room. Everyone who had known the man longer than a few days was visibly shocked. He was always cheerful, his motto was why fight when you can run, in fact the only time he ever clenched his hand was when a woman's breast was in it, and he was always careful to keep people from harming his instrument since it was his “seduction tool”. Yet there was Rak, stalking towards the fallen elf, a bloody and shattered lute in his right hand, and his handsome face distorted and twisted by rage.
Just as the elf started to regain his senses, the calmly walking Rak had reached him, slamming the broken remains of his precious lute onto the disoriented elf's head, completely shattering the neck. As the elf screamed out, Rak kicked him onto his back and pinned him. Realizing the elf was barely coherent, he reached to the table next to him and grabbed a pitcher of ale, splashing it into the elf's face to wake him up.
The moment the elf came to he tried to rattle off an incantation, but was stopped by a fist to his jaw, and then another, and another. After a few cracking sounds, which he wasn't too sure were his fist or the elf's jaw, Rak finally stopped his assault. Calmly reaching back to the table, he grabbed a knife off the plate, and with the same calmness, thrust it into the elf's shoulder. A blood curdling scream rang from the elf and he looked up at Rak in terror, there was no emotion other than rage in Rak's face. No joy at causing the pain, no hesitation or regret, and no fear. Rak ripped out the knife, and made sure the elf was still conscious, before he finally spoke for the first time since the news came out.
(Rak) “That Barbarian bitch is like a daughter to me, and that snotty brat is my son... I don't know what you think gives you the right to judge them, much less attack them”
With every word Rak's face got darker and darker, and his hand shook more and more as it went on, blood visibly falling from the knuckles. Taking a deep breath he finally continued speaking to the terrified elf, “I'm guessing you think you're above other people as a high elf or something, well today I'll be fixing that”, right as he said the last word Rak's knife hand slashed out and the elf let out another scream and passed out.
Next to the passed out elf, the top half of his ear lay on the ground in a pool of blood. “hmm you weren't supposed to pass out on the first one”, with another slash, another ear piece landed next to the elf. “hopefully this will make him a bit less of a purist”, he said as he looked at the elf's horrified companions. Even the villagers holding them down were paling at the image of the light-hearted pervert partaking in violence. Suddenly rising to his feet, Rak headed out the door, yelling back, “I need to go check on my family, beat those scum within an inch of their life and dump them out of town. We aren't murderers, but I see no problem in coming close and letting the beasts work out the rest.”.
Arriving at the house, he was met at the door by Kayla, whose eyes opened wide when she saw the ragged appearance of Rak. Hurriedly coming inside, Rak looked around and frantically said, “Where are Ryzan and Liza at? How bad was his arm? Did it heal”
Seeing Rak become more and more frantic, Kayla grabbed his shoulders and tried to settle him down, “Ryzan and Liza are in the living room, and they're fine, just tired now. His arm was pretty bad, but it healed up fine. There's nothing to worry about honey, but what in the world happened to you. Lend me your hand.” As Rak's wounds slowly started to close, he fumbled a bit and said, “n-nothing much. I just got in a bit of a brawl at the pub, some drunkard broke my lute”
Kayla stared at him with cold eyes for a few seconds, and the knuckles stopped healing.
*Ahh!!* *Owowowowow*
Kayla, squeezing the raw half healed knuckles, stared intensely at Rak's face. “Dear, you should know better than to lie to me, now tell me what happened to you or first, I won't heal you, and second, you won't ever be in the same bed as me for the next 3 months.”
Rak lost all of the tension regarding his Liza and Ryzan's well being, but suddenly gained back a lot more from a different source. Losing all sense of resistance, Rak poured out the nights events, leaving out some explicit details, to Kayla.”
When it was over, Kayla was staring at Rak with absolute shock. Little by little, a small flame could be seen building in her eyes. Rak was someone who could be considered passionate, but only due to his extensive flirting and romancing. Never anger. Knowing that he had such a reaction, made some strong emotions boil up in Kayla. After a few seconds of build up, she pulled Rak's face to hers, delivering a passionate kiss. After about 30 seconds she broke it off, and pulled Rak towards their bedroom.
(Rak) “D-dear my knuckles still haven't been healed”
Seeing the knuckles on his hand again, after knowing how it had happened, Kayla's knees actually went a bit weak. Turning around towards him as they entered their room she said, “Just leave them, battle wounds are pride. Now, no more talking. Liza and Ryzan are both completely fine now, and also dead tired. There's nothing left to worry about now, so just hurry up and get on the bed”. Licking her lips seductively, Kayla almost threw Rak onto the bed before she jumped on top of him, biting at his ear and whispering into it, “Now you've definitely earned tonight, and I think Ryzan's proved he could take care of a cute little sibling, so lets get started on making one, honey”
Rak forgot entirely about his knuckles at this point, reason blown away by his suddenly seductive wife. I should try to punch things more often
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apologies to anyone who loaded this page before now. accidentally hit post instead of preview again. Think i'm going to start doing the proofread outside of japtem so this doesnt happen anymore. Also sorry about the delay. All sorts of stuff stacked up. this was supposed to be out at latest by yesterday :/.