The next month and a half went by in a flash as we all enjoyed life at Corner’s farm. I improved my fighting techniques, learned how to read and write, and both the girls learned how to navigate in the woods better. Old man Corner livened up from our company, and I later introduced him to Granny’s apprentices. They like healing things and thought I was now some sort of life-infused demigod, so when I talked to them about “healing a lonely heart”, they swarmed him and the other elderly folks in waves.

Also, during that time, I finally found out that I didn’t need to avoid “fatherholes” so frantically anymore. Granny finally explained that my life-energy had turned inward, thus causing me to become a self-healer, and was no longer leaking outward as it had been originally.

My “seed” was still incredibly strong, and had a high chance to get any viable eggs fertilized, but I no longer had to worry about it healing my partners. The difference in both Red and Jewel’s cases was simple from before to now.

Since both had taken herbs to stop them from producing eggs, they completely avoided all parts of the reproductive cycle. When I was first leaking life energy, that external effect could’ve healed them, restoring their cycles, and making them very likely to get pregnant. Now, however, my seed was internally stronger – but it still didn’t invalidate the fact neither of them carried a single egg for it to fertilize.

I suppose the long and short of it was I didn’t have to worry about becoming a father with them anytime soon. Any other girl, however, was questionable. Unless I knew they couldn’t have a child, I’d best assume they’d end up a mother nine months after we did it. Not that I actually planned on doing it with anyone else – I already had more than enough action with Red and Jewel.

I also found out being a self healer is a pain in the ass sometimes, during that month and a half. Once, when I was passing wind after eating too much, the girls complained over it, and I errantly accused them of doing the same. It turns out that neither Jewel nor Red have to use the chamberpots.

In this world, there are herbs which strengthen one’s digestive system, allowing it to digest most things completely, without the need to pass waste. Having such a strong digestive system reduces the illnesses a person could get from foods, and it allows them to only need to consume about half as much food as a normal person for their nutrition.

I’d always thought the girls ate like the birds, and I had been utterly shocked by how quickly Red recovered from being starved when I rescued her. Turns out it was all just another advantage the truly wealthy could buy, that the poor can’t even afford to dream about.

Unfortunately, when I asked Granny about getting some for myself, she just laughed at me. I’m a self-healer. Apparently my body will always heal me back to my normal fart-producing self – whether I want it to or not.

In a way, after getting to know both Red and Jewel better, I find I’m both oddly amazed and attracted to them, while also shocked and baffled by them. It’s astounding how much they’ve modified their bodies with various alchemical herbs and medicines!

Both eat less. Neither use a chamberpot. Neither has to deal with a moonblood. Both took a bath in some type of herbs which permanently removes hair – which explains why they’re so smooth all over from the neck, down. Their skin has been softened, moisturized, and enhanced to resist sunlight – which is why they’re so much paler than all the people I know, who work out under the sun all day long. Their hair is hard to tangle, and easy to detangle, and even their breath has been enhanced to have a naturally minty smell.

I know women in my first life shaved their legs and such, (most common women in this world don’t even bother with it), but I was astounded by how far they’d went to permanently alter themselves. On one hand, it made me wonder about what else was enhanced, without me knowing about it. (Are those boobs real?). And yet, on the other hand, I could almost understand it.

What woman wouldn’t want to be able to give up daily shaving, and yet keep her body trim and hairless? Who doesn’t want good breath? To not have to worry about sunburns? Who wouldn’t want to eat less? Or have tangle free hair? Each little thing by itself seemed more than reasonable, but when you considered how much they’d changed with it all….

I guess it just truly drove home mother’s point to me. A rich woman is fundamentally different from a poor one. In the end though, I took Red and Jewel upstairs, and fully molested them shamelessly whenever I had any doubts. They’re not rich women. They’re my women.

But, like always, time kept turning, and it was soon time for us to leave. Jewel had written her father several times, and he continued paying for her room the whole time at the school. He also settled any issues with me moving in with the girls. All I had to do was go sign up for classes, and I was good to go.

I thought he’d object at us being together, like my mother had, but apparently he thought of me as part of his family now. Jewel had pledged herself to me on her family’s honor, and apparently her father was bound by that as well. In the eyes of her family, Jewel was mine, just as Red was hers.

Saying goodbye to everyone was difficult, but we were determined not to let another semester slide away from us. Traveling through the forest, I headed more east than south this time, and when we finally emerged out onto the road, we were nowhere near where the girls had been attacked and captured. I wanted to spare them as much grief as possible, so I avoided that place like the plague.

A few days later, I finally got to see Burkshire for the first time in my life.

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Arriving at the city of Burkshire, I realized once again how screwed up my perspectives were. Part of me was overwhelmed by the size of the city which would’ve contained hundreds of Hones. Another part saw it all as trivial and mundane. The tallest buildings looming in the distance were perhaps ten stories high – a marvel of grandness for this world, but nothing compared to the 300 story skyscrapers of Thomas’s existence.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

The wall surrounding the city was perhaps ten feet high, or so. I imagined a well trained athlete could easily leap, grab and edge, and scale the side in mere seconds. Still though, it was large enough to keep the merchants and travelers from easily bypassing the city gates and paying an entry tax.

Jewel, Red, and I all had to pay a silver in tax before being allowed inside the city. We explained we were students, but with no proof, we still had to pay the tax. We were, however, given tokens, which we could then redeem at the school for our coin back, once we proved our student status and established city residency by staying in the dorms.

At first,I complained about the tax, but then Jewel explained its purpose to me. The cities in this world didn’t have the modern sanitation systems that worked so efficiently in Thomas’s memories. Somebody here – usually slaves, but not always – had to go around collecting waste and refuse, and manually carry it outside the city. A single silver seemed more than justified to me, if it fulfilled that purpose.

Inside the city was a dense hustle and bustle of crowds of people as everyone seemed to be frantically rushing to do their own thing. “It’ll quiet down shortly,” Jewel yelled, clenching tightly to my left arm. “Once we get past the first quarter,” Red confirmed, snuggled hard on my right. All I could do is nod and try to take it all in.

Before long, however, they were correct. As we got further from the bottleneck of the gates, the crowds thinned out as more and more people turned off the main thoroughfare and went a different way. Eventually we stopped at a square with a fountain spraying water from the oversized penis of a stone statue prominently mounted in the center of it.

Pulling me to a bench off to the side, Jewel tugged me to sit down beside her. Whether it was one of those subtle ways of establishing womanly dominance, or not, I don’t know, but there wasn’t enough room left on my side of the bench for Red to sit beside me. Letting go of my arm, she had to walk all the way around to sit on the other side of Jewel.

“We’re basically in the central district now,” Jewel explained, as she nuzzled her head against my shoulder; the soft warmth of her breasts sifting gently through her thin dress to caress both sides of my left arm, as she pressed tight against it. “From here, we can go anywhere we want easily for the rest of the city.”

“Except the slums, slaughter row, or whore’s district,” Red interrupted, in an obvious attempt not to be forgotten.

“I said anywhere we’d want to go,” Jewel snorted. “Who’d actually want to go to any of those places.”

“Well, I was just being thourough for…” As the two girls started to bicker back and forth, I slowed tuned them out and stared at the overly gifted statue in front of us. I doubt even he could keep both girls from these petty bouts of possessiveness.

I couldn’t help but wonder why none of the stories about harems ever had these issues in my past life. These girls were Lady and Servant, and yet they bickered and competed for my attention constantly, in a thousand little ways. The stupid stories of Thomas’s past life never once had that issue, which, once again led me to frowning and thinking perhaps my memories of his existence truly were just nothing more than some sort of dream sequence. Was I just fooling myself into thinking he… I… was real? Or was i….

OFFT! Pain like lightning erupted in my bulging loins, as Jewel suddenly just hopped up and flopped herself into my lap, tossing her arms around my neck. “See, you’re bothering My Lord.” The possessiveness was plain and well emphasized in her voice. “You’re upsetting him,” Jewel accused, glaring at Red. “See? You’re making him frown again.”

“I’m sorry, Mi’Lord.” Sliding over, Red snuggled tight into the spot Jewel had just moved from, to nuzzle hard against my side.

Cold sweat formed on my forehead as I both cursed and worshiped my talent for healing. I cursed it for the eternal bulge which it felt like Jewel had just attempted to crush, while at the same time praying to it and praising it for helping calm the waves of nauseating pain quickly. I wasn’t actually frowning this time. I was just trying to hold back the tears.

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Arriving at the school later, one arm wrapped tightly around each girl’s shoulders as we tightly walked all pressed together, I realized I still didn’t have a real clue about the layout of the town. Jewel had started to explain things to me, but then one thing had led to another, and I got distracted. If she’d finished her explanation, I hadn’t paid any attention to it.

One thing was obvious immediately upon passing the school gates – the people here were all of a different class than the ones outside the gates. Clothes were all dyed vibrant colors, and were made of much finer and more expensive materials. Nearly every female we passed was wearing hose and heels – often the very high heels which I’d always associated with cheap trashiness in my past memories.

The women’s stomachs were fully covered, with not a single one wearing halter tops or half-shirts, as was common on the farms. The skirts were longer, with none shorter than knee length, and the glitter of earrings and jewelry twinkled like stars amongst them.

The only women not dressed as if they could buy the world, were Jewel and Red, in the common farm dresses old man Corner had let them keep of his dead wife’s. Well them, and the slave girls, who ran around completely naked, wearing nothing but a steel or iron neck shackle.

As for the guys… Meh.

I guess they dressed fancier. How the hell should I know? I wasn’t paying any attention to them.

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Going straight to a stone three-story building to the right of the school gate we’d entered from, I was grateful for the girls’ previous knowledge of this place. Everything looked the same to me, and none of the people looked overly friendly or approachable to me.

“I’ll wait out here with my lord,” Jewel giggled, waving her hands in a slight shooing motion towards Red. “You can go in there and get our room keys and school badges for us. We’ll sign Tomas up for classes tomorrow, after he’s rested and cleaned the dirt of the road off him.”

“I’m fine to…”

“Certainly, Mi’Lady.” Curtsying, Red turned and headed on into the building, not even waiting for me to finish talking.

Sighing, I wrapped both my arms around Jewel, and pulled her up tight; her back resting warm against my chest. Wrapping my arms around her shoulders, I gently, but firmly gripped each of her full breasts in my hands and kneaded them lightly. I don’t know if it’s just excitement to return to school, fear of how their friends might react to me, or something else entirely, but I’m hoping things will settle down between them soon.

Guessing that Jewel was feeling insecure about our relationship and the uncertain future of our new lives here at the school, I forcefully gripped her breasts nearly as hard as I could, causing her to groan slightly. “I’ve got an order for you,” I whispered, leaning down to nibble roughly on her ear.

“See the bushes there to the right?” I released the death grip I had on her left breast with my right hand. Rubbing that side of her chest softly, I felt for the bulge of her nipple under her shirt. Pinching firmly, I tugged the soft bud several times towards where I was looking.

“I see them,” Jewel groaned, as her knees sagged slightly as she surrendered completely in my grip.

“You’re going to scoot your pretty little ass quickly over there behind them,” I whispered, moving my right hand back to freely fondle her left breast. “You’re going to strip completely naked, rub both those little nipples of yours until they’re fully at attention, and then get dressed in the only outfit I’ve chosen for you for so far.”

“Then you’re going to sway your little ass back out here, let me have a good look at you, and then…” Licking the base of her neck, I whispered, “Then… Then you’ll do whatever I want you to do after that.” With one last bite on her ear almost hard enough to draw blood, I let go and gave Jewel a push towards the tall bushes lining the front of the building.

Without a sound, Jewel hurried behind the nearest bush and disappeared from sight. Taking up a guilty stance in front of it, I scanned all around to make certain nobody was rushing over to investigate what we were doing, or stop us.

After what seemed like an eternity to my nervously pounding heart, Jewel finally scurried back around the side of the bush, wearing the black mini-skirt, shawl, and heels that I found both so utterly sexy and embarrassing at the same time. Face flush bright red, Jewel slowly turned once, until she made a complete circle.

Rushing over, Jewel tossed herself in my arms and buried her burning cheeks into my chest. “That was sooooo embarrassing ,” came her muffled voice as Jewel giggled lightly and continued to hide her face. “You wouldn’t believe all the looks I got from the students and staff sitting in the waiting room,” she giggled.

Holding her tightly in my arms, I moved several steps to the side for a better view. Sure enough, though the bushes had grown up to block them from this side, there was a whole row of windows lining the wall behind them.

Feeling my own cheeks growing as hot as Jewel’s, I scooped her up and dashed around the corner of the building to get away before anyone came outside to arrest or ticket us. “Which way to your room?” Running while carrying her like a bride across the threshold, I hurried in the direction she pointed.

Red can just catch up to us there!