The Awakening

"Finally, after so many years. I didn't dare to dream… I didn't even begin to hope. But now, here you are. Look at you… look at what I've managed to create. You're perfect in every possible way. Now arise, my Champion. Arise and join this broken, flawed world of ours."

He awakens… slowly. Coming to consciousness is not like anything he's ever experienced before. He's not even sure he HAS experienced anything before. A shuddering breath leaves parted lips all the same, and his chest rises and falls as he begins to take in oxygen and let out carbon dioxide. A shiver runs through his body, but that might also have to do with the fingers trailing along his arm, across his form.

"Gorgeous. Simply gorgeous."

He opens his eyes then and looks upon the owner of those fingers. The one who looks back at him is Salem, Queen of the Grimm, or so his memories tell him. Though… are they his memories? They don't… they don't feel like proper memories. They feel like something has been downloaded straight into his brain. Something vast and impossible.

"You are perfect, my Champion. So very perfect."

The Queen of the Grimm… was his creator. And not just in the here and now, but a thousand-thousand times over. A million times over. He'd… he remembered everything. Salem had given him knowledge. Knowledge taken from a million Grimm that she'd created over the centuries. He remembered being born from shadow and negativity the vast majority of those times, but he also remembered the times that she'd personally handcrafted him.

This too, was one of those latter cases. Salem had built him, had created him… however, despite his vast knowledge of all things Grimm, he had never been in this shape before. Lifting his hands up, he blinks at them, wiggling his fingers. He'd never had five fingers before, never had opposable thumbs. A quick inventory of the rest of his body showed that he was… that he was like Salem. Humanoid, with a head atop broad shoulders and two arms and two legs.

Except not quite like Salem, as her questing fingers reach his crotch and wrap around his cock. The Queen of the Grimm begins to stroke his phallus and under her attention, it starts to grow hard and thick as she offers him a wicked grin.

Salem was female… and he was male.

"Tell me, child. Do you know who I am?"

Swallowing once, wetting his lips, he nods, even as she continues to pulse her hand up and down his cock. She's neither gentle nor rough about it. Her movements are swift but not too swift, and her grip is firm but not too firm. It feels good, he has to admit… and it also feels new. This is not something that Salem has done with any of her creations before as far as he knows from the vast repository of knowledge that's been uploaded into his mind.

"My Queen…"

His answer seems to please Salem, her smile widening as she leans closer.

"That I am. And you… are my young Prince. The Prince of the Grimm, the Herald of Remnant's final destruction. You, my Champion, will be the one to destroy them all."

Her breath is undeniably husky, and his cock throbs in her hand as she continues to stroke it. Her words though… he thinks he knows the answer, but even still, he feels almost compelled to ask.

"Destroy… who?"

Blinking, Salem lets out a titter of a laugh.

"Why, the humans of course."

And like that, he's remembering. Millions upon millions of instances of him fighting human beings. He doesn't win in all of them… actually, he doesn't win in most of them. Many of the humans he remembers fighting as every form of Grimm under the sun manage to kill him in great numbers, slaughtering the vast majority of his… past lives for lack of a better word.

Not all of them though. Some aren't very strong at all. Plenty of others are quite strong but overwhelmed by the multitude that he remembers being. It's disconcerting, having the memories of an entire flock of Nevermore shoved into his head. It's even more so to see all of their point of views at once as they all bombard the same human, only to have him wipe out half of them before the other half overwhelm him and bring him down.

Yes, he has millions upon millions of examples of his creator's war with humanity. The Queen of the Grimm had been sending her creatures to kill humans for as long as she'd been the Queen. And he could remember each and every one of those attacks, each and every one of his kills… as well as his deaths.

But then there are the other memories. Far fewer in number, and yet… so much more vibrant. The memories of the Grimm, those feel like they were planted in his head. Obviously, they were. Salem is making no effort to hide that fact. But then, does she know about these other memories? These scant few that seem all too real?

He sees humans, but this time they aren't attacking him. He watches what he quickly realizes is a family, grow up right before his eyes. A mother human, a father human, and seven sister humans. He's part of that family, or so it would seem… but then, why would they accept a Grimm as one of their kin? He's got so many instances of Grimm and humanity fighting… it seems obvious to him that they could never get along based on the reams of evidence filling his mind. And yet… what is this then?

The vibrant memories continue on. The humans grow and age, as they tend to do. He'd seen this happen in some of the Grimm memories, how one Grimm might die to a powerful human, but he would eventually get to it later, much further down the road, once age left the human older and more decrepit.

The mother and father humans grew towards that point, while the sister humans grow towards peak performance. And still he did not attack them, still he did not attempt to end the threat that the human family represented. He… lived with them instead. He existed peacefully right alongside them. They were… his family?

And then there comes a point where he finds himself alone with the father human. He expects this to be the point where he faces betrayal, or perhaps even when he is the one who betrays. They're on a flying vessel of some sorts… and then there is a shaking, a rapid breaking as the vessel loses altitude, as it begins to fall from the sky like it's wings have been clipped.

The father human's face fills his view then, the human man's hands holding his own face lovingly, tenderly.

"Jaune… I'm so sorry, Jaune."

And then… nothing. Blinking his glowing yellow eyes, he processes this… even as his creator decides that he is sufficiently aroused and climbs atop the slab he's laid out on… climbs atop him.

"You're ready for me, my Prince. Ready to take me, ready to fill me with your cock. Please me, Champion. Please your Queen."

His hands go to her hips instinctively, latching on as she impales herself on his throbbing, pulsating shaft. Judging from the way she gasps and moans and the way her insides have to stretch wide around him, while also being quite pleasurably tight… he's very well-endowed. Grunting, he looks up at his creator… and speaks his mind.

"Jaune… who… is Jaune?"

Salem full-body flinches, stiffening as she looks down at him in blatant shock and surprise. She even tries to jolt back, but he has ahold of her… and for some reason, she's made him stronger than her. He's easily able to hold her in place on his cock until she stops squirming and actually speaks.

"He is nobody, my Prince. Nobody you need concern yourself with."

And then she begins to try and ride him. But no… no, that's not good enough. He grasps her tighter by the hips and holds her still.

"No. Who… is Jaune?"

Not many can say they've ever seen the Queen of the Grimm pout. No one but her former husband, the body-hopping Ozma. He knows about the wizard, having killed him as a hundred different Grimm at least a dozen times over the centuries. But here and now, in this moment, Salem definitely pouts, before letting out a put-upon sigh.

"As I said, he is nobody. He is merely… your template."

Blinking, he looks confused.

"My… template."

Rolling her eyes, Salem nods.

"The humans have these things called Bullheads that let them fly. One such vehicle crashed in my lands two weeks ago. The contents of it were brought to me. The Bullhead contained the bodies of a Nicholas Arc and a Jaune Arc. Corpses of a man and boy who meant nothing, who are nothing. And yet… and yet, Jaune Arc proved quite useful in death. I'd never considered it before… but then, a base body was needed for my transformation, was it not? And so… Jaune Arc was the base of your eventual creation, my Champion."

Jaune Arc… Jaune Arc had died in that Bullhead, alongside his father. But had he truly died? It seemed strange, that he would have Jaune's memories if all that his creator used was the leftover corpse from the crash. Was… was Salem telling him the truth?

Regardless, he felt more like Jaune then any of the Grimm who's memories had been crammed into his head. Whether that was because the Grimm had no lives beyond roaming until finding a human to fight and either kill or die against, or because Jaune was the base body and he was Jaune… it didn't matter, in the end.

He had Jaune's memories… and he had the memories of millions of Grimm. One would expect that the latter would easily overwhelm the former. But one would be wrong. Jaune's memories were so much stronger, so much more powerful. He remembered his sisters and his mother, though their names… their names escaped him. He remembered his father, now known to him as Nicholas Arc.

"Come, my Prince. There is no need to concern yourself with such things. Today is an auspicious day. Let us celebrate with a joyous coupling."

Panting, moaning, Salem bounces up and down on his cock. In his distraction, he'd let her, loosening his grip on her hips as he assimilated all she'd said and tried to understand what it meant for him. And yet… and yet, he can't deny how good she feels, wrapped around his cock. Slowly but surely, he begins to reciprocate, thrusting up into her from below, fucking her with full, deep thrusts of his own.

Moaning wantonly, walls clenching around his length, Salem, the Queen of the Grimm, lets out a soft cry as she cums for him. He finds himself growling in lustful desire, and his hands travel from her hips to her bust, groping and squeezing her bouncing, pale tits as she continues to ride him.

Dropping forward to give him better access to her tits, Salem leans in close, planting a soft kiss on his lips before pulling back to look him in the eye.

"My Champion. I must confess, I have been alone for some time. There have been those few humans who have proved… useful over the years, but they are nothing. They mean nothing. Flickering flames who burn out in but a few decades, disappearing like they were never there. Proving the inadequacy of humanity, proving their flawed nature."

Shuddering, arching her back so that her tits are right in front of his face, Salem of course moans as he leans forward and sucks on one of her nipples. Even as they continue fucking however, she continues to speak.

"Not like you, my Prince. Perfect in every way. Unblemished by the imperfection of this world. You are my greatest creation, my dear Champion. Together, we will wipe the last of humanity from Remnant… and begin anew, with a new species born of our loins."

He freezes at that. On the one hand, he can see it… and even admire the idea. Salem and him, making babies for the rest of eternity, those babies in turn growing up and making more babies. An entire species of his and Salem's kind, spread across the world, filling it to the brim and then some. And with humanity out of the way, they would have it all to themselves.

Except… except, he's not just Grimm. He's human too. And whether Salem intended it or not, he remembers being Jaune Arc. In a lot of ways, he IS Jaune Arc. He has a choice to make here, a choice between humanity and his Queen, his creator… but it's a stupid choice, so he decides to choose the middle road instead.

With a growl, Jaune rolls them over, so that Salem is the one on her back on the slab, and his cock is buried inside of her as he pins her down.

"No."

In the midst of her lust and pleasure, Salem takes a moment to hear him. She blinks at him, furrowing her brow incredulously.

"W-What? My Prince, what do you mean, 'no'?"

Shaking his head, Jaune offers an apologetic smile.

"I won't destroy humanity for you, my Queen."

Salem's eyes widen in shock and outrage, but he cuts her off with a deep, tongue-filled kiss before she can respond. She fights it momentarily, but ultimately melts in the face of his passion. It's clearly been a long time for her, judging by the way she jumped into things so quickly. Jaune… Jaune likes to think that she created him more for this, for the purposes of companionship and creating a new species, then for the destruction of the old one.

And if that's the case, he can convince her to let the latter goal go in favor of focusing entirely on the former. After all, he's not about to let her destroy humanity. Some of his favorite people from his memories are part of it still.

"But I also won't abandon you."

Salem's breath catches, and Jaune continues onwards, full steam ahead.

"I won't leave you, Salem. I won't ever let you go. You're mine and I am yours… forevermore."

And then he kisses her, and as he notes the tears welling up at the edges of her eyes, he knows that he has the Queen of the Grimm right where he wants her. All that's left is to decide now how he's going to try and redefine their relationship. Salem needs a firm hand, that much is obvious. But should he be gentle and kind, or rough and harsh? Should he dominate her carefully and slowly, or take her and make her his bitch?

What would she respond best to? What would he find the most fulfilling? He was once Jaune Arc, a kind boy with a warm soul. But he's also been millions of Grimm, shadows of negativity and a harsh and flawed world.

He has to decide now… what sort of man, what sort of Grimm… is he going to be?