25

25

In the following six months, on the Demon Continent…

We were making our way slowly towards Wind Port. I'd had Sprite plot us a course that let us take a mostly straight shot between Rikarisu and the port, allowing me to raise a road the entire way, trailing off to villages here and there.

Evenly spaced along the main highway I was laying down were rest stops. Each stop was a domed and walled stone shelter, similar in design to what I made for us nightly, but much larger in scale. Within the walls were gardens (created by samples gathered from the Migurd, Rikarisu market, and in every village along the way that had edible plants), fed by water drawn from a well, which also provided drinking water and hot water for a communal bathing/shower area. Inside the dome were rooms for storage and preparation of food, along with simple bedrooms with multiple bunks. There was no bedding, but it was better than sleeping on the ground.

Finally, outside each structure was a statue. Around the base of each statue a simple compass was laid out, showing the cardinal directions, Rikarisu and the nearest villages, and Wind Port. Every statue pointed towards Wind Port—a life sized copy of Roxy in various action shots, with her staff always pointing the way.

I really wanted to see her face when she saw one. Bet she'll blush real good.

Eris was less amused. "How come I don't get statues?"

"Demon Continent. Roxy's a demon and from here. Makes sense that the local adventurers would trust the image of one of their own more than a human."

"Oh. I guess that makes sense," Eris relented, but I could see she was still disappointed.

"Tell you what. When we get back, I'll make you a statue too."

The redhead perked up. "I'll hold you to that!"

A single magic stone powered every camp, tied into the same wireless charging network as everything else I was using these days. Honestly, I didn't even notice the draw from them because so far, most of them were unused and used little in the way of power even when in use. The stones we collected along the way, using Sprite to spot prey from miles off and hunt them down specifically for their cores if they weren't already on our list of mission targets.

Behind us, a train of adventurers and refugees traveled on foot. Far more than I had expected and growing seemingly every day. At last count, over a hundred people—humans, beast-kin, demons, and more—who would have otherwise died. I checked in on them occasionally with the drones to make sure they were following the road, but Sprite was taking care of overwatch for me.

When the sun started to go down, we called a halt to travel and I set up camp for us. Eris and I would spar with Ruijerd, sharpening our sword skills. Eris seemed to take more from those lessons then I did, but what I got was important—at least to me. Like Ghislaine, Ruijerd was someone I could fight against and not have to worry about accidentally killing if my control over my touki slipped.

It was happening less and less frequently as time went on and I grew more accustomed to using it, but I don't trust myself not to hurt Eris when using it yet. We still sparred using magic combined with sword skills, but I didn't use touki during those bouts. Eris did, and it gave her a huge advantage when she could close range. Unless I got my own touki under control, she was going to start beating me in those spars soon.

At night, I took the time to work on spell development. I was going a few different directions there, really.

Any time I got a chance, I captured prey alive and spent time practicing biology manipulation, flesh magic, biokinesis, whatever you wanted to call it. I had mastered simple changes before we had even left Roa, so I was building on that.

I felt like I wasn't far off from being able to do things like safely improve my muscles, bones, tendons, and so on—raising my base level of physical strength, which would theoretically raise my overall strength when using touki. Maybe. I had so much of the stuff that it felt like a waste of time beyond doing it for personal vanity some days.

I was trying new branches of magic, and bigger, nastier spells while I had a whole barren wasteland that no one would mind if I destroyed handy. Drones were useful for making sure nothing but monsters were inside any blast radius.

I figured out how to use lightning to mimic electrolysis and split hydrogen from oxygen in the air on a huge scale, resulting in blasts that were probably in the kiloton range. Then, I refined my control to be able to do it without using the middle step of electrolysis.

I tried doing it in reverse once. That is, splitting water into its constituent parts, then fusing H3.

Once.

On a small scale, using about a cup of water.

I was now looking into spells to detect and defend against radiation, and preferably eliminate it outright.

Eris liked the mushroom cloud, at least. She got that look in her eye and I'm pretty sure the only thing preventing her from dragging me back to camp and bouncing up and down on my cock for a few hours was the fact that Ruijerd was the world's biggest unintentional cockblock.

Because I happen to love shonen anime and wanted to try a few things, I decided to run some experiments with lightning.

The less said about that, the better. It didn't happen.

I had been playing with an idea for a while now that I wanted to try, but had never really had the chance to in Roa. Now, I had all the time in the world…

I had light spells already, but nothing that really qualified as a light based attack. A bright flash, beam of light, strobe, or a blinding laser (or a laser pointer for driving beast-kin nuts. Seriously, every maid in the house…) didn't really count in my book.

No, when I thought light, I thought sci-fi or anime. Lasguns, beam blasts, main battery lasers or phasers, Star Wars (both the only three movies they made and the black project by the same name for a space based laser satellite). A 'fuck you' delivered at the literal speed of light (in atmosphere).

So, I started with what I had and scaled up from there. Which, considering the nature of light, lasers, and energy basically just meant adding more juice, adjusting the frequency, and refining the way it was focused.

Creating a laser based attack spell at Elementary-level was that easy. It produced a blue laser that burned pretty little holes in whatever I pointed it at, or set things on fire. The next two levels up were similar matters of power scaling for a basic single beam.

Saint-level is where I started to get creative and where things started exploding. I created a spell to rain lasers down from the sky across a wide area at random, or specifically target them on one area.

The power individual lasers produced at this level was enough to cause lightning strikes as secondary effects of superheating air into plasma, cause anything with enough water in it to spontaneously explode in a steam explosion or combust if it didn't, set metal on fire with indirect exposure, and liquify dirt into molten lava.

King-level was just a scaled up version of the Saint-level spell, but the power behind each individual laser was increased significantly.

Thanks to Roxy, I knew what the jump from King- to Emperor-level required: namely, putting all the power and destruction of a King-level spell into a construct the size of an Elementary-level spell. In other words, concentration of power and starting over at the Elementary level, then going up again in order to progress further. At least, that was my assumption for getting to God-level.

Theoretically, a God-level spell would, at minimum, cover an area exponentially greater than the jump between Saint- and King-level, while each individual spell effect would have, again, the same kind of exponential power increase. The sort of size and power that sank continents.

I simply didn't have the mana capacity for that.

Yet.

With the fact that I was constantly supplying a whole host of drones and other things with mana, on top of my own spell practice, and exhausting myself every day to make sure my capacity grew? It wouldn't be long. A few years, maybe.

I would really like to know where all the mana comes from. Swear to God, it breaks conservation of mass/energy unless my body is some kind of mana nuclear reactor.

Instead of bothering with running that thought down, I focused on creating my first Emperor-level spell. Again, given the nature of energy, etc and so forth, it really was as simple as scaling up the Elementary-level spell while keeping the beam itself small.

I feel kind of cheated. Like it was too easy. On the other hand, pew pew lasers.

Since that feeling of it being too easy left me dissatisfied, I set about modifying the Elementary-level spell to make things more interesting.

I had a light spell that every drone and phone came equipped with standard: a spell to amplify ambient light. Applying that to my lasers was like adding a new focusing lens, condensing them and squeezing all of that power into a smaller beam, meaning I could use less power for the same effect (or more power for greater effect).

Not feeling like that was enough, I began applying other light-based spells to modify them.

Another one in use by the drones and phones under Sprite's control was a remote viewing spell that used light to reflect light and act as mirrors. Technically, it was part of my illusion/hologram spells, because it was just plain useful for getting 3D images, but I never used it for its original purpose these days. No, mostly it was used in the Search and Rescue project.

Adding that spell to lasers allowed me to bend them around obstacles, corners, or attack from unexpected angles. Adding a second to let me aim them by sight gave me a second alpha strike spell, except unlike lightning, I could attack with a laser silently (up to a certain level of power) and at a much greater range without resorting to bombardment of an area.

Well, if they're silent, I should make them invisible too.

The only real reason I wanted them visible at all was to see what I was aiming at, but for a spell designed for stealth kills, not being able to see it or track where it was coming from was best. So, I shifted the 'alpha strike' version up into the ultraviolet, 'invisible to the human eye' spectrum.

Death ray lasers and invisible death ray sniper lasers. Pretty good. But I think I could do better. What about fields of invisible lasers as an active defense to kill anything trying to get close? Or to trap something or someone in place. …I should add lasers to the drones too.

"Rudeus, what's wrong?"

Glaring at the flaming, partially melted remains of a tire I had just thrown away and blasted with a fireball after… losing my cool and screaming at it like a sailor, I supposed that was a fair question. Taking a calming breath, I answered Eris' question.

"Something about the environment is causing them to degrade faster than they did back in Roa. Before, I could go a couple of months without changing tires. Now, we're going through two sets a month each. Twelve tires a month on average between the three of us. I only made about three sets of a dozen—what I thought would last a year each for three bikes seeing fairly active recreational use. At this rate, that'll be three months. Less now, actually. Because of the cars, and if Sylphie or Ghislaine need replacements."

"What do you think is causing it?" Eris asked, studying the back tire of her bike, which I hadn't removed yet. It was cracked, dry, and the rubber was starting to fall apart.

"Well, for one thing, we're putting a lot more miles on them now than we were in Roa. The terrain is a lot rougher here when we're off-road. It's hotter. Could be all the mana in the air for all I know."

Ruijerd hummed quietly from where he stood nearby, keeping mostly silent vigil while I worked after Eris lost her front tire. "We can travel by foot if need be."

"Absolutely not," I nixed that idea immediately. "The bikes are too useful to give up. We cover a ridiculous amount of ground with them that we just can't on foot."

"So do something different. Metal tires maybe?"

I considered Eris for a moment before shaking my head. "It'd be rough. And slower."

Trying something else was pretty much the only option I had though. Okay, if the tires are causing problems why can't we just… Get rid of them entirely?

Because the alternative was a hover bike and that would be a bitch to control.

Or not? Use summons the same way I'm doing in the drones. Let them do the heavy lifting of making the minutae work. Provide a frame, power, an engine, and controls to tell it how you want it to go…

"Okay, we're setting up camp here for today," I decided, standing and beginning the process of making walls to monster proof our camp.

"Are you sure?" Ruijerd asked, to which I gave a nod.

"Yeah. I've got some modifications to make to the bikes. I just need one for now and the other tires are… In poor condition but should be okay for a bit of light riding. Why don't you two go track down our target for today and take care of that, while I work on modifying Eris' bike as a test case?"

"'Kay," Eris agreed quickly. "Acid Wolf fangs and Pax Coyote hides, right?"

"That's right," I confirmed.

The pair took off and I set about modifying the bike. The first thing to go were the wheels. This also meant everything connected to them also had to go.

It can't stand on its own like this, which means parking will be a bitch. Why not use retractable landing gear?

An impromptu stand allowed me to work on it without holding the whole thing up with telekinesis. Next, I went about changing the interior. Adding a single large forced air engine arranged horizontally under the seat through the body of the bike and four smaller independent forced air engines each on their own gimbal system so they could turn as needed for maneuvering.

A pair of short wings were added to the front, barely six inches long each, capable of tilting up and down. A similar set were added to the rear of the bike. Then, I added a rudder behind the primary engine.

I'm really going to have to build another of these. Bigger. Capable of hauling people and loot. Essentially, take the trucks I made for Ariel and Roxy and make them float.

We did enough quests with the guild to justify having what amounted to a truck, too. The bikes had made us very popular within the Guild on this continent as well. Or at least well known, if not well liked. Just as in Roa, people bitched.

That last part was due to the sheer volume of quests we could take on in a week. Most parties, even those with the local lizard type mounts, took a day or two to do any quest outside the city. We picked them up in groups before coming back and claiming them.

The general process went:

Investigate mission board.

Have Sprite photograph mission board.

Sprite takes down the jobs, removes what we don't qualify for, scans aerial drone footage of local monsters, plots us a course that takes us to them in the shortest time possible, then updates the map and gives us waypoints.

We follow the waypoints, kill whatever needs killing, collect what needs collecting, and move on to the next mission.

We return in a few hours, bikes loaded down with materials.

We turn in the missions.

Rinse and repeat until we're ready to move on to another town.

This has, of course, earned us a bit of enmity from certain people and groups within the Guild. Other parties we double booked on, beat them to the punch by a day or more, and pissed off by 'stealing' what they felt was 'their' missions. Yeah, we were sniping missions, but it was not against the rules.

Refocusing on the task at hand, I finished up the last modifications and summoned a spirit to stick into it—one of the same lower level just as the ones in most of the drones (save for the carrier drone) to do the heavy lifting of keeping it airborne and following the rider's directions. Then, I went ahead and enchanted the thing like a drone and linked it to Sprite.

Yeah, I'd just upgraded from 'recreational vehicle' to something close to 'semi-autonomous fighter jet.'

"Eris, have a look," I called as she and Ruijerd came back into camp some time later.

"What did you do to my bike?" She asked, tone suspicious.

"I made it better. Here, watch." I slid into the seat and turned it on. The four engines on the under side kicked on and it rose into the air about a foot, enough to pull the handle to retract the landing gear.

As I worked, I explained the controls. They weren't much different from those of the ultralight, really. That shouldn't be too surprising though, since the new and improved hover bikes would be able to not just run above the ground like a speeder bike from star wars (which was the default, low power consumption mode), but take to the air and actually fly.

Finally, I took off and circled the camp a few times. As I flew, I made notes of what I'd need to change. For starters, everyone would be getting a harness like the one I wore with the ultralight, just to keep from falling off. Also, I'd be adding a magical wind screen to blunt the worst of it—if not all of it for rain, cold, dust, and so on.

I landed and Eris practically knocked me off the bike. Then, her hands were fisted in my cloak and her lips were attacking mine hungrily.

"Thank you!" Eris practically squealed, before letting me go and sliding on behind me. "Let's go!"

I recovered my wits and laughed quietly, before taking her up as Ruijerd watched with a small smile.

As we flew, my mind wandered back to the same problem I'd had for the last six months. The one gnawing at my conscience and keeping me up at night.

Six months and no sign of Zenith or Norn—

And as always, I dragged my mind off that path and onto something else. Namely, how the new hoverbike was performing. How I'd need to change the rest of our bikes, that way we could cross the Demon Continent faster. Get to Wind Port. Make airships. Sprite was already working on using a few drones to tear down a mountain and make more drones and separate out the raw materials, while hunting monsters for their cores. Soon enough, she'd be full Von Neumann and resources would stop being a problem.

I swear to God, if someone hurt them, I am going to raze whatever shithole allowed it to the fucking ground.

They walked into the Guild office in the middle of nowhere—some little town she hadn't bothered to learn the name of, about two thirds of the way between Rikarisu and Wind Port. Well, Eris and Ruijerd walked. Rudy… stormed, was the best way she could describe it.

He grew tenser and angrier by the day. Eris knew why, so she couldn't really fault him for it. And to his credit, Rudeus never took out his anger and frustration on herself, Ruijerd, or any of the others he talked to in their group. But she suspected the tire burning incident was approaching the… how did he put it? Straw that broke the camel's back. Whatever a camel is. Something like a horse. Why not just say horse? Earth sayings are weird.

Rudy approached the counter and visibly calmed himself before using Air Walking to bring himself level in height with the receptionist across the counter. "[Dead End] reporting ********** for six jobs. Materials for the kill ****** are outside."

Eris was still having trouble understanding the demon tongue, but she understood enough to carry on a conversation, or follow a mission report. Or hear perverts talking about the way her pants hugged her ass and thighs when her cloak rode up. Quit staring, idiots. You're not on the list of people allowed to look, she grumbled internally, but so long as they kept their comments quiet and their hands to themselves, she wouldn't start a scene.

Again.

As much as she enjoyed getting spanked, she didn't want to make an ass of herself in public. More than she usually did.

Paying more attention to the crowd than Rudy's dealing with the Guild clerk, Eris saw the exact moment when one of the drunkards lumbered out of his seat and over to her… friend (lover, betrothed, future husband). She reached back and laid a hand on the handle of the sword gifted to them by Rowin and Rokari, but Ruijerd made a gesture with his hand that she interpreted as 'hold.' So she held, and let it play out.

The drunk man, some sort of big bee-headed looking guy, dropped a hand down on Rudy's shoulder hard enough to rock the boy's body forward. Ever so slowly the white-haired boy turned his head and regarded the offending limb, before turning cold green eyes on the demon it was attached to. "Can I help you?" he asked politely.

Eris mentally translated that in her head to, 'I'm going to zap the shit out of you if you don't have a damn good reason for putting your stinking hand on me.' Rudy did not like to be touched, she had noticed. The list of people he tolerated it from was short and could be counted on both hands with fingers left over. That most of those were female and people on 'the list' was probably not a coincidence.

"Nice haul, kid. I guess it pays to be rich enough to afford fancy magic travel tools. How about you share the wealth, eh? Buy us a round or two, maybe… pass around a little coin to smooth down a few ruffled feathers over having our jobs stolen out from under us?"

Rudy's right eye twitched as he turned around fully and Eris' gut told her that if someone didn't step in soon, he was going to do a lot worse than zap the guy. She felt the hair on her arms stand on end as the room began to smell like it did before a storm. The light coming in from outside dimmed as the wind began to pick up. "We're leaving tomorrow and not taking any more jobs today."

"Even better!" the man cheered, and how could he not realize how much danger he was in?!

"I'm not in the mood to deal with extortion attempts. Walk away." A rumble of thunder from outside punctuated the warning.

The bee-headed demon's hand fell to the hilt of his sword, sealing his fate.

Or it would have, if Eris hadn't intervened. Throwing her arm around Rudy's waist, she pulled him off the platform of air he'd been standing on, bringing him flush against her side. For just a moment, he sent her an annoyed look that said he knew exactly what she was doing and didn't appreciate it, but Eris didn't care. "Ruijerd! Take care of the rest!" she called to the man as she dragged the slightly shorter boy—man—out of the Guild office before he killed someone. And she didn't mean that figuratively. No, if that guy's sword had cleared its scabbard, Rudy would have 'preemptively self-defensed him to death' without so much as a word of warning.

"Very well," Ruijerd nodded, moving up to the counter in Rudeus' place.

"Oh, one more thing," she tossed over her shoulder, almost as an afterthought. It wasn't. "Find somewhere else to sleep tonight."

She wasn't asking. It was not a request.

The Superd warrior was fairly loose in his interpretation of what qualified as a 'child' sometimes, but on the matter of her and Rudy's nightly activities, he almost refused to budge. The man was an unrepentant cockblock, as Rudy called it, and felt that they shouldn't be having sex at their ages.

He'll just have to get over it tonight.

Looking up as they left the small Guild office, Eris found what she was expecting—storm clouds gathering overhead. "You want to dismiss that?"

"Not really," Rudy grumbled, but did so anyway given the way the clouds began to disperse and it started to drizzle rain.

She waited until she got him back to their room before starting in on him. "I've had enough."

Rudy raised an eyebrow as he began toeing off his boots. "Going to have to be more specific, Eris."

Planting her fists on her hips, Eris' red eyes met Rudy's green in a glare. "You're pissed all the time. You're constantly working on magic, or building something, or doing jobs and pushing us on to the next town. I know you've been using healing magic to hide the signs, but I know when you don't sleep Rudy—and you haven't been sleeping well in months. When's the last time you had more than four hours of sleep in a night?"

She wanted to hear the answer to that, but now that she'd started she was on a roll and it was all spilling out. All the little worries that had been building over the past months as the person she l—loved self-destructed and just kept going like it didn't matter. "When you do sleep, you grind your teeth, or toss and turn. Or you cry—"

"I do no—"

"Shut up!" Eris cut him off with a yell. "You've hit me more than once, you know. In the face! I didn't say anything, but it's starting to get annoying. I hear you at night, mumbling to Sprite. You need to stop blaming yourself for not finding Zenith and Norn and let her do her job! You've done everything you can do and all you can do now is wait. Yes, it sucks! It absolutely sucks! But it's not your fault and you can't let it drag you down like this!"

"You done?" he asked in that dismissive tone of voice that grated on her nerves. The one he reserved for idiots and assholes. Eris twitched. "Great. Now, I've got shit to do—"

"No more!" Eris yelled and threw herself at him. She collided with Rudy's upper body and dragged them both to the ground. He fought back, but by some unspoken agreement neither of them was using touki. And if he was giving her a chance…

Rudy went for the joint lock almost immediately, but Eris twisted her arm, hand out at the wrist to break his hold as he had taught her, before grabbing his own wrist in both of hers. He tried the same maneuver, but she shifted her grip to his shoulder and forced the smaller boy to roll onto his belly.

Having none of that shit, Rudy continued the roll, twisting hard into the hold she had on him in a move that hurt himself but forced her to let go or have her hand crushed between his back and the floor. Shifting her hips, Eris straddled Rudy and locked legs around his waist. "Stop. Fighting," she growled down at him as she manhandled both of his hands into her own while he struggled, putting her greater reach and weight to good use as leverage. He was just as strong as her without touki, even with her age and height advantage—maybe even a little stronger—which meant she had to take whatever help she could get.

She leaned down a bit, only to be met by a headbutt to the forehead. Eris saw stars, but a quick, silent healing spell fixed that and she returned the favor with a blow of her own that sounded like two coconuts smacking together and left both of them stunned. She healed herself again and collapsed atop her lover with a groan. Her lips sought his out and, for a moment, he resisted—turning away as he glared at her. Eris persisted and after a moment, he returned the kiss and their tongues waged a similar struggle to the one they'd just had.

Then they were fumbling at each other's clothes. Rudy jerked her pants open, not quite but almost breaking the buttons holding the front of them closed. Eris fumbled with his belt before giving a mental 'fuck it' and simply grabbed the top of his pants—pants, belt, underwear, and all—and jerked everything down, exposing him to the air. She stood long enough to kick her pants mostly off before returning to her perch. Pulling her panties aside, she dropped down onto his length forcefully, drawing a pant from both of them.

And then they were fucking.

Eris bounced up and down on Rudy's cock as one of his hands came up under her shirt, pushed up her bra, and mauled her breast—his fingers rolling, pinching, and pulling her nipple in a way that almost hurt but felt oh so good while he squeezed the flesh of her tit in his palm. She ran her fingers through his white hair, grabbed a double handful, and dove in for a kiss that left her lips bruised and her tongue tingly. The hand not occupying her tit reached between them and found her clit, then he began flicking her little nub in time with her bouncing.

Rudeus shifted his legs a bit under himself to get some leverage and, on her next down-stroke, he thrust up hard enough to make her eyes cross as she felt the length and girth of him—stretching her almost uncomfortably—plumb her to her very depths. Eris's eyes fluttered briefly before she growled, used his hair as a handhold, and brought herself down hard enough that when he met her stroke it left the skin of her lips—stretched taut around his cock—tingling with brief pain.

Rudy let go of her tit and brought his hand around behind her. When they next joined fully, the smack of his hand on her left ass cheek was loud in the room, even over the sound of their thumping against the floor. Eris gasped into his mouth, hissing as her eyes narrowed in pleasure and pain, returning the favor by biting his bottom lip nearly hard enough to draw blood.

She climaxed like that only a few short stokes and swats later, his length feeling like a steel bar inside her as her muscles tried to milk him dry. For a moment, all thought fled from her mind.

Rudy's hands found her hips and he rolled her onto her back without pulling out, breaking their kiss and her hold on his hair. Grabbing her ankles, Rudy folded her legs up until her knees were pressed into her chest.

This position is always fun—she found the thought cut off as he took both of her long, toned legs over one shoulder, closing them and making her that much tighter around his length—consequently, making him feel that much larger inside of her already almost overstuffed cunt. Then he started hammering away at her with slow, deep trusts—each more forceful than their combined efforts earlier. Each one threatened to slide her back against the floor—and in fact, a few did and Rudy had to use his grip on her legs to pull her back into him as he fucked away at her. Then, he began spanking her other ass cheek and Eris howled as she came again, water running between their legs as she lost control.

"I should make you lick it up," Rudy threatened, and Eris felt herself blush as he leered down at her. "Flip you over, plant my foot on your head while I fuck you like a bitch in heat, and force you to lick it up."

She came again, feeling shame that she really liked the thought, finger nails digging into the floor to either side of her hips. And then he hilted himself in her and her womb filled with hot, thick seed. The feeling made her groan and left her wanting more—more and more, until it filled her every nook and cranny. Until it sprayed from her gaping, gasping sex to puddle on the floor. Until her belly swelled up and she had to be preg—

Eris was pulled from her thoughts as she felt Rudy lift her up and carry her to the bed. He tossed her none-too-gently onto the bed and joined her a moment later, pulling the blanket over them both. It was just late afternoon, but she felt like a nap anyway. A bit of magic on his part had the room dark as night.

Laying there, their breathing in sync, Eris quietly asked, "Will you talk to me?"

Rudy's body stiffened against her for a moment before he relaxed and pulled her into his arms. His soft, warm lips found the nape of her neck and kissed her. Eris rolled onto her side, pulling her lover into an embrace with both arms and legs.

"You're leaking on me," Rudy chuckled.

Eris rolled her eyes and nipped his shoulder. "Your mess. You clean it up."

She felt the familiar sensation of water magic pulling Rudy's seed from inside her, leaving her feeling cold and empty in a way she did not like but tolerated, because she didn't exactly want a child at the moment. Eventually, in a few years. Maybe two or three… One every other year?

"I'm so—"

"If you finish that, I'm going to smack you," Eris threatened halfheartedly.

Rudy sighed, his breath warm against her skin. Then she flinched as it was his turn to bite her, apparently. "Brat," he accused. "You're right."

A small smile tugged at Eris' lips and she couldn't help herself as she asked, "What was that? I couldn't quite make it out—"

She yelped as Rudy smacked her red ass. "I said you were right. Don't make me repeat myself," he grumbled, and she felt his cock stiffening, its heat brushing against her leg.

Shifting her legs, she captured it in the gap between her thighs and pussy. Slowly, gently, she rubbed herself back and forth. Enough for both of them to enjoy, but not quite enough to lead to another round just yet. Knowing that sometimes, he needed a bit of time to get his thoughts in order, she kept silent—her lips planting gentle kisses here and there up Rudy's shoulder and neck.

Eventually, he spoke. "There's this rule back on Earth, about survival. The Rule of Three. You can survive three minutes without air or in freezing water. Three hours with no shelter in extreme heat or cold. Three days without water. Three weeks without food. Yeah, magic can fudge the numbers, but… it's been six months. I want to believe they're alive, out there somewhere. But Sprite's got so much coverage now that there are few places they could be—and that coverage is growing by the day as she adds more drones to the network. Every day that goes by without finding them is like watching their chances of being alive and not already monster shit dwindle."

He shifted slightly against her and cleared her throat. His voice sounded rough, but Eris paid it no heed. "If I don't do something it's all I can think about, but I'm already doing everything I can, like you said. My mind's too active to sleep most nights. Or I have nightmares about one or the other of them getting eaten by monsters, gang raped by bandits and sold into slavery, or any one of a thousand other equally bad possibilities. Sometimes, yeah, I've woken up swinging, and for that I'm sorry."

Eris smacked him. Not hard, but enough to let him know she was annoyed.

"Ow! Okay, Asuka," he grumbled.

It was not the first time he had called her by another woman's name. Usually, it was specific names when she did specific things. Being 'tsundere' got her called Rin, for instance. She made a mental note to ask about it later, but didn't want to give him the opportunity to change the subject while she had him actually talking. "You were saying?"

"Right," he nodded. "Other times, I don't want to wake you up if I don't come to violently. So I check in with Sprite and see how the search is going, get status updates, that sort of thing."

"Is that what the thing behind your ear is?"

Rudy nodded against her. "Small piece of crystal from my phone stuck against the bone there. Allows for audio through the bone and I can subvocalize back, which what you've been hearing."

"Okay," Eris murmured, thinking the problem over. "Can't do anything to really help with your mom and sister."

"I kn—"

The redhead planted a finger on his lips to shut him up. There were times where she just wanted to smother him with a pillow until he stopped talking. "I think I can help with the sleep problem."

Rudy chuckled against her shoulder before planting a kiss there. "Knock yourself out."

"The other way around."

She felt the eye roll in his words. "Unconsciousness is not sleep, Eris. It doesn't work like that."

A sly grin pulled her lips upwards as she picked up the pace of her sliding his cock between her thighs and against her dripping lips. "I was thinking more along the lines of wearing you down until you pass out."

He caught on quickly as his hands found her hips and his lips met hers. "Sure. Let's try that. Someone's going to have to tell Ruijerd to stop his cockblocking."

"Mm, I think he'll understand. Now, shut up and come. To. Eris!" she growled, shifting her hips and hilting him fully in one go, drawing a quiet laugh from her love as she started round two. "And no touki!"

"Yeah, yeah. It'd defeat the purpose," Rudy agreed easily.

Going to have to call the others and see what they think, Eris decided. And that was the extent of her decision-making for the rest of the night, if it didn't involve changing position, speed, or whether she wanted his load in her womb, on her tongue, or if she wanted to try getting it down her throat.

On the one hand, nothing quite compared to the feeling of his seed filling her up—even if he had to take it back out after. She ached for the day when he would just leave it in.

On the other hand, she enjoyed the taste and liked watching his face as she bathed the head of his cock with her tongue while he came in her mouth…

And on the other, other hand, she really liked it when he fisted her hair in his hands, impaled his cock down her throat, and filled her belly directly… It was both arousing to see him lose control like that—to know she had that sort of power over him, and to know that if he tried, she couldn't resist even if she wanted to—and degrading, which made it all the more arousing.