Board Thread:What Would You Do?/@comment-34904368-20180704164953/@comment-33398500-20180704233503

By the Chief God, we’re almost home!

As we neared the hill, over which we would be able to see Lescatie for the first time since we set out, practically the entire army being wiped out by the mamono that had met our attack into their city.

I should have known something was wrong, when winning a simple battle with a small mamono patrol group had somehow gotten me command of the entire army shortly before the attack on the city began. Though I hadn’t known what had happened to the previous three commanders, all of whom we’d lost before we even reached the city, though they told me after each had been snatched up in ambushes while we marched. I’d never been an officer, hell, I hadn’t even been in charge of my battalion when we’d won that battle (though I did indeed lead them in that instance), and yet, now I was expected to manage this momentous task of invading this mamono city. Perhaps they had expected me to be scooped up before the battle began so they could appoint their actual intended field commander.

However, this never happened, and as the battle progressed, it didn’t matter anyway, as any attempt to manage the situation with any kind of field tactics had been rebuffed, though I wasn’t exactly sure how it was that happened. It had only been through a lucky glance with my field glasses that I figured out why: the sight of our first commander, watching the battle from over the wall of that hell city, some manner of succubus next to him... he’d been turned to their cause!

After the army had been ground down at the city gates by the monsters in heat, many of whom seemed to be lovestruck when they charged, I had been forced to call a retreat back to the holy city: our army, weapons and morale in ruins as we retreated, something which I had been completely unable to remedy as the calm retreat quickly became a desperate rout, the entirety of the army rushing back to get to our ships.

Many times on this journey back to the city, I had attempted to keep some form of discipline aboard the ships: some of my old comrades who had insisted people be sacrificed to the water mamono to keep the boats from stopping were the next to go. If they wanted that sort of sacrifice, they would be making it themselves...

However, as we had returned to our own continent, I had lost control of the army: having to already fight off a mutiny attempt to keep them from throwing me to them... then again, maybe the mamono knew I was never meant to be an officer, let alone our commander, but I was still, in reality, powerless to stop the mob mentality was currently reigning among the desperate survivors of the invasion army, throwing anyone it seemed the mamono would like to them to get them to slow their pursuit.

I seemed to be the only one to notice, among the hundred or so men currently left, that we had returned to the region around Lescatie, yet the demonic energy that had turned our female soldiers and knights had not dissipated. In fact, it seemed to be even stronger than before here as we neared the crest of the hill. “What is this...? Did we bring back this contamination with us?” I thought aloud as we now reached the top of the hill, the old sights of this area still familiar even with this strange presence contaminating air, earth and water...

“They are coming!” one of the men nearer the base of the hill cried out, terrified as many of us looked back to see where they were coming from, but not I... I could see the source of it just up ahead... the horde was already here.

Able to finally see Lescatie, my heart sank in my chest: the city was less our home, and more like the place we had attempted to besiege so short a time ago... something had corrupted the city, and turned it into one of theirs!

“No! Not from there! The city has fallen!” I called to them. Something had claimed the city while the cream of our army had been away attempting to strike down another of their cities.

We had just come back from hell in an attempt to save what was left of our army, only to find that the home we had left had been brought to hell for us, so that we might never leave. “We have to get out of here!” I started, before then the mens’ fear had been realized, the horde that had still been following us came from behind us.

“No...” I started, as despair started to sweep over the entire surviving army. “No! Everyone! To positions! If this is to be where we fall, then, damn it, we’re going to fall in a way to be worthy of our true home!” Our tiny, encircled force now surrounded by mamono, alongside their new husbands, the group coming from the city wearing armour and symbols that seemed a downright perversion of our own equipment and symbols.

Drawing my own weapon as the few men we had left desperately threw away even their panic, simply mindlessly following my command, the group of us forming a circle as the army advanced on us.

However, before they attacked us, I could see a mamono floating above her army, clearly a powerful succubus, now looked upon us, smiling sweetly down at her catch. “Ah, it seems some of our brave soldiers managed to return to us~” she cooed “...so, what brings you to my kingdom?” the lilim asked, her eyes currently fixed on mine, after picking out the leader among us.

“YOUR kingdom!?” I repeated angrily. “This is OUR kingdom! The holy city of Lescatie, a place that you have clearly twisted with your monstrous perversions! Corrupting what soldiers were left into your convenient sex toys and puppets!” While this seemed to encourage my own men, causing a small but clear cheering, the surrounding force, particularly the group from inside the city, started jeering at what I’d said, their shouting easily drowning out my encouragement.

“Foolish order puppet!” a lamia near the front shouted.

“You know NOTHING!” a man some distance over added.

“Oh my, it seems that you’ve stirred up the noble guardians of my land~” the lilim teased “...but no matter, my children, they will soon learn the error of their ways... feel free to show them as soon as you catch them~” this seemed to stir up the horde even more than my insults had, some of the mamono grinning across at us “Looks like they were running away from some potential suitors as well, you may help catch them... but leave the commander...” As I now wore a plain expression of confusion on my face, she smirked “I’ll be taking care of him...”

At this one of the other mamono, clearly some manner of field commander, gave the order to charge, the horde descending upon our overwhelmed army like a tidal wave. However, as I looked around, my men and I hopelessly resisting the attacking horde, it was clear something was off, even the men made their pets were not striking to kill, instead each of them rapidly disarming my surviving troops, the mamono that had been pursuing us, and some from the city that were without husbands of their own, rapidly claimed each and every one of my men.

Every one, that is, except me.

As they started making my soldiers theirs right there and then, I was left flabbergasted, as none had even tried to restrain me or keep me from leaving: just WHAT was the plan here? To be honest, part of me wasn’t sure to be relieved I wasn’t taken, or jealous that they seemed to be enjoying themselves, especially as the conquering horde started to... umm... celebrate with their husbands in their midst.

“...and then there was one...” the lilim then spoke, landing just a few feet in front of me. “...I wanted that attitude of yours intact, so I could show you just how mistaken you are in your assumptions... that, and I’m trying to figure out an appropriate punishment for violating the new laws of the land so blatantly... They seem to be enjoying themselves, though...” she finished with a laugh before simply grabbing me by the arm, starting fly up over the battlefield, where the entire field seemed to be writhing in pleasure.

I couldn’t really argue with that.

As the lilim now carried me along until we returned to the holy city, I looked around now, as things were even more lewd and twisted here than they were outside, mamono and their captive humans, performing every kind of debauchery under the sun, many of them in the churches and holy places that were dedicated to the Chief God. “The worst kind of blasphemy...!” I started, before a simple gesture from her stayed my hand.

“No need for that. It’s only by my order that you were not claimed outside... I wanted you see this... the people of the city aren’t captives...” she then stated “...in fact, they are far freer now than when the order ran things here... all that mindless religious doctrine, the economic suppression, the forcing of people into armed conflict to kill and die in the name of a malevolent being... that has been stopped... the only law of this land being to spread love and joy wherever one can~” she then bubbled, her hands at her cheeks as she thought about her ideals. “...and it is THAT law which you have broken by order your men to fight, and die if necessary, in an attempt to destroy that love...” she then stated in a harsher tone.

“Yes? ...and what is the punishment for that?” I asked, shaking my head.

“You’ll see...”

The transition of tones almost felt like she had physically struck me, shame welling up in my gut at having led the people entrusted to my care so poorly, unsure how many died, or how many had ended up paired with one of those monsters we had come there to end...

As she led me into the church we had seen mamono and men contorting inside, I caught a glimpse of familiar faces at the altar “Sister Anne...? Jack!?” I started. She was originally a nun in this very church, and he was a friend from back when I was in the city guard. So why... why was she now a lamia, with all manner of snakes emanating from her head and wrapping around Jack!?

“Victor!? I thought you were lost with the army!” Jack then answered in a remarkably casual tone, given he was being raped by a mamono that used to be a nun. “They had put you in charge of it...?” he then asked with confusion.

“Confused?” the lilim who had brought me here now asked. “You see, I can see the true desires of people... and the dear sister of this church so desired to keep your friend for herself and to never let him go. So much so that when I transformed her, her energy allowed her to become a high-level lamia: a medusa...”

“...are you not married?” the nun-turned-medusa asked with confusion apparent on her face, just as surprised by my solitary presence with her leader as I was with the current debauchery.

“I’m afraid he isn’t... but fear not, that shall be remedied shortly...” she then told the worried girl.

“What is this!? He’s a prisoner of her coils, I have to get him out of there!” I started, before, once again, she stopped me with a single gesture, strangely, her slightest instruction caused me to stop in my tracks.

“What? Prisoner? You’ve got it all wrong! I love my wife! She loves me! Soon, we’ll love our daughters! No one’s a prisoner here, though it looks like you might be at the moment...” Jack responded to my attempt to help him. Was I the one in the wrong here?

“True, the man is a prisoner of loneliness... and now attempts to enforce it upon others...” A succubus currently making the organ play with her lewd movements with her husband added over the noise of the organ: that horrible, disorganized cacophony driving any real thought from me as it was quite difficult to concentrate with the noise.

“Always was a quiet one...” a guy on the other side of the church added.

As they said this, I felt myself backing away, right out of the church. “Planning on running, are you? Alone, you’ll end up the gate-guard’s boy-toy, unless she took one of your soldiers while she was out there...” the lilim teased.

“I can’t be here... it’s a twisted mockery of the city... and everyone’s just happily accepting that!” I spewed, thought it seemed my statements were playing on her nerves.

“All right then... it seems you haven’t learned anything from our visit to some old friends... did you not enjoy the displays of affection?” she then asked, looking as if she were thinking of something to be done.

“Not particularly. The defacing of a church in such a manner is off-putting no matter who supports it...” I stated, her attitude earning my ire as well.

“Yeah, you didn’t learn ANYTHING... good day.” She finished, before she flew up, seeming to disappear into the city.

Left alone, I looked around the street now, which was still littered with mamono coupling with their husbands in the middle of the day. Even as I walked down the street, they seemed to take no notice of me, even some people I’d known before the city fell simply saying ‘good day’ or ‘hello’ as I passed by, still garbed in my commander’s gear, which made the situation feel all the more surreal.

Why would she have left me here, after taking enough of an interest in me to stop her army from seizing me as if some manner of spoils of victory?

As I continued to look around, as I arrived at the training grounds, where there were yet more displays of the corruption of the city, in this place where I had first learned how to fight, and how to keep other people safe from harm, were now couples ‘working on endurance’ as a nearby minotaur mentioned without even breaking pace with her husband. Even as I continued to see all this, and friends I had thought were killed by the horde in the middle of pleasing their spouses, I felt quite strange, like someone had hit me in the stomach. What was that?

I was still there, in the middle of the training grounds, having walked through most of the city without being assailed, when the lilim could be seen nearby, though she made no attempt to approach. Why was she so interested in me... and why did it feel downright painful to witness all of this and somehow be alone in the crowd?

“Well, well... looks like someone’s made his way back to where he began...” a clear, firm voice then called from behind me. As I turned about on my heel, the sight of who appeared to be my old training partner back during basic, Sarah, though she was clearly different... transformed into a succubus by the powers that took this place. “...you don’t look any different from when you left...”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, Sarah...” I responded to her, drawing my weapon defensively, as this was the first mamono to approach me alone since I got here, even if she had been a friend before.

“Oh? Nervous, are you? Not surprising, you’ve been surrounded by others having fun all this time and you just wandering about, like something out of a dream... a bad dream. Has the loneliness hit you yet?” she asked, now taking several steps toward me, each one prompting me to move back. When it was clear I wasn’t going to answer, she nodded “...all I needed to see... it’s terrible, being in a place so full of love and no place to give yours~ That’s why I’m glad you came back...”

As I continued to hold out my weapon defensively, she shook her head “Oh, come now, Victor. You must have figured out by now what’s going on~ Lady Druella was even kind enough to show you around the new city, and bring you to where I could find you, even if you did get on her nerves...” this last part was said with a small pout, as if I’d given her mother lip or something. “You can’t win...” she continued “...you’ve been submerged in demonic energy this long, you’re probably halfway to being an incubus before anyone’s even touched you... and... you know... I’ve just wanted to see you...”

I don’t really know where THIS came from... we trained together for a couple of months, but there was never any kind of real connection, at least, as far as I knew...

“She must be as lonely as you are...” a somewhat familiar voice called from where I saw the lilim before. “...and you’re in the perfect place to ‘train’ each other...”

Now, unable to accept what was going on, I charged her, aiming to swing my blade before she simply shifted to the side of my haphazard, half-hearted attack, knocking the weapon out of my hand and kissing me happily. “No, Victor. That’s the old use of this place... now let me teach you the new one~” she then giggled, for some reason looking downright ecstatic at the moment as she pushed my weakened form to the ground and set about claiming her partner, another shadow cast over me as another familiar-yet-not girl was looking down at the two of us, before Sarah whispered “...Lady Druella also told me you needed to be punished, for attempting to harm the love of this place... and so... you will give love freely to whoever asks for it~ Isn’t that nice?” as it now became clear what the second girl had in mind, though her demonic features seemed somewhat... incomplete from my view, other shadows being cast over me, though it was difficult to see anything but their legs from the angle Sarah had me on, her blocking the sight of them, though soon my vision was blocked by the second girl as she cooed the last discernable words I would hear for quite a while.

“We’ll never be lonely again~”