Seeds of Heroism - Chapter 42
Chapter 42 – content: >!general violence, castrations, mentions rape!<
[*A guide to the world of Bythos!*](https://imgur.com/a/poZLPkK)
A wide slash opened a red line on the guard’s throat. With a shocked gurgle, he clutched the wound and crashed to the ground.
“They roughly know where we are, but they can’t see any better than we do! The moment they step into the light, attack!”
Another one of the Cillian guards ran at him, his sword cautiously raised to his side. Jim faked a strike from above before dropping his own weapon low to smash it into his side instead. A second strike bit through his gambeson.
“Cheers!” Aramis yelled. He had an arrow notched and his bow drawn, waiting for another enemy to show up. The moment one did, he pivoted on his heel and let the projectile buzz through the air. It whizzed inches from Liriel’s face, then continued to its target. Before the man had hit the ground, he had already drawn another arrow from the quiver. “Maybe we can actually make it out of here alive!”
“Watch where you’re shooting!” A faint green glow surrounded her empty left palm. Two men emerged from the shadows. She slammed her hand onto the fuzzy floor. A thick root bucked up right in front of the first attacker. It caught his foot like a sling and he slammed to the ground. Suddenly having to step over his tripped comrade, the second guard was brought out of balance. He couldn’t raise his sword in time to block Liriel. As she stamped forward, making sure to trample the nuts of the man she had made stumble, Liriel raised her weapon. She had to fight with a sword rather than the slender rapiers or épées she favoured but she still brought the heavy steel forward with impressive speed, running her opponent through.
She hadn’t seen that a third man was right behind them. He swung a large axe right at her, before suddenly screaming out mid-swing and tumbling to the ground. Liriel turned to the left and smiled.
“Thanks for the save!”
“Don’t mention it,” Ina replied. She grabbed the testicle on her dagger, squeezed her fingers around it and plucked it off the weapon. She carelessly threw it behind herself where a small pile of slashed, stabbed and crushed balls started to form.
“Eyes up front, they’re still coming!” Zenobia reminded them. In her hand was one of the balls Ina had discarded. She briefly channelled mana into it, then threw it at a goblin who was trying to sneak up on Ina. The small charge only made him flinch as the electricity overwhelmed his senses for a brief second, but it was enough for the auf to attack and bring him down.
“I'm not sure they’re ever going to come again,” Ina said with a smirk and a glance at the pile of maimed gonads.
“Really? You’re joking even now?” Zenobia said in exasperation.
“We all deal with stress differently, mi bella!” Aramis yelled while trying hard not to look at said pile. “In fact, I’d love to show you one of my favourite methods after this fight!”
This time it was the sorceress that couldn’t suppress a smile. “I’d like that!”
“Stop getting complacent, they haven’t sent any more royal knights after us. These are all just town guards. Don’t assume the ones we’ve seen before were all that are here!”
As if on cue, a wall of men marched out of the shadows. At least six royal knights were heading for them, walking in step instead of running at them blindly, shields raised, swords pointed towards them. The menacing view shut up the party’s banter.
Jim stepped in front of the group. “Inacea, when I call out a number, can you attack that guy, counting from the left?” He knew what she was doing to their opponents, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“… yeah,” she said feebly.
“Good.” He breathed in and ran forward, sword raised to his side.
“Two!” he shouted and turned left, running straight at the same knight he had called out.
“GYAAARGH!” The knight screamed and buckled over. He had felt a strange cold and rough sensation building in his sack when Ina teleported one of his nuts in front of her, pressing it against the ground. Then she stabbed the ball over and over again, turning it first into a pincushion, then into the testicular equivalent of pulled pork as the gonad lost its shape, instead expelling its stringy contents into the world. She didn’t stop piercing the ball until it had deflated into a sad lump of mush and chunks. Splatters of pasty manhood covered the ground, her hands, as well as her clothes up to her breasts.
Jim used the sudden breach in their formation to drive them apart. Two quick strikes knocked the weapons they had pointed at him out of the way, and a third managed to nick the arm of knight number three.
They immediately turned and focused on him.
He managed to keep pace with two of them, but the third was driving him back. A glancing blow opened a gash on Jim’s arm. In retaliation, Aramis drove an arrow between his shoulder blades.
With a wordless scream, Liriel ran up to assist Jim. The fourth knight seemed to have waited for this. With a wicked grin, he spun around and stabbed his sword toward her.
She panicked and dove. The elf realized he would just stab down in a second, and that would be her end. Liriel tried to twist in the air, which turned into a botched roll forward. The control of her limbs somewhat lost, her arms along with her sword were slung up above her by the wild roll.
She rolled between his legs, coming to a stop behind him. Disoriented, she scrambled up and only then realized she was standing behind the knight. She turned just in time to see the silhouettes of two testicles and a flaccid penis flop down, hitting the ground where she had just rolled. A glance at her weapon confirmed that she must have accidentally slashed his groin when rolling through his legs.
The knight followed his chopped manhood a second later.
Together, Liriel and Jim defeated of the last two remaining knights. Panting, they stood face to face. They could see the fear on each other’s faces, but also the hope they shared. Something glinted on Liriel’s cleavage, and he was glad to see the necklace he had made for her. The yellow scale was a nice contrast to her emerald eyes.
Her gaze similarly fell to his chest. Looking down, he noticed the alicorn tip she had given him as a memento of their quest. Tired and sweaty, neither of them could hold back a smile.
The constant fighting had taken a toll on them, tiring them out but their will was unbroken.
Aramis, Inacea and Zenobia didn’t fare much better, or worse. While Aramis was the least out of breath, he was running out of arrows quickly. Ina and Zenobia both were drenched in sweat from continuously casting spells, breathing heavily.
“I think the worst is over,” Aramis said.
A swarm of Cillian guards descended upon them.
Jim didn’t have time to express his exasperation as he was thrust back into the fight.
*Raise blade, twirl and block with crossguard, forward step and strike, step back and turn hips, hold for approach, high guard.*
The individual steps Leonia had drilled into him again and again filled his mind. He moved like an automaton, mechanically advancing and falling back in time with his opponents, each attack met with the appropriate response.
*Sweep the leg, pommel strike to stun, ox guard, seize opportunity to strike, advance, deflect swipes at legs and slash extended limbs, bide time.*
Sweat ran in rivers along his neck and arms, making his grip on the weapon more tenuous than the sprinkles of blood already did. Thankfully, he didn’t notice how his lungs burned and his arms grew sore.
*Fool’s guard, duck and weave, cut across from right, raise blade left into plough guard, spin and deflect the strike from behind, lunge and turn, from the day, hold.*
Someone unexpectedly collided with his back and Jim was ready to turn and strike, but the smell of moss and misty pines made him stay his weapon. He felt Liriel’s back rise and fall against his own. They were both nearing the end of their endurance, but their enemies seemed to be innumerable. Again and again their blades lifted and fell, struck and guarded, each time just a little bit slower.
*We can do this, we can win. We must! And if we can’t… then I need to find a way for her to at least get out of here. She doesn’t deserve to die here because of me.*
*So, what if she used to work for the Silver Hand? No, that was probably a lie anyway. Liriel’s a good person, I know that because she has been the entire time I’ve been with her.*
*If at all possible… I would like to stay with her. Not just get out of here together but… after, as well. Maybe we could date. Is that even what you say here? Date? Maybe it’s ‘court her’ or something like that. All I know is that I don’t want to lose her.*
Several new cuts littered his body, but none yet that would threaten his life. But he knew it was only a matter of time. Still the guards kept coming, as if they had alerted the entire watch of Hôdoburg.
Liriel and Jim fought back to back, but the gulf between them and the rest of their party had grown. Ina had been forced to use her dagger to defend herself instead of emasculating droves of men. Aramis was next to her, similarly engaged now that his quiver had long been emptied. Zenobia was two steps away, clumsily wielding two of the guard’s swords she had picked up that crackled and flashed with electricity.
Out of the dark, a man’s voice wafted over. “W-won't you surrender n-now? We h-have you surrounded!”
“What the twelve hells was that,” a woman’s voice asked. “You were supposed to intimidate them, not make them laugh!”
Around them, the guards stepped back as one, wary but no longer attacking. “I think… I know them,” Jim said with a heaving chest.
“What… do you mean?” Liriel replied, wincing at the stitches in her side.
“Bruna’s court. They’re nobles on the council.”
With an audible sigh, Yohanna said, “Well, you heard the little guy. Either surrender or be made to surrender.”
“What guarantee do we have that you’ll let us live if we put our weapons down?” Jim asked.
There was a moment of pregnant silence. Then, “None at all, Jim. But it would be less exhausting.” He could feel her smug grin through her words. “I suppose I can guarantee *your* survival.”
He was about to spurn the offer when Liriel shouted at the figures hidden in the darkness. “I will never let you have him! I will kill each and every last one of you if you try to take Jim away!”
The silhouette of a slender woman stepped into the outer edge of the mushroom orbs’ light radius. She whistled appreciatively. “Aren’t you a possessive little minx! See, Kasper, that’s what the queen said you’re missing.” Her head flicked to Ina. “If you use that strange magic right now, all the men under my control will strike you down and pass you around as meat to be fucked for the next decade, whether you’re alive to feel it or not.”
The auf had raised her palm, ready to attack lady Yohanna but slowly let it sink back down. “That’s better, isn’t it?” She nodded to herself. “Now, I don’t think you fully appreciate your situation here, and that may be partly my fault. Sorry about that. I made it sound like you had a *choice*, and that is a tad misleading. No, I just wanted to tell you how useless your struggle is, *but* I might be inclined to give you a little incentive. How about…” Yohanna put a finger to her chin in thought, “I take the foxboy with me. You’re cute, I’d like to have you in my harem.”
Aramis spat on the ground. “No way, I’ve known women like you in the past, rompicoglioni like you aren’t worth my time.”
She raised her hand in a shrug. “Oh well, what can you do.” She slowly stepped back towards the dark. “Have it your way then. So long!” Before Ina could bewitch the noble lady, the Cillian guards attacked them, forcing her to block a strike instead of punish the annoying woman.
Like a swarm, the guards descended upon them. The short reprieve Yohanna afforded them so she could taunt the party let them catch their breath a bit, but that little burst of stamina was soon at its end.
No matter how many they felled beneath their swords, how many Zenobia shocked, or Aramis and Ina injured, more emerged from the darkness to replace their fallen comrades. The surging of bodies, trying to dodge, taking every small opportunity to attack had separated them all from each other. Even between Jim and Liriel, a gulf of men had grown. They could barely hear the other three fight.
Then, Inacea cried out in pain, much louder than the small grunts Jim had heard her give before. He couldn’t see her, but he knew this would be the end. When the first of them fell, the others would follow soon after. Queen Bruna had won. He wished she was here so he could at least scream his frustration at her.
A column of light pierced the darkness before him. He only dared to look for a second, but it was long enough to see the hole that had opened up in the ceiling and the contour of people standing over it.
A faint buzz grew louder, then a crossbow bolt struck the guard right next to him. It pierced his groin of all places and the man fell to the ground, clutching at the projectile lodged in his manhood.
Confusion broke out in the ranks of guards. They shoved and pushed, trying to reorient themselves and fight their attacker.
Ropes whistled through the air as people abseiled from the hole, landing on the mushrooms before rappelling down further. Some instead decided to clamber down the tall fungi as if they were the trees they rivalled. As soon as they touched the gloomy ground, fighting erupted once more. All around them, more bolts whistled through the air as steel clashed with steel.
Jim wasn’t sure who they were, but he knew he couldn’t waste the opportunity. The arrival of the new fighters opened up space and he ran towards the spot he had heard Ina’s scream from. Liriel was close behind him, having had the same idea.
They arrived at the injured woman only to see someone unfamiliar bent over her. A woman with wavy black hair was currently trying to stem the flow of blood from the auf’s slashed side.
“Chew on this for me, would you? I’m no damn priestess, but I can still make sure you don’t die,” she said.
Ina dutifully chewed despite the pain she was in, and even managed to ask, “Ugh, so bitter, do these heal me?”
“Not per se,” the medic said and reached into Ina’s mouth, grabbing the wet greenery and slapping it onto her wound.
“Ow! What the hell!”
“It thickens your blood, stops the bleeding.”
All around them, more people – most of them women, Jim noted – dropped and threw themselves into the fight.
Then, a blur of something fell from one of the mushrooms, landing next to Ina in her pile of testicles.
“Goddessdammit, she didn’t have to push me…” A red mess of hair popped out of the small mountain of leaking balls, one nut precariously balanced on top of it. Streaks of white dirtied the fiery red mane. “I’m going to replace all her rations with merman balls for a week for that…”
[Jim’s jaw dropped. “Despina!”](https://imgur.com/a/3yphut8)
The redhead looked around until she spotted who had called her name, then rose from the gonads and stomped on over to him, each step accompanied by wet squelches.
“Despina, is it really you? What are you doing here, I thought you-”
With a smile, the princess took her last step, then smashed her foot forward into Jim’s nuts. His balls, filled from weeks without a release were sensitive even compared to a normal set of testicles, already nature’s designated off button for any man – or Norea’s, if Sophian mythos was to be believed.
But not only were his nuts incredibly tender right now, they were also bound tightly by the wooden ring Liriel had put on them, smushing the fat nuts into each other. It meant they weren’t as flexible in their position as they would’ve been normally, and so the princess’s foot sank much deeper into the meat of his nuts instead of lifting the fragile organs and moving them out of the way of her kick.
It shut him up immediately, both in shock and in blinding pain that exploded in his balls. Maybe they weren’t responsible in equal measure.
“Aaaaah!” Despina’s sigh sounded sexual to Jim, but he was in no state to comment. “Goddess, I’ve been needing that one.”
“Why?” he squeaked.
“Why? WHY?” Despina bent down towards and grabbed his arms to pry them away from his crotch. “Maybe because you do nothing but cause trouble? Because first I have to convince my mother that no, I didn’t let you stick that stupid horsecock you have between your legs in me, and then you get accused of killing the church’s maiden of light anyway?” She slammed her foot down between his legs, the small slip-on shoe she was wearing scraping against his nutsack.
Despina kept stomping his balls, but her voice grew frail and weak. “Because ever since we said goodbye, it’s all gone down the gutter?” Her toe caught the top of his right nut, pulling it down as the cord attaching it stretched and crushed the testicle against the ground. In a tiny voice, she whispered, “Because I’ve lost my family and my home and I couldn’t do anything to stop it…” She kept his ball pinned under her foot, but her heart wasn’t in it.
Liriel approached and the princess quickly wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve. “Despina! I’m so glad you’re here!” She hugged the princess, then took a step back. “Why do you have a man’s plum on your head?”
The redhead looked at her in utter confusion, so Liriel reached and plucked the whiteish oval from her hair. “See?” She held the nut gingerly between two fingers and showed it to the princess. It had miraculously survived Ina’s onslaught.
“And you didn’t think it important to inform me that I had someone’s babymaker on my head?” she yelled and punted her foot into his nuts, her toes hitting them in the central divot they had received on their first meeting.
Liriel giggled, but couldn’t contain her curiosity as she watched Despina rearrange the contents of Jim’s sack. “Who are all these people with you, though?”
The princess’s red hair bounced up and down as she kicked, in time with her jiggling butt and very much in contrast to her modest chest. “Most of them are adventurers from Calvino! And some regular folk wanting to make a difference! We’re Calvino’s resistance!”
That was when the tall, lithe frame of Leonia landed next to them. The former knight-captain seemed to shake the ground as she landed. Unlike the lightly armoured princess in her usual boiled leather breastplate, Leonia seemed girded for war.
A full plate armour in the vague shape of her physique protected her body. From it dangled chainmail covering her thighs and loins. Pauldrons, greaves and vambraces were buckled to her limbs, leaving few spots that weren’t covered by metal. Slung on her back was her shield, her sword belt carried both a longsword and a broadsword.
As soon as her feet touched the ground, she ripped the shield off her back and drew the longsword. The shield was completely covered in markings.
“Liriel, it’s good to meet you again! You too, boy.”
“Hello, Leonia,” Jim squeaked with Despina’s foot still lodged in his balls.
“Leonia!” Liriel yelled and flung her arms around the woman.
“I’m happy to see you as well,” the warrior said. Jim got the sense she wanted to pet the elven girl’s head but couldn’t on account of the weapon in her hand.
Without warning, she slammed her shield into Liriel, tossing her to the ground. She gasped and Leonia was already above her. She stretched her shield arm, bringing it in front of Despina just in time to catch the arrow that stuck in her shield.
At the edge of the darkness, the hairy figure of a goblin cackled as it withdrew into the shadows, bow in hand.
“You little rat!” Leonia screamed after him. “I pummelled your stones when we tracked that unicorn, it will end the same way this time! But don’t think I will stop before I’ve turned the contents of your sack to jelly this time!”
She easily blocked the arrow that he fired at her from the dark as an answer.
“Badri is here…?” Despina muttered. Her expression changed. Instead of an annoyed frown or sad downcast look, her face set into a determined focus. She took her foot off Jim’s nuts and grabbed his collar. “Up and at ‘em, Jimmy, you’re helping me get that slimy bastard. I’m going to tie his little balls into a knot.”
“I’m afraid that’s going to have to wait,” Zenobia said when she appeared at the princess’s side. “Hello Pina, I’ve missed you.” A heartfelt reunion and introductions for Aramis and Inacea later, Zenobia returned to her original point. “It seems they’ve given up on drowning us in numbers. They’re sending the rest of the royal knights after us.”
“Good,” Leonia said.
“You don’t seem surprised?” Jim asked, still cradling his balls, but standing upright at least.
“We’ve fought our own battles, Jimmy. *Someone* had to help Cillia take Roridafiga. The knights committed high treason. They did it again when Calvino fell, but this time for all to see,” Despina said.
“Calvino… fell?” He tried to search her face to see if she was just joking. “Then, your family… the queen is…”
She nodded, the grim determination never leaving her face.
“Get ready. I can’t promise I will be able to defend all of you.” Leonia pulled the straps on her vambraces tight one last time. “They’re coming.”
“We’re fighting with you, of course,” Jim said. “Zenobia, you should stay with Ina.”
The sorceress sighed. “Guess that makes the most sense. I’ve still got one big spell in me. If things get hairy, fall back to me. I’ll see if I can give you a little help.”
“Zenny, maybe you should take your friend there,” Despina said and pointed at the injured but standing Ina, “and head further down. See where the lights get denser? I’m willing to bet there’s something at the end of this weird place. Maybe you can keep an eye on it.”
Leonia nodded but never took her eyes off the encroaching dark. “Her highness is right. If we have need of your help, we will come find you.”
Zenobia and Ina both agreed reluctantly. They had barely made it fifty steps when another figure emerged from the dark.
His greasy black hair, condescending snarl and visibly straining erection made him instantly recognizable to the princess.
“You… filthy, disgusting manwhore of a traitor!” she yelled.
“Now, now princess, complimenting me will get you nowhere,” sir William replied. “Don’t worry, I’ll pin you down and stuff your ass like I did your mother’s in a bit but you have to be patient. I’m not here for you, at least, not first and foremost.” He ignored her screaming blue murder, his eyes instead settling on Leonia. “Hello, *former* knight-captain. It seems we meet again.”
Leonia stared at him, unwavering. “I have no idea who you are.”
“WHAT? You insolent whore, how dare you… I was lord Fieramosca’s aide!”
Still, Leonia stared at him, moving no muscle except furrowing her brows.
“You… cannot be serious.” Sir William pinched the bridge of his nose. “He was knight-captain before you.”
Her frown cleared. “Ah! The adulterer and defrauder I defeated.”
William spat on the ground. “You only defeated him because you cheated! He was never the same after you… you…”
“Smashed his stones?” she offered helpfully.
“You will pay for what you have done! I will make you feel his pain, and when you lie broken before me, I will rape your little charge on top of your corpse!” he snarled.
Her frown was back. “I cannot allow that.”
He turned and walked back into the dark. “Then you know where to find me.”
From another side, a group of knights, fighting side by side with a unit of the Cillian guards, emerged from the shadows.
“Boy, I will leave those to you.”
She dashed forward, towards the spot sir William had appeared at. An arrow whistled through the air right as she was about to step into the dark. She brought her shield up to her face without even sparing the projectile a glance. Then darkness swallowed her.
A smile stretched Despina’s rosy cheeks. Out of a bag tied to her belt, she fished out what looked to be iron marbles. Her hands twirled the globes in her palm, nervous and eager at the same time. She turned to the knights as well as Cillian guards approached. “Seems like I can concentrate entirely on that hairy cocksucker. It’s time to hunt.”
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*Not enjoying the interface changes in all honesty. Just makes it a tad more cumbersome to paste text in here. Oh well, what can you do*
[*A guide to the world of Bythos!*](https://imgur.com/a/poZLPkK)
A wide slash opened a red line on the guard’s throat. With a shocked gurgle, he clutched the wound and crashed to the ground.
“They roughly know where we are, but they can’t see any better than we do! The moment they step into the light, attack!”
Another one of the Cillian guards ran at him, his sword cautiously raised to his side. Jim faked a strike from above before dropping his own weapon low to smash it into his side instead. A second strike bit through his gambeson.
“Cheers!” Aramis yelled. He had an arrow notched and his bow drawn, waiting for another enemy to show up. The moment one did, he pivoted on his heel and let the projectile buzz through the air. It whizzed inches from Liriel’s face, then continued to its target. Before the man had hit the ground, he had already drawn another arrow from the quiver. “Maybe we can actually make it out of here alive!”
“Watch where you’re shooting!” A faint green glow surrounded her empty left palm. Two men emerged from the shadows. She slammed her hand onto the fuzzy floor. A thick root bucked up right in front of the first attacker. It caught his foot like a sling and he slammed to the ground. Suddenly having to step over his tripped comrade, the second guard was brought out of balance. He couldn’t raise his sword in time to block Liriel. As she stamped forward, making sure to trample the nuts of the man she had made stumble, Liriel raised her weapon. She had to fight with a sword rather than the slender rapiers or épées she favoured but she still brought the heavy steel forward with impressive speed, running her opponent through.
She hadn’t seen that a third man was right behind them. He swung a large axe right at her, before suddenly screaming out mid-swing and tumbling to the ground. Liriel turned to the left and smiled.
“Thanks for the save!”
“Don’t mention it,” Ina replied. She grabbed the testicle on her dagger, squeezed her fingers around it and plucked it off the weapon. She carelessly threw it behind herself where a small pile of slashed, stabbed and crushed balls started to form.
“Eyes up front, they’re still coming!” Zenobia reminded them. In her hand was one of the balls Ina had discarded. She briefly channelled mana into it, then threw it at a goblin who was trying to sneak up on Ina. The small charge only made him flinch as the electricity overwhelmed his senses for a brief second, but it was enough for the auf to attack and bring him down.
“I'm not sure they’re ever going to come again,” Ina said with a smirk and a glance at the pile of maimed gonads.
“Really? You’re joking even now?” Zenobia said in exasperation.
“We all deal with stress differently, mi bella!” Aramis yelled while trying hard not to look at said pile. “In fact, I’d love to show you one of my favourite methods after this fight!”
This time it was the sorceress that couldn’t suppress a smile. “I’d like that!”
“Stop getting complacent, they haven’t sent any more royal knights after us. These are all just town guards. Don’t assume the ones we’ve seen before were all that are here!”
As if on cue, a wall of men marched out of the shadows. At least six royal knights were heading for them, walking in step instead of running at them blindly, shields raised, swords pointed towards them. The menacing view shut up the party’s banter.
Jim stepped in front of the group. “Inacea, when I call out a number, can you attack that guy, counting from the left?” He knew what she was doing to their opponents, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“… yeah,” she said feebly.
“Good.” He breathed in and ran forward, sword raised to his side.
“Two!” he shouted and turned left, running straight at the same knight he had called out.
“GYAAARGH!” The knight screamed and buckled over. He had felt a strange cold and rough sensation building in his sack when Ina teleported one of his nuts in front of her, pressing it against the ground. Then she stabbed the ball over and over again, turning it first into a pincushion, then into the testicular equivalent of pulled pork as the gonad lost its shape, instead expelling its stringy contents into the world. She didn’t stop piercing the ball until it had deflated into a sad lump of mush and chunks. Splatters of pasty manhood covered the ground, her hands, as well as her clothes up to her breasts.
Jim used the sudden breach in their formation to drive them apart. Two quick strikes knocked the weapons they had pointed at him out of the way, and a third managed to nick the arm of knight number three.
They immediately turned and focused on him.
He managed to keep pace with two of them, but the third was driving him back. A glancing blow opened a gash on Jim’s arm. In retaliation, Aramis drove an arrow between his shoulder blades.
With a wordless scream, Liriel ran up to assist Jim. The fourth knight seemed to have waited for this. With a wicked grin, he spun around and stabbed his sword toward her.
She panicked and dove. The elf realized he would just stab down in a second, and that would be her end. Liriel tried to twist in the air, which turned into a botched roll forward. The control of her limbs somewhat lost, her arms along with her sword were slung up above her by the wild roll.
She rolled between his legs, coming to a stop behind him. Disoriented, she scrambled up and only then realized she was standing behind the knight. She turned just in time to see the silhouettes of two testicles and a flaccid penis flop down, hitting the ground where she had just rolled. A glance at her weapon confirmed that she must have accidentally slashed his groin when rolling through his legs.
The knight followed his chopped manhood a second later.
Together, Liriel and Jim defeated of the last two remaining knights. Panting, they stood face to face. They could see the fear on each other’s faces, but also the hope they shared. Something glinted on Liriel’s cleavage, and he was glad to see the necklace he had made for her. The yellow scale was a nice contrast to her emerald eyes.
Her gaze similarly fell to his chest. Looking down, he noticed the alicorn tip she had given him as a memento of their quest. Tired and sweaty, neither of them could hold back a smile.
The constant fighting had taken a toll on them, tiring them out but their will was unbroken.
Aramis, Inacea and Zenobia didn’t fare much better, or worse. While Aramis was the least out of breath, he was running out of arrows quickly. Ina and Zenobia both were drenched in sweat from continuously casting spells, breathing heavily.
“I think the worst is over,” Aramis said.
A swarm of Cillian guards descended upon them.
Jim didn’t have time to express his exasperation as he was thrust back into the fight.
*Raise blade, twirl and block with crossguard, forward step and strike, step back and turn hips, hold for approach, high guard.*
The individual steps Leonia had drilled into him again and again filled his mind. He moved like an automaton, mechanically advancing and falling back in time with his opponents, each attack met with the appropriate response.
*Sweep the leg, pommel strike to stun, ox guard, seize opportunity to strike, advance, deflect swipes at legs and slash extended limbs, bide time.*
Sweat ran in rivers along his neck and arms, making his grip on the weapon more tenuous than the sprinkles of blood already did. Thankfully, he didn’t notice how his lungs burned and his arms grew sore.
*Fool’s guard, duck and weave, cut across from right, raise blade left into plough guard, spin and deflect the strike from behind, lunge and turn, from the day, hold.*
Someone unexpectedly collided with his back and Jim was ready to turn and strike, but the smell of moss and misty pines made him stay his weapon. He felt Liriel’s back rise and fall against his own. They were both nearing the end of their endurance, but their enemies seemed to be innumerable. Again and again their blades lifted and fell, struck and guarded, each time just a little bit slower.
*We can do this, we can win. We must! And if we can’t… then I need to find a way for her to at least get out of here. She doesn’t deserve to die here because of me.*
*So, what if she used to work for the Silver Hand? No, that was probably a lie anyway. Liriel’s a good person, I know that because she has been the entire time I’ve been with her.*
*If at all possible… I would like to stay with her. Not just get out of here together but… after, as well. Maybe we could date. Is that even what you say here? Date? Maybe it’s ‘court her’ or something like that. All I know is that I don’t want to lose her.*
Several new cuts littered his body, but none yet that would threaten his life. But he knew it was only a matter of time. Still the guards kept coming, as if they had alerted the entire watch of Hôdoburg.
Liriel and Jim fought back to back, but the gulf between them and the rest of their party had grown. Ina had been forced to use her dagger to defend herself instead of emasculating droves of men. Aramis was next to her, similarly engaged now that his quiver had long been emptied. Zenobia was two steps away, clumsily wielding two of the guard’s swords she had picked up that crackled and flashed with electricity.
Out of the dark, a man’s voice wafted over. “W-won't you surrender n-now? We h-have you surrounded!”
“What the twelve hells was that,” a woman’s voice asked. “You were supposed to intimidate them, not make them laugh!”
Around them, the guards stepped back as one, wary but no longer attacking. “I think… I know them,” Jim said with a heaving chest.
“What… do you mean?” Liriel replied, wincing at the stitches in her side.
“Bruna’s court. They’re nobles on the council.”
With an audible sigh, Yohanna said, “Well, you heard the little guy. Either surrender or be made to surrender.”
“What guarantee do we have that you’ll let us live if we put our weapons down?” Jim asked.
There was a moment of pregnant silence. Then, “None at all, Jim. But it would be less exhausting.” He could feel her smug grin through her words. “I suppose I can guarantee *your* survival.”
He was about to spurn the offer when Liriel shouted at the figures hidden in the darkness. “I will never let you have him! I will kill each and every last one of you if you try to take Jim away!”
The silhouette of a slender woman stepped into the outer edge of the mushroom orbs’ light radius. She whistled appreciatively. “Aren’t you a possessive little minx! See, Kasper, that’s what the queen said you’re missing.” Her head flicked to Ina. “If you use that strange magic right now, all the men under my control will strike you down and pass you around as meat to be fucked for the next decade, whether you’re alive to feel it or not.”
The auf had raised her palm, ready to attack lady Yohanna but slowly let it sink back down. “That’s better, isn’t it?” She nodded to herself. “Now, I don’t think you fully appreciate your situation here, and that may be partly my fault. Sorry about that. I made it sound like you had a *choice*, and that is a tad misleading. No, I just wanted to tell you how useless your struggle is, *but* I might be inclined to give you a little incentive. How about…” Yohanna put a finger to her chin in thought, “I take the foxboy with me. You’re cute, I’d like to have you in my harem.”
Aramis spat on the ground. “No way, I’ve known women like you in the past, rompicoglioni like you aren’t worth my time.”
She raised her hand in a shrug. “Oh well, what can you do.” She slowly stepped back towards the dark. “Have it your way then. So long!” Before Ina could bewitch the noble lady, the Cillian guards attacked them, forcing her to block a strike instead of punish the annoying woman.
Like a swarm, the guards descended upon them. The short reprieve Yohanna afforded them so she could taunt the party let them catch their breath a bit, but that little burst of stamina was soon at its end.
No matter how many they felled beneath their swords, how many Zenobia shocked, or Aramis and Ina injured, more emerged from the darkness to replace their fallen comrades. The surging of bodies, trying to dodge, taking every small opportunity to attack had separated them all from each other. Even between Jim and Liriel, a gulf of men had grown. They could barely hear the other three fight.
Then, Inacea cried out in pain, much louder than the small grunts Jim had heard her give before. He couldn’t see her, but he knew this would be the end. When the first of them fell, the others would follow soon after. Queen Bruna had won. He wished she was here so he could at least scream his frustration at her.
A column of light pierced the darkness before him. He only dared to look for a second, but it was long enough to see the hole that had opened up in the ceiling and the contour of people standing over it.
A faint buzz grew louder, then a crossbow bolt struck the guard right next to him. It pierced his groin of all places and the man fell to the ground, clutching at the projectile lodged in his manhood.
Confusion broke out in the ranks of guards. They shoved and pushed, trying to reorient themselves and fight their attacker.
Ropes whistled through the air as people abseiled from the hole, landing on the mushrooms before rappelling down further. Some instead decided to clamber down the tall fungi as if they were the trees they rivalled. As soon as they touched the gloomy ground, fighting erupted once more. All around them, more bolts whistled through the air as steel clashed with steel.
Jim wasn’t sure who they were, but he knew he couldn’t waste the opportunity. The arrival of the new fighters opened up space and he ran towards the spot he had heard Ina’s scream from. Liriel was close behind him, having had the same idea.
They arrived at the injured woman only to see someone unfamiliar bent over her. A woman with wavy black hair was currently trying to stem the flow of blood from the auf’s slashed side.
“Chew on this for me, would you? I’m no damn priestess, but I can still make sure you don’t die,” she said.
Ina dutifully chewed despite the pain she was in, and even managed to ask, “Ugh, so bitter, do these heal me?”
“Not per se,” the medic said and reached into Ina’s mouth, grabbing the wet greenery and slapping it onto her wound.
“Ow! What the hell!”
“It thickens your blood, stops the bleeding.”
All around them, more people – most of them women, Jim noted – dropped and threw themselves into the fight.
Then, a blur of something fell from one of the mushrooms, landing next to Ina in her pile of testicles.
“Goddessdammit, she didn’t have to push me…” A red mess of hair popped out of the small mountain of leaking balls, one nut precariously balanced on top of it. Streaks of white dirtied the fiery red mane. “I’m going to replace all her rations with merman balls for a week for that…”
[Jim’s jaw dropped. “Despina!”](https://imgur.com/a/3yphut8)
The redhead looked around until she spotted who had called her name, then rose from the gonads and stomped on over to him, each step accompanied by wet squelches.
“Despina, is it really you? What are you doing here, I thought you-”
With a smile, the princess took her last step, then smashed her foot forward into Jim’s nuts. His balls, filled from weeks without a release were sensitive even compared to a normal set of testicles, already nature’s designated off button for any man – or Norea’s, if Sophian mythos was to be believed.
But not only were his nuts incredibly tender right now, they were also bound tightly by the wooden ring Liriel had put on them, smushing the fat nuts into each other. It meant they weren’t as flexible in their position as they would’ve been normally, and so the princess’s foot sank much deeper into the meat of his nuts instead of lifting the fragile organs and moving them out of the way of her kick.
It shut him up immediately, both in shock and in blinding pain that exploded in his balls. Maybe they weren’t responsible in equal measure.
“Aaaaah!” Despina’s sigh sounded sexual to Jim, but he was in no state to comment. “Goddess, I’ve been needing that one.”
“Why?” he squeaked.
“Why? WHY?” Despina bent down towards and grabbed his arms to pry them away from his crotch. “Maybe because you do nothing but cause trouble? Because first I have to convince my mother that no, I didn’t let you stick that stupid horsecock you have between your legs in me, and then you get accused of killing the church’s maiden of light anyway?” She slammed her foot down between his legs, the small slip-on shoe she was wearing scraping against his nutsack.
Despina kept stomping his balls, but her voice grew frail and weak. “Because ever since we said goodbye, it’s all gone down the gutter?” Her toe caught the top of his right nut, pulling it down as the cord attaching it stretched and crushed the testicle against the ground. In a tiny voice, she whispered, “Because I’ve lost my family and my home and I couldn’t do anything to stop it…” She kept his ball pinned under her foot, but her heart wasn’t in it.
Liriel approached and the princess quickly wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve. “Despina! I’m so glad you’re here!” She hugged the princess, then took a step back. “Why do you have a man’s plum on your head?”
The redhead looked at her in utter confusion, so Liriel reached and plucked the whiteish oval from her hair. “See?” She held the nut gingerly between two fingers and showed it to the princess. It had miraculously survived Ina’s onslaught.
“And you didn’t think it important to inform me that I had someone’s babymaker on my head?” she yelled and punted her foot into his nuts, her toes hitting them in the central divot they had received on their first meeting.
Liriel giggled, but couldn’t contain her curiosity as she watched Despina rearrange the contents of Jim’s sack. “Who are all these people with you, though?”
The princess’s red hair bounced up and down as she kicked, in time with her jiggling butt and very much in contrast to her modest chest. “Most of them are adventurers from Calvino! And some regular folk wanting to make a difference! We’re Calvino’s resistance!”
That was when the tall, lithe frame of Leonia landed next to them. The former knight-captain seemed to shake the ground as she landed. Unlike the lightly armoured princess in her usual boiled leather breastplate, Leonia seemed girded for war.
A full plate armour in the vague shape of her physique protected her body. From it dangled chainmail covering her thighs and loins. Pauldrons, greaves and vambraces were buckled to her limbs, leaving few spots that weren’t covered by metal. Slung on her back was her shield, her sword belt carried both a longsword and a broadsword.
As soon as her feet touched the ground, she ripped the shield off her back and drew the longsword. The shield was completely covered in markings.
“Liriel, it’s good to meet you again! You too, boy.”
“Hello, Leonia,” Jim squeaked with Despina’s foot still lodged in his balls.
“Leonia!” Liriel yelled and flung her arms around the woman.
“I’m happy to see you as well,” the warrior said. Jim got the sense she wanted to pet the elven girl’s head but couldn’t on account of the weapon in her hand.
Without warning, she slammed her shield into Liriel, tossing her to the ground. She gasped and Leonia was already above her. She stretched her shield arm, bringing it in front of Despina just in time to catch the arrow that stuck in her shield.
At the edge of the darkness, the hairy figure of a goblin cackled as it withdrew into the shadows, bow in hand.
“You little rat!” Leonia screamed after him. “I pummelled your stones when we tracked that unicorn, it will end the same way this time! But don’t think I will stop before I’ve turned the contents of your sack to jelly this time!”
She easily blocked the arrow that he fired at her from the dark as an answer.
“Badri is here…?” Despina muttered. Her expression changed. Instead of an annoyed frown or sad downcast look, her face set into a determined focus. She took her foot off Jim’s nuts and grabbed his collar. “Up and at ‘em, Jimmy, you’re helping me get that slimy bastard. I’m going to tie his little balls into a knot.”
“I’m afraid that’s going to have to wait,” Zenobia said when she appeared at the princess’s side. “Hello Pina, I’ve missed you.” A heartfelt reunion and introductions for Aramis and Inacea later, Zenobia returned to her original point. “It seems they’ve given up on drowning us in numbers. They’re sending the rest of the royal knights after us.”
“Good,” Leonia said.
“You don’t seem surprised?” Jim asked, still cradling his balls, but standing upright at least.
“We’ve fought our own battles, Jimmy. *Someone* had to help Cillia take Roridafiga. The knights committed high treason. They did it again when Calvino fell, but this time for all to see,” Despina said.
“Calvino… fell?” He tried to search her face to see if she was just joking. “Then, your family… the queen is…”
She nodded, the grim determination never leaving her face.
“Get ready. I can’t promise I will be able to defend all of you.” Leonia pulled the straps on her vambraces tight one last time. “They’re coming.”
“We’re fighting with you, of course,” Jim said. “Zenobia, you should stay with Ina.”
The sorceress sighed. “Guess that makes the most sense. I’ve still got one big spell in me. If things get hairy, fall back to me. I’ll see if I can give you a little help.”
“Zenny, maybe you should take your friend there,” Despina said and pointed at the injured but standing Ina, “and head further down. See where the lights get denser? I’m willing to bet there’s something at the end of this weird place. Maybe you can keep an eye on it.”
Leonia nodded but never took her eyes off the encroaching dark. “Her highness is right. If we have need of your help, we will come find you.”
Zenobia and Ina both agreed reluctantly. They had barely made it fifty steps when another figure emerged from the dark.
His greasy black hair, condescending snarl and visibly straining erection made him instantly recognizable to the princess.
“You… filthy, disgusting manwhore of a traitor!” she yelled.
“Now, now princess, complimenting me will get you nowhere,” sir William replied. “Don’t worry, I’ll pin you down and stuff your ass like I did your mother’s in a bit but you have to be patient. I’m not here for you, at least, not first and foremost.” He ignored her screaming blue murder, his eyes instead settling on Leonia. “Hello, *former* knight-captain. It seems we meet again.”
Leonia stared at him, unwavering. “I have no idea who you are.”
“WHAT? You insolent whore, how dare you… I was lord Fieramosca’s aide!”
Still, Leonia stared at him, moving no muscle except furrowing her brows.
“You… cannot be serious.” Sir William pinched the bridge of his nose. “He was knight-captain before you.”
Her frown cleared. “Ah! The adulterer and defrauder I defeated.”
William spat on the ground. “You only defeated him because you cheated! He was never the same after you… you…”
“Smashed his stones?” she offered helpfully.
“You will pay for what you have done! I will make you feel his pain, and when you lie broken before me, I will rape your little charge on top of your corpse!” he snarled.
Her frown was back. “I cannot allow that.”
He turned and walked back into the dark. “Then you know where to find me.”
From another side, a group of knights, fighting side by side with a unit of the Cillian guards, emerged from the shadows.
“Boy, I will leave those to you.”
She dashed forward, towards the spot sir William had appeared at. An arrow whistled through the air right as she was about to step into the dark. She brought her shield up to her face without even sparing the projectile a glance. Then darkness swallowed her.
A smile stretched Despina’s rosy cheeks. Out of a bag tied to her belt, she fished out what looked to be iron marbles. Her hands twirled the globes in her palm, nervous and eager at the same time. She turned to the knights as well as Cillian guards approached. “Seems like I can concentrate entirely on that hairy cocksucker. It’s time to hunt.”
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*Not enjoying the interface changes in all honesty. Just makes it a tad more cumbersome to paste text in here. Oh well, what can you do*
