PATRIARCH FOWL
patreon
Casual Heroing, Chapter 181
🕑 Added 2023-09-09 19:19:53 +0000 UTCNext chapter comes out Monday, September 11th!
JOEY WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?! 🪐🪐🪐
3/3 chapters this week!
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Chapter 181 - Lover
"So, would you like to hear my offer, Joey?"
I inhale so deeply that a whiff of intoxicating perfume reaches me and clouds my senses. The statuary Goddess in front of me looks like a dream of dreams—she looks as if one could die from merely conceptualizing a woman this beautiful.
“I—I,” I choke on my words, soon realizing something.
The others didn’t call me by my name. How does she—
“Because I’m like you – Human,” she says with a coquettish smile. “And this would be a simple deal between me and you.”
“Ahem, miss, I would rather… not. Yeah, I don’t think it would do me any good,” I say, mustering up the most courage I’ve ever gathered at once.
“You listened to the other two offers, Joey. This would be the last one. Are you sure?”
“Yep. Positive,” I say, sweating bullets.
If she offers me some crazy sex, I might end up accepting.
“Oh, what a pity.”
She walks closer to me, one moment by my side and the next behind me. She puts her hands over my shoulders, hovering barely half an inch from them. I can feel the great warmth of her skin even through my clothes. There’s something primordial stirring in me; it almost feels like my stomach is being pulled out through my mouth.
“Miss, I—”
“Shhh,” she says in an enchanting manner. “Shhh. I don’t need your permission, Joey. Not to show you my offer. That is not what the rules say. You can still refuse, but I want to feel what you feel when I unveil it.”
I suddenly perceive bone-crushing pressure, as if gravity has increased tenfold just from her hands hovering over me. The other two entities had not influenced my body in any way—this woman, instead, seemed to be relying on her words as much as the rest of my senses.
“Yes,” she whispers, her lips suddenly so close to my ear that I can feel the wetness of her mouth on my skin. “Us Humans value feelings more than ambition, more than power. Demons crave deals that work like a great puzzle. They put a loved one at the center of the deal, placing you between a rock and a hard place. But so many of us are resistant to those deals; so many of us are ready for the sacrifice.”
There’s a pause, and I can feel my heartbeat getting louder and louder.
“My gift, Joey, is the kind of gift only Humans can understand. No other race would comprehend.”
Focus. Goddammit, focus. Focus, focus, focus. [Deep Focus]. Hey, is the skill not working? DAMN IT! Do not accept! Do not accept! I chant the words in my head, trying to psych myself out of the claws of this terribly beautiful woman, but she keeps speaking straight to my soul, to the darkest recesses of my deepest desires.
“My gift,” she whispers in a sultry voice, “is The Lover.”
The fuzziness on top of the third column disappears and leaves place to a… Golem?
It’s a metallic, humanoid form that has a feminine shape but no features worth mentioning.
“Ah,” I say, breathing in relief. “That should do it?”
I snort.
Ok, this is going to be easier than I’d initially thought.
“The Lover,” the woman speaks in my ear, “is the apex of a Grandmaster Golem. It’s beyond it, even. It is one of my greatest creations. Would you like to guess its function?”
I straighten up, more relaxed now.
“Lady, I’m sorry. Metal women don’t do it for me. I refuse. There’s absolutely nothing that I might possibly desire more than my mother. Can I go now?”
I almost expect a tinge of irritation, but that’s not what she offers me next.
I feel her hand sliding across my shoulder and to the front, crossing her fingers in front of my neck. Once again, she’s not touching me. She hovers half an inch from my skin, but that’s not what my senses tell me. I suddenly feel like I can’t breathe anymore, as if there was a steel pipe coiled around my neck.
“The Lover will take the most beautiful form their partner could ever imagine. The metal you think it’s made of is the rarest material you can scavenge in this world. It can turn into the perfect Human body and reproduce together with you. Your children would be perfect beings, immune to any disease, and immortal.”
“Cr—ee—py,” I squeeze the word out as I feel my trachea getting crushed.
She gets closer to my ear again.
“The Lover is the greatest Grandmaster Golem,” she whispers to me, and I feel some moisture enter my ear, “it will level; it will get a class. But most importantly, it will love you forever. It will turn into your perfect partner, beyond reproach. You two will fight like any other lovers shall, but The Lover will always complement all your needs.”
I feel the hands on my throat relent for a moment.
“Ok,” I cough, “are you finished? I’m not interested.”
“But you are.”
“No, I’m not?”
The woman slides in front of me, placing her finger in front of my lips.
“The Sandwich Maker Always in the Kitchen Baby Birther 3000 will take care of all your needs. It will fight alongside you; it will protect you. All those things you are afraid of? The Lover will be there, holding your hand. It will walk through fire for you with undying, immortalloyalty. It will always follow your levels and acquire the perfect classes to complement your growth. And since love is harsh, at times, you will not fully understand what The Lover does, but she will, nonetheless, work for you completely.
“She’ll be the most beautiful woman you have ever witnessed, excluding present company,” the Goddess smiles at me as her eyes become two galaxy pits. “She will protect you*red.”
Those two words now choke me as if she had put her hands back on my neck.
“The Lover*red will take care of you. All the challenges that you have had to face—she will be there for you, Joey.”
“I—I,” something stirs inside me. Something that I thought I had left behind already.
Anxiety starts rising and coursing through my limbs, making them weaker and softer. I can see all those things that await me once I’m out of this cave: the bureaucracy, the explanations, the documents. So many things that I’d never been ready for. I think I might be able to tackle someof them, but not everything at once.
Not alone.
“Not alone,” the woman mirrors what I thought. “She is not your mother, Joey. She’s more: The Lover*red will be your missing half*red.”
Those words start dispelling some of my anxiety as I picture the most beautiful woman in the world standing in the queue at the Watch with me to fill out the report on what happened in the Dungeon, helping me open my own business, and helping me smoothen a deal with [Merchants], [Bakers], and with anyone. I can picture the most beautiful woman in the world fighting by my side, covering my back when I falter, and being there for me when I am dead-afraid of the future.
And all it takes is…
“I believe,*red” the woman says, “that’s the only price you need to pay. You need to say, ‘I believe,*red’ and I’ll grant you the greatest love you could ever wish for.”
“B-but,” my brain tries to scramble a defense, “wouldn’t this woman be fake?”
“She’ll have a soul, just like you. She will be independent, yes. But she will be born as your half, as the perfect missing piece from your life. All your fears, all your challenges, you could now face them while being whole*red.”
Whole…
I can see myself with my children, with a wife that loves me beyond reproach, a wife that I don’t have to look for when getting hurt constantly, when having to face stupid things like a Military Duel—a wife that, perhaps, would kill a few [Soldiers] for me. Heh, not that I would mind!
The more I picture how much easier my life would be with a wife like that, a beautiful woman capable of knowing exactly who I am, exactly what I need…
I feel a sense of peace descending on me, the fog in my brain slowly receding as if I had gotten a skill to contrast the loss of my intellect. It’s… tantalizing.
The woman steps to the side exactly as I step forward, taking a step closer to the Grandmaster creation in front of me. In her metallic form, in their folds, I can now see what she would look like. I can imagine a woman with dark hair, olive skin, and deep green eyes. She looks dangerous, but she looks like she knows what she’s doing.
It’s not a stupid puppet that I’m looking at anymore; it’s something greater, something bordering perfection.
I’m looking at… peace.
Even after all I’ve learned so far, my inner turmoil is still there. Now, it doesn’t control me anymore—I think. Especially after killing the statue. The rite of passage is complete, but it only gave me more control over my inner troubles…
It’s all still there.
But as I look at the metal creation in front of me, I can feel the immense peace it would gift me.
This is the greatest of the three gifts; I realize that I’m barely a foot from the column now.
“What’s the real cost?” I ask the woman, approaching a resolution.
“Faith. Belief. I’ll need you to believe in me more than anyone else, yourself included. You will still die one day, and your soul will rest. Your soul won’t be snatched by me. I just need you to have faith in meabove everything else.”
“It doesn’t even sound that bad of a deal,” I mutter, my eyes glued to the Grandmaster Golem. “And she would love me forever?”
“She would love you forever. And one day, when your mortality reaches its end, she will spire alongside you. But your children and the children of your children will forever carry your name. You might not have become the greatest [Hero] of all time, but there will always be your descendants to remember you – up to the twenty-third generation.”
I need to accept, I suddenly realize.
“Can I ask one last question?”
“Please, do,” the woman smiles kindly.
“Why won’t you touch me?”
She giggles in response and brings her hands close together.
“Look at my palms,” she says.
As I do, I notice sparks and flames flying around where they come in contact that I could barely see before. It’s like a welder, basically.
“I would melt your skin, little Joey,” she replies.
I touch my neck in response, thinking of how close she had come to touching it. And I realize I miss that strong grip over it—it felt… comforting.
It felt like it would help forever, that it would stay with me forever.
I look at the metallic hands of the feminine figure in front of me and, for a second, I imagine them coiled around my neck—not in an ‘I’ll kill you’ way, just in a ‘you’re mine, and I’ll take care of you’ way.
I close my eyes and picture that perfect life.
I laugh as I look at the floor, my decision made.
“This is Achilles’s proposal,” I tell the woman, who looks slightly confused at that. “Her mother offered him a tranquil life, one of many children, and serenity while spending the rest of his life with the love of his life. The alternative was to fight in the greatest war of his era, the Trojan War. I never understood why he decided to go to war, even when his mother had clearly told him that if he went there, he would die. I think that the Odyssey addressed it—basically, the man regretted becoming a [Hero]. And I’ve always shared that feeling.”
I am going to accept.
“So, in hopes of not repeating the mistakes of the blonde, oiled-up version of Brad Pitt, Miss Woman, I b—*red”
Lightning cracks through the darkness, splitting the obscurity, dodging the woman, and hitting me right in the chest. My eyes go wide as I see the woman’s smile suddenly turn into a snarl.
“YOU CANNOT INTERFERE WITH THE ANCIENT PACTS!*red”
Then, I hear a familiar voice.
“BEGONE, YOU FOUL CREATURE! SLITHER BACK TO THE DARK NESTING OF YOUR KIND!*azure”
A second later, all goes dark.
