Theo: the Blood Angel of Lescatie

Copyright Issues:

Nonprofit fiction. Bard's Song around the end is based off Bertold Brecht's poem "To our Posterity."

Intro:

The world of Dunia is similar to ours, where men and monsters evolved in similar forms, and lived side-by side with many continents and countries. The Continent of Ermor has two empires locked in a war for supremacy: Human Holy-Lescatian Empire to the East, and Mamono-Reik to the West.

Centuries long, this conflict was over land and resources, with increasing hostility against humans by "monsters", an amalgamation of races similar to humans, even biologically compatible but with wildly different features and societies.

Last decade the war escalated to a genocidal level when monsters banded under a God-King named Maou, an ancient Dai-Oni from the east. Ironically, around that time, male births started to lessen amongst monsters.

Theophilos is a young boy who fell to the kingdom of monstergirls, also known as "Mamono Reik" 10 years before the battle of Megiddo which was later defined as "The World War", where their leader was killed.

Around these times, Monsters had their males and uglier, man-eating counterparts as well, albeit declining.

His village was raided by Dark Elven raiders of the west, in an era when mamono, monsterkind, were still bigendered and bloodthirsty. He became a slave along with the humans taken from the coasts and sold to mines with his family, lost someone dear; eventually escaping and studying magic and combat in a changing world, his request for justice is denied since everyone likes to make love and forget as some mamono want to escape the past. This is a story when the consensus changes, and your personal pain is ignored amongst the chaos.

This is a story when you no longer conform to "live and let live", instead forcibly extract your wish when the world is quietly wanting to enjoy the moment, wanting you to "let bygones be bygones".

You appear on their bedside with a sword pointed at their throat, saying, "Settle the account first".

Dear reader, you'll encounter friends, relatives and many role models who claim that you should let all grudges go and sing songs of peace and die in a corner.

That is for dogs and slaves.

We deserve better than that.

ACT 1: Hounded, Hunted.

The Monstergirl Empire was celebrating Father's Day, when males even the lowest social standing were honored and raised up and the Empire celebrated paternity and the love of fatherhood, especially since all male monsters are long gone.he celebrations were installed after the first Monster-Human War which resulted in the death of Maou, Monster Emperor, a male Dai-Oni, a demonlike monster of the East. Today was a day of love and life. Monstergirls of all species freely mingled with human males, mostly slaves or freedmen born from humans taken in wars, who were treated like kings for a day.

Someone with a grudge stalking the streets had other plans than be cuddled and loved like some morality pet.

One of the ubiquitous features of a father's day, a monster-human couple fresh out of bar ambled ever-so-slowly and loudly towards their home. The monster one was a drunk minotaur girl who barely stood leaning to her husband, swayed and burped cutely. Her face was a mask of drunk joy, still careful not to hurt her husband with her horns and body that was, even with human influence, still ripped like a titan despite the wondrous curves that would make any grown man look twice. Taking another hoofstep, she was startled by a small hiss and a passing shadow, barely blurting out drunkenly:

"Wazzat a cat?"

Her husband shook his head and led her gently home, too scared to say what it was. A tang of blood and burnt sulphur was telltale signs of a threat not many knew, but some humans of the Reik knew quite well of an urban legend that watched over them.

For one second, the poor human man had seen a young man, barely an adult, no older than a score winters, pass him by. Steps like silk, wild, disheveled hair with a hint of greying at this young age, a 3-day stubble explained everything; if not the hateful glare, grinding teeth, sheathed weapons and constant darting eyes already didn't show his intentions.

"Let's go home sweetheart. You had too much to drink." He gently tried to steer her, only earn a snort, a lusty butt-squeeze and a nuzzle from the muscled minotaur girl.

"Ahm a minotauh! I kan drink azmuchazziwan-" Before she could take another hoof-step, she collapsed in his arms, snoring before mumbling: "I wuv you shnookums."

"I love you too, wooshums." He sighed, kissing her alcohol smelling, fluffy cheek. She was sweet, crude and cute, a snoring, 200 pound muscled beauty on top of him, gigantic breasts nearly suffocating even though she was the sweetest, cutest minotaur girl who had met him and made him love of her life after a skirmish.

"Wooshums...let's just go... You know the penalty for vagrancy..."

Sighing, he dragged her snoring, cute hide across the threshold and into the door.

**

The fireworks' rumble was the perfect cover for the glowing comet of a man to charge the adamantine gates of the sinister mansion. The shouts and music covered the clang of metal and screams of pain to come.

The figure came to stand before the massive gated mansion which had dull sounds of music and clinking of glasses coming from the inside. A party.

Taking a deep breath, he slowly cut his palm with a small dagger, smearing the red blood around his sword while whispering a syllable. Then, the man repeated the strange blood ritual, made a circle on his boots, mumbled arcane syllables, and stretched his limbs.

Chanting a few words, he felt his veins ablaze with anger and eldritch forces as a quiet, humming sensation of power coursed through his veins. Without further ado, he started running towards the ornate, gothic gate and leapt, landing over the crude wooden gate, kept running, and kicked forward when he saw a second gate made from a blackish metal.

The mansion he attacked was a black, metal-walled, almost invisible building in the ass-end of the city. Even the other Monstergirls avoided the place, since it belonged to the Black Brigade, a brutal and unforgiving "Protective Division" of the Reik that was disbanded and persecuted after the World War, grating even on the dark sensibilities of surviving World War Monstergirl leadership, its surviving Dukes and Queens.

His magically enhanced kick, a force landed by a boot that coruscated with magical energy, made the adamantine gate fly, crash into the wooden doors, revealing a shocked congregation of monster women who were lounging in a massive bath house.

The monstergirls had black scales, fur or skin shimmering as if polished, were built to kill. Fangs, claws and weapons were ready to strike back, bared at him by instinct.

Each were darker, and larger than their contemporaries, and still shocked by what just happened; a young man, clad like a common thug wearing a hooded cloak, wielding a short, stabbing spear and a sword had barged in, and without as much a sound as a snake, lunged at the nearest monster with a barely audible grunt.

He stabbed blindly, spearing the Lamia guard who bared her fangs just to realize her body below the spine went very cold. His left hand slashed viciously, decapitating the confused serpentine woman. His haste-imbued arm withdrew the spear, and launched it towards the screaming Kikimora maid, a monster-girl with feathery limbs, to cut her scream and slam her like a trophy butterfly on the wall. Her hand was clutching a wand to blast him.

With furious splashes, the ancient mamono congregation roared and started scrambling for their weapons, some starting to mumble and make gestures of magic to punish the upstart human.

They were the slower ones.

Shouting arcane words, he raised his sword arm and plunged it inside the bath where all the mamono were relaxing ,using his own body and he metal part of his sword like a lightning rod and cast his left palm toward himself.A horrifying pain wracked his body, yet he decided to keep chanting even as his fingers burned, his skin threatened to burst out of his body, his cloak and clothing ignited, and his heart faltered.

A coruscating red explosion in shape of a spidery ball-lightning rocked the bath, causing the mamono veterans to go in cardiac arrest, their naked bodies convulsing in a last dance.

The telltale ozone smell after the lightning bolt lingered in the air as Theo leapt forward towards the Naga that had slithered in terror towards the commotion, short sword aimed to kill. She had been stunned enough to stay conscious. His blade halted a mere few inches from the eye socket of the Naga that raised her arms in defeat, recoiling from his right arm glowing with electricity.

"Stop! Mercy!" The naga looked near death, hair singed by the blast which also shocked her as her body convulsed in pain.

"Mercy? Like you showed her? Showed my kin for centuries?" His hard eyes were locked on hers like grey stones with no soul behind it. The Naga spat blood, staining her slaver tattoo and her slaver tabard.

"Wait... please...wait... listen..."The serpentine woman begged him, shivering like a freezing dog.

Theo squinted, listening.

"Sacrifices are drugged to sleep before... I swear she went on the altar painless-"

The naga never finished her words, cut off by a wave of pain and emitting a horrible shriek.

Theo slowly stabbed the exposed belly, and summoning strength by spending his blood, twisted it, grabbed the hilt with both hands and slashed upward, splitting her ribcage and jaw from below exposing the throbbing heart, lungs and some parts of her brain with one clear motion. The Naga's eyes bulged as she thrashed, insides cooking in a sickly flavor of roast snake as she slowly burned to death when he did the "coup de grace" , an incantation to cast flame.

"Good. Means you get to suffer more." Theo grimly watched the mamono woman thrash, hands cupped in a plea to stop the pain. He didn't.

It took minutes for the Naga to stop convulsing. As his stomach grumbled from the smell of cooking meat and the charnel hall of a scene before him.

"Twenty down, a million to go."

He wasn't a moral paragon turned to violence like a story conjured from a young mind. He was suffering. Groaning in pain, he savored a few brief moments of peace, peace from the ghosts of the past torturing him.

There was no victory: no heroic poses, no wind blowing a cape around him, no heroic confirmations and fanfare. Around him was a ruined dinner and bath party full of corpses, no beauty to be found. He was another human with blood in his hands, with a vengeance that came too late, too cold, tasteless, yet was mildly nourishing.

He was alone, and very cold. He had to get out of here.

++

The loud festivities of Father's Day in Mamono Reik provided the perfect cover for such a time when older, darker mamono brooded in solitude. That also gave him the perfect excuse to excise his bloodthirst and anger.

They were dead. The members of a certain, magically imbued Black Mamono, were dead to the last one. As minutes passed, Theo felt a bit better, especially after eating some of the sweetmeats and drinking fortified spring water, a magically imbued, filtered water for monstergirls and men with kidney problems. Theo knew the delicacy, sold only in exclusive places across Dunia...each filled an empty void inside him, a void which fueled the unnatural and unholy energies he had ruined his soul with.

At the age when children played and knew nothing but joy, he had lost everything; replacing the loss with unadulterated hatred of life, and black magic he stole from his master. Unlike poorly written horror stories of Lescatie, he tried his best to hide his hate and anguish from the innocent...not always successfully.

After raiding their pantry, a short dip in the steam bath felt heavenly, especially around corpses of other dark monsters, he felt a warm glow of satisfaction. The death grimace of a particularly cruel black naga felt almost comical, caught in lightning ball's center.

Washed up and cleaned, after helping himself to the mansion's larder and purses, he left the dark mansion quietly. He paid no attention to the impaled Kikimora maid on the wall, speared on a javelin and mouth open in horror and pain. The so called Kikimora maid's slaver tattoo crinkled as the void-flames started to consume her flesh: another sign that she was a Blood Mage like him, a Black Brigade like the rest.

He sucked a bit of his own blood from a gash he cut on his palm, and spat on an improvised magic diagram. The magical fires sprang to life, dancing on the diagram which he painted with some of the blood using the feathers of the dead Kikimora: eldritch magic washed over him, closing his wounds and fixing his appearance.

Today his traumatic pain was satiated. Tomorrow...there'd be more.

"Tomoko..." His hard eyes locked on a small locket of Black Brigade, clutched by a skeletal hand protruding from the bath. Kneeling, he snatched it, glaring at the picture inside, a serpentine monstergirl of black scales. His sorrowful features sank into rage again.

She was near. He was thirsty still.

++

A mamono Inn looked more like a bawdyhouse than a tavern to eat and sleep.

As Theo entered, no one paid attention to another male as all mamono were busy loving or drinking. Slowly he walked towards the bar and waved at the barkeep, a human male washing glasses over the roar of music, moans, and screams: it must be an art unto itself for a succubus to take five men's cocks at once, one on each hand, two double teaming her ass and pussy, and one on mouth and still make sound enough to startle Theo when he noticed her.

Ignoring the orgasmic scream of the bat-winged devil slut behind him, he shifted just a little not to be in danger of certain bodily fluids.

Signaling the bottle behind the counter, he ordered a glass of wine. It had an ulterior motive, as wine attracted a potential mamono: beer was a cultural sign of "leave me alone" by the subject humans of Mamono Reik; tired farmers, miners and other slaves. More sensible and understanding monstergirls knew to leave the poor humans to rest after they work for their masters.

The prickling on his neck signaled he already attracted one. That was fast.

Amongst the monstergirls of a tavern where men were in constantly short supply, some sat down for a drink. Some simply looked for unattached men to coerce in sex or intimacy. So a human would obviously attract some company, sooner or later regarding to his looks, social status and cleanliness, if he behaved well enough.

The majestic feeling and a rush of perfume confused him, embracing him before the mamono in question was near. Bullseye? Looking aside, he noticed the female monster approaching him.

A mature kitsune, a mature, voluptuous monster woman with nine fluffy tails, slowly approached him, hips swaying with every step, as he sampled his drink. Whether it was magic on his part, or mere beauty of his magic enhanced appearance mattered little, what was certain that, she was interested. Or maybe she was merely starved for mana: more tailed fox-women were hungry like that. Her kimono was low cut, giving an ample view of her chest area for any potential male, two pure white breasts large as melons.

The Kitsune was a big one, a lady of prodigious power and beauty, albeit worn with some passage of time, and she made no move to hide anything. Smiling, brimming with confidence, the mamono slid onto a tavern stool right next to him.

Life's greatest irony on Theo was that everything that happened traditionally, happened to him in reverse.

"Good evening, traveller. Here for a Father's Day hospitality?" She was waving her fluffy tails like a fan and cooed in delight as Theo leaned forward, caressing a fluffy tail and even rubbing his cheek. He was fast and crude, but today he was lucky; whether drunk of lust crazed mattered little to the kitsune.

"Like my tails, do you?" They felt like warm velvet in his hands, playfully brushing his face.

He nodded, with an eager reply: "I can get used to this mamono hospitality you know. Want a drink?" And lifted a small cup.

The kitsune chuckled, her low cut kimono rippling with the promise of bountiful bosom beneath."At last, a man that would buy a mamono a drink and not rut mindlessly. Got a name to remember you by sweetie?" She must have been disappointed by the centuries of short-lived men, Theo thought.

"Gintaras." He smiled, nodding slightly. The kitsune 's eyes glowed with delight. "Amber for Ugaric." he went on.

They both chuckled (him with less mirth) at the sounds coming upstairs, mixes of feral monstergirls' moans and squeals coupled with male grunts and moans.

"Someone's fluent in languages." Was the Kitsune's reply, her mischevious, almost vulpine features glowing in curiosity... Her body was now inches apart from the human youth she cornered, in a brazen display of dominance. But, the Monster Reik was after all, pretty liberal in intimacy.

Theo handed her a wine cup." I am from Ugaric forests ma'am, as you thought. Mamono and humans have their own peaceful lives there. I am a mere wanderer passing into Lescatie."

"Ohhohoho~" The Kitsune grinned. "How about I invite you for a sake after this; I always wanted to meet new cultures~ Maybe you won't even long for boring Lescatian life, strict chastity and all."

Theo smiled. "That remains to be seen. What's sake?" He offered his cup, and the Kitsune clinked.Perhaps another warm night, another lay and the embrace of a loving, soft woman after months of cold sleep, hateful morsels plundered from dead criminal mamono. Anything to beat back the ghosts in his mind, the ghosts that haunted him on the bloody hills of Megiddo.

"Rice wine, my dear... From the eastern lands when most of our kind migrated here..." The kitsune's face was that of a adult human woman in her mid 30's, with only a mild sign of aging around her mouth where she must have laughed a lot. Eyes of gold adorned a smile that was far from evil, and eyes still showed the look of someone that saw horrible things, but came out decent.

He spoke for hours: told of his false identity, his past and how monstergirls were always attractive to his eyes despite his family told him to shun them. She took the bait, hook,line and sinker, making him wonder whether she played along or was interested.

An hour later, they were arm in arm, his hand on her full, white silky thigh, caressing her soft, full leg. Her knowing smile and her own hand caressing his short beard, multiple fluffy tails rubbing his back was a signal not to stop.

"I didn't know north-eastern men were that bold..."

He smiled softly, mumbling. "I can stay like this forever..." as he caressed her cheek, neck and thighs. "I'm not just..." His eyes sank to the floor, making her chuckle in surprise.

The drama lessons he had taken way back in Lescatian custody paid off.

"Sentimental hmm? How about a coffee back at my place?" She smiled.

In a few hours when screams of passion rocked the inn as more monstergirls raped men and indulged in orgies, he donned his most disarming smile, accepting her offer. The fox-lady's answer was of course, a positive encouragement to leave.

Plus, the tavern was making him dizzy. Despite his traumatic past regarding the "monster" women around him, it was deeply alluring to see a Naga entwining herself around a man, softly massaging his body with hers wrapped around his waist, softly straddling with his manhood buried inside her. The snake-woman's tongue lolled, her face a mask of intoxication and stupidity with her clothings nowhere to be seen. Next to the naga lied a Werewolf girl on all fours, her face buried in a man's crotch, cheeks bulging from the sheer size of his cock, with another man thrusting violently into her cunt, his hands grasping and squeezing her voluptuous arse until welts appeared.