Fighting Them There

### Begin Chapter 13 ###

When Max bit into the burger, many kinds of sauces came squirting out onto his hands. It was messy and he loved it. The burger bar had offered many condiments and toppings, and he'd basically put all of it on. Chili, ketchup, mustard, relish, mayonnaise, garlic-mayonnaise, barbecue sauce, ranch dressing, onions, cheese, different cheese, guacamole, tomato, jalapeños, lettuce, bacon, and bean sprouts. Was it a good idea? Absolutely not. Was it delicious? Absolutely yes. And he'd already eaten one just like it. A third was not out of the question. He'd been off food with a tube down his nose for several days, and now that he could eat again we wanted to eat

all

the food. Traditional advice was to "take it easy" once back on solid food, but he was a hunter with magically increased vigor. He wasn't going to be defeated by condiments.

All of his party members looked concerned, but Ulzhari and Chaeryn seemed actively impressed. The reason was almost certainly the jalapeños, which carried a warning for aliens. While they were a

mild

pickled pepper by human standards, eating them would be a painful experience for any elf or orc. The canteen also had to mark anything containing cloves, nutmeg, or cinnamon for the same reason. Despite all of the strangeness of going to other worlds, possibly the strangest experience was seeing a warning label on pumpkin pie. He would have thought there'd be something similar that went the other way, but apparently there wasn't anything discovered so far. The most challenging foods from the other home worlds were just sour or bitter, and almost any human could find them palatable - at least with the addition of sugar or rice.

Confirming that the peppers had inspired her awed expression, Chaeryn chimed in. "The human ability to simply

eat

blister berries is always fascinating to watch. It's a reminder of the resilience and endurance we expect from humans." Given his recent time in the infirmary, Max didn't

feel

very resilient or enduring, but apparently elves and orcs who didn't have a hunter's mark and the magical increases to stamina that implied found it difficult to keep up with humans on long distance hikes.

"

I'm

definitely looking forward to using Max's endurance." Miriam said without a single hint of shame. Max was nowhere near as nonchalant, and blanched noticeably at her aggressive insinuation. "Oh,

come on

," the redhead objected, "after what we did, we're

way

past 'Shy Max.' You've actually conquered my ass. I'm like, literally you're bitch now, don't make it weird."

He contemplated Miriam's outburst. "You're right," he said slowly, his hands and face still covered with burger fixings, "I haven't been contributing much for several days. I know you all have needs, especially after your submissive urges have been activated. The responsibilities of my class don't really end when we leave the dungeon. So whatever you guys need, I'm the support, I'll be there for you." The import of his statement may have been slightly undermined by the ketchup and sundry dripping off of his chin. "So please, everyone, tell me what you'd like me to do for you." He turned to Sophie first, but she demurred.

Put on the spot, the women looked at each other and at their food. Several started to say something but swallowed it in embarrassment. Fiona was the first to muster the courage to present. "I think... and obviously I know that I need Sophie's permission for this... but I'd like to have more of the

girlfriend

experience." Chaeryn and Ulzhari seemed confused. Miriam's eyes bulged with worry, looking with trepidation at the faces of Max and Sophie. A wide range of emotions played on the Valkyrie's face: real rage swallowed by regret and resignation. "At this point, my pussy

belongs

to Max," the Night Caller continued, "I can't have a boyfriend of my own. So I need someone to watch movies with, to tell me that my new clothes look cute, to listen to the songs I like and pretend to like them too. Not just to fight and fuck all the time, I want to go camping."

Miriam pounded her fist on the table. "Dammit Fi! You can find love and get married after we retire. Don't fucking ruin this for us!"

"No." Sophie declared. "No, Fiona's right." The blond woman didn't look happy, but she continued. "We don't know if this slave stuff ever wears off. We have to treat it like we're going to be harem sisters forever. When we're out of the barracks, we're probably going to

live

together. We need... chores rotations and date nights. Bed rotations even." She looked like she was ready to cry.

Sensing that they were on uncomfortable ground, Max spoke slowly and with frequent pauses to look for cues from the others. "None of you agreed to

marry

me. Not even Sophie. I hoped... I mean, I've known Sophie for years, but the rest of you only met me a couple months ago. I don't have the

right

to demand a lifelong commitment from any of you. We're all going different places in the February break, none of you have to be in the party, or the harem when we come back." He looked from worried expression to worried expression, realizing that he wasn't nailing it.

"Are you..." Ulzhari uneasily inquired, "ejecting us from your harem?" The orcish woman had long since finished her food, yet her face seemed emptier than her plate.

Max's face fell. "No. Oh no. Absolutely not. It's just... the seals and the Capitulation and Mastery and everything keep escalating all the time. I was stuck in the infirmary for a few days, and there was a lot of lost progression for you. So I know you feel pressured to keep training with me, to keep pushing this harem stuff farther and farther all the time. But... you don't have to. Your mental health is important in all this. If you, if

any

of you, want to take a break from all this or quit altogether, that's OK." He looked at his party's Berserker with as much gravitas as he could muster under the circumstances. "But if you want to stay with us that's OK too. More than OK. Ulzhari, what do

you

want? From me. From us."

The orc thought about it for a bit. "I'm going to be in a harem eventually, and I think I would like it to be this one. Max as war leader, and Sophie as sex leader, it works. Some day I would like to have children that I can keep, and I don't know if this harem can provide that. But I'd like to try, maybe Max can do that with his class." Her statement reminded him of his ability to spend Mastery to create heirs, and he wondered if he actually

would

be able to grant Ulzhari's wish some day. Human hybridizing with elves and orcs wasn't impossible, but it was

difficult

for some genetic reason that Max didn't understand. He knew that sex between humans and orcs was very unlikely to lead to pregnancy even without his class' weirdness. "For right now, I enjoy having Max use my breasts and face. I see my harem sisters are used in

other

ways, and I think I'd enjoy that as well." Max gulped. He was pretty sure that she'd just asked for more threesomes with him and Sophie, ones where she took his cum in places lower than her mouth.

When Chaeryn was put on the spot, her answer unnerved him even more. "I will follow you across every world in the galaxy, Master Max. You shall slay Calamity Lords and raise your banner above the bastions of vanquished gods, and I will be there with you. If you would have me, I shall fight at your command, and the soft parts of my body will comfort you at your desire. One day you shall have a pit dug for me, and when I am one of your queens I will crawl into that pit with joy." It was really a lot of responsibility to put on him, and he was pretty sure that he wasn't going to manage most of those things. And yet, of all of Chaeryn's screed, the part that jumped out to him the most was her surety that she was going to be one of his

queens

. His understanding was that one of the requirements to be an elf queen was childbirth. Part of him wanted to just ask for a show of hands of how many of his party wanted him to impregnate them at some point, and the only reason he didn't was that he was afraid of the answers he might get.

Miriam's answer was non-committal, which Max found reassuring in its normality. "I appreciate that you're leaving us an escape route, but I also don't think I'll take it. The seals make me very good at the job, and that's very important. And while the thing where it makes me enjoy getting sexually dominated by you is honestly pretty creepy... I

do

enjoy it." She let out a heavy sigh. "Look, I know you don't love me, and there's already four other women and there's going to be more. But just... make sure you fuck

me

from time to time, OK? Don't just fill my ass with Essence for dungeon raids." Her plea seemed like something he could do, and that filled him with shame. Both that he still felt like he was cheating on Sophie when he had sex with the other party members, and also that her needs were objectively not onerous to cater to. He didn't think he'd done a great job in keeping the redhead satisfied, and that was hard to justify.

He turned at last to Sophie, and with no one left to speak, she steeled herself for her admission. "Um... in the dungeon you dominated Miriam. Um... I want you to do that to me too. We're all your slaves now, Max. We have to share. But we... I don't want to be left out. Please do that to me." Everyone looked at the Valkyrie with some amount of surprise, except Chaeryn who seemed to have expected it. In the dungeon, Miriam had been placed in a pillory and then sodomized by Max while she was experiencing the submissive urge of having her Capitulation spent.

The awkward silence was broken by Max. "Sophie, I thought you didn't

want

to have anal sex?"

She shut her eyes and scrunched up her face before letting out a calming breath. "I don't." Max's incredulous expression prompted further explanation. "I want you to do things to me that you want, and I want it to not matter whether I want it. We're your

slaves

, Max. It feels so good when you dominate us, I just don't want to be left behind." The powerful Valkyrie looked fearful.

Max looked defeated. "But... I don't

want

to make you do things you don't want to do! I know I

can

, but that's not sexy, it's disturbing." He reached out toward her, then thought better of it when he saw how messy his fingers were. "Me giving you orders is an important part of your seal progression. I know that, but while I can give you orders that you don't want to follow, it doesn't feel good. That's not something that makes me feel powerful, it just makes me feel guilty." The enormity of the gulf between their desires was laid bare. Despite both wanting to make the other happy, an inherent contradiction was difficult to unwind.

The two looked at each other with sadness in their eyes, and the vibes at the table became uncomfortable. Their Geomancer offered a way out. "What if you spent some of her Capitulation? During the submissive urge, she will

want

you to put her in bondage and fuck her in the ass." Miriam thought about her own experience. "Yeah, she'll want that a lot. And once you've done it, she'll keep wanting it. Just like how I keep wanting it, it wasn't a joke when I said that it feels like you

own

my ass." She looked back and forth between Sophie and Max. "That would fix it, right? Sophie would want Max to turn her into an anal bondage slave, so he should be OK with it. And then Sophie can feel dominated and enslaved according to

her

preference."

It was a lot to think about. Sophie vigorously nodded her agreement. Max cautiously nodded and went back to eating burgers. Fiona looked like she was about to say something and Sophie preemptively agreed with her. "Yes,

obviously

you'd be able to watch. Turning me into Max's three-hole slave would definitely have to be an activity for the whole group. We wouldn't want to waste all that envy seal progression by doing it without an audience." It was a solid point, but Max still felt uneasy about the whole thing.

####

Sitting alone in his room for the first time in what felt like forever, Max checked his messages and found that his sister had sent him a video. Hoping for a bit of normality, he opened it. Michelle came on the screen, looking like she'd dressed up to go clubbing. Her unhatched hunter's rune would open many doors, but close many others. It might as well have been her birth date tattooed on her chest, a declaration of age that no fake ID could gainsay. There wasn't much of a clubbing scene in their town, so he was left wondering where she was going and hoping that she wasn't getting into trouble. She did not yet have even

his

meager hunter's strength, and wouldn't have any magical augmentation until shortly before the August recess.

"Sophie told me all about it!" She was

excited

. "So first, before anything, I have to tell you to not get killed. It's very important that you not die. We love you, and we need you to live." The dour admonition quickly gave way to excitement again. "The slave storage is

insane!

It means that we can adventure together no matter what class I get! Even if I get a vanguard or support class, you can

still

make me a slave and put me in storage. It's so perfect! I can be your slave just like Sophie! Just like we always wanted, the three of us traveling to new worlds, fighting them there. Together."

She made little hops of excitement and joy. "It's better than we imagined. Your class is perfect for us. It's so powerful. You can make me your slave. Train me thoroughly. And then not only can Sophie and I both be your slaves, but we can both be really powerful. We'll be trained together and fight the really nasty monsters. With

you

as our master, we could join the SDRF! Sophie told me how great it was to have you as a master, August can't come soon enough. It'll be so perfect when Sophie and I can be your slaves together." Her excited demeanor gave way to a paper thin mask of seriousness. "But you can't die. Don't die, brother. You need to be alive to come back to me in August to become my master." Her serious expression was already leaking the joy she had behind it when she ended the recording.

Max had thinking to do. Obviously, he'd promised Meesh that she was going to be one of his slaves. And he did need to train her so that her seals progressed. There was a

lot

of things he could do to train his sister that didn't involve him doing... what he was doing to train Sophie. Meesh's whole message had left him feeling uncomfortable and ashamed. She wanted to join his party, and he wanted her to join his party too. But... obviously his relationship with Meesh was going to be different than his relationship with his harem. He didn't mind having sex with his party members in front of Kaitlin, her offended incredulity was actually pretty fun to provoke. Having sex in front of his sister was a whole different thing, and he didn't want to do it. He'd still need to

kiss

his party members in front of her to progress her envy seal, but he couldn't have her watch group sex sessions like he was doing with his current party. At least he had months to come up with a solution, he wouldn't be able to put seals on his sister until the end of his second tour.

He wondered what Sophie had told her about their master and slave relationship to have sold it to Meesh so well. He decided that he'd have to have a tough conversation with Meesh when they got back for February recess. Make sure her expectations for August were sufficiently tempered, because the training he did with her was

not

going to be the same as the training he did with Sophie.

####

"You were um...

not available

when we woke up after the last mission," Fiona explained with as much tact as she could muster, "but we all leveled up. It's a key level for us D-tier hunters, because we all finally got an additional skill. I mean, Sophie got a new skill too, but

she

gets skills all the time." Max was obviously interested, so she continued, "My new skill is shadow anchor. It puts a spike into an enemy's shadow and doesn't let them leave. But with the way lighting works in most dungeons, it's not going to last long. As soon as the twinkling of a glitter cloud or wandering of a will-o-wisp moves their shadow off the anchor they are free."

"So it's best to think of it as a way to trip an opponent rather than a way to restrain one," Max mused aloud, "probably best used on enemies that are running, jumping, or flying so that the sudden stop will knock them down." He turned to the non-human members of the team. "Chaeryn, Ulzhari, what did you get?"

The Shadow Elf was thrilled to explain it. "I got ambusher's guile, it makes me fade from view if I kneel in place." Given that her primary weapon was a crossbow, Max didn't think he needed to elaborate on how it might be used.

Ulzhari took several seconds of awkward silence before she realized that it was her turn to speak. "I got resilience of courage. I can spend a bunch of mana and stamina to gain a very large amount of durability that goes away quickly whether it's used to block damage or not." Like the Essence he provided, it was conceptually similar to healing, but had to be invoked before damage was inflicted. The use was obvious in that it could be invoked right before charging into danger. Berserkers didn't have a lot of mana, so it wasn't something that could be used if threats weren't both certain and imminent.

The last was certainly not the least. "Sophie? What did you get this time?" She was higher level than anyone else on the team, and also her B-tier class showered her with new skills every time she went up in level. Her gaining a new skill wasn't nearly as special an occurrence as a new skill for the others was, but she was already the strongest and more is more.

"Well Max," she replied, "I receive blinding blades: when I strike at an opponent from above, they are briefly unable to see." The requirement of attacking from high ground would be much more limiting if she wasn't literally able to fly. But it did further pigeon hole her fighting style. "Now that we're all up to date, we can go to the bathroom so that you can store me." When Max put someone into slave storage, they left behind

everything

except dungeon equipment - very much including whatever was in their intestines. Getting stored and unstored was a way for her to get completely clean in anticipation of anal sex.

Max looked at the padded bench and the ropes the team had put together. The plan was simple enough: tie Sophie to the bench belly-down, spend some of her Capitulation, and then sodomize her. There were extra sets of ropes so that he could tie up the rest of the party at the same time, which was just efficient for their binding seal progressions. Yet despite how well thought out it all was, he didn't feel right about the plan. "I'm uneasy about this," he said to the entire team, "I

know

that Sophie doesn't like the idea of me putting my dick in her ass. Using the Capitulation to

make

her want it doesn't really change that what I'm doing is betraying her, you know what I mean?"

None of them had read the book

Catch-22

, but Miriam, Sophie, and Fiona were still familiar with the idiom that was named after it. Miriam proposed a solution. "What if you used your own Mastery to make yourself want to make Sophie want you to take ownership of her last hole? I think she wants you to want to make her want it." She paused so that the others could play it back in their heads and sort out all the clauses of what she had said. "While your dominant urge has taken over, you can run roughshod over Sophie's hangups, and then you can live happily ever after with a completely dominated girlfriend." Max nodded along. The logic was sound, and it would probably work, but he didn't actually

want

a completely dominated girlfriend. He

loved

Sophie, and he didn't want to replace her with a sex doll.