Chapter 9: Victory.
'This woman... she really is crazy.' Lucian didn't know whether to be happy that she was underestimating him or angry that she was.
He shook his head lightly before sighing. Mona watched as he nonchalantly approached her. She raised a brow, confused as to why he didn't rush on ahead. It was only when he stopped in front of her... and suddenly wrapped both hands around her neck, pulling her head down for a kiss, that she reacted.
Before she could react, his lips pressed against hers... their softness sending a shiver down her spine.
While she was dazed, his tongue slithered past her lips and wrapped around hers.
"Y-You!!" Mona pushed him away, grabbed her sword and retreated backwards, eyeing Lucian with a dumbfounded look.
"You said we were going to fight! Just what are you trying to do?" Mona's face burned red while she pointed her broadsword at Lucian with a trembling hand.
" I said the rules was... whosoever retreated first, loses." Lucian didn't seem fazed at all, standing up and dusting off himself. "Looks like I win. Now, as the winner, my wish is that you have to listen to me from now on."
Mona bit her lower lip, she wanted to disagree but her pride as a warrior didn't let her. In the end she could only glare at Lucian in silence.
"Good, you listened." Lucian smiled. "Now stop bothering me and just do your job as a guardsman."
"Huh?" Mona blinked in surprise.
"What? I said go back to the door and stay put. Now hurry up and get moving."
Mona furrowed her brows in confusion but when she noticed Lucian's impatient look, she gritted her teeth and returned to the door.
Bond: 40(familiar)+
'Looks like a less direct approach works better than forcing them.' Lucian sighed when he noticed the bond rating on Mona's head had changed.
This worked better for him, at least now he didn't have to feel guilty as if he was forcing himself on someone.
And like that, Mona's shift went by without any more interactions. The cave's damp air clung to Mona's skin like a second shadow, its chill seeping through her beast-skin clothing as she stood guard, her broad shoulders squared against the jagged rock wall.
"..." Her golden eyes, sharp as a hawk's, flickered toward the human prisoner slumped at the cave's far end.
Lucian's chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven breaths, his bound hands resting limply in his lap.
The faint glow of the torch she'd lit awhile ago, wedged into a crevice, casted long, wavering shadows across his gaunt face, accentuating the hollows beneath his cheekbones, while subtly heightening his handsome features.
Mona's lips twitched, not quite a smile but a fleeting acknowledgment of the human's stubborn resilience. The more time she spent with him, the more she felt as if he was a tricky puzzle she couldn't solve no matter what she tried.
"Someone's coming." The crunch of boots on loose gravel snapped her attention to the cave's entrance.
A hulking figure emerged from the darkness, his silhouette broad and jagged with muscle.
'Why'd it have to be this brainless bastard.' Gorzod, the male orc assigned to the next shift, strode in with a swagger that made Mona's stomach churn.
His green skin glistened faintly in the torchlight, scars crisscrossing his arms like a map of past battles. His tusks, yellowed and chipped, jutted from a wide mouth that always seemed to curl into a smirk, as if the world existed solely to amuse him. The iron axe slung across his back clinked softly against his studded belt, a reminder of his readiness to wield it.
Gorzod was one of the males the original chief had assigned to protecting the village, at first, the males assigned with looking after the village grew complacent and arrogant, trying to dominate the village. But with Bulgas help, the females banded together and managed to restrain their scummy tendencies, though they couldn't completely erase them for one reason.
Most of the females couldn't bear to kick them out of the village because of their primal urges. The fact that the other males had been eradicated in the battle between the former demon king and hero was a problematic situation for Bulga and the other females.
The Males used this opportunity to retain their place in the village, but they still couldn't overthrow the females since their numbers were far lower than theirs, in the end they were forced to submit to Bulgas rule.
Out of all those Males, Mona saw Gorzod as one of if not the most insufferable. The piece of crap had been caught on several occasions succumbing to his perverted and lustful tendencies but because the females who were indignant at first... had their desires growing without being tended to, some of them stopped resisting his advances, even if it meant mating in broad daylight.
"Time's up, Mona." Gorzod rumbled, his voice a low growl that echoed off the cave walls. He stopped a few paces from her, his lustrous black eyes glinting with something that made her skin prickle. "Go get some rest and leave this work to us males, why don't you females stick to cooking and warming our beds."
Mona's jaw tightened, but she held her ground, her hand resting lightly on the hilt of her broadsword.
"If I were you, I'd watch what comes out of your mouth next, Gorzod..." she said, her voice steady, each word clipped with barely restrained contempt. "Unlike some, I take my duties seriously."
Gorzod's smirk widened, and he stepped closer, close enough that she could smell the sour tang of sweat from constantly mating, on him. He reached out, his massive hand clapping her shoulder with a familiarity that set her teeth on edge.
"Always so serious, Mona." he said, his eyes dropping unabashedly to her chest, lingering on the curve of her tube top. "You'd be prettier if you smiled more."