DreadWolf

◈ Chapter 109:

"This shouldn't take long."

Without pause he turned and grabbed hold of a squawking Lyra, his paw wrapping around her waist. In one motion he slipped over the side of the construction and crashed down to the forest floor below, feet sinking inches into the earth, the loot construction behind rattling as the ground trembled under the impact

He smoothly leveraged his momentum by leaning into his weight and bounded forward, racing into the trees, leaves flying up around him. It didn't take long for his improved hearing to pick up the sounds of something out of place in the quiet forest and he adjusted his direction.

Without carrying the many tons of the Orc clan's wealth on his shoulders he could actually use the immense speed being long legged and overwhelmingly strong allowed and he tore through the trees so fast that a cloud of leaves and twigs was continuously exploding around his body. His pace meant it took only a half hour to near the source, screeching and roaring, the sound of animalistic monsters.

The destination flickered through the trees and he picked out the sight of stone, grey stone, a clearing, and more importantly, caves, caves at the far side of a clearing amongst the trees.

At the center of the clearing a half dead stag bellowed and bleated mindlessly. Its haunches dragging across the ground as a giant brown bear bit into its guts. At least, it appeared as a bear at first glance. The forest of meter long spines clustered over its back and neck, and the second set of triangular teeth behind its first set, and its long furred otter-like tail said otherwise, not to mention its pink-red slitted eyes.

The sharp sound of bone shattering filled the clearing as the monster bit through the stag's spine. The whip crack crunch was like a starting signal and a massive blur of black shot from the treeline and crashed into the bear like an out of control freighting wagon running down hill.

The bear like monster was ripped away from happily eating the stag alive and sent tumbling, massive black furred arms wrapping around it as they rolled once twice, then a pair of feet dug into the earth, tearing up the ground spray of earth and grass, a ferocious snarl ripping from a pair of wolf teeth as paws found the bear like monsters arms and head, holding the monsters arms behind as the other paw gripped its head holding it in place, the long spines protruding from the bear like monster's back doing nothing, simply snapping against Rain's front, scattering to the grass as they broke and splintered, unable to pierce his skin.

In a moment Rain had locked it in place, on its knees, head wrenched up and throat fully exposed.

"Now Lyra! Do it now!"

The air flickered and then Lyra materialised out of thin air. She held a black knife in both hands, arms shaking wildly, sharp tip wavering through the air as she shook and trembled, breath coming in hiccuped gasps, eyes round and scared.

"Kill the thing Lyra, cut its throat! Do it!" Rain roared causing her to flinch in fright.

Panicking now, she stumbled forward, knife aiming for the thrashing monster, its neck jerking side to side as it snarled and roared trying its utmost to escape Rain's grip.

The blade missed, glanced off Rain's claw, and then it sunk deep into the monster, the blade slipping into its throat with ease, the strange blade almost eagerly seeking to end the monster's life.

The monster froze and blood burbled from around the wound.

Rain waited, checking it had truly died, and then, assured it had, he released it. The monster slumped to the ground limp, its body eerily still in death.

"Are you okay?"

Lyra stared at her trembling hands and then let out a long steadying breath.

"Yes, I just, it's... really really intense... and I have not had a very good time f-fighting lately, I feel... I felt unsafe. I couldn't do anything, just panicking all the time, and then to just kill such a scary strong monster so- so-... I didn't know if I could..."

"I understand, being a Class that isn't about fighting is difficult, not being strong on your own is difficult, I knew that too well as a low leveler, and then surrounded by the strong... The council, the Ranker, the Orcs."

"I... can be called a low leveler too. With a Class like mine even being level fifteen isn't much help. In others eyes I may as well be really really low level since I'm not a fighter. I'm... not happy about that, In Florens I was looked down on, nobody wants or likes a weak Class because it makes life so much harder."

Rain nodded. "Your Class is good, they're obsession with power blinds them to that. What you could become once leveled..." He turned and stared at the crowd of bear like monsters that were gathering at the entrance to the caves, two dozen, more. "But this won't be easy, you're going to need to dart in fast then escape unnoticed. You think you can do it?"

Lyra swallowed then steadied her shaky legs. She lifted a hand and the black knife materialised in it, her fingers wrapping tight around the hilt.

"Yes. Just, take care."

Rain didn't reply but suddenly lunged forward, the nearest bear like monster which had been creeping closer taken by surprise. In moments it was spun around and held down, Rain's weight pinning it, a paw under its chin holding its throat up and exposed.

The monsters behind roared in outrage and lunged for his back, a wave of heavy muscle and brutal claws crashing down, the brutal thump thump thump of flesh against flesh, claws raking, tearing.

Rain remained implacable, not even bothering to turn his head as the sharp claws tried to rend him to pieces and utterly failed to even mark his flesh. The monsters weren't even strong enough to shift him as he held the bear monster he had taken in place.

A flash of fluff and a knife slice followed by the fluff vanishing once more and then the bear was dead, slumping in Rain's paws.

He turned and took hold of the next one.

--

The last bear like monster died and an exhausted Lyra flopped to the grass.

She watched as Rain picked up the monster and tossed it, adding to the hill of the things. It had turned out that the first two dozen was not the total of all the monsters, the caves they had come from were apparently some kind of large warren and by the end Rain had held down nearly fifty of the things for Lyra to kill.

She had leveled twice.

Which, looking over the sheer number of the powerful monsters piled up high, was maybe a little disappointing. She wasn't sure how she would have managed to do such a thing without help, having to kill a staggering amount of weaker monsters she supposed, it was no wonder non-combat Classes tended to languish at the lower levels.

She eyed Rain. He was... very strong now, easily equivalent to some high leveler or other. Yet, a high leveler would never ever help a low leveler like herself to level, in some ways it was a very unique leveling opportunity.

Now that the excitement was over, and she had a chance to breathe, she brought to mind the visualisation of her Classes information, the way that things she needed to know about her Class were displayed to her.

An obnoxiously bright pink floral notebook decorated with flowers and hearts appeared in her mind's eye. The book flipped open and revealed a fresh page. After a moment pink inked writing started to appear, which was a little hard to see as the pink ink was on pink paper. The invisible pen wrote out her name, her species, her new level, her Skills, including her strongest Skill, her invisibility, written as [Unseen Safety] here as well as her climbing Skill.

The invisible pen came to a halt having written out no new Skills, in fact she hadn't gained anything new at all, apart from her level number 15 ticking up to 17.

Her shoulders slumped in a rush of disappointment, all that killing of the crazy bear like monsters for nothing? She had been hoping for another 'Key' powerful Skill like [Unseen Safety]. That had been one of her earlier Skills gained and she was due another strong Skill after this long and this many levels, she was sure. But then, these things sometimes happened, a level without a Skill was common enough, only the added benefit of becoming a bit physically stronger that naturally came along with leveling.

She let out a sigh of dissatisfaction and started to close the pink notebook in her mind's eye.

It was then that more ink started to appear.

Writing at the bottom of her Skill list.

In Black Ink.

She froze up in shock as words formed on the paper, two words, words of a Skill. The pen finished and she read them, uncomprehending.

[Fleece Harbour]

A new Skill, a Skill different from her others which were all written in pink ink, a Skill that almost felt foreboding to look at. Not quite sure what she was doing she focused on the Skill and the page flipped, fresh text, details of the Skill revealed.

[A place of safety in the dark for those in need, carried always.]

"Wh-what?" she warbled in confusion.

Rain lifted his head from where he had been lost deep in thought, going over his own level gains, which he had of course not mentioned anything about to Lyra.

"You got something? A new Skill?"

"I- don't know, it looks different from my other Skills, it looks... uhm, out of place."

"Try it, show me."

Lyra bit her lip, readying herself for something that-, well, she wasn't sure what, her Skills usually weren't so cryptic.

She drew in a breath, counted to six, exhaled, counted to six. Then she used the Skill. [Fleece Harbour]

And... nothing happened. She blinked at Rain then looked around. Nothing.

"I don't get it, what's supposed to happen?"

She looked back at Rain to see him staring at her legs. She looked down just in time to see her wool go from a bright snowy white to a dark black.

"Wh-what?! My wool! What's it doing to my wool!" she twisted and checked over her body. Everything was black now, the same black as Rain's fur, her legs, her arms, her hair. She pulled the top of her shorts out with her thumb, even the square tuft of fluff above her mons was black!

"H-hey is this forever?! This isn't forever is it?! And wh-why does it look like yours!"

She grabbed for her thighs in a panic and her hands sunk into the black, not touching her flesh on the other side but disappearing into it, as though she had plunged her hands into some kind of portal or dark pool.

With a cry she snatched them back and stared at her traitorous fluff in alarm. Could her fluff be trusted?

"It's your Skill, what did your Class tell you of it?"

"It said it created a place of safety, but I don't see how, I don't get it! How is this safe?!"

Rain knee walked over to her and lifted a paw, extending a claw he experimentally prodded at her thigh. His digit sunk into her fluff, disappearing from sight.

"Interesting."

He pushed further into her, up to the knuckle, then further, the wool seeming to stretch outward, spilling around his digits, like it was trying to consume them. His entire paw disappeared into her thigh and Lyra looked down in horror, her cheeks going pink at the baffling sight and Rain's nearness.

"I can feel an empty space inside. Empty air."

"H-hey don't say it like that! I don't have empty air inside me!"

Rain withdrew his paw and looked it over, checking he was fine.

"This seems like it would fit your Class right? Rescuer. I remember you said yourself that you often had to drag half dead bleeding levelers out of dungeons, a place to put them makes a lot of sense."

"But why does it look like your fur!? Oh gods this isn't because we- because we- I'm not like Opal nooo!"

Rain shrugged.

"Want me to look inside of you?"

"L-look inside m-meeee?!" She yelped, very unsure of how this was all going, Rain inside her? Well, that didn't sound so- She shook her head and swallowed, throat dry. "I- I- s-suppose?"

Rain nodded then took hold of her hooves, forcefully arranging her legs so she was cross legged, the area the black wool covered maximised. Then Rain began to lower his monstrously large head and Lyra quickly had second thoughts.

"W-wait! Wait!"

But Rain didn't stop and his snout came down in her lap, inches away from her crotch. His nose touched the black wool and then dipped into it, passing through like she wasn't there.

She shuddered at the sensation and blushed furiously, hand grabbing hold of the pair of large wolf ears in front of her and holding on for dear life as his muzzle descended, the head so large that it covered her front, breasts pressing against the top of his head as he descended into her.

"Oh- oh g-god wh-why does this f-feel s-so! Hnnnnn!" her eyelids fluttered as the feeling of being entered into rushed over her.

The black wool didn't seem to mind that Rain should have been too large to fit and it bloomed around him, fluff spilling around his head as he lowered himself into Lyra's lap.

He closed his eyes as his head fully passed inside, the incredibly soft wool brushing over his head and then ears.

Then he opened his eyes. He was in a different place, or at least his head was. He was in an open space, the air fresh and breathable, a room, a room made of dark black stone, octagonal in shape, eight tall walls arching to a center point at the ceiling, windowless, a soft directionless glow lighting the space. Each of the walls apart from the one he was partially emerged from had a stone bench, or rather bed, and by the beds were stone basins which were filled with water. It wasn't hard to understand the intent, this was a place for the injured to rest and wash their wounds, shelter, a sanctuary from the outside world, almost temple like in its stillness.

The only other thing in the space was the larger than life white marble statue that stood on a plinth in the centre of the room. A statue of Lyra facing the entrance, a wide grin on her face, jauntily winking, one hand on her hip, the other giving a thumbs up. She was also completely stark naked and the statue was incredibly detailed showing absolutelyeverything, a viewer looking up had a clear sight of her, well...

Rain decided it might be best Lyra did not know that she had a large naked statue of herself inside of herself, she'd never let anyone in here if she did, and this was decidedly the most perfect pregnant Opal protection he could have hoped for. His intent had been to level Lyra up to help, this was that and then some.

Pleased, he withdrew his head, pulling back into the dark wall and out, out of her legs and back into fresh air.

"Huaah! NUAAA! HNYYAAA!"

He was greeted by Lyra holding onto his head for dear life as she shuddered and shook, hips shifting and bucking.

After a moment she slumped back on the grass, chest rising and falling as she desperately took in air, her black wool rapidly returning to its original summer cloud white.

"That- that was amazing..." she breathed.

"What was amazing?"

Lyra's breath hitched and she hurriedly sat up, in the same motion wiping away the sweat on her skin as quickly as she could before she stilled herself, pretending calm. Of course, her blushing cheeks betrayed her.

"N-nothing! Nothing at all!"

Rain narrowed his eyes at the suspicious sheep girl.