FA+
Shop
1913
Views
Views
45
Favorites
Favorites
Category
Story / Macro / Micro
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 114 x 120
File Size 169.2 kB
Report this content
More from RaddaRaem
Listed in Folders
The New World is fraught with danger and filled with monsters both thinking and feral. It is a land where humans struggle to survive and coexist with forces far greater than themselves. Hence why the massive monsters that call this place home have taken it upon themselves to guard and guide them. To teach and train them and see to it these frail and imperfect beings have all that they need to survive if not one day thrive in these inhospitable lands.
...Which are only growing more so. The New World is changing and so must the men and monsters that inhabit it.
Thumbnail comes courtesy of
Jazzumi!
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Monster Hugger Frontier
By: RaddaRaem
“Snrrrrrrr...”
Head hanging low, and forked tongue fluttering, Taras gently snored. Stars twinkled overhead as the curtain of night slowly began to part.
“Snrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...”
With his every inhale and exhale crackles of electricity dispersed across the wild white mane of hair draped across the Tobi-Kadachi's back. Side to side did the towering Trainer wibble and wobble as his sleeping self struggled to stay balanced.
BZZZT
Jolting in place, her fur dramatically puffing out as blue beads of static leapt between her fur standing on end, Nell wordlessly grunted when the Tobi-Kadachi all but fell into her. Nuzzling into Nell's shoulder, her thick tufts of fluff enveloping his head, Taras contentedly blepped.
“Jettt!” Cheeks puffed out, Nell stifled one irritable chirp after another as a rat a tat of painful pinches cascaded across her form.
“Patience, Nell!”
Beak pursed, the Nargacuga angrily harrumphed. Sitting before the Canteen's stone counter, and bathed in the glow of its countless fires, the Wyverns patiently-
“Mraowwww!”
Impatiently awaited their break-of-dawn breakfast. Hand outstretched, Nell narrowed her gaze when a Felyne rapped at her knuckles.
“Mreow meow,” the apron clad Felyne calmly but firmly stated. Sporting dark brown mittens, and socks, the Siamese colored cat stood sentry before the Canteen's kitchens.
The Nargacuga, undeterred, hungrily eyed the rows of burnt black clay ovens broken up by flour and spice caked counters. Pots and pans aplenty, boiling and bubbling over with the bounty of the earth and sea alike, sat perched atop the open flames.
A low and pensive growl rumbled within the Wyvern's throat. Sniffing and snuffing at the air, saliva streaming down the sides of her maw, Nell slurped her beaked lips. Nudging Taras aside, and leaning over the counter, the Nargacuga guided her black scaled fingers towards-
FWACK
“Maow. Mjau.” the Felyne repeated with marked annoyance as they whacked at Nell's clawed digits with a spatula.
Brows furrowed the bat cat's eyes darted between the Felyne and the food choked counters. Bowls caked over with leftover batter. Congealed oils pooling along the bottoms of pots. Piles of discarded egg shells sprinkled with sliced off strips of fat.
Pupils dilating into saucers the Nargacuga, yet again, lurched at the all too appealing appetizers.
WHACK
“Meow mow mew mrrp mau mjeow mrow mao mreeerp?!” the Siamese shouted with a shake of their fuzzy fists.
Head tossed back, and hands wrapped around her ankles, Nell impotently rocked back and forth. “Jetttttttttttttttttttttttttttt!” whined the Nargacuga.
“It's almost ready! Promise!” her Hunter shouted back.
Shoulders bunched, the Nargacuga clacked her beak. “Like they'll notice. Like they'll care!” she thought to herself. Slowly, ever so slowly, the bat cat shamelessly shoved the Siamese furred Felyne aside with the back of her hand-
“Meowwwwwwwwwwwww!”
Only to be met with a stream of balled up chef's hats, bandannas, and pans chucked like frisbees. Streams of culinary minded cats abandoned their stations and, en masse, swarmed and shouted down Nell with a stream of curses.
“Mjau mow mraow!”
Hackles raised, and pupils narrowed into razor like slits, the Nargacuga menacingly growled right back at the Felynes.
“NELL,” Brook tersely shouted.
Ears folded flat against her skull, Nell guiltily turned away from the Huntress.
“Nell. Look at me.”
The massive monster grudgingly pressed her eyes against the sides of her sockets.
Lips pulled flat, and ridges carved into her brow, Brook glared at the wilting Wyvern. “You're a guest here. Act like it.”
“But... but...” Shrinking in on herself the Nargacuga limply gestured to the scraps and allegedly inedible offal strewn about the counters. “But they're not even doing anything with them!” she bemoaned.
Slinging her arms around the Felynes at her sides, nuzzling their fuzzy faces into her thighs, the Huntress ruffled many an ear. “So? It's their kitchen and their rules.”
With a roll of her eyes, and flare of her nostrils, the bat cat emphatically exhaled. “Well they're stupid rules...” she muttered under her breath.
“Apologize,” Brook breathlessly barked back. "Now.”
“Fine,” Nell scoffed. “I'm...” the Trainer unconvincingly began to mumble grumble, “Sorry.”
“MROW MAOW?!”
Cupping her hands beneath the Siamese Felyne's arms, and pinching their limbs between her fingers, Brook scooped up and cuddled the cat close. Nosing at their forehead, and bouncing them In place, the Huntress took to gently shooshing them. “I know, I know,” she said before turning to scowl at Nell. “She's only sorry she got caught.”
“Nelllllllllllllllll,” Jet shouted over the roar of open flames and deafening sizzles. “You're not causing any trouble now are you?”
Pained chirps tumbled free from Nell's craw. The thought of disappointing her Hunter, her Jet, was simply too much to bear. “N-n-nooooooo.” Head held low she weakly chirped at Brook and the Felyne both. “I'm... sorry. For shoving you.”
“Better,” decreed the Huntress. One by one she continued to sooth and talk down the furious Felynes. Their egos sated they reluctantly returned to their work stations.
“Just a little longer, Nell! Honest!” Jet called out.
“But it smells good nowwwwwwwwwwwwww!” Nell pouted.
“Well it'll smell even better later!” Jet chimed back.
Beaked lips wavering Nell dejectedly leaned back into Taras' still slumbering form.
“Zzzzzzzzzzz...”
Jaw coming unhinged, his serpentine fangs glistening with saliva, the Tobi-Kadachi lazily smacked his lips as he stirred to life with a yawn.
With nowhere, and no one, else to turn to Nell pecked at the snake squirrel. “Taras?”
“Hrnnnnngh?” he sleepily mumbled.
“Can't they hurry it up?” she incredulously asked. Smells, unfamiliar and inviting, danced along the back of her sinuses and throat. The onslaught of her olfactory senses was simply becoming too much to bear. “This is taking foreverrrrr.”
“It'll be ready when it'sss ready!” Taras sleepily hissed.
“GROWLF.”
With a grunt the Tobi-Kadachi pushed off from the Nargacuga and steadied himself. Sitting cross-legged beside her, Taras fluttered his forked tongue and sampled the spice scented air. “Ahhhhhh! Delissshiousss!”
Hands cupped against the side her face, Nell tiredly thrummed her fingers along her beak.
“It'll be wooooooorth it!” Taras teased.
“Yeah, yeah,” sassed the Nargacuga. Following an exaggerated raspberry a disgusted groan rose like bile from her throat. “Just. Do humans really have to cook everything? Not that. Not that I don't appreciate it. It's just...”
“It'sss how humansss ssshow they care!” Taras exclaimed.
“...Really?” Nell chirped.
“Mmhmm! While you and I both know there's nothing asss romantic asss sssharing, and tearing, apart a fresssh kill...” The Tobi-Kadachi planted his elbows upon the Canteen's counter and chuckled. “You have to remember that humansss think there'sss sssomething even more ssso! Sssilly asss it may ssseem!”
Head cocked to the side the Nargacuga curiously purred.
“Jussst imagine it like thisss, Nell! Ssssay you ssspend your day ssstalking your prey and claiming the kill. Their body, warm and heavy between your teeth, weighsss heavily on your jaw as you carry them back to your nessst.” Taras' forked tongue fluttered wildly between his lips as he began to fluster himself. “Knowing full well that your human isss waiting for you!”
Nell's cheeks burned at the thought. “Yeah?”
“Mmhmm! Waiting for you. Waiting to put your kill's flesssh to flame, to replaccce itsss ssskin with ssseasssoning, and transssform it into sssomething ssso delissshisss it defiesss dessscripssshin! To match your laborsss with their own and ssshow you how much they care! How much they love you!”
“Love?” gasped the Nargacuga.
“Yesss!” beamed the snake squirrel. “Brook told me ssso herssself! Humansss believe the way to a one'sss heart is through their stomach. To cook for sssomeone is to care for them!”
The whole of the bat cat's head became enveloped in a beet red glow. T-t-that meant...then that meant...
WHUMPF
That meant she had been spurning Jet's advances all morning. Whining about them even! Flopping forward onto the counter, hands covering her eyes, Nell's ears folded flat against her skull.
“You're fiiiiine,” blepped Taras. “Human courting ritualsss are a lot to take in!”
“Honnnnnnngh. Some Cultural Ambassador I turned out to be,” Nell mumbled. “Jet probably thinks I'm a terrible mate...”
TONK
The clunk of steel against stone registered in the bat cat's ears. Splaying apart her fingers, the Nargacuga's golden eyes peeking through the gaps, she excitedly growlfed at the cauldron sized bowl planted before her.
“He thinks anything but that,” Jet smirked as he consoled her with a kiss. Hands sinking into her thick fluffed cheeks he nosed at her beak and peppered his big beloved with emphatic smooch after smooch.
“Jet...” Beaked lips peeled back into a smile, and the crimson mask wrapped around her eyes aglow, Nell excitedly returned his affections.
FWUMP
Flopping forward onto the counter, her breasts and muffintop spreading wide atop it, the Nargacuga chirped. To think. This was her new normal now. This was her everyday. She still couldn't believe it.
“It's... it's just breakfast, Nell,” the Hunter nervously laughed as the Nargacuga all but pledged her undying affection to him.
“It's anything but!” she thought aloud with a playful growl. Chin raised, and neck exposed, she melted into purring puddle when Jet accepted her offer and scritched away. That somehow, someway, humans had found a way to fashion food into something akin to a religious experience...
How did they do it? How did they find the restraint, the patience, to not simply devour anything and everything before them? How did they even find out that putting food to flame made it all the more flavorful? How did they learn to extract salt and seasonings from the very sand and surf?
“Mreow maow mjau meow mow!” shouted the Felynes as Nell loafed across the counter.
“I know, I know! Sorry!” stammered Jet as he struggled to keep their public displays of affection out of the kitchen. Eyes half-lidded, and fur puffed out, the Nargacuga contentedly flopped atop her insignificant other.
“N-n-nell. Please,” Jet stammered in between nervous bouts of laughter as he pulled himself out from beneath her. Ladle in one hand, and a ceramic mixing bowl balanced atop the other, he served up a heaping helping of Tangy Tripe to his behemoth beloved. Guiding it atop the Canteen's counter, and sliding it towards Nell's beak, the Hunter proudly puffed out his chest. “Breakfast is-”
HROMPH
“...Nell,” Jet sighed as he lobbed an oven mitt into the side of her head.
Shoving the whole of the bowl into her craw, teeth excitedly grinding away at its edges, bone rattling crunches echoed from inside the Nargacuga's pinched shut beak.
“Nell! No!” begged her Hunter.
“Hruff!” Cheeks puffed out, and juices sloshing out from between her lips, the Nargacuga cupped her hands to her maw and suckled every last drip of juices collecting in the wrinkles of her scaled palms.
“Out! Spit it out!” Clad in an apron, and bandanna wrapped around his forehead, Jet menacingly shook his ladle at her.
“Mrrnhhhh,” she growled with a shake of her head.
“Nelllllll!” implored the Hunter. “I'll never finish working off these damages at this rate!”
The Nargacuga simply couldn't help herself. Never had she ever tasted something to tantalizing, so tangy, so transcendent! Pronounced crunches sounded out as her beak and pointed teeth crunched apart the whole of the bowl.
“Nelllllllllllllllllllll.”
Flustered purrs reverberated within her throat as Nell cupped her hands to her cheeks. Eyes fluttering closed she allowed her tastebuds to take her on a tour to lands unknown.
“Mreow?” grumped a burly Felyne.
“...Yes, again. S-s-she's getting better though!” said Jet. “She at least let me argue with her this time!”
With a dismissive swat of his paws the Meowster Chef bumbled back into the kitchens.
Lips sputtering, the Hunter dragged out a tired sigh. “Anything to say for yourself?”
“GROWLF!” Beaming from ear to ear, and tail swishing behind her, the Nargacuga contentedly smacked her beaked lips without so much as a shred of shame.
Try as he might to fight it, Jet came to sport a sheepish smile of his own. “Well... I'm glad you liked it at any rate,” he smirked.
“Huuurffffff!” How could she not?! Sweet Sapphire where to even begin...
Dragging her tongue along her gumline, fishing free the ceramic caught between her teeth, Nell sloshed the shards about a stream a saliva churning from one puffed out cheek to another. What did Jet call it again? Tangy Tripe?
Mmph. It had taken everything she had not to bound over the counter and devour the ingredients as he was preparing them. Her pupils dilated into saucers when she watched him fill pans, already sloshing with boiling hot oil and spices, to the brim with sliced onions and carrots and peppers. Then when he splashed and doused it all with tomatoes turned to paste and Blissbill broth? WHEW.
Nostrils flared, Nell fanned herself as she recalled the rest of the recipe. Diced potatoes. Marmalade. Strips of Mosswine stomach lining. Minute after minute she tormented herself as she watched her Hunter dutifully stir the ever so decadent dish. Eyes gone wide, and ears perked to attention, she had watched on intently as the meat melted into mush and its sloughed off fat thickened the bubbling broth into a throat choking gravy. Jaw locked open, waterfalls of slobber poured past the sides of her beak as she continued to reminisce on the meal she had just inhaled.
“Nell?” Jet worriedly ahemed as he waved up at the Nargacuga.
“Hmm?” Perking to attention, her chin and cheeks slathered in saliva, the Wyvern unconsciously slurped herself clean.
“Never... nevermind,” he sighed as he topped off another bowl for her. “Either way though... I'd appreciate it if you tried NOT to make more work for me,” Jet mumbled. “I have a busy enough day ahead of me as it is!”
“Growlf?”
“You. You know. Deliveries. Training. Then. Umm. I want to be sure we have plenty of time for the uhh...” The Hunter bashfully ahemed as he felt his cheeks burning bright. “Tour.”
“That's right!” thought Nell. The best was yet to come! This day could, and would, get better still! Finally. Finally finally finally Jet was going to welcome her into his nest. His nest? No. No no no no no...
Their nest.
Bunching her forearms against the sides of her breasts the Nargacuga let slip a lustful growl.
“MRAOW MEOW MJAU!” screamed the Felynes.
“NELL, PLEASE,” a mortified Jet shrieked as her tail lifted high.
Meanwhile, eyes half-lidded, and forked tongue dangling from between his lips, Taras dreamily sighed when a tabletop sized plate was thrown down before him. An entire school's worth of Gastronome Tuna, cut into steaks, sizzled atop the platter. Dipped in butter, and crusted with cheese, the Tobi-Kadachi shuddered with delight at the satisfying sizzle of each and every cut. The beds of mushrooms surrounding them, pan seared to a delicious golden brown and drizzled with garlic and basil, soaked up every last dollop of juice streaming off of the steaks.
“To cook for sssomeone isss to care for sssomone...” Taras repeated back to himself with a smile.
GROWLMPH
Hunched over the counter , and scaly snout buried into his massive meal, the Tobi-Kadachi gorged himself. Through heady snorts, and throat straining swallows, tears beaded along Taras' eyes. To think... day in and day out Brook unceasingly told him, showed him, how much she loved him. It... It... it was more than his heart could bear.
“Taras?” Brook worriedly inquired. “Something wrong?”
Shaking his head side to side, his scaly cheeks wet with slobber and tears, the Tobi-Kadachia could but happily growl. Scarred tail swishing happily behind him he reached forward and daintily curled his clawed hands around Brook. Lovingly stroking at her back, and thumbing at her cheeks, he cupped his Huntress close to his chest.
“W-w-where is this coming from?” Brook yelped. “N-n-not that I'm complaining mind...”
Pointed chin tucked against his chest, and lips enveloping her head, Taras bashfully sniffled and snorted away his tears as he squeezed her tight in between increasingly affectionate nuzzles and professions of love.
Ears burning hot, and soaked through and through with her boyfriend's tears, the humbled human couldn't help but choke up herself. “C-c-c'mon, Taras. You just heard the Felynes. No... no...” With a bemused if not defeated sigh she buried herself into the Tobi-Kadachi's embrace. Reaching up now and again to try and fail to stroke at salt stained cheeks she dutifully whispered just how much she loved him in turn.
“What's gotten into the both of you?!” Jet bemoaned. With a flustered yelp the Hunter skittered back as Nell tried to flop atop and bury him beneath her breasts.
“S-s-seriously!” Brook huffed in between kisses. “You were supposed to tear through these same as it ever was! That way we could show off a little something before deliveries!”
“Hmmm?” rumbled both the monsters in unison.
“Well... something to show Taras anyway...” Jet trailed off as he kept trying to play keep away with the flirtatious bat cat.
GASP
Crackling with static electricity, the Tobi-Kadachi instantly perked to attention. “You mean?!”
With a grunt, Nell's chin clapping down upon him with a playful chirp, Jet groaned when he found himself pinned once more beneath the loafed and loving bat cat. “Alma's training is wrapping up and well. I mean. I did promise...”
Wiggling side to side, his eyes positively twinkling, Taras let slip a gleeful hiss. “Well what are we waiting for?!” Letting Brook drop between his thighs, the Huntress spontaneously combusting as he clapped her between them, the snake squirrel ravenously inhaled the remainder of his meal. Refusing to waste a moment so much as breathing as he devoured everything before him.
Nell, likewise, indulged her uninhibited appetite as she reared back clasped her black scaled hands against the side of the cauldron of Tangy Tripe. Beak parted wide, the rising steam condensing against her cheeks, the Nargacuga noisily glurked and gulped one throat choking serving after another. Every seismic splashdown of a swallow caused her doughy stomach to gurgle and groan.
Jet acked, and shuddered, while steaming hot streams of soup rained down alongside him.
“Ready when you are!” Taras beamed as he wiggled side to side and ground Brook flat into a molten mushy mess between his thighs.
Pushing herself off the ground, and sliding her black scaled fingers under her Hunter's back, Nell rose to her feet with a grunt. As those thick clawed digits delicately but possessively coiled around Jet she took to stroking her thumb along the side of his face. A shiver rolled down her spine at the sensation of his skin against her scales. Soon, so very soon, she would have all that and more. “Where to?” she salaciously purred.
“T-t-to the shoreline,” Jet said with a panicked cough as his girlfriend manhandled him for all the Canteen to see.
Cupping Jet close to her chest, her furred hills clapping against him, the blur of a bat cat deftly and silently stalked Astera at her Hunter's command. Taras, nipping at her heels, all but slithered after her as Brook ragdolled across his curled fingers. Silently winding their way down paths carved into sheer cliff faces the Wyverns excitedly made their way through their now home away from home. The roar of the waterfall crashing through the village's center. The hiss of the ocean rolling into shore. It was so placid, so peaceful, and it filled the Nargacuga and Tobi-Kadachi both with immeasurable pride to know they played however small a part in keeping it that way.
“Taras! Taras, calm down!” Nell pleaded.
Hands clasped around his snout, and eyes wavering, Taras furiously stamped his cloven feet as beads of electricity trickled along his limbs. The snake squirrel's silhouette, outlined by a blinding and brilliant blue glow, contrasted brilliantly against the purples and pinks slowly bleeding out from the edge of the twilit horizon.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZT
With a squawk the Nargacuga flailed backwards as puddles of glass came to pock the surrounding sands.
His mane standing on end, and the whole of his body wreathed in electricity, Taras sparked with every ecstatic stomp. “I-i-it'sss mine? It'sss really really mine?” breathlessly gasped the Tobi-Kadachi.
“All yours big guy,” Brook hummed. Slinging an arm around Jet's shoulder, affectionately noogying and tugging the Hunter close into a throttling bear hug, she broadly gestured to what at first glance looked to be an unfurled sail spread out across the seashore.
An enormous and sleeveless flax vest, stitched together from a recycled sail, gently flopped in the wind carried by the tides. The placket of the vest, strewn with door knocker sized brass rings, mimicked the appearance and functionality of buttons. Sitting alongside it, propped up along a nearby dock, was a sanded smooth boat mast. Its blunted tips were coated with caps of iron and a freshly woven length of hempen rope, notched to the mast like a bow string, dangled from its side.
Blepping and hissing and growling all at once Taras clambered forward and clutched the him-sized article of clothing within his grasp. Eeeeing to himself, and cuddling it close,
“Try it out!” Jet acked as Brook continued to noogy him. “Put your arms through the sleeves. The big gaps, the big holes!”
Sliding his arms through the sleeves-
“Ah. Uh. Well...” Brook laughed as her boyfriend slid it on backwards. “Other way, Taras! Other way! You want the open part, you want the buttons, brushing against your chest! Here lemme-”
Sitting upon the sands, legs kicked out before him, Taras wiggled and giggled as his Huntress clambered up atop his thighs. Smoothing out the wrinkles in his vest she took hold of an enormous hand and guided it towards a button. “And this is how you hook them together...”
“Broooooooook! Let me, let me!” pouted the Tobi-Kadachi. Blushing like mad Taras, nevertheless, followed her lead.
Sidling up alongside Nell, wincing as her puffed out fur snapped and cracked with ambient static electricity, Jet forced himself to withstand a fair few bolts as he hugged into his loomy lover's side. “Soooooooooo...”
“Sooooo?” purred the bat cat as she cupped him close.
“Sure you don't mind me training Taras? I know you were hoping for more uh... well... us time.”
Brows arched, Nell couldn't help but crack a smile at the sight of the sickeningly sweet size-mismatched couple. Who was she to deny him this? “...It's fine,” the Nargacuga said with a shrug. “I've waited this long already. What's a few weeks more? After that though...”
Jet meeped when a lustful growl revved in Nell's throat and a scaled hand cupped around him. Pulling him in close, and smothering him against her muffintop, the Nargacuga nosed into him and playfully nibbled at his shoulders. “You're miiiiiiiine. Mine and mine alone,” she chiriririped with a dreamy sigh.
The Hunter melted into mush as he sank into the noticeable layer of plush that had come to coat her massive and muscular frame. An all Canteen diet was clearly starting to take its toll. Not that... n-n-not that he minded. “You don't see me complaining,” Jet happily mumbled into her. “So. Uh. When were... when were you thinking of...?”
Free hand cupped against her cheek, and crimson mask of fur wrapped around her eyes glowing bright, Nell could hardly contain herself. This was it. This was really it. Today was THE day. Once their deliveries were done, and Jet kicked Alma to the curb, she'd finally be able to enter her human's nest. Day in and out she'd been preparing for how she'd swoon her Hunter out of his armor.
“GROWLFFFFF,” huffed the Nargacuga. To feel Jet's skin against her fur, to clasp his soft hands between the scaly wrinkles of her palms, to simply know her Hunter trusted her so utterly and completely that he was willing to share himself with her at his most vulnerable...
No one, nothing, would stop her now.
Rising to his cloven feet, his peach scaled soles stamping against the glassy sand, Taras picked up his Insect Glaive err Staff.
“First things first!” Brook excitedly elaborated as she chased after him. Hand cupped against the back of his calf, tenderly brushing against it, she motioned to the length of rope strewn down along its side. “So slide your arm through that little gap there...”
Dutifully obliging her instructions the Tobi-Kadachi wiggled happily as the stout ship mast slid up and along past his shoulder. Standing straight up, the rope snugly digging into the crook of his neck, Taras tentatively lumbered across the shoreline. Swinging gently at his side, the Insect Staff stretching from the back of his knees to a head's length above his horned noggin, the snake squirrel's newfound weapon harmlessly brushed against his thighs while he walked.
“Great! Then to unsheathe it...”
“Eeeheeeheee!” Taras growled as he rolled his arm about his socket and knocked the hempen strap free. As it rolled off his shoulder he tried, and failed, to catch it as it shattered apart the many puddles of glass at his feet. With a nervous oops he dropped to his knees and excitedly brandished it once more. Pole held out before him, the arcs of static crackling between his white knuckle grip trickling down along the mast's length before coming to congeal atop its blunted metal tips, the Tobi-Kadachi gleefully poked and prodded at the open air as snaps and crackles accompanied every attack.
“Thisss isss amazzzing!” the Tobi-Kadachi manically blepped. “Ohhhhhhh Nell I can't wait to ssshow the othersss!”
“Others?” said the Nargacuga with a smirk. “What others? You mean Maccha and the Commander?”
“No sssilly! The other Trainersss! Today'sss the day we were sssummoned to ssspeak with the Sssilk Ssseer! Remember?”
The Nargacuga's mood, and libido, immediately tanked at the reminder. “Wait. That's. That's today?”
Correction. One thing, one obligation, could stop her.
“Mmhmmm!” Taras confidently boasted as he bounced in place and awkwardly sheathed his Insect Staff once more. “We'll have jussst enough time to sssqueezzze in our daily deliveriesss before then!”
“...We will?” Nell groaned as her ears drooped flat.
“Yesss!” Hands cupped to his cheeks, and eyes twinkling, Taras' forked tongue fluttered in the breeze. Dropping to his knees, wobbling uneasily as the boat mast scraped against the sand behind him, the Tobi-Kadachi cupped his Huntress beneath his palms.
“But. B-b-but,” chirped the Nargacuga. That could take ALL day. Where was she supposed to find the time to-
“C'mon, Nell!” Cuddling Brook close to his breast, the Huntress' face steaming at being so casually swept off her feet, Taras raced down Astera's shoreline.
Arms hanging heavily from sockets, and flopping chin first onto the sand, Nell whined as she visibly deflated. “But today's the day we...”
Lips scrunched, Jet squeezed at that tree trunk of a bat cat neck. “H-h-hey. Maybe... maybe it won't take that long? And worse comes to worse it's just one more day. Right?”
“But I want it to be TOday!” she pitifully growled.
“I knoooooow.” Ruffling the bat cat's cheeks, Jet did his best to console his looming lover as she reluctantly rose to her feet.
Caked with sand, and stray shards of glass matted against her fur, Nell dejectedly scooped her Hunter up. Clapping him flat between her forearms and breasts, her scaly gloves bunched close, she dragged out tired sighs.
“Awh, Nell...” Sliding his hands between her fingers, squeezing at what little of her that he could, Jet tried his best to console her as she limply pinched his limbs between her digits.
Lumbering along the shoreline, and treading towards the rising sun, the massive footprints and shards of glass left in Nell's wake disappeared beneath the rising tide.
…
…
…
FWOOOSH
FWOOOOOOOOOOOSH
The heavy beat of wings filled the air.
THOOOOOOOOOOOM
A pair of purple scaled legs, tapering off into black fur covered with a rainbow slick of oils, touched down. With a chitter their owner curiously sniffed at the air. A suite of scents, some familiar and some muddled beyond recognition by the rising sea foam, wafted between their nostrils.
Their rounded ears perked to attention with a squeak and a fang filled smile. “There you are...” Noiselessly rising back into the air, their broad toes peeling off the sand, they drifted down the coastline in search of their prey.
The Commander, Light Bowgun in hand, wordlessly patrolled Astera's twilit shoreline. Clinking to a halt, his armor weighing heavily on his old bones, he looked out to the horizon. A shimmering blood red orb set the sky itself ablaze as it rose from beneath the waves. Streaks of pinks and oranges rolled in with the tide and lapped at his shins.
A soft thump sounded out when the Commander tucked the stock of his Light Bowgun against his shoulder. Peering down the sights he methodically scanned the ocean smooth as glass. Nothing. Same as it, mercifully, ever was.
Breathing easy for yet another day, the old Hunter motioned to sling his Light Bowgun over his back-
"Day in and day out you do this," a sultry voice stated. "Whatever for?"
Before he startled to attention. Lips pulled flat, and nostrils flared, the Commander's eyes twitched in irritation. "...Don't know."
A whistling gust of air, and the slow heavy flap of wings, answered him. "You don't know?"
"It's a known unknown," the wizened Hunter unhelpfully clarified. Weapon tucked close to his chest, and pointed down into the rolling waves, his patrol continued apace as he pointedly refused to look back to, much less formally acknowledge, his unwanted guest chittering in annoyance.
"...Omar."
"Within these walls I answer to Commander," the old Hunter curtly corrected them.
Faint squeaks accompanied an exasperated exhale. "Commander Omar-"
"Commander. Just Commander."
"Just Commander-"
The Commander's composure faltered when he subtly slouched forward and all but rolled his eyes straight of his skull.
Laughter, playful and self-assured, lapped along Astera's shores. "It's always so cute when you pout. Have I ever told you as such, Omar?"
"All too often," he grumped. "Out with it woman. What do you want?"
"Ah ah ah!"
The groan of an inflating balloon filled the Commander's ears. Syllable by syllable his sassy shadow's voice deepened in pitch. "If you're going to insist on titles it's only fair that so do I."
Omar reflexively grit his teeth.
"Trainer of Trainers. The First Trainer," the unseen stranger trailed off with a giggle. "I'll answer to any and all, Commander! Why... for old times sakes you can even call me-"
"FINE. No titles. No pretenses." Omar reluctantly tucked his chin against his shoulder and formally acknowledged his gargantuan guest. The Nightshade Paolumu floating behind him, her neck sac inflated and audibly creaking, lazily twirled through the air with the smuggest of smiles. "...What do you want, Nyx?"
"Don't go changing the subject now!" she playfully tutted. The Hunter's brows pulled flat when the balloon of a bat silently swiveled before him and impeded his path. Her purple scaled face, enveloped by folds of black fur, curiously turned towards the horizon. "Well?"
The Hunter defensively crossed his arms about his chest in response. "It's an old habit that refuses to die. Nothing more."
FWOOOOOOM
Tears streamed from Omar's eyes when Nyx emptied her lungs into him. Heels skidding back through the sand, sliding along the surf until he was buried up to his waist, the old Hunter wearily blinked while his wispy white hair flopped back into place.
"It has something to do with your Old World. Doesn't it?" Nyx haughtily huffed. Wings outstretched, and neck sac deflated, the Nightshade Paolumu gently lowered herself onto the shore.
Omar refused to answer. The half-buried Hunter instead preoccupied himself with clawing his way free from the sand and surf.
"Stubborn as always..." Nyx grunted upon approach. Whensoever she lifted her heels or shifted in place water rushed in to fill her craterous paw prints.
Omar bitterly sighed as the rising tide surged past his stomach. Salt water and silt filled in and undid what little progress he had made in freeing himself. "I can't miss what I can't remember, Nyx."
"...True enough. You were but a pup when you first stepped on shore after all." Dropping to her knees, fissures spidering out through the sand upon impact, Nyx clasped her hands around the Hunter's torso. With a unenthused heave she hoisted him free.
Arms dangling over the sides of her gnarled and scaly fingers, the nails jutting from them thick as his forearm, Omar impotently glared at the behemoth bat. "...I meant what I said earlier. I don't know."
Nyx glared right back. Buck teeth poking from between her lips, and pitch black eyes narrowed in contempt, the Paolumu leaned in close. Oils slicked across her graying fur as a menacing rainbow of colors congealed upon the eyespot patterns lining the side of her neck.
"Every sunrise and every sunset those who could miss the Old World gazed out upon the ocean. Watching, waiting, for something," Omar grudgingly elaborated.
The Paolumu's expression softened as she gently set the Hunter on his feet and attentively listened. Even when practically prostrating herself before him he barely reached up to her breasts.
Omar dusted himself with a tired sigh. "...And they always breathed easy when it failed to arrive."
CLONK
Omar grunted when Nyx roughly began to knock and scrape away the sand that had come to cake his armor. "Woman! I'm more than capable of-"
Eyes half-lidded, Nyx continued to manhandle the old Hunter. "And you never thought to ask them what it was they waited for, Omar?"
"Of course I did!" he spat. Grunts and curses tumbled free from his lips while he unsuccessfully tried to slap and shove away her fingers.
"Well?" the Paolumu chittered in annoyance.
Drawing his Light Bowgun, Omar wordlessly threatened to empty a handful of blanks into her forearms.
Nyx, her hands tucked close to her bountiful chest, exaggeratedly arched her brows.
"...They never said," bashfully mumbled the old Hunter. "None of them liked to talk about it. Or the Old World."
The Paolumu growled in disgust. "Tch. So that's where your bad habits hail from." Rising to her feet, her broad and scale plated tail flicking in irritation behind her, Nyx regarded him with a bitter huff. "Must you always be so secretive?"
"Not everything need revolve around you." Omar snidely replied. "What business is this of yours anyway?"
"Hmph. Be that way, Omar. Keep your precious secrets to yourself!"
The Commander wordlessly sheathed his weapon with a disgusted exhale. As Nyx turned her back to him the thigh-high human limply shrugged. He was too old for this shit.
"So I will." Hands stuffed into his pockets, and gaze locked dead ahead, he simply shuffled past the Nightshade Paolumu. Ambling along the shoreline, his silhouette swallowed up by the rays of the rising sun, Omar bid her a dismissive wave. "Until next time, Trainer of Trainers."
Rounded ears perking to attention the Nightshade Paolumu chittered in disbelief when the Hunter actually dared to give her what she asked for. "I. YOU. SO HELP ME, OMAR," screeched the bat. "YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO PLAY ALONG!" Wings fanned out to her sides Nyx impotently stomped after him as the pace of the Commander's power walk not so subtly kicked up to a full fledged sprint.
"Why are you here, Nyx? Really?" Omar wheezed in between breaths. Grunts and groans filtered free from his lips every time the clawed fingers pinching at his collar angrily shook him side to side.
Wrinkled nose held up in disgust, Nyx but haughtily harrumphed.
“You wouldn't have invited yourself in here if it wasn't important,” the old Hunter sighed. Even after all these years she still manhandled him with such casual and infuriating ease.
“And maybe if you bothered to stay in touch I wouldn't need to,” she spat.
With a weary blink Omar plucked free the stray Light Bowgun bolts shallowly embedded into her arms. The Paolumu's thick and fluffy folds of black fur, glistening with an oily sheen, betrayed the impressive mounds of muscle the elderly Wyvern had managed to maintain. “Woman. Just answer the question.”
Nyx responded by curling her forearm around him and crushing him against her chest. The old Hunter wheezed when her wrists painfully dug into him.
“...Please.”
Cheek puffed out, the bat huffed at the much delayed deference. “If you must know...” she said before obligingly relaxing her grip in response.
“Is it about the Feral?”
“Tangentially so,” she acknowledged. “First and foremost I would speak of Astera and the Ancient Forest's relationship. Of your Hunters and my Trainers.”
The old Hunter perked to attention. It was ill like her to speak so plainly. “Well.” He gently slapped at her forearms as she stomped past the docks painted pink by the rising sun. “You have a captive audience.”
“Our accord is being tested. Even though it is understandable, and well within reason, as to why trade has tapered off to a trickle... my patience is wearing thin.”
Upon arriving in the New World the local monsters had paid little mind to the humans that had come to inhabit its shoreline. Their presence was so negligible, so sheltered and secluded, that it honestly took some time for the first Wyverns to bother to take notice of them. Paired with the fact they asked so little of the land itself it was hardly surprising.
What humans gave back though...
Husbandry. Epidemiology. Entomology.
The ministrations they produced. The preservatives they provided. The insects and animals and fruits and vegetables alike they nurtured and cultivated and shared in exchange for the Wyvern's protection and guidance. They had no need to scavenge or gather... they could simply grow whatever they wished on command! With how much of a strain Slayers were on the Ancient Forest, claiming nigh everything edible in sight for themselves on a daily basis, many a monster had become reliant on the excess and ease with which humankind could provide for them. Perhaps overly so.
“I know,” Omar shamefully acknowledged. “I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by our answer to it though.”
Nyx cocked her head to the side as she lumbered past the docks into Astera's empty markets. Her heavy footfalls shook stalls and shacks out of place as the Felynes curled up in their shade mrowled and scurried for cover.
The Hunter reluctantly thrummed his fingers against her wrist. “Lest I interrupt further. As you were saying?”
Bunching her arms together, and bunching Omar against her nigh spherical breasts, Nyx chittered uneasily. “Anyway. Regarding our relationship...” she trailed off with a mumble and a blush. “It is... in all of our best interests to seek to closer ties.”
Omar shuddered as the balloon bat unconsciously, possessively and protectively at that, cuddled him closer. She only ever did that when she was worried. “...Go on.”
Broad scaled tail swishing behind her, and voice squeaking as she choked on her words, Nyx irritably forced out a reply. “The world is changing, Omar. And not for the better.”
The Hunter forced down a nervous swallow. If she was worried then he was worried. “And you're saying we have to change along with it?”
“Mmhmm. I've already enlisted the aid of the Silk Seer to break it down to my Trainers. Whereas you will need to do the same with your Hunters.”
“This news being?”
“In due time,” Nyx sighed. “Let us hear of your efforts first. To help these changes go down all the easier.”
Omar gently slapped at her hands, right then left then right some more, to guide her through the village. The boardwalks sagged dangerously beneath the weight of her gait. “Even if training and trade has shuttered to a halt...”
Nyx's prodigious rodent-like ears, ringed with cartilage, perked to attention as she stamped flat the clay beneath her feet. The Botanical Research Garden had exploded into a veritable paradise in the shadow of the waterfall and great wheels that spun beneath it. Herbs and Mushrooms, lined with Insects of every sort, slowly stirred to life.
“We have not been idly sitting on our hands.”
The Nightshade's mood lifted at the sight, and smells, that greeted her. Piled high sheets of honeycomb replete with wax and grubs. Hill sized mounds of bundled reeds fit for bedding. Carefully packed beads of Smoke Bombs and Tranq Bombs to take the edge off. Barrels stained a kaleidoscope of colors as thick globs of Antidote, Potions, Cool Drinks, Hot Drinks, and more seeped through the gaps in the curved wooden planks.
Omar grunted when Nyx gingerly set him down upon his feet. Lips scrunched he turned away from the sight of his prodigious partner, curvaceous as ever, sashaying over towards their supplies with a nervous ahem. “Our deliveries have been delayed is all. Nothing more.”
Hands clapped together, the Nightshade Paolumu's buck teeth giddily bunched against her lower lip. Dropping to her knees, wincing as her old joints flared and painfully protested, Nyx scooped up a handful of grubs and a barrel of Mega Potion. Effortlessly flicking off the top the barrel with a clawed thumb she drank deeply of the pulpy and sickly sweet morass of mulched herbs and waxen chunks of melted Honey Combs. Her ears drooped, and shoulders sagged, as it sloughed down her throat and her nostrils burned at the overpowering scent rushing up through her sinuses.
Arms crossed about his chest Omar tried, and failed, to elaborate over the noisy and bassy glurks that accompanied her every swallow. Brows furrowed he continued to raise his voice to no avail as she downed gallons with every gulp.
Stifling a heavy cough, her eyes fluttering as what aches and pains and arthritis stabbed at her joints melted away, Nyx tossed back her head and puffed out her cheeks while she strained her jaw with grubs. Crushing them to a bloody mess between her teeth she emphatically exhaled when they heavily slid down into her stomach. Daintily setting the emptied barrel before her she returned to Omar with a pronounced spring in her step and her mood immeasurably improved.
“So I can see,” Nyx ahemhemed as she dabbed at her lips. While most monsters regarded human crafts and constructions as little more than curiosities... there was simply no denying the nigh fanatical demand and delight with which they regarded their ministrations and meals. Potions to take the edge off an ill advised Turf War. Cool Drinks with which, no matter how furry and fluffy one might be, the power to slog through a sweltering summer's day with ease. Antidotes to aid whatever ailed them. Hot Drinks for when the bitter winds blew in at night from the Wildspire Wastes or from across the salt and the Hoarfrost Isles. They were no strangers to gathering and foraging, certainly, for such remedies on their own... but the convenience and raw amount of them that humans were able to provide was simply unheard of. That they could simply grow them on command, without need for scavenging, boggled the mind as well! Recreating their ingredient's habitats on an delightfully diminished scale even!
“Amusingly enough...” Omar irritably continued as he tried to make himself heard over Nyx's contented chirrs. “We have been making our own efforts to cultivate Astera's relationship with the Ancient Forest writ large.” With a wave of his hand he bid Nyx to follow. His waves became increasingly impatient as the Nightshade Paolumu looked longingly to the supplies and mulled sampling another set. “Nyx.”
She just needed to be certain and self-assured of their quality was all! Neck sac inflated, the Nightshade Paolumu twiddled her purple scaled fingers as she hoisted up a barrel of Adamant Seeds in one hand and a Hot Drink in the other.
“NYX.”
Punching a hole clean through the top of her drink with a tap of her clawed digit she gingerly sipped at the spicy concoction rich with pulp and seeds. Nose wrinkled, and lips puckered, she hurriedly tossed back a mouthful of Adamant Seeds. The fat filled oils that came to mat her tongue and teeth dulled her senses in an instant and left her with only the invigorating sensation of the smoldering hot stew that massaged at her very bones.
“WOMAN. THOSE AREN'T ALL FOR YOU!”
“Well maybe they ought to be,” the Paolumu mumbled between mouthfuls. Shuffling back on over towards the Commander she playfully bumped him aside with her calves. “I'll confess, Omar. I was not expecting such a warm welcome on such short notice!” she beamed. “I'll have to swing by more often,” she teased with a wink.
“Please don't” the old Hunter emphatically emphasized. “Were you even listening to what I was saying?”
Nyx continued to sip and snack as she nuzzled her chin into her inflated sac. “I heard you,” she playfully scoffed as she followed him towards the great gates that formally marked off entry and exit into Astera proper.
Omar dragged out an exaggerated groan. “If you must know-”
“I really must,” she cheekily squeaked back.
Slouching forward the old Hunter grimble grambled to himself. “If you must know... out of naked self-interest we've struck up a dialogue with Slayer Alma.”
“The Slayer?” Nyx quizzically hummed. “Funny you mention as such.”
“Then alongside her... I've entrusted two of my most trusted Hunters to work alongside your Trainers-”
Chin tucked against her chest, the Paolumu choked on her drink. Clawed hand clasped close to her muzzle she hacked and wheezed at length. “I'm sorry,” Nyx coughed as she cleared her throat. “I don't believe I quite caught that, Omar. WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?” boomed the Nightshade Paolumu in disbelief.
Omar wordlessly grunted. Head tilted back to the guards manning the walkways above the gateway's entrance the Hunter nodded at them. They obliged back with a nod of their own and waved at unseen someones beyond the borders.
Bundles of lumber and branches in hand, Taras and Nell stood frozen in place as Astera's gates slowly swung open. “Wait. Isss that?” Fur standing on end, the Tobi-Kadachi warily side-eyed the Nargacuga whose dilated pupils indicated a fight or flight response.
From beyond the wooden barricades a husky and feminine voice cleared its throat. “OMAR! Would you care to repeat that?!”
“It is,” Nell nervously chirped.
“Hum? Is what who?” Jet asked as he-
WHUMPF
Turned around to see mountainous piles of logs crumble and clonk atop the beaten path behind him. In an instant Nell and Taras both had darted off into the underbrush.
FWOOOOOOOOOOM
Gates swinging open, Jet and Brook confusedly turned from one direction to the next as the Commander stood front and center to greet them. Directly behind him, her thighs scraping past his head, stood a stout and graying Nightshade Paolumu. Winged arms at her sides, and clawed hands on her hips, she furrowed her brows and regarded the Hunter and Huntress with out and out contempt.
“As I was saying...” the Commander chuckled as he gestured to Brook and Jet. “These fine Hunters, and select unnamed Trainers, have been at the forefront of our exchange efforts. Tirelessly have they toiled to see to it that trade between our peoples can be re-enabled.” With a swish of his arm he approvingly regarded latest and greatest delivery. “A remarkable showing as always you two!”
Her hands overflowing with mushrooms, Brook uhhhhhed as she forced an uneasy thumbs up.
Eyes darting to and fro, Nyx scoured the immediate area for any clues. “...Which Trainers?” said the bat with a squint.
“Details, details...” the Commander dismissively brushed off. “All you need to know is that they assist us in gathering at sizes and scales we could never hope to achieve and, in exchange, we afford them supervised entry and access to Astera proper. A cultural exchange if you will.”
“And when were you going to tell me about this?” growled the bat.
“When you asked me,” Omar snorted.
“Uhhhh... Sir?” Jet sheepishly asked.
“Is now a bad time?” Brook followed up for him as she took note of Nyx's darkening expression.
Hands tucked behind his back, Omar nonchalantly arched his brows as the Nightshade Paolumu beside him crushed the barrel within her grasp. Misshapen shrapnel and sawdust trickled out from between her fingers.
Nyx's beady black eyes bore their way through not only Omar but the Hunters gathered before her. Wings fanned out she wordlessly stomped over towards the great gate. The wooden slabs crunched and cracked apart beneath her grip as she turned her ire towards the diminutive Hunter and Huntress. “A moment if you would.”
FWAM
Slamming the gates shut, pikes popped out of place and the walkways lining the tops of them violently rattled in place.
Jet and Brook both warily gestured at one another while the guards posted atop the walls nervously looked to the duo for guidance.
“Brook?” whispered Jet. His lips pulled flat at the unseen but all too obvious and ominous creak of Nyx's neck sac slowly but surely inflating.
“Yeah?”
“Are we... are we in trouble?” Eyes gone wide he fearfully regarded the increasingly panicked expressions plastered upon the guards.
“Maybe.” Brook mused aloud as she clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Maybe we should-”
“OMARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!”
Nyx's explosive outburst, accompanied by a near tornadic gale, bent out Astera's front gates and snapped apart the pikes surrounding it. Shrieks and wails sounded out as guards stationed atop them disappeared into the rising clouds of rubble.
“WHAT?” shouted the all but deafened old Hunter.
“HOW DARE YOU UNDERCUT ME! MY TRAINERS?! YOU DARE ROPE MY TRAINERS INTO YOUR SCHEMES WITHOUT MY SAY SO?”
“IT'S MY VILLAGE! I CAN EXTEND AN INVITATION TO THEM IF I SO DESIRE!”
Squeaks, infuriated chitters, and the impotent stomping off feet sounded out before Nyx's bassy voice cratered even deeper. “INVITATION?! WHERE'S MY INVITATION, OMAR?” she howled as the whole of the village rattled in place.
“OH LIKE YOU NEED ONE!”
“IT'S THE PRINCIPLE OF IT!”
“THE PRINCIPLE?! YOU TRESSPASS AT YOUR LEISURE! YOU'RE TRESSPASSING RIGHT NOW!”
“IT'S CALLED INVITING MYSELF! SINCE YOU NEVER DO!”
“WOMAN SO HELP ME.”
Their bickering rapidly devolved into a litany of curses and elder swears as the entirety of Astera was forced to listen to the old timers bicker.
Clutching at Jet's shoulder, and whirling him about face, Brook propped her shell shocked co-conspirator upon his armored heels and frantically guided him off the beaten path. “We should leave.”
“We should,” Jet mumbled as the harried Hunters hurled themselves into the hollows of the Ancient Forest without a second thought.
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
...Which are only growing more so. The New World is changing and so must the men and monsters that inhabit it.
Thumbnail comes courtesy of
Jazzumi!FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Monster Hugger Frontier
By: RaddaRaem
“Snrrrrrrr...”
Head hanging low, and forked tongue fluttering, Taras gently snored. Stars twinkled overhead as the curtain of night slowly began to part.
“Snrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...”
With his every inhale and exhale crackles of electricity dispersed across the wild white mane of hair draped across the Tobi-Kadachi's back. Side to side did the towering Trainer wibble and wobble as his sleeping self struggled to stay balanced.
BZZZT
Jolting in place, her fur dramatically puffing out as blue beads of static leapt between her fur standing on end, Nell wordlessly grunted when the Tobi-Kadachi all but fell into her. Nuzzling into Nell's shoulder, her thick tufts of fluff enveloping his head, Taras contentedly blepped.
“Jettt!” Cheeks puffed out, Nell stifled one irritable chirp after another as a rat a tat of painful pinches cascaded across her form.
“Patience, Nell!”
Beak pursed, the Nargacuga angrily harrumphed. Sitting before the Canteen's stone counter, and bathed in the glow of its countless fires, the Wyverns patiently-
“Mraowwww!”
Impatiently awaited their break-of-dawn breakfast. Hand outstretched, Nell narrowed her gaze when a Felyne rapped at her knuckles.
“Mreow meow,” the apron clad Felyne calmly but firmly stated. Sporting dark brown mittens, and socks, the Siamese colored cat stood sentry before the Canteen's kitchens.
The Nargacuga, undeterred, hungrily eyed the rows of burnt black clay ovens broken up by flour and spice caked counters. Pots and pans aplenty, boiling and bubbling over with the bounty of the earth and sea alike, sat perched atop the open flames.
A low and pensive growl rumbled within the Wyvern's throat. Sniffing and snuffing at the air, saliva streaming down the sides of her maw, Nell slurped her beaked lips. Nudging Taras aside, and leaning over the counter, the Nargacuga guided her black scaled fingers towards-
FWACK
“Maow. Mjau.” the Felyne repeated with marked annoyance as they whacked at Nell's clawed digits with a spatula.
Brows furrowed the bat cat's eyes darted between the Felyne and the food choked counters. Bowls caked over with leftover batter. Congealed oils pooling along the bottoms of pots. Piles of discarded egg shells sprinkled with sliced off strips of fat.
Pupils dilating into saucers the Nargacuga, yet again, lurched at the all too appealing appetizers.
WHACK
“Meow mow mew mrrp mau mjeow mrow mao mreeerp?!” the Siamese shouted with a shake of their fuzzy fists.
Head tossed back, and hands wrapped around her ankles, Nell impotently rocked back and forth. “Jetttttttttttttttttttttttttttt!” whined the Nargacuga.
“It's almost ready! Promise!” her Hunter shouted back.
Shoulders bunched, the Nargacuga clacked her beak. “Like they'll notice. Like they'll care!” she thought to herself. Slowly, ever so slowly, the bat cat shamelessly shoved the Siamese furred Felyne aside with the back of her hand-
“Meowwwwwwwwwwwww!”
Only to be met with a stream of balled up chef's hats, bandannas, and pans chucked like frisbees. Streams of culinary minded cats abandoned their stations and, en masse, swarmed and shouted down Nell with a stream of curses.
“Mjau mow mraow!”
Hackles raised, and pupils narrowed into razor like slits, the Nargacuga menacingly growled right back at the Felynes.
“NELL,” Brook tersely shouted.
Ears folded flat against her skull, Nell guiltily turned away from the Huntress.
“Nell. Look at me.”
The massive monster grudgingly pressed her eyes against the sides of her sockets.
Lips pulled flat, and ridges carved into her brow, Brook glared at the wilting Wyvern. “You're a guest here. Act like it.”
“But... but...” Shrinking in on herself the Nargacuga limply gestured to the scraps and allegedly inedible offal strewn about the counters. “But they're not even doing anything with them!” she bemoaned.
Slinging her arms around the Felynes at her sides, nuzzling their fuzzy faces into her thighs, the Huntress ruffled many an ear. “So? It's their kitchen and their rules.”
With a roll of her eyes, and flare of her nostrils, the bat cat emphatically exhaled. “Well they're stupid rules...” she muttered under her breath.
“Apologize,” Brook breathlessly barked back. "Now.”
“Fine,” Nell scoffed. “I'm...” the Trainer unconvincingly began to mumble grumble, “Sorry.”
“MROW MAOW?!”
Cupping her hands beneath the Siamese Felyne's arms, and pinching their limbs between her fingers, Brook scooped up and cuddled the cat close. Nosing at their forehead, and bouncing them In place, the Huntress took to gently shooshing them. “I know, I know,” she said before turning to scowl at Nell. “She's only sorry she got caught.”
“Nelllllllllllllllll,” Jet shouted over the roar of open flames and deafening sizzles. “You're not causing any trouble now are you?”
Pained chirps tumbled free from Nell's craw. The thought of disappointing her Hunter, her Jet, was simply too much to bear. “N-n-nooooooo.” Head held low she weakly chirped at Brook and the Felyne both. “I'm... sorry. For shoving you.”
“Better,” decreed the Huntress. One by one she continued to sooth and talk down the furious Felynes. Their egos sated they reluctantly returned to their work stations.
“Just a little longer, Nell! Honest!” Jet called out.
“But it smells good nowwwwwwwwwwwwww!” Nell pouted.
“Well it'll smell even better later!” Jet chimed back.
Beaked lips wavering Nell dejectedly leaned back into Taras' still slumbering form.
“Zzzzzzzzzzz...”
Jaw coming unhinged, his serpentine fangs glistening with saliva, the Tobi-Kadachi lazily smacked his lips as he stirred to life with a yawn.
With nowhere, and no one, else to turn to Nell pecked at the snake squirrel. “Taras?”
“Hrnnnnngh?” he sleepily mumbled.
“Can't they hurry it up?” she incredulously asked. Smells, unfamiliar and inviting, danced along the back of her sinuses and throat. The onslaught of her olfactory senses was simply becoming too much to bear. “This is taking foreverrrrr.”
“It'll be ready when it'sss ready!” Taras sleepily hissed.
“GROWLF.”
With a grunt the Tobi-Kadachi pushed off from the Nargacuga and steadied himself. Sitting cross-legged beside her, Taras fluttered his forked tongue and sampled the spice scented air. “Ahhhhhh! Delissshiousss!”
Hands cupped against the side her face, Nell tiredly thrummed her fingers along her beak.
“It'll be wooooooorth it!” Taras teased.
“Yeah, yeah,” sassed the Nargacuga. Following an exaggerated raspberry a disgusted groan rose like bile from her throat. “Just. Do humans really have to cook everything? Not that. Not that I don't appreciate it. It's just...”
“It'sss how humansss ssshow they care!” Taras exclaimed.
“...Really?” Nell chirped.
“Mmhmm! While you and I both know there's nothing asss romantic asss sssharing, and tearing, apart a fresssh kill...” The Tobi-Kadachi planted his elbows upon the Canteen's counter and chuckled. “You have to remember that humansss think there'sss sssomething even more ssso! Sssilly asss it may ssseem!”
Head cocked to the side the Nargacuga curiously purred.
“Jussst imagine it like thisss, Nell! Ssssay you ssspend your day ssstalking your prey and claiming the kill. Their body, warm and heavy between your teeth, weighsss heavily on your jaw as you carry them back to your nessst.” Taras' forked tongue fluttered wildly between his lips as he began to fluster himself. “Knowing full well that your human isss waiting for you!”
Nell's cheeks burned at the thought. “Yeah?”
“Mmhmm! Waiting for you. Waiting to put your kill's flesssh to flame, to replaccce itsss ssskin with ssseasssoning, and transssform it into sssomething ssso delissshisss it defiesss dessscripssshin! To match your laborsss with their own and ssshow you how much they care! How much they love you!”
“Love?” gasped the Nargacuga.
“Yesss!” beamed the snake squirrel. “Brook told me ssso herssself! Humansss believe the way to a one'sss heart is through their stomach. To cook for sssomeone is to care for them!”
The whole of the bat cat's head became enveloped in a beet red glow. T-t-that meant...then that meant...
WHUMPF
That meant she had been spurning Jet's advances all morning. Whining about them even! Flopping forward onto the counter, hands covering her eyes, Nell's ears folded flat against her skull.
“You're fiiiiine,” blepped Taras. “Human courting ritualsss are a lot to take in!”
“Honnnnnnngh. Some Cultural Ambassador I turned out to be,” Nell mumbled. “Jet probably thinks I'm a terrible mate...”
TONK
The clunk of steel against stone registered in the bat cat's ears. Splaying apart her fingers, the Nargacuga's golden eyes peeking through the gaps, she excitedly growlfed at the cauldron sized bowl planted before her.
“He thinks anything but that,” Jet smirked as he consoled her with a kiss. Hands sinking into her thick fluffed cheeks he nosed at her beak and peppered his big beloved with emphatic smooch after smooch.
“Jet...” Beaked lips peeled back into a smile, and the crimson mask wrapped around her eyes aglow, Nell excitedly returned his affections.
FWUMP
Flopping forward onto the counter, her breasts and muffintop spreading wide atop it, the Nargacuga chirped. To think. This was her new normal now. This was her everyday. She still couldn't believe it.
“It's... it's just breakfast, Nell,” the Hunter nervously laughed as the Nargacuga all but pledged her undying affection to him.
“It's anything but!” she thought aloud with a playful growl. Chin raised, and neck exposed, she melted into purring puddle when Jet accepted her offer and scritched away. That somehow, someway, humans had found a way to fashion food into something akin to a religious experience...
How did they do it? How did they find the restraint, the patience, to not simply devour anything and everything before them? How did they even find out that putting food to flame made it all the more flavorful? How did they learn to extract salt and seasonings from the very sand and surf?
“Mreow maow mjau meow mow!” shouted the Felynes as Nell loafed across the counter.
“I know, I know! Sorry!” stammered Jet as he struggled to keep their public displays of affection out of the kitchen. Eyes half-lidded, and fur puffed out, the Nargacuga contentedly flopped atop her insignificant other.
“N-n-nell. Please,” Jet stammered in between nervous bouts of laughter as he pulled himself out from beneath her. Ladle in one hand, and a ceramic mixing bowl balanced atop the other, he served up a heaping helping of Tangy Tripe to his behemoth beloved. Guiding it atop the Canteen's counter, and sliding it towards Nell's beak, the Hunter proudly puffed out his chest. “Breakfast is-”
HROMPH
“...Nell,” Jet sighed as he lobbed an oven mitt into the side of her head.
Shoving the whole of the bowl into her craw, teeth excitedly grinding away at its edges, bone rattling crunches echoed from inside the Nargacuga's pinched shut beak.
“Nell! No!” begged her Hunter.
“Hruff!” Cheeks puffed out, and juices sloshing out from between her lips, the Nargacuga cupped her hands to her maw and suckled every last drip of juices collecting in the wrinkles of her scaled palms.
“Out! Spit it out!” Clad in an apron, and bandanna wrapped around his forehead, Jet menacingly shook his ladle at her.
“Mrrnhhhh,” she growled with a shake of her head.
“Nelllllll!” implored the Hunter. “I'll never finish working off these damages at this rate!”
The Nargacuga simply couldn't help herself. Never had she ever tasted something to tantalizing, so tangy, so transcendent! Pronounced crunches sounded out as her beak and pointed teeth crunched apart the whole of the bowl.
“Nelllllllllllllllllllll.”
Flustered purrs reverberated within her throat as Nell cupped her hands to her cheeks. Eyes fluttering closed she allowed her tastebuds to take her on a tour to lands unknown.
“Mreow?” grumped a burly Felyne.
“...Yes, again. S-s-she's getting better though!” said Jet. “She at least let me argue with her this time!”
With a dismissive swat of his paws the Meowster Chef bumbled back into the kitchens.
Lips sputtering, the Hunter dragged out a tired sigh. “Anything to say for yourself?”
“GROWLF!” Beaming from ear to ear, and tail swishing behind her, the Nargacuga contentedly smacked her beaked lips without so much as a shred of shame.
Try as he might to fight it, Jet came to sport a sheepish smile of his own. “Well... I'm glad you liked it at any rate,” he smirked.
“Huuurffffff!” How could she not?! Sweet Sapphire where to even begin...
Dragging her tongue along her gumline, fishing free the ceramic caught between her teeth, Nell sloshed the shards about a stream a saliva churning from one puffed out cheek to another. What did Jet call it again? Tangy Tripe?
Mmph. It had taken everything she had not to bound over the counter and devour the ingredients as he was preparing them. Her pupils dilated into saucers when she watched him fill pans, already sloshing with boiling hot oil and spices, to the brim with sliced onions and carrots and peppers. Then when he splashed and doused it all with tomatoes turned to paste and Blissbill broth? WHEW.
Nostrils flared, Nell fanned herself as she recalled the rest of the recipe. Diced potatoes. Marmalade. Strips of Mosswine stomach lining. Minute after minute she tormented herself as she watched her Hunter dutifully stir the ever so decadent dish. Eyes gone wide, and ears perked to attention, she had watched on intently as the meat melted into mush and its sloughed off fat thickened the bubbling broth into a throat choking gravy. Jaw locked open, waterfalls of slobber poured past the sides of her beak as she continued to reminisce on the meal she had just inhaled.
“Nell?” Jet worriedly ahemed as he waved up at the Nargacuga.
“Hmm?” Perking to attention, her chin and cheeks slathered in saliva, the Wyvern unconsciously slurped herself clean.
“Never... nevermind,” he sighed as he topped off another bowl for her. “Either way though... I'd appreciate it if you tried NOT to make more work for me,” Jet mumbled. “I have a busy enough day ahead of me as it is!”
“Growlf?”
“You. You know. Deliveries. Training. Then. Umm. I want to be sure we have plenty of time for the uhh...” The Hunter bashfully ahemed as he felt his cheeks burning bright. “Tour.”
“That's right!” thought Nell. The best was yet to come! This day could, and would, get better still! Finally. Finally finally finally Jet was going to welcome her into his nest. His nest? No. No no no no no...
Their nest.
Bunching her forearms against the sides of her breasts the Nargacuga let slip a lustful growl.
“MRAOW MEOW MJAU!” screamed the Felynes.
“NELL, PLEASE,” a mortified Jet shrieked as her tail lifted high.
Meanwhile, eyes half-lidded, and forked tongue dangling from between his lips, Taras dreamily sighed when a tabletop sized plate was thrown down before him. An entire school's worth of Gastronome Tuna, cut into steaks, sizzled atop the platter. Dipped in butter, and crusted with cheese, the Tobi-Kadachi shuddered with delight at the satisfying sizzle of each and every cut. The beds of mushrooms surrounding them, pan seared to a delicious golden brown and drizzled with garlic and basil, soaked up every last dollop of juice streaming off of the steaks.
“To cook for sssomeone isss to care for sssomone...” Taras repeated back to himself with a smile.
GROWLMPH
Hunched over the counter , and scaly snout buried into his massive meal, the Tobi-Kadachi gorged himself. Through heady snorts, and throat straining swallows, tears beaded along Taras' eyes. To think... day in and day out Brook unceasingly told him, showed him, how much she loved him. It... It... it was more than his heart could bear.
“Taras?” Brook worriedly inquired. “Something wrong?”
Shaking his head side to side, his scaly cheeks wet with slobber and tears, the Tobi-Kadachia could but happily growl. Scarred tail swishing happily behind him he reached forward and daintily curled his clawed hands around Brook. Lovingly stroking at her back, and thumbing at her cheeks, he cupped his Huntress close to his chest.
“W-w-where is this coming from?” Brook yelped. “N-n-not that I'm complaining mind...”
Pointed chin tucked against his chest, and lips enveloping her head, Taras bashfully sniffled and snorted away his tears as he squeezed her tight in between increasingly affectionate nuzzles and professions of love.
Ears burning hot, and soaked through and through with her boyfriend's tears, the humbled human couldn't help but choke up herself. “C-c-c'mon, Taras. You just heard the Felynes. No... no...” With a bemused if not defeated sigh she buried herself into the Tobi-Kadachi's embrace. Reaching up now and again to try and fail to stroke at salt stained cheeks she dutifully whispered just how much she loved him in turn.
“What's gotten into the both of you?!” Jet bemoaned. With a flustered yelp the Hunter skittered back as Nell tried to flop atop and bury him beneath her breasts.
“S-s-seriously!” Brook huffed in between kisses. “You were supposed to tear through these same as it ever was! That way we could show off a little something before deliveries!”
“Hmmm?” rumbled both the monsters in unison.
“Well... something to show Taras anyway...” Jet trailed off as he kept trying to play keep away with the flirtatious bat cat.
GASP
Crackling with static electricity, the Tobi-Kadachi instantly perked to attention. “You mean?!”
With a grunt, Nell's chin clapping down upon him with a playful chirp, Jet groaned when he found himself pinned once more beneath the loafed and loving bat cat. “Alma's training is wrapping up and well. I mean. I did promise...”
Wiggling side to side, his eyes positively twinkling, Taras let slip a gleeful hiss. “Well what are we waiting for?!” Letting Brook drop between his thighs, the Huntress spontaneously combusting as he clapped her between them, the snake squirrel ravenously inhaled the remainder of his meal. Refusing to waste a moment so much as breathing as he devoured everything before him.
Nell, likewise, indulged her uninhibited appetite as she reared back clasped her black scaled hands against the side of the cauldron of Tangy Tripe. Beak parted wide, the rising steam condensing against her cheeks, the Nargacuga noisily glurked and gulped one throat choking serving after another. Every seismic splashdown of a swallow caused her doughy stomach to gurgle and groan.
Jet acked, and shuddered, while steaming hot streams of soup rained down alongside him.
“Ready when you are!” Taras beamed as he wiggled side to side and ground Brook flat into a molten mushy mess between his thighs.
Pushing herself off the ground, and sliding her black scaled fingers under her Hunter's back, Nell rose to her feet with a grunt. As those thick clawed digits delicately but possessively coiled around Jet she took to stroking her thumb along the side of his face. A shiver rolled down her spine at the sensation of his skin against her scales. Soon, so very soon, she would have all that and more. “Where to?” she salaciously purred.
“T-t-to the shoreline,” Jet said with a panicked cough as his girlfriend manhandled him for all the Canteen to see.
Cupping Jet close to her chest, her furred hills clapping against him, the blur of a bat cat deftly and silently stalked Astera at her Hunter's command. Taras, nipping at her heels, all but slithered after her as Brook ragdolled across his curled fingers. Silently winding their way down paths carved into sheer cliff faces the Wyverns excitedly made their way through their now home away from home. The roar of the waterfall crashing through the village's center. The hiss of the ocean rolling into shore. It was so placid, so peaceful, and it filled the Nargacuga and Tobi-Kadachi both with immeasurable pride to know they played however small a part in keeping it that way.
“Taras! Taras, calm down!” Nell pleaded.
Hands clasped around his snout, and eyes wavering, Taras furiously stamped his cloven feet as beads of electricity trickled along his limbs. The snake squirrel's silhouette, outlined by a blinding and brilliant blue glow, contrasted brilliantly against the purples and pinks slowly bleeding out from the edge of the twilit horizon.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZT
With a squawk the Nargacuga flailed backwards as puddles of glass came to pock the surrounding sands.
His mane standing on end, and the whole of his body wreathed in electricity, Taras sparked with every ecstatic stomp. “I-i-it'sss mine? It'sss really really mine?” breathlessly gasped the Tobi-Kadachi.
“All yours big guy,” Brook hummed. Slinging an arm around Jet's shoulder, affectionately noogying and tugging the Hunter close into a throttling bear hug, she broadly gestured to what at first glance looked to be an unfurled sail spread out across the seashore.
An enormous and sleeveless flax vest, stitched together from a recycled sail, gently flopped in the wind carried by the tides. The placket of the vest, strewn with door knocker sized brass rings, mimicked the appearance and functionality of buttons. Sitting alongside it, propped up along a nearby dock, was a sanded smooth boat mast. Its blunted tips were coated with caps of iron and a freshly woven length of hempen rope, notched to the mast like a bow string, dangled from its side.
Blepping and hissing and growling all at once Taras clambered forward and clutched the him-sized article of clothing within his grasp. Eeeeing to himself, and cuddling it close,
“Try it out!” Jet acked as Brook continued to noogy him. “Put your arms through the sleeves. The big gaps, the big holes!”
Sliding his arms through the sleeves-
“Ah. Uh. Well...” Brook laughed as her boyfriend slid it on backwards. “Other way, Taras! Other way! You want the open part, you want the buttons, brushing against your chest! Here lemme-”
Sitting upon the sands, legs kicked out before him, Taras wiggled and giggled as his Huntress clambered up atop his thighs. Smoothing out the wrinkles in his vest she took hold of an enormous hand and guided it towards a button. “And this is how you hook them together...”
“Broooooooook! Let me, let me!” pouted the Tobi-Kadachi. Blushing like mad Taras, nevertheless, followed her lead.
Sidling up alongside Nell, wincing as her puffed out fur snapped and cracked with ambient static electricity, Jet forced himself to withstand a fair few bolts as he hugged into his loomy lover's side. “Soooooooooo...”
“Sooooo?” purred the bat cat as she cupped him close.
“Sure you don't mind me training Taras? I know you were hoping for more uh... well... us time.”
Brows arched, Nell couldn't help but crack a smile at the sight of the sickeningly sweet size-mismatched couple. Who was she to deny him this? “...It's fine,” the Nargacuga said with a shrug. “I've waited this long already. What's a few weeks more? After that though...”
Jet meeped when a lustful growl revved in Nell's throat and a scaled hand cupped around him. Pulling him in close, and smothering him against her muffintop, the Nargacuga nosed into him and playfully nibbled at his shoulders. “You're miiiiiiiine. Mine and mine alone,” she chiriririped with a dreamy sigh.
The Hunter melted into mush as he sank into the noticeable layer of plush that had come to coat her massive and muscular frame. An all Canteen diet was clearly starting to take its toll. Not that... n-n-not that he minded. “You don't see me complaining,” Jet happily mumbled into her. “So. Uh. When were... when were you thinking of...?”
Free hand cupped against her cheek, and crimson mask of fur wrapped around her eyes glowing bright, Nell could hardly contain herself. This was it. This was really it. Today was THE day. Once their deliveries were done, and Jet kicked Alma to the curb, she'd finally be able to enter her human's nest. Day in and out she'd been preparing for how she'd swoon her Hunter out of his armor.
“GROWLFFFFF,” huffed the Nargacuga. To feel Jet's skin against her fur, to clasp his soft hands between the scaly wrinkles of her palms, to simply know her Hunter trusted her so utterly and completely that he was willing to share himself with her at his most vulnerable...
No one, nothing, would stop her now.
Rising to his cloven feet, his peach scaled soles stamping against the glassy sand, Taras picked up his Insect Glaive err Staff.
“First things first!” Brook excitedly elaborated as she chased after him. Hand cupped against the back of his calf, tenderly brushing against it, she motioned to the length of rope strewn down along its side. “So slide your arm through that little gap there...”
Dutifully obliging her instructions the Tobi-Kadachi wiggled happily as the stout ship mast slid up and along past his shoulder. Standing straight up, the rope snugly digging into the crook of his neck, Taras tentatively lumbered across the shoreline. Swinging gently at his side, the Insect Staff stretching from the back of his knees to a head's length above his horned noggin, the snake squirrel's newfound weapon harmlessly brushed against his thighs while he walked.
“Great! Then to unsheathe it...”
“Eeeheeeheee!” Taras growled as he rolled his arm about his socket and knocked the hempen strap free. As it rolled off his shoulder he tried, and failed, to catch it as it shattered apart the many puddles of glass at his feet. With a nervous oops he dropped to his knees and excitedly brandished it once more. Pole held out before him, the arcs of static crackling between his white knuckle grip trickling down along the mast's length before coming to congeal atop its blunted metal tips, the Tobi-Kadachi gleefully poked and prodded at the open air as snaps and crackles accompanied every attack.
“Thisss isss amazzzing!” the Tobi-Kadachi manically blepped. “Ohhhhhhh Nell I can't wait to ssshow the othersss!”
“Others?” said the Nargacuga with a smirk. “What others? You mean Maccha and the Commander?”
“No sssilly! The other Trainersss! Today'sss the day we were sssummoned to ssspeak with the Sssilk Ssseer! Remember?”
The Nargacuga's mood, and libido, immediately tanked at the reminder. “Wait. That's. That's today?”
Correction. One thing, one obligation, could stop her.
“Mmhmmm!” Taras confidently boasted as he bounced in place and awkwardly sheathed his Insect Staff once more. “We'll have jussst enough time to sssqueezzze in our daily deliveriesss before then!”
“...We will?” Nell groaned as her ears drooped flat.
“Yesss!” Hands cupped to his cheeks, and eyes twinkling, Taras' forked tongue fluttered in the breeze. Dropping to his knees, wobbling uneasily as the boat mast scraped against the sand behind him, the Tobi-Kadachi cupped his Huntress beneath his palms.
“But. B-b-but,” chirped the Nargacuga. That could take ALL day. Where was she supposed to find the time to-
“C'mon, Nell!” Cuddling Brook close to his breast, the Huntress' face steaming at being so casually swept off her feet, Taras raced down Astera's shoreline.
Arms hanging heavily from sockets, and flopping chin first onto the sand, Nell whined as she visibly deflated. “But today's the day we...”
Lips scrunched, Jet squeezed at that tree trunk of a bat cat neck. “H-h-hey. Maybe... maybe it won't take that long? And worse comes to worse it's just one more day. Right?”
“But I want it to be TOday!” she pitifully growled.
“I knoooooow.” Ruffling the bat cat's cheeks, Jet did his best to console his looming lover as she reluctantly rose to her feet.
Caked with sand, and stray shards of glass matted against her fur, Nell dejectedly scooped her Hunter up. Clapping him flat between her forearms and breasts, her scaly gloves bunched close, she dragged out tired sighs.
“Awh, Nell...” Sliding his hands between her fingers, squeezing at what little of her that he could, Jet tried his best to console her as she limply pinched his limbs between her digits.
Lumbering along the shoreline, and treading towards the rising sun, the massive footprints and shards of glass left in Nell's wake disappeared beneath the rising tide.
…
…
…
FWOOOSH
FWOOOOOOOOOOOSH
The heavy beat of wings filled the air.
THOOOOOOOOOOOM
A pair of purple scaled legs, tapering off into black fur covered with a rainbow slick of oils, touched down. With a chitter their owner curiously sniffed at the air. A suite of scents, some familiar and some muddled beyond recognition by the rising sea foam, wafted between their nostrils.
Their rounded ears perked to attention with a squeak and a fang filled smile. “There you are...” Noiselessly rising back into the air, their broad toes peeling off the sand, they drifted down the coastline in search of their prey.
The Commander, Light Bowgun in hand, wordlessly patrolled Astera's twilit shoreline. Clinking to a halt, his armor weighing heavily on his old bones, he looked out to the horizon. A shimmering blood red orb set the sky itself ablaze as it rose from beneath the waves. Streaks of pinks and oranges rolled in with the tide and lapped at his shins.
A soft thump sounded out when the Commander tucked the stock of his Light Bowgun against his shoulder. Peering down the sights he methodically scanned the ocean smooth as glass. Nothing. Same as it, mercifully, ever was.
Breathing easy for yet another day, the old Hunter motioned to sling his Light Bowgun over his back-
"Day in and day out you do this," a sultry voice stated. "Whatever for?"
Before he startled to attention. Lips pulled flat, and nostrils flared, the Commander's eyes twitched in irritation. "...Don't know."
A whistling gust of air, and the slow heavy flap of wings, answered him. "You don't know?"
"It's a known unknown," the wizened Hunter unhelpfully clarified. Weapon tucked close to his chest, and pointed down into the rolling waves, his patrol continued apace as he pointedly refused to look back to, much less formally acknowledge, his unwanted guest chittering in annoyance.
"...Omar."
"Within these walls I answer to Commander," the old Hunter curtly corrected them.
Faint squeaks accompanied an exasperated exhale. "Commander Omar-"
"Commander. Just Commander."
"Just Commander-"
The Commander's composure faltered when he subtly slouched forward and all but rolled his eyes straight of his skull.
Laughter, playful and self-assured, lapped along Astera's shores. "It's always so cute when you pout. Have I ever told you as such, Omar?"
"All too often," he grumped. "Out with it woman. What do you want?"
"Ah ah ah!"
The groan of an inflating balloon filled the Commander's ears. Syllable by syllable his sassy shadow's voice deepened in pitch. "If you're going to insist on titles it's only fair that so do I."
Omar reflexively grit his teeth.
"Trainer of Trainers. The First Trainer," the unseen stranger trailed off with a giggle. "I'll answer to any and all, Commander! Why... for old times sakes you can even call me-"
"FINE. No titles. No pretenses." Omar reluctantly tucked his chin against his shoulder and formally acknowledged his gargantuan guest. The Nightshade Paolumu floating behind him, her neck sac inflated and audibly creaking, lazily twirled through the air with the smuggest of smiles. "...What do you want, Nyx?"
"Don't go changing the subject now!" she playfully tutted. The Hunter's brows pulled flat when the balloon of a bat silently swiveled before him and impeded his path. Her purple scaled face, enveloped by folds of black fur, curiously turned towards the horizon. "Well?"
The Hunter defensively crossed his arms about his chest in response. "It's an old habit that refuses to die. Nothing more."
FWOOOOOOM
Tears streamed from Omar's eyes when Nyx emptied her lungs into him. Heels skidding back through the sand, sliding along the surf until he was buried up to his waist, the old Hunter wearily blinked while his wispy white hair flopped back into place.
"It has something to do with your Old World. Doesn't it?" Nyx haughtily huffed. Wings outstretched, and neck sac deflated, the Nightshade Paolumu gently lowered herself onto the shore.
Omar refused to answer. The half-buried Hunter instead preoccupied himself with clawing his way free from the sand and surf.
"Stubborn as always..." Nyx grunted upon approach. Whensoever she lifted her heels or shifted in place water rushed in to fill her craterous paw prints.
Omar bitterly sighed as the rising tide surged past his stomach. Salt water and silt filled in and undid what little progress he had made in freeing himself. "I can't miss what I can't remember, Nyx."
"...True enough. You were but a pup when you first stepped on shore after all." Dropping to her knees, fissures spidering out through the sand upon impact, Nyx clasped her hands around the Hunter's torso. With a unenthused heave she hoisted him free.
Arms dangling over the sides of her gnarled and scaly fingers, the nails jutting from them thick as his forearm, Omar impotently glared at the behemoth bat. "...I meant what I said earlier. I don't know."
Nyx glared right back. Buck teeth poking from between her lips, and pitch black eyes narrowed in contempt, the Paolumu leaned in close. Oils slicked across her graying fur as a menacing rainbow of colors congealed upon the eyespot patterns lining the side of her neck.
"Every sunrise and every sunset those who could miss the Old World gazed out upon the ocean. Watching, waiting, for something," Omar grudgingly elaborated.
The Paolumu's expression softened as she gently set the Hunter on his feet and attentively listened. Even when practically prostrating herself before him he barely reached up to her breasts.
Omar dusted himself with a tired sigh. "...And they always breathed easy when it failed to arrive."
CLONK
Omar grunted when Nyx roughly began to knock and scrape away the sand that had come to cake his armor. "Woman! I'm more than capable of-"
Eyes half-lidded, Nyx continued to manhandle the old Hunter. "And you never thought to ask them what it was they waited for, Omar?"
"Of course I did!" he spat. Grunts and curses tumbled free from his lips while he unsuccessfully tried to slap and shove away her fingers.
"Well?" the Paolumu chittered in annoyance.
Drawing his Light Bowgun, Omar wordlessly threatened to empty a handful of blanks into her forearms.
Nyx, her hands tucked close to her bountiful chest, exaggeratedly arched her brows.
"...They never said," bashfully mumbled the old Hunter. "None of them liked to talk about it. Or the Old World."
The Paolumu growled in disgust. "Tch. So that's where your bad habits hail from." Rising to her feet, her broad and scale plated tail flicking in irritation behind her, Nyx regarded him with a bitter huff. "Must you always be so secretive?"
"Not everything need revolve around you." Omar snidely replied. "What business is this of yours anyway?"
"Hmph. Be that way, Omar. Keep your precious secrets to yourself!"
The Commander wordlessly sheathed his weapon with a disgusted exhale. As Nyx turned her back to him the thigh-high human limply shrugged. He was too old for this shit.
"So I will." Hands stuffed into his pockets, and gaze locked dead ahead, he simply shuffled past the Nightshade Paolumu. Ambling along the shoreline, his silhouette swallowed up by the rays of the rising sun, Omar bid her a dismissive wave. "Until next time, Trainer of Trainers."
Rounded ears perking to attention the Nightshade Paolumu chittered in disbelief when the Hunter actually dared to give her what she asked for. "I. YOU. SO HELP ME, OMAR," screeched the bat. "YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO PLAY ALONG!" Wings fanned out to her sides Nyx impotently stomped after him as the pace of the Commander's power walk not so subtly kicked up to a full fledged sprint.
"Why are you here, Nyx? Really?" Omar wheezed in between breaths. Grunts and groans filtered free from his lips every time the clawed fingers pinching at his collar angrily shook him side to side.
Wrinkled nose held up in disgust, Nyx but haughtily harrumphed.
“You wouldn't have invited yourself in here if it wasn't important,” the old Hunter sighed. Even after all these years she still manhandled him with such casual and infuriating ease.
“And maybe if you bothered to stay in touch I wouldn't need to,” she spat.
With a weary blink Omar plucked free the stray Light Bowgun bolts shallowly embedded into her arms. The Paolumu's thick and fluffy folds of black fur, glistening with an oily sheen, betrayed the impressive mounds of muscle the elderly Wyvern had managed to maintain. “Woman. Just answer the question.”
Nyx responded by curling her forearm around him and crushing him against her chest. The old Hunter wheezed when her wrists painfully dug into him.
“...Please.”
Cheek puffed out, the bat huffed at the much delayed deference. “If you must know...” she said before obligingly relaxing her grip in response.
“Is it about the Feral?”
“Tangentially so,” she acknowledged. “First and foremost I would speak of Astera and the Ancient Forest's relationship. Of your Hunters and my Trainers.”
The old Hunter perked to attention. It was ill like her to speak so plainly. “Well.” He gently slapped at her forearms as she stomped past the docks painted pink by the rising sun. “You have a captive audience.”
“Our accord is being tested. Even though it is understandable, and well within reason, as to why trade has tapered off to a trickle... my patience is wearing thin.”
Upon arriving in the New World the local monsters had paid little mind to the humans that had come to inhabit its shoreline. Their presence was so negligible, so sheltered and secluded, that it honestly took some time for the first Wyverns to bother to take notice of them. Paired with the fact they asked so little of the land itself it was hardly surprising.
What humans gave back though...
Husbandry. Epidemiology. Entomology.
The ministrations they produced. The preservatives they provided. The insects and animals and fruits and vegetables alike they nurtured and cultivated and shared in exchange for the Wyvern's protection and guidance. They had no need to scavenge or gather... they could simply grow whatever they wished on command! With how much of a strain Slayers were on the Ancient Forest, claiming nigh everything edible in sight for themselves on a daily basis, many a monster had become reliant on the excess and ease with which humankind could provide for them. Perhaps overly so.
“I know,” Omar shamefully acknowledged. “I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by our answer to it though.”
Nyx cocked her head to the side as she lumbered past the docks into Astera's empty markets. Her heavy footfalls shook stalls and shacks out of place as the Felynes curled up in their shade mrowled and scurried for cover.
The Hunter reluctantly thrummed his fingers against her wrist. “Lest I interrupt further. As you were saying?”
Bunching her arms together, and bunching Omar against her nigh spherical breasts, Nyx chittered uneasily. “Anyway. Regarding our relationship...” she trailed off with a mumble and a blush. “It is... in all of our best interests to seek to closer ties.”
Omar shuddered as the balloon bat unconsciously, possessively and protectively at that, cuddled him closer. She only ever did that when she was worried. “...Go on.”
Broad scaled tail swishing behind her, and voice squeaking as she choked on her words, Nyx irritably forced out a reply. “The world is changing, Omar. And not for the better.”
The Hunter forced down a nervous swallow. If she was worried then he was worried. “And you're saying we have to change along with it?”
“Mmhmm. I've already enlisted the aid of the Silk Seer to break it down to my Trainers. Whereas you will need to do the same with your Hunters.”
“This news being?”
“In due time,” Nyx sighed. “Let us hear of your efforts first. To help these changes go down all the easier.”
Omar gently slapped at her hands, right then left then right some more, to guide her through the village. The boardwalks sagged dangerously beneath the weight of her gait. “Even if training and trade has shuttered to a halt...”
Nyx's prodigious rodent-like ears, ringed with cartilage, perked to attention as she stamped flat the clay beneath her feet. The Botanical Research Garden had exploded into a veritable paradise in the shadow of the waterfall and great wheels that spun beneath it. Herbs and Mushrooms, lined with Insects of every sort, slowly stirred to life.
“We have not been idly sitting on our hands.”
The Nightshade's mood lifted at the sight, and smells, that greeted her. Piled high sheets of honeycomb replete with wax and grubs. Hill sized mounds of bundled reeds fit for bedding. Carefully packed beads of Smoke Bombs and Tranq Bombs to take the edge off. Barrels stained a kaleidoscope of colors as thick globs of Antidote, Potions, Cool Drinks, Hot Drinks, and more seeped through the gaps in the curved wooden planks.
Omar grunted when Nyx gingerly set him down upon his feet. Lips scrunched he turned away from the sight of his prodigious partner, curvaceous as ever, sashaying over towards their supplies with a nervous ahem. “Our deliveries have been delayed is all. Nothing more.”
Hands clapped together, the Nightshade Paolumu's buck teeth giddily bunched against her lower lip. Dropping to her knees, wincing as her old joints flared and painfully protested, Nyx scooped up a handful of grubs and a barrel of Mega Potion. Effortlessly flicking off the top the barrel with a clawed thumb she drank deeply of the pulpy and sickly sweet morass of mulched herbs and waxen chunks of melted Honey Combs. Her ears drooped, and shoulders sagged, as it sloughed down her throat and her nostrils burned at the overpowering scent rushing up through her sinuses.
Arms crossed about his chest Omar tried, and failed, to elaborate over the noisy and bassy glurks that accompanied her every swallow. Brows furrowed he continued to raise his voice to no avail as she downed gallons with every gulp.
Stifling a heavy cough, her eyes fluttering as what aches and pains and arthritis stabbed at her joints melted away, Nyx tossed back her head and puffed out her cheeks while she strained her jaw with grubs. Crushing them to a bloody mess between her teeth she emphatically exhaled when they heavily slid down into her stomach. Daintily setting the emptied barrel before her she returned to Omar with a pronounced spring in her step and her mood immeasurably improved.
“So I can see,” Nyx ahemhemed as she dabbed at her lips. While most monsters regarded human crafts and constructions as little more than curiosities... there was simply no denying the nigh fanatical demand and delight with which they regarded their ministrations and meals. Potions to take the edge off an ill advised Turf War. Cool Drinks with which, no matter how furry and fluffy one might be, the power to slog through a sweltering summer's day with ease. Antidotes to aid whatever ailed them. Hot Drinks for when the bitter winds blew in at night from the Wildspire Wastes or from across the salt and the Hoarfrost Isles. They were no strangers to gathering and foraging, certainly, for such remedies on their own... but the convenience and raw amount of them that humans were able to provide was simply unheard of. That they could simply grow them on command, without need for scavenging, boggled the mind as well! Recreating their ingredient's habitats on an delightfully diminished scale even!
“Amusingly enough...” Omar irritably continued as he tried to make himself heard over Nyx's contented chirrs. “We have been making our own efforts to cultivate Astera's relationship with the Ancient Forest writ large.” With a wave of his hand he bid Nyx to follow. His waves became increasingly impatient as the Nightshade Paolumu looked longingly to the supplies and mulled sampling another set. “Nyx.”
She just needed to be certain and self-assured of their quality was all! Neck sac inflated, the Nightshade Paolumu twiddled her purple scaled fingers as she hoisted up a barrel of Adamant Seeds in one hand and a Hot Drink in the other.
“NYX.”
Punching a hole clean through the top of her drink with a tap of her clawed digit she gingerly sipped at the spicy concoction rich with pulp and seeds. Nose wrinkled, and lips puckered, she hurriedly tossed back a mouthful of Adamant Seeds. The fat filled oils that came to mat her tongue and teeth dulled her senses in an instant and left her with only the invigorating sensation of the smoldering hot stew that massaged at her very bones.
“WOMAN. THOSE AREN'T ALL FOR YOU!”
“Well maybe they ought to be,” the Paolumu mumbled between mouthfuls. Shuffling back on over towards the Commander she playfully bumped him aside with her calves. “I'll confess, Omar. I was not expecting such a warm welcome on such short notice!” she beamed. “I'll have to swing by more often,” she teased with a wink.
“Please don't” the old Hunter emphatically emphasized. “Were you even listening to what I was saying?”
Nyx continued to sip and snack as she nuzzled her chin into her inflated sac. “I heard you,” she playfully scoffed as she followed him towards the great gates that formally marked off entry and exit into Astera proper.
Omar dragged out an exaggerated groan. “If you must know-”
“I really must,” she cheekily squeaked back.
Slouching forward the old Hunter grimble grambled to himself. “If you must know... out of naked self-interest we've struck up a dialogue with Slayer Alma.”
“The Slayer?” Nyx quizzically hummed. “Funny you mention as such.”
“Then alongside her... I've entrusted two of my most trusted Hunters to work alongside your Trainers-”
Chin tucked against her chest, the Paolumu choked on her drink. Clawed hand clasped close to her muzzle she hacked and wheezed at length. “I'm sorry,” Nyx coughed as she cleared her throat. “I don't believe I quite caught that, Omar. WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?” boomed the Nightshade Paolumu in disbelief.
Omar wordlessly grunted. Head tilted back to the guards manning the walkways above the gateway's entrance the Hunter nodded at them. They obliged back with a nod of their own and waved at unseen someones beyond the borders.
Bundles of lumber and branches in hand, Taras and Nell stood frozen in place as Astera's gates slowly swung open. “Wait. Isss that?” Fur standing on end, the Tobi-Kadachi warily side-eyed the Nargacuga whose dilated pupils indicated a fight or flight response.
From beyond the wooden barricades a husky and feminine voice cleared its throat. “OMAR! Would you care to repeat that?!”
“It is,” Nell nervously chirped.
“Hum? Is what who?” Jet asked as he-
WHUMPF
Turned around to see mountainous piles of logs crumble and clonk atop the beaten path behind him. In an instant Nell and Taras both had darted off into the underbrush.
FWOOOOOOOOOOM
Gates swinging open, Jet and Brook confusedly turned from one direction to the next as the Commander stood front and center to greet them. Directly behind him, her thighs scraping past his head, stood a stout and graying Nightshade Paolumu. Winged arms at her sides, and clawed hands on her hips, she furrowed her brows and regarded the Hunter and Huntress with out and out contempt.
“As I was saying...” the Commander chuckled as he gestured to Brook and Jet. “These fine Hunters, and select unnamed Trainers, have been at the forefront of our exchange efforts. Tirelessly have they toiled to see to it that trade between our peoples can be re-enabled.” With a swish of his arm he approvingly regarded latest and greatest delivery. “A remarkable showing as always you two!”
Her hands overflowing with mushrooms, Brook uhhhhhed as she forced an uneasy thumbs up.
Eyes darting to and fro, Nyx scoured the immediate area for any clues. “...Which Trainers?” said the bat with a squint.
“Details, details...” the Commander dismissively brushed off. “All you need to know is that they assist us in gathering at sizes and scales we could never hope to achieve and, in exchange, we afford them supervised entry and access to Astera proper. A cultural exchange if you will.”
“And when were you going to tell me about this?” growled the bat.
“When you asked me,” Omar snorted.
“Uhhhh... Sir?” Jet sheepishly asked.
“Is now a bad time?” Brook followed up for him as she took note of Nyx's darkening expression.
Hands tucked behind his back, Omar nonchalantly arched his brows as the Nightshade Paolumu beside him crushed the barrel within her grasp. Misshapen shrapnel and sawdust trickled out from between her fingers.
Nyx's beady black eyes bore their way through not only Omar but the Hunters gathered before her. Wings fanned out she wordlessly stomped over towards the great gate. The wooden slabs crunched and cracked apart beneath her grip as she turned her ire towards the diminutive Hunter and Huntress. “A moment if you would.”
FWAM
Slamming the gates shut, pikes popped out of place and the walkways lining the tops of them violently rattled in place.
Jet and Brook both warily gestured at one another while the guards posted atop the walls nervously looked to the duo for guidance.
“Brook?” whispered Jet. His lips pulled flat at the unseen but all too obvious and ominous creak of Nyx's neck sac slowly but surely inflating.
“Yeah?”
“Are we... are we in trouble?” Eyes gone wide he fearfully regarded the increasingly panicked expressions plastered upon the guards.
“Maybe.” Brook mused aloud as she clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Maybe we should-”
“OMARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!”
Nyx's explosive outburst, accompanied by a near tornadic gale, bent out Astera's front gates and snapped apart the pikes surrounding it. Shrieks and wails sounded out as guards stationed atop them disappeared into the rising clouds of rubble.
“WHAT?” shouted the all but deafened old Hunter.
“HOW DARE YOU UNDERCUT ME! MY TRAINERS?! YOU DARE ROPE MY TRAINERS INTO YOUR SCHEMES WITHOUT MY SAY SO?”
“IT'S MY VILLAGE! I CAN EXTEND AN INVITATION TO THEM IF I SO DESIRE!”
Squeaks, infuriated chitters, and the impotent stomping off feet sounded out before Nyx's bassy voice cratered even deeper. “INVITATION?! WHERE'S MY INVITATION, OMAR?” she howled as the whole of the village rattled in place.
“OH LIKE YOU NEED ONE!”
“IT'S THE PRINCIPLE OF IT!”
“THE PRINCIPLE?! YOU TRESSPASS AT YOUR LEISURE! YOU'RE TRESSPASSING RIGHT NOW!”
“IT'S CALLED INVITING MYSELF! SINCE YOU NEVER DO!”
“WOMAN SO HELP ME.”
Their bickering rapidly devolved into a litany of curses and elder swears as the entirety of Astera was forced to listen to the old timers bicker.
Clutching at Jet's shoulder, and whirling him about face, Brook propped her shell shocked co-conspirator upon his armored heels and frantically guided him off the beaten path. “We should leave.”
“We should,” Jet mumbled as the harried Hunters hurled themselves into the hollows of the Ancient Forest without a second thought.
FIRST, PREVIOUS, NEXT
Category Story / Macro / Micro
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 114 x 120px
File Size 169.2 kB
Listed in Folders
Comments