Death March — Fixed

“Tek here, I have never done with karaoke--not only is my voice terrible--I am also tone-deaf and tune-deaf.”

I can hear birds singing, signaling morning--well, actually they are probably arguing over territory or calling for mates--but why ruin that which sounds beautiful.

Opening my eyes, I can see a faint light through the cloth roof--it’s a bit dazzling. Ah right, I slept in the wagon because the camping spot was a wasteland covered in stones.

 

Last night, both Arisa and I had to spend a fair amount of time to calm Lulu enough for her to fall asleep--Because there wasn’t a nearby source of water. She only went to sleep when we filled up two large buckets with water and placed one at the front and one at the back of the wagon, where she could see them.

 

While still lying down, I look at my chest, and see a hand grasping my shirt loosely. On my left side sleeps a beautiful black-haired girl, hugging my hand and side.

I’ve gotten a bit accustomed to it, but it still makes my heart jump every time I see her beautiful, relaxed, sleeping face--a smile even curls the corners of her full lips--If we were alone, or only with Arisa here, I might, with her permission, act on some of my urges. Arisa would probably encourage that.

However, I’m not the sort who can have sex with a lot of people watching--sooner or later, I will fix that, we will have orgies. Or not. Then again, Arisa may want to try it, so maybe I shouldn’t mention it to her.

I feel a deep softness on my right arm, and a warm back against my hand--the sensations are confusing, so I look over.

There is a girl with long pointed ears, which twitch in her sleep, having the top of her head being pressed on by the same soft breasts that are encompassing my right arm--there is a strangely unpleasant expression on her sleeping face, maybe she is overheated?

The owner of those soft breasts is hugging me arm with an innocent sleeping expression on her truly beautiful face.

Since it’d be too bad to wake everyone up, I lay there while enjoying the soft warmth and fragrance of women.

I can’t help but peek at the wide neckline of Nana’s pajamas, locking on to such a soft-looking valley is a man’s nature. Since I am already using all my might to suppress the natural phenomenon that happens to a man every morning--doing this may be natural, but it really isn’t helping me.

“Master, the preparation for breakfast is about complete, so please get up.” Liza, who had been on guard duty from around dawn comes to wake me up.

She seems strangely, slightly disappointed when she sees us--I hope she isn’t disappointed in me, but she resumes her normally blank expression as her eyes meet mine.

“I’m sorry--” I don’t know why I said that, maybe a habit?

Liza tilts her head slightly, “Why are you sorry, master?”

“You looked disappointed.”

She actually smiled slightly, her tail slowly swaying--her cheeks becoming slightly pink, “Master has no need to apologize, I am not disappointed, at least not at you--”, the last part of her sentence is muttered rather quietly.

Hearing our quiet conversation, Lulu and Mia begin waking up.

Lulu, unfortunately, releases me and says good morning while shyly fixing her hair and clothes--Mia shortly says, “Morning.” in a small voice as she shoves Nana aside.

She seems to dislike being used as a body pillow.

I quietly greet the two girls, and look down. Arisa is curled up in a ball at my feet, she is hugging them for some reason--maybe she wanted more but Tama and Pochi are each clinging to one of my legs, their heads pressed against the outside of my lower thighs. Pochi is making strange little noises in her sleep, one of her legs twitches occasionally; she reminds me of a sleeping puppy--while Tama is rubbing her face on me, also asleep, with a happy grin.

After greeting Lulu, I carefully move Tama and Pochi off my legs, and pull my feet from Arisa’s grasp--Arisa reaches out for something to hug, catching both the Beastkin girls.

Smiling at the adorably sleeping girls, I get up and go to one of the crates, grabbing a white apron and passing it to Liza.

Nana doesn’t seem like she’ll wake up, even after getting enthusiastically shoved by Mia.

Hearing the rustling of clothes behind me, I turn around and see that Mia is crouching there naked--even though she is facing away from me, I can see the outline of her well-shaped body--She obviously doesn’t skip out on exercise.

“Wipe me.” She gives me a towel, wanting me to wipe her back.

It seems that she’s sweaty because Nana hugged her all night.

It still strikes me as weird, how easily she strips in front of me--though she hides her breasts and pubic region when facing me, but she is fine with me seeing everything else. She had been like this since after I saved her from the Mage--since she kissed me.

Since I’ve quickly finished wiping her back, I ignored the quiet giggles when I hit her ticklish spots, and the quiet gasps when I found other sensitive spots; I give her the towel and she wipes her front.

While she is doing this, I force myself to turn away and wake Nana and the girls.

I gently shake Nana awake, without any preliminary signs, her eyes snap open--rapidly scanning from side to side, before they fix on my face, and she slowly sits up.

I wake Arisa, Tama and Pochi; Arisa takes a little bit more effort to wake, resulting in the two Beastkin girls trapped in her embrace and staring imploringly at me.

Once everyone is awake, I get out of the wagon.

***

Outside the wagon, I smell blood--

Looking around, I see that hung from a tree near where Liza is cooking, there are five animals strung up with thick rope--to drain their blood.

The Heads-Up-Display indicates that they’re Brown Wolves--come to think of it, they were eliminated by Pochi and Tama at midnight; since they were just level ten animals, I watched over them on the radar.

So, half of it became, “meat”, huh.

Looking at all this, it means that breakfast is most likely going to be mean--I do like meat, but the Beastkin girls love it a lot, lot more than I do.

“It’s going to be done soon, so please drink this for now.” Lulu speaks to me, serving me tea. Since she’s only wearing a simple apron over her pajamas, her body lines are visible in the morning light.

“We have prepared vegetable soup and bread for master and Mia, so, please don’t worry.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it.”

If I left it to Liza alone, it would become a meat fest, so I’m happy with Lulu’s concern.

Mia has somehow quietly sat down beside me, even before I was aware of it--which is difficult with my skills--she snatches the cup from my hand and drinks the tea.

The Tama and Pochi are already by Liza, asking to help while tasting bits and pieces of the meat, and getting scolded.

 

“Master, ‘ning.”

 

“Good morning, Nana. The correct greeting is ‘Good Morning’--forget the strange things Arisa taught you.”

“Yes, my lord.” She salutes while answering me.

I look up at her, and seen this close--her face is hidden by her breasts--truly a splendid view.

I ask Nana to sit down beside me on the sheet; I take this chance to correct the strange words and actions that Arisa taught her.

Her clothing looked like what a cheap courtesan would wear--right now, she’s wearing Liza’s spare clothing; clothing made for a girl with a fair bit less chest. At first I wanted to lend her my robe, but when it looked like Arisa would possibly steal it, and Lulu looked slightly envious, I decided against it.

On a large platter is some wolf meat, with fried vegetables and boiled potatoes, as well as vegetable soup. This is to be shared among Arisa, Lulu, and the Beastkin girls--There is plates with vegetables, boiled potatoes, bread, and fruit for Mia and I.

At Liza’s instruction, Tama and Pochi quickly distributes plates; at Lulu’s instruction, Arisa helped them. Of course, none of them forgot to encamp near the large platter of meat.

Nana drinks water while watching us all eat.

I’ll say this beforehand, but it isn’t bullying. She said that for approximately six months after her birth, she can only receive water and Magic Power. Since the same things are also written in the Alchemy book left behind by Trazayuya, so it’s probably true.

There are three ways to supply Magic to Nana.

The first is using a facility called a Regulation Tank--when she was with Zen the Mage, this was the method she and her sisters used.

The second is through, to put it bluntly, by having sex--I was fine with this method, but Lulu suddenly cried, “I’m first!”, so I decided to wait until then. Lulu’s crimson face afterwards was absolutely adorable, it seems that it had been a verbal slip, she couldn’t look me in the eyes for two days after that.

The third and last is by placing hands near her heart and pouring Magic Power into her heart, which operates like a Magic Tool. To have a justified reason to touch her soft and voluminous breasts, I have to complaint.

Arisa and Liza are fine with it, though Lulu and--Mia, look slightly envious.

***

After finishing breakfast, Nana shifts her position and sits down facing me--and begins unbuttoning her shirt. She calmly drops it next to her, exposing her snow-white breasts.

There is movement and Tama and Pochi wander over, seeing Nana, they suddenly take their shirts off too. They seem to think it’s a new type of game, their ears and tails move as they get excited.

Liza walks over and tells them to put their clothing back on. When the two, slightly disappointed girls, are dressed--Liza leads them over to some of the left over food, to distract them. When I give her a thumbs up, she actually smiles, then copies the salute that Nana had given me earlier.

Arisa is watching with a small grin.

Nana’s plump breasts stand perky, not sagging at all, her areola are a light tan with small nipples. Her eyes met mine, and she looked down as well, she seemed to track my hand as I moved it forwards and gently placed my hand over her left breast; it softly deformed and Nana breathed in. Then I begin to pour in Magic Power, she acts slightly ticklish when I do; she giggles and squirms--interesting.

The Dryad reacted in a similar way when I put Magic Power in her--I thought of an experiment I want to try with Arisa, next time we’re alone at night.

When I glance over at Arisa, she must have seen something in my eyes, because she blushed and raised an eyebrow.

Nana’s charging is over too quickly, taking around five minutes before she says she’s full.

***

“Are you going to practice again today?” Arisa asks me after Nana gets dressed .

“Of course.”

Arisa agreed to help me practice Magic.

We all stand in a clear area near the wagon--which isn’t too difficult since the ground is basically flat and covered in stones. Pochi and Tama are standing next to me and holding short staffs. They wanted to imitate me when they saw my Magic practice, so I gave them some of the cheap staffs I had stored, simple wooden ones.

“Then, I’ll give you an example. I will only do it once, so watch well.” Arisa is holding a long staff and faces away from us, starting to chant.

 

“***, Breeze!”

 

After the rather short chant is complete, gentle winds stir up some of the dirt under the scattered stone, “Uuu, my head hurts--The burden of using Magic without the Skill is rather large after all; it seems like it may use up to five times more Magic Power.”

I thank Arisa, and begin to practice the chant.

It’s a Magic with the shortest chant found in Life Magic, and has the highest success rate.”

 

“*&^, Breeze!”

 

Like usual, I failed.

“Not good, it’s not at all good. Only the first node, in the beginning was correct--moreover the rhythm was strange.”

Rhythm huh, I’m not confident with that--maybe even less confident than with my timing and tune.

First, let’s do something about the fumble.

 

“Nyrurireato saru mina ra me ra to oi yoi oi.”

“Nyururiareto saru ra mina metora oi yoi io!”

 

Pochi and Tama face each other, reciting random chants while waving their staffs around like they’re dancing.

Of course it doesn’t work, but I don’t say anything unnecessary because the two of them look really happy--and incredibly cute.

 

“#@^, Breeze!”

“#^$, Breeze!”

“^^%, Breeze!”

 

“No good, it’s getting weirder.” Arisa rolled her eyes, plopping down and watching Tama and Pochi, resting her chin on one arm, “Let’s change the approach.”

 

“Like how?”

 

“Let’s see, do it calmly and slowly, first, why don’t you make sure that you get the pronunciation, right?”

That reminds me, I’ve bought books about reciting and pronunciation too.

I take out one of the books, and while reading one, the practice begins.

When I start practicing tongue-twisters, Arisa, who was looking at Pochi and Tama’s dance, interjects, “Try saying ‘Kami Anime’ five times as fast as you can.”

 

“Kami anime, kami amime, kami ami i, I can’t.”

 

What the heck is this, it’s much more difficult than I expected.

 

“Next, try to pronounce the vowels, ‘a’ and ‘I’ clearly.”

 

Let’s try this.

 

“Slowly, okay.” Arisa reminded me.

 

“Kami anime, kami anime, kami anime, kami anime, kami amime.”

 

“Too bad, only the last one was incorrect, once more! Come, stand up--if you’re like this, than the lowest seat of the Celestial Maiden is but a dream!” Arisa hid one side of her face while saying that--I wonder what she was quoting.

For now, let’s ignore her strangeness, and challenge it once again.

 

“Kami anime, kami anime, kami anime, kami anime, kami anime.”

 

>>Skill: Tongue-twister Acquired.

>>Skill: Smooth Talking Acquired.

 

Alright!

I max out both, and then activate them.

Now, I will be able to accurately utter any kind of tongue-twister.

 

“#^^, Breeze.”

 

--I failed.

 

“Well, you didn’t bite your tongue--but your rhythm is still wrong.”

 

I tried to practice, with Arisa’s help many times, but my chanting never succeeded; only Tama and Pochi were having the time of their lives.

Liza is calling, it seems that the preparation for departure is complete, so I finish my Magic practice.

I can’t practice while on the wagon, because I almost bite my tongue or my voice shakes--so practice isn’t possible.

I make a promise to myself, in my heart, to do my best again tomorrow--then go and sit on the driver’s seat. Pochi and Tama sit beside me, and I gently stroke their heads for a short time before we depart.