The Sixth School.

Chapter Seventeen: Title items…

Greg came to a stop half a kilometer away from the town. The potion of heightened sense that he’d taken just three hours before was about to lose its effect. Still, even while it faded, it was potent enough to let Greg know that there was no one within a hundred meters of him. As such, Greg didn’t hesitate to take three items out of his storage ring.

The first of the three items was the carcass of a three-tusk boar. Greg’s initial plan had been to buy whatever meat his family might need from the shop. After getting the floating dagger set, however, hunting had become all too easy for Greg. All he needed to do, was to dip one of the blades in one of the powerful and fast-acting paralytics that Olivia had had him buy from the system. After that, all Greg had to do was get within a hundred meters of his prey. Whenever Greg picked a target and had the daggers fly toward them, the targets would be struck by the three knives even before he could blink. That was how fast they were. The three-tusk boars usually weren’t paralyzed immediately, owing to how big they were. They, however, never made it more than a kilometer from where they were stabbed before they could no longer move. Tusk boars tended to avoid blood as they instinctively knew that it attracted predators. As such, when a member of the group was bleeding and not moving, the rest of the group tended to move away from the victim to avoid being caught up in an attack by a predator that was drawn near. After that, all Greg had to do was walk over to the downed boar and slit its throat. Simple.

For Greg, it would have been far more convenient to just walk to his home and take the carcass out when he got there. He, however, would have no way of explaining his new abilities. Given that this was a world of magic, having magic, in and of itself, wouldn’t be considered that much of an issue. After all, the healer, was a magic user and no one batted an eye at this fact. The issue where Greg was concerned, was the fact that, before the injury, he’d had no magic to speak of. If he started demonstrating powers that he shouldn’t have, it would raise questions that he couldn’t afford to have raised. He planned to slowly start to demonstrate the abilities that he had over the course of his apprenticeship with the healer. It would still be shocking to the members of the town, but seeing as she was already a mage, more people would be willing to believe that he had awakened his abilities as a result of training under her. Until such a time, however, Greg would have to keep his abilities hidden.

This was the reason why Greg had taken the boar out of his ring. Roughly half a kilometer was as close to the town as Greg was willing to get and still risk using the storage ring. After all, the closer one got to the town, the higher the chance that he’d encounter others. He wouldn’t be able to explain pulling a whole three-tusk boar out of thin air. The second of the three items was a strength-enhancing potion. A three-tusk boar could easily weigh over two hundred kilos. As he presently was, there was just no way Greg would be able to carry the beast without the potion. After he’d taken the potion, Greg would quadruple his strength for roughly half an hour. Enough time for Greg to carry the boar on his back to the town.

The last thing that Greg pulled out was a wooden mask. While he was out in the forest for a hunt, Greg saw no need to keep his face hidden. It wasn’t like he was trying to make friends with the beasts. Now that he was coming back to the town, however, the mask was a necessary part of the plan that Greg was weaving together. Looking at the plain wooden mask in his hands, one wouldn’t be able to tell it apart from the mask that Greg had gotten his sister to get from the town carpenter. It, however, was nothing like the first mask, this mask was one of the twelve items that had appeared when Greg unlocked the elite Eros shop. In fact, this mask was the reason that Greg had asked his sister to get the wooden mask from the town carpenter.

Six days prior, Greg bought the ‘AROUSING’, title for five million lust points. Following that, he’d naturally wondered if there were more titles that he could obtain from the shop. After all, unlike the magic shop, Greg had unlocked all levels of the Eros shop. While he might not expect to find titles on the basic level of the magic shop, there was a good chance that he could get them from the elite tier of the Eros shop. And sure enough, seven of the twelve items that had appeared when he unlocked the elite tier of the Eros shop were items that would grant him other titles. However, unlike the ‘AROUSING’ title that Greg got from the feat of lust, these new titles were attached to the items themselves and not Greg. In other words, so long as Greg had the particular item correctly equipped, then the title would apply to him. However, as soon as he took the item off, he’d also lose the title that came with it.

Of the seven items, there were three rings, two bangles, one pendant, and one mask. Each of them granting a different title:

Ø CHARMING – MASK.

Grants the title of ‘CHARMING' to the wearer.

CHARMING – All members of the opposite sex who gaze upon the owner of this title will find them to be attractive.

Cost: 85,000 Lust points.

Ø TEMPTING – PENDANT.

Grants the title of ‘TEMPTING’ to the wearer.

TEMPTING – Members of the opposite sex that are in a committed romantic relationship are attracted to the owner of this title proportional to how committed to the relationship they are.

Cost: 92,000 Lust points.

Ø SENSUAL TOUCH – BANGLE.

Grants the title ‘SENSUAL TOUCH’ to the wearer.

SENSUAL TOUCH – Causes the touch of the owner of this title to be very arousing and pleasurable to the opposite sex.

Cost: 88,000 Lust points.

Ø ADDICTIVE – BANGLE

Grants the title of ‘ADDICTIVE’ to the wearer.

ADDICTIVE - The more the number of encounters of a sexual nature one has with the owner of this title, the more one will crave to experience more sexual interactions with them.

Cost: 97,000 Lust points.

Ø DISCERNING – RING.

Grants the title of ‘DISCERNING’ to the wearer.

DISCERNING – The owner of this title can instinctively tell what will arouse a member of the opposite sex and how aroused they presently are.

Cost: 93,000 Lust points.

Ø VIRILE – RING.

Grants the title of ‘VIRILE’ to the wearer.

VIRILE – Every time a man with this title has sex with a woman, they will inevitably get pregnant.

Cost: 96,000 Lust points.

Ø STERILE – RING

Grants the title of ‘STERILE’ to the wearer.

STERILE – No amount of sex with the owner of this title will lead to conception.

Cost: 82,000 Lust points.

Of the seven items, none of them cost less than eighty thousand lust points, the cheapest being the ring of sterility which cost eighty-two thousand lust points. The most expensive of the lot was the addictive bangle which cost about ninety-seven thousand lust points. After buying the Eros sigil and Eros familiar, Greg had been left with two hundred and seventy-five thousand lust points. When Olivia reminded him to go to the missions tab, he gained another two hundred and three thousand lust points leaving him at four hundred and seventy-eight thousand lust points. A hundred and fifty-five thousand lust points shy of what he’d need, to get all the seven items. Each of the seven items had its own appeal and Greg had agonized for long trying to decide which ones to buy and which one to leave for later.

The mask was a must. Even though Greg had no plans of curing his disfigurement in the near future, he had no desire to have it interfere with his ability to accomplish the system’s missions. Greg wasn’t naïve enough to believe that other women would be as indifferent to his disfigurement as the healer had been. As such, the choice had been down to which of the other six items he would buy along with the mask. In the end, Greg chose to buy the TEMPTING pendant, ADDICTIVE bangle, and DISCERNING ring, which came to a total of three hundred and sixty-seven thousand lust points. This left Greg with a hundred and eleven thousand lust points. It was enough that Greg would have been able to buy another title item if he’d so desired. Olivia, however, had advised him against spending all of his lust points away. As such he’d left it at that. He would get the other three items later.

When Greg had first gotten the mask, it had been made of the clearest glass and thin as a cicada’s wing. Greg had been afraid that the thing would shatter at the slightest pressure. A few minutes of interacting with it, however, had made it clear that even if Greg expended every ounce of strength he could muster, he’d never be able to even make a dent on the item. What made the mask even better was the fact that it wasn’t just limited to giving a title. Not only could the mask change to look like any other mask that Greg wanted it to, but also, it could do the same with faces. In short, the mask doubled as the perfect disguise item. Heck, if Greg wanted to, he could have the mask just merge with his face. The mask would disappear but the title would remain. This ability of the mask to take on any look that Greg desired was the reason why it looked no different from the mask that his sister had gotten from the town carpenter.

After taking the strength-enhancing potion, Greg pulled on the mask. Greg was still for about fifteen seconds as he allowed the strength-enhancing potion to take effect. He wasn’t sure if steroids back on earth felt like this, Greg however doubted it. As the potion took effect, he could feel his muscles bulking up and tightening like steel cords. He felt like he was tapped into a bottomless well of energy that would never run out no matter how much of it he expended. Without wasting time, Greg put on the mask he’d bought from the Eros store, bent down, took hold of the three-tusk boar’s legs with both hands, and with one heave, lifted it into his shoulders. When he first got them, Greg had liked the quiet steps enchantment of the subtlety pants more than the dainty steps one. It was only in the days that followed that Greg had come to value the dainty steps enchantment far more than he did the quiet steps one.

Stealth had its utility, no doubt. However, for most of his day, Greg wasn’t trying to be stealthy. If anything, for the past four days, he’d been moving about in the forest hoping that his uncle would come for him. As such, the stealth aspect hadn’t proved all that useful. However, inside the forest, he had always been on the move. With the dainty steps, Greg was able to move far more efficiently. At first, he hadn’t noticed it. However, the more he moved the more he noticed the effects of the enchantment. They didn’t actively affect or interfere with any of his motions. Instead, it was more of an unconscious influence on how he moved. Like ‘step here and not there', ‘only stride this far forward’, that spot is soft, you won’t have a firm footing’, that spot is full of brambles, that will slow you down,’. None of these were voiced or active thoughts. Instead, whenever he moved, they would just float up into his awareness based on the terrain around him. If he wanted to, he could consciously choose to ignore the feeling. He, however, would always be left with the uncomfortable feeling that he wasn’t moving as efficiently as he otherwise could. Slowly, without a single word being uttered, Greg was learning the best way to move in different terrains. Greg wasn’t sure if this was part of what Olivia had in mind when she had him buy this pair of pants. Knowing the familiar’s thoughtfulness, however, Greg wouldn’t be surprised if it was. Olivia often acted like sex was all that was on her mind. Greg, however, could also see that the familiar was a lot smarter than she let on.

Even with the guidance of the dainty steps enchantment, Greg was sweating by the time he got to the town. He, however, didn’t mind this. The town didn’t have a wall around it, as such, there wasn’t anything like town gates. There was, however, only one road leading in and out of the town, and except for those that already lived close to the edge of the town, most of those who lived deep within the town tended to use that road. As such, a large number of eyes were fixed on him as he walked into town with a three-tusk boar on his shoulders. The mask was the only one of the title items that Greg usually took off whenever he went hunting. This was because it was the only one of the title items that he currently owned that impeded his ability to take potions. Even when it merged with his face, Greg wasn’t able to take anything with it on. According to Olivia, when Greg became a first-tier mage and could use mana, he would be able to overcome this shortcoming. Until such a time, however, he’d just have to take it off whenever he wanted to take any potions. The TEMPTING pendant, ADDICTIVE bangle, and DISCERNING ring, however, always stayed on him at all times. As such, even while he moved through the house toward his home, Greg was the center of attention.

Greg wasn’t stupid. He knew that walking into town with a two-hundred-kilo boar on his shoulders would be a spectacle that would draw eyes his way. But while the men were looking at him with some respect and awe for the feat of strength, that wasn’t what was burning in the eyes of the women that looked his way. Each of the four title items was playing its own particular role in the scene that was playing out. The mask, despite completely obscuring his face, still left the women that looked at him with the impression that they were looking at someone attractive. The pendant made the wives, fiancés, and those being actively courted among the women even more enamored by him.

At the time, Greg hadn’t given much thought to it. But at the party that his mother had thrown over his recovery, Greg had interacted with almost twenty different couples. That was roughly twenty different women that were affected by his ‘AROUSING’ title. The reason this was important was because there was a milestone mission that kept track of how many women Greg had aroused. The first target was usually one woman, followed by ten women. The target for this milestone mission right now, however, stood at one hundred women. Greg already had the innate ‘AROUSING’ title. On top of that, he now had two completed milestone missions whose reward was to make it easier for Greg to arouse members of the opposite sex. And from the ring Greg had on, Greg could get a very clear sense of the lust that was slowly building up in the women around him.

The lust sense that Greg gained as a result of the ‘DISCERNING' title was a mysterious feeling as far as Greg was concerned. It was as if a new sense had been added to his body, and his brain didn’t know how to interpret the information it was getting from this new sense. It was almost like a warmth that wasn’t quite a warmth, a scent that tickled at his nose but wasn’t quite a scent, an intense feeling that suddenly became illusory whenever he tried to get a grip on it. Greg just simply couldn’t capture exactly what this new sense for lust translated into, he however could feel it intensify the longer that the women looked on him. In most other settings, a sweaty man carrying a boar on his shoulders wouldn’t have been considered an appealing sight. In this town in the middle of nowhere, however, a strong man capable of hunting and taking care of their family was the most appealing kind of man to the women of this town.

The first day that Greg had come back with a boar on his back, it had been attention-grabbing. The people, however, had probably thought it a fluke. When Greg repeated the feat the next day, people had taken notice. When he did it again on the third day, they began to anticipate it. Judging by the amount of attention that he was garnering, he’d clearly already set himself up as a powerful hunter in the minds of those around. And from the mounting lust that Greg was picking up on, he had caught the sight of quite a number of the women in the town.

The bangle was the last nail in the coffin. Due to the lust that was almost oozing off most of the women that were looking his way, the nature of the interaction morphed from a mundane one to one of a sexual nature. The title granted by the bangle made it so that the more one engages in any kind of sexual interaction with the owner of the title, the more one would desire to engage in the same behavior going forward. At present, all this amounted to was that the women would want more and more to ogle Greg. However, anyone that knew anything about addiction, or human nature for that matter, knew that eventually, people wanted more. Lust led to ogling. Ogling would lead to fantasies. Fantasies would fuel desire. Desire would inevitably draw them to Greg like a moth to the flame.

The only wrinkle in this picture, for Greg, was the fact that the system required him to have interacted with someone before they were added to his mission lists. Apparently, lusting at him from afar didn’t count as an 'interaction’, to the system. Otherwise, given the amount of lust he was sensing, Greg was certain that he would have easily blown past the ‘arouse one hundred women' milestone. Seeing as the town was comprised of roughly three hundred families, which came to about two thousand people, Greg was certain he would have made it a good portion of the way toward his next milestone, which he assumed was a thousand. Greg, however, planned to solve this wrinkle at his ceremony to honor his father. By now, it had probably spread around town that he was planning to have a ceremony at the end of the week. With the amount of hunting he was doing and the reputation he was building for himself, Greg wouldn’t be surprised if a majority of the town attended the ceremony. Heck, there was a chance that someone from the three big families, perhaps even from the town head’s family, would be in attendance. It wasn’t expected of him, but Greg planned to greet every single one of those that attended. His target, of course, was to get the brief interaction that would get the women on his mission lists. He, however, couldn’t just greet the women and ignore the men as it would raise eyebrows. Instead, he’d have to interact with everyone that came, and in so doing, cover up his true intentions.

When he got home, Greg’s mother was already at the gate ready to greet him. Greg had been coming back home at pretty much the same time every day, so it wasn’t too surprising to find her there. The compound was already full of meat racks that were drying out yesterday’s hunt, and turning the meat into jerky before it was moved to the smokehouse, where it would be smoked in a bid to keep it fresh until the day of his father’s send-off ceremony. “Mother,” Greg called out in greeting, even as he pushed past the gate.

“You’ve worked hard my child,” His mother answered him in a genial tone even as they moved around the house towards the back. At the back of the house, there was a Y-rack upon which Greg could set the three-tusk boar to allow one to work on it more easily. “I’ve had your sister prepare you some warm water,” She declared. “After you’ve set the boar on the rack, you can use the water to clean yourself off and rest,” She instructed.

On the very first day that Greg went out hunting and came back with a three-tusk boar, he had argued with his mother over this. Thinking the job of skinning, disemboweling, and preparing the boar to be dirty work that he didn’t want his mother to be doing, he had insisted that he be the one to do it. His mother, however, would have none of it. She had told him that she’d been the wife of a hunter for years. Long before Greg even knew how to walk, she’d already been dealing with the game that his father brought home. This was nothing new to her. Despite this, Greg hadn’t been willing to give in. He’d still wanted to be the one to take on the task of taking care of the boar. But while the woman before him was calm and soft-spoken when she wanted to be, she could also be quite stubborn at times. Of course, as the head of the house, Greg could have forced the issue based on his authority and she would have been powerless to stop him from doing as he wanted. This, however, was his mother. Much as he had the right to do so, it wouldn’t have felt right to pull rank on her. Especially when all he was trying to do was help.

In the end, this turned out to be the right thing to do. When the argument had been going on for about ten minutes, his mother went quiet for a while, her gaze dropping to the ground. “I never got to see your father’s body,” She had said quietly, catching Greg completely off guard. “The snow bear that attacked your hunting party was too ferocious,” She explained. “No one had the time or chance to go back for your father’s body. They barely even managed to save you,” she continued. “The man I loved died, and all I received were just empty words telling me that he was gone forever. I never got to see him one last time or to give him the last respects a wife should,” She said, turning back to look up at him. There were no tears in the woman’s eyes. The pain he could see in them and the bitterness Greg could hear in her voice stabbed at his heart like a thousand needles. “You can go hunting to honor your father, but I… I have nothing,” She had continued. “Please... just allow me to do this little bit… for him,” She had pleaded.

Unable to help himself, Greg had pulled the woman into a tight embrace. He did not attempt to verbally comfort her as he knew that no words would be able to even touch the deep pain that his mother felt at the death of his father. In the end, all Greg said was, “Don’t hesitate to come to me if you need any help. And not just with the boar, with anything Mother,” He had emphasized. “Even if you just want to talk, I’m here for you,” He’d added. With a small smile, his mother had nodded against his chest in acknowledgment. That discussion was the reason that Greg no longer raised any objections on the subsequent days when his mother came out to deal with the boars that he’d hunted. The same still held true today. After making sure the animal was properly racked, he walked into the house, leaving his mother to do her thing…

***

Greg stood in the bathroom with his hands held out to his sides even as Olivia’s delicate hands roamed over his body. In this world, they didn’t have the same kind of soap that Greg knew from Earth. They did, however, have a certain oily mixture that gave off a minty smell that they used in both washing items and bathing. Curiously, when mixed with water, this oily mixture also formed suds, just like the soap back on earth. It was this soapy mixture that the familiar was slowly spreading over his body. Greg could feel Olivia’s glorious mounds press into his back even as she reached around and slowly ran his hands up and down his torso. The temptress occasionally brought her hands just an inch shy of his cock which was stiff as a steel bar at the moment. Just as Greg’s anticipation starts to build up, however, the tease would pull her hands away. “Why are you so tense,” the little minx whispered in his ear.

Greg knew perfectly well that Olivia was teasing him. He, however, chose to voice what had been on his mind. “It’s been four days now, and yet other than on the day I left the infirmary, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of my uncle,” Greg spoke up.

“I’m not surprised, “ Olivia answered, continuing her sensual massage of his torso even as she lathered up his back with her boobs. “You’ve been playing his game, by his rules, on his chosen field of engagement,” She answered. “If I was him, I wouldn’t attack when you were expecting me either,” She declared. “I’d wait until you either develop a false sense of security, or you got too frazzled from anticipating an attack that doesn’t seem to be coming,” She stated. “Just when you are on that edge, about to snap from the tension, I’d throw everything I have at you making sure you have no room to escape,” She declared.

Greg was quiet for a while as he turned the familiar's words over in his head. She was right. It was his uncle that had baited him to go hunting. Meaning that whatever the man had planned, it would probably happen within the forest. He was the one that had chosen the stage, and Greg had even been dumb enough to tell him how long he would be on that stage. He had given his uncle a whole seven days in which he could prepare to attack him. Greg turned around in her embrace to face Olivia. “You had to have known that I was making a mistake at the time that I announced the seven-day period,” He stated. “Why didn’t you stop me?” He asked.

“One, there was a chance that your uncle would be equally as impetuous and would attack you on the first day,” She declared. “Secondly and even more importantly, if I give you all the answers whenever you need them, how will you learn and grow as a person?” The familiar posed with a smile up at him. “A parent can help a child to walk, they can’t, however, walk on behalf of the child, lest they rob that child of their ability to walk,” She declared. “If you ever find yourself in mortal danger through no fault of your own, I’ll do everything within my abilities to save you,” She declared. “However, if you make stupid decisions that land you in trouble, you can be certain that I won’t save you from their consequences,” She informed him.

A brow arched on Greg’s face. “Didn’t you say that you are mine and would do anything I asked?” He posed.

The smile on Olivia’s face widened as she pressed her bountiful chest even more against Greg. “I am yours, and I will do anything you ask me,” She agreed. “If you asked me to, I could go kill your uncle right now,” She said, the smile still on her lips despite the fact that she was contemplating murder. “All you have to do is say the word,” She stated. “However, just because I’d do whatever you ask of me, doesn’t mean that I think it’s the right thing to do,” She went on. “If you depend on me to face this enemy, what’s to stop you from depending on me for the next, and the next one after that? Your uncle isn’t even a first-tier mage. You have a system that grants you an almost infinite number of ways to deal with this little problem. If you can’t even summon the strength and courage to face down this little hurdle in your path, you might as well give up on your desire to rise to the top,” She said.

Greg could see where the familiar was coming from. And though it would make his path a lot more thorny, Greg could understand why it was important for him to learn to deal with his issues and learn from the consequences of his own mistakes. I mean, he was the one that had been asking the familiar to help him strengthen his willpower. How could he then turn around and try to take the easy path through life? Besides it wasn’t like the familiar was abandoning him altogether. If a second-tier mage were to attack him out of nowhere, the familiar would step in and save Greg. It was only if Greg walked up to a second-tier mage and slap them that the familiar wouldn’t intervene. Greg would have to face the consequences of that action on his own. The promise to be saved from disasters that weren’t of his own making was already more than most had when they started out as a mage. “Can I at least ask you for advice?” He posed with a small smile.

“Haven’t you already been doing that?” Olivia replied with a smile. “I’ll always be willing to offer you a word of advice when you need it,” She confirmed. “Take the current situation for example,” She declared. “You might think that you are the one on the back foot. But, in reality, all the initiative is with you,” She informed him. A slight frown creased Greg’s brow as he tried to figure out how this was the case. “Think about it master,” The familiar continued. “Your uncle came and tried to instigate you to go hunting,” She said. “In this town, there is no way one can avoid hunting forever, especially after you’d already made clear that you would be taking care of your mother and sister,” She explained. “At some point or the other, you would have gone hunting anyway. So, why go out of his way to get you to go hunting?” She posed.

Greg thought on it for a moment before answering. “Because whatever plans he has, they can’t wait long!” He at last answered.

“Exactly,” Olivia replied. “When you gave yourself seven days to go hunting, your uncle didn’t object, why?” the familiar once again asked.

This time there was no delay in Greg’s reply. “Because his plans could accommodate that window of time,” He declared.

“Four of those seven days are already wasted, so?” Olivia continued.

“He has only three days within which to act,” Greg immediately answered with a smile on his face.

“But there’s a big problem here,” Olivia spoke up, causing the smile on Greg’s face to stiffen a little. “What if the seven days aren’t the maximum window his plan allows?” she asked. From the tone of her voice, Greg could see that the familiar wasn’t the least bit worried. The problem she was raising wasn’t a problem for her, it was just a test for him. “What if your uncle’s plan can accommodate an eight, nine, or ten-day window? What if it can accommodate a fortnight of delay before he acts?” she posed.

Greg wasn’t caught off guard by the question as Olivia had already given him the answer to it at the start of their conversation. “It doesn’t matter how long he can wait because I’ll no longer be playing his game,” He said, causing the smile on Olivia’s face to widen. “I’ve already hunted enough boar to honor my father and make good on the promise I made to my neighbors,” He declared. “And even if it’s not enough, I have the system to make up for whatever shortfall there might be,” Greg voiced what he was thinking. “I won’t go on any more hunts after today. Starting tomorrow, if my uncle wants to find me, he can go to the town infirmary where I’ll be learning from the healer!” Greg declared, unable to hide his excitement…