-----

A half-black bear and a half squirrel girl, Acathea, used her powerful paws covered in black fur and strong claws to release a series of martial techniques over the little Ervas, who was completely covered in the dark armor created by Veronica. ​​

"Let's go!" she said, cheerfully.

Clash! Clash!

Her large paws clashed like bullets against Ervas's little body. Although he had grown considerably thanks to the 'Demon Metabolism' skill, Acathea still doubled his height.

Even when calculating that she was ten years old, Acathea grew abnormally quick. Squirrel-kin women were known for having petite bodies of no more than one meter and fifty centimeters, a ten-year-old Squirrel-kin girl would usually be in the one-meter and twenty centimeters of height… but Acathea had already reached one meter and forty centimeters, and kept growing more and more as the years went by.

This was because of her having inherited the bloodline of her anonymous father, a Black Bear Beastmen.

Black Bear Beastmen grew up to three meters in size, and they possess great strength, vitality, and defense, some could say that Acathea's mother was truly a brave woman to confront such a beast in bed.

Due to that night, Acathea was born and miraculously was not born as a pure Squirrel-kin as it usually happens. She was part of the small percentage of children born with both parent's traits, a hybrid.

However, hybrid traits were just as impossible to inherit, so Acathea's traits would be most likely a one-time occurrence amongst her family tree, if she ever has children, they will be most likely normal Squirrel-kin.

Ervas tanked the hits of such a strong little girl while using all of his soul, phantom and magic imbued into his armor and shield, making sure to not use Telekinesis to 'cheat'.

"You're doing good Ervas, keep it up!" said Acathea, enhancing her paws and feet' claws with her mana and releasing Unarmed Fighting Techniques one after another.

Although Acathea was good with an Axe, she could also just use her natural steel-like claws as weapons without any issues. She was using Ervas as a practice dummy as well, as she wanted to polish her abilities.

Clash! Clash!

However, Ervas could not resist much longer and was blown through the air again.

"Ervas was already sent to the air, it's my turn Acathea!" said Pekorina, jumping into action while waiting for Ervas to recover and stand back up again.

"Alright, alright!" said Acathea, moving to the sidelines and watching carefully.

Pekorina had the strong legs of the Rabbit-kin, with them, she was able to exert immensely strong kicks, which even surpassed the strength of Acathea's paws to some extent when used alongside Techniques.

"Haah… alright," said Ervas, standing back up with his small body.

"Here I go, pekooo! Hare's Kick! Piercing Kick!"

Pekorina jumped to action as she jumped and while in midair, moved the strong rabbit leg she had that started from her knees, covered in silvery white fur, a thin cape of mana strengthened them momentarily as she unleashed two techniques simultaneously.

"Iron Wall, Iron Shield!" said Ervas, chanting the techniques he wanted to learn as a way to make himself think that he could use them.

Clash! Clash!

"Ah…!"

Pekorina's legs flew in midair at a fast speed, clashing like two silver meteors over Ervas's shield and armor, he was sent through the air again.

"I almost got it… but I failed again…" said Ervas.

"Don't worry, Ervas! We can do it all day if you want!" said Pekorina.

"Indeed! That's what big sisters do after all" said Acathea.

Ervas felt as if he had fallen into an abyss where he would be constantly bullied by cute girls.

Pekorina and Acathea did not have any bad intentions at all they wanted the best for Ervas. But because they were naturally playful, they found a lot of fun in treating Ervas like this.

Not like he minded. He had a strong will.

Ervas stood up again, cleaning the sweat off his forehead with his hands.

He felt that the bones of his little arm holding the shield had slightly cracked by Pekorina's kick, but with his regeneration coupled with his spells, the bone was as good as new.

"Phew… Okay, again, please… how about you two do it at the same time?" he asked.

Although Veronica was not present at the moment in her main body, she was on Ervas's equipment.

"Are you sure about that, Ervas? These two little girls are kind of crazy strong…" she said through the helmet.

"Yes, it will be fine, Veronica, don't worry about me," said Ervas, mildly smiling. Although he looked like a creepy and lifeless doll, and when he smiled, he looked rather sick and people would often think that he might have caught some disease.

"The two of us? Very well, I like your spirit, little brother!" said Pekorina.

"Let's go, Pekorina!" said Acathea, running towards Ervas alongside Pekorina.

The two girls bathed Ervas in punches and kicks constantly. Ervas resisted many hits and then was blown away, this cycle repeated itself dozens of times until the sun fell down the horizon again and the moon raised atop the night sky.

Another day has passed without him learning the skills… but he was hopeful that it should happen one day.

At the same time, he was also passively earning Experience Points through the hunting done by his plants.

"Hey, I want to train too!" said Amelia, the little daughter of Ismene.

"Amelia, you're a mage, you can't practice with Ervas, he needs physical attacks!" said Acathea.

"What? But I wanna!" said Amelia, disappointed.

"Amelia you can't, peko!" said Pekorina.

"Muhh…" muttered Amelia.

"And it is late, let's go back to the tribe, I'm starving…" said Ervas, guiding the girls through the forest.

Although he was being in a passive situation just now, they knew that he was one of the strongest people they have ever met, and they never feared any monster appearing when they were with him.

They also knew that as long as there was vegetation around, Ervas would be there protecting them. Through these last two weeks, he had been turning the whole surrounding forest into his 'domain', where every plant was below his command and shared their senses with him.

Through their trip, they also stumbled across many of Veronica's clones, metallic spiders of all sizes wandering around. Some carried materials, other hunter monsters, and some were just walking around.

Before Ervas and Veronica appeared, the outside of the tribe was always a dangerous place where children should not step in, but thanks to these two, it had become a very safe place where anyone could go around and take a trip, gather herbs and plants or hunt with the assistance of Ervas's plants and Veronica's clones.

The living conditions of the Squirrel-kin tribe were greatly improving as time went by, and they were slowly expanding, using Ervas's help to take down trees and create more livable space.

"Objbjbjbj"

"Bilililili"

Cthulhu and Nyarlathotep greeted Ervas that had just come back, hugging him tightly with their fleshy and slimy tentacles.

"Did you miss me?"

Cthulhu patted Ervas's hair and touched his white horn, while Nyarlathotep shapeshifted into Ismene and crushed Ervas's face in her breasts.

"You two are as lovely as ever… but please let me go, I am starving…"

Obeying their master, both aberrations carried him through the tribe towards his tent, where Veronica, Jason, and the rest of 'his family' greeted him.

"Ah, you're back, Ervas! Dinner is ready, come here" said Jason.

"Were the girls too brute with you, my son?" asked Ismene.

"Not at all, they were exceptionally brute. But that is the only way to learn techniques," said Ervas.

"I-I suppose… I am not good at all with techniques, I better stay at home practicing alchemy with Veronica, my back pain gets worse when I get to do too much physical activity…" said Ismene.

"Hm, perhaps doing more daily massages could help?" wondered Ervas.

"Even more? Are you not doing them a lot already? I worry that you might end up developing some weird tendencies, my son…" muttered Jason.

"It is all for the best of the Squirrel-kin, father. I am not a pervert…" said Ervas. He was a little child and his reproductive organs have not developed yet, so he had no sexual drive. Everything he did was out of the good will and for the sake of investigation.

Although Ismene was considered as the strongest Squirrel-kin in the tribe and was the chief due to one of these things being a reason, she was also quite weak physically. Her magic was her strongest tool, but her physical ability was subpar even to her daughter Amelia.

Squirrel-kin grew sexier and alluring as they had children and developed. This also caused them to grow their magic capabilities but weaken their physique.

Ismene was a mother that had given birth to many children, around twenty percent of the tribe were her daughters. Of course, they all had fully developed by now and had their own daughters, so she was more like a grandmother by now.

Amelia was her latest child, and she has not had anymore since five years, deciding to take care of Amelia personally until she grew into a fine adult.

She was also kind of 'laying back' from being constantly pregnant. Although this nourished the population with members and made her magic abilities grow exponentially, she also grew weaker and weaker physically and decided to stop having children after Amelia was born.

Her chest was heavy and bouncy, giving her back pain often, so she would usually spend her days in the tribe cooking, crafting, and doing alchemy, and would rarely hunt by herself except when it was an emergency.

Ervas had begun to administrate her massages using his Telekinesis combined with his Life Attribute Spirit Magic spells that had slowly made her back pain dissipate. But he considered that a special outfit that alleviated her back pain was needed for her to fully recover.

It was certainly a problem that the enthusiastic mothers that had many children would weaken physically to this extent, most of the elders were like this as well, so Ervas, who desired to protect and help them, began to do daily massages every morning to all the mothers with different pains around their bodies.

It was a certainly enlightening experience, as he learned a lot about the anatomy of the Squirrel-kin.

Veronica wanted massages as well, but she was made out of metal, so it was impossible… although on occasions, she would receive 'massages' from the burning hammers of the blacksmith women of the tribe.

Ervas feared that Veronica might be the one developing some deviant tendencies.

Ervas munched in the grilled meat that was given to him by Ismene.

"Hm, what is this? It is delicious" he said.

"You like it? It is Nyarlathotep's meat, it came today and offered it to us happily. It is surprisingly sweet," said Ismene.

"…What?"

It seems that Nyarlathotep had weird tendencies as well.

-----