Chapter 9

What Lies Ahead

“Be gentle my ass.” Star said after their third go at it. Sure it had started out gentle because she’d asked. But after about thirty seconds Amy pretty much abandoned the notion herself and became an absolute monster in the sack. She’d gone from innocent and timid to being the most wild sexual partner he’d ever had the pleasure of being with.

What was surprising was just how much she could take. By the end he going full bore with no holding back and she’d made enough noise that that there was no doubt that everyone on the entire block thought that someone was being murdered, or getting tortured, or experiencing mindblowing sex for the first time in their life.

Amy was now passed out with her face on his chest and pretty much draped over Star like a blanket. His WarPad buzzed beside his head and Star frowned glancing over at the thing. He pulled it over to himself and tapped on the notification box and was greeted by a pleasant surprise.

Congratulations!

You have been officially granted the Title: Alpha

Effect: +10% modifier to all stats. +50% Fertility Rating

Title Perk Granted: Pheromones Of The Alpha

Perk Effect: Your body now emits much more powerful Pheromones that influence both males and females around you. Females are significantly more likely to choose you as a breeding partner. Males are significantly more likely to obey your commands.

Star wasn’t exactly sure how to feel about all of that. The +10% stat boost was awesome and would scale as he leveled. The fertility bonus made him a bit leery but he was in a different world and having children probably wouldn't be too much of a hassle here. The Pheromones perk seemed like it could be a double edged sword when combined with the Fertility bonus. He was about to throw the WarPad across the room and try to actually fall asleep when he noticed another notification.

Congratulations!

You have accomplished a Legendary Feat.

You out fucked a BeastKin Beta to the point where she actually gave out before you. Few in history have been man enough to sate the thirst of a BeastKin Beta once it is awakened. And you knocked it out of the park. Get Some!

Perk Granted: Legendary Alpha

Effects: +5% modifier to all stats. +200% increase in Fertility Rating. The effect of your Pheromones on females has increased by 400%. Alpha males will instinctively feel inferior to you if exposed to your Pheromones.

Not sure if you are ready for this TBH.

Star had to struggle not to laugh as he read that one. Again the stat bonus was huge. having more women wanting to fuck was a bonus. And making other Alphas feel inferior seemed like it might be useful if he had to interact with them regularly. But he was now 2 and a half times as likely to get a woman pregnant and that's on top of his extra stats that would make him who knows how many times as fertile as any other male out there. The last little note at the end made him wonder who was writing these notifications.

He chucked the WarPad onto a dresser and looked down at Amy who was drooling on his chest at this point. He sighed deeply and tried to get to sleep.

* * *

Star awoke the next morning when Amy stirred. She kneaded at his chest for a few moments before she seemed to realize where she was and woke with a start. Her gaze found his after a moment and she smiled at him before she cuddled up against him even more and nuzzled her face into his chest. After a moment Amy sighed.

“We probably need to get up and go talk to uncle Lupin. He is supposed to be setting up a meeting with all the other Alphas in the city to see about what they need to do to push back Justin’s kingdom forces from our lands.” She practically groaned as she rolled over and went to stand.

Star joined her and his civilian clothes popped onto him with a little manipulation of his WarPad before he’d even stood up. Amy stood and nearly fell over, her knees wobbling and she let out a nervous chuckle.

“Gods above I can barely walk.” She exclaimed in a strangely exuberant voice.

Star popped a regeneration syringe out of his WarPad and stuck her in the but with it. She yelped and hopped forward almost immediately surer on her feet with the regeneration cocktail coursing through her veins.

“Wow that was amazing!” she exclaimed in wonder as Star popped the thing back into his inventory and recycled it. “That was super convenient too. It would have been embarrassing to walk around all wobbly-like all day. Did something happen to you by the way? You smell… kinda different this morning. Good different. But still different somehow.” She somehow sounded disappointed by the fact that she wouldn't be wobbly all day though.

Star just shrugged, he figured that he was lucky that she didn’t just immediately jump into another sex frenzy like last night. Although that would probably be fun, but like she had said earlier they needed to start figuring things out.

He watched her get dressed then followed her out into the house. Amy told him to wait in the living room area and she went off to look for her Uncle or figure out what was expected of Star now that he was an Alpha. He had a feeling that he wasn’t going to enjoy a lot of what they expected of him, but so far the benefits were pretty great.

It was not long before Amy found him again.

“We will need to be at the army barracks by noon, the Alphas are meeting up then to discuss what is happening and what the latest reports are. That means we have about three hours before we need to head out which gives us time to deal with applicants who are waiting at the gate.” She said as she took his arm and dragged him towards the exit to the SilverEye family compound.

Outside Star saw that there was a large wooden desk set in front of the gates with two chairs and stacks of papers on it. There were several house servants standing by and a pair of guards standing on either side of the desk. Outside the gate was a line of people. Both men and women. Star had no idea what they all wanted but it appeared that he was about to find out. Amy directed him to take a seat and he did so. Amy took the seat next to him and signaled one of the servants who nodded and allowed one person inside.

The first person in line was a beastkin man with a tortoiseshell. Star had not seen this version of beastkin yet. His name sadly was not Leonardo, or Michelangelo, or any of the names that sprung to mind. His name was Bob and he was here to apply to become a part of Amy’s and Star’s Run when they set out to establish their own village. Amy directed him to fill out some paperwork then told him that he would be informed of our decision in the near future.

It seemed that they were purposefully only allowing in the males who intended to join the Run when it was established until there were no more male applicants left. pretty much it seemed like they were all dudes looking for work that would obviously benefit them by being a part of establishing a new Run. A Run, as far as Star understood it was sort of like a county or city. usually an Alpha and Beta had a Run with a few villages or even towns within its borders.

Then came the females turn to come to apply. Star was actually surprised by how fast the lines were moving. The females were mostly in the same vein as their male counterparts. Basically looking for work in a newly established Run when it came time for them to go and rebuild Amy’s old village.

Then in came someone Star recognized. The fox beastkin who’d lasted till the end in his trial of battle the day before. She walked up to the desk and cleared her throat.

“I would like to join your pack.” she said, looking Amy in the eyes.

“You will have to fill this out. And do an interview with us at a later date to determine what you have to bring to our pack and why we should accept you.” Amy said immediately, handing the woman a set of papers that Star hadn’t seen given out yet.

The woman turned and met his eyes for a few moments then nodded to Amy and took the papers off to the side where she began filling them out. Then the next person in line arrived and it was yet another one of the women who’d suffered a pimp slap of doom yesterday. Star sat up straighter and looked down the line realizing that he recognized the rest of them too. Either from the first trial or the third trial. There were a lot of women here requesting to join his pack. all of the women from the trial of battle and a bunch more that he was sure he recognized from the trial of senses.

He’d figured out that basically signing up to be in their pack was them requesting to be concubines or something similar. There seemed to be more to it than that but Star had no clue as to what all he’d gotten himself into here. If Amy accepted all of them he’d have to pair them up and go at it with two at a time to be able to make it through all of them in a month. Not all of them were super attractive, but apparently in this day and age here it was hard not to be fit and healthy looking. So they all held some level of attraction to him in one way or another.

Surprisingly they had gotten through all of the supplicants with time to spare. Star was glad that he got to wash up before they left because the night before had been very sweaty and intense. It kinda seemed rude to show up to a meeting with a bunch of army folk still reeking of sex.

Amy and Star rode the SilverEye family's private carriage to the barracks and they arrived just as the sun was hitting its peak in the sky. The Barracks were set near the city walls. They were squat long buildings that looked to be made out of solid stone. Outside was a series of large marshalling grounds where soldiers were practicing maneuvering drills even in the heat of the midday sun. Star was actually impressed by the troops' coordination and seemingly precise movements.

Disembarking from their carriage Star found himself wondering if he should find an instructor who could teach him how to use a sword. He was a damn good knife fighter, but everything that did in a fight was to be able to make room to use his guns. He figured that there would eventually be situations where it would be handy to know how to handle himself in a more visceral hand to hand combat level of fighting.

His musings were interrupted by a soldier approaching and saluting him, then bowing to Amy and saying that he’d take it from there. Amy had to return to the estate because she needed to go through the applicant's paperwork and make sure that she sorted who wanted to join the pack out promptly. on the way to the barracks she’d explained that it was considered rude to take more than a day or two for Pack applicants to get their responses. So Star waved goodby to Amy and turned to follow the soldier.

He was led to the central Barracks building and guided through the surprisingly cramped interior to a large door where the soldier knocked firmly exactly three times. There came a shouted response from the other side, “Enter” and the soldier opened the door, took exactly three paces and stood at attention.

“Private Elor reporting as ordered with Alpha Star SilverEye in tow.” Private Elor said in that almost yell that soldiers always use when standing at attention for their superiors.

“Very Well” Star heard the response from inside the room, “Dismissed Private.”

With that the private did a perfect about face and exited the room almost seeming to deflate as he passed Star and made his way out of sight. Yeah he’s new. Star thought to himself as he walked into the room and found what he would describe as a war room, or command center. There was a large table in the center of the room with a huge map spread across its surface. There were small figurines depicting beastkin and humans placed at various points on the map, and the walls seemed to be covered in maps of much more detail on individual places that were represented on the main map on the table.

Arrayed around the table was Lupin, Magnus and ten men whom Star had not yet met. one of those men was obviously by far the most important of the bunch. His uniform was sharp and it was decorated with more medals than Star cared to count. Each individual present was in some kind of dress uniform with their medals on display so Star whipped out his WarPad and switched to his Dinner Dress Uniform, which had all of the medals he’d earned in WarFare Online plastered across his chest.

“There now we are all dressed up nice and fancy like. What's on the agenda folk?” Star said before pausing, “Oh and I should probably introduce myself and get introductions to all of you, I know two of you but not the rest of you. I’ll go first! I’m Star, newly of the SilverEye family, Scout and Recon Specialist, Infil and Exfil specialist, Search and rescue Expert, Assassin, Sniper, and all around badass. Your turn.” He said, pointing to Magnus.

Star knew that being so overbearing right when meeting these important people would show him a little about the power dynamics at play here and what they were willing to tolerate from him. It's always nice to know where your boundaries lay when interacting with people who are in power, and he wasn’t going to have the excuse that he was new to all of this for very long, so he felt that it was better to come off as arrogant and pushy in the beginning and mellow down as he figured out where his sphere was. They would put it down to personal growth and feel like they played a part in it. And Star would get a more detailed view of the existing power structure if they were all off their guard. And he saw that he had indeed succeeded in putting them off guard.

Everyone's eyes were wide, and their gazes nervously bounced between Star and the man who was obviously a general of some sort. The man gave an almost imperceptible nod and Magnus cleared his throat.

“I am Magnus BoulderFist, this city and the surrounding territory are my and my Beta’s Run. I handle the city guard and overall security within the city.” he said, his voice firming up as he spoke.

The rest all introduced themselves but they were mainly just low ranking officers under General WhiteClaw. Which was a funny name seeing as how the man had rat ears and tail. Lupin was the second highest ranked individual there and probably the person who worked the most of all of them. All the others reported to Lupin and he in turn reported to the general. Star was an outlier here and none of them really knew where he placed. Star would technically be considered a visiting Run leader but he obviously had a great deal of military might all by himself. So they all seemed to be treading lightly with him. Which served Star just fine.

The general directed everyone's attention to the table map and cleared his throat,

“To give you an overview Star. We are here.” he said pointing to the map where a decent sized cluster of beastkin models were located.

Star quickly oriented himself on the map seeing what was where, based off of their current location and positions of the enemy pieces. Dragons Roost appeared to be in the farthest northeastern Run of Dogs Run Kingdom. His own Run was southeast and directly adjacent to human territories to the east. Judging by where all of the pieces were located around the map Star saw a clear picture of a frontline invasion directly aimed at the cities to the south of Dragons Roost. Star took that all in before the general started talking again.

“The human armies started to march in our territories nearly three months ago as far as we can tell. They used powerful obfuscation magics to conceal their movements until it was too late for us to meet them in the field. Almost every major force on the eastern front of Dogs Run is currently being held down in the major cities, as far as we can tell every bordertown and village has been sacked and raided from Dragons Roost to Krakens Den in the south, with only the cities themselves actually managing to hold off their sieges. Reinforcements from the west are not expected to get here for another six months. Somehow the enemy mages have interfered with our communications arrays and no messages are able to get through by magical means. As far as we know, only Dragons Roost has managed to break the siege, with your help apparently, and our scouts have already reported enemy troop movements towards our direction.”

Star nodded and pointed at the map, “If they have similar sized armies to the one that was here at each of these other cities that means that they have fielded at the very least three hundred thousand men. but it looks like they have significantly more surrounding Krakens Den and at least three other cities meaning Justin’s Kingdom must have at least a half million soldiers on the field right now, not to mention supply trains what they must have in reserve… How the hell could they even do that? How big is Justin’s Kingdom? And were their significant tensions before this attack started? A recent change in leadership?”

The general nodded at that.

“Justin’s Kingdom was Harold’s Kingdom until five years ago when Justin usurped his fathers throne. It is said that Justin awoke one day and founded his new religion based on the superiority of the pure human race. He outlawed the worship of any other deity in his lands the day he killed Harold. Then within a few weeks he issued proclamations that no race other than pure humans had any rights within the kingdom and needed to be owned by or accounted for by humans. We knew that he was building a new army, but all signs pointed to them going east after the goblins. As to how he could afford to field an army of such size… We have no clue. and we were lucky that he had no Elites stationed in the army that attacked here. I don’t think they expected to need them against a city like Dragons Roost, but their response force will more than likely have multiple Elites and more than likely griffin riders or wyvern riders among them.We are expecting another attack within three months, but we have no idea when it might come because of their obfuscation magics.”

Star cursed internally, Freaking lying ass gods saying I had a choice in participating in what was going on. Obviously this Justin fellow is a Champion. and if he’s getting similar benefits to myself he’s probably very powerful. I wonder what god is his patron. Star thought to himself.

“Does the term ‘Era of the Gods’ mean anything to any of you?” he asked not really knowing what to expect as an answer.

Literally every head in the room was nodding. And Star sighed aloud.

“I heavily suspect that Justin is a champion of a god or multiple gods which would mean that he is very strong himself and probably has his own set of unique powers like my own. Those powers may be responsible for him being able to field an army of that size so quickly. My own powers are more about personal power so far, but I have no idea what will develop in the future.”

Everyone except for Lupin seemed to be stunned by his statements.

“Are you saying that you are one such Champion of the gods? you are not simply a powerful Elite?” the general asked.

Star shrugged, “Technically, but I have no obligation to The Pantheon that brought me here. By their own words I am not obligated to them. They gave me no mandate to spread their word or try to take over the world in their name. They just said to go and live my life how I wanted to and that's what I am doing. You all apparently know them by different names than I do, War is one of their number and the only one to have communicated with me as of yet.”

“It is comforting to know that the Pantheon has not abandoned us.” The general said, “War is the patron deity of the Dogs Run Army and Naval forces. During the Age of Prophecy it was foretold that the gods would send their champions to do battle with each other. When the Prophets stopped receiving messages it was feared that the Age of the gods had begun. What you are saying confirms it. The Pantheon has always been about personal choice which makes sense as to why they did not give you marching orders. They probably placed you in a situation that required you to make a choice and you chose us over the humans, though they are your people. I thank you for that.”

“I saw soldiers taking advantage of prisoners in a way that should never happen and I kinda snapped. Slaughtered thet assholes and decided that I like you and your people. Never really been a fan of humans even though I am one.” He shook his head, “For better or for worse it looks like I’m with Dogs Run. What can I say? Amy’s kinda gotten her claws in me.”

“I noticed! Didn’t get a lick of sleep last night because of you two.” Lupins exasperated tone

“Everything else aside. It looks like we can only wait until the response comes from Justin’s Kingdom to us breaking their siege. Until then I would like to receive some training if you all don’t mind. I don’t know how to use a sword and I feel like that is something I should get good at. Anything else that you all could think of that I need to learn. I am new to all of this and I’d like to know more.” Star said.

After that portion of the conversation Star did not have anything else to contribute. The meeting only lasted about a half hour after that, and whenever they had a question for Star he answered to the best of his ability. When it was done, Lupin guided Star out of the building and told him that he should probably head back to the estate and see if Amy needed his input on anything.

So Star jogged back to the estate at a sedate pace. the pace would have put olympians to shame but to him it was relaxed. Arriving at what was now basically home, Star found Amy going over papers in his room.

“Oh good you’re back, I need your opinion on the Pack applicants. How many should I approve and are we looking for a particular set of skills. Or are we just looking to add as many as possible right now and worry about recruiting for specific skills later? I don’t want to screw anything up and any of them that we accept are with us permanently.” She sounded frustrated and worried.

“I’ll trust you to pick based on what you want. I don’t know anything about what is expected of a Pack and I don’t know what we’ll need in the future. It looks like it might be a year or two before we are going to be able to go out and actually establish our Run. This war with Justin’s Kingdom is probably going to take a while and I don’t know what will be expected of me after the next army shows up at Dragons Roost. I really don’t care how many you pick, and if any of them start causing you problems I’ll set em straight.” He responded whilst flopping onto the bed.

“Ok… Then I’ll be right back. going to have the servants send out some notices. Then we’ll see if you can make me all wobbly again before they get here.” She smiled as she scooped up all of the papers and headed out the door.

Star smiled to himself. “Damn I really got caught up in a teenagers wet dream didn't I? Lets just hope I don’t wake up anytime soon.”