Rupegia 56 Roxanne's Origin: What Of My Future? - Teaser

This is a teaser for the patreon-only side stories I'm writing.

Each chapter has 3 parts and the first part of any new storyline I will make public as a teaser. I'm planning for the main cast to have at least 3 chapters of side-stories.

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I look out the window. The seagulls are squawking, the sky is clear and the sun is s.h.i.+ning. I can hear the faint sound of the waves if I concentrate enough.

I can't hold back the sigh that escapes my lips.

I look over my clothes and pick up a thin white dress. I tuck my tail through the back hole and put on some cute yellow shoes.

I leave my room and go to Mom's office. She's doing accounting with her abacus. She adjusts her small round gla.s.ses and continues writing. Her long silky black hair is tied in a ponytail to keep it out of her face. Her long white fingers write with lots of "Speed" and "Dexterity".

"Mom?" I ask.

"Yes, honey?" She says without lifting her eyes from her work.

"I want to go out."

"Bring Shervin with you."

"But Moom! Shervin scares the others. I don't need him watching over, I will behave this time, I promise!" I clap my hands in pleading and bow.

"Don't make me repeat myself," she lifts her eyes and her cold glare gives me s.h.i.+vers.

I immediately straight up and nod to her repeatedly. She returns to her work and I skedaddle out of there.

Heh, skedaddle.

I sigh and resign myself to my fate. I dread the reaction of others when they see Shervin shadowing me.

At least Mom's books are improving my vocabulary, those hard words impressed Khadima.

I go downstairs and look for Shervin. I see Khadima is waxing the tile floor, the old woman is calmly humming a song as she works, her tail flabs around, barely staying upright.

"Khadima," I say.

"Yes little Rox?" She turns to me and smiles warmly.

"Don't call me 'little'," I pout.

"Sure. Little Rox," she smiles wider.

I just can't get mad at this woman.

"Where's Shervin? Mom said I have to bring him if I want to go outside."

"He's not here yet but his s.h.i.+ft is about to start, just you wait and he will be here soon," her tanned and wrinkly hand pats my cheek. She smells of the flowery perfume of the cleaning products.

"Okay…"

I continue past the hall and down the corridor towards the backyard. I smell something sweet being baked at the kitchen but I can't go there, Mom gets mad when I eat out of time.

I reach the backyard and suddenly remember I didn't have any reason for coming here. I should have returned to my room but now I don't feel like walking anymore.

I sit down by the pool and remove my shoes so I can dip my toes. I think about just jumping in but Mom gets mad when I do that.

I see Mushtal is working on the flowers. The old man is wearing some jumpers with dirt on his knees. At his age where does he get so much energy to work like this?

He lifts from the patch and cleans sweat from his brow. He notices me and waves.

"h.e.l.lo, Roxanne, refres.h.i.+ng yourself?" He asks with a tired smile.

"Yes."

"Today is a good day to go out, eh?"

"Yes," I say and nod.

He comes over and sits on the gra.s.s near the pool with a grunt.

"Feeling bored again?" He asks with a slight frown and I hear sympathy on his voice.

"Yes."

He ungloves his hand and scratches his head with a slight cringe.

"Maybe you should, uh, find some other girls to play with, you know, some who have more, uh, money," his tone is not very convincing.

"I did, once. They were mean, I don't like them," I say and turn away, the twinkle of the pool looks much more enticing than Mushtal's pitying gaze.

"People of influence can be mean, sometimes, but you have to endure, get closer to them so they are less mean to you."

"I don't want to."

We stay silent for a long minute.

"I have to get back to work, your mother will get angry if the flowers wilt," he says and gets up again with a grunt, "but think about what I said, uh? For your future," with this he goes back to working on the flower patch.

My future? What of it?

­

"Roxanne!?" I hear Shervin call out.

I jump out of the edge and scurry towards the source of the voice.

On the doorway to the house I see a tall, muscular, and broad s.h.i.+rtless man with a long sword at his waist. Brown fur comes out of the side of his arms, hands bigger than normal hang near his knees, and a brown wolf head looks at me warmly. A gorosnegee-type demon race.

"Shervin!" I yell and run to him. I hug his large waist and feel some of the fur on his ribs tickle my head.

"Y-yes, me. Careful with your horns," Shervin says and awkwardly pushes me away. "Khadima said that you were looking for me?"

"I want to go out!" I look up to his face and smile, his glacial blue eyes are beautiful to look at.

He pats my head softly, something difficult to do with his thick and rough hand.

"Alright, then. Lead the way," he says with a toothy smile that shows his fangs.

­

Now that Shervin is beside me, the guard lets me out of the estate.

Those thick and high walls were suffocating me. Seeing the cobble road, the white buildings, and the townspeople on their day-to-day gives me new vigor.

I quickly move way from this block, I don't want to meet our neighbors. I make my way towards the central square, everyone likes to hang out near the plaza in front of the governor's mansion.

There's a few stalls selling food but I'm not hungry yet. Quite a lot of people in here, even though not many have the money to spend on the shops around the governor's house they can still buy a thing or two from the stalls.

I heard that the governor wanted to remove the stalls so the poor people would leave. That sounds incredibly mean, the governors is just like the neighbors, she's a snotty snooty sn.o.b.

There's lots of tails swaying about without care, some are even on the way, mostly the men. That's incredibly rude to force me to touch their tails so I can pa.s.s, I kind of understand why the governor dislikes the crowd but that doesn't excuse wanting to force the stalls to go away.

I also don't understand why they like this plaza so much, there's always so little non-succubus in here that it's kind of boring. I like people like Shervin, makes it more pleasant to the eye. And it seems plenty of other people think this way, specially the women. I don't get why they like him so much, do the goros-types have bigger d.i.c.ks or something?

I look around and find Nousha walking with the usual group. The albino succubus is with her brother, Firuz. This makes things more difficult, Firuz became like a kheshm-type ever since we changed houses, I don't like him anymore.

I breathe in deeply and move towards them. I have to talk to Nousha, I have to.

Firuz is the first one to notice me, d.a.m.n, he scowls when he sees me.
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"H-h.e.l.lo, Firuz," I say and look over Nousha, she hides behind her brother. Why would she do that? "h.e.l.lo, Nousha."

"Oh, it's Roxxy," says one of the other kids. Firuz glances back and the smile on the kid's face quickly fades.

Firuz glares at me, "What do you want?" He asks.

"Nousha? H-how are you? It's been a while since I saw you," I say, trying to peek over Firuz but he stands in front of Nousha and blocks her vision of me.

"Why are you coming after her again? Wasn't my dad enough for you?" He asks and takes a step forward, his tail standing still and pointing forward, threateningly. Shervin growls and Firuz glares at him, then he steps back and pushes Nousha behind him again. "Are you going to sic your dog on us now? Are you going to get him to kidnap my sister and beat her? Why don't you leave us alone!?" He barks at me.

"That's, that's not fair!" I yell at him, "I didn't want this, I didn't want any of this, it's not my fault!"

"I don't care! Your mother already fired my dad and now he's drinking again! Go away! Your family became just like the other sn.o.bs!" He waves his hand in the air to shoo me away.

I don't know what to say. I don't want this, I don't want to fight, I just want to play with Nousha again, to talk to her again.

I lower my head and keep it down, it's all I can do to keep the tears away. I won't cry, I won't let Firuz see me cry, I won't let the others see me cry.

"Sorry…" Nousha mutters and I hear them walk away.

I lift my head and see them leave, they don't even look back. The people around me have mixed gazes, some obviously dislike my mother, so they dislike me; others don't care and only pity me.

I don't like the pity, I don't want the pity, I just want to play with Nousha again, I even want to play with Firuz again. I just want to go back how we were.

I turn around and leave.

­

I walk down the market, she smell of fish and seafood is in the air. Plenty of merfolk walk the streets and browse the wares, most are tall and strong Sea Soldiers, not many commoners bother to get a permit to enter our Holy Lands.

"h.e.l.lo, Roxanne," says one of the vendors.

"h.e.l.lo," I answer.

"How are you, Roxanne?" Asks another.

"Fine," I answer.

"Going for a walk, Roxanne?" Asks an old woman.

"Yes."

"Taking a stroll with Shervin, eh? Why don't you spend some time in my house while I talk with Shervin?" Asks a young female vendor. "I can give you lots of cookies again."

"Later, Shervin can talk with you on his free time," I say, provoking a coughing fit on Shervin.

"h.e.l.lo, Roxanne, tell your mother how your father is always a pleasure to deal with," says another young female vendor.

"Okay."

"Roxanne, won't you take some Tickly Tentacles for dinner? I know your mother will love them, I know how to find them better than even the merfolk!" Says a fisherman.

"Another day."

I finally pa.s.s through the market and the a.s.sault ends.

­

The smell of salt gets as high as it can once I reach the pier. Then I move along it until I find the sh.o.r.e, after a long way past the bathers I find a thick patch of trees.

There's a very faint path that only me, Nousha, and Shervin know about. We go down the winding path and enter a small cave. It's a beautiful where the sun light creates reflections on the rock ceiling that wave about as the tide comes and goes. The sound of the waves echoes through the cave and makes me sleepy.

I'm finally alone, except for my shadow called Shervin.

"Can't you leave me alone?" I ask, very annoyed.

"No," he answers flatly, "if I do you might run away and get into trouble again."

At the end of the cave I see a green flag on a buoy, the Sea Soldiers are on patrol so it's safe to enter the water. Not that I want to, I just want to stay here without anything crawling out of the water.

"You shouldn't have come, you made things worse," I say and crouch over a dry rock.

"You know that's not true," he says softly.

"Yes it is! Firuz hates you and you made him mad!"

"Hey! No I didn't, you know exactly why he hates you!" Shervin shows his fangs at me in anger, not that he's trying to scare me. He sighs, then he runs his hand through the tall fur on his head and says, "I'm sorry, Roxxy, I shouldn't yell at you. Look, Firuz is a kid, and so are you. Firuz is just taking his anger on you, it's not fair but it's how things are, one day Firuz will calm down and you can become friends again."

I turn around and look over the water, the waving lights on the ceiling are much more enticing that Shervin's pitying gaze.

"Father says we are going to leave Mashoor."

"Hm?"

"He hired an instructor in magic, he said he got me a spot on the Holy Academy once I'm old enough. We are going to Xane."

"Oh… then over there you can make some new friends," he says softly.

"I don't want to."

"You will, soon enough."

I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to!

d.a.m.n, stupid, s.h.i.+tty, filthy... argh! Skritter-brains!

I don't control my mother, I don't tell her what to do, and she certainly wouldn't fire his dad because of some stupid s.h.i.+t we did.

If I could just…

I lift my arms and start casting a [Fireball], I barely have the concentration to properly chant so I just mutter some stupid words and curses in a voice Shervin can't hear.

"… and rip them apart! [Fireball]!"

The spell fires towards the water and explodes, a large amount of scalding water flies in all directions and burns my face.

"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!" I cry as I throw cold sea water in my face and arms to cool it down.

"You stupid kid, what did you do this time!?" Shervin angrily yells at me. He grabs my arms and splashes 3 HP potions on my whole body. The pain slowly fades away as the potion takes effect.

Thank the G.o.ds for my gla.s.ses, if that water entered my eyes I would be in much more pain.

"What kind of d.a.m.n spell was that?" He asks and looks over where my spell hit the water. There's a small whirlpool quickly decreasing in size where the spell hit. "How much mana did you use?"

"Not much," I say and move away from him towards another dry rock.

"You know how to manipulate concepts of magic? That must have been an explosive [Fireball]."

"I guess so," I say and shrug.

"You have some talent, you will be a good mage one day," he smiles and shows all of his fangs and sharp teeth.

"I'm tired of hearing that," I mutter.

Shervin cringes and I look away, I'm tired of these pitying gazes.

I grab some pebbles and start to throw them. My aim is horrible, if only I could cast [Fireball] without having to aim, then I could blow those sn.o.bs with a thought.

My dress is now wet with salt water and some sticky remains from the lower quality HP potion. I [Conjure Water] on my hand and slowly scrub myself, if I use Fire and [Water Magic] properly then mother won't notice I dirtied my dress with sea water.

I have 14 "Willpower" and 5 [Mana Control], it should be enough for some faint elemental manipulation. I have to heat my body and pull out the water from my clothes along with whatever is dirtying me.

Fire causes heat that turns water into steam. Fire causes heat that turns water into steam. Fire causes heat that turns water into steam.

I close my eyes and repeat the words in my head to aid in the visualization. I imagine the fire tickling and licking the water droplets, who get scared of the heat and scream while running away. The droplets scatter into a cloud and run as fast as they can from the heat. They feel the heat on each other and panic, they try to run in any direction as long as it's away from the closest source of heat.

I feel my body get uncomfortably hot and the water in my skin sizzle and turn into steam. My mana drops steadily and I quickly get tired.

I look over Shervin and see he's meditating on a dry rock. Good thing his [Sense Mana] is low, he would tell Mom I'm doing this and she would get mad, then she would force me to improve [Clean] until my head hurt.

I turn back and continue throwing pebbles but I quickly stop and stare at the water in silence. I don't know what I want to do but I certainly don't want to go home.

­

Shervin suddenly rises from his meditation and says, "Roxanne, dusk is coming. Let's go home, I'm hungry."

"Okay."

The walk back is silent.

The vendors are closing their shops, some people go to the plaza to hang out and drink, others leave to go home or to a tavern. The merfolk Sea Soldiers go back into the water and turn the green flags red, now the sea is off-limits to anyone not stupid enough.

We enter the estate just as the guard s.h.i.+ft changes. The tall gate closes behind us and I feel my body pressured again.

I go towards the master bath while Shervin goes towards the servant's bath. As I'm about to enter Mom comes out of the bath looking refreshed. She stops to look me over and gives an approving nod.

Good, she didn't notice. I just hope I didn't damage this dress, it's one of the better ones.

I enter the bath and dad is in the tub. I quickly wash myself and jump over the bath, I swim towards dad and nuzzle on his arm.

"Hey, my little Rox. Careful with the horns," he says and pats me.

His thin, delicate hands caress my horns, his unnaturally white skin is flushed pink. His dark brown hair is sweptback like always, it's like he doesn't know any other hairstyle. I entwine my tail with his and close my eyes.

"Did you talk with Nousha, today?" He asks.

I grit my teeth but try to keep myself from frowning in front of Dad.

"No, Firuz didn't let me, he doesn't like me anymore," I answer as unemotionally as I can.

"It's fine," he says and hugs me with his other arm, "You are a child, friends.h.i.+ps come and go, you will make new friends. Have you talked to the neighbors kids yet? Some of them are the children from Holy Officials on vacation in here. You should make friends with them, you will meet them again at the Holy Academy soon enough."

I stay quiet. I'm tired of saying the same thing and I don't want to tell Dad how that went.

­

Dinner is usual, Dad goes on, and on, and on, and on, he tells us of his meetings and the updates of the s.h.i.+pments while Mom listens and occasionally interjects to suggest something. When she starts giving her report on the finances I zone out and focus on savoring my food.

I understand a few sc.r.a.ps of conversation coming from the servant's table but I have to hold my laughter or Mom gets mad, she wants me to learn business too so their talk is also for me. I don't know why she does this since she wants me to serve as a Holy Official.

I see Shervin is eating a mountain again, how does he not get fat?

"Mom, can you buy some more books?" I ask.

"Have you finished the other books yet?" She asks with an inquisitive gaze.

"They are too boring!" I protest and pout.

Her eyes narrow into long lines as her gaze turns cold.

"Come now, Sanaz, she deserves a few more books to distract her, doesn't she?" Dad asks with a warm smile.

"Fine, but you will have to make sure she doesn't ditch her training, Behrouz, at least until her instructor comes," Mom mellows and smiles at Dad.

"Yes, my dear," he grabs Mom's hand and kisses it, making her chuckle,"I will come home earlier to measure her progress," he turns to me and says softly, "I want to see this powerful [Fire Magic] I hear so much."

That doesn't sound so bad.

­

I spend some of my evening on Dad's lap as he brushes my hair. I love his [Ma.s.sage] skill, it feels like he's slowly caressing the inside of my brain.

Eventually Mom and Dad retire early to the bedroom. I don't feel like talking to the servants so I go to my room and look for a book to read. No matter how many times I look at them none seem interesting.

I groan and pick one I've never read before, "In Vivo Experiments of Death Valley's Flora on Humanoids".

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Hall of Fame of Patrons

The patrons who support Rupegia shall have their names sung by the bards for they deserve the glory and honor. Their names are:

Oracle Maximillian Hübner.

Lord Andrew Meyers.

Lord SenilePenile.