A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

After using that chain to hogtie the unresponsive Victor so that he wouldn't try to get into the room again, Erik dumped him out in the cold and damp hallway before closing the door to the room they had occupied.

Inside, Emma and Astrid failed to contain their chuckles and giggles at Victor's fate and Erik's likely reasons for tossing him out.

Although they had to admit they, too, didn't want the doll-eyed and enslaved Victor to hang around where they would soon sleep.

Erik next walked over to the fireplace, which clearly used to be electric, and quickly ripped out all the useless components before taking something from his armor storage.

In his hands was now a red, sphere-like object that gave off a pleasant and far-spreading warmth.

This sphere, called a fire orb, was a simple and readily available object back on Söl that essentially served as an equivalent to Earth's modern heating elements.

It wasn't that any of them really needed the warmth to survive, or even be comfortable, but it was still preferable to the alternative.

So he placed the orb in the now-demolished electric fireplace and stepped back to let it spread its warmth throughout the room.

After all, the warmth Astrid had spread was already fading, while this orb wouldn't have been good enough to dry and clean the room as Astrid had done.

He released a sigh of contentment. "Finally, time for some rest," he mumbled.

He turned towards Emily while addressing Emma and Astrid: "We'll leave Emily alone for now. Forcefully waking her might not be a good idea. I'd prefer to have her either wake up naturally or have Elora take a look at her before we do anything."

Emma looked concerned at her motionless big sister but nodded in agreement. She wanted Emily to wake up soon, but above all, she wanted her to be safe.

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At this point, Astrid allowed herself to fall back into one of the faded yet newly warmed and cleaned sofas and sighed deeply from contentment as well. "Aaaah, finally, time for rest indeed." She had her eyes closed and her head leaning all the way back.

Meanwhile, Erik turned toward the large windows and sank into thought as he looked out over the abandoned town and beautiful vistas. 'I need to get stronger,' he thought to himself. 'There were a million things that could have gone wrong today, all because I'm not strong enough to defeat Mom's little ass-kisser.'

'There will likely be more third-rankers on my path in the future, and even getting to Edda might require me to get past one or more of them," he thought to himself.

He stared at the view for a few moments longer until he came to a decision.

'After we've rescued Alice and checked out whatever Mom wanted me to, I'm going to find a quiet place where I can make use of Earth's development phase and Elora's support to rapidly grow in strength before I confront Sigurd and Frostfang and before we leave for Africa,' he thought to himself.

Then he nodded, as if to confirm his own plans. 'I'm sure Elora will agree with me; she's always been a proponent of the slow but steady approach. My revenge on Edda is already cold anyway, and now I've made commitments in this place, meaning I need to take down Sigurd, and Frostfang for what he did to Elora, before moving on.'

'You can live for a little while longer, Edda,' he thought to himself grimly. 'But when I come for you, nothing and no one will be able to stop me.' He remained quiet for a moment before adding, a little wryly, 'Assuming, of course, Mom or someone else hasn't beaten me to the punch by then.'

Shaking himself free of these thoughts, he turned around and grinned at the relaxing Astrid, who continued to have her eyes closed, seemingly in thought or simply resting.

'For now, however,' he thought. 'Perhaps I could use a distraction.'

The fact was that his mind continued to be preoccupied with what had happened to Elora earlier. He knew she should be fine; he simply had never seen her in such a state, and it rattled him a little.

He knew there was no reason to feel guilty. The only way he could have prevented what happened was if he had known it would happen beforehand.

But that didn't stop him from struggling with what happened to her. He never wanted to see her or anyone he cared about get hurt, and regardless of logic or reason, he still felt like he should have done more.

But thinking about such things was pointless and prevented him from relaxing and recovering.

Thus, it was time to distract himself while also giving Emma something else to think about besides her big sister.

He was still grinning at the resting Astrid as he chuckled and thought, 'And at the same time, I can tease Astrid a little.'

He quickly began to remove his armor piece by piece until, unbeknownst to Astrid, he stood entirely naked in the middle of the room. Some bruises still covered his body, but for the most part, he looked fine by now.

At least on the outside. His insides still needed more time to fully recover, but he could still have a little fun.

He sat down on the sofa opposite Astrid, with his legs wide apart, and beckoned towards Emma, who was still standing in the middle of the room, a few meters away from him, in the maid outfit she gained from Elora, which had become her standard attire.

"I've had a stressful day, little glimmer. I think it's time to help your husband relax a little," he told her through their link so as not to alarm Astrid.

With her thoughts still preoccupied with today's events and her big sister's current status, Emma blinked for a moment before realizing Erik's current seating and his words.

Naturally, she knew what he meant.

Her eyes quickly fluttered towards Astrid, and a healthy blush appeared on her cheeks. Still, no one would think she was actually reluctant when they noticed the accompanying small yet perverted smile on her lips.

Quickly, Erik's order and her desire to follow it pushed away any distracting thoughts. She looked at Erik with her limpid, heterochromatic eyes before responding through their link with lustful obedience and excitement: "Of course, Master. Let your beloved maid take care of you."

With Erik's hungry eyes locked on her body, Emma first took an elastic band from her storage ring. She bunched her long white hair into a ponytail.

Next, she started slowly and sensually undoing and removing her maid dress. Emma's eyes reflected the same hunger in Erik's as more and more pieces of her clothing disappeared into the storage jewel on her ear.

Over the last few days since losing her first time to Erik, they had been having sex every night, causing Emma to quickly become increasingly liberated, lustful, and obedient.

Before, she would, at the very least, have hesitated if Erik wanted to do anything with Astrid in the room. But now, the very thought of doing this next to Erik's childhood friend only caused her to heat up even more. At the same time, any last hesitation was annihilated by the fact that Erik had worded his proposal as an order.

Emma knew that Erik would never force her into anything if she resisted. Still, as the last pieces of clothing disappeared, she knew she would never be able to resist those piercing amber eyes.