Celebrations cut short

While the walk back to Othrys and the Citadel at its center might have taken a long time, Aires barely felt it. Victory was the headiest **** and right now, it pumped through his veins in abundance. Sensing his city fill behind him with Infected, new and old, was a special reward, as was having his harem girls steadily catch up to him. He made Naomi crawl ahead of him, enjoying watching her struggle to maintain a decent pace as well as see her ass shake back and forth. Every jiggle gave him a new idea for ways to break her, all of which he tried to remember for later.

With such an enjoyable sight and thoughts to occupy him, the lengthy walk to the Citadel seemed practically instantaneous. Before he knew it, the incredible gates to the Citadel was in front of him, wide and welcoming. The thick bark walls welcomed him with gorgeous, blooming flowers decorating them. Every color, every shape, every single one a thing of beauty. Aires didn't slow his pace though; he knew the truest bloom was waiting inside.

"Feel free to celebrate, but don't infect anyone else." The god's short proclamation went out to every one of the Infected filling out the city. He was looking forward to a long celebration before doing any work, and the sight that greeted him in the throne room only reinforced that aspiration.

"Congratulations, love," his goddess crooned from the massive pile of bedding taking up the middle of the throne room. She was utterly breathtaking, sitting on her knees amid a pile of pillows, her back arched in such a way that it thrust her own vast pillows out in an indescribable display. The rest of her body had the perfect amount of softness to be sleek but undeniably female. Tousled blonde curls flowed a bit past her shoulders and around her gorgeous face, smokey eyes above high cheekbones and plump, welcoming lips spread with a smile. The fact that her voluptuous body was lightly covered by lingerie only added to her beauty, and Aires' horny mind, the same part of him that urged him to worship this glorious woman, demanded he tear it off to see what was underneath.

"What?" he asked dumbly, realizing Aphrodite, his goddess, queen, and wife, was still talking. She stopped whatever she was saying and let out a laugh that the purest of bells could only aspire to mimic.

"I guess my body is more worth your attention than me singing the praises of your victory," she said, giggling. "Either way, we're all ready for you any time, my king." Aires finally managed to tear his eyes away from Aphrodite and saw that both of the other girls he had left behind were similarly lounging about. Vivian was laying on her front, kicking her feet with her tail waving back and forth with eager energy, and Evelith was already on her back with her legs spread, lightly toying with her barely covered snatch.

The women behind him were also wasting little time in joining the pile, Grace and a blue-haired, bottom-heavy woman with her that he didn't immediately recognize having already changed into loose, transparent robes and kneeling devotedly near Vivian, their holy appearance lessened slightly by the hungry looks they gave the tented front of his waist wrap. Zoe had reduced herself to a sleek and elegant woman and perched on the edge of the pillows, teasingly obstructing his view of her tits with whisps of silk, and Rebecca was extracting pleasured whines from Evelith by forcefully pinching her firm nipples. Cecilia and Venus were slight outliers, already all over each other with little intent to seduce him, but the sight of their intense lesbian kissing had an appeal all its own, especially coupled with the knowledge that they'd dive for his dick at the earliest opportunity.

"Who's your pet?" Aphrodite asked, slipping the too small cups of her bra lower to show more overflowing breastflesh. He opened his mouth to answer, but Vivian interrupted.

"She can't be Master's pet, I'm his pet! Master, you didn't get a new pet, did you? You just wanted to impregnate me and throw me away once I start swelling with a litter for you?" The lilac-haired catgirl rolled over, revealing a belly that was just slightly more rounded than usual, the first visible sign of her pregnancy. Her fingers traced along it gently, soft but fiercely protective, and Aires' dick throbbed harder at the sight.

"You're still my pet, Vivian, I'd never think to replace you," he said, voice a low thrum that made the quim of nearly every woman in the room drip, the one closest to him the only exception. "This is our new slut, Naomi, formerly the traitorous cunt aiding Olympus. I thought that she deserved it as her reward for trying to defeat us. That's for later though. Naomi, go sit by my throne like a good little bitch." The black-haired woman silently obeyed, internally thinking that Aires' lust was probably powerful enough for anything to happen if she didn't listen. At least if she complied, his attention wouldn't be on her.

Once she was close enough, Aires snapped his fingers and a thick collar wrapped around her throat, just tight enough to slightly impede her breathing. While Naomi gasped and struggled to adapt, a short rough chain linked it to the throne, giving her very little room to move and forcing her to keep her back bent to be comfortable. The whimper that escaped her throat was entirely involuntary and she stifled it immediately, but she couldn't deny that this was not a promising start to her captivity.

Aires, for his part, only had eyes for his harem anymore, specifically the heavenly blonde at its center. Aphrodite was resplendent before him, becoming even more so as her lingerie literally unraveled into thin air. Laying back in all her bountiful glory, the goddess was the very image of sexual perfection, and Aires' cock pulsed in response. "Come here, my king. I need you. WE need you. Come and show us how much you love us."

For just a moment, Aires saw all the women as he originally knew them, however briefly before they were transformed, Aphrodite most of all. His mind superimposed several images of her on top of her naked body: the welcoming smile she'd had for him when he arrived at what would be Othrys, her excited expressing as they experimented with their newfound magic and her scream of joy as he impregnated her, her sultry walk along the beach, their first meeting in her forest clearing, and even further back, to their stint as lab mates in school. Every snapshot was as beautiful as the last and brought him closer to just blasting cum all over her. The only reason he held back was so he could spend it inside her.

Basically diving for the nest of bedding, the god immediately filled his hand with as much female flesh as he could. Naturally, the two most ample targets were his love, his wife's enormous breasts. His searching fingers instantly made her moan and writhe, always with her hips rising towards him.

"Fill me up, Aires. Pump your cum into me! Fuck your queen!! MMNNHHH!" Aphrodite moaned when he pressed his head to her soaked lips, rubbing it against her hungry, parting folds. He ground against her clit, pulling another squeal of bliss from her, as well as drops of liquid from her nipples as he kneaded them. "I'm gushing for you, Aires, all for you! So stop teasing me!! FUCK M--!"

Her plea for sex was cut short and Aphrodite froze in Aires' arms. Her eyes were unfocused for a handful of seconds, each one that passed ramping Aires' anxiety up further, until finally she came back to herself, completely different from before.

"There's something at the Wall," she said coolly, entirely lacking her former passion. She looked at Aires not with hunger and lust, but cold calculation.

"What?" he could only ask, confused by the sudden turn of events.

"Rose felt something scratching at the Wall, but couldn't sense anything. So she alerted me. By the time I hooked in, it had already melted its way through."

"Melted? What the fuck is it, some new Infected?"

"Yes, melted; it somehow overcame Rose's regenerative abilities long enough to make a tunnel through. As for what it is...I do not know. I only knew where it was because I could feel the damage being done to the Wall, I felt absolutely nothing otherwise, and believe me, I tried."

"Some kind of machine then?"

"No, the damage done to Rose was too irregular and erratic for that. Whatever this is, it's alive and likely carries a strain of the Contagion extremely different from ours."

"And it got through the wall?"

"Yes, and then promptly disappeared; I can't find it. I even checked the minds of any Infected nearby, no one in the city has seen whatever this is."

"....all of you, make yourselves presentable and ready, I think we're going to have a guest," Aires said, reluctantly pulling himself off of Aphrodite. The other women backed off with just as much **** while Aires helped Aphrodite to her feet, both of them summoning what passed for clothes for the Divines around themselves.

"What makes you say that?" the goddess asked, trying to will away her own arousal. She recognized the severity of the situation, but her body only saw the possible danger as another excuse to fuck while they could, leaving her stifled and annoyed.

"Whatever this thing is, no matter how skilled in stealth it may be, if there were multiple of it moving through the city, we'd be able to tell. At the very least, the Rose Wall would have sensed the vibrations if a host of them were nearby. Additionally, it can't be oblivious to our strength. If this was an attack, it's doomed from the start. Plus they'd be attacking people along the way, but they're not. And if it's so sneaky that we can't sense it, there's no reason to assume it couldn't get past the Wall somehow. So it's come alone, drawn attention to itself, blowing its element of surprise, isn't attacking, and now is moving through the city with an unknown destination. To me, that can only mean it's an envoy of some sort.

"Someone wants to talk."

Just as he had before the attack on Olympus, Aires was on his throne, surrounded by his girls with his queen next to him. The pile of bedding had been dismissed, practically untouched, much to the ire of everyone present. Almost everyone, that is, with the exception of Naomi, who was still chained to Aires' throne and now gagged to keep from possibly rebelliously saying something compromising, and Owen, who didn't really care about much at all. Rebecca lurked in the shadows, ready to intervene if the guest proved less friendly than expected, and Zoe was back in her drider form, prepared to shield her master and mistress at a moment's notice.

"It's coming," Aphrodite whispered, her voice easily heard in the near silence of the room, which had gotten a previously unnoticed touch up while Aires had been away at war, including artistic representations of his feats and conquests so far. He definitely wanted to take a closer look at those when he had time. For now, the shadow in the hall's entryway drew every bit of his attention.

"What are you?" Aires asked, his voice echoing and booming with Divine power.

The creature moved slowly forward, the darkness appearing to cling to its glossy black hide, before it fully emerged from the shadows, revealing its form to those inside. It neither faltered nor seemed phased by the array of powerful beings watching it in silence, rather, it slunk forward with the grace and surety of an apex predator.

Though he couldn’t see any hint of eyes, Aires felt as if the creature was looking at him and him alone, ignoring everything else in the room, including the growing unease and hostility of the girls as it made its way towards the seated Divine.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of mounting tension in the room, silent but for the almost inaudible footsteps of the creature, it came to a halt, facing Aires, and then simply seemed to freeze.

“I’ll repeat myself, assuming you’re intelligent enough to understand: what are you?” Aires asked again, staring the black creature down.

The creature didn’t move in the slightest, seemingly not intimidated by the powerful Divine in front of it, not saying a word, simply staring; watching.

‘This is a promising start,’ the crimson-haired god thought sarcastically to himself. ‘Let’s try something else.’

“You break through my wall, invade my city, and belligerently walk into my home uninvited, all to stand in front of me and not say anything? I thought I detected intelligence in your actions, or at least in your master’s directions, emissary. I’d be disappointed to find my assumptions were wrong.” Once again, silence reigned in the throne room as Aires waited to see if his barb would cause a reaction.

At first the creature remained as it was, before it suddenly tilted its head and gave a horrific facsimile of a smile, seemingly tearing a gash through half its face to expose a barred row of large silver teeth glinting in the light, and vaporous breath escaping into the air, but aside from this, there was no other reaction, and still, it did not speak.

‘What the fuck…’ Aires grumbled to himself, more than a little irritated. He glanced to the side, eyes meeting with Aphrodite’s, who was just as confused. ‘Is it running on instinct? I feel like it can understand, but maybe…’ Reaching out with his mind, he tried to convey a wordless sense of welcome and curiosity to the creature, a task made a bit harder thanks to not being able to sense the thing at all. As far as his Contagion-given senses were concerned, this thing didn’t exist.

If his message was received, the creature gave no indication of it, aside from tilting its head the other way and, if possible, widening its grotesque expression even further, far past the point where any mundane human’s lips would have been ripped into pieces, and yet seemingly causing no discernible discomfort or, truly, any kind of reaction from the creature at all. It seemed as if the bottom half of the thing’s ‘face’, if it could be called that, was almost entirely devoted to its mouth, the evidence of which was being rather grimly presented to them first-hand.

“You’re enjoying this, you bastard,” Aires growled, resisting the urge to get up and punt the freakish thing across the room, diplomacy be damned. “You don’t feel like talking? I can wait until you do.” True to his word, Aires didn’t say anything else, more or less patiently waiting for the thing to do anything but grin. His ire was soothed just a bit thanks to Aphrodite reaching over to stroke his hand a little, but even his queen could only do so much to reduce his annoyance.

The creature’s manic expression didn’t change, but it did right its head, and, as if to mock the Divine in front of it, almost seemed to adopt a more relaxed posture, as if to challenge Aires’ claim, and became still once more.

An hour passed, and the creature hadn’t moved even the slightest bit - Aires couldn’t even tell if the thing was breathing - before it suddenly jolted upright, shattering the stillness of the room. Broken out of daydreams of finally being able to slake his lusts with his girls, Aires refocused on the monster with a barely restrained sigh of relief. He had long since gotten bored of altering and fine tuning the Citadel’s structure to his preference, purposefully only changing things out of sight of the creature. It’d ruin the image he was going for to admit to his boredom in waiting. The other occupants of the room did much the same, though Owen stayed leaning against a pillar, either earnestly asleep or doing a great job of faking it.

The creature’s teeth parted, before a sibilant voice seemed to penetrate the ears of everyone who heard it. Its macabre grin widened even more, to levels that were truly disturbing, and also seemed to cause the creature itself discomfort. “It seems thou do have some patience to thee after all, Red-Hair. I would not have given thee the credit.”

“You’re lucky I’m curious, or else I would have torn you apart forty minutes ago. In case you don’t remember the original question, what. Are. You?” Aires said through strained lips of his own. Either this creature’s impetuousness knew no bounds or he was speaking directly with an annoyingly skilled puppet master manipulating this thing from afar. He wasn’t sure which he would prefer.

“Questions, questions. We all have them, we all want the answers to them, but! the thing thou must ask thyself is, are thou asking the right questions? Thou has asked what I am repeatedly, and I have not said. A truly intelligent man would have then moved on to other questions, thinking that perhaps I would be more inclined to answer those and through them gain insight into the answers I did not provide. Thou did not. This is not a good first showing, Red-Hair. And then, to threaten me, oh, well that would be a mistake, a very large one indeed. After all, thou thyself admitted that I made my way unhindered to thee, even after I gave thee the courtesy of announcing myself. Just think, if I had had more sinister intentions, well… how attached are thou to the unborn life next to thee…?”

The stone arm of Aires’ throne was practically atomized under his grip, unrestrained fury momentarily superseding every other thought in his head. How dare this grotesque, insignificant insect come into his home and threaten what was his? His wife and his child? It would pay, first with it’s life, then with-

‘Calm, Aiden,’ Aphrodite’s voice sounded in his head, pushing down the wrath that threatened to control him. ‘It wants you angry, so you prove it’s point. Take the higher road. Be a king.’

She was right, Aires knew, and with less hate clouding his judgment, he had the strength to loosen his grip, fragments of stone dust slipping from his fingers. Imagined or not, he felt like the monster was smirking at him, like it had won some imagined battle. Forcing the last of his fury down, he reformed the arm of his throne with a gestrue and leveled his gaze on the creature as calmly as he could.

“Welcome to Othrys, outsider.” His tone was colder than the depths of the ocean. “Why have you come?”

The creature snapped its teeth shut, the violent sound testament to the **** of its jaws, and smiled again. “Oh, well done, Red-Hair, well done. It seems the little one is dear to thee? This is good, family is important.” If possible, the monotone voice took on a mocking edge. “Thy queen is far smarter than thee, knowing the goals of others is important for one of thy self-appointed station, something thou should work on.

“Othrys? The citadel of the Titans, an interesting choice given thou calls thyself a god.

“And finally, a new question, one I am pleased to provide an answer to. Why am I here? I am here to deliver a message to thee.”

“...I’m not justifying my choice in names to you,” the self-titled god said flatly, “no more than I’ll warn you against threatening what is mine. Given how well informed you are, puppet master, I shouldn’t have to. Instead, why don’t you fulfill your purpose? What is your message?”

Once more the demonic grin eclipsed the creature’s face, before it suddenly spasmed and adopted a completely different pose. It’s voice, sibilant and silky before, was suddenly raspy, as though its vocal cords, or however it spoke, were made of sandpaper, and every word was agony to get out. It looked once more directly at Aires, before rasping out, “My master, Wey’land the Emperor, bids thee welcome to his Hive.”

As soon as the last syllable left its maw, the creature turned and began swiftly making its way out, without a spared glance for anyone in the room.

Momentarily happy to just have the aggravating encounter over, Aires waited until the creature was out of sight before slumping in his throne. “Fuck that thing,” he grumbled, running a hand through his crimson hair. Though it might not have been a jab at him, the creature had put him on edge about his choice of hair color.

“You should not fuck that, my Lord, you should give it to me so I can slowly melt it down and make it and its master understand true agony,” Grace whispered through clenched teeth. Vivian seemed to agree, clutching her own belly and hissing through lengthened fangs.

“There’ll be time for that later, Grace. For now, I’ll play to its tune and go with it. All of you will stay here, please make sure no more of those things are skulking about. Loath as I am to admit it, it had a point, there could be more around. I’ll hopefully be back soon with one less annoyance.”

“Don’t lose your temper,” Aphrodite warned, looking at where the creature had disappeared. “If that thing is what I think it is, it’s more dangerous than we realized.”

“What is it?” Evelith asked, trembling slightly. She had put on a brave face, but everyone in the room could tell the thing had terrified her.

“It seemed to be modeled after an old horror movie monster, at least on the outside. Hard shell, very fast, very sneaky. In the movie, if I remember right, it was basically indestructible.”

“It’s never had to deal with me,” Aires growled, rising from his throne. He almost wanted to destroy it again just to try and feel better, but held back.

“And you’ve never had to deal with it, much less whatever controls it. It called its master ‘Emperor’. You should know a creature doesn’t get a title like that without reason. So be careful and don’t piss it off. Not at the seat of its power.” He very nearly snapped at her, berating her for thinking him weaker than this thing, but her steadily flexing toes gave him pause. Aphrodite was anxious, he belatedly realized, just like him, and probably more disturbed by the creature’s threat on her than she’d ever reveal. She knew that anything that threatened their happiness should be taken with utmost care and caution, and he had no sensible choice but to agree.

“I will be careful, Julia,” he said, leaning down to gently kiss her. She returned the gesture, unspoken distress obvious in her telling lips. He held there for as long as he could, before reluctantly admitting that he had to go. “I’ll be right back,” he finally said, turning and striding out of the throne room.

Finding a balcony, massive wings ripped out of his back and he dropped into the sky, searching for his target. He found it quicker than expected, though definitely not where he expected to. The creature was already outside the city, heading steadfastly and speedily in one direction. Pumping his wings, he rocketed himself out over the Wall, following the monster from above and slightly behind. It didn’t care if he was following it, so he didn’t bother to announce himself. Instead, he busied himself with examining it as he followed it further from Othrys and closer to its master’s hive.

“I don’t know what I expected,” Aires said to himself, looking at the overrun sprawl in front of him. It had taken a while, a few hours of fast travel, for Aires and the monstrous messenger to reach what could charitably be called a city and most definitely be called a nest. Weird, tar-black material stretched from building to building, each one a perversion of Japanese architecture and a single piece in a complex web that made his head hurt to try and follow. He wondered if Zoe would be capable of making sense of it.

Feeling ill at ease, Aires began walking through the darkness-dominated city, keeping his eyes moving. Though he couldn’t sense them, he had no doubt he was being watched by the city’s formerly human occupants. Knowing they were there but being unable to detect them was more unsettling than the god could have expected and he could easily understand why these creatures had starred in a horror movie.

Fortunately, Emperor Whatever of this place seemed to agree with Aires concerning his home of choice. Rising from the center of the city was a massive, appropriately convoluted spire that continued the trend of having long strings of material running to more buildings further out. Just looking at the monolith made Aires long for his own tower, smooth and simple. Or at least smoother and simpler than this. For the moment, he suffered through and tried to pay everything around him the minimum necessary amount of attention as he walked. Every step closer to the central tower was a step closer to figuring out what the hell was going on.