Scarlet Date 3, Part 2: Meet the Parents

Scarlet

“Hey, Mom and Dad, here’s my 3 girlfriends. By the way, I’m now a...” Harper muffles the rest. Scarlet glares at her. She looks at me with such sympathy I can’t be mad for long.

“Shaemus, invite them in.” Mom, sitting in an easy chair, looks infuriated, but less so than Scarlet would expect. Dad, standing by the doorway, looks more shocked than anything.

“Um, okay, Pumpkin, come in. Nice to meet you, Scarlet’s smoochie friends.”

“Daaaad!” Dad smiles at that, and directs everyone to come in. At first glance, the room looks like a nice suite you’d find in a hotel. A small living room with an attached kitchenette. A functional bathroom. A serviceable bedroom with a bed big enough for the two of them. Then, you notice the hot tub, the bondage cross, and the wide selection of complimentary sex toys. Okay, Mom is taking this like a champ. There is no way she’d tolerate all of this without being at least a little angry.

“Don’t worry, Pumpkin, the monks made lunch. Is that the right term for them? They are way hotter than the monks those mackerel snappers have.” Scarlet rolls her eyes at that. Does he know?

Lunch is simple. Grilled chicken-looking meat. Fresh salad, dressed lightly. A whole blackberry pie (Mom’s favorite) for the group. They sit down. Harper starts to sing a brief prayer of thanks for the food. Scarlet rarely notices that Harper does that, never quite recognizing when she started, but it certainly catches Mom’s attention.

“I hear the ladies here sing that. Don’t tell me your a part of this weird sex cult?”

It’s hard to tell whether Harper is simply deferring to the oread when dealing with her mother or is blatantly ignoring her, but she doesn’t respond. Dad does instead, “Sinead, this ‘weird sex cult’ is giving us free room and board while our daughter is trapped on the show. The least you can do is be polite. And, hey, any religion that encourages women to walk around like that is okay in my book. Cheers?”

Scarlet tries her best to keep everyone on light topics while they eat. Harper stays quiet. It’s almost as if she is trying to figure out Dad. Luckily, Tina can talk for the entire table. She had a lot of fun playing college student yesterday, huh?

Soon enough, the food is gone. Dad stands up and goes, “A lovely lunch. Pumpkin, give my thanks to the chefs when you can. Whichever one of you is my Scarlet’s mistress, can we talk on the patio? I have questions. Sinead, play nice with the other two.”

With that, Dad and Harper both stand up and walk out the door to the balcony outside. Scarlet wants to join them, but a rap on the door causes her to answer it instead. She finds the High Matron on the other side. “Acolyte, this way please.”

The look Mom gives makes her think that she didn’t know. She follows the drow woman. The woman walks and talks, “We assisted your parents in mailing that letter because the Goddess revealed that She was sending you to us. While I do not approve of doing this so soon, especially given how little love you have for Her in your heart, the Goddess wills that you are to be tested to be given the title of Matron. The test consists of three trials: a Trial of Mind, a Trial of Body, and a Trial of Soul. The trials are never exactly the same, not that you have had time or inclination to study them. The specific tasks are laid out by the Goddess, but the general themes are always the same. The Trial of Mind tests your ability to think, to guide Her people to wisdom. Pillow talk is important to our Order. The Trial of Body tests your ability to serve, to please Her supplicants. While I understand you do not wish to offer your sex to those seeking the Goddess’s blessing, you are still expected to do something. Finally, the Trial of Soul tests your ability to sacrifice, to protect Her people from evil. I doubt you will succeed, but I must let you try. Your details are here. You may attempt the Trials in whatever order you wish. We have supplies ready for you and your companions for your Trial of Soul. Due to time dilation differences, you have 48 hours from when you arrived to complete all of these tasks. When you decide to quit, let me know.”

With that, Scarlet is handed a piece of parchment and the drow leaves. She unfurls it to read:

Trial of Mind:

• Pay off your loan, you dummy!
• Help mend the strained relationship between Josie and Tina

Trial of Body:

• Perform a striptease for the public, including your parents.
• Provide a sexual massage on Harper for the public, including your parents.

Trial of Soul:

• Discover what is causing the nearby volcano to become dangerously active.
• Prevent the volcano from erupting, killing all that live in the monastery.

Complete all of the above before your date is over.

Wow. That puts my quest into a different perspective. I’m not just doing this for myself. I’m doing it for everyone here, including my parents. Who have to watch me strip and then fuck Harper. Scarlet sighs. Thinking back to the text she burnt, she recalls her quest: Scarlet’s Monastery Date Quest: Become a Matron for your Order. Reward: a bonus transformation and a magic item.

Well, I put this first bit off long enough. Scarlet pulls out her phone and pays off her loan. Two notifications pop up. Transformation Evolved. Package delivered to dorm room. What? She checks her transformation list. The Magic of Student Loans is gone, replaced by something unexpected:

The Magic of Career Change – You know what’s frustrating about graduating? Oftentimes, you never use what you learned in your degree ever again. Scarlet can now recall any non-sexual fact or technique she has learned throughout her college career (and does get her Master’s in Psychology like she has been pursuing), but it doesn’t matter. Instead, as a monk in the Order of the Silvery Moth, she will only be able to treat any mental illness with a prescription of sexual acts for the patient to perform. The more intense and frequent the prescribed act, the better treated the patient will be when following the dosage. She can even cure incurable mental illnesses if she prescribes something **** enough (Monk).

Fuck. That’s super messed up. And hot.

Mattie

“Hey, Dinah, you wanna stop being a bookworm and join us for some Leylines action?” Mattie shouts across the library, blatantly ignoring all library etiquette. Dinah flips her off, then goes back to reading. Well, alright then.

Skye is still in her funk, but Aelene and Daphne are paying attention, the high elf more curious and the mermaid more excited. Luckily, Harper let her borrow some stuff and she had something close to the perfect teaching tool. Mattie pulls out the 4 pre-cons from that one dumb attempt Warlocks Made of Toast made to build successful Leylines based board games. “So, we got Mermaids, Vampires, Pirates, or Dinosaurs. What tickles your fancy.”

“Mermaids!” Daphne shouts, then adds, “Those look smaller than the deck, is that the right word, Harper was playing with last night.”

“Vampires and Pirates are bad guys. What are dinosaurs?”

Oof, that is a whole ‘nuther discussion. “Big ground lizards.”

Aelene shrugs. Mattie hands Aelene the dino deck and Daphne the mermaid deck.

“Okay, to address Daph’s question. There are different formats with different deck construction rules. Last night, you watched Harper and Tina play Dragon Deity Highlander. It’s a format judges invented to have something less competitive to play after events. To be honest, Harper mostly plays that format ‘cause it’s popular. She really likes draft, which is a limited format that isn’t super popular. Neither of them are great to teach newbies, ‘cause both require way more game knowledge than a newbie has. These decks were built as a newbie friendly thing. Warlocks made this weird set where Luskan pirates and a flock of vampires were attacking Chult, which is this land full of dinosaurs. A bunch of mermaids were added as the ‘good guys’ of the set to fill things out. As a supplement, they made this ‘make your own board’ board game thing, and these are the decks they made for it. They are simple, slow, and durdly, which makes them great to learn with but boring to play with for too long. We’ll play a few games so you can get the basics down. Sound good?”

“Yeah!” Daphne is excited.

“Okay, if my betrothed likes this, I should at least see what the fuss is all about.” Aelene is less excited. Still, this will be a good time and maybe, just maybe, they’ll like me better after this.

Harper

“I don’t know what to do. Last time I had this talk, I at least had a shotgun I could clean. Here? No idea how this works.”

Scarlet’s dad stares out to the horizon, watching the waves. Harper wishes she could be swimming in it right now. A real ocean, right in front of her. Home, in the biological sense of the term. She leans back in her chair instead.

“You know, I could teach you how to sharpen a sword?”

The old man laughs, “And how is that supposed to intimidate you?”

“It wouldn’t, but it’ll give you the illusion that maybe you could.”

The old man laughs again. A glimmer of mischief is in his eyes. “I’m pretty sure you or that wolfy girl could snap me in two. Now, the bunny I could take.”

Harper chuckles, “You’d have to catch her first.”

“Still, I don’t know what to do here.”

Unlike last date, this time Harper filled up her inventory with anything she thought she could possibly need (and then some). She summons a bottle of 12-year old scotch and 2 whiskey glasses. “Would a drink help?”

Scarlet’s dad lets out a long, low whistle. “Damn, girl, I knew I liked you. Pour ‘em.”

A couple of neat scotches poured and doled out later, and Scarlet’s dad seems more at ease. Both take a sip. “It’s like drinking a year’s salary. I suppose I shouldn’t let all that go to waste. Question time. From what we figured from finding out this show is like prime-time entertainment here, none of you are exactly volunteers. That right?”

Harper nods. “Yup. All kidnapped.”

“From what we figured, all of the contestants are connected to the Master / Mistress in some way. Now, I’d think I’d remember Scarlet having a blue-skinned, green-haired friend. How’d you know my little pumpkin?”

Harper sighs. How to approach this. “Honestly, this season is atypical in several ways. Of my original 6, I really only had a decent connection with Josie in there. I taught Heidi A&P the summer before she was Scarlet’s roommate. Apparently, she bad-mouthed me so much that Scarlet changed her major?”

“Frack-face Francis?”

“Apparently.”

Scarlet’s dad’s brain breaks for a bit. “But... um... how... wasn’t... he a he?”

“Like I said, this season is atypical. The whole premise was to see if letting the contestants transform the Master would make them buy into the whole harem thing better. My transformation list is a nightmare compared to theirs.”

The man suddenly looms over the sea elf, pointing a finger at Harper’s forehead. “Let me see.”

“I can pull out my phone...”

“Oh, sorry, we got a transformation thing to help us fit in here. That’s why I didn’t freak out at the whole inventory thing you pulled. We also got a couple of ways of seeing people’s stats? I assume I’ll need permission, seeing that I’m a civvie here and you are definitely not.”

That explains some things about Aelene. Huh. Might as well. “Go ahead. Do what you gotta do.”

The man presses his finger into Harper’s glabella. His eyes glaze over for a minute. Two. Three. When we comes to, he is ashen. “Level 12? You’re Level 12? They say that’s impossible. That High Matron chick with the nice ass is Level 4 and they make it sound like that’s a lifetime accomplishment. How?”

“Different leveling system. Scarlet and Josie are Level 12, too. Tina’s only Level 11, but she’ll catch up sooner or later.”

“My little Pumpkin is Level 12? What class?”

“Monk.”

The old man laughs again, “So that’s why she was called. Here to teach the weaklings what’s what? Karate them into shape?”

Harper laughs too. She likes this guy. If Dad was still alive, would he be like this? “Probably not. Probably here to save the world.”

He stops laughing, “You ain’t serious there, right?”

Harper just gives him a slight nod and takes another sip of scotch. He shakily downs half his pour in one go.

“Alright, girlie, two more questions. First, Scarlet tell you about Alex yet?”

“Bits and pieces. I know she’s important to Scarlet. I know I shouldn’t pry. She’ll tell me everything when she’s ready.”

“Thank you for waiting. Alex is a bit of a sore point for her. For me, too. Scarlet’s tale to tell. Final question.” The man pauses to rise up to his full height. He stares intently at the sea elf. “What, dear lady, are you intentions with my daughter?”

“Same as with everyone else in the harem with me. Love them as best as I can. Take care of them as best as I can, which should hopefully be pretty well, given that I’m royalty here now. Marry them when we are both ready. As far as Scarlet is concerned, I do love her. She says she loves me and I have no reason to disbelieve her. We haven’t set a date or anything, but I’m sure we’ll get hitched. Probably not with a ceremony you’ve seen before, but it’ll happen.” She takes another sip to watch the man think.

He slowly starts to smile. “Presumptuous, don’t ‘cha think?”

“Well, dear sir, do I just need to ask for permission or would you like to haggle over a dowry instead?”

The man takes the bottle and pockets it in his dimensional inventory space. “Dowry paid. Congrats. When you two are ready, my little pumpkin is yours.”

Daphne

“Hey, how is that giant dino fair?”

“Hey, you got a spell that gave you an extra turn. My big dinosaur dealing 3 to your mermaid lord and 3 to your face is totally fair.”

“Stop complaining. The decks are balanced. You two having fun?”

Aelene nods. Daphne does too.

“Good. Keep going. We need to break the tie, don’t we?”

Dinah

Who cares if they are over there having fun? I got work to do.

A loose plan is coming together, based on her reading so far. The wish loopholes are a bust, because that requires manipulating the Master to the point where you have the top spot in the harem. Harper’s too smart, too paranoid, too in love with most of the harem at this point to fall for things like that at this point. While Dinah is sure that, if she started with a plan like that at the beginning, she could have pulled it off, it’s a moot point. Then again, would she be willing to sell her soul to do so? To become a monster like that Sharron character? Dinah isn’t sure.

Now, the Host Punishment escapees? They have some ideas that Dinah could execute. It’s actually convenient that they are required to go off-site this week, as the off-site dates seem to be a lot less secure than the ones inside the Hotel. She just needs to find the right date location, sneak away from Harper’s prying eyes, bust through the minimal magical security there, and hide from detection until the season is over. Simple to say, may be difficult to execute. Her big advantage is that, if she’s smart about it, they will never expect her to be capable of escape. That will give her time to find a place to hide. It’s still her only chance to get out of this even remotely resembling herself.

Didn’t those DoD books mention something about spell scrolls being one-shot spells for non-casters? Dinah switches over to the pdf of those books. Time to find a solution.