Time for a bath for their new stray.

"Are you fucking kidding me? Are you made out of money? There are fucking gold pillars in the walls! How the fuck is there a kingdom like that in the New York area without anyone having a clue about it?" screamed Stella as she looked around. "This can't be! No one is that stealthy..."

"It's rather simple. One, those pillars are not made out of gold, they just looks like they are. It gives the place a classy atmosphere without costing me billions. Two, we are not in the New York area. I just happen to have a way to get to my kingdom from wherever I happen to be, with some exceptions like from certain barriers. Which is why we had to leave the mall to get home. Hmm, what are you doing?" he stopped in his explanation. She was removing her pants, shredding them with the pincer on her tail, and a quick check through Theft showed him that the oversized grey hoodie was the only item that she had on her.

"These itch like crazy. They were my bug out clothes. The cheapest stuff that I could afford, that I’ve never worn or touched before and that I stored outside of the shop. They are mundane stuff that I bought second hand. I'm not going to wear these pants one second longer than absolutely necessary. I hope this isn't a problem, because I have nothing else to wear," she told him.

"Well, in fact this isn't an issue. You'll quickly notice that in this kingdom, the rule is to wear or not wear whatever makes you feel comfortable. Most people are often naked or close to it, unless they are doing something that requires more clothes or we are receiving guests from the outside that would be less accepting of such customs," he told her.

"Pff, if it's what you're into. But there isn't much to see," she puffed as she ripped her hoodie in half and stood naked in front of him and the others.

John already knew about her cybernetic limbs, and the clothes she wore at the store did little to hide their connection at the knee or elbow. But he now could see how the cybernetic tail was attached to her. Small plates of the same orange metal covering a black articulated metallic device were attached to the whole length of her spine, from her head to the small of her back. A larger port resting just above her butt was where her long, rubbery black tail with its three pronged orange pincer was plugged in. John **** himself not to wince and to keep his face neutral. For her limbs, a few centimeters of a black coat made out of soft tissue extended beyond the metal on the flesh to cover the connection. All along the length of her spinal augment, her flesh had been left burnt and scarred, the traces of heavy surgical intervention left visible, as if whoever performed it had suddenly stopped to care and left it there. The more John looked at it, the more it seemed like it wasn't something that had been grafted onto her spine but had literally replaced it.

"Stella, I'm sorry for whatever happened to you. But know that no one here will judge you for your appearance. I would be wary of using my own powers on you, only because I don't know exactly how your augments works and I wouldn't want to mess with their interface. But we have two good healers here and a bath with curative properties, so I think we should probably be able to heal these scars…" he explained.

"Yeah, so just for me to end up with another debt that I can't repay. I know how much healing magic can cost. And until you put me to work, I won't have a cent to my name…" replied Stella in a scornful tone.

"Let me stop you there," interrupted Anna. "Vesta dear, could you please try to find something that she could wear? We are not a capitalist kingdom. We are few enough, and a good part of our members come from places that do not use currency, that paying for stuff hasn't been an issue so far…"

"What… You're fucking slavers? Ohh fuck, I should have thought more about this…" she said recoiling in horror as Vesta came toward her to give her a t-shirt and a pair of shorts belonging to John. It had become an unspoken custom for the girls to often wear his clothes whenever he wasn't around and they needed some.

"I think you misunderstood me. No one here is a ****. Most people chose to come here or were rescued in some way. What I meant was that we work more like a family than a nation so far. You won't pay rent, won't have to pay for food, we'll lend you some clothes and toiletries. No one is **** to work, but we all contribute what we can to help build this place. It's the nature of this world. When John got it, this was just an empty grassy plain with a single stone room. It took everyone's work and help to make it what it is. So, while we might not afford to pay you a full wage for the work you will do here, healing will be free and you won't get into debt," Anna corrected her.

"So… you're some sort of anarchist commune?" she asked, making it sound like one of the most vile swear words.

"Far from it, we are a monarchy. I'm king, Anna here is my queen, this is my kingdom and I own its content. I protect and provide for my subjects as they are all friends, family, loved ones. In exchange it is expected that they contribute some of their time and effort to help me improve the place. With it getting bigger and bigger and activity rising, I might have to start doing something with local currency for exchanges, but there hasn't been a need for it so far. I'm not… independently wealthy; the only purely capitalist endeavor that you will notice around here is the production of goods for sale outside of the kingdom. The proceeds are used to improve the kingdom or give me the means to get stronger like the armor that I just bought," John said as he watched how Stella put on the t-shirt and after some thought put the shorts on backwards to get her mechanical tail through the fly.

"Will I have my own place?" she asked.

"We only have one spare bedroom so far, so you'll use it for now. I'll start building a few more rooms or small houses soon. Ohh, Daphne, do you have any news for me?" he said as the slime girl entered the room and approached him.

She took his left hand and put it on her head. It wasn't absolutely necessary but it made John mindlessly run his fingers in her hair (well the mass on her head that mimicked hair anyway). John's mind was filled with warmth and love, followed by images of Cali, standing vigil next to Sylvia's tree and patrolling the kingdom on the quad.

"Nothing changed. I have to check a few things. How soon can we start the treatment for Algernon?" he asked Tricia.

"I need a couple of hours to install these parts and properly calibrate them. I'll call you when it's ready," she replied, going upstairs to the lab with Anna who had the parts in her inventory.

John had pinged Cali on the messaging system of the rings, and she was on her way to the castle. He asked Stella to wait for a moment and went to retrieve the new ring that was unlocked now that his kingdom had reached 10 members.

He came back to an absolutely stunned Stella, standing outside, looking at the kingdom with an expression of utter disbelief on her face. He could see the quad approaching the castle. He had ditched his suit for a simple t-shirt and shorts ensemble.

"What the fuck is this place? Flying rocks and… Those!!!" she screamed pointing two fingers in the general direction of his Arcane Sanctum and the Glade. She gave no indication to be a mage herself, but it seemed like her artificial eye was giving her a way to at least detect magic or energy.

"You'll see when we get closer," he explained.

After a short exchange with Cali and awkward introductions from Stella who wasn't understanding what was happening there and surely didn't expect to be hugged by a caramel skinned elf, John straddled the quad and invited Stella to climb on it behind him. As much as he loved this mode of transportation which **** beautiful women to cling to him, it was becoming bothersome to not be able to move around more than two people at a time.

If Stella had been shocked from John having a few flakes of Hyperium crystal at the shop, she nearly fainted when she saw the baseball sized sphere levitating in the Sanctum.

In the Glade he took a second to go touch Sylvia's tree, longing to see her again.

"Are your augments waterproof?" he asked Stella.

"Yes, why? You realize that I can't swim and would sink like a stone with my augments on…" she told him as she saw him walk towards the fountain.

"This is not just lighting, this is an Orb of Life. The waters of this fountain should be able to cure your scars. You don't have to worry about it, the water is not deep enough that you have to swim and there are steps that you can sit on under the water," he pointed. "Besides that, I'll be here to hold you, to make sure nothing happens to you."

She seemed to begrudgingly accept this notion and followed him to the edge of the fountain, where she looked at him weirdly when he removed his clothes.

"What do you think you're doing?" she asked.

"Well, it's either doing that or driving back with wet clothes, so…" he told her.

"Does your queen knows what you are doing?"

"Well, if it were what you think it is, she would have ways to check, but I told you, it's not. I just… Wait til you get into it. You'll never want anything on your skin while in the fountain."

With the same lack of care she had shown on her arrival in the castle, she removed her clothes, staring at John with a look that clearly meant to ask if he was happy now. He offered her his hand and stepped inside of the basin.

Stella first felt nothing. Only the sensors on her feet and legs told her that she was touching a liquid and its temperature (not hot enough to seem comfortable). Then, as he guided her down the next few steps, her thighs came in contact with the water. The shock of the cold was quickly replaced by a warmth that shouldn't exist if her augments were correct. John was already deeper, getting water up to half of his torso. He showed her by moving his feet further that that was as deep as it went.

After her thighs came her pussy, not literally; contrary to his lightning powers, the magic of the water didn't affect her in this way. It was just soothing, making her feel good in a way that she couldn't remember ever feeling. Inconvenience or rather even dull pain that she had felt for years and stopped noticing was so obvious now as it started to fade away.

She advanced faster into the water, getting her elbows in, and the itch she had begun to forget only became noticeable by its slow disappearance. She soon had followed John to the deepest part of the water and the same feeling was coursing along her spine. John guided her to the center of it, just under the floating orb, and made her bow forward. The drops of water falling from the golden orb where now hitting her back directly, flowing along her spine. Stella couldn't handle how she was feeling and started crying. She had felt so bad for so long that having at least part of it lifted from her was impossible to imagine.

After a bit of this treatment, John helped her to sit down on a step where only her head would be above the water and sat next to her. He then made her lay back, holding her so the bit of her spinal implant connected to the back of her skull was underwater but the rest of her head was above the surface.

There, she laid. Naked, held by her savior, receiving free healing for something she thought would last all her life and feeling so relaxed that she couldn't understand how it was possible to feel so good.

"Fuck, you're a smooth, attentive motherfucker. I understand why they all like you. And I'm sure this helps too," she said with a drawl, pointing at his cock under the water before dozing off, years of pent up stress, sorrow and pain washing away in the soothing fountain.