Right of Conquest

**A/N: Merry Christmas!- - - - - -

**

Right of Conquest: The idea that by conquering an entity, you are entitled to claim something from them.

Most notably used in times of war, relating to countries claiming land from their enemies after defeating them.

In ancient times, this idea would be used to capture citizens, loot, land, and other such items from your enemies. If you conquered a city, weren’t you entitled to enslave their men and their women? Plunder their treasure stores and all that?

Yeah, not anymore. Right of Conquest fell out of style back after World War II, and hasn’t seen much use since.

This story, however, has nothing to do with countries, or claiming land from enemy states. This story is about a painfully average loser, with a remarkable power that he absolutely does not deserve.

This story is all about me. Yeah that sounds narcissistic. Alright let me introduce myself.

I’m Jackson, and I wasn’t exaggerating earlier. I’m as close to nobody as you can get. Average grades, average personality, average ambitions, and PAINFULLY average looks. For real, if they ever needed a live action Where's Waldo? actor, I’m their dude. I blend into a crowd like I’m wearing fucking camoflage.

Just imagine a guy. Any guy. I probably look something like him. Medium height, short hair, no discernible features whatsoever.

Now why was I talking about all that philosophical crap earlier? It goes back to what I said about having a power I didn’t deserve.

I HAD the Right of Conquest.

…

Once again, I realize that sounds super weird. Let me elaborate. Ever since I was a kid, something was off about me. Whenever I won at Mario Kart, or beat someone in Rock, Paper, Scissors, I was always allowed to take something from them. Anything I wanted, no matter how ridiculous, was mine. As long as I could beat them of course.

‘What? That’s so unfair!’ I hear you whine, in your prepubescent voice. And yeah, you’re probably right. It’s super overpowered, and I definitely don’t deserve it.

There's only one thing holding me back, from completely abusing my power.

I suck.

At everything.

Rock, Paper, Scissors? I’d always pick wrong. Mario Kart? I’d get shitstomped. Chess? Forget about it, I couldn’t plan ahead to save my life.

Yeah, I wasn’t very good at the whole, WINNING aspect of my powers. The only times I would ever get a victory were against toddlers, and parents going easy on me when I was a kid.

And as I grew older, I lost access to both of those groups. No parent was going to go easy on an 18 year old, and no toddler would want to play with me. That left me with only my peers to challenge.

As for how that went…

“Checkmate, Jackson!” The raven haired girl said, smirking in triumph. “That makes five in a row, why don’t you quit while you're ahead? Well, not quite ahead, but quit before you sink any lower I suppose.”

The girl in front of me was Stacy Cao, a pretty asian girl who was in my second period math class. She wasn’t kidding either, that really was the fifth checkmate in a row. We’d been playing for 2 hours now. Why was I still fighting, despite knowing I couldn’t beat her? Well…

“One more match Stacy. Then I’ll leave you alone, I swear.” I said, grinning sheepishly. She sighed loudly, resting her hands under her sweater, and inadvertently pushing up her massive boobs.

Yeah, that was why.

“Fine, but then I’m out of here. And this is the last time we do this, deal? This is the third day in a row where you’ve me to play with you.” She said, sneering at me. “And as much as I love putting you in your place, I have things to do.”

Thus, the game commenced. After 15 minutes, it was obvious I was going to lose again. Half my important pieces were gone, and she had only lost a few pawns and a rook. This would mark 6 straight. Before my doom could be sealed, however, her phone rang.

“Tch. I’ll be right back. It’s my boyfriend, I gotta take this.”

And with that, I was alone in the room. For five minutes, I waited patiently.

Then ten minutes.

Then fifteen.

At the twenty minute mark, I was bored out of my mind. I had forgotten to charge my phone this morning, so the battery was dead, and the only books I had around me were math textbooks. There was nothing to do.

After another half a minute of being bored out of my mind, my mind wandered to the chess board. Maybe I could spend my time waiting by planning a strategy? Sure, I was getting my ass kicked, but I still had a few pieces left…

Nope. I was fucked. Funnily enough though, looking at the pieces on the board, I could see how close I was to winning.

If my queen and her queen were swapped, I could checkmate her with a single move.

Wait a minute, was it possible? I sat at the desk, staring a hole into the board. Was it worth risking? Would it even work? She had been gone for an awful long time, nearly 25 minutes now. Would she even remember the piece placement?

“If I just…” I muttered to myself, carefully switching our Queens. For a moment, I held my breath.

---

Stacy sat rigidly in her seat, staring at the board in shock.

“That’s not… you can’t…” She stuttered, trying and failing to get a full sentence out.

“Well, I guess even I get lucky once in a while. It might be a fluke, but I’ll take it.” I said, casting a life raft in her storm of emotions.

“Yes! A fluke! Obviously.” Stacy said, immediately latching on to the idea. “Even a loser like you has to get lucky at some point. This doesn’t mean anything in terms of skill.” The haughty tone had returned to her voice, as she plastered a fake smirk on her face.

Now was the moment of truth.

“Even if it was a fluke though, I still won didn’t I?” I start, nearly hyperventilating. “Isn’t it my right to claim a prize from you?”

Stacy squints at me, then sighs in resignation.

“Yeah, since you won, it’s you right. You can take whatever you want from me.”

It worked.

IT WORKED!

This changed everything! Now that I knew I could cheat, It opened so many avenues I couldn’t use before! I could get clients for video games, rig coinflips, get a deck stacked in my favor for every contest!

“Uh… dork? You’re drooling. Hurry up and choose a prize, I’m getting bored waiting.” Stacy said, crossing her arms and once more inadvertently pushing her bust up.

Wait, what? Oh crap I hadn’t actually thought about the best thing to ask for. Should I ask for her loyalty and see if that makes her my ? Or say her virginity and fuck her? Or maybe I should claim the right to her body and-

“Hurry up dumbass!” She snapped loudly at me.

“Oh shit, I want your, uh, wallet?” I stammered, uncertainly.

Wait, what?

“Fine, done. Better use those cards before I cancel them.” She tossed her pink leather wallet on the desk. “Fucking loser.” She muttered as she walked away.

…

…

I’m a dumbass.

FUCK! I mentally shouted, and slammed my head on the desk.

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A/N: Sooooo, I honestly was never happy with this first chapter. I wanted to do this story for a while, but I’m not joking when I say I rewrote this 4 times. I still haven’t gotten it how I want it, but I’m afraid if I take any more time I’ll never upload it at all, so: Merry Christmas! Hope you guys like what I wrote, even If I don’t. If people enjoy this enough maybe I’ll write some more, but I’m not really feeling this as much as some other ideas I have right now.