Ambiguity 8 (2/2)

Several minutes of staring later, she had been convinced that he hadn’t awoken, but merely turned over in his sleep. Drea left her hiding spot and silently skittered over to get a close look at his face, as she felt somehow drawn to it. She loomed over him and nearly squealed in response to just how ridiculously handsome he actually was. It wasn’t just about the perfectly sculpted facial features. It also wasn’t the silky black hair and well-groomed goatee. Neither was it about the roguish smile that naturally formed even when he was asleep.

It was all of that and more, as he practically exuded charm, ruggedness and elegance all at once just by lying there… breathing. His presence alone was so enthralling, that he could probably sweep any woman, and perhaps even a man or two, off their feet just by saying ‘Hello.’ Drea, who was also technically a female, had also been captivated by this man. Without even realizing it, she had already climbed onto his bed and was looking down at him while on her knees and hands. She lowered her body and her head, allowing their face to draw closer together in one long, smooth motion. A few agonizing moments later, they were so close that she could feel his hot breath on her skin. She kept shortening the nearly non-existent distance between them even further as she unknowingly, unwittingly and unerringly placed her lips on his.

Her mandibles then dug into the sides of his face and dug deep into his immaculate flesh. The human woke up and tried to scream, but his lungs had already been pierced by a quartet of scythe-like blades. What pathetic voice he managed to get out was stifled as it went down the demon’s throat, along with his entire lower jaw. He struggled in vain for a while longer, until Drea put him out of his misery by stabbing him through the heart.

The Stalker lifted her head and sat back atop the corpse as she savored the taste of this irresistible meal she had found for herself. After licking her bloodstained lips and letting out a few tiny moans of satisfaction, she unhinged her lower jaw and took a huge bite out of his right shoulder, which she chewed slowly with full cheeks and a smile on her face.

“Claws!” shouted Boxxy, directly into her head. “What did you just do?!”

“Oh hey, Master!” she replied in a jovial tone. “Just ate some guy. No big.”

“Guy?! What guy?!”

“Dunno. He was sleeping here and he looked so incredibly cute that I could help but eat ~♪. Him ~♪. Up ~♪!”

“Wait, you just killed someone who was sleeping?”

“Yup!”

“Inside one of the big tents in the camp?”

“Yup!”

“And he was good looking, with short black hair and beard?”

“Yup!”

“I see… So that’s why I got 5 Levels out of nowhere…”

“... Huh?”

“Nevermind that, what’s the condition of his body?”

“Reporting that it is extremely delicious!”

“That’s not what I meant, idiot!” it roared angrily. “I need to know if he’s still in one piece or not!”

“Ack!”

The demon snapped out of her gluttonous trance and audibly swallowed her mouthful, even though it wouldn’t impede her telepathic conversation.

“Uhm, w-well, the, uh, half the face is gone. So is his right arm. And shoulder. And liver. Also a third - no, make that half of his left leg. Oh wow, I didn’t even realize I had taken so many bites out of him already!”

“... Is the heart still there?”

“S-sort of?”

“What do you mean sort of?!”

“W-well, h-half of it is still in his chest.”

“And the other half?”

“I… may have eaten it.”

In the next moment, Drea could’ve sworn she heard unmistakable sound of an open palm colliding with a face at high velocity resound within her skull.

“Well, it’s not a big a deal anyway,” said the Mimic with a disappointed tone. “His corpse wasn’t going to be of much use anyway. Yeah, on second thought, absorbing it could backfire anyway.”

Oddly enough, those words seemed to be directed at itself rather than Drea.

“... Claws?”

“Yes, Master?”

“You’re still eating the body, aren’t you?”

“Y-yeah…”

Technically speaking, although ‘stop eating the guy’ was heavily implied in Boxxy’s words, it was not directly stated. And since it wasn’t, the gluttonous Stalker saw no reason to stop sampling the delicacy in front of her eyes.

“... Did you eat the other half of the heart, yet?” asked Boxxy expectantly.

“Of course not, Master. I was saving it for you since it’s your favorite part!”

She also made sure to slobber all over it in order to try out this ‘indirect kiss’ thing she heard about from Zolmegnara, her demonic sister. Apparently it was kind of a big deal in the Pearly Dunes where her sibling’s contractor lived, and Dreaheath had to admit the concept definitely sounded exciting.

“Oh, nice! Then you can just eat the rest. Except the head… what’s left of it, at least.”

“Aww… But I wanted to carve the skull into a bowl and slurp out the brain!”

“Too bad. My orders still stand - do not touch, nibble, bite or even lick the head.”

“... I can still eat the neck and spine, though, right?”

“Hmm? Yeah, sure, just make it snappy. The mission’s more or less over so we’ll be leaving after a few minutes.”

“Yes, Master!”

“So boss, about that distraction,” butted in Kora, “is it still a thing that could happen?”

Inquiring about her role in this operation had allowed the fiend to bypass the ‘idle chatter’ ban that Boxxy placed on her earlier.

“No, that won’t be necessary.”

“Not even as a ‘farewell gift’ to the Empire? I’m sure that Bonerwood fellow wouldn’t mind if we thinned out their numbers a bit!”

“Uh, no. There’s no reason to declare our retreat like that, you idiot.”

Even if the shapeshifter’s meddling would be impossible to hide at that stage, it was better that the humans found out about it later rather than sooner. Besides, tough as she was, Arms could not kill more than 3 or 4 of those guys if she was all by herself.

“Oh. No, I suppose not,” said the fiend dejectedly. “I mean, both Bug-face and the Slutmeister got to enjoy themselves during this field trip, so I just thought… y’know… you’d let me smash some skulls just for the heck of it…”

“Reporting that Koralenteprix is being particularly pathetic right now,” butted in Claws.

“You’ll get plenty of that in a few days, so quit your moaning,” declared Boxxy.

“... Yes, boss. Sorry, boss.”

Meanwhile, the succubus that was on her way back to New Whitehall was currently working on solving an age old philosophical conundrum. Namely - ‘If a succubus mocks someone behind their back but nobody is around to hear her, does it make her a bitch?’

Unsurprisingly, the answer she eventually arrived at was a resounding ‘Yes.’