Bloodline (9): The Succubus Queen's Pure Love
A very long time ago, in an age when the power gap between humanity and the demon king's army was even wider than it is today, there lived a most peculiar succubus queen. This succubus queen yearned for pure love. A succubus queen was a hollow creature by nature, much like a female mantis that devours her mate after coupling; she was simply incapable of love. The moment she truly fell for someone and consummated the relationship, she would drain her partner into a lifeless husk. Still, she refused to give up. Desperate to experience genuine love, she reached a single conclusion.
"The answer is pure love by abduction."
"Huh?"
Ren blinked repeatedly, her long lashes trembling. The word had been so utterly unexpected.
"Abduction?"
"No matter how intimate I become with him, if I kidnap a man strong enough not to be drained and marry him, wouldn't that solve everything? And if I can't find such a man, why not raise one myself? Seduce a promising youth, nurture him into a hero, then marry him. That way, I could have my pure love. That was her reasoning."
Ignoring Ren's stunned reaction, the matriarch continued.
"So the one she chose was the hero of that era. As the first hero of common birth, he received no proper support and was left to wander the demon continent on the edge of death. Our ancestor approached that hero, raised him up, and rather than devouring him, she supported him brilliantly so he could slay the demon king and then married him. It was the very picture of noble pure love through abduction. She is the founder of our family."
"Abduction... you mean?"
"Exactly. Oh, but don't worry—we aren't demons or demonkin. The hero's blood suppresses the succubus queen's bloodline, keeping us balanced as humans."
"No, that's not what I meant. Abduction... in other words, marriage by capture?"
"Correct. It refers to the true form of pure love: stalking the man who catches your eye, imprisoning him, threatening him, training him, gaslighting him, and finally marrying him."
"Wh-what do you even think pure love is? Don't insult it!"
Ren's face flushed crimson as she protested, but the matriarch merely tilted her head in confusion.
"Now I see. In truth, the Sonnet family is not a renowned house of thieves."
"Then what are you?"
"A renowned house of abduction."
"Huh?"
The matriarch snapped her fan open. An elegant ink-wash landscape of mountains unfolded, concealing her mouth.
"The matriarchs of Silver Dew Hall, who inherited the blood of that noble succubus queen who overcame destiny itself to attain pure love, were all women. All of them had silver hair. And every last one of them abducted the man she fell for at first sight and married him."
"Th-the last part sounds wrong, doesn't it?"
"Whether he was a traitor who tried to assassinate the mad emperor, a leper cursed with corruption, or a hero enslaved after losing to a dragon, it didn't matter. They abducted them all. Because they loved them."
"Ah..."
"Performing such high-difficulty abductions naturally required technique. So they developed skills for picking locks, wiretapping, gathering information, poison arts, blackmail, torture, and more. To outsiders, it all looked like thievery, and that's how we somehow became known as a family of thieves."
"Enough! Stop ruining the ancestor stories I listened to with a pounding heart ever since I was little!"
"But what can we do? This is the truth."
At the matriarch's words, Ren pulled herself together and finally found a rebuttal.
"Just a moment! Then what about that? Explain that!"
"What do you mean?"
"You and Father are a show-window couple with a terrible relationship! If you married for love, why is it like that?"
"What are you talking about? There are few couples with a marriage as harmonious as ours."
"I know all about it! How Mother always slips poison into Father's teacup! I thought it was resentment from a political marriage or something..."
At Ren's accusation, her father burst into hearty laughter.
"Haha, so you knew after all. Don't worry, dear. It's been that way since you were five."
"Huh?"
"Your mother, you see. When she was five, she met me by chance at a social gathering, fell for me on the spot, ran over, fed me paralyzing poison, tied me to a chair, and forced me to repeat 'I love you. I'll never cheat on you' for ten straight hours. Ever since then, whenever I so much as spoke to another woman, your mother made sure to poison me."
Sipping his tea, the father continued.
"The reason I became a poison master was simply because I trained like hell to survive your mother. Ah, look—there's poison in this cup too."
He poured the tea into the flowerpot. It must have been a sulfuric type; the geranium planted there melted yellow and died on the spot.
"So, darling, what did I do today to deserve another dose?"
"That geranium had one more female flower than male flowers."
"Oh dear, I've committed a grave offense."
"Do you understand how heartbroken I was?"
"I love you. I'll never cheat."
"It's all right. One rich kiss of reconciliation and I'll forgive you."
And right there in front of their daughter, the two of them shared a deep, shameless kiss. It was a thick, serpentine kiss, tongues twisting all the way to the root.
Ren's face burned scarlet. She covered her eyes with both hands but peeked through her fingers.
"Stop! I get it. Then when I was five, what did you mean when you said I was different from a normal heir?"
"By five, you should have been falling for boys and drawing up kidnapping plans, but you were strangely modest and shy. It seemed abnormal no matter how we looked at it. The pure vein blockage must have been the cause. The clear energy of the blocked veins probably suppressed the succubus queen's blood."
"Then why did you keep telling me to get pregnant quickly? I was sure you meant I should leave an heir before I died... or that you'd arrange a political marriage later..."
"What are you saying? Why would we do that? It was exactly what it sounded like—find someone to love, and quickly."
"Th-then why say 'get pregnant' instead of 'find a partner'?"
"Oh my, aren't they the same thing? When two people love each other, isn't it natural to make love and get pregnant?"
At her mother's breezy reply, Ren clutched her forehead and muttered.
"This is hopeless. We don't share a single sexual ethic..."
"And that is precisely why I allowed you to join the hero's party."
To her daughter, the mother spoke in a voice grown far warmer. She set her fan down carefully. The sharp jawline she always kept hidden and her thin lips, as if brushed with pigment, were revealed. Those lips now wore a faint smile.
"And right now, I am just as happy as I was when I carried you. It seems my daughter has finally found a man worth devoting her life to."
"Mother..."
As matriarch of Silver Dew Hall, her mother had always concealed her expressions behind that fan. Showing a smile like this was the first time since Ren had come of age. Seeing her mother's gentle face for the first time in her life, Ren felt her nose sting.
When she took the hand her mother offered, the older woman spoke again in that same tender voice.
"So if something troubles you, don't lock yourself in your room. Ask your mother. After all, I've walked this path before you."
"Yes, I understand."
"Stalking techniques, torture methods, ways to drive off stray cats, reverse-rape tactics, poisoning skills, how to sabotage contraceptives—everything is recorded in the family secret texts. Just say the word and I'll teach you..."
"I don't need any of that!"
Ren snatched her hand back, face blazing, and shouted.
"I want to love normally, without any of those things... and build a normal family..."
"Normal people don't shut themselves in their room for an entire month just to masturbate."
"Uuuu..."
"Nor do they charge into a man's room wearing nothing but underwear to repay a favor, or secretly masturbate while camping with their party and lose their virginity that way."
"Pl-please stop talking about that..."
The matriarch folded her fan and pointed it at Ren, who looked ready to burst into tears from sheer embarrassment.
"Accept it. The same blood of mad love that runs in me flows through your veins as well."
She opened the fan again to cover her mouth and declared.
"Sooner or later, you too will discover yourself straddling a wooden horse, clutching a red candle."
At that horrifying prophecy, Ren shuddered violently. Then she clenched her fists and cried out.
"No! I—we won't end up like you and Father! We'll have pure, sincere, heartrending love! We'll have five children and build a normal, wholesome, happy family!"
In the weeks that followed, Ren received the family's secret arts. They were techniques to control the succubus queen's blood and suppress her seething lust. They also served as a cultivation method to convert that same desire into magical power.
By the time the transmission was complete, Ren had grown a full stage stronger than before.
"Young lady, travel safely! And make sure you eat properly!"
On the evening the secret transmission finally ended, a single carriage set off. Soria followed it all the way to the hill outside the village, waving her arms in farewell. Ren leaned out the carriage window, smiling brightly as she waved back.
The carriage had a clear destination: the city of beginners where the heroines of the former hero party were gathering. The place Jain had, for some reason, chosen as his base. Rotern.
Yggdrasil. The tree that served as the origin of all elves, the name of the world tree itself, and the name of the city in which they lived. In a small room tucked away in one corner of that city, a green-haired elf was currently sprawled out like a starfish. She was Naelle, the archer of the hero party. She must have been drinking until just moments ago; a large beer mug was still clutched in her hand. While lying down she had been gulping it down, spilling nearly half of it onto the floor, when she suddenly dropped the mug and began to shiver violently.
A thought too terrifying to even contemplate had seized her mind.
Staring blankly at the wooden propeller spinning on the ceiling, she muttered in a daze.
"Is it me?"