The Village's Shadow - 1
I headed to the ranch to procure ingredients, and there I met a sturdy middle-aged man gripping a goat's horns with his thick forearms.
"Who are you?"
"A pleasure to meet you. I'm Ian, a hunter who recently settled in Entiel Village."
"Ah, so you're the fellow everyone's talking about — Adelia's son-in-law. Good to meet you. I'm Walter, the rancher of this village."
Walter extended his hand for a handshake. His palm was slick with goat drool, which gave me a moment's pause, but I took it anyway.
Walter is the only decent man in Entiel Village. Filthy or not, I'll put up with it.
One look at this place was enough to tell you the truth: every last man in the village was trash who wanted nothing more than to screw other men's women.
Most of the male characters in H-games are bastards who lose their minds trying to fuck the heroines, after all.
Walter, by contrast, was a devoted husband who treated every other woman like a block of wood for the sake of remaining faithful to his late wife. Granted, he seemed to work off his lust through bestiality with his goats — but compared to the rest of the scum around here, that still put him ahead.
"Thanks to you, we won't have to worry about meat."
"My skills are still lacking, but I'll do my best as a member of this village."
"That's reassuring. If you ever need anything from the ranch, just say the word."
"In that case, could I trouble you for some milk and eggs?"
"Milk? Hold on a moment. I'll bring you some fresh from today's milking. Marin! Lily!"
Walter called out to his two daughters, who were feeding the goats. They were bright, freckled beauties of the kind you only found in the countryside. They couldn't hold a candle to Isolde, the village's top beauty — but they possessed something Isolde never had.
Damn. Those tits are huge.
Breasts big enough to put a dairy cow to shame made it easy to understand why Walter had become such a devoted husband. With those, no baby would ever go hungry.
"Marin, go fetch today's milk. Lily, grab some eggs from the chicken coop."
"Yes."
"Daddy, who's that man?"
The eldest, Marin, immediately set off on Walter's errand. Young Lily, however, still eyed me with open curiosity.
"He's a hunter who just settled in the village."
"A hunter? But the rumors said he was ugly."
"Don't talk nonsense. If you want meat, go get those eggs."
"Meat? Okay!"
At the word meat, Lily bolted for the chicken coop. Walter watched her go with a fond look, then naturally picked the conversation back up.
"If you don't mind, may I ask an impertinent question?"
"Please, go ahead."
"As I understand it, the village chief originally introduced Isolde to you. But you married Isabel instead. Was there a particular reason you chose her?"
"Would you believe me if I said I fell for her at first sight?"
"That's a bit hard to swallow. Isabel is little more than a burden who can barely take care of herself. And it's not as though she's a beauty like her older sister."
"So you believe I must have had some other reason for marrying Miss Isabel."
"If I've offended you, I apologize. But try to see it from my position as well."
Walter's question came from the typical exclusivity of rural folk.
From Walter's perspective, I must look suspicious.
A skilled hunter turning down Isolde — the village's greatest beauty — to choose Isabel, who could barely function because of Rose's Punishment. To any third party, it would look like I had some ulterior motive. And Walter's suspicions weren't entirely wrong. I had married Isabel because of the Giant Weed, after all. But it wasn't solely for the Giant Weed that I'd married her.
"I understand your position, Mr. Walter. You must suspect I'm a bandit spy."
"There have been no shortage of grim rumors lately."
Outsiders settling into a village only to turn bandit and plunder it was a common occurrence in this world. In fact, when you played The Affairs of a Rural Village, Entiel Village itself got attacked by bandits because of a traitorous outsider. There was a reason country folk were so closed off.
"You may not believe me, but I truly did fall for Miss Isabel at first sight."
"What about her, exactly?"
"Her voice."
"Her voice?"
"Yes. Her nightingale-like voice stirs my very soul. Being with her out in the fields felt like walking through a fairy tale. And it wasn't just her voice. I fell for her heart as well. Though her body is frail, Miss Isabel cares for her family more than anyone. Seeing her smile through her pain made me want to do something — anything — for her."
I praised Isabel's charms with every flowery phrase I could muster, like some romance-novel protagonist. It was empty fluff, of course, but that kind of ornate language was the vocabulary of refined nobility. For Walter, who'd lived his whole life in the countryside, it was rather difficult to parse. He simply nodded along.
"Ah, I see. I understand well enough how much you love Isabel. That's enough."
"Thank you. If it wouldn't be too much trouble, could you share my feelings with the other villagers? I haven't yet grown close enough to my neighbors to convey my heart myself."
"Ahem. I'll do what I can."
Having been the one to commit the impropriety first, Walter agreed to my unreasonable request.
"Dad."
Someone stepped between Walter and me. It was the dairy-cow girl who'd brought the milk — or rather, Walter's eldest daughter, Marin.
"Here's the milk from today's milking, like you asked."
"Good work. Marin, I'm sorry, but go check on Lily at the chicken coop. She's taking so long, she's probably getting pecked by the chickens and wrecking the coop like last time."
Walter sent Marin on yet another errand, and she headed straight for the chicken coop without a single word of complaint. Watching her go, I turned back to Walter.
"And this is a secret, but it seems Miss Isolde has a lover."
"A lover?"
"A man named John. Do you know him?"
At my words, Marin's footsteps stopped cold.
. . .
In The Affairs of a Rural Village, Isolde's descent into becoming the village's communal cum-dumpster had partly to do with her adultery — but the decisive factor was a woman named Marin.
She commissioned a curse from a witch, didn't she? Pure on the outside, rotten on the inside.
Marin was the woman who was supposed to become John's wife. She was the submissive type he preferred, obedient enough to turn a blind eye to her husband's affairs. But that didn't mean she forgave them. In secret, Marin used a witch's curse to turn Isolde — who'd been having clandestine trysts with John — into a lust-crazed nymphomaniac. Thanks to that, Isolde slept with John and every other man in the village, transforming into a public flesh toilet.
Originally that was years in the future. But things have changed because of me.
Unlike the original story, Isolde hadn't married Ian, so she'd work hard to marry her lover John — and Marin, who'd been pining for him, would deal with the witch sooner than planned to stop her.
I need to make a deal with Aurora before Marin does…
The witch Marin dealt with was named Aurora. Just like Ian, she was the protagonist of The Affairs of a Shadowy Witch. And of course, I already knew where she was.
Finding her isn't hard. The problem is I don't have what Aurora wants.
True to fantasy witches, Aurora used all sorts of bizarre materials — virgin's blood being a prime example. That was how Marin, a mere country girl, had been able to deal with a witch at all.
In the original, Marin offered her little sister's blood. This time, will she offer her own?
What I had, on the other hand, was a pink flower — a natural aphrodisiac I'd found in the goblin cave — and a lily that had grown alongside the Giant Weed.
Not sure if these are better than virgin's blood.
I'd figure out the trade goods later. Rushing off to the witch's house was a problem in itself.
If I get caught, the losses would be catastrophic.
The Church of the Sun God had designated witches as heretics. If evidence of my dealings with a witch came to light, all the contribution I'd built up with the church could become worthless overnight.
"It's a bit early, but I should go get that."
Having organized my thoughts, I headed straight for the church. When I arrived, Reina greeted me as she always did.
"Brother, you've come again today♥"
The look in Reina's eyes as she gazed at me had subtly changed. Where once she'd regarded me with mere curiosity, now there was something hungry in her gaze.
This bitch is completely in heat.
It was only natural, if you thought about it. Isolde had become a nymphomaniac because of a witch's curse — but Reina had been born one. If I asked her to have sex right now, she'd spread her legs without a second thought. But I still had no plans to fuck her yet. Once Reina crossed that line, she wouldn't be able to control her lust. Once she tasted sex, she'd throw her body at every man who came along.
That can't happen.
She had to become mine and mine alone. To that end, I planned to train Reina slowly — to make her into a saint who looked only at me.