For a split second, the world stops spinning. Lady Vespera's stride freezes mid-step, her entire body contorting with the effort of not tripping over her own ego. She cranes her neck down, then finally spots Poly: a yellow-haired microdot staining her otherwise spotless floor.
Vespera's eyes bug out, then narrow to wicked slits. "E-Excuse me?" she stammers, as if she couldn't even comprehend the very concept of being insulted.
My knees liquefy. "What the hell are you doing?!" I hiss at the stubborn little girl. "Are you trying to get us killed?"
Poly doesn't budge, just throws a sassy hip and sticks out her tongue. "I said, you're a big, dumb, overgrown fossil! Also, your horns look like wet spaghetti."
Lady Vespera's face does something I've never seen before: it breaks. For half a heartbeat, she genuinely looks confused. Then all the blood rushes to her cheeks, and she radiates enough fury to melt glaciers.
"What did you just call me?!" she thunders. Vespera's heel slams down with enough force to cave in the floorboards. "Looks like I'm going to have to make you learn your place!"
"You're the one who needs to learn your place, small fry!" Poly shouts up, before pointing towards me. "Michael will deal with a weakling like you in no time!"
What is this woman saying?! I glance up nervously, and my spine nearly collapses into itself as my gaze meets the towering Demon's.
Instead of pulverizing me right away, Vespera almost doubles over laughing, the sound shaking the bedposts and making every glass in the room hum like a tuning fork. "She thinks YOU are going to beat me? You can't even give me a proper back massage!"
She wipes away a tear, then lunges down with a hand the size of a boulder, aiming straight for Poly. "That ended up being more entertaining than I thought, but this is where you die."
The Demon's hand comes down like a comet, digits splayed wide enough to catch an entire chicken coop's worth of prey. For one insane heartbeat, all my survival instincts fire at once: flee, hide, scream, beg for mercy, fake a heart attack and hope she loses interest. But Poly is still standing right in the open, seconds from being squashed like a bug.
I panic as I consider my options: grovel, beg, or grovel more. But then, I think about last night, the way it felt to swing the sword in my dream, the way the world seemed to ripple and bend around it. That brief, fleeting moment of feeling like an actual hero. Is it possible? Is there anything at all to this whole "holy sword" business?
Lady Vespera's hand is coming down quick. There's no time to think. I grip the sword with both hands, pull back, and swing as hard as I can at her index finger.
There's a metallic ping sound—not the meaty thwack of blade through flesh, but the ringing bell of sword striking something sturdy. The runes on the sword's edge flare a brilliant pink, just for an instant.
"AH!" Lady Vespera yelps and her hand jerks away from me. Her legs begin to wobble and her knees knock together, causing her to stumble backwards.
I stare, slack-jawed, as the towering Demoness totters, teeters, and finally collapses onto her butt with a seismic crash that rattles every window in the room. Her dress flies up, revealing acres of smooth thigh and a lacy black undergarment that could double as a circus tent. She slaps both hands over the spot where I hit her, clutching her finger as if it's about to fall off.
I'm not sure who's more stunned—me or the Demoness herself.
Lady Vespera's mouth keeps opening and closing like a fish out of water. "Huh…? What just happened?" she mutters, shaking her head as if trying to clear it.
Poly plants her fists on her hips and crows up at her. "That's what you get for picking on someone smaller than you when you're nothing but a small fry!"
I want to join in the celebration, but my hands are still tingling from the shock of whatever just happened. I flex my fingers and stare at the sword, which now seems slightly less pathetic.
Poly hops up and down, sleeves flapping. "Now go finish her off! Hurry before she recovers!"
I look at Poly, then at Vespera, who is still clutching her finger and scowling at us like an injured jungle cat.
Maybe—just maybe—I can actually do this.
I dash forward, sword in both hands, aiming for her thigh this time. The blade hums, the pink rune flickers, and when I swing with all my strength, it lands with a thud that sends a jolt through my elbows and straight into my teeth.
"Gah!" Lady Vespera gasps. Her legs quiver and her lips part in a shuddering cry.
I grip the holy sword tighter, my hands sweaty and shaking, and watch the Demon noble reel back.
This is actually working. I continue working on her thighs, landing blow after blow consecutively. And with each strike, I can hear her moans and grunts emanating from above, growing more intense by the second.
"Gah!"
"Nnngh!"
"Mmph!"
Wait…Aren't the sounds she's making kind of weird?
Behind me, Poly is hopping from foot to foot, screaming, "Keep going! Keep going! She's almost done for!" But the sound of Lady Vespera's moans is impossible to ignore. I stare at the sword, then at Lady Vespera's monolithic face, now flushed an impossible shade of red and dripping with sweat. I look over at her thigh, at the spot that I've struck over a dozen times, and realize it looks completely unharmed. But she's squeezing the flesh there, rubbing her fingers over her unbruised skin, her nails digging in as if she's desperate for something.
I step back, lowering the sword. "Uh, Poly?" I say, angling my face so she can hear me over the Demon's groaning. "Are you sure this thing is working?"
She pumps both fists in the air. "Of course it is! Look at her! She can barely stand! Go for the finish!"
The finish. Right.
Vespera's eyes have gone glassy, her chest heaving in and out. I circle around to her other leg, and before she can react, I give it another solid whack with the sword. This time, she shrieks, a long, high-pitched whine that makes my ears ring. Her entire body jolts forward, and her tail whips the floor, gouging a trench in the floorboards.
What the hell is going on?
I glance down at the sword, hoping for some kind of instruction manual to materialize, but it's still the same old piece of scrap metal, sticky and slightly humming.
"Michael!" Poly's voice is shrill. "Hurry! She's gonna recover if you don't keep hitting her!"
I bite my lip. Okay, maybe it is working. Maybe this is just how Demons die. Maybe they don't bleed out, they just vibrate themselves into oblivion.
But as I step up for another hit, Lady Vespera's hand shoots down and slaps the ground next to me with the force of a landslide. I jump, tripping over my own foot, and nearly face-plant into the ground. The Demon's fingers twitch, the nails flexing open and closed as if she can't decide whether to grab me or herself.
I scramble up and, with a last-ditch effort, stab the sword into her inner thigh.
Vespera's whole body convulses. Her dress rips open at the side as her legs kick out, and the impact nearly blows me backwards. But the sound she makes—it's not a scream, not a growl. It's a moan so loud and sensual I half-expect the mansion to collapse from the force of it.
I take a step back. "Poly, are you seeing this?"
She beams up at me, thumbs up again. "You're doing great!"
Lady Vespera slumps back, the ground groaning beneath her. She's panting heavily, sweat beading on her brow.
I go for another swing. Lady Vespera arches her back and moans once again, her entire body shivering intensely like an asylum patient.
I spin on Poly. "What the fuck is going on?"
She shrugs, a little too cheerfully. "What do you mean? Isn't everything going just according to plan?"
"But she's not even bleeding!" I point out.
"Well, um," Poly says, scratching her cheek sheepishly, "that might be because...Instead of dealing damage, Excalibur's strikes, uh, inflict...Something else…"
I look at Lady Vespera, who is currently gripping her chest, her knuckles white as if she's trying to rip them off her body. "I…I'm going to kill you…" she pants, but her limbs are so unsteady she can barely even sit up.
A pit opens in my stomach. "Explain."
Poly glances hesitantly at the sword, then at me, then away again. "Um. Well. You see, Excalibur doesn't cause pain to its target, it kinda…does the opposite of that actually."
I just stare at her.
She coughs, then continues, "it, um, stimulates them."
I blink, then gaze up at Lady Vespera, who is now biting her lip, her entire body still trembling. The color in her cheeks is so deep I worry her head will pop like a balloon.
My brain short-circuits for a second.
"So you mean to say…THAT I'VE BEEN PLEASURING HER THIS WHOLE TIME?!" I shriek, flailing my arms so high I almost fling the stupid sword out the window.
"Uh, but it works, right?" Poly flashes me a twitchy grin.
I want to scream, or maybe just fall through the floor and keep falling forever. Instead, I stare at the sword in my hands, now suddenly much stickier than I remember.
Poly leans in close. "Look, all you need to do is bring her to orgasm and the sword will be able to absorb her energy," she explains matter-of-factly. "I recommend you target more sensitive areas if you want to finish her quickly."
I look down at the sword again, then up at the Demoness writhing before me. I never thought my life would come down to a boss fight where the goal was to pleasure a giantess using the most dubious weapon known to mankind, but here I am.
I edge toward Lady Vespera's crotch, which is currently being ground into the floorboards with the force of a hydraulic press.
I hesitate. Is there no dignity left for me?
But then I remember what's at stake—my life, Poly's life, the remote chance of ever escaping this place. I steel myself, grip the sword, and jam it right between her legs.
"UNNGGHH!" Lady Vespera detonates.
There's no other word for it. Her entire body locks up, then shudders with such violence that the floorboards literally split. She roars, then shrieks, then finally sobs as wave after wave of ecstasy tears through her. The sound is obscene, earth-shaking, and so deeply mortifying that I want to crawl into a sewer and never surface again.
I tumble backwards from the force, rolling back towards the corner I came from, sword clattering beside me. I look up and see Lady Vespera's legs shaking, her toes curled, her body twitching uncontrollably.
For a full minute, she just convulses, the sounds of her pleasure fading only when she finally collapses in a heap, her breathing slow and shallow.
She's out. Cold.
I lie there, chest heaving, staring at the ceiling and wondering if my ancestors would be proud or just deeply confused.