For no reason other than his own lust, John made Metra take the short walk on all fours. She crawled along next to him, looking more and more turned on along the way. Something that, John knew for a fact, she would have hated under previous masters and probably wouldn’t have enjoyed as much as she did under him until quite recently. Yesterday had clearly been a breaking point in their relationship.

John wasn’t used to such shifts having a clear-cut date to them, but he wasn’t going to complain about it. Not since it played so much into his favour. Although Metra had not enjoyed being a submissive in the past, she knew how to play the part properly from observing others. Not that she had to be very creative in this instance.

Once they were a good distance away, John just told everyone to stop. He put a few Sentinel Golems into the area, to make sure they weren’t disturbed, then positioned himself behind Metra. It was a quick affair, he pulled down her soaked hot pants, got rid of his own legwear, then went straight to business. Taking her doggystyle out in the open, covered only by the densely standing trees, was extremely liberating.

His cock was soon lubricated to the maximum, so fucking her hard and rough wasn’t a problem. All he cared about was getting off. To that end, he was remarkably uncreative, only keeping his grip on Metra’s hips and thrusting. That was, with his knowledge of her sensitive spots, more than enough to send her over the edge three times before he filled her up.

Not that one orgasm was enough.

That one had barely ended and he was standing. With one command, Metra was sucking his dick. He guided her movements with one hand, while groping Gnome with the other. For once more needy than embarrassed, Gnome joined them, and after John had shot his second load into Metra’s mouth, he fucked the soil elemental against a tree.

After his third orgasm, John felt much better. He could have continued, of course he could have, but that was enough to let him go on with his day without feeling pent up. ‘Thank you, Gaia, for allowing me this life, despite all the trials and tribulation,’ he thought. Cumming a few times cleared the mind quite nicely, so now the day was drifting towards acceptable again.

He pulled a steamed towel out of his inventory, Aclysia had prepared a new one this morning, and they cleaned themselves off. Metra had to work with a pair of Rave’s yoga pants for the moment as John didn’t want her to walk around with that damp spot between her legs. If spot was even the right word in this context, consuming about a third of her hot pants entire surface.

“Urgh, why do I even have to wear anything?” Metra complained as she slipped into the stretchy fabric. Although her ass wasn’t as perfect as Rave’s, the berserker babe’s butt was beautiful, bouncing as she let the waistband snap into position. “Back in Akkadia, nobody cared if I was fucking naked.”

“When in Rome, do as the Romans do,” John told her, not particularly interested in having this argument for the seventeenth time in its entirety. “I don’t want to become so depraved that I walk around everywhere in the nude. I still want to be a somewhat functioning role model for people and that includes being able to fit into polite society. Do you want to defy me, Metra?”

“No, my king,” the First of Wrath grumbled, clearly not content but accepting of the situation as she had always been. “What else do you have to do anyway? Can’t we just go back to the Palace and continue this properly?”

“Aside from the full day job of running around the city and fixing things, showing my people that I am helping them on the ground level? More importantly, aside from checking on my sweet, little, and once more going through a break down, Eliza?” John asked and rolled his neck. It felt a bit stiff, he probably had strained some muscles thanks to the repeated orgasms. “Well, that depends on what kind of update Aclysia gives me. Speaking of that,” he pulled out his phone, “it’s just about the agreed time.”

As if on command, likely having waited for a window in the conversation, Aclysia contacted him mentally. ‘Report,’ she initiated the contact, ‘I have successfully arranged for a meeting in Boston tomorrow, as you have asked me to. Although my obvious threats failed to impress them initially, once the demise of Lakamun was proven, they were more than willing to initiate peace talks. The negotiator changed at that point as well.’

‘Wonder what that means,’ John thought. ‘Did the person speaking first simply retreat from the conversation out of shock or were they forced to take a step back because Lakamun was the head of a pro war faction, now fatally weakened? Lots of other possibilities as well, could be as simple as a bathroom break.’ He turned from the internal analysis back to the conversation. ‘Thank you, Aclysia, would you say they are absolutely sure to attend the peace talks?’

‘I found no single reason for them backing out. Similarly, I have no ultimate confirmation that they will agree to the terms as I have presented them, Master,’ the weaponized maid quickly responded. ‘The final negotiator was rather nervous, however. They might be creating some scheme.’

‘We’ll take the necessary security precautions. Shouldn’t be too hard, since this will happen on our soil,’ John responded and then began walking. The next part, he said both out loud and in his thoughts, “Alright, we should give the Lake Alliance something so they’ll be less nervous.”

He started walking, but not before putting his arms around Gnome and Metra again. There was no way he wouldn’t feel someone at his sides. For him to skip that luxury, he would need to be in a real hurry. If someone used the scene to snap a photo of him and write an article along the lines of ‘John Newman enjoys leisure stroll while city still burns’, then the Gamer would make that sacrifice.

Not that they had the longest walk ever. They had already been in the southern parts of Newman Shire so the Palace was only about a hundred metres away. Although Metra had given a reason to return there just a few moments ago, John wanted something else from inside the building.

They passed by the Cleaning and Security Station. Both Buildings were normally unremarkable. Small towers, barely bigger than John, the former with a round and the latter with a square roof. In both cases, that roof was tremendously oversized, giving the impression of mushrooms. Underneath that large rim, normally, rested a few slimes or Sentry Golems that were not needed.

Right now, they were completely empty. John had manually assigned patrol routes for all the golems. The slimes, on the other hand, now had the task of eating all the ruined crystals on Silicate Island. As far as John understood it, they wouldn’t be involved in the actual repair process. The Cleaning Station was a normal Building and, as such, entirely optional. The restoration of its shape to the defined setting was something the Guild Hall did by itself.

While the Cleaning Station looked like always, there was constant buzzing coming from the Security Station. Its roof turned slowly, looking almost like a decoration in a park. All of this was likely to signal that it was currently working on assembling one of the destroyed Sentry Golems. John only slowed his steps for a few seconds to observe that thing, then passed it without thinking much further about it. The way his Guild Hall worked was, in many ways, just as enigmatic as the core of his powers. Gaia had done some programming and was feeding it in reality defying ways. While they were technically things John had placed, he had no control over the actual design of things.

He was the Gamer, not the designer. That was sometimes frustrating, but if he had to program his own abilities, he would probably still be busy figuring out how to debug Possession.

They took an elevator up the Palace and John stood atop the star fort, looking northwards. “Does it look smaller to you?” John asked, gesturing at the volcano. Since he had already invested the money, the thing was supposed to vanish within a day. From what he saw, the whole thing did seem to have shrunk, but that may have been a hopeful trick he played on himself.

“Yeah!” Gnome answered, a bit too enthusiastically. “Uhm,” she noticed and eventually became so self-conscious that she began to stammer, “I-I mean… l-l-l-l-l-loooook over there!” She pointed towards the east of the volcano.

John immediately spotted what she was referring to. A bit of road that was running so straight next to the rise of the flat mountain that it couldn’t have existed in that state had it been caught up in the natural rise of rock. “Good catch,” he complimented the cuddle rock and kissed her on the cheek. She blushed intensely, then they turned to the Palace proper.

They ascended to the second level of John’s home and walked towards an area that he had just dubbed the guest room. In essence, it was something he had filled with all the necessary bits for someone to live in. There was no one who still needed an apartment though, so it had just been left empty, as John had already put the work in to create it.

For the last half hour, it had become the dwelling for a sort-of involuntary guest. Theron was residing there, waiting for John to decide what was happening next. As it had already been proven the guy wouldn’t flee if given the easiest of chances, the Gamer didn’t see any reason to lock him up in any capacity. Although two Sentry Golems were still around to alarm John if there was something sketchy going on.

As it was, John entered the room after knocking and found the interruption mage mid-yawn in front of the television. Like in John’s own living room, the thing was controlled over a laptop. Theron had decided to go on some website and started watching a series. From the “LANAAAAAAAAAAA” that echoed out, John knew that it was Archer before he actually looked at the screen.

Audibly, Theron hit the spacebar, causing the thing to stop at a comedic frame of an ocelot, then turned around. “Got to admit, you have it nice here,” the tired-looking guy said. “Almost happy I got caught. Could get used to this couch.”

“I have to admit, you’re scarily cool about all of this,” John responded, not feeling particularly trusting of Theron. Obviously, the guy kept his promises, but the way he did it just screamed suspicious. It also screamed lazy. If John had been a less paranoid person, he would have just surmised that Theron wasn’t feeling like doing any of this. Instead, and the Gamer knew this was likely pathological, he was on the constant lookout for any sign that his opposite would slip up in his act.

“Well, I lost, so now it’s not my problem anymore, right?” Theron responded and yawned again. Meanwhile, John grabbed a chair from the nearby table and positioned it so they could talk.

“What is ‘it’ in this context?” the Gamer asked, honestly curious.

“You know, this,” a hand reached up from behind the back of the couch and made a circular gesture, “the war and stuff. Lakamun can go deal with you, since he wanted us to attack you so badly as well.”

‘I guess that lends credence to one of my theories about internal factions.’ John felt pleased with himself about that. ‘There had to be an internal counterforce that was growing after I both humiliated and didn’t harm any of their people.’ “I will just break the news to you: Lakamun is dead.”

Theron was taken aback by that announcement. His half-closed eyes actually widened to the level of an awake person. “Seriously? Wow.” That seemed to be all he had to say about the demise of the demi-god. After a few seconds, he even settled back to the previous look. “I guess that’s good for you?”

“I didn’t want any casualties, but in the interest of sparing you any propaganda talk: yes, yes, it is good for me. Especially if he was the main warmonger on your side,” John sighed and shook his head. “You could possibly know. What did I even do that you people decided to attack me? Was it really just the takeover of the Little Maryland?”

“Lakamun started talking about you the moment you took over New York.” Theron shrugged. “He doesn’t like competition. Even he didn’t guess you would rise that meteorically though. That you took over one of our allies kind of gave him justification to escalate things. Helene was sporting for a fight anyway, Jeremiah knew you had something tasty, and Leslek is a bootlicker. You know, the usual stuff.”

John wanted to say that letting the strong lead on the basis of being strong was a pretty bad idea exactly because of situations like this. What stopped him was that he had no idea how the Lake Alliance’s internal system actually functioned and that he would have looked like a giant hypocrite saying that. All wars Fusion had been involved in, so far, came as a result of John’s own actions. In some way, shape, or form, he had invited the conflict and used the growing power of his Federation to support him in ending it in his own favour.

Instead, the Gamer decided to get to the point why he had come there. “I am releasing you,” he stated.

“Oh, cool.” Theron was already in the process of raising his hand, the usual gesture to leave a barrier, when he stopped and gave John a long stare. “You look constipated, my dude.”

“You can’t just leave without asking me why,” John whined. “That’s against the rules.”

“That sounds bothersome though.” Theron yawned for the third time. “You mind if I just pretend to listen while concentrating on how comfortable the couch is?”

“Fine.” John did a throwing gesture to express his discontent, but this was better than nothing.

‘You could just stop behaving like a super-villain?’ Gnome suggested.

‘But where is the fun in that?’ John asked back, then went on with the explanation, “It’s simple, really, the Lake Alliance has confirmed they will talk to me and I am sending you back to show that I am pleased. Do let them know that I am not out to utterly dismantle them and just ease the tension in general. This can all end without further complications.”

“Urgh,” Theron groaned, raising his hand further. “Just when I thought I was out of responsibility for a few weeks at least. Leslek won’t stop screaming into my ears. Neither will Jeremiah.”

“Well, look at it like this, you do the work now to get the war over with tomorrow,” John stated. “No more stress after that.”

“Sure, sure.” Theron didn’t sound particularly convinced.