Chapter 92 - Rite of Luwreni

Since comparative religion wasn’t exactly a topic for public places like the medlab, we changed locations to Captain Inatumal’s quarters. As we walked, I did my best to keep my concentration on my form, to keep it from getting out of control. Who would have guessed that increasing my ability to shapeshift would have had a downside? Still, I could see skill XP start rolling in, which meant that working to control the unstable flesh was basically helping me increase my shapeshifting skill.

Anyways, once we were all in the captain’s suite, I looked over at the twins, and said, “All right, what is this Rite of Luwreni?”

Aurae sighed, and said, “As we said, Mimdros is the Divine of War and Fertility, the Defender of the People and Conqueror of their Foes. As you might have guessed, many of His teachings have to do with War, the division of Spoils, and so on. Among those is the Rite of Luwreni, named after his consort in the religious texts.”

Nimue nodded. “You see, when Mimdros would return from war, he would celebrate his victory with his consorts, and encouraged his followers to do the same. As the god of Fertility, he would… ensure that the next generation was as strong and numerous as the last.”

I nodded slowly. “I think I’m beginning to get the picture. And I am going to guess that this is not just symbolic, something that is carried out to completion as thoroughly as possible.” The twins were blushing heavily at this point, clearly pretty embarrassed at having basically just propositioned me for a threesome with them. “I understand why a slave would traditionally seek out their Master for this, but why would you seek out your Commander?”

Aurae shuffled her feet, and said, “Because, if the seed takes, then the blood of one who is victorious in battle would make for a stronger addition to the People than that of one who has never known victory. It is supposed to be a good sign if a Communionist is with child following the Rite of Luwreni.”

“I see. Out of curiosity, what happens when the ‘Master’ or ‘Commander’ is a woman, or when the Commander and Subordinate are the same gender?” I wasn’t lying when I said I was curious, since it would be interesting to see how far this rabbit hole went.

Nimue looked glad to be talking about anything other than asking me to bang her and her sister. “Oh, that is simple enough. If the Commander is a woman and the subordinate is male, they might still perform the Rite, though the dominant party shifts. If they are the same gender, then if they have no consort, they may find one of their peers who was in battle instead, or, if all else fails, they might find one amongst the population that they protected or conquered to perform the rite with. But first they must have approached and been denied by better candidates. Amongst Communionists, it is an honor to participate in the Rite.”

Makes sense, I guess. Most religions that aren’t insanely repressed have traditions like that. “So, are there certain forms to follow, or ceremony to do?”

Aurae shook her head, though she was trying to look me in the eye, instead of looking at the parts of my body that were moving outside my control. “There is some preparation on the part of the Communionist’s part, but we already went through that, while we were waiting for you to… return. Now all you need to do is ‘conquer’ us.”

I nodded once. “I see. And you both wish to do this with me?”

The two knelfi women looked at eachother, and then nodded. Nimue responded, “Yes, Master. The truth of your ‘heritage’ is… off-putting, but you have been good to us, and could have taken us any time you wished. After leading us into battle, this is only right, even if the sight of your flesh doing those… things is disconcerting.”

Well, I wasn’t going to get a better offer than that. Stepping forward, I cut off anything further Nimue was going to say by sealing her lips with mine. She was surprised, at first, but then relaxed into my arm. Without thinking about it, I reached out for Aurae, to draw her into the embrace as well, and I heard a small shriek of surprise, causing me to break the kiss, only to see that my arm had become a tentacle, and had wrapped the captain around her waist, bringing her to us. Guess I lost control for a bit there.

Of course, I’d be lying if I said I’d never dreamed of being the tentacle monster in a hentai before, because let’s face it, any guy who has watched hentai has probably thought that, at some point or another. So instead of fighting it, I went the other way, and dove in, letting flesh become more fluidic, as more tentacles grew from my body, and began stripping the twin sisters. Turned out they were indeed perfectly identical, except that Nimue had shorter hair. They even tasted almost the same.

The women tried to get away, but by then I had tossed both of them to the bed, with smaller tentacles binding their wrists together behind their backs, and others forcing their legs apart, spreading them open for my viewing pleasure. I slipped a tentacle into their mouths, both to reduce the sound they made, and to get a bit of lubrication going. Small, thin tentacles snaked about their bodies, gently squeezing their breasts and stimulating their nipples, while another concentrated on repeatedly flicking the little button between their legs, causing screams to become moans.

I hit them both with Mindread, so I knew just where to aim for ‘critical hits’, when to speed up or go slower, when to go hard and when to be gentle, constantly changing the rhythm of the ‘battle’ in ways I hadn’t even considered before. Eventually, though, things came to a head, and I found myself once more in my ‘normal’ form, though still dealing with the occasional ‘writhing’, and two very satisfied Knelfi women lying on either side of me in the captain’s bed. Now that I was out of ‘combat’, I decided to check the notifications I had been getting.

Seduction has improved to 40/100. +15 CHA Mental Psy Mastery has improved to 40/100 +10 WIS Shapeshift has improved to 40/100. +5 CON, +5 CHA

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Shapeshift. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Perfect Shapeshifting	The shapeshifter has learned perfect control, allowing them to easily shift their internal structure to mimic other creatures, to the point where they can confuse biometric scanners.
Wild Shapeshifting	The opposite of perfect shapeshifting, Wild Shapeshifting allows the user to more freely change their body to whatever form is most efficient for the situation at hand, even if that means more tentacles.
Adaptive Shifting	The user passively shapeshifts their body to react to incoming hazards, allowing them to exist indefinitely in a variety of hostile situations, including hard vacuum, and makes them immune to most toxins or diseases.

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Seduction. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Smooth Talker	The quintessential smooth talker, who can simply say a few words and have willing partners running after them, and convince them to ‘try new things’.
Magic Touch	Less concerned with the ‘hunt’, and more focused on ensuring that the ‘prey’ they catch always leaves satisfied, the person with the magic touch knows what to do in order to ensure ‘repeat customers’.
Charismatic	Some people walk into a room, and all eyes turn to them with thoughts of lust. This is a passive effect that increases the interest of those around you.

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Mental Psy Mastery. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Mindreader	One of the most basic uses of Mental Psy, but perhaps the most subtle. It also has the most potential rewards, but sometimes ignorance truly is bliss.
Dominator	An advanced use of Mental Psy, the ability to control and compel the minds of other beings to do what you wish is a very powerful ability, but one that can spark distrust in those who know about it.
Sensor	One of the basic uses of Mental Psy, and perhaps the most utilitarian. Being able to detect danger or ill intent in advance is an incalculable boon on the battlefield.

The skill boosts were nice, but the skill evolution thing was something he was not expecting. But then, other than hardcore grinders, how many people would be up to 40 on one of their skills, when you had to live the world? And how many of them would tell people? That would be giving away some critical info that could help your enemies, after all.

Now, I had three choices for each skill, and on the face of it, each evolution looked to be pretty interesting. The Dominator evolution of Mental Psy Mastery, for instance, would play well with my Charm and Alter Memory abilities, as well as the Mindbreaker, allowing me to more easily play an ‘offensive’ Mental Psy user. But was that what I really wanted to do? I already wasn’t really comfortable with using Mindbreaker except as a last resort. On the other hand, Mindread was the Mental ability I used most often, and boosting that would allow me to be more effective at the ‘subtle’ manipulations… Yeah, Mindreader was the choice to make.

Skill Evolved. Mental Psy Mastery is now Mental Psy Mastery (Mindreader). You gain the Telepathy power.

Psy Powers
Mental	Telepathy – Allows two-way mental communication between targets, sharing surface thoughts with all recipients. Can affect up to three targets simultaneously. Only works on living creatures. Requires concentration. 8 PP per second per target. Range 10 meters. Improves with use. Rank 1/10 (0%)

A new power, huh? Lucky! Well, what would Seduction get me? I thought about Smooth Talker, but decided that wasn’t really what I needed. I already had a harem, after all, and any help I could get keeping them all satisfied was definitely welcome. But something about the Charismatic option appealed to me. Being able to walk into a room and just have all eyes on me would be useful for any number of possible tricks, whatever form I took. But in the end, I took the advice of a senior chief who was my superior back when I was in the Navy, “If your woman ain’t happy, ain’t NOBODY happy!”

Skill Evolved Seduction is now Seduction (Magic Touch). You gain Touch of Ecstasy power.

Psy Powers
Energy	Touch of Ecstasy –  Converts PP into low level electricity, stimulating target’s pleasure centers, giving them an instant climax. Cooldown 1 minute. Costs 20 PP. May improve with use. Rank 1/10 (0%)

That just left Shapeshifting. Adaptive was pretty cool, if I was a solo player, but being the leader of what was quickly becoming my own faction, I couldn’t just go off on my own. Also, that was a good way to get myself shot, or worse, and I wanted to keep the number of people who saw my whole Corporeal Instability thing to a minimum. The same with Wild Shapeshifting. I’d just experienced what a lot of fun going full on crazy with the shifting would be, but was that really what I wanted to base my playstyle around? Perfect Shapeshifting, though… yeah, I could definitely use that.

Skill Evolved Shapeshift is now Shapeshift (Perfect Shapeshifting). You gain Scan Biometrics power.

Psy Powers
Physical	Scan Biometrics – Scan the touched creature’s biometric profile. Only works on living creatures. Scan takes 10 seconds, and requires physical contact for duration. At current rank, able to scan fingerprints, facial structure. Rank 1/10 (0%)

I would have continued playing around, but I felt the twins moving next to me, and decided that it was time for round two…

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