Chapter 8: Fishing Trip

Mine sat, staring up to the sky with a blank look in her eyes. Unable to properly focus on anything. Her skin a light shade of red, having completely given up on controlling her wandering mind as it seemed much to persistent for even herself.

She hadn't wanted to come out into the forest today. She had no need, she would just do her task of staying with Parc while avoiding all forms of conversation with him. That had been the plan had Akame not been sent out on an emergency sortie to deal with som group of fools, foolish enough to wander too close to the base. Leaving someone else to go out hunting for dinner.

Parc ending up with that honour by default because everyone else was out on a mission. Except her. Him and Akame. Much to her misfortune, Akame had decided she wanted to cook some fish for dinner. And Akame of course being Akame, didn't do fishing in the traditional sense.

Meaning there were no actual fishing rods. Not that they would have helped when the fish they were fishing was twice their size and could drag someone into the water with a single swish of their tail.

That was just what the river tuna was, an apparently exceedingly rare and dangerous species that Mine had tasted so many times by now it had lost its exotic appeal. This all in thanks to the spawning pool she was sat by. To her side a neatly folded brown cloak, vest and pants stacked atop each other.

Their previous wearer now somewhere in the pool trying to capture one of them. She had practically forced herself to turn away with rosy cheeks as Parc undressed to his briefs. Only for her nose to guide her back to the alluring scent of mint and oranges that burst from him the moment more of his skin was in the open.

She was just glad that he was beneath the surface of the water now and no longer drowning her in an annoyingly addictive perfume. Though since her close call where she overheard Leone and him going at it, her mind has been a boggle of confusion.

Every time she would think about him, even in the plain sense of just speaking with him, she would feel something welling up in her lower body. Guiding her towards him as if he were the only source of light in a maze of mist.

'Please stop…' she whimpered to herself, hugging her legs close to her chest, forcing her hands into her knees to prevent them from wandering to her the mess coming from her unmentionables and quell the desire radiating within.

She hated it; he was a nobody. She barely even knew him and yet he made her feel like this. That her body was just waiting for him to take it for himself while her mind screamed, NO!

Yet over the weeks, every time she had seen him and Leone together, she would chew on her fingers, shutting out her internal jealousy and forcing in her annoyance with him. She knew it was only putting a divide between them, one she refused to acknowledge she wanted gone.

Her eyes slowly traversed over the tree line, drawn to the stark white shirt laying atop the pile of clothing. Gulping slightly as she lingered on it and the constant scent attracting her to it. She pulled her hand from her leg, slowly reaching out for it but freezing just an inch from it as she realized what was going on.

Her hand shooting back beneath her legs, but not happy with how it was so easy for her to unconsciously lose control, she decided it may just be better to sit on them. Didn't matter if the went numb or the feeling of crushing them under her-albeit, light weight, on the hard ground would hurt ever so slightly. That would hopefully just act as a bonus to give her something else to focus on that wasn't leaves and the extremely rich fragrance besides her.

A gasp for breath came from the pool as Parc rose from the water. Not taking long on the surface before diving back under for a second attempt of skirting the lake bottom in wait for his prey to come by.

Mine watched him dive back under, her mind drawing a blank as she swallowed the saliva that was trying to leak from her mouth. Mine turned back to the shirt, her stomach bubbly and wanting, 'j-just once?' she thought to herself, hoping it might finally get her body to calm down. Glancing back to the water where a ripple of bubbles had just surfaced she sighed, relieved that Parc hadn't surfaced just yet.

She reached out, grabbing his shirt. Her hands trembling as she held it in front of her face. Expression already melting into a trance as she brought it to her nose. Taking in a deep breath of the powerful remnants of Parc's natural perfume, sending sparks through Mine's mind.

"Fuaaaaa!" she gasped, her eyes moistening while her right hand pushed into her dress. The fabric between he legs pressing against, and moistening from her lust. Her hand jolting away when she felt a spark of electricity shoot through her the moment fabric rubbed against the sensitive nub of he clit.

The jolt seemingly enough to wake her from her stupor of desire. Dropping Parc's shirt onto her lap, hands together, looking down at the offending garment as if it were a demon in disguise. 'W-what am I doing!?' she screamed in silence, covering her face with both hands while steam rose from her head.

"You look like you're having fun~" Mine's entire body froze, her mind going blank. Jankily lifting her head with a twitching red face until she tied gazes with Parc. His body dripping of water that gave him a light sheen, his body laced with neatly defined muscles and numerous small scars of varying shapes from his time as Esdeath's torture toy.

On his face a wide, cocky smirk. His eyes sharp as he looked down at Mine's form. Who herself was unable to think properly, resembling that of a little puppy caught in the act of doing something it knew was wrong.

Parc chuckled, throwing two gargantuan, lifeless fish to the ground. A hand on his hip, "if you just wanted to smell me, you could have just asked. Though, I would ask of something in return~" Parc could see why Leone enjoyed teasing everyone, him and Mine in particular. The way she curled in on herself, mouth chattering trying to find words to say, yet coming up with naught but incoherent squeaks.

"Oh, you don't need to say anything," Parc leaned his body down, propping his hand against the tree Mine was seated against. Bringing his face as closer to hers as possible, noses nearly touching. Feeling each other's breaths on the others face. Seeming to affect Mine even more as she looked about ready to explode from an incoherent babbling overload.

"You're just a little closet pervert, aren't you?" using his other hand, Parc cupped her chin, his thumb on her cheek. Tilting her up to meet his gaze. Her eyes darting around for an escape. The only thing making itself to her mind being the large body of water behind him that she quite frankly wanted to dive into and never return to the surface. Problem being that Parc himself, had effectively trapped her in a corner.

Mine's hands feebly lifted to Parc's chest, feeling the muscles of his pecs. But not revelling in them for long as she put whatever power her body could muster and pushed him back and away from her.

Which, if Parc wasn't in a teasing mood, wouldn't have even been powerful enough to cause him to stumble. But he was so he went with the flow, pretending to stumble backwards. Giving Mine just enough time to burst to her feet. Hopping on one foot to pull her boots off before grabbing the hem of her dress and pulling it over her head revealing her appropriately plain white undergarments with pink trim and black pantyhose-which was also quickly removed.

"I-I n-need to cool off!" she said, wading through the shore water and diving into the deeper parts. Submerging herself fully.

Parc wasn't quick to follow her, only entering the water up to his calves, waiting for Mine to resurface. But as seconds turned into thirty, Parc began to worry, all he could see were bubbles rising. Not a head of pink hair. 'She knows how to swim… right?' he questioned himself. But she still didn't surface.

"Oh, fuck. MINE!" he threw himself into the water. The initial blur of entering water, dissipating until he could see Mine flailing at the bottom of the lake. He swam to her as fast as he could, wrapping his arm around her waist and racing to the surface. Breaking through it with a gasp on to fronts. Mine soon launching into a fit of coughs and hacks to clear her lungs of the lake water.

"What were you thinking!?" he berated as he assisted her to shore, "you can't just do that! What if I wasn't fast enough to get to you!" he laid her down on the bank, her chest heaving as she continued to sputter out water. Her face still a bright red. "How could I live with myself if I let you die like that!?"

He wasn't angry, no really, he wasn't. What he was feeling was fear, fear that he would blame himself if Mine so much as got hurt worse than she already was from what he thought was simple teases.

"I don't know," she whimpered holding her chest. Her head curling close to her legs, "I don't know anymore," her voice low, almost a whisper. "I hate this! I hate you! WHY!? WHY DOES MY BODY HAVE TO FEEL THIS WAY NEAR YOU!?" She slammed a fist down on the moist soil, her eyes looking up at him, desperate for an answer.

Parc could feel his fear manifest as anger, dwindle away. Looking down at her with surprise. That was not an expected anger.

"Every time I look at you my heart beats faster and faster! IT HURTS! when I see Leone dragging you around! IT HURTS!" tears flowed freely, her voice lowering, "When I smell you, my body tingles all over and I don't know why! I hate this…" she buried her head into her knees, fingers grabbing fistfuls of her hair.

"I don't want to like you… but I can't help but. I don't even know you, you're a stranger to everyone here and I start feeling like this for a stranger I don't know…" She fell into light sobs. A sight Parc never thought he would have ever seen in person that wasn't Leone spreading some rumour around.

Parc's mouth fell open but shut to form a soft smile. Leaning back and using his hands to keep himself upright, looking out at the orange light of evening. "I'm a single child to a single mom. My father abandoned us when I was seven. Apparently, he was called back to his homelands and just never came back. I don't know if he's alive or otherwise."

Mine's sobs fell away. Lifting her head from her legs with trails of tears down her water logged cheeks.

"My mother… she is the best person you will ever meet on this world." He said, adding in thought 'Technically another, but details.' "She rose me from the ground up, helped me through the worst years of my life where I thought I was nothing but a parasite leeching off her. Every year we would run closer and closer to running out of our savings, all because a woman of her position had a child. Which for a Valkyrie is a big no no." he shook his head.

Mine tilted her head slightly at the mention of 'valkyrie' but kept listening, even as she wiped her still flowing tears away.

"It was on my tenth birthday when some man came to our house and tried to pay my mom for her 'services' that I learnt that she had ended up selling herself to some luxurious brothel in the upper quarters that catered specifically to the needs of the wealthy." A sodden expression took hold of him.

"It was also on my tenth birthday that my mother was nearly killed right in front of me," he gripped handfuls of mud. Mine gasping with widened eyes. "See, Valkyries are a special race where I'm from. We're born with more than just four appendages," he reached around to his back with grit teeth, "we Valkyries are born with a set of fully functional wings." He chuckled at her dubious expression.

"I know, sounds insane. But we have them." He could see Mine look to his back with a raised brow, but he said nothing about it. Instead returning to his story, "that man, I actually knew him quite well. He was the father of my bully, Broa. Somehow, he had learnt my mother was a courtesan and decided that he could just have his way with her whenever he wanted. For pennies of course, no chance that bastard would be able to afford her."

"Mother refused, slammed the door in the bastards face and was about to turn away to hand me my first gift when he crashed through the door. Tackling mother to the floor in rage. Tearing her wings out by the root. I still remember the squall of feathers and her screams. And I could only watch in horror as he tore mothers' clothes about to have his way with her body."

"But it seemed luck was kind to that just this once. As one of my aunts was passing by, the only one who cared enough about my mother to come to my birthday. Even if it were just so that she could check up on mother for the once-in-a-year she actually lowered herself to being near a half-breed like me."

Mine's breathing hitched 'Half… breed?' she thought, suddenly feeling a new connection forming between them. She herself was a half blood of imperial and foreign blood. A curse upon her childhood it was and lead to many a bruise on her body due to the vitriol people held and still do for those of foreign descent.

"My aunt skewered him through the heart, killing him. But her eyes, they were cold as they looked down at mother, the scorn she held in them was almost palpable. That was the last time in the last nine years I saw her. I later learned that when a Valkyrie lost their wings, they would be shunned even worse than after she gave birth to me."

"To this day, she hasn't seen one of the women she called 'sisters' even worse still, without her wings, she lost her appeal to the wealthy. Lost her job only to get a new one in the poor districts. We lost our house, downgrading to a shack in the middle of nowhere where monsters roamed around us. Stomping their hooves and paws, scratching at the wood of our shack and leaving scars in the land around us."

"Eventually, after I myself was shunned by my people, forbidden from even taking a small time job slinging horse crap into a compost pile, I was given the option to go through a de-winging. Which, I'm sure you can imagine what that entails."

Mine's eyes trembled in realization.

"I was brought into the back of a shed, face down on a slab of stone with my arms and legs tied down as the sawed through bone of my wing. My mom screaming in the distance for me not to go through with it, that even with only one wing I was worth more."

Her heart stopped for a second.

"I… I was an abnormality. An abomination in their eyes. A creature born with a cursed single black wing. A sign of impending destruction…" he snorted, a sharp glint in his eyes, "and when they offered me the chance to cut it off, remove the curse. I of course being the naïve idiot I was, jumped at it, wanting to finally be able to do more than leech off my mother for the rest of my life."

"Only, it seemed that there was more to that curse than just rumours as days later, our country was invaded by an enemy nation. Me and mom barely escaped our village before they arrived to raze it to the ground. We ended up crossing the border half a year later into a kingdom allied to our now annexed nation. And I can tell you first hand, never believe the bullshit men spout about their kingdom being a safe haven for all who come to them. It certainly wasn't safe for mother when she was kidnapped and forced into slavery," he looked up to the sky with a forlorn expression.

"Thirteen, that's how old I was when I last saw my mother. I have no idea where she is, who I need to kill to get her back or even if she is alive. I haven't given up, gods no. I have full intentions of gutting the bastards who took her. Even if it ends up being the monarch." Mine could see the ruthless determination on him. The way his eyes sharpened to slits, the focused but emotionless curl down of his lips. "So, yeah. That just about sums up my most defining moments." Just as quickly as it had appeared, it left, replaced by a bright, overflowing smile that caused Mine's heart to palpitate a beat faster.

"I've had a shit life."

That was the final straw that broke the camels back. Mine launched towards him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Surprising him as he heard her whisper "I'm so sorry," into his ear.

He chuckled, lifting a hand placing it on her lower back to reciprocate her hug, "don't be. That was just a small part of my life. I'm not going to get hung up on it. I've still got plenty of years ahead of me to make up for it."

Mine remained silent, her grip only tightening around his neck as a subtle indication of 'shut up and take it without feedback.'

Parc shut his eyes, saying no more as he simply let it happen. Feeling Mine's warm breath on his neck. The soft squish of her chest against his and the warmth her body exuded. Unable to see the bright red, panicked face she was making over his shoulder.

Hearing a light crunch, Mine looked up. Her face visibly paling at the sight of a certain blonde haired lioness. A mischievous grin on her face as she found a new muse to tease Mine about. Mine was just about to pull away from him and make as much distance as possible. But her body had other ideas, doing just the opposite. Her arms tightening around him to the point he felt circulation to his brain beginning to weaken.

Leone's eyes widened. A challenging smirk replacing her previous expression. "Oh, it's on pinky," Leone muttered under her breath, backing away further into the forest until she was out of sight. Relief filling Mine's body when she did.

But still they were not alone, as unbeknownst to them all was the green haired resident of Night Raid. Hidden behind a bush to the side of the pool. A trail of blood down his nose from when Mine had stripped to her undergarments which themselves had grown just slightly seethrough.

Lubbock turned his eyes skyward, moving away from the lake, "I still have much to learn, master."

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HAHA! You thought was raunchy sex scene! But it was I, backstory!