Dungeons and Dalliances

7.63 – Into the Basement I

"What did you call me?"

Natalie winced at the expression on Vanetta's face. "Uh. Just said it in the moment?"

"Why do you keep using that word for me?" she demanded. "I'm not 'cute'."

In the aftermath of a vigorous throat-fucking, red-faced with saliva dripping down from her chin, Natalie was temporarily inclined to agree. Cute wasn't the first word that came to mind. At least, that would've been the case if she hadn't been glowering in outrage over 'that word' being used for her.

"Agree to disagree?" Natalie joked, maybe unwisely. She fell onto her back on the bed and let out a huge sigh. "You know, you took that better than I thought. You're a natural."

"I'm not sure 'natural cocksucker' is a compliment."

"Wasn't much sucking happening," Natalie snickered. "Natural dick taker? Whatever you wanna call it."

"Do you want me to kill you?"

"At least I'd die happy," Natalie sighed. "Seriously, that was amazing."

"Ugh," the girl said, rolling off the bed and stalking to where Natalie had thrown her armor. "You're impossible sometimes. Get dressed." She tossed Natalie's metal bra at her. "Still have a mission to get to, if you've forgotten." Her lower piece of armor followed, then her boots and gloves next.

Mid-task, Vanetta paused, distracted by something. She flexed her hands in front of her face, blinking in surprise. She hopped a few times from side to side, then dashed to the other side of the room. It took a second for Natalie to understand what was happening.

"Oh, wow," Vanetta said. "You weren't kidding. I'm not even fighting, and I can feel how big the stat boost is. That's some skill."

She emphasized the statement with a few more displays of speed and acrobatics. Straightening out, she seemed to forget about the offensive word Natalie had used for her; her focus was on the buff she'd gotten. A combat-obsessed delver, as usual.

The change in attitude was swift enough that she even seemed to forget the lewdness that had been happening minutes prior: that she'd just gotten a sizable load of cum shot down into her stomach, and that her face was still a mess from the rather thorough abusing Natalie had put it through.

She briefly wondered whether she should return the favor. She'd gotten a wonderful orgasm out of the 'skill requirement' of [Divine Invigoration], but Vanetta hadn't. Though, by the enthusiasm she'd shown while taking Natalie's cock, she'd enjoyed herself.

Alas, the moment had passed, so Natalie knew what response she would get: Vanetta would decline, citing a lack of practical reasons to do so.

She might have tried her hand at pinning Vanetta down anyway, but they did have a Palace Basement assignment coming up, and that whole ordeal would come with a number of climaxes for both of them. No need to rush.

She went about cleaning herself up using the cleaning agent. Afterward, she passed the towel and liquid to Vanetta, who, blinking, remembered she had plenty that needed cleaning too. She took the vial with a blush.

"You got it everywhere," Vanetta muttered, wiping her face off. "And I'm still mad how you hit me with it, by the way. That was rude."

"My bad," Natalie said, though both of them knew Vanetta had liked it as much as she had.

A few minutes later, they were presentable again and striding back out into the palace as if nothing had happened. As if a few moments earlier she hadn't just been slapping her hips into Vanetta's face and watching her throat bulge. Such was their new 'normal' in the City of Eros—if admittedly she hadn't fully adjusted to it yet. It would take more than a week to get used to such constant lewdness, especially the public sort the City loved to flaunt. She still couldn't pass by the occupied pillories without her cheeks flaming.

Heading down the palace hallways with Vanetta by her side, apprehension for their upcoming assignment rose within her. It was time for, by all accounts, the 'lewdest' of the assignments a person could be offered in the City of Eros—though upper-ranking Arena stakes could get pretty crazy too.

The Palace Basement, from what Natalie had learned, was similar to a normal themed dungeon floor: it kept the aesthetic of stone cellars and passageways throughout and contained a variety of monsters and traps. But the real theme wasn't the aesthetics, but the frequency of that type of encounter. Where she might bump into a few such events with her team on a regular dungeon trip, delving the Palace Basement meant every few rooms might come with a lewd encounter—or more often than that, depending on their luck.

That said, there would be regular encounters too. Or, as one girl had suggested while giggling, maybe there were deviants who were willing to 'do it' with anything, including regular monsters—so every room was lewd, if you thought about it. Natalie had no intentions of testing that theory; if they ran into a normal, non-humanoid, non-busty wolfgirl-monster monster or similar, she would be killing it, not testing how amenable they were to the idea of fucking rather than fighting.

But in the worst-case scenario, she had braced herself for anything. Diving into the Palace Basement was giving blanket consent for the variety of situations that could be found within. She and Vanetta stood significantly better odds at fighting their way out of anything they didn't feel enthusiastic about, at least, but there were no guarantees.

The entrance to the Palace Basement was found through an unassuming wooden door in the kitchen area of the palace. There were a few people hanging around the door hoping to team up for their bi-daily assignment. Finding a team wasn't the easiest task, though, since most people preferred to tackle such degeneracy themselves. Plus, grouping up essentially guaranteed sexual encounters between party members. Either a positive or a negative, depending on the person.

A few people of both genders propositioned them, but she shook her head to decline. Swinging the Palace Basement door open and looking into the staircase that dipped into pitch-blackness at a supernatural speed, Natalie took a breath and met Vanetta's eyes. The other girl hesitated briefly before lifting her chin, squaring her shoulders, and striding into the dark tunnel—perhaps to stop herself from losing her nerve.@@novelbin@@

Natalie, of course, followed.