The World Is Mine For The Taking

I tore all the vines off her body with a swift, merciless pull and let her collapse to the ground like a ragdoll dropped from a great height.

Dorothea lay there, panting heavily, her chest rising and falling with shallow breaths.

Her face was flushed, her lips slightly parted, eyes hazy from the overwhelming stimulation.

Then, suddenly, she gasped sharply, like someone jolted out of a trance.

"Ah…! W-Why'd you drop me like that?!"

Her voice trembled... not out of fear, but out of longing.

Her body, her mind… she still craved more of the pleasure those vines had given her.

She wasn't even trying to hide it. It was written all over her face.

But I had no intention of feeding that desire any further.

"I'm not giving it to you," I said flatly.

"Eh?! W-Why not?!"

"Because you were clearly losing yourself in it," I told her, narrowing my eyes. "You were drowning in that pleasure until nothing made sense anymore. It stopped being fun. It stopped being sane."

And there was another reason.

"I also want you to return me to normal. Us, I mean."

"I-I will…! I will!" she said desperately, like a child promising not to misbehave again just to get what they want.

She snapped her fingers without hesitation, and in that instant, the unnatural weight crushing my chest disappeared like smoke blown away by the wind.

I inhaled sharply and glanced down.

The height difference… the absence of that heavy mound on my chest… the return of that familiar, unmistakable presence between my legs.

I reached down to confirm it... just to be sure.

Phew… yeah. I was definitely back.

Thank fuck.

I let out a long breath I hadn't realized I was holding.

Turning around, I glanced back at Tris and Isiliraiellyn.

They, too, had reverted to their original forms.

Tris, however, was still caught up in the afterglow of what had just happened. She cupped her tits with both hands, biting down softly on her bottom lip, her eyes half-lidded with what looked like arousal.

But the moment our eyes met, she froze and quickly dropped her hands, looking flustered.

"N-Now, please… subject me to that again…!"

Dorothea wasn't even trying to hide it.

She seriously wanted another round of tentacle play?

Unbelievable.

She was hopeless and shameless. Utterly depraved.

"Nah. I'm done for today."

"Why?!"

"Because you were playing around," I said coldly. "I'm not in the mood to indulge someone who treats it all like some perverted game."

I turned my back to her, already walking away.

"See you," I said, my tone final.

"W-Wait…!" she screamed behind me, then practically threw herself at my leg, clinging like a child having a meltdown. "P-Please, don't leave me…! Please! I beg you! Subject me to that again! I've never cummed that hard in my entire life! So please! I'll do anything! Just… don't go!"

She was clinging to me, tears spilling from the corners of her eyes.

She looked desperate. Like seriously, unhinged levels of desperate.

She wasn't faking it. She looked like someone on the verge of breaking.

And this… this was supposed to be the infamous Black Witch?

"Fine," I said slowly, narrowing my eyes. "If you're that desperate, I'll entertain you. But you'll listen first. I came here for a reason, remember? I asked you something. Did you ever do something like this to a child who was brought by their father... Someone whose gender you changed? Does that ring any bells?"

"When did this happen?"

"Roughly twenty years ago," I replied, my voice firm.

She tilted her head back and stared up at the ceiling, fingers resting thoughtfully on her chin. Her expression twisted with effort, as if she was digging through dusty archives in her mind.

For a few seconds, it seemed promising.

But then she threw up her hands with a groan.

"Ugh. I can't remember. I give up."

"Goodbye, then," I said coldly, already turning away again.

"W-Wait! D-Don't leave, please!" she shouted, grabbing at my leg again. "I swear I can remember! It's just… hard, okay?! That was twenty years ago! I can't even remember half the people I met this week! How the hell am I supposed to remember something like that when I can't even remember where I put my shit yesterday?!"

I paused and looked down at her.

"Then you'd better start thinking right now," I said darkly. "Because if I leave, I'm not coming back. And I'm pretty damn sure you don't want that, do you?"

She knew I was right. No fake dick or overpriced dildo would ever make her feel what I did.

Not even close.

"A-Alright. I'm going to think real hard," she muttered, standing up from where she was kneeling.

She smoothed out her wrinkled, half-open clothes—still disheveled from earlier—and looked like she was really trying this time.

Her brow furrowed.

She looked deep in thought, her eyes scanning the void as if chasing after some fading memory.

"Hmmm… Hmmm… Hmmmmmmmm…"

She kept humming to herself, pacing slightly, hands on her hips, then back to her chin.

Then suddenly—

"Aha!" she exclaimed, clenching a fist and smacking it into her open palm. "That's right! I remember now! There was this old guy with white hair who came knocking at my door. Gave me a mountain of gold. Like, a whole-ass stack. Not that I've got any of it left because I blew it all on wine, food, random junk, and dildos, but yeah, he gave me 300 gold coins to do something for him. And then another 100 gold coins to keep quiet about it. So I did."

"Are you going to tell us what it was?" I asked, eyeing her carefully.

"That's no big deal," she said, waving her hand nonchalantly. "A promise from twenty years ago? Please. That kind of pact breaks apart like cheap parchment. I'm not bound by that shit anymore."

She let out a light laugh, as if that decades-old promise had meant absolutely nothing to her.

Honestly, she seemed like the last person on Earth you'd want to trust with a secret.

"Alright then. What did he make you do?" I asked, my voice low but firm.

Tris had already come back to her senses now that we were back to discussing something serious.

"He brought a baby with him... and made me change its gender. Just like you said," Dorothea replied, her voice surprisingly casual for something so heavy.

Tris and I turned toward each other at the same time, exchanging a look that confirmed what we both already knew.

The puzzle pieces were coming together faster than I could process them.

Given that Dorothea was paid a massive sum not just to perform the spell but also to keep quiet about it—and considering the man's white hair, matching the current appearance of the Sword Saint, there was no doubt. The one she was talking about... was the Sword Saint.

And that baby—the one whose gender she had altered—it could only be one person.

Johanne.

"Judging from the look on your faces," Dorothea suddenly said, snapping us from our thoughts, "you two must be pretty close with that baby I changed, huh?"

There was a casual amusement in her voice.

"Well, I guess that makes sense," she continued, laughing softly to herself. "It has been twenty years, after all. That child would be around your age by now." Her laugh quickly turned louder, more unhinged, echoing through the room. "Hahahaha! This is fate! Actual fate! Because of that spell, I met Leon! And now—now we're here together like this!"

She suddenly threw her arms up toward the ceiling, eyes gleaming with a strange, manic joy.

"No—this is fate!" she cried out, her voice almost singing, directed up to the ceiling as if the heavens themselves were listening. "It's destiny! All of it!"

I waited for her excitement to die down before stepping forward, my tone turning serious again.

"Let me ask you something," I said. "Is it possible to reverse the gender of someone you've changed—even without hearing that snapping sound you make?"

I was thinking about Johanne.

She had turned back into a woman after kissing me—something that felt spontaneous at the time, but maybe there was something more behind it. I needed answers straight from the source. From the one who held this power.

Dorothea tilted her head thoughtfully, tapping her chin. "Hmm… I don't really know for sure, but…" she trailed off, eyes lighting up as a memory surfaced. "Oh yeah! There is something. A specific act that can undo the spell. It erases the curse as well as lets the person go back to who they originally were."

Her voice dropped slightly, like she was sharing a secret.

"And that act... is a kiss."

Just like I thought.

It was possible.

"That explains so much…" I muttered under my breath, the pieces falling perfectly into place.

But Tris looked troubled, her brows furrowed as she recalled something. "But when we kissed during our wedding… she didn't turn back," she said, a hint of confusion in her voice.

Dorothea didn't seem surprised. She shrugged, casually, like this was all common knowledge.

"Well, that's because there are conditions," she explained. "In order for the spell to break… the person they kiss has to be someone they're truly in love with. That's the requirement."

She paused, letting it sink in before grinning again.

"Actually… that's the only requirement."

With another shrug, she sealed it.

"Anyway, yeah. The key is a true love's kiss. Nothing else works."

A true love's kiss.

Now everything was starting to make sense.