Jacoby was relieved of ‘intimate contact’ detail after we got out of the shower. By the end she was repeatedly going ‘oh my gods’ and looking down at the mess seeping out of her. But she dutifully held my hand and toweled me off, then handed me off to the next person the Agency thought they needed to keep latched onto me. This keeping me in line thing was working out pretty well in my favor, I had to say.

Fletcher II doing his duty as sex clone.

If you count leveling up as doing my duty, then yes. I not only got level 44, but also 45 from completely dominating Jacoby.

Level 44: +10 skill points

Level 45: +10 skill points

Twenty skill points, and for what? Making Jacoby do a complete about face. Thoroughly making her mine. Also making two trained Agency Guardians and one Bard thoroughly lose their shift when trying to pry me off her… or her off me.

In addition, I received the same notification about Jacoby joining the fold. We had somehow become Close Confidants over the course of the last three loads inside her. That made me grin.

If I wanted, I could replace one of my abilities with Fleet of Foot. My growing Mana Affinity skill informed me that this was an aura similar to the one she used to move through the wilds, and help others move quickly along with you.

There was no way I was going to let this replace Bondsealer, so instead I just lumped the experience in. And speaking of Bondsealer, I was actually now in a position to bond a third Nakamamon.

Astonishing. The obvious choices were Azalea, who felt like she owed me a life debt, and April, who also felt beholden to my every whim. The flower fox girl was even now following OG Fletcher around the garden and smiling at literally every action he took.

My skill points needed to stick around for the first moment when I got a Healer level. If there weren’t enough for my Healer skills, I’d use these from Pleasure Seeker. My adventures in ‘convincing’ Jacoby to help me were proof that my Qualities were plenty high enough level.

Once I was dried off and dressed again, the Agency had Jacoby bring me to a meeting of the conclave. She kept casting glances back over her shoulder at me. I wondered if she expected me to simply vanish now that I’d gotten inside her and changed her entire perspective on what feeling good could mean.

She was blushing, and I realized later that every time she turned, she was casting a glance down at my crotch. I followed, watching her butt bounce. I’d just been inside that. What I’d deposited inside might still be trickling out this very moment.

I don’t want you messing around with any other men, I sent her telepathically. I also want you to make getting me free of this place your priority. Within a week.

Her pony tail bounced and shimmered, but next time when she turned to look at me, I thought she nodded just slightly.

When I entered the conclave room hand in hand with Jacoby, and beheld the five Agency higher ups, I wanted to laugh in their faces. Jacoby’s entire team was there. Savannah had been shortlisted to be my next intimate contact partner, followed by Celine, but the normally cheerful Bard turned down the job after her psychic effect rebounded back on her and caused her a whole bunch of pain. Celine they’d eliminated because they scried my past and found out she was in even deeper with me than Jacoby was. Celine hadn’t lasted a day before calling me Daddy and asking me to call her slut and whore.

That left the Guardian, Ribbit. The last time I’d seen her, it was to drag her out of the divinity poisoning area where she’d been getting spit roasted by two of her team members.

I glanced over and noted the two other Guardians who had tried to pull Jacoby off me and failed. Neither met my eye.

“You might as well just let me go,” I told them. “You’re wasting time and resources here you could be using to fix the problems in this world.” Most of those problems were ones they’d created.

“We cannot simply order your death,” they said. Jacoby’s hand tightened in mine, and a flare of annoyance bubbled up in my chest. “Nor can we entrust your continued incarceration to Ranger Jacoby.”

“I’m still locked up,” I said, shrugging. “She’s doing her job. Intimate contact is exactly what we’ve been doing.”

Jacoby sidled closer to me and squeezed both my hands, hard. Her grip was strong, and my trapped fingers protested at the pain. “Don’t do it,” she breathed.

I just turned a smirk her way. Whatever she was warning me away from, I wanted to know.

“You’d better not make me fork you right here and now,” she breathed.

I found the idea so deliciously wrong that I considered it. How far could I conceivably get before they tore Jacoby away from me? Would they literally be pulling her off my full length? They had tried before and failed. These people were already squeamish enough as it was.

Wanting to test that squeamishness. Not wanting to provoke them any further than I already had. Both.

“We are deliberating on a partner to keep you from dissolving,” the conclave said. It was clear they’d had Savannah lined up until the incident with her falling onto my spears, followed closely by asking for volunteers and getting Celine, who wasn’t going to cut it in their book. The hilarious irony of requiring a partner be in intimate contact with me, but be unable to have sex with me, was not lost on me.

“Here’s a counter offer,” I said, with more cockiness than I felt. “Why don’t you let my people go, and let my other people tunnel you an access point to the portal, and we’ll call it a day.”

Several frowns followed. They’d rather watch me have sex with anyone they sent along with me.

“Ranger Jacoby, you are relieved of your assignment,” one of them said. “Wizard Rasmussen, you have been tasked with keeping in contact with the prisoner until we are prepared to take punitive action against him.”

My brow furrowed in confusion, until Celine stepped forward. The slight Wizard with the mousey brown hair, the huge lenses, the cute and unassuming look was the last person I figured they would send with me.

With measured steps, she came over and clasped my other arm. Jacoby had some difficulty peeling herself away from me, and was gently coaxed off me by a distrustful-looking Savannah and one of her Guardians.

Celine appeared dazed up until we left the conclave room. Then she turned a look at me that was so predatory and needy I had a moment of wondering just what the Agency had chosen her for.

***

Two minutes after passing the Eelysian’s test, I was making my second Divine Resistance check. I had to admit, the divine energy here was far in excess of the one I’d encountered in the Ascendillo compound. I had no concrete proof that they had a god convalescing on site, but the Healer part of me knew.

The Eelysian hadn’t wanted to give me its name, but finally relented. Its name was Bert.

Bert the holy eel. Sure. Probably short for Berteleminaous Constantine Krakaw von Sheepsbilge, EIEIO.

“Are you sheltering a god here?” I asked the creature.

It simply regarded me with that awkward and condescending eel stare.

“Because if you’re sheltering a sick god in here, I can tell you it’s wrecking havoc on the lives of tens of thousands of your fellow citizens. I’m almost certain it’s illegal.”

“What allows you to walk amongst us, Healer?” it asked.

“Divine Resistance. Up above level 10.”

It chewed on this for a while and floated at head level, not far off.

“More importantly, if you’re sheltering a sick god here, it’s wrong. I’ve healed a number of gods already, and I can tell you that I’m going to heal this one. Life here will go back to how it was…”

They didn’t want life to continue. These people were hiding the God of Doors in their cavern system here. They wanted the people of Saxwhacket to leave, abandon the city. This place could go back to being a remote sanctuary in a strange location.

I activated Draconic Spirit for a single Likability Token and Healer’s Resistance for 2 Durability Tokens at the same time. A split second later, the creature’s eyes glowed.

“You have been judged and found unworthy,” it said, its voice changed by the ability. The next words died in its throat as the spirit of the dragon surrounded me. Still, the ability it used appeared in a UI message a second later.

Fall of the Prideful: Partial success! You have lost 5 levels of Divine Resistance while this ability is active. You have lost 5 Tokens permanently. Your Divine Resistance has allowed these Tokens to be lost at random.

“I don’t take being attacked lightly,” I said, my voice cold. I could feel the divine energy of the place hitting harder than it had previously.

Thing was, I couldn’t just lash out and return fire. The mayor was a stickler, the people weren’t happy, and there was no telling what either of them would do if I raised a hand against one of theirs, especially if the citizen in question was part of a holy order.

The eel’s mouth hung open, and in typical eel fashion, it looked like it had just told a bad joke, and was waiting for you to laugh. It was funny, but under the circumstances I didn’t want to make the situation worse by laughing.

Instead I flapped my wings and lifted off the ground, then cleared the area in a hurry.

***

The Lemonkey was apoplectic with rage. “You are NOT to invade the domains of the citizens! Under NO circumstances are you to approach the Eelysians again, do you HEAR me?”

I swallowed my annoyance.

“There is a sick god here, and it is making everyone’s life more difficult. The Eelysians almost certainly have it in their compound.”

“You have no PROOF!” he shrieked. “How are you supposed to level ACCUSATIONS like this when there’s no PROOF?”

“They attacked me,” I said.

He froze, mouth agape. This simply did not compute. They… what? Only wild animals attacked people, and that was rare, since everyone had aspect-based magic and didn’t act like complete morons. They didn’t, for instance, go into the dens of incredibly powerful rock munching creatures, and coat themselves in delicious rocks using their Guardian abilities.

“Yes, they attacked me. Used some divine ability to suck out my Tokens and lower my skill levels.”

Suddenly his entire tone changed. “I would hardly call that an attack. I’m sure there was some kind of misunderstanding—”

“So you wouldn’t mind if I started using abilities on you?” I asked.

He grew angry again, and I understood something: this guy didn’t like humans.

“There is a clear and strict rule as laid out by the treaty as signed by your—”

“Oh yes, I know,” I said. “It doesn’t cover such topics as shouting at the top of your lungs at people, but I would think it’s pretty clear about attacks made using aspect abilities.”

He blanched, then started stammering.

“I’ll take a read through that treaty, if you don’t mind.”

“Well, there’s no, that’s not necessary.”

“Then you will do me the favor of following me, so I can solve your problem.” I marched back off in the direction of the Eelysians.

It turned out the Eelysians claimed they were not bound by the terms of the treaty, since they had arrived in Saxwhacket before all the rest of the people, and had never been under the aegis of the mayor or the town’s governmental apparatus.

I listened to this with an odd sort of detached calm. A ten foot floating holy eel was arguing with a four foot lemon yellow howler monkey over whether or not I could confirm the presence of a sick god. Truly the world was an incomprehensible place.

“So you see—” the Eelysian started, but I held up my hand.

“So you mean to say this treaty doesn’t apply to you?” I asked, deadly quiet.

The two of them froze and regarded me.

“This treaty that claims no violence shall be done to the citizens of Saxwhacket by the humans of the Agency? You’re not covered by this treaty signed by my leader, which I am bound by?”

The eel’s mouth opened again in what appeared to be incoming mocking laughter, but was probably shock.

“Human—” the mayor warned, but I had already stepped onto the property again. For once, the Lemonkey fell silent.

In a flash I burned all of my Likability and Free Tokens. Then in a loud voice, I shouted, “Eelysians and your charges, I am Christopher Fletcher! I have been tasked with curing a sick god, and that means I’m coming in to confirm the presence of a sick god. If you attack me, as one of you has already done, I am well within my rights to return violence in kind.”

After this, I burned through all my other remaining Tokens: Muscularity still had two left, Agility, Ingenuity, and Durability I spent to make myself immune from divine damage for the day. I could see the magic of the huge, almost hockey puck sized coins appearing and puffing into magic sparklies in the eyes of the Eelysians.

With only Affinity Tokens left, I then spent 5 of those to refill all my Tokens using Arcane Alchemy.

I hadn’t done this before, since I could only use it once per Healer level, but it was a dizzying rush to be filled with all the Tokens all at the same time.

When Bert the Eelysian got in my face, I calmly took him by the snout and shoved him aside. He went careening off and only just managed to stabilize himself to avoid crashing into the compound’s wall. It was close.

It was not a long walk to the main ‘building’, which was actually a towering rock full of small holes for eels to fit into. Like the walls, this was white marble filled with gold veins. The god wasn’t going to be in there, unless they destroyed their building, stuffed it in there somehow, and finally restoring the building to the way it had done.

It wasn’t there, meaning the only other place it could be was the temple-looking building with the very low doorway made of the same white and gold marble. This one was sculpted: columns flanked the door, with a large triangular pediment up top proclaiming divine acts by eels in relief sculpture. Behind this rose a large dome, some fifteen or twenty feet.

The pressure of divinity increased the closer I got, so I ducked down and prepared to shuffle inside.

Excoriate the Slothful: You are immune to Divine damage. Damage is reduced to zero. However, you have been slowed by 10%. (Divine Resistance success cuts the effect by 80%)

I turned, manifested the Draconic Spirit, and had the thing roar directly in the face of the eel. With my enhanced Likability, especially using the Free Tokens, the intimidation skill check went off like a dream. Burt literally tied himself in a knot trying to turn and get away from me as fast as eel-ly possible.

Other Eelysians and their little ones were coming to their aid, only to stop at hearing the mighty roar of a dragon come out of my hospital-blue dragon’s maw.

The doorway, all of four feet high, I had to duck through, but once I was inside, I could stand. And wouldn’t you know it, they had themselves a god inside. Sure, it was literally a door lying on a large marble plinth smaller than the door itself, but the way the door was slowly breathing, and the divinity coming off it were both clear indicators that it wasn’t a normal door. It was your standard wood, carved into four rectangular quadrants and with intricate rope-like borders running the exteriors, with a brass knob and a keyhole. A central peephole was set around eye level.

It slowly opened, letting out a breath, before air was sucked in and it closed. Then it opened again and exhaled.

“Heyyyyyy,” I told it gently, and felt the presence of more eel Nakamamon from without, all closing in to watch me. “I’m just going to give you a few diagnostics. Once we figure out what’s going on, we’re going to whip up a cure and get you healed up, okay? You’re going to be just fine.”

I produced a tool for diagnosis using the boon from the God of Productivity, before running the crystal over the door’s exterior, a few inches from actually touching it. That done, I examined it for actual breakage, or, I don’t know, evidence of divine termites. The physical test for physical abnormalities. Finding none, I struck a small tuning fork. The hum was supposed to give me an indication of whether or not the god was suffering from a mental issue. I wanted to say I doubted that a door could get depressed or anxious, but I could never really tell with this world. The eggs in Slinktrickle had been mentally ill.

Finally, I surrounded the door with small blue and purple stones to gauge whether the mana coming or going from it, circulating through its chakras, was healthy or not.

My first check succeeded handily. It was at Extreme difficulty, but for now, my Ingenuity was at level 20. Coupled with my Diagnostics of 12, there was no problem getting the dozen necessary successes. I ended up with 13.

The UI then informed me that the God of Doors was indeed suffering from a Mental affliction after all, and not a Divine or Magical one as I’d suspected. I cast my mind back to the strange dark Nakamamon who had appeared, who altered my memory and stopped time. She had claimed to be the reason behind all these problems… how in the devil would she even go about harming a God of Doors mentally?

I didn’t have any answers to that question, for the moment. The first thing that happened was several water attacks from the Eelysians.

The next insanity that befell me was a cascade of water attacks. I already had a whole lot of water resistance from being a bond mate with Vellenia, but when I actually started taking damage, I activated Healer’s Resistance to make that number near zero.

“You’re actually doing violence,” I muttered to myself. “Do you realize how insane this seems?”

Another few attacks followed, which bounced off my resistances.

I whirled on them, and the dozens of Eelysians and Celesteels shrank back.

“You’re causing thousands to suffer,” I told them.

“They cause us suffering every single day,” one intrepid leader eel claimed, as if that made sense and was okay.

“Not for much longer. I’m going to cure this god and put the city right.” No more doors to fracking rivers.

When I started to walk towards the exit, none of them moved.

“Let me out.”

Instead, they crowded in closer.

“That’s enough,” I said, but my Likability had been spent.

Apparently it wasn’t enough. A bunch of them rushed at me, and now I experienced true frustration. I wasn’t supposed to attack these people, but I was approaching self defense territory, a feeling I’d never had to deal with before.

This is Christopher not enjoying the idea of hurting people, even people who are kind of jerks.

I ended up activating Draconic Spirit too late. Well over a dozen of the larger Eelysians darted in, jabbing me in the chest with their snouts all at the same time. The little ones blasted out with jets of water simultaneously. It had a knock back effect, and I was forced to step back just as I was battered by a dozen of these things. The Tokens appeared and so did the spiritual dragon, just as I slipped and hit the door jamb.

Someone had opened the God of Doors.

This is Christopher getting shoved through.