Chapter 339: Half Man, Half Snake**
When Ren finally peeled her eyelids open, the very first thing she saw was the dark ceiling of Syris’s nest.
She shot up in the fur bed with a gasp, her chest heaving as if she had just breached the surface of water. Her green eyes were wide and frantic. She whipped her head around, taking in the familiar, dimly lit cavernous room, the plush mountain of animal pelts, and the glowing blue moss illuminating the corners.
She remembered it. She remembered all of it.
She had gone back down that aquatic waterslide. She had dragged Vex down with her. They had popped out of the waterfall into that blindingly bright, tropical utopia under the swamp. But this time, unlike her first accidental plunge, she distinctly remembered an overwhelming sensation hitting her the second she surfaced. She remembered feeling incredibly strange—her head had spun wildly, her vision had blurred with dark spots, and a suffocating lightheadedness had dragged her under.
Was it just from holding her breath in the tunnel for way too long? Or was there something wrong with the crystal-clear water itself? Maybe the air in that hidden utopia was toxic, causing her to instantly pass out?
Ren rubbed her temples, groaning in frustration. She wasn’t sure what to think anymore. Because the most glaring question still remained: Who brought her back here?
And more importantly, why was she naked again?! Ren looked down at her bare, shivering body, completely devoid of the coarse fur dress she had put on in the scullery. She grabbed a thick wolf pelt and yanked it up to her collarbone.
"Why do I always end up naked?!" Ren hissed to the empty room.
She still firmly believed this nightmare had everything to do with Uriel and Selestia. The blue-haired fish beastman had pinned her in the garden pond, roughly demanding that she ’show Selene to him.’ Selene. The Moon Goddess.
If he was forcefully demanding her to do it, it meant there must be a way, right? But why her? Did she somehow have a connection to the Moon Goddess? Did Selene purposefully take her from her modern world and drop her into this wilderness? Could the Goddess actually do that?
Ren had a million burning questions and no one to answer them. She knew, deep in her gut, that all the answers she needed were hidden in that bizarre, sunlit place beneath the swamp. But she passed out every single time!
Then, a sudden thought hit her.
She had made it back to the nest. But where was Vex?
Was he still down there in the utopia? Was he captured? Was he still alive?
"System!" Ren called out, her anxiety spiking. "System, answer me right now! I know you can hear me! Where is Vex?!"
Radio silence, just like earlier.
Ren shivered, her bare shoulders cold against the damp cave air. With a frustrated huff, she checked her Quest Log.
Ren’s heart dropped all the way into her stomach.
[Quest: Free Vex the Fox Shaman from jail! - STATUS: INCOMPLETE]
"Incomplete?!" Ren shrieked, staring at the hovering blue text. "What do you mean incomplete?! We jumped down the magical hole together! I freed him!"
Ren pulled at her frizzy red hair, feeling a wave of hysteria washing over her. Was she losing her mind? Did she actually dream the entire second half of the night? Was the whole daring rescue, the Somnus-Weave Ivy, and the second plunge down the waterfall just a hyper-realistic hallucination induced by stress and whatever Uriel had done to her in the pond?
Maybe Vex was still sitting in his wooden cage in the lowest dungeon, waiting for an execution that was only hours away.
Ren couldn’t take the not-knowing. She threw the wolf pelt off her body and swung her bare legs over the edge of the bed. She was going to summon another dress, march straight back down to that freezing dungeon, and see for herself if the trickster fox was actually in that cage.
But just as her bare feet touched the cold stone floor, the door at the entrance of the nest opened.
Syris slithered into the room.
The royal feast was officially over. The Snake King had shed his legs, opting for his half-snake form. His upper torso was perfectly, muscularly human and entirely bare, while from his waist down, a long tail of shimmering dark scales dragged gracefully across the obsidian floor.
Syris immediately spotted her sitting on the edge of the bed. His amethyst eyes darkened with relief. He slithered forward, approaching the best.
"Are you feeling better?" Syris asked.
As he drew close, the scent of fermented grape wine washed over Ren. He wasn’t drunk, but she could see that he was horny. He wanted to mate.
Ren let out a sigh, gently pushing against his chest as he leaned over her.
"Syris, I’m really not in the mood right now," Ren murmured, her head throbbing with a vicious ache every time she tried to piece together the blanks in her memory. She felt confused, agitated, and overwhelmingly stressed. "My head hurts. I need to go check on something."
But Syris wasn’t taking no for an answer tonight.
"You need to rest," Syris commanded softly, ignoring her weak resistance.
Before she could stand up, his coils slithered onto the bed, wrapping around her bare legs and trapping her in place. He pushed her gently but firmly backward until she was lying flat against the furs.
"Syris, wait—" Ren tried to protest.
He silenced her by capturing her lips in a deep, bruising kiss. He tasted like berries.
While his mouth devoured hers, his large, cool hands swept down to cup her bare breasts. He kneaded the soft flesh with an aggressive, possessive hunger, his thumbs finding her sensitive nipples. He rolled the hardened peaks between his fingers before dragging his mouth down her jaw, her neck, and latching hotly onto her left breast.
He sucked hard, drawing the sensitive peak deep into the wet heat of his mouth, swirling his tongue around the areola while his teeth lightly scraped against the sensitive nerve endings.
Ren gasped, her back arching off the furs on its own accord. Wetness instantly flooded between her thighs. She had no choice but to surrender. Her treacherous body melted under his touch, the intense pleasure rapidly overriding her confusion and agitation.
His snake tail shifted, sliding between her bare thighs and forcing her legs wide open. It was a bizarre, overwhelming experience for Ren when he chose to mate in his half-beast form.
Syris gripped her hips with his large hands, lined himself up, and drove his length deep into her tight passage with one smooth, powerful thrust.
"Ah!" Ren cried out, her fingernails digging desperately into his broad, muscular shoulders.
He filled her completely, stretching her inner walls to their limit. The scales wrapped securely around her calves and thighs, pinning her in place, while his thick shaft pounded deep inside her core.
Syris let out a guttural hiss of pure pleasure, his amethyst eyes glowing wildly in the dim light. He began to thrust with a brutal, relentless rhythm. He pulled almost completely out before slamming his hips forward, burying himself to the hilt over and over again.
"Syris," Ren whimpered, her head tossing side to side on the furs.
The intense, repetitive friction was rapidly erasing her headache, replacing her stress with a blinding, intoxicating haze of pure lust. Her inner muscles clamped down greedily around his thick girth with every deep thrust. She wrapped her arms securely around his neck, pulling him down to kiss him fiercely, matching his primal, drunken hunger.
He set a punishing pace, the heavy slapping of his hips against her wet thighs echoing loudly in the cavernous nest. He knew exactly where to angle his thrusts, his thick shaft continuously grinding against her most sensitive internal spots.
Ren couldn’t hold on for long. The sheer, overwhelming dominance of the Snake King completely broke her. She let out a loud, shuddering scream, her vision going completely white as a world-shattering orgasm ripped through her body. Her inner walls spasmed violently, milking his thick length with every contraction.
Her intense release pushed Syris straight over the edge. With a dark, feral roar, he drove his hips forward one final, deep time, pinning her to the bed as he unloaded thick, scorching ropes of his seed deep into her aching womb.
He held himself buried inside her, his broad chest heaving as he caught his breath.
Ren lay boneless beneath him, her skin slick with sweat, her brain emptied of all thoughts regarding trickster foxes, missing dresses, or subterranean utopias.
Thoroughly satisfied, Syris pressed a soft, lingering kiss to her damp forehead. He shifted his weight off her, pulling her flush against his side. His dark coils slithered around her body, wrapping her securely in a protective, possessive cocoon of scales.
Within minutes, the sated Snake King fell fast asleep.