These Eldritch Hips – (Modbased)Litrpg

Haet didn't waste any time.

"Secrets. Know things. How?"

Celia didn't answer immediately. Couldn't answer it. Her thoughts churned and slowed as explanation passed through her mind. Questions as to whether it was wise to tell or not. And if he would even believe her if she did.

She wasn't sure she would believe herself. A future version of myself told it to me, was quite the thing to digest after all.

You can tell him.

Celia almost asked why aloud. Only to stop herself and think the question instead.

Something you will come to learn in time is that most things with claws are great secret keepers. Scorpions included.

Celia wasn't certain if she trusted that. Both because it sounded clinically insane, and she had more than a few bad experiences at the beach to prove that not all clawed creatures could be trusted. But, she was already going off of somewhat sketchy information from her future self anyway.

So, she told him.

He took it well.

"Beyonder. You... Become Beyonder? Haet, Haet need moment. Haet also have more question."

Celia leaned against the wall, arms crossed, and nodding in agreement. "Trust me, I've got a few questions myself."

There was no response from the scorpion. Not for the next minute after that. Instead, he wrapped his stinger like legs around the bone chair jutting out of the ground and took a seat. Head bowed in thought.

He stayed like that for the next for minutes. A stretch of silence that Celia let linger. She had a bit to think about as well, one half of her brain choosing to wonder about food while the other tried to wrap her understanding around her current life. Namely how it seemed to be getting more ridiculous with every turn.

You can say that again. Discipline agreed.

Vice on the other hand, looked at it all with a far more optimistic point of view. Namely through the lens of getting to taste more unique foods.

Truly, a noble goal.

Haet had a more noble answer, however. One of both ruin and promise. The visage of his carapace no longer disguising the sharp mind held within.

"Haet heard of you. Old stories. Wrong stories. Ruins, crypts, tombs out place. Old name, new name." He said, slowly, each word bearing the weight of experience best left forgotten. Of things seared into the mind.

And Paradox responded in kind. Her voice a lilt of song. Older and more ancient than what should've been possible.

"Lo and behold, eyes that have drank darkness and light. Teeth that have tasted of sky and deep. Hunger that has no end. Behold your nameless thing and serve."

The words, ringing with promise, with power that echoed beyond the immaterial and into the physical, hit Haet like a sledge hammer to stone. And at once he dropped to something resembling a knee. A dark tendril, dripping black splotches of what could've been blood connecting him to her.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

And Celia couldn't help but wonder. Mind couldn't help but churn and think and beg to know.

"What did you just do to him?"

Like I said my dear self, messing with time is a fools errand. So best to take a few precautions when you do it. Meet your first retroactively created familiar.

Again, Celia could fathom no greater response.

"What?" She asked, confused, and more than a little tired of being confused.

And the answer she received in response didn't help with such a matter at all.

I altered his history a bit. Trust me, just by the slightest amount necessary for what we need.

"You did what!? Why? That's seems really messed don't you think?"

In my defense there are a couple of timelines in which he betrays us.

"Is it for valid reasons?"

In... A few of them.

"No, turn him back. I'm not okay with this."

"Haet okay with serve."

See, he's fine with it.

Celia growled. "Paradox."

Okay, fine. I may have gone a little overboard based off a cocktail of experiences I technically never lived...

"... So you're going to fix him. Now."

... Does it have to be now?

"My morals could not have degraded that much. Yes it has to be now, and put him back exactly as he was before you touched him."

And for a moment, her future self pouted. Almost exactly like a child given too much power. Which obviously reflected on Celia in a way she very much chose not to think about.

But eventually her future self moved. Invisibly, silently, and powerfully. A spear of darkness moving out from Celia and into Haet. The blast causing him to rise, convulsing, claws held out snapping open and shut.

Stay still by the way, I'm not exactly an expert when it comes to this.

Celia did as asked, though not without sassily pointed out how she shouldn't have done it in the first place within the supposed safety of her own mind. A mind that was quickly filling with questions coming from her other two selves. Giving Celia a brief moment of distraction in explaining all that had transpired.

Paradox was finished with her work by the time Celia was halfway through the tale. And by the time she was done, so too was Haet and his shaking. The red armored giant stumbling on his stinger like feet a second after. Clawed hand cupping his head as he came to.

"What do to Haet?"

"That was my, uh, future self." She offered, hoping that would be explanation enough.

It wasn't.

"Haet demand answers. If good will not turn to smear on wall."

Celia nodded in understanding, certain she would feel the same way in his position. "Okay so future me is a Beyonder. You remember that right?"

"Haet remember. Haet unsure how that make actions okay." He said, standing ever more imposingly over her.

Celia instinctively took a step back, rear end meeting the wall long before her back did. Hands rising in preemptive defense.

"I'm not saying it's okay, Haet. But I don't really control her so please don't hit me. Also I'm sorry. Really."

And for a second, Haet loomed. Red energy bursting from his body in cackling chains of erratic light. Forked tongues that promised pain and destruction. Tainting the air with his rage.

And then his power was pulled back. Red glow sinking back into the cracks of his armor, the ire leaving his eyes as he took a deep breath. Storm abating as quick as it arrived.

"Lucky Haet like you. Also owe Haet free hit when turn into Beyonder. And favor."

Celia, nervously, chuckled. "If I live that long, I'll give you two. Uh, three if you agree to help me?"

"Kill hydra?"

"Yes."

"Haet already want do that. Was curious of strange discrepancies. Now understand, cursed to power not wanted."

Celia looked down as he spoke. Eyes resting on her chest and the arms wrapped beneath it. At all the changes that had wracked her body. From the additional set of arms to the leather like dress that had become her skin.

"Yeah." She agreed.

And that was that. Words uttered in almost silence before they returned to their little gathering hall. Each of Celia's steps sending an echoing quake of motion through her body. Behind quaking twice as alien thoughts nibbled at her mind.

Was she sure she wanted to go home?

The answer, ultimately, didn't matter at the moment. Not until E-10 was dead and she had the freedom to choose where she would go.

What she would become.

Because it was becoming increasingly clear to her that she would become something else. And her only choice in the matter seemed to be how much of a beast she would transform into.

That scared her. But she suppressed the fear as she returned to her seat at the table. Squeezing her every growing body into the bone born chair. Ignoring the monster's hunger clawing it's way out of her core. And allowing a shadow of the animal cunning her mind was slowly growing used to free.

And then they planned.