I strolled down the snow-covered alleyway, whistling. People gave me strange looks as I passed but I ignored them. I was in a good mood.
Getting into Rosa’s pants had been easy.
I was a natural at seducing women! My acne scars and awkward posture had held me back.
But thanks to Selena I now had skin as smooth as a porcelain doll’s. And my muscle-bound body was straight out of Greek myth—or Fight Club.
I decided to skip all the training and leveling up and head straight for the King’s castle.
The first Queen of Light was probably waiting in one of the castle towers, bored as fuck, fingering herself because her small-dick husband (aka the King of Windmoor) had ED.
Why train or level up when I could walk in the front entrance and steal her away?
The back streets of Windmoor were a messy tangle, filled with beggars, merchants, musicians, and soldiers for hire.
The castle wasn’t hard to find, though. No matter where I went in Windmoor, I could see its stone towers looming overhead.
I managed to reach the main gates after a half hour of walking.
As soon as I arrived I realized I’d been overconfident. Stone walls surrounded the castle, too tall to climb. Guards patrolled the ramparts carrying bows tipped with poison arrows.
A moat surrounded the wall. Fish with sharp teeth swam in the murky depths. With their fat bodies and bug eyes, they looked kind of like piranhas.
"Geez, there’s so much security. What’s the King of Windmoor afraid of?" I joked to a guard in a hut near the drawbridge. "Does he think someone is going to come in and steal his wife or something?"
The guard glared back at me, hands gripping the long spear by his side. His breath smelled like rotten garlic. "What do you want?"
"I’m here to have a ... uh ... an audience with the Queen."
The guard snorted. "You? A mere commoner? See the Queen? Even the aristocrats are only permitted into the castle on special holidays. Fuck off."
"I’m not a commoner. I’m special."
"Bullshit."
"Aw come on," I said. "Don’t talk to me like that. Let’s be friends. Listen—"
He shoved me in the chest. I stumbled and almost fell.
I glared at him. "So that’s how it’s going to be, huh?"
"Yea. It is."
"Well, then I’ve got to show you something."
I reached into my pocket and fumbled around. I pulled out my middle finger.
The guard didn’t like my joke. He rammed the butt of his spear into my solar plexus. Then he lifted me onto his shoulders, walked me outside, and threw me, kicking and screaming, into the moat full of man-eating fish.
"Bastard guard," I grumbled after I climbed out of the moat and stripped the flesh-eating fish off my arms and legs. I was bleeding from a half-dozen wounds, but already the flesh was beginning to knit shut. Another benefit of Shelhana’s magic. "If I wasn’t so busy, I’d track down your wife and fuck her. In the ass. But lucky for you I have things to do."
I sat down on a crate to think. Castle security looked tight. How was I going to get in? Unfortunately, none of the guards were women, or I could try to seduce them and "fuck" my way inside. I didn’t have any money for bribes either.
Coming through the front probably wasn’t going to work. Sneak in, then? But I had zero talent at sneaking. There were no vines to climb up or secret sewers to crawl through either.
That left me with a couple of other options. I could try to find work inside the castle. Or I could make friends with the aristocracy, who were invited inside on special days.
"Hey! Why are you still here?"
The guard from earlier was coming toward me. He didn’t look happy.
"Fuck off," I said. "I’m thinking about serious things."
"Well do it someplace else."
"Are you married?"
"Huh?"
"Do you have a wife?"
"Y-yea ... why?"
"Well I don’t have any money on me. I need to place to sleep. Any chance you’d let me stay the night? Preferably in her bed, not yours."
The guard socked me in the gut and threw me in the moat again. People aren’t very polite in Windmoor.