CxC Chapter 33: Bargain (Patreon)

~Venelana Gremory~

Venelana enjoyed a cup of tea with her daughter on the gazebo as they watched the sight of Rias' pawn working out in the yard a bit away from them while taking a break from their own training session. Him doing pushups without his shirt on he sweated heavily. The visual of the attractive young man doing exercise was certainly pleasing. Even more so the dedication to helping her daughter the young man showed made her appreciate it even more.

And glancing to the side of her daughter she giggled to herself seeing the wistful sigh she was giving with the adoration in her eyes. She knew that expression, the boy had unknowingly wrapped her daughter completely around his finger.

But she couldn't say that she disapproved of her daughter's choice of men in the least. The boy, as she had found over the few days was a pretty good gentleman, caring, respectful(as much as he could be anyway), dedicated, strong-willed, and overall very friendly despite the everpresent expression of a corpse on his face.

Not only that, his abilities and work ethic were beyond exceptional. It was incredibly rare, if not mythical to find a man of his caliber. If he had been here a few years she would have pushed her daughter to marry him asap.

Hell, if she had been younger she would have snatched him right up. She spared her daughter who looked like a lovesick puppy a glance and decided to mess with her just a little. She covered her mouth with her hand and commented.

"Rias my dear, you are drooling."

Her daughter instantly snapped back to reality and wiped her mouth with her sleeve without thinking, even she believed that she was drooling at the sight of the boy. Her daughter glanced at her sleeve and upon realizing there was no drool there she turned to her mother with a light blush of embarrassment.

"...Was it really that obvious?"

Venelana smiled and sipped her tea. Covering her smile subtly.

"Quite so, you weren't very subtle when you were looking at your pawn as if he were a fresh cut of meat." Her daughter looked like she wanted to bury herself as Venelana shook her head fondly. Embarrassing her daughter was her job as her mother.

Speaking of meat, Venlana lightly blushed. Remembering the events of a few days ago she glanced at her daughter and felt a light heat between her legs she tried to ignore.

She certainly had her trouble cut out for her. Even her husband was barely half that size. The boy would be a monster in bed, if his doing push-ups non-stop for the last hour while levitating metal was saying anything about his endurance.

Shaking her head she turned to the boy intensely training as if his life depended on it. She really wondered what he was thinking to be training so intensely.

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~Grayfia Lucifuge~

Grayfia prepared a thermos of tea for herself as she stepped out of the manor, she was dressed only in her nightwear as she was off the clock at the moment, she simply enjoyed the calming chilly night breeze, silence and the flavour of tea to warm her up. It was a night routine she often enjoyed. But as she was heading to the pagoda to sit down she noticed something.

"673... 674... 675..."

She had to do a double take seeing Yuta, her temporary pupil doing pushups in the dead of night with the iron chains they used in training floating above him. His body was absolutely drenched in sweat and steam wafted off his body from how hot it was compared to the chilly night. She could see some stains of red on the ground around him.

Was she still training even at this hour? She couldn't help but approach him despite knowing her indecent attire. But he hadn't even heard her footsteps until she had arrived just beside him.

"Yuta-kun, why are you still working out this late at night? I thought you would have retired to your room by now." Grayfia asked, she knew he was a hard worker but this was bordering on the level of being excessive. As his trainer, she had to scold him properly.

Finally taking notice of her his eyes widened slightly as the chains floating next to him fell down and he pushed himself to a sitting position. He heaved breaths of air as if he were drowning just before. Her eyes snapped to his rippling abs for just a single second before she chastised herself and focused on the face of her pupil.

"*Huff Huff* Grayfia-san? What are you doing out this late? I thought I was the only one in the manor who would be out sightseeing at this hour." Grayfia's experience dealing with obstinate men immediately told her that Yuta was trying to deflect her question. As if he had something he wanted to hide. She lightly frowned.

"Yuta-kun, please do not avoid my question. Why are you still training up this late at night? I am aware that you are resilient but foregoing rest is not something you should do..." Grayfia sternly lectured before her tone fell off upon seeing the expression on her pupil's face properly.

The boy turned to her but the expression on his face surprised her. He looked normal at first glance, with just a wry smile at being caught red-handed, but she could see his jaw clenched tight, his hands balled up into fists. She could read the emotion in his eyes thanks to her plethora of experience.

Frustration.

"I am just doing my best okay? The best I can anyway, if I have time to sleep that means I haven't done enough. If I am not doing everything I can to train, then I am training to lose. I picked this fight so that I have to do everything I possibly can to prepare. So, even if it's night I am working out here, I can go without sleep for a few days."

Grayfia furrowed her brows as he looked towards Yuta, she noticed that he didn't even notice nor did his eyes wander her figure as they usually would. That meant something was seriously wrong and concern welled up in her chest.

"Yuta-kun, are you alright?" She said in a slightly softer tone as she shifted closer to him.

He frowned at her for a moment before sighing and looking up at the sky with a face of pure frustration with his fists clenched tight.

"Was it that obvious? Man, my poker face is really getting shitty. Yes, I am not okay. I am frustrated okay? I am cursing my shitty luck, just banging my head against the wall hoping something will happen knowing damn well nothing will."

Grayfia raised her eyebrows, she had never such a side of him despite training him for several days.

"What do you mean by bad luck?"

"Bad luck, I thought I was getting too lucky for too long now. I have all this damn potential inside of me, I can eventually get unimaginably strong, with so many hacks that I could become practically untouchable, yet I can't do jackshit with it in this time frame. Plain training made it very clear to me that this will not get me where I need to be. Even though I am getting stronger I am not getting stronger enough."

She furrowed her brows as she saw red dripping out from his fists that were clenched so tightly, she put a hand on his shoulder and he slightly relaxed at her touch. He breathed out a sigh and threw a stone into the lake in frustration.

"It's just... I have my ability, I thought I could do something against Riser. I thought I was hot shit talking down to him like that, talking a big game to Rias and making a promise that I thought I could keep. Yet it became clear to me that I can't do such a thing if I keep going at this regular pace. So, I am training myself to the abnormal before I change plans."

Grayfia couldn't help but feel concern and fondness for the boy in front of her. His sheer dedication to his woman touched her, but at the same time, she did not like seeing him so downtrodden. Although she had not known him for longer than a week she was still very fond of him.

"What is that plan you are talking about?"

"I am going to throw myself into the familiar forest and start beating up creatures there until I get a good enough ability."

Grayifa wore a face of surprise, the sheer dedication and firmness in his voice told her that he was absolutely sure of himself. She couldn't help but admire the sheer resolve of the boy before her.

...Which was also why she decided to not point out that he outright said that he planned to break into the property of the family she served and beat up their property in front of her.

She was very annoyed at Zeoticus for trying to sell her sister-in-law to the worst child of the Phenex so she would overlook it.

"That sounds awfully reckless."

Yuta shrugged his shoulders, showing a devil-may-care attitude.

"Sure is, I have never lived my life without knowing risk, I don't have any other options. If that also doesn't work I will have to find something more insane to do. And I will, because I promised Rias, and my father taught me that if there was ever something I would have to make sure of, that was that I never broke my promises."

Grayfia hung her head slightly, she couldn't help but pity the boy, doing whatever he could even at the risk of his safety while all she could do was watch.

She wanted to help in some way. But she had no way to-

'Find something insane to do.'

'Well then, another way I can gain abilities is by engaging in sexual acts.'

Those words came to Grayfia's head but she quickly denied them. She couldn't possibly do such a thing. But a voice nagged at her.

'Are you really willing to let Yuta get torn apart by Riser and Rias being forced into a miserable life while knowing that you could have done something?'

Grayfia bit her lip, her thoughts felt chaotic. In theory, if what Yuta had explained to her about his ability were true doing that would almost definitely give Yuta a massive edge considering how impressive the "feat" would be from an objective standpoint.

Her thoughts felt incredibly chaotic and she needed time to sort them out.

"Alright, I wish you the best of luck and apologize for being unable to offer any help to you."

Grayfia bowed to the young man in courtesy but he simply gave her an honest embarrassed smile which was incredibly rare to see him do, making her heart skip a beat.

"Don't say that Grayfia-san, you have already been helping me greatly. Please don't say sorry for not being able to help more than you already are when I haven't even been able to thank you for all the times you helped me. Maybe I should just call you Grayfia-sensei instead? Hah."

He did a little humourless chuckle and Grayfia felt the words dig into her heart as she finally set on the realization.

'He needs me. It is my responsibility to help him. What kind of a maid would I be if I did not?'

She had a responsibility for him. Yes, she wouldn't be able to sleep at night if she did not do all she could do to help her sister-in-law and her pupil. It was her duty as a maid to do so.

She shook her head, she would have to speak to her husband first. And she also needed to think.

So, Grayfia left Yuta alone for now. Before heading back to her room and having a sleepless night.

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~Yuta Yukimura~

I felt kinda like shit after trouble dumping all over Grayfia. But it helped me affirm my feelings at the very least.

Regular training was not going to cut it. Yes, I had become significantly stronger. All of my stats and abilities are way above what they were before coming here due to my extreme training that I could confidently say I could beat 3 of me from before I started training at once.

But my opponent was a prince from the Phenex house, one of the strongest Pillar Houses, who not only trained regularly but was more experienced at fighting than I was. And his physical stats were a solid cut or several above me. With my current loadout, I probably cannot make it. So now it was plan B time.

Appealing to Tiamat. My goddess of luck and ticket.

For that reason, after Grayfia had left me alone I headed to the kitchen to cook a feast for Tiamat. Grayfia also taught me how to cook even better while I helped her prepare the meals that everyone ate. I prepared 10 boxed lunches of a wide variety and brought 3 bottles of the Hlanith Wine with me. I needed to ask her for a few favours.

I packed everything into a bag before clutching the metal plate that led me to Tiamat's lair, I hoped to everything that she was currently in her lair and was not in a bad mood.

After inserting a bit of my magical power into the tablet I felt a wave of magical power overtake me as I felt a brief sensation of vertigo assault me with a flash of light before quickly fading away to reveal my surroundings had changed to that of the exuberantly wealthy dragon's lair. And I was already face to face with the gigantic azure dragon with gleaming gem-like scales and pink eyes that put the fear of Tiamat in me laying on a giant mound of gold covered by a building-sized silk curtain.

Huh, I forgot Tiamat's real form was this shit scary.

The dragon raised her head before tilting it curiously. Easing my worries that I would become a food delivery.

"Yuta? What an unusual time to visit."

Whew, thankfully she was in a pretty decent mood it seemed.

I took a deep breath. Here goes nothing.

"Tiamat, I have come to bargain."

A/N: This training camp has just become Milf Central hasn't it? I am not a man of tremendous willpower, when given an opportunity to milf, I shall milf. Also, I hope the different PoV's did a good job of portraying Yuta's mindset in the reverse of the scene he had with Rias. What did you guys think about it? Did it do a good job? I would have used Yuta's perspective but Grayfia's internal conflict and cope were too important not to include.

Speaking of Grayfia, I hope you guys can smell the blood in the water. Yuta needs big tickets to win against Riser and one of the biggest tickets is debating whether she should give it to him, which was immensely helped by her maid fetish kicking in due to Yuta needing her help. In the meantime, Yuta has to rely on the bankrolling Dragon God Milf. What did you guys think about Grayfia's internal debate? I'd love to know.