Chương 10: Living in a Brothel… as a Rock?!

as a Rock?!

Chapter Ten Living in a Brothel… as a Rock?! Alice sat on a chipped wooden table in a small room. She was, unfortunately, not alone.

"So good! So good! Don't stop!" Alice forgot some of her fury as the wet sounds of lust filled her new home. These were not the embarrassed grunt, grunt, sigh s she had seen and heard with Eva and Erik. These sounds belonged to two practiced adults, and Alice wished she could close her nonexistent eyes. Back on the mountain, Dale and his bandits had left Mittica and Sorin discarded in the woods, befouled with blood and as naked as newborns.

Alice wished she could forget the two days she had spent bouncing in a sack with other misbegotten spoils. She had wanted to fill Dale's ears with [Malevolent Whispers] until blood ran down his face. But somehow the murderer was not cursed. Curse Spread: Ratko Puck Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy! Curse Spread: Tallak Low Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy! Curse Spread: Conrad Cook Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy!

Curse Spread: Toma Puck Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy! Four filthy bandits had been cursed, but somehow Dale and all his rotten smiles had remained decidedly untouched. Day after day, the mountain had transformed around them. The trees had thinned, brooks and streams had bubbled out from the earth, and somehow Dale had remained unbothered and full of good cheer. The memory made Alice sick with hate. She had not even been able to feel excited when the town appeared.

Dale and his bandits had passed beneath a gate flanked by wooden palisades and into civilization. Where the babble of streams had once tickled Alice's nonexistent ears, a tidal wave of humanity replaced it. The nameless town was not a packed center of civilization, but a constant stream of carts still rumbled over its muddy streets. Tall brick-and-wood houses yawned overhead, the alleyways between them filled with passersby. Everyone in the town seemed to give Dale and his crew a wide berth.

Deeper and deeper the five had trod. Filthier and filthier the nameless town had become until they finally arrived at... a brothel. Alice had never actually seen a brothel before, but it was fairly easy to put two and two together. Despite the filthy surroundings, a dozen scantily-clad women waved and made merry. Almost immediately upon entering, Dale had grabbed a short black-haired woman, dragged her to a shabby room upstairs, and dropped Alice onto a wooden table in a corner.

"Yeeeeeeeees!" The black-haired whore continued to scream like a pig up for slaughter as Alice's nonexistent face continued to blush. It was impossible to close her eyes, but there was one thing she could do. Active Skills Malevolent Whispers (Rank I I): A red string connects you and your accursed. You can pull on this thread to fill their thoughts with a fragment of your voice.

"So, I've gone from being able to scratch thoughts to... to fill thoughts!" Alice said loudly as she studied the description of Rank II. She tried to drown out the woman's moans, but the only noise Alice made was the faintest vibration. She turned her attention away from Dale's flailing buttocks to her newest skill. Serpent's Whisper (Rank I): The mortal mind is full of desire. Do you really think they' l l notice one more? You can whisper simple desires into the ir thoughts.

Your accursed are more prone to listen to your suggestion s.

"Th-that sounds useful!" Alice shouted, and the black-haired woman chose that moment to let out her loudest scream yet. It did not sound all that genuine.

"I wish those two would shut up." And Alice's noiseless curse filled her rocky head with a thought. [Serpent's Whisper] almost sounded like mind control. Could she use it to make them wrap up their fun?

"I suppose it's worth a try," Alice said to herself. The skill's description did not explain how to whisper desires into someone's mind, but she supposed it would work the same way as [Malevolent Whispers]. Feeling a little anxious, Alice reached out with an invisible hand to an imagery string attached to Dale's bastard of an ear.

"S-Stop having sex!" Alice whispered, feeling hot in the face as she tried to pour her own desire for celibacy into Dale. The animal sounds continued uninterrupted, however. Dale's butt continued to jiggle.

"I guess it was too good to be true..." Alice felt herself deflate. With a huff, however, Dale slowly disentangled himself from the woman.

"A break," he said happily, but not nearly as happy as Alice felt.

"It... It worked?" Alice felt even hotter in the face as she realized what she had just done. It really was like mind control!

"This skill is the- ""Don't tease me like that!" the short woman said, and she pinched a part of Dale's body that Alice really did not want to see pinched. Whatever desire Alice had implanted in Dale's head vanished.

"You little mink!" He threw himself back onto the woman with an even greater animal passion than before.

"I-I guess it is just Rank I," Alice groaned noiselessly as the woman resumed her fake moans.

"This is the worst..." It seemed to take a very, very, very long time for Dale to finish. [Geological Patience] may have made it possible for Alice to yawn her way through the seasons, but it certainly did not make several hours of grunting and squealing any more comfortable to watch. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

"What's this thing?" the black-haired woman asked after she had dressed. She looked down at Alice the Rock with a curious smile.

"A luck stone," Dale said from the bed, still naked.

"Give it a rub." And before Alice could even blink, the woman had bent over with a laugh and rubbed Alice. Curse Spread: Ana Widowluck Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy!

"You stupid idiot..." Alice mumbled as she studied the notification.

"I suppose I ought to ask Grimm for that coin he owes me," Ana Widowluck said as she blew Dale a kiss goodbye.

"Might finally get it from him with this extra luck!"

"You can leave already," Dale said, still smiling, and he swung off the bed. The man's face was full of horrible scars and burns. The rest of his body was much of the same. It was a relief when he finally covered himself in his sweat-stained outfit.

"I hate him!" Alice fumed as the woman disappeared from the room. Dale had doomed her with just a few words. Just like Mittica and Sorin, this random whore was now going to die.

"Why...? Why does the curse affect everyone but him?!" The fury of her thoughts was interrupted by a soft knock at the door.

"Why, if it ain't my favorite little lady!" Dale's scarred face broke into a toothy grin as a particularly short woman stepped into the cramped room. The stranger said nothing. Alice was not even sure if she could speak. The woman's face was hidden behind several hempen bandages wrapped tightly around her head. Black hair dashed with mournful streaks of grey had been tied in an enormous ponytail that hung down to her flat buttocks.

"Momma... Momma said to bring you this." Alice blinked in surprise. The voice did not belong to a woman. The young girl lifted a clay tankard of water into the air awkwardly, as if Dale would not have noticed it otherwise.

"What a good little girl you are," Dale said, all smiles. There was no warmth in his eyes, however.

"Bring it here then, eh?" The Girl seemed reluctant to approach. Her hands were thin and covered in still more bandages like a leper. She wore a filthy gown that seemed three times too big on her starved frame. With a resigned sigh, she drew closer to Dale, the tankard of water held protectively in front of her. Unfortunately, it offered little protection.

"H-Hey!" The Girl shouted, sloshing water onto the floor as her voice filled with fear. Dale pulled her into his lap with a smile reminiscent of a hungry wolf. He held her with one hand and yanked away her hempen bandages with the other.

"Oh." Alice instinctively wanted to look away from The Girl. It was not out of disgust, but rather that awkward politeness you sometimes felt when you realize the person sitting across from you is disfigured and you don't want to be rude by staring. The Girl was ugly. It was a sad truth, but her face was grotesque. Scale-like scars covered much of her mouth and the side of her head like some cliché Hollywood villain. The skin cracked with bloody red lines that The Girl tried to cover with her free skeletal hand.

"M-Momma says you shouldn't... That you can't..." She bit on her lip, which had the horrible effect of stretching her scaled skin even tauter.

"I'm not... of age..."

"You think I'm interested in a child like you?" Dale barked a laugh and pinched her disfigured face. The girl seemed to lose all strength as his hands closed around her scales.

"Can't your favorite Uncle just show you some... some kindness from time to time?" The Girl seemed to collect herself slightly, or at least regain enough strength to try, and fail, to wiggle free. She looked around the room as if in search of an escape. Instead, she noticed Alice the Rock.

"Wh-what's that?" she asked desperately, pointing to the chipped table. Dale released her at once, and The Girl did not let the chance slip by. She skittered out of his lap, across the room, and quickly wrapped her hempen bandages back around her face. Dale's own face had lost its smile.

"That is a very special stone," the Smiling Man said with a cold, hard look.

"Very valuable, so you can go ahead and let it collect dust."

"Wha...?" The Girl did not seem to understand. Neither did Alice.

"When you clean my room, Urd." Dale's voice was very calm and very cold.

"Don't even touch that desk, right? Let it collect dust. If I learn someone's mishandled that there stone, I'll take your cherry with the end of a spiked mace." Urd went very pale.

"You understand?" Dale asked, and his smile returned like a bad cough. Urd nodded so quickly her bandages came undone, revealing the white lines of her fear.

"Is it... Is it smart...?" Urd squeaked, her eyes darting over to the Alice the Rock.

"To leave something so... so valuable out? Won't s-someone try to... steal it?" Dale laughed.

"Have to be a real fool ta try and steal from me, but it's kind of you to worry." Dale patted his knee, beckoning Urd closer.

"Well, come and give Uncle a little kiss. Then fuck off." Urd dragged herself reluctantly over to Dale's side, pecked him lightly on the cheek, her bandages still covering her face, and then fled from the room with whirlwind haste. Alice loosed a nonexistent sigh as The Girl vanished. She hated Dale more than she could put into words, but at that moment she almost wanted to thank him. Alice would have felt particularly awful if she had cursed a child like Urd.

Dale stared at Alice the Rock for several moments and then made for the door himself. Alice soon found herself blessedly alone.

"Finally..." She had not realized how pleasant living at the bottom of a pond was before today. She could hear awkward carnal noises coming from men and women in the rooms beside her own, but her vision thankfully did not reach that far. Dale's room was on the second storey of the brothel, and while she could see the tips of bobbing heads downstairs, she could see little else. Her table was far enough from the hallway that she could only see the arms of passersby as they stomped towards bedroom fun.

"This is the worst..." Alice repeated, not for the first time. It took a supreme force of will not to replay Mittica and Sorin's death over and over in her mind with [Geological Memory].

"But now... now I have a weapon!" [Serpent's Whisper] was not the mind control she wanted, but it was only Rank I. And it affected Dale! Even though he was not cursed, she had still been able to make him... make him stop. At least for a moment.

"I'll just need to rank it up!" Alice said defiantly. [Malevolent Whispers] had ranked up after she had used it enough times. [Serpent's Whisper] would be the same.

"Though I wonder if all my skills will be about whispers..." The rest of the day was spent whispering at whoever passed her field of vision. Unfortunately, she could not really see anyone from where she had been left on the table. The sun fell and then rose again without any of her skills ranking up. All the change of day brought was Dale, and he brought along another woman. Curse Spread: Oana Cook Severity: Powerful Received experience! Received cursed energy!

"What a pretty rock," the new black-haired beauty said, studying Alice's sparkles.

"These women have the survival instinct of a rock..." Alice muttered angrily to herself. All the whores at the brothel would end up cursed at this rate.

"I suppose it would be quieter if they all died..."

"And who said you could touch it?" Dale asked, but he was smiling.

"Come here." The woman put Alice the Rock back down and joined Dale on the bed. Alice knew what would come next, but...

"Yes! Yes! Yeeeeees!"

"No, no, nooooo!" Alice wanted to scream. Was this going to be her new life? Having to watch this battle-scarred murderer flap his flabby rear end each and every night? Hours passed and soon night covered the town. Dale fell asleep after their fun came to an end. The black-haired whore gingerly disentangled herself from his scarred embrace and began to dress. The woman glanced down at the bed, and an electrifying thought filled Alice's head.

"Kill him!" Alice whispered savagely into the woman's head.

"You want to strangle him!" The woman's eyes went very wide, and her face paled slightly. Alice watched with mounting anticipation as the black-haired whore continued to stare down at Dale's slumber. But with a small shudder, the woman wrenched her eyes away. Without another glance, she hurried out of the room.

"I should have known that wouldn't work," Alice said to herself. She had to remind herself [Serpent's Whisper] was not mind control. She couldn't just make people do anything.

"I need to experiment with... with smaller things." And so like clockwork, Dale came and went each day. A new black-haired woman appeared in his bed each night. Sometimes an old favorite like Ana Widowluck would reappear. And like clockwork, Alice would experiment as best she could with the tools laid before her.

"All right..." she said, trying hard, and failing, not to hear every meaty slap that accompanied tonight's carnal fun.

"Let's try..." She reached out to the black-haired woman's ear and whispered.

"Pull on his hair."

"Playful little thing, eh?" Dale hooted as the woman yanked on his long black hair just as Alice had asked her to. Alice experimented with a few more simple whispers after that, and soon the pair finished their midnight fun. Dale dressed, stomped out of the room, and a familiar face reappeared. Urd was covered in the same hempen bandages as she crept into Dale's room with a bucket and rag. She said nothing as she began to scrub the floors and change the soiled sheets.

She found a small coin underneath the bed and quickly snatched it up. There was greed in her eyes, the only bit of her face left uncovered, but then a deflated look washed over her.

"He'd know..." Urd said as she placed the coin beside Alice on the chipped table.

"He always knows..." Alice had no interest in her melancholy, however.

"Take the coin!" Alice whispered the desire into Urd's head. The disfigured girl glanced over at the table, but then turned back to her cleaning.

"This skill really needs to rank up already..." Alice muttered, dejected.

"I can't make people do- " Urd had been on her way out of the room, but with a nervous glance over her shoulder, she raced back to Alice's table.

"Yes!" Alice cheered in triumph as Urd snatched up the coin and hid it in the bundle of her rags.

"That's progress!" The days bled into one another after that as Alice continued to experiment with [Serpent's Whisper]. Night after night, Dale returned with a black-haired beauty. Day after day, Alice would unwillingly spread her curse. Occasionally, she would receive a notification that a curse had reached its end, and she would earn a little more experience. It was hard to get excited about leveling, though, when she knew a dead prostitute was to thank.

Her mood brightened considerably when her skills began to rank up. [Malevolent Whispers] reached Rank III, allowing her to whisper even to those unaffected by her curses. Both [Glamour] and [Chest of Woe] reached Rank II, the latter doubl ing her max cursed energy. With Sorin and the others, she had done everything she could to keep her cursed energy from spilling out, but she offered no such kindness to Dale. Not that it mattered.

No matter how much cursed energy she seemed to release into the room, no misfortune touched his scarred little head. She would not have been disappointed if the whole brothel collapsed, but while her cursed energy had summoned demon dogs back on the mountain, its effect in this town was decidedly less noticeable. And so nine days passed rather uneventfully. There wasn't even anything particularly remarkable about the start of the tenth day. She never could have known that on that day...... she would become a god.