TTT Vol. 1 pt. 29 (Patreon)

Granny and Lada ended up talking about our night and morning together far more than I was prepared for. Granny just kept on asking more and more questions, wanting to know every single little detail, occasionally looking at me with a smirk as if she wanted a piece of me herself, and so on.

I felt violated.

But at the same time… it was nice to hear Lada talk about how great I made her feel. She practically sounded like she was bragging about me at times.

Who didn’t want a beautiful woman to brag about how great they were in bed?

As embarrassing as it was, and as violated as Granny’s looks at me made me feel, I was overall more happy about it than bothered.

But I definitely wasn’t doing anything with Granny. No way. I didn’t mind older women, but Granny was too old for me. She could have fun with all the other wrinkly men in the village.

That aside, the morning routine was a simple one. Get breakfast and drinks for a few of the regulars who lived in the inn while waiting for their own houses to finish being built. There were no travelers who came by, so the only people who actually used the tavern for lodging were those who just didn’t have anywhere else to live yet. Mostly younger adults who were tired of living at home and were either in the process of building their own house or waiting for somebody else to help them build one.

When they were taken care of, it was time to make sure everything was clean. The dishes, the tables, the chairs, the floor and walls, and so on. Then there was replacing any candles that were getting too short. Checking on spoiling food to throw outside where the farmers would come and pick it up to take back to their place for composting. There was a bin that spoiled food was tossed in outside, and the farmers would pick it up with a wagon, take it back to their place, dump it out, and bring it back.

And once all that was dealt with, I made sure all the flowers and plants both inside and outside were watered.

Then by that point, those who stayed in the tavern were all out for the day which meant that it was time to go and clean their rooms. That included changing their sheets, cleaning up any messes they made, checking on the candles and plants in them, sweeping the floors and dusting the furniture—those were all of my work duties before it was even midday.

It amazed me that Lada used to do all of it all on her own. I had tentacles which made it far easier, but she didn’t. And she had to do it all while carrying around that weight on her chest.

I had nothing but the highest respect for Lada’s work ethic.

Then, once I was finally done with all of the usual morning routines, I went downstairs just in time to hear Granny ready to give us some more work. “I’m in the mood for some flowbi tea,” she said.

“Ah… should I let the guards know?” Lada asked.

“Don’t bother them. Send your boyfriend there out for it.”

“B-boyfriend?”

“Well, he basically is, ain’t he? It ain’t like you’re sleepin’ around with anybody else. Ya share a bedroom, do what lovers do, ain’t doin’ anythin’ with anybody else—ya might as well get married. Pop out some more workers to help out around the place while you’re at it.”

Puffs of steam left Lada’s ears as she looked down with a bright blush on her cheeks. It actually seemed like thinking of us as lovers was more embarrassing to her than all of the adult things we did together, and more embarrassing to her than talking to Granny about all of it.

“Goodness gracious, girl. Ya get all flustered over somethin’ like that while bein’ the nymphomaniac that ya are?” Granny looked down to me. “You’re goin’ to have to screw a lot of confidence into her.”

I didn’t really know how else to respond, so I saluted.

“Now then, I need ya to go get some flowbi petals.”

I held my sign.

FLOWBIS?

“Plant beasts. Tend to hang around the pond in the back and have heads that look like flowers. All ya have to do is sneak up behind one, grapple onto it, and pick the petals off its head. I’ll use those to brew a nice tea.”

Tea… made out of the petals of a plant beast’s head. Well, people have used beast parts for weirder things before.

DANGEROUS?

“Not at all. Worst case scenario, it runs away. They don’t exactly like having their heads picked. Well, they’re beasts, so I guess they don’t really like anythin’ in the first place. Can’t dislike anythin’ either.”

She had a point. Beasts only knew whatever instincts they were created with. Nothing else. Picking petals off of a beast’s head was no more meaningful than picking petals off of a normal flower.

ALRIGHT. WILL DO.

WHERE ARE THEY?

“All ya have to do is go out around the back and head straight into the woods. You’ll come across a pond eventually. If you’re lucky, one’ll be there already. If ya ain’t, then ya might have to look around for a little. They tend to burrow underground leavin’ only their heads stickin’ out when they’re not goin’ to get water. Look for a giant flower stickin’ out of the ground and it’ll probably be one.”

ANYTHING ELSE I

SHOULD KNOW?

“Be gentle with the petals. Rough ‘em up even a little and it ruins the flavor.”

BE GENTLE. GOT IT.

WILL GO NOW.

“Good. I want my tea before noon. Lada, go invite the usuals over. Let them know we’ll be havin’ the good tea.”

Lada nodded and then looked at me. “Be careful… alright?”

Seeing Lada look at me with such concerned, genuine eyes made me feel like melting. She was so cute. Not to mention that she tended to bend over a little whenever talking to me, and that made her breasts hang lower for me to look at. It was a beautiful sight.

WILL BE CAREFUL.

PROMISE.

Lada crouched down to pet the top of my head tentacle. “Let’s do our best.”

I saluted and then we both left. While she went into town, I went around to the back of the tavern and looked straight into the forest ahead. The sun wasn’t in the best spot to illuminate it, but there was enough light to see. And as far as I knew, there were no threats close to town anyways. I probably didn’t have anything to worry about.

So, I lined my back up with the tavern and swung from tree to tree with my tentacles in a straight path.

It didn’t take more than two minutes to find the pond that Granny brought up. Now, had I been a Chosen walking on two feet, it might have taken five to ten minutes or so. But being able to swing like I could made travel significantly faster.

And fortunately, I was in luck. A beast matching the description of the flowbi granny mentioned was standing right ahead of me.

Seeing it made me curious about something, though.

Nature-based beasts were not uncommon. I knew that much. However, it being the second large example of one on the island was uncommon from what I could somehow remember. Most beasts resembling plants were small, passive, and immobile. These ones, however, were large, one of them was hostile, and mobile.

I wondered if that had something to do with the island itself or if it was just random chance that they evolved in such a way.

I wanted to study them. In fact, studying them sounded incredibly interesting and… fun, even.

I want to take my notepad and write down as many observations as I can.

That thought made me pause.

A notepad? I didn’t have a notepad. Yet… I felt like I was supposed to have one.

Taking notes… in a lab. Wait! I remember!

A single memory came to mind.

It was a memory that showed a group of men and women around me in what looked like a sterile, scientific environment. We wore white coats and gloves, masks and goggles—there were vials all around us, and… the woman standing next to me playfully nudged her elbow into me. We were having fun. Everybody was happy.

I even remembered what she said, and she sounded like the woman from my dreams. “Think of how many lives this will save!”

We did something. We accomplished something.

But I couldn’t remember what.

And the rest of the memory was surrounded by nothingness. I had no idea where I was. I had no idea who I was. I had no idea who anybody else there was. I had no idea what we did.

All I knew was that I felt a crushing feeling around my heart. It was as if somebody wrapped a hand around it and squeezed as tightly as they could.

I felt nothing but pain and regret every time I remembered even the tiniest of details about my past. It even happened whenever something only felt a little familiar and nothing more.

What… what happened to me?

I remembered when I first woke up in my new body, assuming that it wasn’t actually always my body. It didn’t take long for me to remember something and feel so much despair over it that I almost killed myself by jumping into the endless sky.

If my past life was really that painful, was it even worth trying to remember? What if I tried to forget it on purpose? What if I did something that would make me forget?

Spending time with Lada and the others made me happy. I felt at peace. Content with life. It was a slow, simple life, but it was a good one.

Remembering anything about my past caused nothing but pain to the point where it sometimes made me want to kill myself.

Something important and meaningful had to have happened in my past to cause such emotions. Something like that would normally be worth remembering. It would drive a person to discover the truth, and part of me felt that way.

But the other part of me, even though it made me feel like a coward… wanted to ignore it. Even if I was curious and felt like I needed to know, I didn’t want to give up the new happiness that I found.

I had two options: one, I could pursue my past and potentially kill myself from remembering what happened; or two, I could focus on the present and appreciate the new happiness that filled my every day.

Was a past that caused so much pain worth abandoning the joy I’ve found in my new life?

My heart felt conflicted, but my brain said no.

If my heart being conflicted counted as half of a point for both sides, and my brain solidly saying no counted as a point for no, then that meant no had one and a half points and yes only had half of a point.

Therefore, “no” won.

I slapped myself in the “face” with my tentacles as hard as I could to get my mind off the topic. I had a job to do, after all, and that was what needed my focus.

Back to the task at hand.

Standing next to the pond was my target. The plant-like beast had a rose-shaped head that seemed to constantly sway from left to right. Its overall body was similar to the beast that attacked Lada, even when it came to its arm tendrils. The main differences were that the first beast had a deadly maw for a head while this one had a flower for a head, and the first beast had hardened bulbs to smack enemies with while this one had bulb-like “cups” that it scooped down into the water to drink with.

The tentacles scooped the cups down into the water, closed once within it, and then raised back into the air to use gravity to let the water flow down the tendrils.

That was when I realized I was becoming a pervert.

Watching how the beast drank water from the pond… and knowing that I could change my body by eating beasts…

I imagined eating the beast to grow myself a couple of tentacles like that which could be used for milking Korova. Lada, too, though I wouldn’t actually get any from her.

Though, it would be even better if I could apply suction with them instead of just scoop things with them.

I wonder… if I concentrate on wanting to evolve in that way enough, and I eat the beast, will I get that?

It was worth a try.

Wait! But I don’t see any other beasts like it around. I was sent out here to collect the petals from its head. If I kill it—wait. Couldn’t I collect the petals and then kill it and eat the rest of its body?

I thought about it for a few moments, tapping one of my tentacles against my head as I did so.

That sounded like a good plan to me.

Alright. Let’s try it.

First, I approached from behind as Granny recommended. I was careful to make as little noise as possible in my approach. As soon as I was close… I wrapped my tentacles around its body and lifted myself up to its head!

The rest of my tentacles then got to work plucking the oversized flower petals from its head. Honestly, it didn’t seem to mind too much. It just wobbled around a little. Maybe if I was an old woman like Granny, it could escape, but I doubted anybody young would have trouble with it. Especially if they were like me and could use tentacles from a distance.

Oh well.

I picked all the petals off from its head and then placed them as far away from me as I could reach with my tentacles. I didn’t want to risk eating them once the usual hunger overwhelmed me.

Next came killing the beast.

The most efficient way I could think of doing that was to tightly constrict my tentacles around its “neck” until it stopped moving. Though, I did get another idea once I began doing that. While choking it, I used my tail tentacle to wrap around the upper length of its neck directly underneath its flower of a head and lifted up as hard as I could.

I popped the head off the beast no more than a few seconds later.

Another memory came back to me.

I was a small boy playing other children in the yard. We were picking up dandelions and popping their heads off using our thumbs.

I basically just did that but to a beast.

And thankfully, that memory didn’t cause me to hate myself. It was the first one not to.

I didn’t know how to feel about the first memory making me not hate myself was related to the genocide of flowers.

Regardless, I rode the beast down to the ground where its tendrils all fell limp to the ground. It didn’t take long for my hunger to kick in and encourage me to do what came next.

Tentacle suckers. Tentacle suckers. Tentacle suckers.

I repeated that over and over in my head to try and make sure that would be what I gained.

If it worked, that would essentially confirm that all I had to do was want a specific thing from something in order to gain a version of it for myself. If it didn’t work—well, there were always more experiments to be done.

But for the time being, I opened up and got to work.