Chapter 45: The mutant

「What sin have I committed?!!」The female beastman screamed in pure hatred as she pinned her young child down onto the ground, one of her hands gripped tightly against his slender neck, the other raised up in the air while holding onto a sharp knife. She did not seem to care for the toxic miasma exuded from the kid's discolored skin, which has now slowly crept upward along her arm, at least, not anymore. Her murderous eyes coldly leered down at the youth, who struggled to lift the woman off his body.「Why have I been forced to give birth to such a monstrous being like you??」

「P...Ple..asee Hana… Mo...ther」The child called out in desperation to his once loving mother. 「S...st..oppp...」

「And that face of yours! Those two fucking horns! You're looking more and more like that rapist father of yours! That filthy creature!!!」The woman yelled as tears of frustration streamed down her face.「If you have already chosen to look like him, then don't take after me! I'll fucking cut off your ears! You don't deserve them! You're not my child… you're not my child… you're not my child...」As she continued to repeat the phrase, the woman finally swung the knife down to slash off his floppy ears.

「ARG… ARGGHHHHH!!!!」The young boy screamed out while being choked to death by his own mother.

Darkness took over… He did not know what happened, but he could feel his blood gushing out from his mutilated ear, rolling down both his slender cheeks…

How long has he been sitting there in the corner of this tiny home? How long has he been gazing expressionlessly at the corpse lying dead in the middle of the room?

「Did you hear? Hana was killed by that cursed monster.」「I know! They found her dead body covered with claw marks, her throat was cut open.」「Told you! That's her fault for giving birth then letting that cursed monster live.」「Where has that monster gone to?」「I heard he's running off into the forest outside his home.」「We can't just let him lurking in the forest, can we?」「No no no, of course not! The elders are gathering strong men to head to the forest to hunt him down and kill him.」「Thanks goodness! I don't think we can live in peace knowing he's lurking around.」「Of course not!」

「... Cursed child… They are actively hunting for you. They want you dead for what you did to Hana… to your own mother. If you want to live, then run away from here. Next time we meet, I will not hesitate to end your life… After all… I don't think I can ever forgive you...」

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The boy suddenly opened his red eyes, which almost seemingly glowed in the darkness of the room. Cold sweat was dripping down from his swollen forehead. It has been six years now, but the same nightmare has been haunting his sleep ever since. It took the boy a few minutes to finally calm down and tried to recall what had happened. The last thing he remembered was having rocks thrown at him as his captors dragged his beaten up body to the execution ground. Yet, once he looked around, he was sure he had yet died. Given that he wasn't chained in a cell somewhere, that just meant one thing: someone had taken him in as a slave and for a mutant slave, living was even worse than dead. The only reason anyone would obtain mutant slaves was to torture them to death through experimenting on their bodies to look for the source of miasma. He had seen it first hand when he was locked in cages back in the slave shop, when customers, who usually dressed in researchers' coats, would barge in, dragging the corpses of mutilated mutants to the slave shop owners and asked them to discard of the bodies by giving them some extra payments. Once he realized his slave collar was gone, the boy looked down at his naked body and checked for any sight of the dreaded slave crest, which was supposed to be more restrictive and permanent compared to the collar. Finding none, he knew he had to act now before his owners, whoever they were, would most likely come back and put the slave crest on his body… Kill ... and escape… the boy thought. His gaze now turned toward the rooms located at the end of the small hallway, where he could sense, with his beastman instinct, several dangerous individuals staying inside. The boy finally got off the couch he was sleeping for the past few hours and lightly walked toward the room in complete silence…

Although it was not yet morning, the hybrid has already woken up since he did not need much sleep, unlike his human slaves. But he opted to just lay there on his bed to think about his future plan, his arms wrapped around the tightly sleeping Ryan and Maia, his fingers were playfully swirling around their nipples, causing the two to lightly squirm around in their sleep. That was then, when the door slowly opened and a small shadow coated in murderous aura began to move across the room toward his bed. Before the boy could do anything though, Kibadios activated his skill that allowed him to materialize dark shadows, which soon reached out and grabbed onto the weakened boy's ankle, then hung him upside down like a piece of meat at the market as the boy struggled to break free from the tentacle.

「Yo kid! I know I'm irresistible but if you want to jump onto my bed and satisfy my sexual needs, at least buy me some dinner first.」The hybrid teased the clearly inferior attacker.

「What's wrong?」Maia askes since the commotion woke up his two sleeping slaves.

「Nothing really.」The hybrid slowly got off the bed. 「I just caught a rat... 」He turned to the boy, the tentacle that held onto the boy's ankle suddenly raised up, allowed the hybrid to look straight at the boy's face. 「Maybe I should bath you first since you're still rather filthy. I wouldn't want you to dirty the sheet of my bed, kid」Again, he taunted the boy.

「Wait, who is that?」Ryan was surprised to see the mutant boy.

「I guess you didn't notice him when you got back, Ryan?」Kibadios concluded. 「I'll go and get him clean, Maia can fill you in the details.」

Kibadios headed to the bathroom, dragging his shadowy tentacles and the kid along with him. Turning the light on, he simply filled the tub then threw the mutant straight into it while he himself got into the shower to stand under the streams of warm water and rinse his body. In the tub though, his tentacles began to act on its own to systematically cleanse the dirt off of the boy's body. The boy has not been bathed in forever so it took much longer than the hybrid anticipated to get him clean. Of course, the fact that the boy was actively fighting against his invasive tentacles was not helping. By the time he got out of the shower, the boy was yet half cleaned, though he has ceased struggling and appeared exhausted since he has yet fully recovered from all his injuries. Kibadios just stood there, drying his hair with the clean towel as his tentacle continued to scrub off layers of dirt, sweat, and blood off of the boy. By now, the hybrid has finally taken a good look at the slave that he rescued, from the top of his head to his small, rounded balls attached to his uncut cock, down to his toenails. Since he's a beastman hybrid, there turned out to be a really short layer of gray furs that covered most of his torso, starting from his collar bone down to his elbows and his knees.

「Don't struggle any further or you'll risk injuring yourself, you little shit.」Kibadios warned since he noticed the boy has begun to start fighting back again. 「It's not like going to harm you after rescuing you twice.」

His warning seemed to have worked, for the boy slowly stopped moving, his piercing eyes, which looked more intimidating than they should have since he did not have any eyebrows, turned to Kibadios questioningly.

「Good… You understand what I'm saying?」Kibadios put on his bathrobe. 「You're not like a feral child who doesn't understand intelligent speech, right?」The boy only nodded slightly, though it was hard for Kibadios to know what the boy was thinking since he has only been donning a poker face expression. Kibadios continued to wash and rinse the boy's hair and furs for another fifteen minutes until he's fully clean, before he simply dropped his used towel onto the boy's head and ordered him to dry himself with it. Once they walked out the bathroom, the hybrid dressed in his bathrobe while the boy was still naked with only a towel covered his head, they were greeted with all four of the individuals who stayed at the guesthouse with the hybrid. Ryuu was fuming after he learned that the mutant child dared to ambush his master while the others all looked displeased. Since they were all covered in bodily fluids, after the hybrid ordered Ryuu to stand down, he told them to take a bath before they would all sit down for an introduction session. While his slaves were busying in the bathroom, the hybrid leisurely lying down on the couch while his gaze fixated on the mutant, who seemingly stood still with the towel on his head at one corner of the room, his own two red eyes were also reciprocatively gazing back at the hybrid.

「Are you still afraid I'm going to kill you or something?」

「...」

「Are you curious why I rescued you and took you in?」

「...」

「Say, I'm just curious but why are you still looking like a kid? Given your age, you should look much older, at least as old as I am.」

「...」

「... Fine. You dont want to answer huh? Do you at least have a name?」

「...」

「Ha! My bad. Of course you don't.」The hybrid let out a brief laugh.「Do you want to have a name?」

The mutant twitched slightly at the question before reverting back to his emotionless self in seconds, as if he did not believe in the hybrid's offer. Since mutants are creatures that attracted and emitted toxic miasma, similar to , since time immemorial, both human and demihuman, have been ostracizing them whenever there was one born in their community. Usually, mutant individuals would not be able to live for long since their parents would either kill them or leave them for death as newborns. Due to this, as people got accustomed to the fact that most mutants would die as nameless infants and so overtime, a superstition was born, stating that if someone named a mutant child, that person and the surrounding community would be cursed along with the child. Such myth had already existed during Kibadios' first reincarnation and given how virtually nothing has changed in the way people treat mutants in the present day, he suspected the practice of not naming mutants would still have persisted. Of course, the boy could have already given himself a name, but most mutants Kibadios had met never did since what was the point? If they were ever lucky enough to survive into adulthood, they would be forced to be living in seclusion anyways, without interacting with anyone else and if they did not have to interact with anyone, what was the point of having a name.

「...Listen kid. I'm going to give you two choices: follow me and be of use to me, or escape and risk being caught by slave hunters again. Mutants like you will always be the prime targets for slave hunters. What is your choice?」

「...」The boy was now thoroughly confused. From the brief interaction with the mysterious hybrid, the boy knew he truly did not mean any harm since had he wanted to, the boy would have been dead the moment the dark tentacle got hold of him. But, asking the boy to follow him was an extremely peculiar request since everyone knew anyone staying in close contact with a mutant for a long period of time would undoubtedly be poisoned and driven mad. Even his once caring mother had fallen victim to his own miasma. 「... why… not afraid?」

「Ho?」Kibadios raised his eyebrows. 「Finally decided to talk? Had you remain silent for a bit longer, I'd just assume you don't know how to speak the intelligent speech. But anyways, why should I be afraid of you?」

「Because … miasma...」The boy hesitated for a second, as if he was afraid the moment he revealed the reason, the hybrid would jump at him and try to kill him.

「What miasma?」The hybrid laughed. 「Are you still too sleepy even after I gave you such a long bath?」Although the mutant did not respond, Kibadios could see a big comic question mark forming on top of the boy's head. 「Have you ever looked at yourself since you woke up earlier? Is there any miasma seeping out from your body now?」

「How?」The boy looked down at his hands, his eyes widened even more than usual as a sense of disbelief washed over his confusing mind. 「No miasma?」

「Of course not.」The hybrid proudly smiled. 「Before I took you back here, I have cleansed your miasma with my flame. You think Arch would let me take you back had I not got rid the miasma off of you? And the last thing I wanted would be to bring you little shit back here, only to have your miasma poisoned my Rowan and Maia. I had to cleanse it, though it's only a temporary thing. I have to purify the miasma on you every once in a while… that is, if you decided to stay as my slave. If you want to leave, then so be it.」

「Slave?」

「Yes. Arch even gave me a slave collar to mark you as my property. That way, no one would try to hunt you again.」Kibadios nodded. 「So, kid, what's your answer? Will you join me as my slave and have the problem regarding your miasma taken care of ? Or would you rather run off into the wild to retain your precious freedom? Answer me soon or my offer is off the table...5...4...3...2...1...」

「Stay!」The boy clenched his fist.

「Perfect! Then come here.」Ordered the hybrid. 「I need to put this collar on you.」

The boy gulped down, lingered where he stood for a few seconds before slowly moved to the sofa where the hybrid was lying. Once he got there, the hybrid had already stood up, standing towering over the small boy. Deep within him, the boy had a feeling that he had just made a deal with a devil, but it was too late for him to change his mind… not that he wanted to change his mind. This hybrid standing in front of him, whoever he was, was able to get rid of the curse he was born with, the very curse that caused him to kill his own mother. The boy did not know why the hybrid wanted him as a slave, but that mattered not anymore.

「There you go. Does it fit right?」asked the hybrid after he put the collar onto the boy, though he received no answer. 「Well, now that you're officially my slave, let's get you some clothes. Don't try to stay naked to tempt me.」He looked around, only to pull a neatly folded white shirt from a drawer and threw it at the mutant. 「Put that on.」He ordered, then proceeded to look for some small pants but he stopped once he realized his shirt was already long enough to cover the boy's lower area. Although it was originally a shirt, now the oversized shirt looked more like a simple white dress once it was worn by the mutant.

「... That would do it.」Commented Kibadios before walking to the kid again. 「So, do you have a name?」

The boy simply shook his head. The closest thing to a name he ever got was "Slave 455" designation on his tag while he was captured before.

I figured , Kibadios thought.

「I'll give you a name then!」declared the hybrid. 「Now that you're with us, you need a name or else it's going to be so inconvenient.」

「Name?」The boy looked up to the hybrid, somehow, even though his poker face did not show it, his heart was racing in anticipation.

「Let's see… A Western name or a weeb name… I mean, you're supposed to be half ogre and all, maybe a weeb name would fit more.」Kibadios talked to himself.「... What about… Yuusei? Does it work?」

「Yuusei?」His eyes brightened up, then he simply nodded. 「Yuusei...」

「Great!」The hybrid patted "Yuusei's" head, then he gave the mutant a rather devious smile. 「Yuusei! Serve me well! From now on, you'll be my secret weapon!」

Although he should be creeped out by his new Master's smile and unknown intention, having gently touched by a warm hand, with his name being called, all he could feel was a nostalgic emotion that he had already forgotten for the past 6 years… what was it called again , he was trying to remember back to the blurry memories of the past, before his loving mother got poisoned by his miasma.

[[ No matter what people say… No matter what happened in the future… I love you, sweety...I'll always love you…I hope I can give happy life, my dear dear child… ]]

Happiness? He thought. Is this it? Something he had rarely felt before began to swell up in his eyes and streamed down his face… Tears ?