Chapter 27 - Going outside
In the few weeks after, Hati kept punishing and rewarding Astrid in various sexual scenarios. He never had her do anything to him, though. Not yet. Remembering Luna's lessons about instilling obedience, he knew it was most important to give pleasure before receiving it.
First, you make them dependent on and grateful for the pleasure you give them. You then start giving that pleasure as a reward for performing simple tasks, slowly escalating the orders and decreasing your rewards until they reach the point where they will do anything just for some scraps of what only you can give them.
And that's when you start really training and moulding your target into whatever you want. Of course, this whole process is much easier if you have a previous position of power over the other, like Hati does with Astrid.
After all, it's important the other person cannot get the pleasure elsewhere, including from themselves, and also that they have a reason for feeling grateful. Both of these things become much easier in a controlled environment where you are the master.
Again, like Hati and Astrid. Not to mention that Astrid had masochist tendencies and was genuinely in love with Hati, making everything even more uncomplicated.
He learned all this from Luna because, between Hati and Luna, Hati just enjoyed dominating others, but Luna had developed it into an art form.
He had never met anyone better at twisting a person's mind until it was putty in her hands, something that was only exacerbated by the ability granted by her pride shard.
He could only count his blessings that he had managed to make her submit in their first meeting, causing their resulting connection through the sin shards to temper her desire to dominate him; otherwise, he would have surely ended up under her heel. Literally.
Currently, it was Hati's birthday as he turned sixteen. He and his family were sitting in the library., while Astrid stood behind Hati.
His great-grandfather Erik looked pleased as punch as he had prepared an exciting gift for him. Hati looked at the man sceptically and asked,
"Are you sure they agreed to let me roam the compound, old man? Didn't they want to wait until I awakened so they could check whether my unknown father's bloodline had suppressed the blood of Fenrir?"
Still looking particularly pleased with himself, Erik nodded and said, "That's right! Considering that you still haven't awakened after six years and nothing suspicious has happened to you or the clan since your birth, I convinced enough elders that you weren't a disaster waiting to happen.
Of course, you still aren't allowed to leave the compound, but at least you can meet some other people now."
Looking at his great-grandfather while rolling his eyes, Hati said, "Well, it's always nice to hear only some people consider me a disaster waiting to happen. And I guess something good came from my inability to become an Einherjar?"
Erik laughed sheepishly while scratching his head and said, "Ahaha, you should try to see the positive side of things more, boy. Things may not be perfect still, but at least it's getting better."
Sif looked at Hati with a concerned look as she commented, "Hati has been getting gloomier later. I hope going outside will do him some good." Hati smiled at his mother, "I'm fine, Mother. You really don't need to worry."
Then, looking at Erik, he continued, "Thank you for the gift, old man. Despite my words, I do love it." He wasn't lying about that. He'd been looking forward to leaving the house for a while now.
Of course, telling a mother not to worry about her child was like telling the sun not to shine. And the fact is, he is getting worse. Although he was now somewhat convinced that Luna had indeed reincarnated and was also close by, he still had no idea how close.
The voice had only said Luna was closer than he thought, but that could still mean multiple things, as he didn't even have a guess at her distance from him at the time. Plus, time was still moving, and he had no idea how Luna was living right now.
Was she okay? Did she remember their previous life, like he did? The longer time went on without any concrete news about Luna, the more trouble his pride had with keeping his depression at bay.
Sif rolled her eyes at him, "You always say that, and yet I don't believe you. A mother can see these things! I just wish you were honest with me…"
Feeling that now was a good moment to jump in, lest things become more uncomfortable on a supposedly happy day, "I also prepared a gift for today. I debated for a while whether I would give this to you now or later, but I decided to err on the side of positivity.
After all, this cannot be used by anyone who has yet to awaken." He took a silver-coloured ring out of his pocket. It looked like any other ring, except for the small runic markings that littered the surface of the ring. Leif handed the ring to Hati and said,
"This is a storage ring. It has an internal space of a few cubic meters; you can put things in and take them out using spirit energy. Rune smiths create these rings, which are standard gear for most Einherjar. Since you cannot use this yet, you could give it to Astrid so she can store things for you."
He then smirked and winked, "Assuming you trust her enough." It seemed Leif knew about some of the things going on between Astrid and Hati.
Hati smirked back, took the ring, and marvelled at it while thinking, 'Such a small thing actually holds so much room?' He decided to ask about it, "How does this little thing hold so much space, Uncle Leif? "
Leif had a helpless look in his eyes as he shook his head while saying, "You're asking the wrong person, Hati. I have never done much with runes, let alone rune-smithing. All I know is that it has something to do with the space element."
Sif and Erik were the same. Sif knew a bit more as she loved to read, but she had no idea about the specifics either. Hati simply filed this away for later, as he got quite interested in runes and rune-smiths.
He decided to follow Leif's suggestion and handed the ring to Astrid with a wink, "Hold on to this for me until I can use it myself." Astrid simply nodded, took the ring and put it on her finger.
When she tried to check the ring's space, she noticed something already in it. She was about to bring this up to Hati when Leif addressed her. "You probably noticed there is something in there already, Astrid.
Don't worry about that for now; it's simply a precaution in case something happens outside the house." Astrid looked at Hati and decided to let the matter rest when she saw him nod.
Although Hati was curious, Leif clearly didn't want to explain too much, and he trusted his uncle to have his best interests at heart.
Later that day, they were all preparing to leave the house as a group to show Hati the Fenrir clan compound. Although this was not the first time Hati was going outside in this second life since the house had a yard he had access to, he was still excited to see more of this new world he had so far only read and heard about.
Sif smiled at her son's excitement and said, "Come, let us show you around our clan's home, and later, we'll show you something interesting, as today is somewhat of a special day for the Fenrir clan."
So they started touring around the compound, showing Hati the most exciting places. The Fenrir clan's home resembled a self-sufficient village with a wall surrounding it. It looked like a Viking village, considering the architecture, except cleaner.
Roads weren't made of mud and dirt, but of actual stone, there was a lot of green as they were close to a forest, and the people looked healthy and happy.
They passed by the tower of elders in the centre, various crafting halls in the west, and training grounds in the east. Hati was particularly interested in the crafting halls, where he saw several smiths working their craft, which fascinated him.
They came across many people, but with several influential and powerful people surrounding Hati, no one dared to approach him. Even though they were all curious about who this mortal boy was, to be surrounded by so many important people.
Eventually, they moved towards the north, in the direction of the forest. The Bönd clan inhabited the north of the Fenrir clan compound. Because of this, it was the Fenrir clan's most well-guarded area.
But today, a special event was taking place because they were introducing the fairies that would become a companion after the five-yearly contest that would be held a year from now.