World of Women - World of Women – V5 – Chapter 23

Every day in Trilor was filled with work. They had an agenda with me, and they didn’t hesitate to make sure I served their agenda properly. I was being dragged all over the place. I gave countless speeches filled with adoration and positive words for Trilor, and I rarely got any time to eat. I honestly thought that this might be what being a celebrity felt like, the part that wasn’t glamour. It was an endless schedule of the next thing to do.

When I wasn’t making a public appearance, I was traveling to the next one. I learned that I needed to use these times to catch up on sleep. They had me out working until midnight and then wanted me up by 5:30 in the morning to begin it all again. That included the time given to impregnate the girl of choice for the evening.

The girl I had met the first day and chosen to impregnate wasn’t there the next day. I had been hoping that after a night of love-making, she’d be a lot more open and considerate of my feelings. Given enough time, I was confident I could gain any lady’s affection, and I used to get her pregnant to speed those feelings along. It turned out, the government reacted in kind and immediately separated us. When I asked the new girl, she merely stated that the other was given a promotion.

I began to realize that this was the nature of Trilor. Everyone was a commodity to be used by the government. Even if there was a bit of sexism toward men, they didn’t treat women any better. Men just had more value, so they kept far closer control of them than they did the women who were worthless beyond their capacity to do work.

“What about my party…”

“Yes, they are having a fun time. You don’t need to worry.” The woman reassured me with an incessant smile. “You will see them after a week.”

“It’s already been six days, I’ll be seeing them tomorrow, yeah?”

“Oh, yes, yes, of course! One more night.” She nodded, finding ways to agree with me even when she disagreed with everything I said.

I frowned slightly as I considered things for the rest of the day. The night came quickly, and I was brought to another heavily guarded building to stay the night. These buildings stood tall and imposing, with a stark, concrete façade and large banners sporting Trilor’s colors. The windows were small and high off the ground, concealing the contents inside. The bedrooms were small and bare, with a single queen-sized bed tasked with doing the deed. The sheets were crisp and white, and the walls were painted with dull grey, giving the room a sterile appearance.

After being left in the room, two guards waiting outside the door and even more at every hallway and exit point. I took a shower and cleaned myself, and no sooner had I finished when a door opened and a woman in a suit stepped in. These were the women that were being fed to me over the last week. I didn’t get any of them pregnant except for the first girl. These other women didn’t feel genuine at all. I was pretty sure they were politicians looking to increase their political standing in the party.

“So, you’re next?” I asked.

The girl looked at me smiled, and then began to undress. I was pretty certain that she did not speak my language. I had encountered a lot of Trilorians the last few days, and I had a good sense of when they didn’t understand a word I was saying. They’d usually give a smile like that and then proceed to do whatever they wanted, presuming I would just follow along. This wasn’t too surprising though. The previous four women I had encountered were similarly unable to speak my language either.

Once her clothing fell to the ground, she walked over to the bed and lay down. She then spread her legs and looked up at me expectantly. Even knowing that I was being used, it was a tempting enough position. There weren’t many ugly women in this world, and Trilor was no exception. Women were fiercely competitive when it came to appearance, and in a world with magic, beauty was easier to obtain. Anyone who had the power or backing of their government likely had the money to afford perfect skin and attractive proportions.

The standard for beauty was a bit different in Trilor, pushing for a tall, tan body that reminded me of a supermodel. This was in stark contrast to the curvaceous bodies that Amaryllis favored. Small boobs and small butts with stringy long legs and arms. Most of the girls looked like they could afford to eat a bit more. That said, there was a certain level of beauty within their thin, delicate bodies that was different, not better or worse, than other women.

However, I had no intention of sleeping tonight. I fought over the decision all day, but I decided I wasn’t going to wait until the morning and hope that Trilor acted magnanimously. I might cause issues by escaping their control and going to find the rest of my party, but I had a gnawing suspicion that things weren’t going properly ever since our separation. Since I wasn’t able to use the honeypot method, my only choice was to use a bit of force.

Thankfully, I had already laid out plans ahead of time. There was a formation I left on my girls that would allow me to track them down. Trilor had completely underestimated my magical ability. They thought that if they left me without any ink or pens, I would be useless in conjuring magic. To be fair, for most magic users, that was already enough to clip their wings.

I immediately checked the windows. There were still two guards outside. I could do something about that though. The woman, noticing I wasn’t jumping on top of her to do my job, started saying something. She looked a little upset.

“Sleep.” I held a hand out to her.

She blinked a few moments but then fell back with her eyes closed. She must have had training. I used a lot more mana than needed to make sure she fell asleep quickly. Had I used less, she might have realized what I was doing and then yelled out the guards. It turned out she was probably someone pretty high up in the party. There was no telling how long she’d remain unconscious, so I decided to tear up the sheets into restraints and I tied her up and left her in the bathroom.

“Sorry, lady. You’re first time won’t be with me.” I started as I finished, and then noticed her advancing years. “Or maybe a second time.”

I closed the bathroom door and then walked up to the front door, listening carefully. The good thing about the Trilor country giving me nothing was that I had nothing to pack. Even my clothing had been taken and replaced every day, never mind any souvenirs. I knocked lightly on the door.

The door opened and a woman poked her head inside. As soon as she did so, I touched her forehead and initiated a spell. She shuddered for a bit and then moved back into position. The other girl spoke another language to her, but she didn’t respond. Frowning slightly, she turned back and looked in the door as well. I touched her forehead and initiated the spell a second time. She shuddered and then returned to her spot as well. It wasn’t a sleep spell or something like that. It was a blank spell. It’d make someone phase out for about an hour or so. They’d work mindlessly, doing their task, but they wouldn’t be alert to the world around them. It was possible to knock them out of this vacant state, but it required something extreme, like a threat to their life. In that way, it was a lot like hypnosis, just magically induced.

I could have knocked the girls out, but this would more quickly reveal that something was wrong. I wanted as much time to pass as possible before anyone knew I was escaping. I wanted to get out of the building. If I could be outside the city by the time they realized something was wrong, it’d be even better.

Unfortunately, there were cameras everywhere, so sometimes the easiest plan was the best plan. I closed the door and sat down on the end of the bed. Lifting my shirt, I took out my pinky nail when I had allowed it to get a bit sharper over the week. I cut my wrist and then used the blood to write on my chest. It was messy, but the next spell I created needed to be maintained for a long time, and I couldn’t keep a spell in my mind perfectly in shape for such a long time. Spells created in the mind were best if they were quick things. Anything you needed to continue to pump mana into would be difficult.

After about fifteen minutes, I put mana through it and my body shimmered a bit. I took off all of my clothing and then put on the clothing the girl had stripped off. It did not fit on my form well at all. I could barely manage to get it on. I glanced in the mirror, and I now looked like the girl who had just come in. It was more difficult to do clothing, so I had to cross-dress for a bit. Thankfully, with the spell going, the clothing didn’t look as ridiculous as it felt on me.

Well, it wasn’t like it was the first time I had to do this. In a world where 99% of all clothing is made for women, it did sort of happen. Even some of the clothing I wore normally was technically made for women of similar body types. Male-centric clothing just didn’t need to be a thing. The best you could usually find were uniforms and unisex. Of course, Valiant was trying to change that, and it was another growing export of our country, but we certainly didn’t export to Trilor.

I walked out the doorway, my eyes flickering toward the camera before heading on. The two girls were staring straight ahead and didn’t even pay attention to me as I passed by. With luck, that would be enough to get me out of the building without alerting anyone. A moment later I was down the hall and around a corner. My heart was pounding and my mind raced as I made my way to the nearest staircase. This was a large building, a government facility, and the stairs would take me from the upper floors where the offices were, down to the front lobby. I was hoping  I wouldn’t have to walk out the front door. I hadn’t worked out a way to get passed the lobby just yet.

I reached the staircase and paused, taking a deep breath and trying to steady my nerves. I had to stay in character. If I moved unnaturally, then the security watching over the cameras might notice something.. If they suspected that I wasn’t who I appeared to be on the camera, then I wasn’t sure what would happen next.

“It’s now or never,” I muttered to myself, and put my hand on the doorknob. “I can do this.”

I wanted adventure. Now, I was getting it. I had no room to complain. I twisted the knob and stepped inside. The stairwell was dark, illuminated only by dim emergency lights along the floor. I took a few steps down the stairs before the lights automatically kicked on.  I nearly stumbled thanks to that. Suffice it to say that my nerves were shot. I could hear the heels of my shoes tapping on the hard concrete. That was something I couldn’t get used to as a man. Heels were painful to walk in, and walking downstairs was a nightmare.

My pace quickened, and soon I was descending the stairs three steps at a time. The sounds were getting louder. I knew it wouldn’t be long before someone came running. I was dressed as an official, which meant I wasn’t supposed to be running, and even if I did, the other women in the building would know that I was not who I seemed to be. I wasn’t supposed to look flustered or anxious, but I was doing a pretty bad job. I just had to hope that nobody would find it suspicious.

I had reached the bottom floor. The lobby was just beyond the door. I pushed the door open and stepped through.

The guard’s voice rang out through the lobby. She was sitting behind a desk, her back straight and her face neutral. I had no clue what she said because it was in a language I didn’t know.

“Y-Yes.” I nodded and smiled and spoke with an accident. “Good morning.”

I felt the eyes of the other guards on me, but I ignored them. The main thing was not to let my nervousness show. I had to pretend I was a woman who had every right to leave. I kept walking, heading straight toward the doors. The guard spoke something more. I looked back at her. She then burst out laughing. I forced myself to laugh as well. I then raised my hand and waved goodbye. My hand reached the doorway, but when I tried to open the door, I realized it was locked. The blood drained from my face. The woman spoke again. I didn’t respond, praying that she wasn’t asking for anything.

Bbbbeeeep.

There was a beep and a click, and I was able to open the door. I waved one more time and was out the door. As the door shut behind me, I felt like collapsing. That was perhaps the most reckless thing I had done since I was a teenager. Part of me couldn’t believe it had worked. I continued to walk down the long stairways to the street. I was moving so quickly that a heel broke and I ended up stumbling down the last few steps. At that moment, I heard a woman call from the doorway. It was one of the security guards.

I cursed my luck and kicked off the heels. I then began to run. I was only a half block away when I heard an alarm sound up. That was not good. I was not sure what they had seen or if the disguise had broken. I was not going to stick around and find out. I had to get far, far away from there.

I sprinted as fast as I could down the street in my bare feet. My legs burned and I could barely catch my breath, but there was no time to rest. Every moment was precious, and the longer I remained in this city, the higher the chance that I would be captured. I saw the lights of police in the street in front of me, and I quickly ducked into an alleyway.  I looked around it finding a stone. When I found it, I quickly did a few calculations, and then I used magic to jump up. There were numerous balconies along this alleyway, so I was able to make it to the roof quickly. I also stripped off half my clothing so that I wasn’t as restricted, but that left me mostly naked.

“Nice.”

On the way up, I found some clothes set out to dry tied across the balcony. I helped myself to some baggy robes and then continued my trek up the building. These buildings were a lot taller than Amaryllis. I had a feeling they made them this tall as some kind of statement about their power. It was clear just by climbing them that they didn’t fit the structural needs of a building from my old world. Instead, it was magic that was keeping them standing, which gave them a particularly dangerous feel.

At least, I didn’t plan to stay on them. As soon as I reached the roofs, I began moving from one roof to the next. I moved for perhaps hours, and it was only when the alarms sounded distant that I finally sat down. The first thing I did was cast a spell to prevent anyone from tracking me. After that, I moved to a new spot a good distance from that one. Then, I began working on some new magic. After another hour, I was channeling through a formation carved on the roof.

“Hey, Hey, it’s me… Clyburn.” I spoke through the formation.

“D-dad?” Raven’s drowsy voice asked.

“Are you guys doing okay?” I asked.

“Dad! Where are you?”

“I’m in Chi Long City. I think…” I responded. “I’m using a mark spell I placed on you to connect an audio tunnel… eh… never mind, it’s phone magic.”

“Phone… look, they’ve had us locked in here all week! They won’t let us see you or even talk with each other. It’s just me and Lexy. She’s bored and she keeps wanting to entertain herself with me!”

“I’m going to open the channel and step through. It’s going to use a lot of mana. You might want to step back.”

“Ah… o-okay…”

“Alright… teleportation.” I slapped my hands together. “I’ve done this before when I had half my mana and ability… of course… I’m teleporting an unknown distance and the tunnel could collapse suddenly.”

I used to do this kind of stupid stuff all the time. Now, I understood how dangerous it was. I didn’t want to create such a conduit. Who knew what could happen? It was the only way to reach them in a reasonable amount of time. Likely, they were only just aware I escaped. They’d be locking down the entire city soon.

I began to work on the calculations again, thankfully finding a lit bank sign across the street that had the temperature and pressure on it so I didn’t need to guess.  When I finished, I told them to hold on and I created the portal and jumped through. Once I was done with this vacation, I’d tell the girls if I ever spoke of wanting one last adventure again, they had permission to kick me!