"Look at him, Penny. Just look."
Brock's voice was a low, smug rumble, a sound that had haunted Tadao's dreams for years. It was closer now, intimate, dripping with a possession that made Tadao's stomach coil into a cold, hard knot.
Tadao couldn't move. He was pressed against the rough bark of a towering oak at the edge of the clearing, his fingers digging into the moss until his nails packed with dirt. The curse on his chest, that intricate purple tattoo that had appeared on his eighteenth birthday in this godsforsaken world, was ice-cold and silent. It gave him nothing. No power, no warning. Just the hollow, familiar ache of his own magical impotence.
From his hiding spot, he watched.
Penny, his Penny, was on her knees in the soft grass. The late afternoon sun speared through the forest canopy, turning her auburn hair into a messy, fiery halo. Her head was bowed, not in prayer, but in submission. Brock stood before her, his trousers open, his hand fisted in her hair. He wasn't forcing her. That was the worst part. Her hands were resting on his muscular thighs, not pushing him away.
"See how weak he is?" Brock continued, his gaze fixed on the spot where Tadao hid, as if he could see right through the foliage. A cruel smirk played on his lips. "He can't protect you. He can't protect anyone. He's just a ghost watching his own life burn."
Penny let out a shaky breath. Her shoulders trembled.
"Look at him," Brock commanded again, his voice softening into a terrifying parody of tenderness. He tightened his grip in her hair, not yanking, but anchoring. "I want you to see who you really belong to now."
Slowly, so slowly it made Tadao's jaw ache from clenching, Penny turned her head. Her eyes, wide and glistening with unshed tears, found his across the twenty yards of clearing. The shame in them was a physical blow. But beneath the shame, swimming in those depths he knew so well, was something else. A helpless, flickering fascination. A terrible curiosity.
The eye contact lasted only a second before she squeezed her eyes shut, a tear tracing a clean path through the forest dust on her cheek.
That's when the curse woke up.
It started as a deep, internal thrum, a vibration that originated from the cold tattoo over his heart. The intricate purple lines began to glow, emitting a faint, sickly light he could see through his thin tunic. A wave of heat, completely at odds with the ice that had been there moments before, washed down his torso, pooling in his groin. He felt his cock twitch, then harden against his will, swelling painfully tight against his pants.
No. No, not now. Not to this.
His mind screamed the protest, but his body was no longer his to command. This was the Corrosion Curse's primary function: to feed on betrayal and convert the emotional agony into a corrupted, physical response. The more he witnessed, the more potent the humiliation, the stronger the cursed arousal became. It was a parasite, and the sight of Penny's tearful, submissive face was a feast.
A surge of something else came with the heat—a brief, crackling sensation in his limbs. Mana. Not the free-flowing, controllable energy his mothers or childhood friend wielded, but a raw, internal surge. It tightened his muscles, sharpened his senses, made him acutely aware of every sound: the rustle of leaves, the distant call of a bird, the wet, soft sound of Penny's lips parting.
Brock chuckled, a rich, satisfied sound. "That's it, baby. Open up for me. Show your boyfriend how a real man is treated."
Tadao's vision tunneled. The clearing, the trees, everything blurred at the edges except for the devastating scene in the center. His breathing came in short, ragged gasps. He wanted to roar, to charge out and tackle Brock, to beat that smug face into the dirt. But the curse was already working on his mind, too. It wasn't just his body it corrupted. A thick, syrupy thought oozed through his panic: She's doing it to protect you. She's being strong. Just watch. Learn.
It was a lie. A corrosive, comforting lie planted by the curse to ensure his compliance, to make him a willing spectator to his own destruction.
He was powerless to stop it. He was always powerless.
*
Three Weeks Earlier
The transition to this new world, Aerth, hadn't been gentle. One moment they were all in the old neighborhood—Tadao, his girlfriend Penny, his two moms (Elena and Sarah), his three sisters (Maya, Chloe, and the youngest, Lily), his childhood friend Leo, and his bully, Brock—and the next, they were sprawled on the soft, alien grass of a sun-drenched meadow, staring up at a violet sky with two small, shimmering moons.
A disembodied, echoing voice had welcomed them, the "Isekai Champions," and bestowed upon them their "divine gifts," the Skills that would define their roles in this world.
It had been a brutal, public unveiling.
Elena and Sarah, his mothers, had glowed with a serene, potent light. Their Skill, they whispered, was XXX, a divine blessing of fertility and creation they were still understanding. His sisters received variations of the same—Maya's was XXX: Blossom, Chloe's XXX: Veil, Lily's XXX: Seed. They'd huddled together, a powerful, feminine unit thrumming with latent magic.
Leo, his lanky, loyal friend, had whooped as a blazing golden sword of light materialized in his hand. The Hero. It suited him, his honest face set with sudden, noble purpose.
Penny had gasped, her artist's hands flying to her mouth as shimmering, complex blueprints and equations flashed in the air around her. Artificer's Genesis. The ability to create anything she could imagine, limited only by available materials and her own understanding. A god-like skill.
Brock had scowled, kicking at a tuft of grass. "Empowerer," he'd grunted, sounding disgusted. "Sounds like a fucking cheerleader skill. I empower others? What kind of bullshit is that?" He'd shot a mocking look at Tadao. "Probably to buff up the real heroes while I stand in the back, useless."
And Tadao… Tadao had felt nothing. No surge of energy, no glowing sigils, no weapon. Just the same, frustrating emptiness that had plagued him his whole life, now magnified in a world where magic was the air everyone else breathed. The voice had said nothing to him. He was a blank space, a null set.
"Looks like someone got left out," Brock had laughed, the sound harsh in the tranquil meadow. "Guess the isekai truck dropped off a dud."
The weeks that followed were a special kind of hell. They'd found shelter in a deserted, vine-choked manor on the edge of the Whisperwood. Leo, with his hero's strength, helped clear debris. Penny, with her burgeoning creation skill, managed to will basic furnishings and tools into existence, though it drained her visibly. Tadao's mothers and sisters, their XXX Skills seemingly passive for now, took charge of the home, their presence growing more… vibrant. They moved with a new grace, their laughter was richer, their touches lingered. Tadao didn't understand it, but it made him feel even more like an outsider.
Brick by brick, the hierarchy solidified. Leo was the protector, the leader. Penny was the inventor, the essential resource. The women were the heart, the mysterious core. Brock was the complained, the one with the "useless" support skill who nonetheless started organizing patrols and making decisions with a confidence that brooked no argument.
And Tadao fetched water. Gathered firewood. Cleaned. He was the mundane in a world of miracles.
On the morning of his eighteenth birthday on Aerth, he'd woken with a searing pain on his chest. He'd staggered to a tarnished mirror in the manor's remnants of a bathroom and pulled his shirt aside. There, over his heart, was the tattoo. It was beautiful in a horrifying way: fine, interlocking lines of deep violet that swirled and knottted like thorny vines, pulsing faintly with a light that felt hungry. When he touched it, a wave of profound weakness washed over him, a suction that seemed to pull the very air from his lungs. It was the final seal. The curse that confirmed his destiny as the powerless one.
He told no one. What was there to say? 'Hey, I'm not just magically inert, I'm also cursed!' It would only fuel Brock's derision.
The change in Penny had been subtle at first. She spent more time "consulting" with Brock about security for the manor, about materials she needed for her projects. Brock, the "Empowerer," would place a hand on her shoulder, his face a mask of serious concentration. "Trying to channel some energy to help you focus, Artificer," he'd say. Penny would flush, a strange, distracted look in her eyes, and nod.
Tadao's curse would grow cold each time he saw it.
Then, a week ago, Penny had come to him in the overgrown garden. Her eyes were red-rimmed but fierce. "I'm going to do something, Tadao," she'd whispered, gripping his hands. Her fingers were ice. "To protect you. Brock… he's dangerous. He's getting stronger, and he's looking at your sisters, at your moms, in a way I don't like. Leo is strong, but he's naive. He trusts Brock's 'strategic mind'."
"What are you talking about?" Tadao had asked, dread a cold stone in his gut.
"I'm going to… get close to him," she'd said, the words tasting like ash in her mouth. "If I'm with him, if he thinks I'm his, he might leave the others alone. I can use my position to influence him, to tame him. For you. For everyone."
He'd argued, pleaded, but her mind was set. It was a sacrifice, a noble one in her twisted logic. She kissed him then, a desperate, salty kiss that felt like goodbye. "I love you," she'd breathed against his lips. "Remember that. This is for you."
The next day, she'd stopped meeting his eyes. She started sitting next to Brock at meals, laughing a little too loudly at his jokes. Brock's hand would find her knee under the table. Tadao's curse would throb, a dull, angry pulse.
And then, this afternoon, he'd followed them into the woods.
*
Back in the present, at the edge of the clearing, the corrupted mana surging through Tadao's veins did nothing to loosen the vice around his lungs. It just made him more acutely, horrifyingly aware.
Brock used his grip in Penny's hair to guide her forward. "Go on, sweetheart. You know what to do. You've been thinking about it, haven't you?"
Penny whimpered, a soft, broken sound. Her eyes were still shut tight. But her body leaned in. Her parted lips, glistening and full, hovered an inch from the swollen head of Brock's cock. It was thick, veined, and ruddy with arousal, a vulgar monument to the power imbalance between them. A drop of clear precum beaded at the slit.
Tadao's own traitorous cock strained painfully. The curse fed on his jealousy, his rage, his helplessness, and converted it into this vile, rigid proof of its control. Heat radiated from the glowing tattoo, a shameful beacon.
"P-Penny, don't…" The words tore from Tadao's throat, a ragged whisper meant to be a shout.
She couldn't hear him. Or she chose not to.
Brock did. His smirk widened. "He's begging, Penny. The little ghost is begging. Doesn't that just make you want to do it more? To show him how little his begging matters?"
A shudder wracked Penny's frame. Then, with a sob that was half anguish, half something else entirely, she opened her eyes. She didn't look at Tadao this time. Her gaze was fixed on Brock's cock, wide with a kind of horrified fixation. Her tongue darted out, a pink, fleeting glimpse, and she caught the bead of precum.
The smack of her lips was obscenely loud in the quiet clearing.
"Fuck yes," Brock groaned, his head tipping back. "That's it. Taste it. That's the taste of a real man. Not that weak shit your boyfriend's got."
Encouraged, or perhaps simply broken past a point of return, Penny opened her mouth wider. She leaned in again, and this time, her lips closed around the head.
Tadao felt a jolt, as if lightning had arced from the tattoo to his spine. A vivid, unbidden fantasy slammed into his mind, courtesy of the curse: not Penny pulling away, but Penny taking Brock deeper, her cheeks hollowing, her eyes rolling back in pleasure. The fantasy was so detailed he could almost hear the wet, guttural sounds.
In reality, Penny was tentative, clumsy. She took only the head into her mouth, her body trembling. But for Brock, it was enough. He sighed, a contented sound, and began to move his hips in tiny, shallow thrusts.
"Mmm, good girl. Such a good girl for me. Take it. Just like that."
His praise acted like a spell. Penny's trembling lessened. A low, muffled moan vibrated from her throat, a sound Tadao had never heard her make before. It wasn't a sound of pain. It was one of… overwhelmed sensation. Her hands, which had been limp on Brock's thighs, now curled, her fingers pressing into the hard muscle.
Brock looked directly at Tadao's hiding place, his eyes glinting with malicious triumph. He maintained eye contact as he began to move more deliberately.
"She's a natural, Tadao," he called out, his voice rough but clear. "You never taught her this, did you? Too busy being weak."
With each word, he pushed a little deeper into Penny's mouth. Her eyes watered, her nose pressed against his lower abdomen. She gagged, a wet, choking glrk that made Tadao flinch. But Brock didn't pull back. He held her there, his grip in her hair firm.
"Shhh, breathe through your nose, baby. You can take it. My good girl can take all of me."
Penny's body convulsed, but she stayed still. Her throat worked, and after a moment of strained, nasal breathing, she relaxed. A line of saliva escaped the corner of her stretched lips and trailed down her chin.
The curse in Tadao was a living thing now, a second heart beating in his groin. His arousal was a painful, throbbing ache, a sickening counterpoint to the devastation shredding his soul. He could smell the earthy scent of the forest, the musk of Brock's sweat, the faint, coppery tang of Penny's distress. Every sense was magnified by the cursed mana, a high-definition feed of his own ruin.
Brock began to fuck her mouth in earnest. Not a brutal pounding, but a slow, possessive, deep rhythm. Each thrust buried his considerable length to the hilt, his pubic bone meeting her lips with a soft, damp thump. The sounds were filthy, explicit: the wet shlurp of her mouth accommodating him, the guttural glck as he hit the back of her throat, the ragged, rhythmic gasps she managed through her nose.
"Oh fuck, Penny… your mouth… it's so fucking warm," Brock moaned, abandoning his taunts for a moment, lost in the sensation. His free hand came down to cup her cheek, his thumb stroking over the stretched skin. "Look at you. Look at you serving me. This is what you were made for."
Penny's eyes were glazed, unfocused. Tears streamed down her face, mingling with the spit on her chin. But her hands had moved. One was braced against Brock's thigh for balance. The other… the other had drifted between her own legs, hidden by the folds of her skirt. From the frantic, subtle rocking of her hips, from the choked, desperate little moans that were forced out of her around Brock's invading flesh, Tadao knew what she was doing.
She was touching herself.
The realization was a nuclear blast in Tadao's mind. The curse roared, and the world dissolved.
*
It wasn't a faint. It was an ejection.
One moment he was against the tree, his body humming with cursed energy and torment. The next, there was a violent, sucking lurch behind his navel, and his perspective wrenched.
He was suddenly floating, disembodied, in the air just three feet away from the scene. He could see the back of his own physical body, still slumped against the oak, motionless. He was a ghost. Invisible. Intangible. This was the curse's masterpiece: Forced Astral Projection. When his emotional distress peaked, it tore his consciousness free and made him watch from the best seat in the house.
He couldn't scream. He couldn't look away. He was a prisoner in a bubble of pure, sensory horror.
From this new vantage point, the details were excruciating. He could see the individual strands of Penny's hair where Brock's fingers were tangled, the flushed, reddened skin of her lips stretched to their limit around the thick shaft. He could see the way her throat bulged slightly with each deep push. He could see the muscles in her slender arm working frantically under her skirt.
And he could hear everything.
"Gah… gonna… gonna come, baby," Brock grunted, his rhythm becoming jagged, urgent. "You want it? You want me to fill that pretty mouth?"
Penny's response was a muffled, high-pitched whine. Her head bobbed in a frantic, eager nod, her eyes squeezed shut. Her fingers moved faster under her skirt.
"Swallow it all. Every drop. For me. For your man."
With a final, deep grind of his hips, Brock held himself buried to the root. His body tensed, a corded statue of pleasure. A raw, animal groan tore from his throat.
Tadao, in his ghostly state, saw it happen in surreal, slow detail. Brock's cock pulsed violently inside Penny's mouth. The first shot was visible as a subtle, throbbing jump at the base. Penny's throat convulsed as she swallowed instinctively.
But Brock was not an average man. His Empowerer skill, the one he mocked as useless, had a secret function he'd been exploiting from day one: it could subtly enhance and amplify biological processes, including his own. And he'd been "practicing" in private.
The volume was monstrous.
The second, third, and fourth pulses were a flood. Thick, opaque cum, whiter than milk, erupted into Penny's mouth with such force it bypassed her ability to swallow. It backed up, spurting out around the seal of her lips where they met his flesh. Ropes of it painted her chin, her neck, dripped onto the collar of her blouse.
Brock finally pulled back, his spent cock sliding out with a wet pop. The moment he was free, the dam broke. Penny's mouth, overfull, overflowed. A torrent of viscous semen gushed from her lips, splattering onto the grass between her knees. She coughed, gagging, more cum bubbling from her nose. It was a obscene, glistening mess.
"Fuck… look at that… look at all of it," Brock breathed, his chest heaving. He wasn't repulsed. He was enthralled. He kept his hand in her hair, forcing her head up so he could see the devastation on her face. "You took it all, you dirty girl. You're drenched in me."
Penny was a wreck. Cum coated her lips, her chin, her neck. It matted in her eyelashes, pooled in the hollow of her throat. She was panting, coughing weakly, her body trembling with the aftershocks of what Tadao now realized was her own orgasm. A dark, wet patch had spread on the skirt between her legs.
She looked shattered. Defiled.
And then, as Brock knelt down in front of her, ignoring the mess, and captured her cum-smeared lips in a deep, possessive kiss, Tadao saw it.
Her hands came up. Not to push him away. They clutched at the shoulders of his tunic, pulling him closer. A broken, hungry sound vibrated from her throat into the kiss. She kissed him back. She licked her own lips, tasting his release mixed with hers.
The betrayal was complete. The sacrifice had become indulgence. The corruption was not just external; it had taken root inside her, watered by Brock's secret power and Tadao's cursed, passive witness.
The astral projection snapped.
*
Tadao slammed back into his body with a gasp that felt like drowning. He was on his knees beside the tree, vomit burning his throat. The glow of his curse tattoo was fading, leaving behind a deep, satisfied warmth that made him want to tear his own skin off. The surge of physical mana was gone too, leaving him emptier than before.
In the clearing, Brock was standing, tucking himself away. He was smiling, a gentle, terrifying smile as he helped a wobbling Penny to her feet. He used the edge of his own tunic to tenderly wipe the worst of the mess from her face, like a parent cleaning a child.
"See?" Brock murmured, his voice carrying easily in the quiet wood. "That wasn't so bad, was it? You're stronger now. You feel it?"
Penny nodded, her eyes downcast. But she leaned into his touch. Her voice, when it came, was hoarse, cracked, but clear. "I… I feel it."
"Good." Brock slung an arm around her shoulders, pulling her into his side. He turned, his eyes finding Tadao's pathetic form immediately. The smile never left his face. "Let's go home, baby. We have plans to make. Your friend Maya has been giving me some looks lately. I think it's time I had a proper talk with her."
He led Penny away, not even glancing back. Penny, wrapped in Brock's arm, took one last look over her shoulder. Her eyes met Tadao's. The shame was still there, but it was buried under a new layer of something hard, something resolute. And something else—a flicker of pity, for him.
Then they were gone, swallowed by the trees.
Tadao stayed on his knees, the taste of bile and helplessness in his mouth. The curse on his chest was quiet, sated. It had fed well. And it had shown him the future. Brock wasn't just taking Penny. He was taking his time. He was going to take everyone. And Tadao's curse would force him to watch every single, degrading moment, fueling his own pathetic existence with the ashes of everything he loved.
A cold, seeping resentment began to fill the void the curse had left behind. It was the only thing he had left.