Void System: Every Heroine Makes Me Stronger

"Crisis Hold."

The name settled between them.

Tressa did not look away. Her fingers remained curled around the key in her apron pocket, and a flush still warmed the freckles across her nose. The narrow bed stood behind her. The coin packet and folded work note rested on the chest beneath the shuttered window, separate from both of them.

Severin stepped closer.

"Turn the key."

She drew it out, crossed to the door, and locked it. The small iron click sounded louder than the work in the main room beyond the passage. Tressa set the key beside her coins rather than giving it to him.

Then she came back.

Severin caught her chin and kissed her.

Her first breath stopped against his mouth. She held still for half a heartbeat, not retreating, then gripped the front of his coat and rose onto her toes. The next kiss opened under his. She followed late once, learned the pressure, and met him sooner when he changed the angle.

Nothing in the kiss felt practiced. She learned his pressure as he gave it and answered with growing certainty.

His hand slid behind her neck. The other closed around her waist and pulled her against him. Tressa made a small sound when the hard length beneath his trousers pressed into her belly.

She broke the kiss only far enough to breathe. Her eyes dropped between them.

"That was quick."

"You expected difficulty?"

"I didn’t know what to expect."

"You will."

Her gaze returned to his. Nervousness remained. So did the decision beneath it.

"Tell me what you want first," she said.

Severin released her waist and removed his coat. He folded it once and put it over the footboard, away from the basin and the chest. His dark shirt followed. Tressa watched the cloth clear his shoulders, then looked at the dragon worked across the left side of his chest and ribs. Her attention caught on the black sigil at his neck before dropping lower again.

He sat at the edge of the narrow bed, feet planted apart.

"Kneel."

Tressa untied her apron and laid it beside his coat. Then she lowered herself onto the bare floor between his knees.

She reached for the fastening of his trousers, glanced up once to be sure she had the right piece of cloth, and opened it. Severin lifted his hips enough for her to pull his trousers and underclothes down. His cock came free, fully hard and heavy above her hands.

Tressa stared long enough for him to notice.

"That looks difficult."

A laugh almost escaped him. "For you or me?"

"Me. You seem comfortable."

"Not for long."

She wrapped her left hand around the base. Her grip was cautious. Too cautious.

Severin covered her fingers and tightened them until the pressure suited him. "Like that."

Tressa nodded. Her right palm settled on his left thigh for balance. She leaned in and touched the head with the tip of her tongue.

The small contact pulled a hard breath from him. She noticed his abdomen tighten and did it again, slower, tracing the rim before passing over the wet slit. Her mouth closed around the crown.

Warmth surrounded him. Her lips dragged down less than a handspan, then back. The first stroke lacked rhythm. The second did not.

Tressa watched him while she worked, hazel eyes lifted beneath her lashes. She used his breathing as instruction. When a firmer pull brought a deeper breath from his chest, she repeated it. When her teeth brushed him, his right hand settled over the back of her head.

"Open wider."

She did.

He guided her down another inch. Her tongue flattened beneath him. Saliva slicked the shaft below her mouth and ran over the fingers holding his base.

Tressa drew back for air. "Faster?"

"Deeper."

Her brows pulled together, not in refusal. In calculation.

She took him again. This time she kept her lips loose as he guided her forward. The head pressed against the back of her mouth. Her throat tightened. She stopped, breathed through her nose, then pushed another fraction before her body rejected the angle and she pulled away with a cough.

Severin released her at once.

Tressa caught her breath against his thigh. Tears brightened her eyes. She wiped her mouth with the back of her wrist and frowned at herself.

"Again," she said.

"Look at me."

She did.

"You breathe when I give you room. You don’t fight for another inch after your throat closes."

"I can take more than that."

"Then prove it without choking yourself."

The sharp answer steadied her more than comfort would have. Tressa shifted her knees, braced her right hand harder on his thigh, and wrapped her left around his base again.

She licked him from beneath the head to the tip. Her mouth returned with more saliva and less hesitation. Shallow strokes built a wet, steady pull. Severin let her find it. Her cheeks tightened around him each time she drew back, and her tongue pressed along the underside on the way down.

Heat gathered low in his body.

Tressa felt the change before he spoke. Her eyes sharpened. She took him farther, paused at the back of her mouth, then withdrew for a full breath.

"Now," Severin said.

His right hand closed through her chestnut hair. He guided her forward in a controlled movement.

Her lips reached lower along the shaft. The head pressed past the back of her tongue. Her throat opened around him, tight and hot, then clenched with a hard swallow.

Severin’s left hand dug into the mattress.

Tressa’s eyes watered. She stayed responsive beneath his hand, right fingers flexing against his thigh. A muffled "Ghnn..." vibrated around his cock as her throat worked again over the head.

"Hold."

The command left rougher than the others.

She held him there. Her nose remained clear. Her throat gripped once more, sending a violent pull through his groin.

Severin drew her back before her breath failed.

Air entered her with a wet gasp. Saliva stretched from her lower lip to his cock and broke across her chin. She coughed once, swallowed, and wiped the tears from her left eye.

Then she put him back into her mouth without being told.

Eager. Good.

Her rhythm changed. She used shallow strokes to breathe and deeper ones when his hand tightened. Each time Severin guided her to the limit, he released her before panic could replace effort. Tressa recovered quickly and returned, learning the space her body allowed.

The next deep stroke took him into her throat cleanly.

She swallowed around him on purpose.

"Fuck."

The word broke from Severin before he could shape it into an order.

Satisfaction flashed across her wet eyes. She drew back just enough to breathe, then took him deep again, chasing the reaction she had earned.

Pressure tightened across his abdomen. His thighs locked beneath her hands. Tressa kept the pace even when his right hand began to control more of it, mouth opening for each guided stroke, throat accepting the last part in short, wet pulls.

Severin felt the climax gather too quickly to disguise.

"Tressa. Take it."

The clean command failed on her name.

She looked up and stayed where he put her.

His cock pulsed inside her mouth. The first release struck the back of her throat. Tressa swallowed hard around him. The contraction dragged another surge from his body, then another, hot semen spilling while her left hand held the base and her throat worked to take it.

Severin’s breath tore loose. His shoulders locked. His hips pushed forward once before he caught the movement and held himself still.

Tressa remained responsive, eyes wet and fixed on him. She swallowed the last pulse, then pressed her right fingers against his thigh.

He released her immediately.

She drew back with a rough breath. A white trace shone at the corner of her mouth. She caught it with her thumb, looked at him, and licked it clean before reaching for the folded linen by the basin.

Severin took the cloth first. He wiped her chin, then the saliva from his shaft.

Tressa swallowed once more. "Did I do it properly?"

"You made me forget the next command."

Her mouth softened with unmistakable satisfaction. "So yes."

"Yes."

He gripped her arms and drew her upright. Her knees were marked by the floorboards. Severin sat her across his right thigh and kissed her again. She tasted faintly of him. The fact sharpened the fading aftershocks instead of ending them.

He spent nearly 15 minutes letting his body recover while he kept her close. The stripe of late light beneath the shutters shifted across the wooden chest. He kissed her neck and opened the buttons of her clean work dress while her breathing settled. Tressa helped with the sleeves. The dress slid from her shoulders and gathered at her waist, revealing plain underclothes and the compact fullness of her breasts beneath a thin shift.

Severin pulled the shift over her head.

Her breasts lifted free, pale and soft, fuller than her work clothes suggested. He cupped both. Tressa inhaled sharply as his thumbs passed over the pink tips. "Ah..." The sound slipped out before she could close her mouth. They hardened under the repeated strokes.

"Sensitive?"

"More than I thought."

He closed his mouth around her left nipple.

Tressa’s fingers entered his hair. She did not direct him. She held on while he sucked. "Nghn..." Her grip tightened when his teeth caught the swollen tip lightly before his tongue soothed it. He worked the other breast with his hand, squeezing until warm flesh pressed between his fingers.

Her hips shifted across his thigh.

Severin felt the damp heat through her underclothes.

He stood and turned her toward the bed. Her dress still hung from her waist. He pushed it over her hips with her remaining clothes until everything gathered at her ankles.

"Step out."

Tressa obeyed. She placed both hands on the mattress when he guided her forward, bare ass presented behind her.

Severin held her waist with his left hand and spread his right over the round right cheek, feeling the muscle tense beneath soft flesh.

His open right palm landed across the center of her right ass cheek.

The crack cut through the room. Her right cheek flattened under the impact, then shook as his hand lifted. A red print began to form across the pale skin.

"Ah!" Tressa rose onto her toes. She did not straighten. Her hips remained where he had put them.

"That hurt," she said.

"Too much?"

She tested the heat with her fingertips, then returned her hand to the bed. "No. It surprised me."

Severin ran his palm over the mark. Her breath shortened at the contact.

"Stay open."

He parted her cheeks and found her already wet. Moisture shone along the lips of her pussy and dampened the hair above them. Severin dragged his index finger through it. Tressa’s back tightened. A low "Ngh..." escaped her.

He rubbed along the swollen outer flesh, then found her clit. The first circle made her push backward by instinct.

"There," she breathed.

He repeated the pressure. Tressa widened her stance. Her head lowered between her arms while his fingers moved in slow, firm circles. Her body gave him immediate facts: the hitch in her breath, the tremor in her thighs, the way her wetness spread across his hand.

Severin slid his index finger into her.

Tressa tightened hard around it. "That feels strange."

"Pain?"

"No. Full."

He worked the finger slowly until her body stopped resisting the movement, then added a second. "Ahhn..." Her lips stayed parted after the sound. The narrow heat gripped both fingers as his thumb found her clit again.

Tressa began to meet his hand. Small movements at first. Then a deliberate push backward when he curled his fingers inside her.

"More pressure?" Severin asked.

"Yes. Like that. Harder if you can."

He withdrew his fingers. His right hand settled at her waist while his left spread across her left cheek.

His open left palm struck her left ass cheek.

"Ahhn!" The left cheek jolted under his hand and flushed beside the earlier mark. Tressa’s hips moved backward again after the impact, not away.

"I can," he said.

She gave a short, shaky laugh into the bedding. "I noticed."

Severin turned her over and lifted her onto the narrow mattress. Her chestnut hair spread across the pillow. The bed barely held his knees beside her hips, forcing him to keep his weight through his arms rather than settle over her.

Tressa watched him remove the rest of his clothes. His cock had hardened again during the long preparation, not with the urgent ache of the first round but with a deeper, steadier pressure.

Her gaze moved from it to his face. "I’ve never done this part."

"I know enough now."

"From looking at me?"

"From how tight you were around my fingers."

Color climbed her throat. "That is very direct."

"You chose a direct man."

"I did."

He bent and kissed her before embarrassment could become distance. Tressa opened under him at once. Her hands moved over his shoulders and down his back, learning the body above her while he returned to her breasts.

Severin took his time with them, then moved lower. He kissed the soft curve of her stomach and the inside of her left thigh. Tressa’s knees shifted apart without instruction.

His fingers opened her wet lips. He rubbed her clit until her hips began to follow the movement again. Then he pushed 2 fingers inside, working her carefully while his mouth closed over the swollen nub.

Tressa’s back lifted from the bed.

"Severin..."

He felt her tighten around his fingers and stopped before the building contractions could finish. Tressa looked down at him, breathing hard.

"Why did you stop?"

"Because I want your first climax around my cock."

The answer left her silent for a beat. Then she nodded once. "All right."

Severin rose between her bent legs. He dragged the head of his cock through her wetness until the crown and shaft shone slick. Tressa’s hands closed on the linen beside her hips.

He pressed the head to her entrance.

The first resistance was firmer than her fingers had suggested. Severin pushed slowly. Her body stretched around the crown, hot and painfully narrow. Tressa’s brows drew together.

He moved another fraction.

Her breath snapped. "Ahh... sharp. Wait."

Severin stopped at once, weight held off her body.

Tressa stared at the ceiling and took 3 slow breaths. The muscles around him fluttered, gripping and releasing without letting him farther. A thin line of red marked the wetness at their joining.

His hand settled on her lower stomach, not pressing. "Tell me when it changes."

She swallowed. "It burns. Not badly."

He remained still.

The tension in her thighs eased by degrees. Tressa shifted her left heel closer to his hip and tested the pressure herself. The movement drew him barely deeper. She winced, then breathed through it.

"It is easing," she said. "Keep going. Slowly."

Severin entered her in measured inches. Each advance made her grip him harder. He paused whenever her face tightened, waiting until her body released enough to take more. When his hips finally met hers, Tressa let out a long, unsteady breath.

The heat surrounding him was almost motionless, stretched tight around every part of his cock.

"Ngh... full," she whispered.

"Pain?"

"Sore. The sharp part is gone."

He withdrew only a little. Her pussy clung to him, wet and narrow. The first return made her inhale. The second brought no wince. After several shallow strokes, her hips began to tilt toward him.

Severin kept the pace slow. He watched the strain leave her mouth. Her fingers loosened on the sheet. Her thighs stopped bracing against him.

"Ah..." Tressa blinked at the sound she had made.

"There?" he asked.

"A little deeper."

He gave her more.

Her eyes closed. "Nghn... yes."

The answer pulled at his control.

Severin shortened the next withdrawal and drove back with firmer pressure. Tressa’s breasts shifted with the movement. Her pussy tightened around him, no longer only resisting. She started meeting each stroke, learning his rhythm from underneath him.

"Look at me."

Her eyes opened.

He increased the pace without making it rough. The bed began to creak. Wetness gathered where their bodies joined, mixed with the small blood trace but not hiding it.

"Ngh... that one. Again."

Severin repeated the angle.

Her hips lifted. Her hands left the linen and caught his forearms. He felt the moment she stopped enduring the entry and began wanting the next stroke.

Now.

He withdrew and turned her before her body could settle.

Tressa moved onto her hands and knees near the center of the bed. Tenderness made the first shift careful, but she found her balance and lowered onto her forearms when he pressed between her shoulder blades.

The 2 earlier marks showed across her ass, right and left, the first already fading at the edges.

Severin spread her with both hands and guided his cock back to her entrance. She was swollen and wetter now. He entered in a slow stroke, stopping when her body tightened around the returning fullness.

Tressa breathed out. "Ngh... not sharp."

"Good."

He gripped her left hip with his left hand. His right palm covered the warm right cheek, directly over the cooling print.

She pushed backward, taking him deeper.

His open right palm cracked against her right ass cheek again.

The impact cracked over the sound of the bed. Her cheek jumped beneath his hand. The older mark reddened sharply, a fresh print blooming over it. "Ahh!" Tressa drove her hips back, burying him to the base.

"Again?" she asked, breathless.

"No. Hold still."

She held position.

Severin pulled back and thrust into her harder.

The rear angle opened more of her narrow heat around him.

"Nghn... Severin."

Her body had adjusted enough to accept the force, but first-time tightness remained in every withdrawal. Warm, slick walls dragged along his cock and closed behind each stroke. Tressa pushed back in an uneven rhythm, correcting herself when their movements collided badly and meeting him cleanly on the next one.

He caught a fistful of hair near the back of her head, not pulling her neck, only holding the line of her body while his left hand kept her hip steady.

"Keep coming back to me."

"I am... ngh."

The next thrust broke the answer apart.

The bed struck the wall once, then settled into a hard creak beneath the pace. Tressa’s breasts swung below her. Her forearms pressed into the linen. The heated marks across her ass flexed with every movement.

Severin drove deeper. The angle made her voice rise.

"Ahn... there. Don’t change it."

He did not.

Tressa’s hips became more urgent. She was no longer following him by accident. She pushed back for each thrust, taking the force he chose and adding her own. Her pussy tightened in quick pulses around him.

Severin’s first climax had left a lingering sensitivity along the shaft. The long recovery had dulled it enough to continue, not erased it. Now every contraction pulled directly through him. The narrow warmth of her first union, the slick pressure, and her active response gathered into a second build that felt slower and heavier than the first.

Tressa reached her left hand beneath herself.

"Use mine," Severin said.

His left hand left her hip and found her clit. He rubbed in time with the thrusts while his right held her hair and upper line steady.

Her body faltered.

"Nghnn... I can’t keep the rhythm."

"You don’t need to. Take mine."

Severin set it for her. Deep, hard strokes. His fingers kept circling the swollen point between her legs. Tressa’s words broke into breath and short sounds. Her thighs began to tremble.

The first strong contraction closed around him without warning.

"Ahh... Severin!"

Another wave followed. "Ngh... ah..." Her pussy clenched in tight, repeated pulses. Tressa’s hips jerked backward, then lost their rhythm completely as her climax moved through her. Her ass tightened beneath the red prints. Her fingers twisted in the linen.

Severin kept thrusting through it.

The contractions dragged his second release close. He felt his control narrow to the pressure at the base of his cock, the hot grip around him, and the woman beneath him still trying to push back even while her legs shook.

"Tressa."

She lifted her head enough to answer. "Inside... ngh... please."

The word tightened his grip.

Severin gripped her hip again and drove fully into her.

The second release broke harder through his abdomen than the one she had drawn from him with her mouth. His cock pulsed inside her. Hot semen spilled in thick surges into the tight warmth, each pulse met by another contraction from her climax.

A rough groan left him. His thighs locked against the bed. He held her hips flush to his and emptied inside her, the pressure drawn out by the way her body kept squeezing around him.

Tressa shuddered beneath his hands. "Ahhn... I can feel it."

The plain wonder in her voice nearly pulled another thrust from him. Severin held still instead, buried deep until the final pulse faded.

His breathing came hard against her back. The first release had left him loose and sharply sensitive. This one left his abdomen heavy, his grip slower to open, and ordinary fatigue settling into his thighs.

He released her hair and ran his hand down her spine.

"Stay there."

Tressa remained on her forearms while both of them recovered. Her breathing was uneven. The red marks on her ass remained visible, the right one warmer and darker than the left.

Severin eased out.

Her pussy held him until the head slipped free. White semen followed in a thick line, gathered between her swollen lips, then dropped onto the folded linen he pulled beneath her. A faint red smear remained separate near her entrance.

Tressa looked back over her shoulder. "That is more mess than I expected."

"You expected very little today."

"I had no useful measure."

He almost smiled.

Severin helped her roll onto her side, keeping her weight off the tender skin. He brought the basin closer, wet a clean cloth, and wiped her thighs first. Tressa took another cloth and washed her mouth and chin, then her breasts and stomach.

He wiped the release from her thighs and swollen lips without rubbing the sore entrance. The small blood trace remained visible on the separate edge of the linen.

"Pain," he said.

Tressa tested her body before answering. "My jaw is tired. My throat is sore, but I can swallow. Between my legs is sore. The right side of my ass hurts more than the left."

"Walking?"

She bent her left knee, then the right. "I can walk. I would rather not run."

"Good."

He settled her against his chest for several breaths. Tressa accepted the hold without going limp in it. Her hand rested over the dragon on his left side, fingers moving once across the ink before stilling.

"Was it different the second time?" she asked.

"Slower to build. Harder when it came."

"Because of me?"

"Because you were tight, warm, and pushing back while you came around me."

Her face colored again, but she did not hide it. "That is also very direct."

"You asked."

"I did."

They dressed without hurry. Tressa used the basin once more, then drew on clean underclothes with a small wince she did not conceal. Her work dress covered the marks. She tied the apron back around her waist, slower than before but without help. Severin put on his underclothes, trousers, shirt, and coat.

The room smelled of soap, sweat, and sex despite the used linen folded inward beside the basin.

Tressa retrieved the key from beside her coins. Before she reached the door, Severin caught her wrist.

Tressa stood dressed and sore beneath the plain cloth. She did not pull her wrist from his hand.

He held the name in his mind.

Crisis Hold.

He selected it deliberately.

[Skill Copy successful.]

[Skill Grade: F — Nascent Skill]

[Skill Name: Crisis Hold]

[Void Imprint recorded.]

The pattern settled into him without pain. 1 living target. 1 failing process. Several breaths in which worsening could be stopped, never healed.

Tressa watched his face. "Did it work?"

"Yes. You still have it?"

She went still for a moment, attending to something he could not see. Then she nodded. "Yes. Nothing feels missing."

A fist struck the door hard enough to rattle the latch.

"Tressa! Severin!" a man shouted from the passage. "A man helping with the late work collapsed. We put him on a litter, but he stopped breathing before we reached the shelter!"

Tressa’s hand was already turning the key.