Villainess is being pampered by her beast husbands

Cutie bolted upright, swinging his massive paw wildly in a blind panic, assuming the fight was still happening.

"Whoa, whoa! Easy, big guy! It’s me!" Kaya yelled, throwing her arms up.

Cutie stopped mid-swing. He blinked, his massive chest heaving, and looked down at Kaya. Then he looked at Veer. Finally, he looked across the room at the headless, massive corpse of Lord Siss.

A low, whining whimper escaped the giant bear-rabbit’s throat. Before Kaya could say another word, Cutie lunged forward and wrapped his massive, furry arms around her in a bone-crushing, desperate hug. He buried his giant head into her shoulder, trembling like a frightened child.

"Ack—Cutie—lungs—crushing—" Kaya wheezed, patting his massive back while trying to preserve her own ribcage. "It’s okay. We won. You did amazing."

Veer smiled softly, stepping forward to gently pry the giant beastman off his fragile human wife. "Alright, that’s enough, you overgrown furball. If the Snake Lord couldn’t kill her, I’m not letting you accidentally hug her to death."

Cutie backed off, sniffling loudly, and wiped his nose with the back of his paw. He grunted, pointing at the severed head of Lord Siss, and made a crushing motion with his hands, as if asking if he should smash it into paste just to be sure.

"No," Kaya said, catching her breath. She rubbed her ribs, her tactical mind booting fully back online. "Leave the head intact. We are going to need it."

She turned away from Cutie and slowly walked to the center of the ruined treasury.

The sheer volume of wealth in the room was staggering. Even with the chests Cutie had smashed and the gold Lord Siss’s acid had melted, there were still mountains of unrefined ore, cut gemstones, thousands of high-grade steel weapons, and countless crates of preserved food and medical supplies. It was the accumulated fortune of three centuries of absolute tyranny.

"So," Veer said, walking up beside her. He kicked a stray gold coin across the marble floor. "How exactly do you plan on carrying all of this back to our cave? Cutie is strong, but even he can’t carry three tons of gold. And the fifty idiot recruits outside don’t have wagons."

Kaya looked at him, a slow, dangerous, incredibly ambitious smile spreading across her face.

"Carry it back to the cave?" Kaya repeated, letting out a sharp laugh. "Veer, why on earth would we go back to a damp, miserable cave in the middle of nowhere?"

Veer blinked, his predatory eyes narrowing as he tried to follow her logic. "Because... that is where we live?"

"Not anymore," Kaya declared, spreading her arms wide, gesturing to the massive, sprawling obsidian fortress around them. "Look at this place! It has towering, impenetrable walls! It is surrounded by a natural moat of toxic marshland! It has fully stocked armories, massive treasuries, and enough infrastructure to house an entire army."

Veer stared at her, the realization slowly dawning on him. "You cannot be serious."

"I am dead serious," Kaya said, her eyes burning with the undeniable fire of a conqueror. "We didn’t just assassinate a tribal leader, Veer. We decapitated the entire command structure of the West. If we pack up a few bags of gold and run away, some other warlord is just going to sweep in tomorrow and claim this fortress for themselves. We did all the hard work. I am not letting someone else reap the benefits."

"Kaya," Veer said, his tone turning remarkably serious. "We are three people. There are still hundreds of elite Snake guards, archers, and soldiers stationed at the front gates of this canyon. Lord Siss pulled his inner guard here, but the bulk of his military is still fully operational and entirely loyal to him. If they realize he is dead, they will swarm this inner sanctum and bury us under a mountain of bodies. We cannot hold this fortress."

"They are loyal to a god," Kaya corrected him, pointing at the severed head on the floor. "They are loyal to the invincible, three-hundred-year-old monster who could crush them with a single thought. They obey him out of absolute, unadulterated fear. But what happens when a god bleeds?"

She walked over to the severed head of Lord Siss. She grabbed it by the long, silky black hair and hoisted it into the air.

"What happens to that absolute fear," Kaya whispered, looking at the dead amber eyes, "when they realize a human girl walked into his impenetrable sanctuary, shattered his inner guard, and cut his head off?"

Veer stared at her, a profound, terrifying awe washing over him. He had thought she was brilliant when she manipulated the hyenas. But this? This was the mindset of an emperor. She wasn’t just trying to survive the beast world anymore. She was playing the game of thrones, and she was playing it for keeps.

"You want to subjugate them," Veer breathed.

"I want to absorb them," Kaya corrected. "The Free Clan was a lie. A ghost story I invented to flush out an assassin. But right now, outside those gates, fifty beastmen are banging on war drums, believing that the Free Clan is real. They think they are part of a glorious, rising empire."

She looked at Veer, her expression entirely resolute.

"It’s time to make the lie a reality."

The sun had finally crested the horizon, casting the Venom-tooth Canyons in the harsh, unforgiving light of dawn.

At the massive iron front gates of the canyon, chaos reigned.

The fifty "collateral recruits" Kaya had accidentally drafted were exhausted, but their morale was terrifyingly high. They had been banging on hollow tree trunks, screaming battle cries, and smashing their crude weapons against rocks for hours. They firmly believed that they were the vanguard of a massive, glorious revolution. Every time the Snake archers on the high walls fired a volley of venom-laced arrows down at them, the recruits cheered, viewing it as proof that the mighty Snake Tribe was terrified of their nonexistent army.

Up on the towering stone walls, the commander of the Snake Tribe’s outer defense force was pacing nervously.

He was a massive Python beastman, covered in thick green scales. He looked down at the pathetic, fifty-man mob banging drums in the mud below, and his brow furrowed in deep confusion.

"Commander," a younger snake guard hissed, slithering up to him. "They are not attacking the gates. They are just making noise. Should we open the gates and slaughter them? A single squad could wipe them out in ten minutes."

"No," the Python commander snapped, his slit-eyes darting nervously toward the inner sanctum of the canyon. "Lord Siss ordered us to hold the wall and fire warning volleys. He specifically told us not to engage in direct combat. He said the real threat would reveal itself."

"But Commander, it has been hours!" the young guard protested. "The sun is up! There is no hidden army! Lord Siss must be mistaken!"

The Python commander grabbed the young guard by the throat, hoisting him off the ground. "You dare question the wisdom of the Snake Lord? He has lived for three centuries! He sees things we cannot! We hold the wall until he commands otherwise!"

He dropped the gasping guard and turned his attention back to the massive, heavy obsidian doors that separated the outer courtyard from the inner sanctum.

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