Harem Assassins : King Sekton's Harem Planet, Book 2: A Space Opera Harem Adventure Baron Sord (good books to read for adults .txt) 📖

“Who’s he?” Deneb whispered.

Violet muttered, “I don’t—”

“SILENCE!” the Cyborg Centaur reared up on hind hooves and roared, his voice exploding from several loudspeakers mounted inside his helmet and mechanized horse torso. His adaptive camouflage flickered with black lightning before returning to burning red to match the red Zalaxian soil he was kicking up in great clumps. He galloped toward Violet and Deneb.

“Move!” Violet hissed, and pulled Deneb aside before she was trampled. Behind them, their sisters scrambled for safety as the Cyborg Centaur plowed through the crowd.

One sister wasn’t so lucky. Kyri was knocked to the ground with a resounding CRACK! She slammed face-first into the red dirt, rolled onto her side and screamed in agony, curling into a ball to cradle her broken thigh. Kyri didn’t know it yet, but the mechanized centaur had fractured her femur completely in two. Nor did she know that, after she healed, she would never walk straight again, such was the severity of her injury and the limitations of her tribe’s primitive jungle medicine.

“BOW BEFORE HADE! BOW BEFORE THE PRINCE OF PANDEMON!” the Cyborg Centaur raged, bucking women aside left and right, their arms and legs flailing as they went flying. “ON YOUR KNEES, WHORES!” Hade circled relentlessly through the scattering tribeswomen.

“Stand your ground!” Violet shouted in frustration. She yanked her Black Hole Blaster from her hip holster and trained it on Hade. She only had four shots remaining, but it would only take one to vaporize Hade in mid-gallop.

Unfortunately, every armored pirate lined up in front of the destroyer snapped their rifles to the ready, pointing their Stygian K177’s at Violet’s head and torso.

She didn’t need to look to feel the aiming lasers dancing across her skin. She ignored the danger and shouted at Hade, “If you harm one more of my sisters, I will send you to another dimension!”

“BOW!” Hade roared, ignoring Violet. He bucked and lunged at the scattering crowd of Violet’s sisters while trying to run them down. Some stumbled and ran out of his way, or dove into the red dirt or blue bushes. Others clustered together as Hade herded them into a group and circled. “ON YOUR KNEES, WHORES!”

“Stand tall, sisters!” Violet ordered. She desperately wanted to fire on Hade, but it would only get her sisters killed.

“KNEEL!” Hade bellowed, again rearing up near a cluster of frightened tribeswomen, kicking at them with his titanium hooves.

Several of Violet’s sisters looked to her, their eyes desperate.

“Do as he says,” Violet sighed, lowering her Black Hole Blaster and holstering it. The armored pirates didn’t lower their K177 rifles. They maintained aim on Violet. She didn’t care. She recognized Hade’s bravado for what it was. No different than King Sekton’s. If everyone obeyed Hade, he wouldn’t kill anyone. He was here for a reason.

Violet had a moment to wonder: had Tim defied the odds and defeated King Sekton that night a few days ago? Here in the jungle, she had no way to know if Tim had won the throne or lost his life. That tragic thought was battered away by Hade as he cantered around Violet, trying to intimidate her, his titanium hooves kicking up red dirt that pelted her in the face.

Disgusted, Violet spat away a small clod after it hit her lips. More clods fell into her bikinied cleavage and stuck there. She ignored those. There would be time for bathing later.

Beside her, Deneb stood cringing but held her bolt rifle ready. Violet had never seen Deneb so scared or angry. Her eyes kept darting toward Kyri where she rolled in the red dirt, hobbled by her broken leg and moaning incoherently. Kyri was in a tremendous amount of pain. Pure agony.

“Now kneel,” Hade demanded with cruel amusement.

Again, Violet’s sisters looked to her for permission. She gave a slight nod. Every tribeswoman knelt down reluctantly in the red Zalaxian dirt.

“Heads down!” Hade barked.

Hatred strained the women’s faces. They refused to lower their heads.

“I SAID HEADS DOWN!” Hade roared, bucking and cutting the air with his hooves.

Snarling, the women lowered their heads reluctantly.

Violet felt their emotional turmoil like it was her own. Neither she nor they had knelt or bowed to any man since escaping King Sekton’s Royal Palace and his Royal Kingdom, not even to pirates like these. Her tribe was a proud one.

But they had never met a pirate like Hade.

Hade was another King Sekton Darkstar in the making, or another Baron Crewd von Bludlust in training. Violet knew men like this all too well.

Satisfied and smug, Hade trotted to a stop in front of Violet and looked down at her with his magnesium eyes. They flamed white inside their shadowed sockets. If he had a mouth or nose, it was hidden behind a spiked, knightly grill that covered most of his face.

“Bow before me, whore,” he said with lazy disdain.

“Before I do that…” Violet said with equal ease. Again she whipped out her Black Hole Blaster in a flash, aiming it at Hade’s chest, the human portion, not the horse portion. “…you’ll have to kill me first.” Violet didn’t know if Hade had two hearts — one in his horse chest, one in his human chest, or none. He was a cybernoid, after all. But it didn’t matter. At this distance, she couldn’t miss. One shot from her blaster would remove him from existence.

“A Kurkullan Black Hole Blaster,” Hade chortled, slightly dismissive, slightly respectful.

“If you value this dimension, you’ll show my tribe some respect.”

“Is it loaded?” he snorted doubtfully.

“Unlike some,” she meant him, “I never strut.”

Hade’s white eyes smoked and smoldered in the black sockets of his helm. “Go ahead, whore. Shoot. My men will slaughter your entire tribe before you finish pulling the trigger.”

Violet arched an eyebrow, recognizing the parameters of this blustery standoff. Goddess knew, she had been through countless similar standoffs with King Sekton when she’d been trapped in the Zalaxian Royal Palace for too many years.

Shifting on his titanium hooves in agitation,