Teressa was barely ten when her marriage was arranged with the count's family. Her parents were only barons, a rank that barely scraped the bottom rung of nobility.
The day she arrived at the count's estate, every servant and noble looked at her as though she were an intruder. Yet no matter how many condescending stares followed her, she never allowed anyone to decide her worth. Though born into a lesser house, she had been drilled from infancy to become the perfect high-born lady: poised, refined, unbreakable.
And so she blended in flawlessly.
When she turned fifteen, Count Robert finally saw her as a woman. They consummated the marriage.
For a time, everything was perfect. The count was utterly enchanted by her beauty and grace. He refused to touch another woman, not even while she carried their child.
But everything began to crumble after she gave birth to their son, Julius Edgar.
Almost overnight, the count's interest vanished. Conversations grew shorter, his visits rarer. Then one day she walked into their bedroom and found him tangled with another woman in the very bed that had once been theirs alone.
When she demanded an explanation, he only laughed.
"What's wrong with a mistress or two? If it bothers you so much, take a lover yourself. Stop nagging, woman, or I'll send you back to the pigsty I dragged you out of."
From that day, the smile died on Teresa's face. She stopped speaking to the servants, stopped smiling at all, and drifted through the mansion like a ghost.
Five years passed in silence. The count's debauchery grew worse with every season. No maid, no servant girl was safe from his hands.
One night she confronted him again. She received exactly the same answer, word for word.
Realizing her husband would never desire her again, a burning frustration took root inside her. She needed release just as badly as he did.
But she refused to sink to his level and harass the household staff to relieve herself. That would erase the last difference between them.
She was still the lady of the house. Her dignity was the one thing he had not yet taken.
So she turned to the slave markets instead: bought men, used them, sent them away.
At first it was enough. Then it wasn't.
Slowly, ordinary humans stopped satisfying her entirely. Burly, savage, refined, slender, even beast-race warriors, none of them could sate the hunger that now lived inside her. Her libido rose to monstrous heights while true satisfaction slipped further and further out of reach.
Just when she believed there was no cure for this twisted sickness, the war ended and captured elven prisoners flooded the kingdom.
Thirty of them were delivered to their estate, a "gift" from the crown, even though the count had never fought a single battle. That was how endless the supply had become.
Teresa had never tasted an elf. For the first time in years, genuine curiosity stirred inside her.
The Count, on the other hand, smelled fresh prey and took charge personally. He had the elves thrown into the underground dungeon beneath the main mansion and treated them worse than animals, their lives reduced to serving the pleasures of the family.
Teresa protested, loudly.
The result was exactly what she expected. Her authority was stripped away, and she was confined to her wing, allowed outside only with permission that never came.
To a man like Count Robert, a rebellious wife needed only one lesson: punishment severe enough that she would never dare again.
While she rotted in her rooms with a single maid for company, the count grew bolder. He installed official concubines. Having his legitimate wife locked away felt like cutting the last chain that restrained his lust.
One of those concubines, a viscount's daughter, seized control of the household that had once been Teresa's domain.
Powerless and forgotten, Teresa survived on the only pleasure still permitted her: the male elf slaves sent to her chambers.
Eight more years passed. Without her careful management, the once-prosperous county sank into crippling debt. Taxes were no longer enough. The count borrowed enormous sums from a marquess at thirty-percent interest and signed a contract so absurd that missing a single payment would double the rate.
When he finally realized removing Teresa had been a fatal mistake, it was far too late.
He returned her authority with a sheepish apology. She accepted without a word and fought desperately to save the house, but the damage could not be undone. They began selling land, jewels, heirlooms, anything to keep the creditors from the gates.
But even after all this struggle, she failed to erase the huge loan.
While husband and wife scrambled to hold the estate together, their son grew up wild and utterly unchecked.
No one ever scolded Julius. No one ever said no. He slapped servants for amusement, hid the maids' undergarments, tormented them whenever the mood struck, and laughed at their tears.
By the time he turned sixteen, Teresa was thirty-three and still breathtakingly beautiful, only now her beauty carried the sharp, dangerous edge of constant deprivation. Whenever the weight of work became too much, she dragged whichever male slave caught her eye straight to her rooms and rode him until the frustration quieted, even if only for an hour.
The count no longer cared. He only came home these days to sate himself on the female elves.
Julius watched his parents and learned.
His father saw nothing wrong with it: boys became men, men had urges, slaves existed to be used. What harm could it do?
He never saw how different his son truly was.
Julius became obsessed with the elf mother-daughter pair in the dungeon. Daily visits turned into addiction. He forced the mother to call him "my sweet boy" while he took her, pretending she was Teresa.
Jealousy soon followed. Every male slave his mother used, Julius later dragged from the cells and beat until they begged for death.
That was the real nature of Julius Edgar.
When the butler finally brought word of the growing gossip, the count panicked. To redirect his son's dangerous fixation, he returned to the same baronial house Teresa had come from and acquired a maid whose face was nearly identical to his wife in her youth. Money failed; blackmail succeeded.
He presented the girl, Carla, to Julius like a gift.
The plan backfired horribly.
The resemblance did not distract the boy; it inflamed him. Now he had a living substitute to torment who looked very identical to his mother, and his obsession with Teresa herself grew darker still.
──────────────────────────────────
After listening to the entire tragic history of the count's house, whispered by an exhausted Carla on his left while Teresa slept curled against his right, Eon finally understood the rotten web he had been thrown into.
Both women were utterly spent from hours of relentless passion, yet Eon's elven body still thrummed with energy.
Carla had spilled everything because he promised her a gift in two days if she did. To her, anything from Eon was worth more than gold.
Before coming to this mansion, she had steeled herself for harassment; the rumors about this family were vile.
What awaited her was far worse. Julius Edgar was perversion given flesh. He violated her whenever he pleased. Once he dragged her and the elf mother-daughter pair outside, forced them into humiliating costumes, made them run through the fields while he and his friends pelted them with rotten tomatoes, then took them right there in front of everyone. He never let the others touch them, but the humiliation was no less crushing.
Eon had been the only one to comfort her afterward.
"As long as you're still breathing, it gets better. I promise."
Simple words, yet they saved her life. She fell for him hard. They had even had sex in secret several times.
Tonight had been one of those times, except tonight Eon was different. His usual gentleness had turned possessive, almost feral, and she had loved every second of it.
While Carla drifted in satisfied haze, Eon's mind raced.
He hadn't expected his plan to work this well. Two women, the countess herself and her personal maid, conquered in a single night.
None of it would have been possible without the new trick he had discovered in his Alchemy skill only minutes before the guards came for him.
Earlier, back when he was still in his cell, he was experimenting with the system window and the newly made poison potion in his hand, he found something interesting.
─SKILL─
Alchemy
Lv1: 1/10
Potion gained: Low-grade poison
Description: Host can refine any substance into its purer form. Recipes will be provided for each compound after he makes its prototype.
Low-grade potions: Poison, Healing, Strength booster, Sleep, Anti-sleep, Anti-poison, Anti-pain.
Mid-grade potions: None.
High-grade potions: None.
Among the listed recipes was Low-grade Aphrodisiac, but he lacked every proper ingredient. In desperation, he experimented with the freshly-made low-grade poison vial in his hand.
He focused on the aphrodisiac recipe while holding the poison potion vial.
Low-grade Aphrodisiac
Ingredients: Aulena tree, Disghlam roots, Fjuriober flower.
Effects: Arousal at the contacted area for 10 minutes, Brain fog.
Use the skill on the object in front of the Host. Y/N
He selected Y.
The potion glowed. Most of it crumbled into useless ash, but a few shimmering drops remained, pure aphrodisiac essence extracted from the tiniest trace hidden inside poison materials.
─SKILL─
Alchemy
Lv1: 2/10
Potion gained: Low-grade poison
Potion gained: Low-grade aphrodisiac
Description: Can be applied to any part of the target's skin. The target will feel slight arousal and their mind will grow foggy with impure thoughts.
He found out a cheat like ability for sure.
Targeted Extraction.
Every ingredient contained traces of countless potions; normal recipes simply discarded the rest. By forcing the skill to look for something else, he could pull out even a single drop of whatever he needed. Wasteful, yes, but in a dungeon full of nothing but vermin, it was a godsend.
After understanding the concept behind it with just this simple experiment, he wanted to test it, if it still works the way he is thinking. Cause if it was then it would be a broken ability.
With Elsa and Verra's help, he found out more ingredients that was supposed to be the ingredients for Low-grade poison potion.
He focused his skill on making aphrodisiacs out of them. And surely he was successful. Although they were very little, but he could potentially found a way to make almost any type of potion with any type of ingredients was in itself a rare find.
But however broken ability it was, it was undeniable that it wasted the ingredients of their original use. Most of it would turn into ash after using the skill. It might not be a very efficient way to make potions, but it would be a huge advantage in times of crisis.
He quickly produced several tiny vials and hid them on his body.
The moment the guards shoved him into Teresa's chambers, his palms were already coated with the aphrodisiac.
That was why the proud, untouchable countess melted the instant he touched her. Ten minutes of skin contact turned her into a mindless, pleading mess.
Now, as both women slept clinging to him like exhausted children, Eon dressed quietly, woke Carla, and whispered the list of rare ingredients he needed before nightfall tomorrow. She had to smuggle them in without anyone noticing.
She nodded without hesitation, anything for Eon.
She agreed instantly, still dazed, thinking to herself: It's only Eon. What trouble could he possibly cause?
She was dead wrong.
The next day, when those ingredients reached his hands, she would finally understand what he had brewed… and by then it would already be far too late to stop him.
Author Note: If anyone can guess the next potion Eon is going to create, I will personally give a special gift to that reader. Be sure to comment on your guess.
👑 Support the Story & Read Ahead! 👑
Unlock Exclusive Access:
🚀 20-Chapter Head-Start on the public release! [https://www.patreon.com/posts/instant-access-144077066?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link]
Discord link: [https://www.patreon.com/posts/join-discord-144597844?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link]
🎨 Access to Exclusive Character Art, lore, and much more.
To know about Further benefits, visit my Patreon page. [https://www.patreon.com/Visioner10]
Thank you for reading my Novel.