Work Text:
Author’s Notes:
This is a Roxy x Rudy prompt I received for Secret Santa 2025. It’s a bit of a spoiler for anime-only viewers, but for anyone more than halfway through the LN, here’s a rarely talked about divergence.
The exact prompt will be written in the Author’s notes at the end of the story.
It’s alright to be happy.
K 427, Fort Karon, Shirone
Killing people was never something that came easily to me. Throughout my new life in this world, it was something I always hesitated to do… High Minister Darius was the first and only person I murdered in cold blood.
Despite everything Darius did, killing him left me nauseated.
However, these soldiers were killed even though they did nothing wrong to me; it was for Zanoba’s sake, and through him, the kingdom of Shirone, which was led by someone I found almost as repulsive as Darius himself. Then again, I was only following orders, right? It was convenient to blame that blackhearted king, after all, he constantly harassed my Roxy… Pax even imprisoned Aisha and Lilia for the mere crime of being related to me!
In this world, I was incredibly powerful. I could kill most people with just a flick of my fingers. If I didn’t have a natural repulsion to killing, I could easily turn into the vicious monster that wrote the diary from the future.
I remembered the moment I pulled the trigger. I took that deep breath and channeled mana with Roxy by my side.
I killed a lot of people with the first Saint-ranked spell I learned, straight from the Goddess herself… Cumulonimbus.
“Rudy? You’ve been staring at your bowl of rice for the past few minutes. Is there something wrong?”
We had a feast that night: roast this and that, a massive terminator boar expertly cured into bacon, its ribs roasted over a barbecue fire, and innards turned into a thick stew, all heaped in front of me. It was beside the steaks, rib slabs, and other meals that I would have enjoyed even the night before.
I was at the seat of honor, the hero of the day. While Zanoba was the prince, and Roxy was my master, by widespread acclaim, and the not-so-subtle praise of Zanoba throughout the night, here I was.
A hero who felt like a monster.
I smelled the battlefield shortly after the wind blew our way; the cumulonimbus spell left lasting effects on a battlefield already torn up by other saint-ranked spells.
Burnt meat, all those human corpses made me want to throw up.
It wasn’t that different; beasts killed by my spells or humans killed on the battlefield.
There was that unique, charred, meaty, and metallic scent that mixed with the decay and innards scattered around the battlefield.
The smell of cooked Terminator Boar meat wasn’t too different from that of a charred human corpse. I shuddered in my seat.
I tried to force myself to eat when Roxy took my hand.
Zanoba was too busy shouting around the table to see, but my wife had an inkling.
“I haven’t seen you this terrified since the labyrinth. Oh dear… follow me.” Roxy whispered to me, her warm breath tickling my cold ears.
Roxy led me quietly out of the dining hall, eyes tracking our departure, after all, the hero of the night left the feast in his name.
Instead of judging glares and stares, Roxy winked at the group of soldiers, and they cheered in return, wolf whistles filling the room as they suspected we were gonna have some action.
Sex, yeah, sex cures everything, right? That was what Roxy did to me after Paul died, and that got me out of my funk.
Was I still such a base creature whose needs had to be sated after depressing events?
.
.
.
.
Time flowed quickly as we arrived in our room, one way or another, it was already set up for something romantic, scented candles, dim lights, and a bottle of Shirone’s finest liquor on the side. Roxy was prepared for this.
Roxy was wearing thinly woven fabric for her undergarments, something I didn’t expect her to bring for our expedition to Shirone. She must have been saving it for a time like this.
This reminded me too much of the time I was struggling with Paul’s death and the discovery of Zenith’s condition. Back when I “only” had one wife, one I cheated on with my teacher, even though Sylphie forgave me.
“Uhh,” Roxy stammered. “I should have considered this before. Killing someone for the first time can take something out of a person, especially for one like you. All that power at the tip of your fingertips, and it finally reached a point of no return.”
It wasn’t exactly the case; I had a hand in Auber and Darius’ death, but those felt like very different circumstances compared to what happened earlier today.
“Here, take this.” Roxy passed me a goblet; the warm liquid left a bitter aftertaste in my mouth despite its fine quality. My feelings about what I did on the battlefield were leaving a mark on my mind.
“Yes… Does it get easier from here?” I could easily imagine the atrocities my other self from the future did.
Millis was razed to the ground, and Ars was turned into a smoldering crater. It was easier to think about using powerful spells against opponents when they were as durable as Badigadi or Orsted. Heck, even Paul shrugged off most of my attacks during our spars, and he was nowhere near as powerful as Ghislaine or Ruijerd.
“We talked about this yesterday; you were scared of losing your tendency to hold back.”
Roxy smiled as she rubbed my hands, her warm fingers slipping between my calloused hands, sweaty from the anxiety I felt since I wiped out an entire army.
“For a man like you, it will never get easier.” Roxy looked me in the eyes.
I shrank as I could imagine her disappointment; I knew she had experience killing even as a much younger woman, and she also accounted for a lot of deaths on the battlefield.
It was like the time I was too scared to ride on Caravaggio for the graduation exam.
“I could say you did this to fulfill our obligations to Prince Zanoba and his orders, but that won’t help. Instead, I want you to think about this.”
Roxy led me to the window, where I could see a large throng of soldiers and camp followers dancing, cheering, and frolicking in the night. Meat and beer were wafting through the air, and some of the more attentive soldiers raised a glass in our direction.
“Look at them, do you honestly think they would be able to do this if you didn’t use Cumulonimbus? If the enemy forces were able to rush into battle, or cast their spells on the fort, we wouldn’t even be here.”
That took me back to the days I was traveling to Begaritt with Elinalise, to the time I hesitated to kill the bandits attacking the merchant’s party I was escorting. The look on that woman’s eye when her lover was killed, and the sour taste in my mouth when Elinalise had to stand up for me and my principles.
“But you also…”
“But what, Rudeus? I know you wouldn’t want to leave me with the burden of wiping out those forces myself? While I’m confident that I could eventually overpower their mages, I would’ve been exhausted at best, or vulnerable to counterattacks at worst. If the enemies overran the camp, I know I would be one of the first victims left alive for their purposes.”
She was right, I turned the tide of the battle. While Roxy was a powerful mage in her own right, there was still a threat in the sheer quantity of mages and troops invading the fort. Zanoba would have lost the volunteers with him even if I hadn’t intervened, as they would have been swept aside by the much larger army they infiltrated.
Knowing how lustful men can be to their prisoners, I grew enraged at the thought of what would happen to my goddess if she were captured. I would stop at nothing to keep her and my wives safe, even though it made me feel like a monster.
“You’re right, it’s kill or be killed. I would gladly trade an entire army to keep you safe.” I sighed as I agreed with her arguments, but something else was still itching inside.
“Are you scared of something else? That look in your eyes tells me I didn’t hit the spot.”
She was right, I should tell her.
“It felt like stepping on an anthill, despite how weak and insignificant I feel against some people, these mages were nothing to me. Our gusts of wind and bolts of lightning killed them by the dozens. They looked like stray garbage to me; anyone who survived our attacks was mowed down by the defenders up the walls.”
Roxy looked at me with understanding eyes, knowing I had more to say before she said her part.
“I know I’ve been restraining my attacks for so long, but some of these spells tore people apart. I never had that problem against anyone else I faced, whether at the Demon Continent or anywhere else.”
Then she shook her head.
“Oh, Rudy, sometimes I forget. From the moment you’ve been born, you’ve been surrounded by legends. Your parents’ party set the record for the fastest ascent to S-rank, while Paul could take an advanced spell to his face and laugh it off. Sylphie told me that she attacked Paul when she saw him toss you into the carriage with Ghislaine.”
I didn’t know that, my wives must be telling stories behind my back.
“And despite Zenith’s calm demeanor, with a single strike, she punched Paul over the marketplace and into the countryside when she found him being too handsy with the traveling merchant.”
Oh, that was why Paul was nursing a bruise all those years ago, the things I missed by staying at home. I missed the days when Zenith was lively and full of energy. If I were more proactive and aggressive in my approach, would there have been a way to save them both?
No, regrets like these wouldn’t help me right now.
“Ghislaine and Ruijerd are obviously powerful, while Elinalise and Talhand prove their worth even in dangerous situations. And they’re all more durable than your parents.”
Roxy was right, my sense of scale was skewed from the very start.
“Sooner or later, all your efforts to hold back would either lead to your death or someone else’s.”
Roxy made a quick chant and fired a rock bullet at my forehead.
“Hey! That stings.”
“That’s the point, but Demon King Badigadi wouldn’t even notice that. But what you did to him at the Ranoa campus would’ve blown apart everyone short of Orsted, the Demon God Laplace, or maybe perhaps the Demon Empress in her prime. You were extremely lucky to hit your opponents at just the right speed to knock them out rather than kill them, blow them to pieces, or worse, to do nothing more than a flick in their eyes, getting you killed in the process.”
I was lucky, and selfish at the same time. As much as I didn’t want to cheapen the value of human life, if I didn’t have an innate sense of using exactly the right amount of force against my opponents, thanks to my demon eye helping out, or else I would’ve been in serious trouble long ago.
It was starting to click.
“It’s hard to say it, but you’re right. I can’t deny how important it is to protect the ones I love, even at the cost of someone else.“
A soft green glow enveloped me as Roxy healed the small bruise on my forehead.
“Yes, Rudy, that’s what matters. There comes a point where the man of the house has to take care of his gorgeous wives and adorable children, right?”
“Heh heh, you’re right again. That’s why you’re always Master Roxy to me.”
Roxy did a pose that made me think of chuunibyo girls from my early childhood back in my previous life.
“Of course, for I am the great teacher Roxy M. Greyrat!”
Then she did another pose.
“King-ranked water mage,”
And another one.
“And master of Rudeus Greyrat!”
Did Nanahoshi teach her how to do this?
I couldn’t control my laughter.
“Pfftt. Hahahahaha.”
I wasn’t mocking Roxy, per se, but it was something uncharacteristic of her, and it worked. She continued to act as if she came from some sort of slice-of-life anime instead of this magical world, and…
Roxy was holding her arms up, elbows bent with her hands in front of her face, fist closed and…
Swaying her body while moving one arm up, and doing it again in the opposite direction, while bouncing on the balls of her feet. I was so caught up in my guilt earlier that I failed to notice Roxy had her hair up in twin pigtails.
Which she was now treating like antlers. Her hair was bouncing carelessly in the wind as she danced in front of me.
It had a childish element that reminded me of…
“Looks like that worked. A little birdie told me that Greyrat men want their women to do those kinds of things.”
Hey, that only worked for Boreas Greyrats… Oh, wait, I was kinda one of them. Did Eris teach Roxy how to do this?
“Nope, Eris didn’t teach me that. Although she told me about how you tried to do the same thing to Lord Sauros, and he said that real men don’t do that kind of thing.”
Did I say that part out loud?
And hey! I am 100% male! I spent two years restoring my Rudeus Jr. back to full power, so he won’t take any insults to his masculinity.
“Don’t worry, you’d make a fine wife, Rudy! I’ll be the one to rescue you in a labyrinth.”
Roxy flexed her biceps; despite her petite build, she could still pack a punch compared to me. Touki is so overpowered.
“And I won’t barf at first sight.”
We reached the point that we could laugh at things like that, at least on a normal day, and I chuckled back at her.
“Maybe, but I was able to smell you all the way from the other side of the dungeon. You were pretty damp down there. Happy to see me?”
I stuck my tongue out. She already told me her embarrassing situation months after the trip, but she ended up bonking me in the head when I told her that it was hot.
Mind out of the gutter, Rudeus.
Is this what takes me to get over my guilt so easily?
“Lewd-eus. That sounds a lot better, right Lewdy?”
I swear I didn’t say the last few sentences out loud, but.
“I know that look, Lewdy, you wanted me to 'create holy water' for you and bottle it as a relic. I swear you’d fit in with the Asuran nobles and their base desires.”
Speaking of base desires, perhaps it was time to call it a night.
“Maybe you could help me out with my desires tomorrow night.”
I didn’t have enough energy or libido to do more tonight, but I still grabbed Roxy’s ass, firm yet smooth. If I wasn’t close to collapsing out of fatigue, I would’ve pounded her hard, but… butt… I had to control myself; I can’t just solve my trauma with sex all the time. I’d barely be better than that old man with the diary.
“Of course, now let’s call it a night and have a better day tomorrow.”
Roxy reached up and kissed my forehead and added.
“Remember, it’s alright to be happy.”
Author’s Note
- I tried my best to deal with this issue since Rifujin glossed over Rudeus’ feelings about harming or killing people with his magic.
- Search for Roxy Nokotan dance if you want to know what she did to cheer him up.
- I want to put more personality between Rudeus’ wives than what Rifujin did. Why wouldn’t they gossip with each other about their life and the things they experienced? Also, married couples often tell a lot of their intimate and embarrassing stories over time, so I think some of the other experiences and adventures they had would be known among Roxy, Sylphie, Eris, and Rudeus.
Preferred characters/pairing you would like to see appear in the fic
Roxy/Rudeus
Plot prompt
Roxy and Rudy retire for the evening after the battle for the fort in volume 19, chapter 7.
If you want to take this in a safe-for-work direction, it would be a good opportunity for Rudeus to go into more detail about his feelings - how he feels about killing, all the lives he took that day, and his anxiety there. We only get a taste of that in the LN after all when he talks about non-lethally subduing attackers the next day.
NSFW prompt
Roxy and Rudy retire for the evening after the battle for the fort in volume 19, chapter 7.
Roxy's feeling hyped up - the adrenaline of everything that happened that day is still running hot, and now that they're finally alone she's determined to make the most of it with Rudy - and she's going to use that determination to finally assert herself in bed, or at least try to.
Preferred genres, themes, or tropes to read and write
Romance, Hurt/Comfort
Additional notes
It would be interesting to try and combine both prompts somehow, but challenging.