Harem King's Collection: Turning Beastkins Into Desperate Wives!-Chapter 70: A Mohawk

Mist turned to leave, never even turning to make sure the human had followed. He had, and soon found himself being led to one of the small buildings near where he and his wolf were staying.

Mist stepped inside, and Aster followed her through the opened door. When he stepped inside, he saw she was gesturing at a chair in the center of the room.

There was a larger mirror on the opposite wall. The human was a bit uncertain, but trusted the peacock anyway, taking the offered seat. It seemed her kind gesture earlier had won her some of his trust.

Mist went directly to her point.

"There’s something you have that I would like to purchase from you, human. I will well compensate you for your trouble."

Aster gave the peacock a curious look. He had nothing of value on him aside from his armor, and that was back at his bedroom along with his staff, none of which were for sale. The avian clarified for the human.

"Worry not. It’s something simple. What I want to buy from you is your fur. Your "Hair," as your people called it."

Aster laughed loudly in response to the odd request.

"Hahaha! You don’t have to buy that... You can just have some... But I have to ask, why?"

The graceful peacock stepped over to a small table as she answered his question.

"Human fur was used for a large variety of medicine before the fall of man, and since there aren’t many humans left... I mean, any humans left, besides yourself, that ingredient has become increasingly difficult to find. The only option at this point is tomb robbing, and even then, it is nowhere near as potent as a living sample."

Aster wasn’t sure he really wanted to know the details of tomb robbing human graves, so he just agreed to give her some of his hair. It wasn’t like it didn’t grow back quickly enough.

A moment later, and Madame Mist came back holding an extremely thin, short blade. She held it to the side while she talked to the human in the chair.

"Human fur is rare, so I will be compensating you for it. Does thirty gold sound fair? I’ll leave a bit for you, I have plenty of practice from the orcs."

Aster didn’t have the best concept of the value of money, considering his upbringing, but he knew that offer was greatly overpriced. He tried to argue as much, but the avian silenced him when she spoke again.

"You are the only source of this ingredient left. You should place more value on its availability, last son of man... Besides, I will make far more than that by selling such rare tonics in this age, so listen, when I say, you should not feel guilty about taking the payment... Is there nothing you wish to purchase for yourself? Or perhaps your wolf?"

Aster thought hard about that and remembered he had seen a few things in the town that had caught his eye as a gift to Stahl.

There were supplies they needed, too, and he could contribute to that simply by having his hair cut back. After pondering that angle, the boy agreed to accept the payment.

Mist went to work, leaning Aster’s head back so she could skillfully begin shaving his scalp. The avian bantered softly with the human as she progressed, asking him seemingly random questions as she trimmed away, cutting the hair low to the scalp.

Aster couldn’t help but feel a bit homesick then, as Javis was the only one to ever trim his hair in the past.

Nearly thirty minutes passed, and Aster relaxed into the sensation, closing his eyes and enjoying the feeling of air on his head for a change. He was brought back to reality when the avian took a step back and coughed lightly, signaling to him that she had finished her work.

Aster lifted his head forward then and took a glance towards the mirror. He had had his hair cut plenty of times by Javis, but the results here were certainly much different than the ones his caretaker had yielded.

Aster really kind of liked it. It made him look more mature somehow.

His entire head had been closely shaven, leaving a very light, prickly feeling to the skin there. Directly on top, the avian had left a narrow strip down the center, barely an inch in height. (To put it simply, what you or I would call a Mohawk.)

Aster was admiring his drastically different appearance with fascination at the difference it had made. His hair had never been cut so low before, but it felt nice, and a whole lot lighter as a bonus.

He felt oddly strong in that moment and smiled at his reflection. Mist spoke her reasoning behind the choice.

"This style symbolizes a promising young warrior in the orc’s culture, so it seemed appropriate here. I do hope you like it?" The peacock tilted her head as she finished her inquiry.

"Yes!" Aster replied excitedly, "It’s different than I expected, but it looks good! Thank you... I feel even worse about charging you now, though..."

In quick response, the elegant avian placed a small sachet in Aster’s hand with a clinking of coin. She smiled and dismissed the worry. She had already received what she needed, after all.

Another voice from the open door started to interrupt the pair, but Aster looked over to see his wolf pausing mid sentence, simply staring at her mate’s change.

’By the gods... He got even hotter somehow...’ Stahl could only stare in her state of heightened emotion, her thoughts running wild on what she wanted to do with Aster in that moment.

The moon hadn’t changed its effect on her too drastically from the last time, and that predatory part was surely making a comeback. Aster shifted uncomfortably in the she-wolf’s silence, casting his eyes to the floor as a frown formed on his lips. He mumbled quietly.

"Sorry... I guess I should’ve asked your thoughts before... I hope it’s not too bad?"

Stahl stuttered to get the words out to correct the assumption.

"NO! I like it! Sorry, I just couldn’t come up with the right words... Aster, you really do look great. You look like you’ve grown... You have grown, so maybe that’s appropriate. We all need to change ourselves every now and then... Are you going to leave the face fur with it?"

Stahl motioned towards his jaw.

Aster knew she was being honest and perked back up just a little bit before he responded, still not exactly happy to reveal why he didn’t usually grow his facial hair out.

"Javis said humans called it a beard. I usually keep it cut because it doesn’t grow well over the scars... I think it looks weird..."

Stahl understood, but still wanted to see what this "beard" looked like when it was left to thrive, so she made a request to her mate.

"Will you leave it for a while? I’d like to see that part of you too."

The human melted at the way his wolf always seemed able to raise his spirits with the smallest of kindness and nodded his agreement. He suddenly recalled what task he had left her to do without his distraction that morning and asked about her progress.

"So... Any word from home yet?"

The she-wolf’s smile faded, and her head dropped just a bit. frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓

"Nothing yet... But it is still early..."

Stahl had been repeating that reassuring line to herself for the entirety of her day so far, desperately trying to hold on to hope that she would feel a thought tug at her mind soon.

The beast could only pray that hope would be enough.

***

Foll𝑜w current novℯls on fre𝒆web(n)ovel.co(m)