It felt like a miracle, the moment Leo just started the airbike's engine and turned its magnetic field back on in a split second, IN THE MIDDLE OF FREEFALLING, and then landed both of us on the ground safely like it was nothing. Unsurprisingly, while I was feeling like my soul temporarily left my body during the whole 'flight', on the contrary, Leo didn't seem to feel sh*t, he just hopped off the bike like a cat hopping off a shelf, then he started to stretch in a feline-like way, making me question his whole identity. Was he even human?
"Ah, sh*t... Look where we just landed. This place stinks..."
However, after Leo said those words, my eyes then turned away from his kitty face to take a look at 'this place' he mentioned. It seemed that we just got ourselves into some dirty alley filled with garbage and waste, home to the infamous NYC giant rats. In the corner of my right eye, there also appeared multiple big dumpsters full of an unimaginable amount of junk and scrap, and possibly excrement, making the whole place reeks of various types of nasty odors, when I realized what I'd been inhaling in, I almost fainted.
It seemed that working a white-collar job in the tidy and beautiful downtown did cause me to forget that most part of this world we're living in is so sh*tty... and also full of sh*t.
"Leo, I don't think I'll survive breathing in this place for longer than 30 seconds..."
"Hmm? Oh, really? Weren't raised on the streets, were you? Alright, be a good boy and wait for me until I can find us a way to get our asses out of here without getting bitten then."
"OK..." Somehow I just replied obediently.
...
"Getting 'bitten' what...?"
Then I found myself mumbling and repeating some suspicious words in his speech that sounded too calm considering the context. To state that our asses are going to be bitten, wasn't that too specific...?
"WHAT what? Can't you hear their footsteps? All of these b*tches are after our asses... I wonder if someone has sent them. There are too many..." When Leo started to talk to himself under his breath, hinting that something or someone had been chasing us, my body just went stiff like a log.
Here my normie ass genuinely thought that being at risk of getting bitten by the giant rats along the way out was what the kitty boy meant...
"...Wait, are you scared? Where is this sweet scent coming from?"
"...?!" To make the situation worse, as soon as I got shivers running down my spine and my heart began to beat faster out of fear, suddenly Leo just shoved his face onto my neck and started sniffing like crazy, making me jump and almost yelp. There was some kind of visible confusion happening on my face as his kitty nose was rubbing all over my skin and then he took a long deep breath while making such a relaxed expression as if he just smelled catnip.
"Why does this smell so good... sweet even... Because this place stinks? Ugh, I don't know anymore... Hey, Adel, can I take a bite of your neck?"
"...???" Such a request was so sudden and spontaneous, it made my jaw drop in that instance. 'Why? Why would you do that? What the heck is happening?' I bet all of those questions got written all over my face and in my eyes.
And this kitty boy didn't seem to be joking, his sharp-looking teeth were getting closer and closer, inch by inch. Eventually, they got to scrape lightly over my pulse, sending some form of a strange but sweet feeling I had never felt before in my entire life throughout my whole body.
"Give me your blessing, will you?"
"...?"
Blessing?
My eyebrow did raise itself up at that particular word. How odd of him, having said something like that while trying to take a bite of my neck.
"Give me... Give it to me, your sweet blessing..."
"A-Ah...?!" But it seemed that I must take such a peculiar saying seriously since his teeth were on the verge of sinking into my skin already. His rough hand also began stroking my cheek so gently, the unusual warmth of his divine body seeped right through my heart from the tip of his fingers, shaking it to the core.
'What are you doing? This is not the time! See how horrid your choice of location is!' In an unwanted situation such as that, guess I should yell those words to his face, stopping him right before things go wrong, but... in reality, I didn't say a thing.
Why?
Why, why, why?
"Your blessing, Adel... Give it to me... Allow me..."
"I-I--?"
Why didn't I feel like stopping him?
In that second, that fleeting moment when his steamy breath touched my skin, and his lips were on their way to my pulse...
[Hunter Leonardo Rhys, may I inform you that the system's overall temperature is back to normal, and flight mode is ready.]
...It was indeed a miracle that his airbike's AI suddenly decided to inform its master about its body's temperature being back to normal, stopping him in his track at once - saving my grace.
...
Oh, by the way, did I just hear his pretty little secret--?
"Leonardo Rhys...?"
"...?!"
Judging from his instantly widened eyes, those were indeed his real names. But he hadn't told me to call him 'Leonardo', just 'Leo', so it was possible that he'd rather keep that name to himself.
"What a pretty nam--"
"SHUT THE F*CK UP!!!"
"...???" Still, I didn't expect such a strong reaction. The boy snapped so hard I almost fell from the airbike's seat.
W-What the hell? This wild lion just touched me in the most gentle way possible seconds ago???
"L-Leo, I-I'm sorr--?!"
"I said SHUT THE F*CK UP! Wanna die today, do you?!"
"NO, SIR???!!!"
It was the third time of the day that I almost choke on air. Jokes on me, I did underestimate a cat's mood swing.
Anyway, not longer than a minute later, it was revealed to me that he might not be angry at me or anything since he immediately began doing his *sniff sniff* thingy right after I shut myself up. Seconds passed, and then his head sprang up like a cat sensing its prey from afar, his eyes darted to the back of the alley. There came a growl from his throat.
"They're here!"
"W-Who?!"
"The dogs!"
"THE DOGS?!" Your natural enemies?!
"Their master must have trained them well... But don't they know mongrels are no match for a great lion?!" The cat boy then scoffed and turned his back to face the dark alley. At first, my mere mortal eyes couldn't make out a thing what lurks behind that drape of the night, but then it gradually became clear to me that there were indeed some creatures with four legs walking toward us starting from that spot, their 8 pairs of flaming eyes as red as ruby shining in the dark combined with their onyx black bodies helped make their presence all the more frightening. Their canine snarls filled the air with a spine-chilling atmosphere, causing all the hair on my body to stand on end.
"F*cking hellhounds! KNOW YOUR PLACE!" On the other hand, Leo was still Leo. The boy seemed to know no fear, as he took his firm stance facing those hounds from Hell, unarmed, like a mad lad that he was. Then... he started laughing, with a low-pitched voice that seemed to emerge from the deepest part of his own throat.
It sounded like a god's laughter mixed with a lion's roar. And somehow it felt even more menacing than the demons themselves...
"KNEEL BEFORE THE KING!"
"HELIOS, BESTOW UPON ME YOUR POWER!"
As the lion roared his command, his body was then lit in heavenly light as bright and blazing as the sun in the midday sky. Divine flames arose from nothingness and slithered on his torso all the way toward his neck, becoming his fiery mane and a King's mantle made of solar blaze. Such an astounding sight did take all my breaths away.
That was how one became a god.
To be chosen by gods and be bestowed their powers, thus would be no different from becoming the divine themselves.