John was having a progressively worse ti just sitting there. Patience was a virtue he generally possessed, but there were several ways to corrupt that willingness to wait. One of the most effective ones was seeing a person he loved, especially a harette, hurt. Rave was far from fragile and none of the wounds was threatening, but her visibly injured state still bothered her boyfriend. It bothered him a lot.
‘Concentrate on her breathing,’ the Gar told himself. Despite the bloody and bruised state of her body, Rave was showing no signs of overt pain. Her steady in- and exhales were a calming insurance that she was fine. He would still have preferred it if she rose from her ditation already. Undine crawling through all of the tunnels would take a while, assuming she even found the entrance. The labyrinth was weird like that.
Disturbing her wasn’t an option either. For all John knew, there was still so adjustnt of Copernicus’ body going on at a magical level. The last thing he wanted to do was ss with a process so close to its completion. Especially one so vital to her combat developnt.
Impatiently, John waited. He kept his fingers still, his lungs from pressing out a sigh and his foot from tapping on the crystal ground. Occasionally he averted his gaze, tried to distract himself with the fantastical scenery. Its beauty was difficult to appreciate, given the blemished state of the gorgeous woman sitting at the centre of it.
In order to keep his mind from circling around Rave’s wellbeing, he extended his thoughts to the rest of the harem. Aclysia was currently inside her wing of the Palace, picking out the ingredients for dinner. Beatrice was still in the Fusion Administration Building, currently busy checking on their tax settings. The Guild chanics allowed John to automatically pull a percentage of a person’s earnings into the Guild Bank, with the limitation being that they had to be part of Collide, a vassal of Collide, or a mber of the Federation led by Collide.
This made tax evasion effectively impossible and anonymised the entire process. The only thing that was displayed on the receiving side was the guild the taxed person was a part of. Generally, this was an advantage. It kept the necessary bureaucracy small and John could still keep a pulse on where the majority of economical action was happening. If he ever jacked the taxes up, however, people wouldn’t just try to dodge them, they would have to leave the Federation entirely. That could cause so issues.
The majority of the elentals were busy wrapping up their affairs for the day. Only Undine and Siena were exceptions. Undine because John had called her, and Siena because she apparently was in a minor feud with a ssenger from her mother. Not an unusual thing, really. tra had so more interesting stuff going on, but John had no need to go into her mind to find out more about it. He could just look down as Jack to find the First of Wrath’s head bob in his lap.
The eagerness of his willing sex slave to satisfy him distracted John properly, while he waited.
Even if he was in sowhat of a blowjob trance, the Gar did not miss when Rave finally started to move. A little stirring behind her closed eyelids preceded her raising her arms and stretching. The sound started satisfied, like waking up from a good nap, but soon transford into a displeased grunt. Copernicus only had to deal with the first part, his manifestation was unhard.
“Everything huuuurtsssss,” Rave complained and opened her eyes. “Oh, hi John?”
“Why do you sound that doubtful?” the Gar wanted to know, finally standing up and approaching his girlfriend. He inspected her wounds a bit closer.
“Dunno, so final test?” Rave asked, finalizing her stretch when her spine made a cracking sound. Whether that was satisfying or worrying, John wasn’t quite sure.
“For what? You already succeeded,” Copernicus comnted, causing his summoner to turn her head.
“By Gaia, ya got big,” Rave blurted out, eyes and hands travelling all over the light spirit. To show off, Copernicus made his fur glow. With the hollow shape of the larger, black spots on his middle-section, it almost seed like he was covered in reverse eclipses. “How am I supposed to carry ya if you’re almost as long as I’m tall?”
Copernicus sighed and let the light ebb away. “I’m quite certain I am longer than you are tall.”
“Tails don’t count.”
“You always seed rather insistent on being precise on tail length.”
“I didn’t start as a size queen, I just got a handso boyfriend whose dick grew,” Rave retorted. “Hmm, your fur got less fuzzy and more smooth. Dunno if I like that.” She put both hands around his ears and started scratching more intensely. “Awww, but ya got way chubbier, that’s cute.”
“I’m not chubby, I just got bigger and have more skin,” Copernicus growled. It occurred to John that the cat’s masculine voice now sat in a body that definitely fit it better. The growl had a more threatening ring to it, despite being the exact sa as before on a pure audio level. That threat level was diminished quite a bit by Rave rolling his checks, however.
“Whatever ya say,” she grinned.
John, as little as he wanted to ruin their mont, could no longer just keep watching. “How badly hurt are you? Can you walk?”
“Don’t ya worry about , tiger,” Rave turned to him while hugging her considerably upsized elental. As revenge for the non-serious treatnt, Copernicus started to gnaw on her neck. “Just had to defeat five strong elentals in sequence and then go through an inquisition by Light Daddy.”
“…Did you call him that to his face?” John wanted to know.
“She did,” Copernicus answered, between playful mauling attempts.
“And he still helped you with the Tier-up?”
“He didn’t mind,” Rave told him. “Not everyone is as weird about that word as you are, ya know?”
“That’s just a straight-up falsehood. They are either normal and accept it’s weird or they aren’t and think it’s neutral or okay, even.”
“Don’t ya rember the 11th commandnt, tiger?”
“…I an, Moses dropped them, so I can’t rember what isn’t written down.”
“It goes ‘Thou shalt not sha the kink of others’.”
“Given what God did to Sodom, I highly doubt that was part of his manifesto.”
“Nah, I’m totally right. Now kiss for my success!” she puckered her lips and he didn’t have any choice but to oblige, really. Even with a blue streak under her eye, she was still too beautiful to leave her lips unclaid.
Tasting her blood in the process did reduce his enjoynt greatly. “Let’s get you out of here. Undine is waiting at the exit,” he told her.
“Ya don’t need to get out of here,” Rave chuckled and tapped the tip of his nose with his index finger. “I ain’t a damsel – I just fought so kind of small tree dragon, a floating jellyfish, a magma blob with glass teeth, so kind of horror show, and a talkative curvy lady that tried to stab .”
“Did you get the last two mixed up?” John asked. He knew that shadow had been the the of the last chamber before this one. The second to last one had been wind.
“Nope, wind elental was so kind of… fog made out of tallic gas? Really creepy thing. Kept poisoning the air and blaring out distorted sounds.”
“I suppose there have to be so non-chatty air spirits around,” John conceded while giving Rave the space she needed to get up. If she said she didn’t need his help, the Gar believed her. She proved it quickly as well by jumping into the cave/portal that had led them there. No other way back was apparent. He and Copernicus were quick to follow. “So, what did you talk about with the Father of Light?”
“He was checking my vibes,” Rave told him. “Ya know, regarding how I like to seek out danger, how I’m handling the Moira stuff, and so such.”
“Any epiphanies there?” the Gar asked. “When I talked to him, it was a pretty illuminating experience – no pun intended. Showed in detail how much my pride had grown.”
“Dunno,” Rave responded.
“You don’t know if you had an epiphany?” John asked.
“Ja, no idea,” the Lightbearer responded. “I feel like I realized sothing about myself, but I’ve no idea what to do with that.”
“That is always how that goes,” Copernicus chid in, as the three of them climbed up the vertical shaft. The pillars served as their footing, which ant that they had to move with the solar jaguar as the slowest mber. Cats were extrely good sprinters and they could scale trees no problem, but they were not made for ladders. As to why he didn’t just follow in spirit-form, John guessed that Copernicus wanted to move his new body around. “If every personality flaw was fixed upon realizing it, the world would be a much different place.”
“There’s also the question of what is a flaw or not,” John echoed the sentint. “Your daring nature has helped us out before. Most importantly, had you not been such a straightforward girl, we wouldn’t be together now. It’s a high risk, high reward lifestyle.”
“Speaking of high risk, high reward,” Rave said. “There’s one thing I did realize.”
“Which is?” John wanted to know.
“I have to beat Moira. At least once. I kinda… need it for my fulfilnt, ya know?”
“I know,” John confird. It was like he had needed to punch Maximillian in the face or how he wanted to see every last Lorylim eradicated. Granted, the latter would be a benefit to the world as well as personally satisfying, but the emotional foundation existed beyond that. “There’ll be another ti you can challenge her. Our paths will inevitably cross again.”
“Yeah… and if I do sothing stupid at that ti?” Rave asked. “Like, really moronic? Just like I did at New Alexandria?”
“Then I’d let you,” John responded honestly. “Because you won’t lose a fourth ti.”
Rave didn’t answer imdiately. Their steps on the crystal ladder echoed in the cave. “You don’t know that,” she said slowly. “I lost three tis and that last ti cost us. Not dearly, you reason it might even be better for us that we lost, but the fact is that we were pushed back because of . If we clash with the Order again, chances are the stakes are going to be even higher.”
“And I would still let you,” John told her.
“You trust that much?”
“Jane, I’ll say this with every fibre of that loves you,” John said, picking his words carefully. “I’d take any risk of a setback, sacrifice any sche, lose any war, and offer any of my resources, if it ant that you got to pursue sothing that lies by your heart. You are the love of my life and there is nothing I would not give for you. All of that, however, does not matter to this case. You will not lose a fourth ti. No matter the circumstance. Because you are Jane ‘Rave’ Holly and I love you. Those are the only two reasons why you will win.”
Sothing dripped down on John’s hand. He did not have to look to see that it was translucent. A second drop fell past him. Then he heard a sniff. “Thank you, tiger. I needed to hear that,” she whispered. Then she cleared her throat. “Alrighty, I’ll win then. Gonna be a challenge, but that’s the fun of it, right?”
“I’ll whip you into shape,” Copernicus purred.
“Heck ya an, whip into shape? Ya got all big, so I no longer need to feed ya to let ya participate in fights. WE are going to get into shape.”
“My contract was clear. I give you the power to fend for yourself and I get to lay in the real sun. That was the bargain.”
“How co ya keep helping when I need it then, ya big tsun-cat?”
“If you get depressed, you might lose the drive to buy tuna.”
“A, Aclysia buys the food, not .” Rave let one leg dangle to show that she was counting. “Second…” She suddenly pulled herself up with enough intensity that she flew over the next three pillars and then landed on the part of the cave that was tilted just enough that she could stand there, while using one of the beams as support. She raised two fingers. “…since ya got so chubby, putting you on a diet might be a good idea.”
“That wouldn’t even work!” Copernicus roared and jumped right after her. He wasn’t tall enough to reach the pillars for support, but he also didn’t need them. With four sizable paws. He could balance that elevation level on his own.
‘She lived and she learned,’ John thought. They had invoked that saying directly after Rave lost to Moira. It hadn’t co true yet. His girlfriend was living the spirit of the saying, trying her best not to let past unpleasantries weigh down the rest of her life. That did not an that they just had to forget everything that had happened. In order to truly move on, Rave had to sort things out her way.
For that, she would need to get even more powerful.
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