Lee was in the Palace’s gym. Sweat ran down her tensing midriff, with each sit-up delivering another burst of protesting quivers. Her attempts gradually lost in reach, until she struggled to do as much as lift her head. With a long groan, she sprawled out on the mat.
Tilting her head back, she could see Rave run on the treadmill. Watching, Lee developed that fluttering sensation in her feelings that she usually got when looking at John or her fellow harettes. She had the biggest girl crush on the feline Lightbearer, for a long while, and being in a relationship with her had done nothing to change that. Certainly, so myths had been dispelled, so realities set in, and none of that had been to the detrint to what Lee felt for her and the rest of the harem.
A soft pressure left her feet. Nia bowed over her a mont later. “You good?” the lovable pariah asked. In her white workout clothes, she was herself a total beauty as well. That long, golden hair, tied at the neck, those long, fair limbs and slender chest. Lee couldn’t believe how lucky she was to have a friend like that, much less a lover.
“No,” she croaked, breathing heavily. “I feel like my midriff is made out of lead.”
Nia gave her midriff a couple of pokes. “Sothing hard, yes,” she stated, then laid down next to the young Fateweaver. Their hands found each other and they looked at the ceiling together. A minute passed, before Nia added, “Take a pause.”
“I’m already doing that,” Lee chuckled. What had once been sowhat creepy behaviour, she could only see as dorky these days. Nia was just so adorable once she had gotten to know her. All kinds of odd, yes, but Lee had always hung out with the odd bunch. From puberty onwards she had thought there was sothing off about herself, not caring to hang out with the other girls or having any interest in the sportsy guys. Well, she had never really had much interest in guys or girls, period. For the longest ti, she had thought she’d just stay alone and watch old cartoons at the side while gaming.
Then all of this had struck a chord with her and, miraculously, she had gotten an in.
What a wonderful life.
“Get off your fucking ass!”
‘What a wonderful, hard, hard life,’ Lee thought and directed her eyes at the chiselled wolf girl. Arms crossed, gym wear stretching over her fit form, tra stared at her in disappointnt. “Co on, can’t I take a breather?” Lee complained.
“Enough of a breather,” Nia weighed in quickly.
“You just told to take a pause!”
“That was two minutes ago,” Nia stated. Lee’s eyes glanced over to the clock on the wall. It was true. Where had the ti gone? Working out had a strange way of warping the sense of ti. It was not quite as bad as videogas, but the stimulation was similar. It was probably why she took to it easier than she would have guessed.
“Do I have to?” Lee whined anyway. She cringed when both Nia and tra gave her a disappointed glance. That was enough shaming to make her curl up into a sitting position. “Alright, ssage received. What’s next?”
“Squats.” tra pointed over her shoulder at the weights rack. They were currently suppressing their magical power, to allow the biological systems that were empowered by it to grow on their own. With that in mind, all of them were fit enough that they could torture themselves with so additional difficulty. That was for those among them who even had any benefit from working out at all.
Which, arguably, was none of them. tra definitely got nothing out of this. Nia, Rave, and Lee herself could not grow any fitter without entering a realm they found aesthetically unpleasing. Muscles looked great on tra, but Lee thought of the defined midriff and thunder thighs she had as enough.
Lee put a couple of weights on a handlebar. Not too much, just so much to make squats challenging. More challenging, it should be said. Even with thighs like hers, squats turned into a difficult task if there were enough repetitions involved. Especially when there was an overseer involved.
“Bend those knees. Slow. Slower. Lee, don’t make fucking add an extra set to it so you rember how to do your squats.” Groaning, Lee ignored the general exhaustion and got into the desired position. Then she got back up. Then she went back down. Then she tried not to think about it and just did it. After about 17 repetitions, tra had counted to 10 and Lee was allowed to take a breather. “Acceptable.”
“It’s been a month!” Lee complained and reached for the water. All the sweating she was doing demanded constant rehydration.
“Your mistake for not working out while we’re out in the countryside.”
“I was taking walks… sotis. Can you believe this girl?” Lee directed the question at Nia. Her best friend in the harem was sticking close, while recuperating from her own set. They were doing all their efforts in parallel.
“Yes,” was the plain and expected answer. Lee chuckled. Even if she rarely ant it as a joke, the way Nia talked was just naturally funny to the gar girl. “Next rep?”
“If I have to.” Lee got back up. A little while and several repetitions later, she stumbled towards one of the benches at the side of the gym. Nia followed, her legs just as wobbly. The two collapsed against the wall and just sat in their temporary misery. Although they were both beaten, one was openly struggling for air while the other was breathing controlled through her nose. “Can anything… get you out of breath?”
“I do cardio,” Nia responded plainly.
Lee snorted, in the middle of taking another gulp of water. Predictably, she burst out coughing. Nia took the water from her and took a couple of sips herself, while the young Fateweaver wrestled to get her coughing under control. “Maybe I should chase so animals sotis, see if that is good for my heart.”
“Do you want to?” A few seconds after the words, Nia showed her excitent at the idea on her face. “Animals are always good for the heart.”
“I dunno, when Tatyana’s cat jumps onto her keyboard, that’s very bad for my heart,” Lee responded. “I swear that thing has a sensor to notice when we’re playing League.”
“Petting animals is always good for the heart,” Nia corrected herself, her voice rising from the usual, cold neutrality. She clasped Lee’s hand with both of hers. “Let’s go pet animals together.”
“You rember the last three tis we tried this?” the young Fateweaver cautioned. The pressure around her hand lessened. Nia blinked three tis, before she rembered she was supposed to look away when she felt guilty. “I’m only as fast as you when I play Sonic.”
“nagerie then?” Nia asked.
“We can do that.” Lee stretched her legs and looked around the room. Rave was still on the treadmill, bopping her head to whatever banger she had drawn out of the depth of the internet this ti. Of the many advantages of being friends with Rave, knowing the latest and greatest techno music had not been one of them. tra, anwhile, had moved on to torture the last person in the room.
“Thought y’all wanted to ditate,” Hailey drawled, trying her best to ignore the wooden stick that tra was poking her with.
“ditation is useless when you can only do it when there’s peace and calm around you.”
“Ain’t matchin’ what I heard about it.”
“Did you hear about magical Palaces and n that put womb tattoos on you when you join their harem? No? Didn’t fucking think so,” tra pointed out. Defeated, Hailey groaned and let herself be subjected to the treatnt for a little while.
Eventually she joined Nia and Lee on the break couch. “Hope ya got room for one more, hons,” she said, before plopping down.
The tits of the country gal bounced when she hit the wood. They were barely even contained by the baby blue crop top that she had gotten from Rave. “If we didn’t, you wouldn’t be here,” Lee pointed out, with a disarming smile.
“Ain’t that the truth,” Hailey chuckled and downed half a litre of water in one go. “Gonna be honest, real risky of you. I still barely know half of ya.”
“Eh, John is a good judge of character. Plus, we have our mind reader over there.” Lee gestured at Rave, who did her best to wave mid-sprint. “Nothing risky about it. Nothing more risky than packing up your entire life and entering so magical space you never even heard of.”
“How are you settling in?” Nia asked the question underlying Lee’s little monologue.
“Never had sleep that good, so that’s been helpin’ with everythin’. Ya always hear that sex helps with stress, but getting’ pounded out of my mind sure puts stuff in perspective.” Hailey stretched until there was a satisfying pop in her spine. When her arms ca back down, one of them confidently settled behind Lee’s back. “Otherwise, dunno, don’t quite feel real yet, livin’ with y’all.”
“Never quite does,” Lee confessed. “I haven’t even been mundane at any point, and it still feels absurd sotis.” The two girls turned to look at Nia for her input.
The typical five seconds of staring back were needed before the blonde pariah shook her head. “I feel very real here. This is what I wanted. This is where I am.” She took the hand Hailey had behind Lee. The enigma engineer’s hairs stood on end for a mont. “You’re doing well with my presence.”
“After ya get blasted by Thana’s aura, life do be put in a new perspective.” Hailey shuddered, rembering an incident that Lee had only heard about. Although she had been around when Thana had awoken every now and again, she had not been hit with the misfortune of the full might of the goddess of genocide’s presence. She hoped she never would. “Pleasant topic, I was thinkin’ about upgradin’ the gamin’ room.”
“Upgrade how?” Lee was imdiately all ears.
“Gonna take all of the individual PCs and build so super-rig.”
“Nnnnnot entirely sure that’d be an upgrade,” Lee carefully put forward. “You’d have to switch them all on individually. Plus, the socket managent… sounds like you just want to screw sothing for the sake of it.”
“There’s a cheap sex joke there… I ain’t makin’ it.” Hailey shrugged and ultimately responded. “Pro’ly. Feels like I gotta pull my weight and I ain’t got a clue where to start. A gal’s gotta contribute sothin’ to the household. Knew a guy who said minimum a lady needs to do is cook and get fucked and I ain’t doin’ the cookin’ around here. Feels like I’d hazard my health if I tried.”
“Aclysia is defensive of her territory,” Nia agreed.
“Not that I’m complainin’, the maid could make cry in delight after she cooked so leather boots,” Hailey drawled hastily.
Lee punched the country gal’s shoulder. “No need to get defensive, dude, we’re all sisters around here – as Lorelei would say.”
“Ya do be makin’ confused, callin’ dude and sis in the sa sentence.”
Lee did not know how to respond to that. Nia, after a pause, did. “This harem is full of weird speaking habits.”
“Ain’t that the truth!” Hailey laughed loudly and inched a little closer. “We gotta be a weird bunch, ain’t we? To be all fine with sharin’ the J-man…” Lee couldn’t help but stare at the tan lines in Hailey’s cleavage. She filled out Rave’s clothes REALLY well. “…and to like starin’ at each other so much.”
“Hana hana hana,” Lee rambled under her breath and then cleared her throat. “We definitely are as weird as people that play Morrowind over Skyrim.”
“That one is lost on .”
“Never played Elder Scrolls?”
“Nope.”
“…We have to rectify this imdiately. There’s nothing more importa-“ Lee stopped mid-sentence. Shock settled in her bones and her entire body went rigid. Hailey raised an eyebrow, as a drop of cold sweat ran down between the young Fateweaver’s eyebrows.
“What’s the problem?” Nia asked.
“I have a dissertation to write!” Lee cried out.
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