Time might be passing, or it might not. Nothing can be felt or heard. There's no room for thoughts. There is simply a sense of vastness and eternity. It's peaceful.

Suddenly enough that one might blink in surprise, Ameron is sitting in a comfortable chair on an elaborate rug which is resting on some kind of tower. She's wearing whatever would best be described as her usual outfit, less any damage or grime. The landscape all around is bucolic - rolling green hills, pastoral rivers, and friendly-looking forests. An old woman in a bright floral dress smiles warmly and gestures to a fancy porcelain tea set on a round table between them.

"What kind of tea would you like, dearie?"

Ame is a (rather successful) underage homeless street prostitute. Her usual outfit isn't much 'better' than being naked, and she's a little more preoccupied by

TRUCK!

FUGUE?

This is definitely not Brockton Bay.

This is... not anywhere near Brockton Bay.

Also, she distinctly remembers a massive tire separating her leg from her hip.

"Oh fuck..."

"...my brain's in a jar in some tinkerlab right now, isn't it."

Tea Lady shakes her head. "Unfortunately, you are dead. Are you sure you don't want tea? I find tea helps when it's time for these conversations."

Ame just stares at her flatly for a long, awkward moment.

"No. Thank you. I don't want..." she makes air quotes, "tea."

"The way you're using words, words like 'dead', fuck knows what you think 'tea' is."

"Mm." She pours herself a cup of something that steams and smells very tea-like and sips at it. "I suppose if death means oblivion to you, then you are not dead. You've simply been moved by the loss of your previous body. Regardless, you are not a usual case. Instead of whatever normally would have happened, you are soon to enter a world that is likely quite different from your own. I am here to help with that. Answer questions, offer explanations and advice."

Ame blinks at this shockingly reasonable concession.

"Uh, alright. What world? If I'm not hallucinating in a brain jar, where am I and how did I get here, and more importantly, why did I get here?"

"The universe has no specific name. The planet, like Earth, Terra, Země, Aarde, Bhūmi, goes by many names. 'Damen' is currently a common one."

Sip.

"You are entering a less orderly world, and by world I mean 'universe', with different underlying rules and systems that pose certain challenges. The laws of physics, such as they are, are quite different. One effect of this is that occasionally, appropriate souls- those who are likely to be at least passingly familiar with relevant concepts, with an outside perspective, with strong drive and a certain indefinable spark- Will find themselves drawn to this world from others. Such souls receive a chance at a new life, power, and advantages compared to the average person in exchange for accepting a duty - to grow powerful in their new home and defend it against the forces that would destroy it."

"...that sounds super fake. Alternate universe are supposed to have all diverged from the same..."

Ame trails off and sighs.

"But what do I know, I'm just a homeless kid and a whore. So, I'm supposed to be 'passingly familiar with the relevant concepts' and have 'a strong drive to save the world'? I mean, I guess you could say I'm a... driven sort of person, if you squint. What are 'the relevant concepts'? And, again why? And also why me? I'm a criminal."

"I don't know all the details of the selection process. It selects based on intangibles. It does prefer young people who have met untimely deaths."

Sip, sip.

"The most important concepts are the Winds of Magic, Skills, and Dungeons. It's inadvisable to have me tell you too much about these things, as your perspective as an outsider is valuable. The Winds of Magic are a metaphorical cornerstone of this world. They are a topic as complex and deep as any other world's physics, but the key thing is that they have a mutable and sometimes metaphorical nature. This is what I mean by 'less orderly'. Skills are specific groups of actions or tasks bundled together in intuitive ways. After one practices, oh, let's say cooking, the long way, one earns a level in the cooking Skill and can broil steaks, scramble eggs, and bake bread with passable competence, even if they practiced only with soups and vegetables. Dungeons are magical entities that produce both monsters and valuable materials or objects, and it's a common career to enter dungeons and fight the monsters in order to retrieve the objects."

"...well, you're not wrong. Those are... familiar... concepts..."

Ame rarely had the opportunity, but one glorious weekend one of her more unlikely and improbable 'clients' (he'd been closer to her own age, and had paid her enough she was willing to sleep over) had wanted the gamer girl fantasy. And he'd gotten something closer to the reality than the fantasy. She'd been completely engrossed in the RPG he'd had her play, but he hadn't actually complained about her as good as ignoring him the whole time he had his cock in her.

Is she taking this premise seriously? Apparently. That didn't take long.

"Alright, assume I believe you. Tell me about these forces that want to destroy, uh, Damen. And about why it's my problem, apparently."

"Well, you will be living there. If the world were destroyed, your new body would be as well, and I know not what your soul's fate would be after that."

Sip.

"The winds of Dark have grown too strong, and a Demon Lord is soon to arise. Their powers, strategies, and goals cannot be known in advance - but they will be grand and terrible and destructive. Whole cities and kingdoms, perhaps even entire continents, will vanish before them."

"Presumably, a lot more people than me will be living there, and will also die if the world were destroyed. Why am I supposed to be better at preventing that than a local? Unless you need someone sexed up I'm not that useful."

"My apologies for overestimating your self-interest." She frowns slightly and swirls the half-empty teacup. "I admit yours is not a usual sort of heroic background. Regardless, you will have extreme potential compared to the average person, due to the nature of the summoning. Souls are... Hmm. This is an extreme simplification, mind you, but otherworldly souls are wreathed in powerful energies in the process of bringing them here, and I'm going to give you a little boost as well."

"A boost? And, extreme potential? What kind of extreme potential?"

"You will level faster, find learning magic far easier than average, and have a superior growth and advancement rate. And, when our time here is done - it's not infinite, alas - you will receive a Unique Skill. A powerful and unique ability that is beyond what is possible for ordinary people. Simply tell me what sort of power you would wish to have, and I will do my best."

Did she really just say 'level faster' like this was literally...

"Wait. Power? You can give me powers?" Ame exclaims excitedly.

"Uh..." She pauses, her mind pulled in two directions: the things that immediately come to mind about living her life that suck, and the things that struck her as really annoying not to have when she played that RPG. "I really get to pick?"

A grandmotherly smile. "I can influence what kind of Unique Skill you receive. You would be getting it even if I had not stopped you and spoken to you, though you wouldn't get to choose in that case. You should pick a general theme, or perhaps a goal. Neither you nor I can control the exact details, and things like 'the ability to return home', 'total unconditional invulnerability', or 'time-unlimited resurrection' are sadly impossible."

Ame nods thoughtfully.

"What about conditional invulnerability? Like, uh..."

"I want... I want to be, or have the ability to, like, be immune to all the negative physical consequences of sex, prevent menstruation, and be immune to all the negative physical consequences of being naked in the wilderness, or uh, being naked in a fight? Is there a 'theme' that'll do that for me and also make it easy to keep my, uh, 'party members' alive and healthy?"

The old lady sips her tea thoughtfully for a while. A pleasant breeze blows and windchimes sound from somewhere.

"...Yes, that should be doable. Which is more important to you, the health and environmental sealing effects on yourself, or the healing and buffing of others aspect? You'll get a good mix of both, but which is primary?"

"That depends on details, I think. I'm not sure I can make that call unless you can tell me about, uh, my 'quest', in a lot more detail?"

Tea Lady shakes her head. "The Demon Lord's plans are not yet clear. All else being equal, I suggest your self-focused effects being primary, but I will try my best to balance both aspects, of course."

Ame bites her lip.

"I guess leave that to chance or fate or whatever."

She nods.

"What about the immediate, uh, vicinity, of wherever I'm going? Can you tell me about that? Should I be asking for, like, a map."

She pulls a small paper map out from under the table.

"You'll find yourself within a day or two's travel of a town or village, not in a Dungeon or anywhere you're in severe physical danger. You shan't have trouble with languages. It would be a poor use of time to describe particular political units. There are too many to cover quickly."

The map shows one massive mostly-round continent with a few big inland seas like the Mediterranean that go quite deep into the interior, ringed by either small continents or large islands and snaky archipelagos on all sides. There are odd holes in the coastline and mountains here and there.

She gestures over to one of the pretty forests, where the trees are starting to turn orange and golden. "Our time here is growing short."

Ame studies the map for a long moment. 

"Alright. Anything else?"

"I would like to let you discover how to work magic or seek a local teacher yourself. There are nonhuman people of various kinds, some humanoid and some not. Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer." Sip. "I think that's everything. Unless you've any further questions...?"

"...not any that can be answered in a single conversation, probably. Unless there's a very simple explanation for who you are and why you do this."

"Not one that would satisfy you, I'm afraid. Good luck!"

With a final grin from the matronly old woman and a sudden rushing sensation, Ameron is now sitting on a rock, on a sparsely vegetated rocky hill. 

And something tells her, though it's not a voice or text scrolling across her vision but more like suddenly knowing,

Unique Skill gained! 『Axiom of Physicality』 level 1.

The mind reflects the body. A brain is a living thing, it breathes and grows and is affected by chemistry, ultimately chained to the body. Why not the opposite relation?

Allows the body to reflect the mind. Meditating on an image of yourself will allow you to change your body. Touching another allows you to bestow this effect. Currently, you can remove simple wounds and alleviate fatigue. Higher levels will increase speed, reduce the amount of focus required, and expand the possible range of effects.

A dirt path is visible, with more hills to the left and patches of thick shrubland to the right. There's nature sounds - the wind, birdsong.

Ame lets the knowledge of her new power rush through her, and a smile breaks out on her face.

She's gone out of her way to learn enough about the human body to aim this power pretty well, she thinks. After all, her body is her primary commodity and other people's bodies her primary work environment. Ignorance on the subject was intolerable.

First can she just wish away the years of eating poorly and fill herself out with that fitness and healthy glow she used to have, or does she need to go nutrient by nutrient? And then, she read once that when bone breaks, the seam along which it heals is actually much stronger than the surrounding original bone. Can she just, implement that across her whole skeleton right away?

There's no direct feedback from her Unique Skill at level one. After ten minutes of meditation, she feels more awake and energetic and might look a tiny bit more healthy and fit, though it's kind of hard to tell. She had no scrapes or bruises or aches and pains to heal, the transition to another world already got those.

Ame is pretty sure she can tell.

So, it works, at least as proof-of-concept.

Ame gets up and looks around. Hills or shrubland? Well, running uphill should make the effects of her nascent power more obvious, and end with the better view of her surroundings. Why not.

Ame jogs to the path, turns towards the hills and then breaks out into a run, doing her best to find a rhythm meditative enough that she can 'alleviate fatigue' while she's moving.

It's taxing to do this. Painful, even. She's working hard, breathing in great gasps and making her legs ache. But if she maintains that meditative pace, the strain never elevates above the burning sort of pain that intense exercise brings, her legs fail to turn leaden, her heart threatens to beat its way out of her ribcage but keeps going. If she was wearing more she'd be weighed down by sweat, but she can sustain this insane pace as long as she keeps close focus on it.

Half an hour later, there's a fork in the road. There's no signpost. Near it, just lying there in the pebbles, is a torn leather pouch of some kind, a broken bottle still covered in some kind of blue goo residue, a scrap of bloodstained fabric, a leather belt, and a short sword, complete with scabbard. It seems like kind of a shitty sword, a little rusty and not very sharp, and the belt and scabbard look worn-out. But it's a sword.

Running like this is not as fun as it could be, but it's still awesome.

She stops at the fork, gasping, then doubles down on her focus, recovering her breath in an unnaturally short time. And yeah, absolutely cheating at the exertion sweat to armor ratio was definitely one of the things she thought would come in handy. How thirsty is she, is her power having any effect on that?

A sword, huh? That's convenient. In both senses of the word. Not that she particularly sees the appeal of swordplay for its own sake; the sword-toting warrior in that one game had been the least interesting party member to play as. Still, she investigates the stuff. Anything in the pouch? Can she derive anything about the blue goo without touching it? Is there anything identifying about the bloodied fabric?

She is getting kind of thirsty. The pouch looks to have once been a waterskin, there's a bit left that didn't leak out. The blue goo is... Blue and gooey? Where it's dried out it gets darker and looks almost crystalline. It smells like some kind of plant? The fabric looks like rough-spun cotton, dyed a faded green.

There's some yelling down the left fork of the road. Two men's voices, arguing. She can't quite make out the words.

...she picks up the sword. She can always dump it again later.

Its dirty and dusty, but she grits her teeth and straps the scabbard on, it immediately sticking to her sweaty skin. Then, sure, she'll go toward the probable trouble. Who's arguing about what?

Bearded men who look the very picture of preindustrial rural farmers, with some kind of family resemblance. One has the other held by both arms.

"Are you deaf? Get the guards to-"

"They won't chase him past the river or the toll! He killed my best sow! I saw him do it! I'm going to make him pay!"

"No you're not! He has a head start, and besides Baron Traver won't exactly look kindly on you following and murdering some man on his lands."

"I don't want to kill him! I just want some fucking money!"

"Robbery, then! Come on, listen to me."

"No! Let me go! Hey, you!" He suddenly points and shouts at Ameron, then glances down and up, blinks, and pauses uncertainly. "...Adventurer?"

Ame suddenly just has to laugh.

"As of thirty seconds ago, sure!" she calls back, patting her crappy sword.

She strides up to them, brazen as can be. "Sounded like you're not having a great day either."

The angry one is suddenly rather speechless. The other one keeps his eyes firmly averted, focusing on her left ear.

"Some days are like that."

"That's one of his swords," the other one says, staring... Near it.

...The prudish one pinches his brother(?) until he looks away.

"Did you see the man carrying that blade?" Asks the prude.

"Sorry, no. I found it with some rubbish back at the fork in the road over there. I haven't got anything else useful and figured I'd rather have and not need a sword than need and not have a sword. If someone's gonna want it back it might be more trouble than its worth, do you think?"

Her tone is wry, and she feels kind of bad that her whoredrobe is making them uncomfortable, but only in the way where her solution to that is to laugh at the quaintness and say, "And hey, my tits are down here. What's so fascinating about my ear?"

"But you're-" He glances and blushes and shakes his head rapidly. (The other guy chuckles.)

"Gale. Adventurers have strange customs*."

"Right. Strange customs. It's just-" He sighs and shifts awkwardly.

"...I think you should keep the sword. Serves him right. And I got him with my pitchfork, I think. That'll have to be good enough. Dammit."

*Literally: 'Saying hello by punching.'

"I mean, I wasn't an adventurer yesterday. But then I had a very bad day shading into a very confusing day, and here I am wandering around with a sword in an unfamiliar land for reasons I'm still not entirely clear on. That said, please don't bother yourself to accommodate my non-existent modesty."

"No offense, but it's just. Making me uncomfortable. You're... A bit young."

"She's not any younger than Celera, and I know you want her."

Gale splutters in indignation, the other guy laughs.

"Besides, adventuring has got to be at least as sweaty as fieldwork and shirts go away for that."

"...I suppose."

"A bit young? Wow, it's been a while since I've heard that one. And don't you think it's curious to say you're uncomfortable when you clearly want to look and only think you shouldn't? You're the one making this weird by thinking you know better than me what I'm comfortable with letting happen to my own body. I've been a whore for four years. Your darkest fantasies are probably tame by my standards."

Ame gives him an apologetic, unapologetic shrug.

"Anyway, you are literally the first people I've met in this... country? I don't think Tea Lady counts, so yeah. What's the deal around here? And, uh, what exactly happened with this guy and your... uh, was it a cow? Maybe I can help somehow. It's not like I've got anything better to do."

Yep, there's a flash of pity, and then confusion, and Gale shakes his head again and mutters something under his breath.

"No, a pig! My best pig. She had some kind of enchantment that makes her an' her spawn grow faster, but it's weaker on the new ones. I don't know what in the darkness possessed him to mess with her, but pigs get mean if they don't know you, so it's really his fault he got bit. He ran off before I could make him pay for all the excellent little piglets she's never gonna have. Adventurers are supposed to dungeon-dive, not kill perfectly good pigs!"

"So an incompetent adventurer as good as stuck his leg in your pigs mouth and then panicked and stabbed it when it bit him? Wow."

Ame bites her lip in thought.

"Well, that does make me feel a lot better about keeping his sword, even if he does try to take it back. I can show you where I found the sword? There was some other stuff there, might be a clue."

Ame stops.

"Actually, how, uh, is the pig dead-dead or just mortally wounded and unconscious? I... may... be able to manage healing of some kind, if that would help."

As-yet-unnamed other guy looks intrigued, then crestfallen. "Naw, I put her out of her misery."

"Any kind of decent healing is a fine Skill. Usually worth some good coin... I still say chasing after him is a waste of effort. Better to move on."

"Uuuugh. You're probably right."

"Want to check out this 'other stuff'?"

"...Naw. Let's go home. I'm mad but the pork's not getting any fresher."

Gale pats him on the back. "-Uh, by the way miss, I'm Gale Savoi any my brother here is Codri Savoi." He gives a little bow, still averting his eyes. "Well met. You're welcome to follow us to Traver Hollow if you'd like. Might be healing to be done, and if you're any good with a blade or spells, there's a real little dungeon a bit north of town. Too little for most adventurers to bother with, unfortunately. Or perhaps fortunately."

"Suit yourselves. But thanks."

Ame falls into step and follows them.

"I'm Ameron. Ameron I don't actually remember my family name it hasn't come up in at least a decade. My friends call me Ame."

They walk in slightly awkward silence for a little bit, before the less prudish man speaks up, "We Savoi are a pig clan. Some of us tend the pigs, some process 'em into pork and tallow, some sell the results or keep the clanhold in shape. We've even got the stuff for rendering and soap. It's not glamorous, but everyone needs to eat and wash up, yeah?"

"Aye. And Raz has the Skills to use the local dungeon loot to make very good soap. Cityfolk will pay a lot for fancy soap."

"Maybe that bastard* just didn't like our offer..."

*'Clanless and unwanted'

"Raz?"

Ame is intermittently dipping in and out of her powerfine, 'Skill', continuing to push the changes to her body she came up with before. It should be faster by now, right? After half an hour of constant use, the Skill should've improved at least a little. Then again, its much harder to maintain the required meditative state while paying attention to a conversation than it is while running, so she's not going to make much progress either way. Still, some is not none. She wants to get in the habit.

"I'm a city girl, I guess. But I always thought the 'fancy' soap was just regular soap with a pretty ribbon around it and a bigger price tag..."

She's no longer pushing herself to the limit and it's still not giving her direct feedback, so it's hard to tell how much progress she's made.

"Raz is kind of amazing. She's our aunt, she's the left arm of the Savoi clan of Traver Hollow! Always knows how to fix things, keeps people from fighting or getting too down."

"Well, fancy soaps are definitely harder to make. I don't like the city. Everything's so fussy and official and polite, makes me anxious."

"Gale, you are fussier and more polite than anyone I've ever met in Brockton Bay. Of course, that says more about Brockton Bay than about you, probably."

"Well I'm terrified of getting it all wrong! Nobody else can be trusted to do the accounts, you know. Nobody double-checks anything!"

Codri laughs. "I've been to Caldu, too. They tax the hell out of us* to sell there and there's guards just about everywhere, but it's better than being cheated by a merchant."

*Literally: 'Fully clear the dungeon level'

"Caldu? Where's that and what's it like there?"

Ame does in fact have the necessary tact to stop herself before she says something like, "oh, they don't tax whores where I'm from, the cops just rape them instead."

She follows them onward.

Caldu is a big city, they say, and famous for something or other! It does lots of trade, it has lots of blacksmiths. It's very clean, they throw you in jail for littering. The noble lady in charge is supposedly disloyal to the King. To get there you have to walk for a week or ride in a carriage for three days and pay a bunch of tolls to every minor lord or whoever in the way.

The village is centered around five large longhouse-type structures, and the Savoi brothers head for one of them. A good number of people are wearing elaborate colorful cloaks. Ame attracts attention, but most people mutter and shrug and get right back to their business. A few stare, gratifyingly.

Everyone seems to know each other at least in passing. It doesn't smell as bad as a real medieval village might. "Welcome to Savoi Clanhall. You'll need coin for... Well, just about everything. Want to put out the word that you can do healing? Maybe meet Raz and whoever else is in at this time of day?"

The tolls thing is a bit ominous. Ame makes note of it.

The village sure has an aesthetic. Neat. She ignores completely anyone who seems disapproving and offers a smile to anyone who otherwise stares at her.

"I should probably meet Raz," Ame agrees. "Go ahead and tell everyone I'm willing to offer healing." She needs to level up her Skill anyway. "Also sex," she adds, mostly to tease Gale, but it's not like she's lying.

As soon as Gale goes to do that, Ame turns to Codri and smirks. "So, who's Celera?"

Codri sighs. "Fairsol clan girl, 'bout his age. A potions genius to hear him ramble on about her. Just go and ask the clan about adopting her, or them him, I say, but that'd be selfish apparently."

He pokes his head into the clanhall. It's surprisingly roomy. A kid is poking at some kind of arts-and-crafts. "Hey niblet, where's Raz?"

"Butcher house."

And he turns around again, pointing at one of the outlying buildings.

To the butcher house then.

"Potions, huh? And 'clan adopting'? That's new to me. How does that work?"

"If a man loves a woman and wants to fuck her all the time and have kids, they need to either be in the same clan or start a new one."

"Ah, so, he's outright pining for her and fantasizing about them growing old together, then? Oh dear. Have they even kissed?"

"Like I would know? They spend time together."

His mood is dropping rapidly as they approach the butchery.

Ame stops herself from asking her next question and just offers him a kind smile.

Into the butchery they go.

It's surprisingly clean! No blood at all except for the one table, where a very large pig is halfway disassembled. Three people crowd around it.

One of them turns, and with a phrase and a gesture her bloody hands and arms are clean. She's middle aged, but has aged more than gracefully, and is startlingly toned and fit. There's a strange presence to her. Greying hair kept in a simple bun.

"You know you don't have to watch this, Codri. We can take care of it. Or - Hm, who's this?"

She walks out and looks Ameron up and down doubtfully.

"Ameron I-still-don't-remember-my-family-name-actually. Professional slut, hopeful Healer, and as of like twenty minutes ago, wanna-be adventurer. Nice to meet you."

Raz raises one eyebrow. "Raz Savoi. Many things. Former adventurer, most relevantly, apparently. Can't say I've seen that combination before, and I saw strange things."

Codri shuffles a bit. "Codri, you've had enough of a day already. Why don't you go take a nap and have something to eat, hmm?"

"Yes, Raz." She watches him go.

"You're young and confident. Being an adventurer gets people killed, Ameron. On a regular basis. Do you know how rare I am, to have both eyes and all four limbs?"

"Just today I've been beaten, nearly stabbed, crushed in half by a large vehicle, kidnapped, offered tea, and then dumped in a foreign land I know nothing about," Ame deadpans. "Notice how I'm here instead of in the dungeon over-estimating my healing Skill right now."

Raz gives a short, sharp nod. "More sensible than the average idiot, at least. Former adventurers with all their eyes and limbs are rare. I am a vain bitch and spent a lot of money on some very good cosmetics, so you don't see scattered across my body the twelve times I very nearly died, but for luck or fate. The final straw* was a swarm of giant spiders injecting paralytic venom into among other places my eyes. They dissolved. I survived because our wizard panicked and burned himself alive along with enough of the spiders that the other two could drag me away, and I got my vision back because alchemists are wonderful people when you pay them four years' salary in cash."

*Lit. "I'm not fighting a dragon"

"That is impressive, but none of that is particularly surprising, you understand. I have a vivid and pessimistic imagination."

"But, it was, in fact, Tea Lady who saved me from the thing where I was ripped in half by a very large wheel crushing my hips earlier today, and she made it clear I won't ever see her again. That was, in fact, extremely unpleasant, and I'm not going to rest until I've improved my own healing enough that I could survive that without help. As I understand it, I can't actually do that just by hanging around in the village healing everyone's wounds and fevers or whatever, but I'll gladly start with that."

It's possible to advance without dungeon-diving, but not quickly. That's basic common sense. Who wouldn't know that at her age? Strange. Strange generally means trouble.

She shrugs artfully. "I don't personally care if you go off and die. I just enjoy horrifying wannabe adventurers. You'll be laughed at and turned away at the dungeon entrance like that, though."

Ame snorts. "Fair enough. Laughed at and turned away by who, exactly?"

"The Baroness's men, of course. Dungeons don't have guards and taxes where you're from?"

"I lived on the streets of a big city where prostitution was illegal. I've never interacted with taxes, and only interacted with, uh, guards when they were either chasing me or trying to rape me."

"So... if I can beat these men at the entrance then I'm definitely qualified to survive in the dungeon?" Ame asks impishly.

Raz glares. The glare has weight. She suddenly feels far more sheepish and afraid than she really ought to, a sudden flood of irrational terror rolling through her.

Ame goes perfectly still, her face freezing over as her mind slams down into pure threat-assessment mode, overcome completely by the cold clarity of win-or-die that she's only ever dipped into before, even during her escape from the Dallons. (She doesn't even notice, but this state of mind kicks her Skill into overdrive as her awareness of her own body crystallizes.)

She draws her sword.

No, before the sword has moved even an inch, her other hand lashes out like a striking snake, not even grabbing but just flinging the closest object to hand directly at Raz's face.

And then she stops, mid lunge, because she knows that she can't get the sword out in time, and she doesn't expect her fists to do much. She drops and rolls in an attempt to reach the nearest cover but adrenaline and intent aren't enough and she flubs the roll into and undignified sprawl.

It stops just as suddenly as it started. Raz smiles at her, holding the trowel Ame tossed by the handle.

"Interesting. It would appear you're relatively well equipped to deal with terror Skills. Perhaps you have a chance as an adventurer after all, with that kind of instinct."

She waits for Ame to get up.

"I would disapprove of you killing My Lady's loyal subjects. It would invite a response. It would have political consequences. It would be very inconvenient for a great number of people, and lead to a situation most easily resolved by your summary execution."

Ame sucks in a pained breath from her position on the floor as the unnatural fear vanishes. What the fuck just happ---oh, 'terror Skills', of course that's a thing.

"Please don't do that again," Ame gasps.

She pushes herself up and re-sheathes the sword, dusting herself off.

"I would... heal them... after..." Swallow. "And I wasn't serious anyway. I just want a benchmark for how much practice I need before I can fight on their level."

Raz frowns. She sets down the trowel. "-I won't. Most adventurers would joke about killing an inconvenient guard or two. It's part of the culture."

Deep breath.

"I am sorry. Well. If you want an honest assessment, why don't we go outside, then you draw that blade and try to hit me?"

"I had thought about asking. Wasn't sure I should. Awesome."

Ame follows Raz outside, but she doesn't draw her sword

"Actually, I'd rather learn to fight unarmed, first. It's more likely to save my life and I don't know if swordplay is even going to suit me; I might be better off with a different weapon." Also, if this is like a video game, specializing this early could soft-lock her out of better options she might only discover later.

"I agreed to test you, not tutor you. Do you even have any levels in a sword or unarmed Skill?" There's that concerned frown again.

"Sword, definitely not. Biggest blade I ever held before today was a dinner knife. Unarmed... well, let's find out."

Ame takes a breath, tries to recapture some of that cold clarity. She knows basically nothing about martial arts but she does have a firm grasp on basic causality.

She walks calmly towards Raz. She makes a fist. She deliberately lets her eyes flick towards a likely punching-target. Then she steps hard and deliberately tenses her shoulder like she's going to swing. Instead she does her best to slam her knee into Raz's gut, bracing because she knows perfectly well the blow isn't going to land.

Ame is at the upper end of the curve on speed and precision, for an untrained and unenhanced teenage girl, and she does in fact have some experience here, but she's clearly never been taught a single thing about how to fight.

She's faster and stronger than she remembers, but indeed, she doesn't even get close. Raz sidesteps and gets a hold on her arm and twists just enough to hurt, then lets go, shoving her lightly.

"Again."

When Ame fails to hit again, Raz is smirking at her and baiting her to try again. "Again." "Once more!"

After a minute Raz starts dispensing advice on form and leverage.

After two and a half, Ame suddenly knows where to put her weight to deceive, how to hide the motion of preparing a strike, on a more instinctive level.

After five, Raz seems to catch herself, stepping back sharply and calling, "Halt! Ah, bracing! I think you have a few levels in Street Fighting, but it doesn't look like you have Basic Unarmed Combat. Do you know any offensive spells? Describe your healing Skill."

Ame doesn't need to be baited, she's going to absorb every bit of skill she can, here.

Whoa, so that's what leveling up feels like. Cool.

When Raz finally remembers she's not actually supposed to be teaching Ame, Ame takes a single deep breath, during which she closes her eyes and uses her Skill to catch the rest of her breath.

"It lets me force my will on my body, like, when you try to willpower your body into acting less fatigued than you actually are, I can do that for real."

Ame doesn't actually know how it works on wounds yet, but she doesn't want to admit that. Pretending it's for demonstrative purposes, she draws the sword, pulls up her fishnet sleeve, and gives herself a little nick on the back of her arm. Then she glares at the cut until it goes away.

"It takes ongoing concentration to heal, and its slower than I'd wish, but I think that's the trade-off for how I can aim it a lot more freely than typical healing?" This is a guess, but it only makes sense that typical healing would be less aim-able than her Skill.

"...Thaaat could make you quite the effective brawler. It's like no Skill I've ever heard of. And you can cast it on others?" Her eyes narrow. "Have you ever had an analysis done?"

"My thoughts exactly. As far as I know I can use it on any living flesh that is... I can use it on my own body and on anybody I'm touching at the time. I haven't had an analysis done that I can remember."

"...Frankly, you seem like trouble. Mysterious Skills, unclear origins. Trouble."

She shakes her head and sighs.

"Try not to accidentally kill anyone, and please leave before an ancient curse returns to the world, or your vampiric father catches up to you, or any other dangerous nonsense like that."

"Pff. Sure. That's fair."

Sword, back in sheath.

"So, Gale's going around telling everyone there's a healer for hire in town, but speaking of changing the subject, is this where I offer to heal anyone you point me at, for free, no questions asked, if you do teach me to fight? And or teach me a spell or two?"

"I'm not a teacher. I'm not going to teach you. I'm just not, okay? I was getting exhilarated, it was fun, but now I'm remembering my dead friends and that's going to take days to go away. Maybe try Arwen Fairsol. Militia leader, has half a clue about the basics, will probably hit on you."

Apologetic shrug.

"Sounds perfect. Where do I find Arwen Fairsol?"

"Ask Fairsols until you find him, I suppose. Their clanhall is one north. They wear a lot of bright yellow." She indicates her colorful cloak, which is dominated by dark, almost bloody, red.

"Thank you."

Ame goes north and starts asking people dressed in yellow where to find Arwen.

Some of these people are a little uncomfortable about her clothes up close. Does she maybe want to borrow a shirt. Or pants. (They won't press, just kind of give her the cold shoulder.)

Arwen is findable after a few minutes of wandering, shirtlessly building a shed. He double-takes and grins at her mostly-bare thighs. "Well met, stranger."

Ame is quite comfortable in her current outfit, thank you. She has a good bland sarcastic smile; she doesn't approve of the people who don't want to ogle her trying to ruin it for those who do, and there're more than enough of the latter around.

"Likewise, if you're Arwen. I'm Ameron. Raz says you might be willing to spar with and or instruct me."

"Raz sent you to me? I had better give you my full attention, then."

He sets down the long timber he was carrying on one shoulder.

"Uf. S'pose I am one of the organizers of the local levy, such as it is. And I'm assuming you're interested in fighting Skills, instead of carpentry."

"Raz is kind of a big deal around here, isn't she. Yeah, I'm in desperate need of Skill levels. At least enough to survive the local dungeon. Not that building stuff is entirely uninteresting, but."

"She's a former B-rank adventurer. Yeah, she's kind of a big deal in this backwater we call home. I am honestly surprised she didn't just take over from Baroness Leonora or something. Uh, I have a few teaching Skills, mostly themed around basic combat, so that's convenient." He frowns. "You must be totally new at this, if you're asking for training enough to face our dungeon. Why here and now? And why are you wearing... That?"

"What, you don't like it?"

"I've had a very bad, then very strange day. That involved getting almost killed several times and viscerally discovering that my own healing Skill, and my fighting Skills in general, are nowhere near good enough. I didn't need to know what it feels like to get my legs ripped off but now I know. This day has also included getting dumped here in this country with nothing else but this," gesture at outfit, "and a burning desire to spend the next year leveling."

The legs-ripped-off bit throws him. He puts a serious face on. "...Sounds pretty dire. How the healing works will affect how you want to steer your training, long-term. The basics are mostly the same. Now, I want to help, and I can put this off for later, but. I would in fact like to get something out of it."

"In theory, I can recover from anything reasonable as long as I'm awake to concentrate on it. I can heal fatigue, for both of us, as much as I want. I got to Traver Hollow by sprinting up the road for like half an hour straight."

Ame smirks. "As for what you'll get out of it, I'm sure you can think of all kinds of things you could enjoy about getting up close and sweaty with me."

He looks down. "...True enough. But- Hm. Nothing levels you quite like experience against real monsters in a dungeon. But you really don't want to be alone your first time in a dungeon. What do you say I teach you, we have some fun, tomorrow we dive the first level only and split the loot sixty forty?"

"Awesome and excellent."

Ame coughs lightly.

"Can I get some water, first? I wasn't kidding about the half-hour sprint."

He has a canteen. He walks over to hand it to her.

"That's a damned powerful Skill you've got, you know. Know anything about the activation conditions for it?"

Glug.

"You'd have to ask Tea Lady, and I'm not entirely sure I didn't hallucinate her. So, where to?"

"There's a practice field if you don't mind maybe getting an audience. Wooden weapons too. This way. Tea Lady?"

Ame does not mind free advertising maybe an audience. She follows him to the practice field.

"I couldn't begin to tell you. It's been a very strange day."

"Well, better keep my face out of the thorns! I'm well aware I'm not pro adventurer material. Your type can handle all the dangerous weird stuff."

They get to the practice field. Instead of sparring with her right away or picking up any practice weapons, Arwen has her learn to fall correctly, how to punch correctly, has her hold a stance and nudges her into correctness, and generally tries to fill in street fighting instincts with actual training. His eyes wander appreciatively and his professionalism has a couple of itty bitty cracks, groping a bit after demonstrating a grab, lingering close behind her after correcting her arm position...

They pick up a few spectators, and almost the only reason more of them stare at Ame than Arwen is because she's new - He's not bad looking, very fit, and still shirtless.

Ame is passable at falling correctly, and does know how to throw a punch. Stances are new, though, and give her plenty of opportunities to encourage cracks in Arwen's professionalism. She learns quickly, even before Skills get involved, and is taking the lesson seriously, but she doesn't bother to hold back the little appreciative noises she makes when his hands wander.

She'd also like to encourage the ogling of Arwen in addition to herself, in whatever subtle ways present themselves.

Arwen privately thinks that it's lucky his pants are loose, baggy things.

Anyway, he's happy to repeat inadvertently ogleable motions a few times upon requests and if he realizes any of this, he doesn't comment on it.

He starts doing more intense exercises along with her, repeated lunges and punches and kicks and the like. Some time into this it clicks in the now-distinctive feeling of Skill-up. 

He calls for a break after most of an hour, breathing hard.

"Quick learner! Huff. Weapons, next. Sword and shield?"

She smiles at the compliment, puts her hand on his chest, and heals his fatigue.

"That's actually a good question. I picked up this random sword but I'm not sure what kind of weapon might actually suit me, and that's something I want to figure out as early as possible. What do you think?"

"-Woah, or, no need for a break. Wow. Eh- Broadly, for melee weapons, you've got sword-and-shield, large weapons, knives optionally with shield, and polearms. Sword-and-shield is balanced. Large weapons need strength and hit hard but can leave you vulnerable. Knife users tend to be quick, tricky, and frail. Polearms suffer in one-on-one fighting are great in a group, and you can lean either with-shield or large-weapon with them. If you were going to join our militia I'd tell you to get spear and shield, and maybe archery... But as an adventurer, I'd suggest learning whatever your preference is to use with a shield, and also either large weapons or heavy polearms, for flexibility."

"Hm. I've ever fought with a knife before, and I am quick and possibly sneaky, and 'frail' is probably relative. On the other hand, I just, like the idea of having a shield. On the other other hand, healer. If I'm not by myself would I even be on the front line?"

"You could learn to buff or attack from a distance later. I can't teach you archery - no spare bow - or magic, don't know any worth aught to an adventurer. Very much a weapons specialist, see?" He flexes his arms with a slightly self-deprecating smile.

"I see. Hm. I want to suggest something like a... bladed shield, like a small oval shape with the forward edge sharpened or serrated or something? But I dunno if that's at all practical."

Ame doesn't even know how magic is learned at all, though. "Now I'm curious, what magic do you know?"

"Sounds impractical. Maybe someone out there is using such a thing. I can do, you know, little everyday things. Mending loose threads, sparks for campfires. Holding nails steady."

Ame glances down at her fishnet top, which, on reflection, is as far from 'sturdy' as a piece of clothing could get. "I'd love to learn how to mend loose threads, now that you mention it. That can wait, though. I think knife-and-shield would probably work best for me? I'm probably worst at arms reach, so I should plan on either staying at full range or being so up-close that a weapon I need room to use would be useless."

"Where's that self-reflection coming from? I mean, looking at a mirror must be fun so maybe you were just distracted, but I'm not quite seeing why you're so sure you're worst at arm's reach."

"It's more that, I'm pretty sure at higher levels my healing Skill is going to make, just, tackling the monster and ignoring any damage it does to me while I stab it disproportionately effective. So I should have a weapon that's still just as useful when I'm pinned down as when I'm standing."

"Ah. Definitely knives or short sword, then. Some other holdout weapons wouldn't be a bad idea. I can sort of see the appeal of never using armor if you're expecting to level that hard... Reckless. I still say there's merits to flexibility, though. And I don't have delving knives spare for you to borrow, you're going to have to use that cheap blade. Maybe clean and sharpen it first."

He does a quick stretch and goes to fetch 'practice' knives from the racks at the edge of the training field.

Ame decides to try all of the combinations of sword, shield, and knife, including sword and knife without shield, just to see how each feels. Arwen is a good teacher, and none of the three configurations feel particularly awkward when they move on to sparring.

Once she gets her first Skill level(s) she tries mixing in Unarmed. Her body is still getting slowly stronger and more responsive from intermittent but on-going mental effort with her Unique Skill, and she feels wonderfully light on her feet as she trades blows with him.

The one-two drop-kick into a spinning backflip is mostly just for fun, and she doesn't exactly stick the landing.

She's advancing at a frankly kind of insane pace, and Arwen is happy to train for a long time, forgetting about how time is passing as long as she keeps restoring him.

She gets the Skills, but it's becoming clear that her capacity to refresh herself is not infinite. A sort of bone-deep tiredness is starting to creep up, she's not moving as quickly as she could anymore. Also, the sun is low to the horizon. And she's hungry and thirsty.

Well that figures. She really hopes that at higher levels she'll be able to bootstrap herself to healing her own brain and achieve infinite stamina, but for now it makes sense that a Skill that lets her mind rule her body isn't going to let her ignore mental fatigue.

She restores them both one last time and hands over the training weapons with a grin.

He puts the training weapons up. "I think we both need a meal and a bath, much as I almost want to grab you here and now from all the great views I got. Also, that Skill has wonderful implications for... Training." He smirks.

"I know right."

Ame slips in close, and indulges herself by licking from his chest up to his neck. The salty burn on her tongue is an erotic thrill even if the taste itself is worth forgetting, and she wants to see his reaction. Her hand glides over the front of his crotch and rubs, just once.

"Lead the way."

He doesn't seem to know how to react, except in an involuntary shiver.

"Of course, fair adventuress."

The bath he has in mind is next to a bedroom at one end the Fairsol clanhall, so he endures crass comments about 'practicing swordplay' from a variety of hecklers in the rooms they pass (one of whom teases him about finishing her shed some time this week), and grabs two hunks of bread on the way in. The bathroom looks clean and the taps are recognizable - the tub is sized for one. He gestures Ame in.

"Since you've nothing clean to change into, perhaps I could go wash- Well, it seems like you might not mind doing that yourself but I don't want to presume too much."

"I think you mean foreplay!" Ame calls back at the one loud heckler.

When a woman mentions a shed, Ame remembers that Arwen was building a shed and pauses briefly to promise to owe her a favor to make up for the delay.

Aw, the tubs not big enough to share. Too bad.

"It's fine," Ame tells Arwen, stripping out of her barely-clothes. "I can just put it all in the tub for a minute. One of the advantages of wearing stuff with very little fabric is that my clothes have very little fabric. Makes it easy to wash them on the go, and they dry really fast."

Indeed, she drops the fishnet shirt, nonporous skirt, and matching fishnet panties and socks into the tub instead of getting in herself, then bends over to work the taps, wiggling her nude hips at him.

The pun she attempted..... Does not work at all. It causes confusion instead of amusement.

This might the first time she's noticed that she's not actually speaking English if she hasn't caught something strange about a few of the idioms people use up until now. Whatever is translating for her, it's mostly very smooth, but it appears to have trouble with puns.

"Too bad it's not bigger, I'd love to hop in with you. Instant hot and cold water is already pricey - double-sized tubs for every bathroom is beyond us. Guess I'll just have to watch the beautiful view 'till my turn, eh?"

(Tea Lady told her she wouldn't be speaking English, she just forgot for a moment, and is ignoring the fallen pun, thank you, maybe they just misheard it, she's still smiling like it was funny.)

Ame grins at him over her shoulder, then gets to washing her clothes. If he just wants to look for now that might make sense but she is bent over and fully exposed and visibly aroused, right in front of him, and... moving, rolling her hips in a very suggestive way, that could almost seem unconscious if you didn't know her.

He watches, licking his lips. But doesn't do anything about it.

Until, somewhat suddenly, he does. He takes off his pants, comes up behind her and gropes her ass, pressing his hips up against her so she feels his hard cock.

"I've just decided it's easier if we wash up after," he almost growls. "I've got Luci seeds you can have when we're done, so I really want to fuck you, right now."

She grins back at him, wriggling against his cock, her arousal washing away sweat as she slickens him.

"I'm almost entirely certain my healing Skill takes care of that, too, but I won't say no. Now come and collect your payment... I'm all yours for the rest of the night, but that's no reason to... procrastinate."

He grins, "Lucky me," leans down to kiss Ame, then carefully aligns and inserts himself with a grunt of pleasure and... Doesn't procrastinate.

Ame lets him take the lead, but she's far from passive, writhing against his thrusts with all the skill of a veteran sex worker who takes sincere PRIDE in her work.

She doesn't even break rhythm when she has to rinse her clothes and drape them over the edge of the tub to dry.

She doesn't break rhythm when she cums a minute later, either, but she arches up to give him better access to her breasts and make the position more stable. Fucking standing up is always fun.

It is fun! Arwen is apparently a hugger, holding her tightly even as he plays with her breasts, pressing his chest to her back, panting and kissing at her neck, and still thrusting despite the slightly awkward angle as if not quite entirely in control of himself.

If the angle is awkward, Ame isn't doing her job. She's more than flexible enough to keep her hips at a non-awkward angle even while pressed back against him all the way. She really doesn't want or need him to control himself, either, that would just be pathetic on her part. Ame loves skin contact, though, and writhes closer to him as much as she can.

When he climaxes, she wrings the orgasm out of him until she's supporting more of his weight than he is. Keeping her hips in position so he doesn't slide out even while they're standing flat against each other is easier than before; she's even more limber now than she used to be.

Cuddling leads to washing, and eventually they finish with the task of cleaning up. Ame shakes out her clothes until they're reasonably dry and puts them back on, so as not to unnecessarily scandalize anyone on the way to Arwen's room(s).

And then Ame spends the rest of the evening making sure Arwen feels like he got the better end of their deal.

Apparently they tend to sleep in huge family-wide cuddle-piles around here, though they also have smaller rooms for young couples and guests. He takes her to one of those. (He gives her a little green seed despite her assurances about her Skill, just in case)

...He's definitely pretty happy about it, grinning deliriously and everything. He didn't even realize some of those positions were possible, or some of those sex acts were things.

In the morning he wants another round or two (particularly enjoying pinning her to the soft bed during it), then fetches breakfast and the news that there's a few people who would appreciate healing depending on how much she wants to charge.

Ame is so pin-able in bed. Arwen's enjoyably wholesome as clients go.

She does want breakfast though, and one of the very few things she doesn't do except on request is eat and fuck at the same time.

"What's a reasonable price, you think."

"I haven't actually seen how well it works on real wounds, 'tho it's amazing for fatigue. If it's effective, you could maybe get away with charging just barely less than a potion would be - Silver and six copper? But people decide to just wait for things to heal instead of buying potions, so maybe you want to do it for just a few copper."

Ame... almost asks how many copper to the silver, but catches herself in time.

"Just a silver, no extra copper? That's probably reasonable, right? Who's hurt worst? I should start with them as proof-of-concept."

"Still a bit pricey, but it should work. I'm not sure who's worst off." He frowns. "I don't regret it one bit, I'll remember yesterday, but I really need to catch up on work. Why don't you go find out and do whatever else you'd like, and we meet back by the practice field around noon? Then we dungeon-dive. I'll front the entry fee and take it out of your share afterward. And bring the loot bag."

"Good plan. I'll see you at noon."

As she departs, she gives him a smoldering grin. "Feel free to rave about me to your friends, but don't go making any girls jealous either. You can tell everyone I'm entirely equal-opportunity."

Speaking of making girls jealous, in knit communities it is usually a good idea to keep an even gender balance in her partners, so, hm. She thinks back. Were there any girls in the audience that were obviously watching her and not Arwen?

"I'm not really the fuck and tell type to be honest, but if anyone asks... Have a good morning!"

There was one! Short and slim, wide green eyes, her hair in a distinct loopy-braid style, carrying a bolt of cloth until she set it down to stare. She looked slightly stunned the whole time.

Oh yeah, that one.

Ame wanders around looking for that girl's face.

The suspected lesbian can't be found before someone makes a beeline for her and asks if it's true she was going to heal people, holding out his bandaged hand.

Ame sighs wryly.

"It's true. Got a silver? What's wrong, there?"

"Someone replaced my sharp knife with a dull one and I slipped. That's more than two days' work! A dozen copper."

"Free now, and two silver next time you need healing, three silver the time after that. Or one silver now, and one silver always."

Well, Raz is going to make her leave sooner or later. "Free, then!"

Ame rolls her eyes, takes his hand, and glares at his wound until it goes away.

"Amazing. Hey, everyone! She can really do it!"

The guy wanders off, waving his repaired but still bloody hand around for the whole tiny market area to see.

Ame keeps her eyes peeled for any green-eyed lesbians but follows after him to heal anyone else who approaches her. Same pricing scheme.

A few people want healing! One silver is high enough the guy with the sprained wrist prefers to keep his money (some market observation reveals that it's 19 copper to the silver), but one with a nasty bruise on her side that she attributes to a training accident is happy to pay. An old woman complaining about her knee wants to know if the fix sticks.

The green-eyed lesbian is staring at Ame again from a position behind one of the stalls (full of fabric and clothes). A new shirt is halfway assembled, sitting forgotten on stall table. Her hair is messier today.

Ame heals all comers. She tells the old woman that as far as she knows there's nothing temporary about her healing.

When she's done, she tosses her profits in one hand, wanders over to the fabric stall, and smiles at the cute lesbian. "Hey there. You sell," language language, "coin pouches?"

Blink. "Oh! Y- No," she says a bit reluctantly, "If you want a good travelling coin pouch you want that stall over there. I don't work with leather and leather is a lot more durable, even with my Exact Stitch skill. I don't suppose you need - uh - clothes?"

Ame notes the leatherworker's stall, but doesn't go there yet.

"Maybe. It could be nice to have a backup outfit in case something bad happens to this one." Jiggle. Despite leaving exactly nothing to the imagination, her fishnet top does provide half-decent support.

Blush.

"It seems like very fine weaving. Never seen the like."

That paper-thin excuse established, she looks more openly.

"I could try to make something like it? It's, uh, small enough that it shouldn't take too long..."

"One of its best features, in my opinion. Very easy to wash, too. Want to take a closer look?"

"Yes."

Ame joins Cute Lesbian behind her stall.

"I'm Ameron. What's your name?"

"O- Ophile. Well met??" Blushblushblush. She's looking around at the surrounding everyone. At least three people are paying attention to them, which: Aaaah.

Cuuute.

"Well met, Ophile."

Ame casually skimms a finger through Ophile's hair in a light caress, now that they're standing so close.

"I saw you watching me yesterday, too. If you wanna to do more than look, I'd be happy to let you. How does that sound? But I'm gonna want at least a discount for letting you study my... shirt... up close."

She leans back slightly. Eyes darting around anywhere else but magnetizing back. "Sounds, uh, good! You're very pretty. The shirt, I mean, is very pretty. But-" She gives a helpless vague gesture at the fact that they're in public. "And a discount, uh, that's, I wouldn't..." 'Hire a whore', is the phrase she doesn't manage to actually speak.

It's easy enough to guess the end of that sentence.

Ame smiles gently, leaning in close, caressing her cheek with a light, seemingly absent touch.

"Wouldn't you? You're a part of the mercantile life, too. I'm proud of my trade, and I bet you've been told you ought to be proud of yours. Your desire shines like a diamond in the sun, and you stand to benefit besides. There is absolutely nothing wrong with giving me an incentive to make time for you."

She takes another step back. "Um I'm only a part-time merchant but that's irrelevant Spirits that sounds nice but everyone is going to know we had sex!" She whispers in a low hiss.

Ame doesn't pursue, just maintains her smile.

"They'll probably at least guess, but it also probably won't be long before everyone starts guessing that about literally anyone I've ever spoken to. I won't be upset if you decline, but it is ultimately up to you to decide if people knowing about it is worth more regret than not doing it at all."

Ophile squeezes her eyes shut and fails to stop blushing and takes a deep breath.

"You're... Good at it?" Blush increases and she holds a hand up. "Wait. Stupid question." Breathe out. Activate Skill. A calm comes over her.

"Material cost is two copper for linen or cotton, six for nola. I recommend nola, it's nice, here, feel my shirt sleeve. Because a custom shirt will involve design skills and unusual patterns and at least a couple of hours I would normally charge eight to twelve copper more depending on what exactly you want in a new, uh, open shirt. One or three for materials and four to six for labor for each of, uh, panties and tiny skirt. I don't have the Skills to enchant it with anything but I know how to make it compatible with future enchantment and the color-change cantrip. I can try to teach you the color-change cantrip for, uh, six copper. I'll drop the price by up to t-two thirds plus materials cost if you- If you're good at your job. For one hour."

"Two-thirds off non-materials cost for an hour of me doing my best to melt you into a happy puddle, for one unenchanted replica of this outfit, is probably a better deal than you realize, but I think it'll be more fun if you learn that the... wet... way. Agreed."

One of her hands unconsciously drifts in front of her skirt before she catches herself. "Yes good. Okay. I can - Let me make a good sketch of how it looks on you. Close examination. Have to get every detail right." (Clear ulterior motives, there). "And then I'll put my things up and my place is just across the street."

"Of course. Take your time."

Ophile sketches! In full view of the rest of the market, even. She's a surprisingly good artist... And adds slightly more detail than is strictly necessary to describe the construction of the garments. She flushes whenever she glances up to meet Ame's eyes and smirk. Or when Ame teases her in a dozen easy-target ways.

Ame doesn't tease her too much, even if she does at one point suggest that since at least the skirt and maybe the shirt too are of unfamiliar materials, Ophile should probably finger the materials to gauge their properties while she's still taking notes.

"Your clothes are weird! What's this even made of? It's smooth and thick but doesn't even feel like fibers. The stitching on this is incredibly regular. Whoever did this was high level - except it's also weirdly crude in places? There's no double-stitching on the seams here. And your shoes... Sorry if I'm nerding out* it's just- Where did you even get these?"

*Lit: "Talking about my rock collection."

"I honestly don't know. It might be vinyl? I think the fabric was probably cut and stitched and assembled by different people, though. The skirt was abandoned in a donation bin. The shirt and panties were a gift. I stole the shoes from a... rival, who tried to get me arrested."

Frown. "I've never heard of vinyl. Different people- Why would you do it like that, it'd limit their Skills. Wait, arrested? That sounds terrible!"

"The city I'm from was not a nice place. And it wouldn't surprise me if whatever company employed the workers considered that a bonus."

"They don't just - quit, and make things themselves?"

"It'd be illegal or impractical to sell those things, and they wouldn't be able to compete price-wise anyway, so they'd just starve. There's a joke about wage work where I'm from, that it's just slavery with extra steps."

"...Cities sound terrifying. I'm glad I live out here where we help each other."

"Well, you're not wrong."

Idle, seemingly thoughtless caress, none-the-less careful to not disturb Ophile's sketching.

Blush. "N-Nobles cause trouble with each other sometimes out here, but it usually doesn't spiral out of control and hurt the little folk if you're not a fighter. Just changes who we're paying our taxes to."

"Lucky."

Ame turns around, then, so Ophile can finish the sketch of her from behind.

Incidental exposure manages to thoroughly embarrass her normally, but having a job to do distracts from that, but vague naive imagining of how Ame is going to pay for that job makes it about ten times worse. She continuously blushes as she sketches, biting her lip.

"I think I've got enough detail to make a good replica," she says slightly regretfully. "I kind of want to sketch you wearing other things... There's so little on you there's actually not much room for looking pretty the way clothes can."

Ame shrugs at that, then slinks in close.

"If you're still conscious an hour from now, maybe we could play dress-up with me as the doll. If not... well, there's always tomorrow."

"C-Conscious? Please don't literally-" mumble "-me unconscious. That would be alarming."

Ophile is so cute.

"I certainly wouldn't want to do anything alarming."

"Good." She adjusts her hair slightly.

"I guess it's time to - pack up my things and go home. With you."

"Yep. I'm all yours."

Actually, Ame will briefly detour to buy that leather coin pouch, first, so she isn't carrying around a bunch of loose silver.

Then Ophile can show Ame her bed.

She ducks into the bathroom immediately, declaring an intent to wash up.

She has to take several deep breaths before coming out again nude a couple of minutes later, hands twisting anxiously.

Ame was listening for sounds of undressing, so when Ophile emerges, it's to find Ame also completely nude, sitting on the edge of Ophile's bed. Ame, not reacting even slightly to Ophile's nudity, gives her a gentle smile and pats the covers next to her.

"Come sit."

She looks at Ame in that same 'slightly stunned' way a bit, then does, a twist in her gut.

"I don't actually... Know. What to do now. 'M kind of scared."

"That's why I'm here. To know, and to do. So you don't have to."

Ame loops her arm around Ophile's waist and pulls her in close, gently guiding her to lean on Ame. She takes Ophile's free hand and brings it up to cup Ame's bare breast.

"I'm here to work my art of pleasure upon you, so don't worry about pleasing me. Think of me as a healer, here to 'heal' your unfilled urges, your unmet carnal needs." Ame's hands caress her hip and belly. "Now tell me, where does it... ache? Yearn? Besides the obvious, I mean," she adds, her hand gliding down briefly between Ophile's thighs.

Ophile leans into Ame - and 'eep's and squeezes her legs closed when her hand goes down.

"I don't know. How do you know that? Touching me is - nice. And you're so soft... Just, hug me?"

"Skinship deprivation," Ame diagnoses with mock seriousness. "Here."

Moving slowly, but firmly, Ame reaches over, under Ophile's opposite thigh, and lifts. With her other arm already holding Ophile close around the waist, Ame guides the other girl onto her lap, straddling her waist, their fronts pressing snugly together, Ame's larger breasts enveloping Ophile's own as Ame pulls Ophile's head down onto her shoulder.

"Kiss my neck, just forward of the tendon. The skin is soft there, it'll feel nice on your lips."

!!

Their breasts! And hips! And faces! She's so close to Ame! So much pressing and soft!

It's kind of overwhelming. She stiffens and shuts her eyes. Where are her hands supposed to go??

...Ame would know what's nice. So she tries it, breathy kisses on her neck.

"Mmm. That's good. Feel me. Your body knows what it needs, let the sensations take you. Give your hands what they want. Don't think about what you should touch. Just touch."

Then, once Ophile relaxes again, she slides her own hand down the other girl's spine, over her butt, to gently caress Ophile's vulva from behind.

Ophile keeps kissing Ame's neck hungrily. Her hands end up on Ame's shoulders and arms, mostly.

This earns another 'eep!' and a whole-body twitch upward.

Ame gives her a gentle squeeze and keeps up the gentle caresses at the same pace until Ophile adjusts and is able to process the sensation normally. Meanwhile, she'll close about ninety-eight percent of the way to a kiss on the lips, tempting Ophile to close that last bit of distance.

Ophile totally does that! ...She's not a very good kisser. She's trying to have as much of her body in contact with Ame's as possible, needily pressing against her. Skinship deprivation seems about right.

Ame isn't here to critique Ophile's kissing skill, or any of her other skills. She's here to melt Ophile into a puddle of pleasure.

Ame is a huge fan of skinship herself, so Ophile's skin-hunger is met with genuine enthusiasm, as they continue to make out and Ame continues to rub Ophile's vulva, not so much stimulating her as teaching her body to expect to be touched there.

Maybe fifteen minutes in, Ame observes that Ophile is ready for more, and tips backward so they're laying flat. She rolls them over, and starts kissing her way down Ophile's body. The transition from hand to mouth is seamless, never leaving Ophile's pussy alone long enough for it to recapture any shyness.

She brings Ophile to the edge easily, then shifts into what she likes to call 'a study in contrasts', dancing with the rythmns of the other girl's body from slow, light licking to intense sucking and fingering. The thing a lot of people miss, is that desire, arousal, pleasure, and satiation are all separate things. Knowing which of those things you're trying to make your partner feel goes a long way.

When she makes Ophile cum, the pleasure is explosive but not overwhelming; it immerses her in pleasure but leaves her wanting more, and Ame gives her more.

Eventually, Ame switches into a sixty-nine position, more to resume the skinship than to get Ophile to reciprocate the oral sex. She settles into a slower, ramping build-up technique toward Ophile's final, ultimately satisfying orgasm while laying flush on top of her, rubbing her whole body with her own and giving Ophile access to Ame's hips and sex should she feel inclined.

Ophile is never in danger of literally passing out, but she almost certainly gets the joke, now.

Ophile is a little too incoherent to try reciprocating by then.

"Skills are amazing. That was amazing. You must have at least level twenty in something sexy. I'm sure of it. Mmmmm..."

"I wouldn't know."

Cuddle cuddle.

The hour's up, but she doesn't need to be anywhere until noon, so she's not going to mention that.

Ophile wants to cuddle, but one of her Skills is time management. She pushes it out for five minutes then decides surely Ame will notice it's been too long soon, and reluctantly gets up.

"That was - so good. I'll go start on your order soon. I might have it done this evening, but it could take until tomorrow instead. Do you want cotton or satin or nola?"

Ame gives Ophile one last nude skinship hug and a lingering kiss, before re-dressing herself.

"I'm not sure how long I'll be in the dungeon with Arwen, but I'll be fine if it takes until tomorrow either way. I'll take your recommendation and go with nola, why not."

"Eeeeheheh..."

Ophile knows it's not love, but she feels so relaxed and giddy that she practically skips back to her stall and doesn't care at all about all the gossip that results from Ame leaving her house a minute later.

If Ame wanted to spread rumors that she's good at her favorite job, defrosting Ophile did that wonderfully.

Ame loves it when a plan comes together. This should also help head off any Ame-as-topic-of-conversation becoming a point of contention between the men and the women of the village, hopefully.

It's not noon yet. Ame supposes she will hang out in the market for a while in case anyone else wants healing.

There are not really that many injuries bad enough enough to pay a silver to heal but not so bad that they've already been dealt with one way or another in a town of a couple thousand. One woman who got kicked by a horse, a man who broke his arm and didn't set it right some years ago.

This guy wants a blowjob, though.

Can normal healing spells fix an incorrectly set bone without rebreaking it? Ame doesn't know, but her healing apparently can!

"In a hurry?" Ame asks blowjob guy wryly.

"Not particularly. I'm just slightly more shameless than average and it's my thing, you know? I'll go away if the rumors are wrong."

"Your thing, huh." Ame stands up. "Two copper. Three if you wanna be rough. And I'm curious what the rumors are actually saying."

He laughs. "What counts as rough? That you're a prostitute. That you're from somewhere everyone fucks each other three times daily. That you have to have sex at least once daily or you'll lose your improved stats. That you fell out of the sky to avenge the Savoi prize pig. That Raz thinks you're gonna get yourself killed."

"The first one and the last one are definitely true. The rest of those are hilarious, though."

She will follow him if he would like more privacy before pulling his pants down.

"Rough is you pulling my hair and fucking my face balls-deep. I have a stubbornly persistent gag reflex so I charge extra for that."

"Rumors are an art form, much like novels or plays. And in that case, rough is not my thing and I'll gladly give you two copper."

He would like a bit more privacy, in fact. Here's a shed.

She doesn't get any other quite as bold clients, but she could probably find one or two more before noon unless she'd rather do something else.

Ame sucks the guy off. For only two copper she doesn't draw it out, and he doesn't seem to expect her to. It doesn't take long.

For the rest of the morning, Ame won't turn anyone away who asks (unless they ask for something that'll take more time than she has) but she doesn't seek anyone out, no.

If no one comes by for healing either, after a while, she will ask around in pursuit of getting her own waterskin-or-equivalent and maybe a snack, portability optional.

The time spent sitting isn't spent idle. She spends all that spare time working her Unique Skill on herself, trying to push its limits and enhance her body further. Like finally getting rid of her gag reflex, maybe. Can it do that, yet?

Canteens, waterskins, and snacks are all things that can be bought with money. (One woman loudly comments to a friend that whores don't actually produce anything of real value in her earshot.)

Her Unique Skill can't do that yet. It kind of seems like it hasn't gotten any stronger or more flexible, she's just gotten better at phasing in and out of the mental space that activates it. Which will be good for the speed of healing at least?

Ame has money now!

Not directly responding to the whorephobic comment, Ame idly makes her own comment, seemingly offhand, about the insanity inherent in the premise of denying the evidence of one's own senses: the clear and obvious fact that anything wanted holds real value, since it is indeed that wanting that gives it 'real' value. To argue that sex work holds no value, to anyone, is to argue that no living person has ever actually wanted sex. Why, that is surely the sign of a deranged and immature mind that never learned to cope with basic differences in preferences or taste!

Ame gets back to meditative practice. Grrr. What does it take to make this thing level up?

Well, she's certainly opinionated, huffs the complainer as if that's a bad thing.

It's maybe a little bit stronger? It feels like fixing that one guy's mishealed bone wouldn't have worked yesterday. She certainly is not nearly as undernourished-looking as yesterday, but it's hard to say if that was repeated 'healing' or the result of a level up.

At any rate, noon quickly approaches.

Ame buckles her crappy sword back on and looks around for Arwen.

Arwen is wearing head-to-toe leather armor, plus a chainmail shirt, and has a metal kite shield and a halberd. He'd look positively Knightly if the amount of metal versus leather were higher.

"Hello again. I thought you'd buy a shield, or a short blade? I suppose you might not have much money..."

"I still could, if there isn't anything I can borrow. I've got some money. And maybe I can trade this sword in? Is that a thing?"

"That's a thing. Some chests give out weapons sometimes. There's not much call for small knives designed for fighting around here, come to think of it, but if you can afford a backup weapon, having a backup weapon is a good idea. I can lend you a small shield, but if it ends up broken you have to pay for mending, alright?"

"Of course."

Then they can go and trade in her crappy sword for something shorter and sharper, maybe a gladius, if there's something like that available.

There's a surprising variety of weapons for a small town. She can get a mediocre instead of terrible gladius-like blade by trading in her terrible sword plus a few more coins, and can get a pair of cheap daggers on credit once it's explained that she's going on a dungeon run.

That'll have to do. It is certainly an improvement. She will also, assuming its not too expensive, get a new, cleaner sheath, and something to strap a dagger to each thigh, with.

She doesn't exactly have a lot of coin left, but those run only a couple copper.

"Just a few small things about dungeon runs," Arwen tells her as they're walking out of town. "They are serious business. You have to be sharp while we're in the dungeon. We have to stay alert and keep joking around and distractions to an absolute minimum. Even when you think you're safe, be alert. Watch for wandering monsters. Sometimes there are traps - this dungeon doesn't seem to use them except on the last level, but it's easy to be caught unawares. If we have to take a break, we can sheathe our weapons, but we don't sit down and we find a room where we can watch all the entrances at once. I want to clear the whole first level, and then leave. I don't want to fight a boss today. Even if you feel confident and it's just a first-level boss."

"This dungeon uses plant and grass type monsters. It has three levels but we're only going through the first. On the first level, there are Grass Sprites, Pineapple Surprises, Walking Sticks, and Looper Vines. Grass Sprites are animate bundles of grass about waist-high. They don't have claws or anything and they're easy to cut apart, but they hit surprisingly hard and they tend to swarm. You just have to avoid getting swarmed. Pineapple Surprises are spiky little fruit things. They throw themselves at you pretty hard, and the spikes hurt. The first time they see an adventurer they always panic, so the best time to kill them is when you surprise them. Walking Sticks are a lot like the Grass Sprites, but sharp twigs can pierce you and do considerable damage. They're the monster most like a human opponent on the first level, so parrying or dodging and then striking should work. Looper Vines..."

He pauses and looks sad. "Looper Vines are the most dangerous. They're why I'm wearing a gorget." He taps the stiff leather at his throat. "So I'll enter new rooms first. They lurk in disguised pockets in the ceiling and especially just inside the entrances to rooms, and reach down to strangle adventurers and suspend them in the air. If you're caught like that and your friends can't help you, and you can't cut the vine with weapon or spell, you will die. That's why you need to have someone with you, and why you have to be alert and especially cautious entering new rooms. And let me just say one last time, this dungeon can kill you. Respect it."

"I will."

Ame does, in fact, have her serious face on.

She thinks over this new information.

She turns to Arwen. "Hold on, I want to test something."

Ame unstraps her sheath, and loops the strap around her neck. 

"Grab this and strangle me, as hard as you think a Looper Vine would. I want to know how long I can stay lucid."

"-I see the idea but I don't think it's a good one."

"It's always a good idea to know something before you need to know it. Just do it. We need to know this, especially if my healing Skill affects it."

"And I think going into things either injured or unnerved by recent pain and suffering might be bad. Fine. It won't even be a perfect facsimile because that's not a vine and I'm not attached to the ceiling, but fine."

He loops the strap around her neck and lifts.

Ame can't help but snort at 'unnerved by recent pain'. What does he think she is?

Ame's been humming along at a high simmer all day and it's surprisingly not unpleasant for the first couple seconds. Then her neck starts to hurt and her lungs start to burn, and it stops being even tangentially sexy.

Good. Pain and fear have always had a chilling effect on her mind, even if she hadn't realized just how extreme that effect was until Raz hit her with that terror Skill. It makes it very easy to sink into her Unique Skill.

Ame tenses, and her hands instinctively go to the strap around her neck, but she maintains her composure and maintains eye contact with Arwen.

She points her Skill not at her neck, she can heal the bruise later, easily. She wants to 'heal' her blood. Specifically her blood. Possibly her lungs and brain and heart too, but it's definitely her blood that should take priority, because if she can keep her blood 'healthy' that should obviate everything else. And she starts counting the seconds.

"Going to have fun explaining this if anyone comes along the path..."

Sixty seconds. A hundred twenty. She's starting to feel her lungs demanding air.

One eighty. The burn to breathe is stronger but not yet overpowering. Her fingers and toes are tingling slightly. Arwen is looking concerned, like he might drop the hold.

Ame isn't going to tap out until she loses her hold on her Skill.

Arwen starts asking if she's okay at fifteen second intervals and will drop it if she doesn't confirm.

By five minutes she really needs to breathe. It's very distracting.

But is it distracting enough. Maintaining her focus under duress is probably going to be her single most valuable skill, in this world of Skills.

Ame can still nod in response to questions, though she almost loses her grip on her Skill each time she has to. Is it still getting worse?

The burning need to breathe seems to have leveled out. The tingling in her extremities is getting worse, though. She's starting to feel cold.

Yeah, this is about where it feels like all she can do is maintain her Skill, and not very well at that. She taps out.

And Arwen gratefully lets her down and gets the sheath out from around her neck, looking somewhere between thoughtful and anxious.

Okay, yeah, Ame will take a moment to heave a few desperate breaths into her lungs. Then she straightens up and closes her eyes for a moment. The red welt around her neck fades away, and her breathing steadies.

"So, that was... ten times as long as it would normally take to be incapacitated, you think?"

"Maybe even more times if it's someone who doesn't react in time to take a deep breath. You say you've never gone adventuring before? I'm trying to figure out what in the darkness gives you such a powerful Skill."

Ame shrugs, checking herself over and making sure she's thoroughly healed.

"Alright, I'm good. We ready to go?"

"I think so.

-Please don't flirt with the dungeon guards. And if they ask why you're not wearing armor, say you're doing DEX focus and armor would slow you down."

"Sure. I mean, that's not even actually a lie."

They come into view of a low hill with an elaborate stone gate, decorated with carved images of trees and other plants. A man and a woman with spears stand guard.

"Hey, Fairsol! You're that militia trainer. Arlo?"

"Arwen, actually."

"Arwen, right. I didn't think you did dungeon runs anymore."

"Today's a special case. Ameron here wanted some training, and I think level one will be a good intro. We're splitting the loot sixty-forty."

"...She's the one everyone who came in this morning was talking about? The whore-turned-adventurer?"

Arwen winces, but nods.

They glance at each other. "Well, the fees are the same as usual. Ameron, this dungeon is the property of Baroness Leonora Hargrave. You may enter it and slay the monsters there to gain experience and loot, but Our Lady takes no responsibility for damage to property, injury, or death caused by a dive. All the laws of the land up here apply in the dungeon - this is not the kind of town where adventurers are allowed to kill each other and take the other party's things. Do you understand?"

That wince probably adds an item to Ame's to-do list, but whatever.

"I understand. That's all perfectly reasonable and clear."

Arwen pays them the entry fee. "You two can go on in, then. Good luck."

And they step through the heavy stone gates.

You are in an empty room in a dungeon. A soft coating of grass covers the floor. There are exits to the north, east, south, and west. What do you do?

All else being equal, Ame will head left unless Arwen wants to take the lead.

Arwen follows her left, but pushes forward to enter the new room first, peering around carefully and ready to jump back. Nothing suddenly grabs him by the throat.

This room contains: One eerie scarecrow-looking thing and a half dozen little grass monsters!

Ame draws her new gladius and starts stepping sideways, spiraling in, trying to get the scarecrow thing between her and the grass monsters so she can kill it first.

All of the monsters rush straight towards the pair! Luckily for her plan, the scarecrow thing (Walking Stick) is faster due to its longer legs.

Arwen follows close behind her with his long halberd, saying "Covering your flanks."

Nod.

Ame bashes the Walking Stick with her shield to slow it down and then stabs it, before leaping back to keep ahead of the grass monsters.

Stabbing seems to have limited effect. A few of the twigs that make up its body are broken, but it keeps coming at her.

"Slash plant monsters, Ame!"

Right, that's obvious.

Ame kites it a bit more to give herself room, and then lunges, slashing down hard at center-mass.

It strikes at the same time Ame does, managing to scratch her slightly as she drives home a fatal blow that splits it cleanly in two. The remaining branches twitch once, then fall to the ground.

Arwen slashes at a flanking grass monster with a side-swing from his halberd. The extreme reach of the weapon means he's still not in Ame's way.

"Good!"

Ame heals the scratch without slowing down, but she's a little surrounded by the grass monsters. So she kites them directly toward the nearest wall and leaps, kicking off and flipping over them to land well clear.

She's a little surprised by how well it works. Her self-enhancement must be doing something right.

Plenty of room, now. Slash slash slash.

This gets her out of the way and in a good position to kill grass monsters, but kind of leaves Arwen in the lurch since he definitely can't do that weighed down as he is and probably couldn't even if he were naked. He's wearing armor and more or less ignores the hits the grass monsters get in, slinging the halberd on his back and drawing a short sword to slash with in a smooth and practiced motion.

Once the monsters are dead, they quickly start turning to odorless smoke. The twig monster leaves behind a hand-sized chunk of wood and one of the grass monsters leaves behind a little spool of rough-looking thread.

Arwen frowns at Ame. "We need to discuss coordination. I brought a halberd to act as your support, but with you so fast and me so slow finding a good strategy could be tricky."

"Yeah, sorry, I thought they'd keep after me. I probably should ask more specific questions about how dungeon monsters behave, how they choose targets, what tactics they might use, and so on...?"

He has them walk to a spot where they can watch all the entrances and spends a few minutes explaining. Monsters usually have a specific set of behavior. Low level monsters almost never display any tactical acumen - anything approaching tactics will be the result of the dungeon's animal cunning, for example putting monsters just close enough to a Roper Vine that they'll attack right when the vine attempts to snag someone.

There are Skills to draw aggro or reduce it, but he never learned Taunt and doesn't know much about the opposite version. Occasionally the dungeon will tell monsters to move somewhere else or switch targets, but even then they tend to follow the same attack patterns. He spends a few minutes explaining and giving examples - it's a combination of distance, threat level, recent damage output, and Skills to modify how much attention one gets.

"I'm not an adventurer or a tactical expert, have to admit. We could probably do our own things and be fine since it's the first level, but that's a bad habit."

"Yeah," Ame agrees.

They continue, hugging the left wall. Its as good a method of navigation as any, Ame figures.

She pays more mind to fighting as a team with Arwen, putting herself, and therefore their targets, at optimal halberd range, and is more careful about losing aggro.

Kiting the sticks and grass monsters to where she wants them gets easier with practice. She can keep up her evasion for as long as her Unique Skill holds out, which is apparently "all day" judging by how long she was able to train yesterday.

They develop decent teamwork after the first few rooms. There's never more than six monsters in a room. The monsters occasionally drop bits of loot - generic and low quality things for the most part. Chunks of wood or bark or tinder, bits of thread or fiber or small bags of wheat. They meet the Pineapple Surprises, which tend to drop large tough leaves or bits of fruit (which are curiously neat and tidy and storeable). Though one Grass Sprite drops what Arwen says is 'refreshing dew'. It looks like teabag-sized globule of clear water, but it doesn't get anything wet or stick to anything and he insists it's slightly magical and worth several copper. It goes into a different compartment of the loot bag.

They run across a small, cheap looking 'treasure chest' guarded by three twig monsters and four spiky pineapples. Once those are defeated, the treasure chest contains... An awful knife, a wicker buckler, and a chunk of flint.

Are the knife or the shield less awful than what she's got? Well, her current shield is a loaner.

"Is that shield as bad as it looks or should I switch?"

The knife is worse than what she has now, but probably worth something. "Loot from the first dungeon level is not exactly amazing. Very light, it'll deflect glancing blows... But yeah it's not great. Better than nothing, I think some of the militia use this exact shield in fact."

Ame will stick with her loaner shield for now, since she's accustomed to it.

Onward.

They keep going through the monsters. Ame levels up in what feels like general footwork and moving around in combat, then in sword. The loot backpack slowly gets fuller.

After a couple of hours they come to a huge, tall wooden door decorated with a border of thorny brambles and the words 'HEART OF THORNS' in the middle. There are two side doors. "Bathrooms are there if you need it. Dungeons almost never attack in the bathrooms, so it's a good time to take a breather."

Ame will take advantage of the provided bathroom even though she doesn't urgently need to. (Thanks to her Unique Skill, is it taking ten times as long as it should for nature to call, too? She hadn't noticed before but it's starting to seem like it.)

The dungeon has apparently sealed the other bathroom with Arwen inside. He's nowhere to be seen, at least.

Maybe he's just taking a while?

After several long minutes, Ame tries knocking. "Arwen?"

The door seems immovable. Arwen doesn't respond in any detectable way.

The giant doors creaaaak open. And a seven-foot-tall vaguely person-shaped mass of thorny vines walks out of the large open room beyond.

Instead of attacking, however, it holds its 'arms' out stiffly and the thorny tendrils slowly creep into the shape of strange letters that only snap into comprehensibility once they're fully formed.

'I INVITE YOU TO A DISCUSSION OTHERWORLDER'

Ame sllloooowwwwly lowers her sword.

Arwen didn't say anything about dungeon bosses pulling this kind of thing as a trick... and she thinks he wouldn't have left something like that out?

"How did you know I'm. Not from here. And how do I know this isn't a trap?"

IT IS DISTINCTIVE TO SUFFICIENTLY ACUTE MAGICAL SENSES

I AM NOT THIS MONSTER. I AM NOT THIS DUNGEON. I AM CONTROLLING IT. I COULD KILL YOU WITHOUT TRICKERY. I WILL NOT YET BECAUSE YOU MIGHT BE MY CREATOR'S SUCCESSOR.

Well that's good to know.

"...alright. You've successfully engaged my curiosity."

THE BOSS WILL TAKE YOU TO THE END OF THE DUNGEON. I CAN COMMUNICATE BETTER THERE.

Ame sheathes her sword and follows the Heart of Thorns.

THIS WILL BE FASTER

It weaves together some non-thorny vines into a sort of chair and lowers that to the ground expectantly.

...yeah, fine, alright.

This is pushing it, though. Ame is not going to play nice if this is a trick.

It's not exactly comfortable, but the monster doesn't suddenly try to kill her when she's in its grasp. The Heart of Thorns carries her down the stairs at the back of its room, then very swiftly through the rooms on the next floor down. It stops at a wall, which opens and reveals some kind of cramped and dlimly lit crawl space, which it maneuvers itself and her into and then down some distance, then opens another wall. A few more rooms to dart through, and they're - outside? No, that's impossible, and the blue 'sky' looks fake on second glance. In the center of this room is an oak tree - small as trees go, but still at least fifteen or twenty feet tall.

The oak tree uproots itself and turns into a treant. Then it claws its own front open, revealing a round chunk of wood that glows green and has lots of thick vines connecting to the rest of its body leading out of it.

KILL IT, says the vine-based monster carrying her.

Ame draws her sword with a sigh. This is going to destroy her clothes, isn't it. And she doesn't want to strip beforehand because fighting without something to keep her breasts in check doesn't seem like the best idea.

Unless... is Mystery Person going to just, hold the final boss down for her? That would be nice of them.

Only one way to find out.

Ame races forward, and swings, slicing through the connective vines between the heart-thing and the rest of the treant.

The treant spasms dramatically as it receives fatal damage. It doesn't strike back. It just collapses.

And as it starts to turn to thin grey smoke, left behind is an elaborately carved wooden staff that is actually glowing with what must be magical power. And a large shiny key.

On the back wall there is a door with a big, prominent lock.

Ame grabs the staff. It looks neat. Should be worth a bunch even if she doesn't get to keep it.

Key. Lock. What's behind the door?

An empty, dark stone room. Except for a stone pedestal, above which hovers a dully glowing red sphere with a broken half-ring of metal wobbling listlessly. One of the unreadable runes on the broken ring flickers.

"Good. I can speak properly here," says a scratchy, growly voice coming from... The red orb? No, from a dark, smoky shadow that flickers across the ground beside it. "As I said, I think you may be my creator's successor. Tell me, are you interested in changing the world for the better?"

"In principle, sure. Who and what are you? And who was your creator?"

"Would the words mean anything to you, I wonder? I am a curse... What? That doesn't sound right. Or possibly cursed. Except, no - yes, I am a curse. I keep the dungeons shackled. I was created by Demon Lord Haruto Tachibana The Corrosive. He wanted to change the world. To change dungeons. How do you get stronger? You kill. Kill monsters. Makes killing people easier. Lots of adventurers, good at fighting, mercenary. Endless war over petty things. And endless young fools dying in dungeons. The dungeons are the problem."

"It's not ideal," Ame agrees. "As I understand it, people with peaceful, productive Skills grow in power much slower than people willing to take violent risks in a dungeon. I may include myself in the latter category, but I don't prefer it, no."

Ame pauses. "Wait. You... think I'm the next Demon Lord? How does that work? You already said you know that I got, uh, 'summoned' to this world."

"Ha! Yes! My Lord Tachibana came here from another world, too. The western spirit told him he was the hero, and he came with good intentions. But he couldn't stand the state of the world. Too much war and death. And even if he conquered all the corrupt and selfish nobles and built a land of peace and prosperity, eventually he would grow old and die. He realized this. He tried to change the rules that everyone accepts, cleverly seeing that only lasting change can truly save the world. Of course, everyone invested in the current way of things decried him as the foulest being to ever exist. Before long they called him the Demon Lord."

Pause.

"It didn't help that the first few experiments went so badly, I think."

"Of course they did. Ugh. You can't actually do a better job than the extant asshole if you just kill them and take all their problems for yourself, that's just obvious. You have to solve the problems, first. Of course then whoever actually tried to solve the problem would terrify every asshole who'd happened to build their castle on a pile of those problems."

Ame sighs.

"So, you are seriously telling me Tea Lady lied. There is no Demon Lord. Not really. She set me up."

"You share his dislike. The western spirit is one thing My Lord never was able to learn about. He theorized that-"

"What was I saying? No, nevermind. I had a script so I wouldn't forget anything important and I've lost my place. Ruined! Just let a dragon eat me... I should kill you so nobody can know my failure! -No, no, Lord Tachibana told me to stop killing people. That was important, I think? Or was it the other way around..."

"It sounded like you were meant to do something that requires my cooperation, and I can't cooperate if I'm dead. Me being dead sounds like it would be a much bigger failure on your part, if you want my opinion. Now are you going to tell me why I'm here? As much as I appreciate knowing the score, I'm still very curious what this is about."

"-To the next Demon Lord. My death is near, for the Hero's growth has eclipsed my own. I do not wish the knowledge I have won to be lost. The power to bend dungeons to your will can be yours, if you are truly my successor. This construct will teach you the first spell along this path, and then tell you to find the next step in your understanding. However, nothing is truly free. I have found that trials and questing have greatly improved my power and understanding in this strange world, so I shall put you through the same. If you pass the tests I have left - if they have survived the gulf of time between you and I - you will be ready to wield the knowledge I have won through hard work and many trials. The knowledge of how to create and manipulate dungeons, as well as my insights on the natural forces of the world. Sincerely, Haruto Tachibana. Recorded seven years since my death in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture."

"That was the message! Ah, to hear My Lord's voice again..."

"...huh."

Creating and controlling dungeons. Holy fuck that's big.

"So I guess you're supposed to teach me a spell and then tell me where to find these trials? Who was 'the Hero'? I though you said, uh, your lord was supposed to be the Hero."

"My Lord called her 'that gaijin bitch'. She had very strong fire magic. I don't know much more about her. Right, the spell! Spells are tricky, do you know any already?"

"No, I haven't been able to learn anything at all about how spells work, yet."

"To do this spell you need to draw upon the mana inside you. Then you push it into the right shape with words and gestures, and a spell happens!"

"Alright. How do I do that. In excruciating detail."

This sentient curse or whatever it is is not exactly a skilled magic teacher, and is completely unable to explain the theory, but eventually hits upon a meditation exercise that lets Ame feel her inner mana and do things with it.

The words of the spell are in another language that uses different phonemes. She has no trouble pronouncing it, but whatever language power she has it doesn't let her trivially rearrange the words into other valid configurations. If she wants to figure out this language's grammar she'd have to guess.

"I offer two mana from my core in the form of viric to the spirits of creation so that they might create a monster with a body of slime, which will be sustained by mana from my core and unerringly obey my command!"

A shadow-smoke-thing sprawled out across the floor is not very good at demonstrating gestures, though.

Ame has the shadow thing repeat the incantation until she's managed to nail down the meaning of every sound. This is the first time her language-barrier?-what-language-barrier thing has made itself obvious and frustrating, but this is important. And some hints of theory are derivable just from the incantation.

If she tries, can she speak any other words in this language? If she tries to construct a sentence with some of the words she already knows does the language thing fill in any of the blanks?

Are the gestures correlated with the incantation? She's figured out how to feel what her mana is doing now, so if the words and gestures are linked she should be able to guess at the correct gesture by feel or something...

Trying to figure out the meaning of individual words and sounds is really tricky. She can speak other words in that language... If she's addressing it at the weird shadow thing. It comes out as English otherwise. She doesn't think about what she's saying when this power activates, it just comes out fully formed with the meaning she intended to convey. Deriving grammar from this process is going to be tedious. The shadow-thing seems amused at nonsense conversations and is willing to play along.

Come to think of it, whatever language she's been speaking with the locals has been doing the same thing, it was just less obvious.

Her mana does nothing until she's all done and voices the ! at the end of the incantation, which is its own word in whatever-language-that-is. If she did everything right, she'll get a torso-sized blue slime sitting on the floor in front of her! If she didn't, what happens depends on what the mistake was.

Ame is very aware of when she doesn't know something.

She painstakingly derives more vocabulary and grammar, enough to be absolutely sure of what she's telling the magic to do. She tries variations on every gesture, prodding the shadow-thing each time for confirmation or error. She's pretty sure she has the correct gestures but she wants to derive what she can about why those are the correct gestures.

Hours upon hours pass.

She has quite forgotten that Arwen is probably frantic by now, or just thinks she's dead.

And only then, when every variable is accounted for, not just memorized but comprehended. Ame casts Create Lesser Slime.

She gains a level in Incantation Comprehension somewhere during those hours, and her progress speeds up rapidly after that. The gestures connect the words to each other in a smooth logical chain. 'I offer' opens up a phrase with one gesture, then 'Two' refers to 'mana' with another gesture, after 'from my core' is the gesture that ends the phrase opened by 'I offer'... And so on.

She feels suddenly drained by the movement of her mana and the trickle still flowing outward. Cold, tired, feeling like it would be nice to just veg out for a bit.

But a blob of blue slime is sitting on the dungeon floor. It moves when she intends it to move, rolling along the ground.

Slime!

Can she sense anything about its properties? Is there, like, a figurative control panel or is she just meant to guess? Is it safe to pet?

"What determines the slime's specific properties? That wasn't part of the spell, so the... physiology information... must come from somewhere else. Can I change its properties?"

Oof. That was either a very impressive spell or she has very unimpressive mana. Does healing her fatigue have any effect on her mana? Or has her Unique Skill been using mana all along without her noticing?

It is a slime. It is <over there>. It is <not damaged>. It doesn't hurt her hand to pet it.

"I don't know! Probably!" Is the shadow thing's unhelpful answer.

Her Unique Skill is not interacting with her mana at all.

Eyeroll. "What are this slime's specific properties, then? What all can it do? How does it attack. What can and can't hurt it. What are the dos and do-nots of slime."

For example, is sticking her hand into the slime a do-not. She can just heal herself if it is. Can she make the slime shape-shift? Or is it limited to being a round blob?

"It's a generic level one slime! It can harden and leap to bludgeon and engulf to suffocate! Slimes are resistant to slashing damage!"

Putting her hand into it adds a mental indicator that the slime has <englufed something approximately fist sized>. It's thick and sticky like some sort of gelatin, it's hard to move her hand and hard to pull it back out and her skin starts to sting after a few seconds.

The slime can bend and mold if she focuses her intent. Flattening it out or elongating it is pretty easy, and making it do a 'leap' by suddenly tensing and changing shape is only a little tricky. Extending a short pseudopod is a lot tougher.

Hm, that's all good, except for how it's stinging her hand. She was afraid it might be like that. This seriously limits the slime's non-combat applications.

Can she order it to not digest her hand? Or is that involuntary on the slime's part?

...can she summon a second slime? "How many slimes can I sustain at once? What happens to me if I run out of mana?"

The slime has a thin layer of 'skin' that is tougher than the internal goo and non-burny. Digestion seems to be involuntary.

"As many as you have mana for! You might fall unconscious."

Ame attempts a variation, having derived the grammar and vocabulary for it during her experimentation.

"I offer two mana from my core in the form of viric to the spirits of creation so that they might create a monster with a body of slime altered to replace all corrosive properties with restorative properties, which will be sustained by mana from my core and unerringly obey my command!"

Nothing happens.

"[All corrosive properties] isn't a thing, silly!"

"Well that's dumb."

Ame tries again, trying to find a grammar construction that the magic will accept.

After her third failed attempt, she pauses.

"How do I dismiss a slime I've summoned?"

"Let the spirits know all connections between the mana in my core and slimes I created by the name 'links'. Let the spirits destroy the oldest connection in the set known as 'links'."

Shadow demonstrates gestures.

Ame goes over this until she's sure she can re-construct it even if she forgets a detail.

But also, oh so that's how you construct "all".

Ame attempts again to summon a restorative-instead-of-corrosive slime with this new piece of knowledge.

Nothing happens. Shadow has no comment this time.

...oh, she's being dumb:

Instead of "all corrosive properties" she tries "altered to replace its property of corrosion with a property of restoration"

Mana rushes out of her and starts forming a new shape - And here's a slime the size of two fists, dark greenish-blue.

She's more drained than before. Another expenditure like that and she might need to sit down.

Yeah, she---oh she's already sitting down. Good.

But she's smiling. It worked.

Okay yes, Ame will use her new slime as a (very small) pillow and rest for a bit.

"Alright, that all works. Tell me about the trials."

"The first secret tome is in a palace that's a shack, in an empty city in the mountains of mist, that was once known as Saroshem. You will need mastery of slimes to enter."

"Saroshem," Ame repeats firmly.

How fast is her mana recovering. Is it the sort of thing that she can wait out or is it the sort of thing she has to sleep off?

"Alright. Will that lead me to the next, or are you supposed to tell me about all of them now?"

Her mana is going down under the combined drain of two slimes.

"I think that's all I was supposed to tell you. Maybe I can finally fall apart now? No, wait, I have to see if you actually manage it. Dang."

Damn. She can't even maintain two slimes? That sucks.

She casts the dismissal on the blue slime, and asks, "How can I increase my mana?"

"I think people get stronger when they use the thing in question? Especially to kill monsters or to do monster-killing-related-things? I don't level, so I don't really know."

Can Ame maintain one slime or is her mana still depleting?

Her mana is very slightly positive with one slime!

She's suddenly better at judging her mana level (she has about three left) and gets a more precise idea of just how positive it is! Tiny fractions of "one" mana per minute.

Excellent.

Ame waits until she's recovered some more, then stands up and moves the green slime onto her shoulder, then has it stretch itself to wrap around her neck, to protect her in case of surprise Looper Vine, now that OH SHIT ARWEN.

"Uh, what happened to that guy I was with?"

"I let the dungeon let him out after a while. I wasn't paying attention to what he did next but he's not here anymore."

"He's... gonna be pissed. I should go."

Ame heals herself and draws her sword. "You gonna put me back where you found me or am I gonna have to fight through the whole place?"

Is her low mana affecting her balance or physical strength for real or is it just mental? She's halfway confident she could've handled at least all the non-bosses without Arwen before she spent a bunch of mana...

"I'll get Thorny back to take you to the entrance, sure!"

It seems to be purely mental.

A minute later the Heart of Thorns shows up again and forms a chair again.

"Maybe don't take me all the way to the entrance. My mana will grow much faster if I keep my slime alive while I fight inside the dungeon, right? That's how that works? And it should also help sell my cover story. I don't think you want me telling the villagers about you?"

Ame sits in the provided chair.

Shadow-being shrugs. "I don't know them but they'll probably be angry and afraid if you tell them about me. I'll be waiting for you at the palace that's a shack, maybe! Goodbye!"

Back up to the first level Boss Room she goes!

Ame spends the rest of the day and into the night making a circuit of the dungeon's first floor. She doesn't challenge the boss. Her head is full and her brain is tired, and she shouldn't attempt anything new, but she's still lightning fast and agile enough to dodge a Looper Vine with feet to spare. She will keep slaughtering the minor monsters she already knows how to deal with until she's twice as worn-out as she was after training yesterday.

Finally, well after it's dark outside, the next time she spots the entrance/exit, she steps out, weighed down by loot, with more than a few rips in her shirt, and inadvertently startles the guards by flinging the fancy magic staff out onto the ground ahead of herself, while she carries the rest heaped on a short stack of wicker shields.

It's lucky for her that this dungeon is... Broken, for lack of a better word, and essentially braindead. It doesn't get annoyed at her incessant grinding and looting. It doesn't start sending higher level monsters at her, or amassing large swarms to punish her, like other dungeons might.

It's a different shift of guards. One rushes over to her, the other stays where he is, confused.

"-You! You're not dead!"

"What the fuck?*"

"-Hey, that's a wyldfire staff. Isn't that a final boss drop?"

"-Yeah, it is."

They both stare at Ame for a moment.

"It's not that amazing, is it? I mean, it's such a wimpy dungeon..."

"It's still a final boss, but shut up a sec. How are you feeling - Aeri - Sorry, can't remember your name. You alright? Need anything - food, water?"

*"Why is there a dragon in my house?"

Ame was half expecting some kind of twist or escalation to interrupt her grinding. She decides to blame / thank the shadow thing for not-that.

Besides the rips in her fishnet shirt, Ame appears steady, physically. But she has deep, dark circles under her eyes, and is putting obvious effort into moving smoothly. Her green slime is nowhere to be seen.

"The final boss was a fluke," Ame says tiredly. "Large amounts of both kinds of luck. But yes, I'm alive. A meal, a drink, a bath, and a bed. I could use all of those things but I'm not gonna collapse in the next ten minutes."

"Rico, run down to Traver Hollow and rouse up a wagon - or at least a cart. I'm sure she'll be happy to pay reasonable rates for it if anyone's upset at being woken up."

"We're supposed to stay by the dungeon-"

"We're being paid to think and react, not just stand here. Besides, I'm the boss of you. Go."

Rico nods and sets off at a jog.

"Here, you can come by the fire. I've got water and I'll give you my midnight snack. We can figure out the loot in a bit."

"Thank you."

Ame plops down. There's kind of a lot of loot, but its definitely a quantity over quality sort of situation. Still, it should give her more than enough financial breathing room, especially since she doesn't have to split it with Arwen.

Speaking of Arwen. "What happened to Arwen? We got separated. Obviously."

"He was trapped in the bathroom for an hour - I didn't even know dungeons did that - and then the first floor boss room was sealed and you were nowhere to be found, so he wandered the first floor looking for you and eventually assumed you were dead and came out. What happened to you?"

He offers Ame a spare cloak.

She's not actually cold, but Ame takes the cloak and uses putting it on as an excuse to think over her cover story.

"I got lost," Ame says blandly. "The Heart of Thorns chased me... somewhere. I think it was the third floor, somehow skipping the second, because you say that staff came from the final boss. It was this kind of... the room had this fake sky, and the monster had this glowing heart thing. After that I tried to find my way out. I still haven't seen the second floor, so I have no idea what was going on, but eventually I found the first floor again and... decided to work out some frustrations."

"I'm glad Arwen didn't ditch me."

"He was so mad. You don't leave people behind, he said - very loyal sort of person, Arwen is. You know they say he loves his militiamen more than his brothers-"

He glances over at the loot. "...Yeah, that's definitely a wyldfire staff, it's one of three things the final boss drops. It's a high-E-rank channel for aqshy and ghyran."

"I've heard those words before," Ame lies, "but I don't actually know what they mean."

"What, aqshy? It's the wind of fire. And ghyran is the wind of life."

"Right, that was it," Ame agrees.

She sits, swaying a little, an occasional hitch interrupting her steady breathing.

When the cart arrives, she gets up and gives guard guy his cloak back.

Guard guy has been separating a portion of the loot, if she wants to check his work.

It's not like she would know if he's ripping her off. She decides not to comment.

He leaves her the wyldfire staff and what looks like just over half of the rest of the stuff.

Arwen is with the cart, as is a frazzled-looking young teen and an annoyed horse. His face lights up seeing her. "You're okay!"

"Yeah, things got weird, but I survived. Sorry I worried you."

"Hi, thanks for rolling out so late," she says to the frazzled teen.

She points at Arwen, mock serious. "You're not getting sixty percent of this batch of loot, though. Now let's get back to town so I can pass out in comfort."

Frazzled teen blinks a bit sleepily at her boobs. "Sure?"

"-No, no. Well, you can use the same room in our clanhall as yesterday."

Off the cart goes.

Ame leans on Arwen, just a little, as they stroll after the cart.

"And you can use me in that same room again once we get there, as long as you don't expect me to, like, move much. I'm definitely not up for anything I'd ever charge for. I'm just saying, your cock is welcome, if you'd rather. So's his, why not," Ame adds, sleepily-impish, raising her voice to make sure Frazzled Teen can hear.

Frown. "I'm not really in the mood. And he's a bit young, isn't he?"

(...Frazzled Teen wakes up a bit more, and drives the horse a bit faster.)

"I think that's his decision."

Walk walk walk.

Slightly deeper frown. Then he sighs slumps a little bit.

"Raz is going to make you leave."

"This is not surprising," Ame deadpans. "Any particular or new reason?"

"That dungeon has been basically the safest, most boring, most predictable dungeon in the world. Nowhere near enough to make this place rich, but good to make a living. And then you go in, and it does something unprecedented."

"...yyyyeap that would do it."

"You must've leveled like crazy, though. If anything proves you've got the makings of an adventurer, crazy nonsense happening and you coming out of it alright does."

Heh.

Once they make it back to town, Ame gives back the borrowed shield and asks, "I guess I'll hang onto my loot and sell it all tomorrow? Unless there's someone around who buys all varieties of dungeon loot right away regardless of need, and in the middle of the night."

He shakes his head. "They're all asleep. Like I will be soon, I hope."

Arwen gives the cart-driver three copper and he busies himself unhitching the horse, leaving the loaded cart somewhere out of the way.

Ame pauses to give Frazzled Teen Cart-Driver a shoulder pat and to say, "Thanks. Feel free to come find me after I wash up, I'll be in there." Ame points.

Ame heads to the baths alone. She takes off her shoes and flops fully clothed (for her own extremely relative standard of 'fully') into the tub. She wriggles out of it all, leaving it to float in the water as she leans back against the lip of the tub, arms draped over the edges.

Despite not moving, her breath shortens into soft panting, and her hips squirm under the water.

Even though she's not moving or touching herself, Ame cums, letting out a soft moan, and suddenly her pussy lips bulge outward before stretching wide open, revealing a mass of translucent green slime forced out of its hiding place by her orgasm.

Relaxing with a long sigh, Ame scoops her Healing Slime out of the bathwater and smiles at it for a moment, before she softly casts the dismissal and watches it evaporate.

After a few moments idle, Ame finally rinses herself and her clothes and wrings them out to dry.

Still naked, she leaves the baths and goes to the room she shared with Arwen before, flops face-down onto the bed with her legs spread, and instantly falls asleep.

He blushes and stammers something about taking care of the horse.

Nothing disturbs her sleep.

A new day, and new things to do.

Ame summons and dismisses a Healing Slime, just for practice, then gets dressed and heads out.

First, Ame needs to sell off all of her loot. If that's straightforward, she'll put the profits towards getting herself a new better-than-wicker small shield (and paying off those knives). She knows how she fights, now, so she can make much more of an informed decision.

The loot buyers haggle pretty hard, but with moderate effort her pile of loot is worth approximately nine silver coins, and another three and a half if she wants to sell the wyldfire staff. Arwen also gives her a silver and a few coppers, as her share of what they got together before they were separated. She can get a banded wooden shield for one silver coin or a sturdy (but also heavy) iron shield for one and a half, and travel food for a few coppers.

Ophile calls her over to hand over her new clothes after an hour or two. They feel nice indeed - something between silk and cotton, not quite as good as the former but definitely better than the latter. "I stopped making them when I heard... You know. But I'm glad you're alright! And they're finished now!"

Ame hesitates over the wyldfire staff, but she doesn't actually know how to use it and suspects by the time she does she won't need it. She sells it.

She buys the banded wooden shield, and some travel food, leaving her with a comfy dozen silver.

Ophile is her next stop anyway. Ame indulges in the urge to hug the cute lesbian after handing over the coin she owes.

"Thanks, you do good work. This looks good."

Then Ame proceeds to strip off the damaged fishnet shirt and put on the new fishnet shirt of Ophile's make.

"Definitely good work. You willing to show me how to mend this one? I'd hate for the same thing to happen to the one you made someplace where I can't get it repaired."

(eee hug)

"Of course! I'd like one copper if it takes more than few minutes - no idea if you've sewn before-"

Ame hands over a copper.

"Nope, I haven't."

Ophile will show her how to sew and mend the fishnet weave! It's a relatively tricky bit of sewing, so this takes a while. She did it with little ribbons rolled onto each other, not thin ropes, and offers some replacement ribbon for another copper.

"Or actually," she says with sudden realization and a blush, "-Waitnonevermind one copper."

Ame palms a copper but doesn't hand it over. Instead she just leans in close enough to fill Ophile's head with thoughts of kiss.

Bluuush. "One kiss is not worth a whole copper piece," she says with a little pout. "Maybe a copper penny if it's a pretty good kiss."

Ame laughs, hands over the copper, and then kisses her anyway.

A kiss!

She steps back, looking a bit sad, after a bit. "...I'm going to stay here, and you're not. It was never anything more than - than sex."

"Neither is this," Ame says with a gentle smile.

"I enjoy my work, and I take pride in my work, but its still work because its not how I'd fuck if I was just there for me. I don't charge for the sex, I charge for the... selfless performance of skill. Also time."

She shifts to a teasing tone. "I don't know if you've noticed, but you're fucking adorable when you're thinking horny thoughts. Kissing you wasn't work, it was just sex."

"Huh... I was mostly telling myself I'm not anyone special and I don't have some kind of stupid claim on you like part of me wants. And it would be a bad idea to follow you when Raz kicks you out."

Ame's smile softens.

"It probably would, yeah. But think of it this way. The best thing about having no claim on me is that you don't need one. If we ever meet again, you'll know you can have me then, too. Because a nonexistent claim can't degrade with time and distance."

"Also is Raz going around telling everyone that or is it just that obvious."

"Oh, apparently during the fuss yesterday she said something like - 'well, I'm not going to go looking for her, I give her fifty-fifty odds of coming back and if she does I'll tell her this is worse than a vampire dad'."

Ame bursts into laughter.

It is kind of funny. Ophile smiles.

"So. I could make you something else - something simple - if you want another spare outfit, if you think you have a few hours before Raz glares you away."

"There might be a thing I need to talk to Raz about anyway, actually. Since there's nothing to gain from not making her even more suspicious of me, now. I definitely shouldn't expect to wait until tomorrow to set out, though, which means you might not have the time if I want to get an early start."