Reysha was picking some meat remains out of her teeth with the sharp end of a shattered bone. It once belonged to a large rat, but the tiger girl had killed and devoured it a few hours earlier. Now she was just sitting on her ass and waiting. There was a question to be raised: why she even was waiting.

The initial reason that she stayed with the slime and the fairy because they had saved her life was fading out rather quickly. As far as that thing went, her debt was repaid. So, what were her reasons for sitting on this rock near the dungeon entrance for the second day in a row?

There was nothing easier than to just get up, walk away and leave the leaf. It would be considerably harder with a slime and a moth-winged fairy in tow. Getting through the controls at the stem of the leaf, the point where the world connected to the branches of the omniverse, was already difficult enough with how much she stood out.

The bone snapped and Reysha tossed the useless tool away, extending the claw of her index finger to continue the work. Since the Noir affliction started, her nails had progressively turned red. By now, they looked somewhat like heavily diluted wine. Who knew how much redder they would get?

Reysha snickered to herself as if somebody heard a joke she hadn’t even told. Then she got back to the question. ‘At the very least, I like Apexus,’ she thought, taking her life decisions seriously was outside of her usual expertise, but she had nothing to immediately distract herself with. ‘Aclysia is alright, even if she is an annoying cunt sometimes.’

Were those personal feelings worth the risk of sticking to them?

No. Not really, they were completely arbitrary, bindings that could be undone quickly as she could end a life. A kill count that would include humanoids already were it not for Aclysia. Getting rid of that shackling influence would be pretty liberating.

It was also bound to get her in trouble sooner or later. ‘Maybe keeping her annoying side around wouldn’t be that bad,’ Reysha thought, having found a rational reason to stay around. With her utter lack of sensibilities, having some moral compass around when running around society wouldn’t be the worst decision ever.

With all of that thought done, the tiger girl decided to just toss it all out the window and just stay just because she felt like it. Sure, it wasn’t the safest or most logical decision, but when had she ever taken those two as her first priorities? It was fun and not utterly suicidal. That was good enough.

Fun that manifested in her rolling on the floor about thirty minutes later. “Wha-a-a-aaaaaahahhahahaha,” she tried to get some words out, but all she could do was cry from the way her stomach hurt and continue to let unnerving amusement echo over the landscape.

The reason stood in front of her, Aclysia hiding her lady bits with nothing but her angled wings and hands. She was a very attractive woman, tall as well. Reysha herself was already bigger than the average, Aclysia slightly upped that. Her milky skin was a bit dirty from the way, particularly around the shoulders and face, but generally reflected the sunlight brightly. Her curves greatly profited from her now human proportions, long legs ending in a criminally perfect ass and smoothly transitioning over a flat stomach to petite breasts and a slender neck.

“This is not funny!” the metal fairy declared, raising her voice louder than usual, clearly uncomfortable. A blush turned her beautiful face redder than usual, the green eyes opened wide. It was one thing to be naked during sex, outdoors or not, it was a whole thing to just casually reveal her bare form to everyone who could see her standing in the landscape. It wasn’t proper, even if that was just the tiger girl right now, who had seen the goods before.

Reysha barely gathered herself, sitting up and folding her legs with a giant grin on her face. “Why aren’t you just putting your clothes back on, then? Just do the usual and let them grow.”

“I… cannot do that anymore,” Aclysia grumbled. “Upon my final transformation, my creator stripped from me several capabilities…”

“Including literally stripping you by taking your ‘divine garb’ away?” Reysha giggled, to which Aclysia nodded. “Leaving you to flee that well on your own, naked?” Another nod. “With dozens of adventurers staring at your bubble butt and smooth cunt?” No nod, just rapidly deepening redness from shame and anger.

Reysha fell back down backwards and continued to ecstatically pour the content of her lungs out until she had trouble breathing and grasped the air physically. Offering no help, Aclysia instead commented, “I genuinely wish you would fail at inhaling right now.” There was no god around to fulfil that for her, so the tiger girl eventually drew a successful breath and continued on.

It took a long time for Reysha to stop bursting out in immense fits of terrible glee. Shamed and with only a limited capacity for sarcasm, Aclysia sat down at one of the many stone pillars that surrounded the Clearwater fountain. By pulling her legs to her chest and layering her wings on top, the boneless limbs at least guidable enough for that endeavour, she turned into a glaring head poking out of a black and white fuzzy blanket. For some reason that only prolonged the redhead’s amusement.

“The look on your face,” Reysha managed finally to say. “Absolutely priceless.”

“Is that the end of your ceaseless amusement at my expense?” Aclysia asked.

“Yes…” the tiger girl snorted and continued to giggle. “No, I will poke fun at you for this FOREVER.”

“Forever?” Aclysia’s voice rung out in a displeased fashion.

“Forever!” Reysha assured. Still laughing, she grabbed her adventurer’s bag and started rummaging inside it. Then she pulled out her robe. “Here, since I am not using it right now, might as well.”

The metal fairy looked at it with several blinks, her point ears standing at attention. “Right… you have that,” she slowly opened the cocoon of her own wings, the two big ones at the top folded open first, closely followed by the two smaller ones. As she rose, she unfolded them fully. She had a surprisingly narrow wingspan, the tips not much further out than the fingertips of her fully extended arms. “Was it truly necessary to extend my shame for a complete hour?”

“It wasn’t THAT long!” Reysha stated, watching as Aclysia hovered over. Notably, she didn’t beat her wings to fly anymore, all she needed to keep herself afloat was to keep her wings extended. The moment Aclysia folded them again, her feet came in contact with the ground. “I think.”

“I am halfway certain I am correct,” Aclysia countered, completely open for a moment as she reached out to take the cape.

“Why naked?” Apexus asked, suddenly landing next to them. Although this was the last person she minded seeing her in the nude, Aclysia’s face went right back to bright red. “Why are you naked, sorry,” the slime corrected himself, thinking that was the mistake that made her flustered.

“Because…” Aclysia suddenly realized her awakener was a whole lot smaller than the last time she had seen him. All of her personal shame took a backseat for her worry. Uselessly, she immediately began searching him for any harm. “Are you okay, Apexus? Did something happen?”

“Yes, many stuffs, but why’re you naked?” the slime insisted on knowing first what was wrong with his beloved white-haired fairy.

Reysha giggled from the side lines. “You two need to slow down and explain everything.”