｟Knock｠ ｟knock｠

Outside of Xalvari and Rosaria's mansion stands a slender and quite otherworldly-looking figure. After knocking a few times on the door, the guest waits patiently, not minding the thumping sounds and muffled voices behind it.

「No....— won't allow—」 a feminine voice shouts angrily, followed by what sounds like grunts, as if the the owner of the voice is struggling to hold someone back. These are followed by a high-pitched「Kyah!」

「Fufufu, Princess Rosaria, amusing as always.」 the figure lets out a hearty laugh at the theatrics happening behind the door.

「M-miss Mela—!! Is — okay?」 this time a younger, frantic voice joins in, followed by quick clacking sounds.

「Hmm? Goodness, I wonder who that may be?」 the figure puts a hand on its mouth, eyes widening in surprise. Wishing not to waste another second, the guest knocks on the door three more times.

「Hey— Sto— already told you— necessary for—plan」 a masculine voice joins the commotion.

The figure looks at the door with longing eyes. 「Xalvari...」 it softly mutters.

A few more thumps and, with a loud click-clack of the metal lock, the door finally opens. The wide wings slowly swing open, and a haggard-looking man reveals himself. The annoyance on his face clearly reveals what he just had to go through.

「Ishaha, Xalvari! Oh, how have I missed you!」 at the sight of him, the figure leaps forward with open arms.

「Shanii! You're late! I thought I would never see you again!」 says Xal, his face brightening up and equally opening his arms to receive her.

Their embrace is deep and intimate. With content faces, they resemble long-lost soulmates reunited after being split up during childhood.

After a while, Shanii opens her eyes and peeks behind his back, spotting princess Rosaria and a short elf wearing an unusual maid uniform, standing a fair distance away.

Rosaria has her arms folded, standing with a challenging pose, and shoots her back an icy look while the elf is standing next to her, almost cowering, with mouth and eyes wide open in shock. Her lips keep moving without making a sound. Shanii shows her a courteous smile, but it only makes the elf take a shaky half-step back. Shanii closes her eyes in resignation.

One, two, three seconds pass and a loud scream coming from the elf's mouth overwhelms the wide hallway. Shanii's smile gets wider while she nods, looking like someone who is already used to such reactions.

The elf points at her while switching her attention between Rosaria and the woman a couple of times, wordlessly gesturing a demand for an explanation. Instead, with a shrug, the princess rolls her eyes in an expression spelling out 'don't look at me' before sighing and turning around.

「Xal, you'll pay for this later, just you wait!」 she spitefully says as she walks back further into the mansion with heavy steps and clenched fists.

The maid's gaze follows Rosaria in disbelief until she is out of sight.

「Hello there, I'm Shanii, who may you be, little cute elf?」

「Yiieek!」 The elf jumps away with a shriek after suddenly hearing a voice suddenly coming centimeters from her ears.

With smiling eyes, Shanii is now standing up close while holding out what the maid guesses is her... hand, at the tip of one of her several limbs... requesting a handshake.

The elf holds back another scream while scanning Shanii's body from top to toe.

She stands tall, almost as tall as Xal, with skin that looks smooth — more than silky smooth, with a glistening, wet look — ranging in color from a vivid light purple near her head and neck to a deep purple near her feet. From a few meters' distance, it would seem this skin is covered with scales, but upon closer inspection, it becomes obvious that it's a pattern under the flawless, translucent, upper layer. The pattern stops at the middle of her chest, the border running down over half of her breasts, which the elf notices are bigger than her own. The pattern continues diagonally inwards onto the abdomen, forming a neat border with the plain, beige coloring of the skin in the middle, making it seem like she's constantly wearing a half-unzipped, body-tight swimsuit. Together with her slim waistline, the resulting V shape underlines the curvatures of an alluring female body, though without as many bony protrusions as those on an equally-slim human woman.

Her face matches the light purple of her upper neck, although with an almost-imperceptible skin pattern, and her eyes — which look human except larger, with bright sclera and dark, glowing purple irises — have pupils more vertical than human ones. They seem to react to both light and her emotional state, as they now glow less than when she was embracing Xal a few seconds ago.

Her nose is also human-like, but very narrow. Tracing it up, the maid notices what appears to be a rounded sapphire, especially bright in color, and about half a thumb in diameter, embedded in Shanii's upper forehead.

She's wearing a nun headpiece — the bandeau, which looks more like a hat, is made out of two stripes of black cloth surrounding a singular white stripe. On the front and the sides of it are intricately gilded and polished ornaments, culminating in a cross in the middle — about the size of her palm, it partially sticks out above the top of the hat. The back, and partially the sides, descend as a thin, semi-translucent black veil that reaches to about her shoulders.

Her hair, tucked partially under this head covering, appears quite silky, thick and clumped, and as shiny as constantly moist, polished marble. From beneath it protrude two ears with curled, downward-facing auricles — each about half a head in length — which, to a naive observer, might resemble horns.

On her neck she's wearing another cross with a few crystal insets, the body of it gilded metal, and the entirety hanging off of an intricate silvery chain with very small links.

Multiple tentacles jut out of her tailbone, all as thick as her arms, each curving downwards in its own path. They, too, seem to reveal her emotional state, as just before, they were all curved upwards and wagging like a dog's tail while coiling around Xal.

Besides those, her limbs are almost completely human-like. The legs might be missed under a very long dress with a mermaid hem that comes to a sharp point, giving her an octopus-like appearance from a distance.

The elf turns her attention back to Shanii's face, locking eyes with the guest. The maid feels her own face suddenly become hot, with a blush washing over it. She gulps loudly before promptly turning on her heel to run back inside the mansion.

「Miss Melan! W-wait for me!」 she calls out, choosing to completely ignore the woman.

「Akhashal'ai, was I that frightening?」 Shanii lets out.

「Terrifying and terrific. You make people's hearts beat faster in more ways than you could imagine, you can't blame her, can you? ... I thought you'd already gotten used to it,」 Xal quips.

「That's Percibell by the way, a new maid we employed. Ask Rosaria for the details,」 he adds with a shrug.

「Princess Rosaria, Xalvari」 Shanii corrects him before putting a hand on her chest, touching the cross.

「But heavens, dnay-ai! Is that truly how you see me?」 she adds, staring at him with a coy look.

With gazes locked on each other, Xal takes a few steps closer and says, 「Well, what can I say? Smooth, slippery wet, and...」

As if to complete his sentence, Shanii approaches him while her tentacles are moving about wildly and says, 「Wiggly?」

Xal continues, 「... and...」

Shanii completes, 「Twitchy? And squishy?」

Xal takes one of her tentacles and squeezes it softly, causing it to twitch and make a slippery sound.

They continue looking at each other in silence for a few moments before both bursting into laughter which immediately gets interrupted by a loud thud coming from an adjacent room.

「I see that Her Highness still has her gripes about me,」 Shanii says with nonchalance while adjusting her hat.

「The church's old doctrines must still run deep in the royal blood,」 Xal comments.

Shanii blinks her eyes twice in slight surprise. She shakes her head and says, 「Fufu, that's an insult to Her Highness, and you should know that. My, you manage to be quite dull in the most peculiar of ways」

「Is that so? You always tell me that, but I don't get what you mean,」 Xal disapproves.

「Xalvari...」 caressing his cheek, she continues, 「Dear, you look so... tired... Are you really sure about this? Why don't we just go back and make amends with—」

「Don't be ridiculous!」 Xal whips his head away and looks at the ground with a mad look.

「Shanii... do you know what he's done?!」

「Why... yes but... do you truly realize what you're up against...? Dieties... Xalvari... they are on his side, you can't go against them...!」 Shanii reveals in a hushed voice, trembling slightly at the thought.

「Shanii, he has it out against me, had for a long time! Spare me these sermons, too! You know I was never a churchman!」

「Xalvari...!」 Shanii's tentacles shove out and wiggle themselves around him in an embrace as if they had a will on their own.

Her eyes start glowing a bright pink and when their faces are only a few centimeters apart, she adds, 「... please...」

Looking her directly in the eyes, Xal feels the time freeze, yet the distance between them gets shorter. Her already big irises only appear to rapidly increase in size until they almost fill his entire field of view. A bright pink glow is all he can see while experiencing a most soothing feeling, urging him to get sucked in and forget all about his troubles. It feels almost like an illusion - no, it is an illusion, he realizes. When that happens, they go back to their normal size, and his consciousness returns to the two gazing at each other in a slow approach, full of repressed longing, mouths ever-so-slightly ajar. Her tentacles gradually increase the grip around his waist. Some of the tip endings are caressing his crotch while others move towards the waistband, feeling for a way to sneak under the clothes.

With a start, Shanii's tentacles push him away, against the front door, and both let out a breath they didn't know they were holding, while the guest comes to her senses.

As if a spell has been broken, sounds of mumbling voices and footsteps coming from a different room return, making time run again.

「Mal'i'shaar, I'm sorry...!」 Shanii corrects herself.

「Shanii... I could use some of your mind-bending right now,」 Xal whines.

She turns around swiftly and looks down at the floor. Clutching the cross on her chest with a tight grip, she takes a few more breaths before mumbling a prayer.

「Stav-razia Algeth... Praise upon the Goddess, beacon of mercy, light of foregiveness, might these desires be quenched, may this longing be silenced...」

After this, she turns back around with a calm smile, her glowing eyes already back to normal. They cast a kind gaze over him. She takes hold of his hand and pulls him along.

「I lost myself there for a second, Xalvari. Now, come with me! Knowing you, Her Highness must not have been told anything yet...」