No Need for a Core?

Breathe in, breathe out, chi flowing with each inhale, refreshing her body, and with each exhale releasing the buildup of exhaustion. Two steps for each inhale, and two more for each exhale. A slow breath normally for a runner, but with Moriko’s training she could maintain this pace until hunger or thirst made her stop. And she was even faster than when she’d run from that group of bandits, her stride eating distance as she practically flew, elemental air energy roiling about her to keep the wind from resisting her, and cushioning each step only to turn into a spring and push her foot up and forward.

And flying is exactly part of her pursuit, the reason she’d chosen to focus her studies on air instead of fire. She could air-walk for short distances, but could not yet take to the skies. The heat of the flame matched her temperament more truly in some ways, but she was a free soul, even by the standards of Kuiccihan. Given what they had learned over the past few days, Moriko suspected that there had been a certain amount of deliberate design by the founding monarchy to shape future attitudes. A kingdom built with a nobility that almost all had some ‘outside’ blood, whether elven, kitsune, the rarer touch of celestial blood, or even more exotic heritages, was not likely to be very tolerant of any ‘pure-blood’ fanatics.

Her thoughts flowed casually, not considering anything too deeply, her attention mostly taken up by mastering the flow of chi and air, the energy of her body, controlling every muscle with precision as she ran. Moriko had so many reasons to want to become stronger, and her competitive drive had recently given her a new one. As the dungeon grew deeper, Mordecai and Kazue grew stronger in pace. Kazue had to practice in order to master the next stage of her potential, but Mordecai was simply using the growth of their core to unlock the power and skill he’d previously mastered. And Moriko was certain that if she sparred with him now, she’d lose.

She had also become suspicious that the reason she’d won before was that he’d met her on her terms. Leaving alone his dungeon powers, she knew he was a spellcaster as well. He could have enhanced his body with spells, or flung shards of ice at her, surrounded himself with an aura of flame, or any of a hundred other things.

Well, maybe not all of those. Moriko was less certain about what a mage or priest of his power was capable of than she was of more physical manifestations of strength. But it didn’t matter, the fact of the matter was that she’d won when he’d limited himself to her own skill set. That meant she might have lost if he hadn’t.

It galled her.

Even more than normal. It ate at her in a way no surge of competitiveness had before. But no deep meditation was required to parse this out. Or at least, no more so than she already had. Moriko was beginning to feel a touch redundant in her role as their contractor. Free of soul she may be, but being a freeloader was not acceptable. If trade was bringing in more materials than she could possibly gather locally, and she fell behind in fighting ability to defend the dungeon, then it would be hard to fulfill her duties as a contractor without leaving them for extended periods to hunt down exotic things.

She would not be useless. They wouldn’t care, she knew that, but she cared, and that was enough. So on she ran, focusing to perfect every aspect of her form and control. To improve every inch she could.

After Moriko had left, Kazue asked Mordecai about any ideas for helping her father live longer, but unfortunately, the only way he knew of that they could help Ricardo would be to offer him a position as a contractor or an inhabitant and even then aging would only be suspended inside the dungeon’s territory. For most mortals, extending their life span was a pursuit they had to follow on their own. Kazue couldn’t see her dad as a druid or studying to become a wizard, but she was wondering if she could talk him into studying at a temple to become a monk. He might be a touch old to be a new student, and only masters of that sort of path achieved any sort of immortality, but Kazue was feeling more keenly aware of the concept of mortality, given that she was alive only because her goddess chose to reincarnate her.

But now he was off taking the time to work out his shape-changing options, and had asked for some privacy. So she mentally blanked out his bedroom from her core’s awareness and went to her room to practice on her own. Kazue was gaining more control, she could slow down her transition between her kitsune and human forms, chose to have only fox ears or tails, and even reduce the number of tails she had showing, but going the other way and taking on full kitsune fox features was harder.

She had already found that having fur on a human face was disturbing, and had been put off when she’d seen a glimpse of herself with her face partially shifted towards a fox’s but without any fur. Not at all cute. And losing concentration before she completed the shift caused her to revert back to her normal form. So she had to work on both happening at the same time, without her concentration wavering.

It took three more hours of practice before her efforts were rewarded, but she finally had it completed! She could do it! And just as fast as taking on human form. Kazue quickly cycled through her available changes, getting to know the feel of the changes in her physical structure, and beginning to work out how to do more subtle shifting, for kitsune who truly mastered this art could even take on guises other than their normal faces and colors. But she had something else she wanted to do first.

Kazue cycled her form between full kitsune and human, pushing how fast she could go through every step without skipping any of it, feeling like she was building momentum on a swing. Which was sort of what she was trying to do. Then once more she started shifting from human to kitsune, but she didn’t let it stop, she pushed.

That hurt, and it made her rebound, but she’d expected it to not work the first time. So she did it again, building through the cycle of her changes and once more pushing. It hurt every time, and the pain was getting worse, but it was also happening further into the change beyond her kitsune form.

Then there was an agonizing crack that radiated throughout her body, and Kazue dropped to all fours, her head now not even a foot off the floor. She glanced down at her body and then started running in circles, yipping in excitement. She’d done it! She’d gotten all the way to fox form! And this time it didn’t hurt when she shifted back and forth between it and any of her other forms.

“Mordecai, you ready for some company?” She sent while admiring her adorably tiny fox form in the mirror. When he affirmed, she leapt up and started changing even as she shifted her location, finishing the movement by pouncing on him in full kitsune form and bearing him down to the ground.

“Look! I did it!” She practically shouted, then playfully growled down at him through bared fox teeth. “You have to be scared of me now!”

“Mmm, yes, I am absolutely terrified. Can’t you tell?” He looked amused as he stared up at her from the floor. “And you did something else well, my little dungeon girl.” She cocked her head at him as she tried to figure out what he meant, but as she played back the last few moments, she brightened with further excitement.

“I transported myself while I was moving and changing! I didn’t have to stop to just do one or the other!” Kazue started to lean down to kiss him, realized how awkward that was going to be with a muzzle, and shifted back to her normal form. Then she paused again, considering ideas as she eyed his prone form. He lifted an eyebrow with a challenging expression and a smirk. Kazue brought back the sharper teeth. And grew out claws.

She left marks. Some were deeper than she’d intended, and she felt a little bad about that, but not bad enough to stop, or let him stop, until she was satiated. Then she curled up to snuggle in his arms, not caring that they’d never made it to the bed. She wasn’t quite sure how long she just let herself drift happily, but a thought started to niggle at her, and she opened her eyes to frown at one of the marks on his skin that had drawn blood. “Hey, you’re a priest, can’t you heal that?”

“I could.” Came his lazy-sounding response, and she rose onto one elbow to look down at him.

“But you aren’t going to?” She asked, and he shook his head. “Why?”

He smiled up at her. “Love, I already have described myself as possessive to a fault. And I feel that way about both of you, so why should I mind if you show possessiveness in your own way? The pain is slight, and there is no real harm.”

That made her happy in ways she didn’t quite understand yet, but his exact wording also made her suddenly suspicious about something. Kazue brought the more detailed scrutiny of her core to bear upon his skin. “Oh, Moriko left marks first!” Looking closely with her dungeon senses she could make out the faint scars that would be invisible to the naked eye. Her jealousy was mostly in play, though a small part of her wished she’d been the first between the two of them to mark his skin.

Then again, she was pretty certain Mordecai hadn’t left any marks on Moriko’s skin. And Kazue was beginning to wonder what that pretty half-elf would taste like. She also did not attempt to keep that thought private, and the involuntary response from Moriko’s mind was rather rewarding. Then Kazue giggled. “Not a month ago I’d have died of embarrassment if I thought I was going to act like this. But, as long as it’s you two, all that cluttered thought that used to screw me up doesn’t matter. Mmm, I should take advantage of feeling bold.” She rolled away from Mordecai and sat up on the floor. “I want you to show off for me.” She also tweaked Moriko’s nose a little more by keeping her thoughts open, but deliberately not sending along exactly what she got to see.