Aidan
The Realms
Unknown date (day 2)
Morning
Starchaser tribe village, somewhere in the Mistvale Highlands

As Lail guided Aidan through the village, drawing stares from the other centaurs as they went, he decided to strike up a conversation with her. “Forgive me if I overstep my bounds, but you have been much friendlier to me than the others of your tribe so far. May I ask why?”

Lail laughed merrily in response. “Mama Eilwen would tell you that I like to pick up strays. In truth, I could tell when you walked out of that thicket that you were lost and alone. I will not say that you present no threat to us, for even if we did as you asked and sent you to our border, you could still give information to our enemies. However, I have never been in favor of killing without good reason. We Starchasers are an insular lot, but we are not evil. We like to be left alone, for the most part.” She smiled at him again and turned the conversation back towards him. “So, tell me about this place you come from. At-lant-a, you called it?”

Aidan nodded and thought about how to describe a modern metropolis to a centaur in a fantasy world. He had a feeling that even what would be considered a sleepy country town back on Earth would be challenging for Lail to really imagine. He left out anything which would go over her head like phones or computers, choosing instead to emphasize all the reasons he buried himself in games like this so much. “It is a huge city; I’m told millions of people live in it, although I certainly can’t say I’ve met them all. It’s a very crowded place, dirty and smelly except where the ruling class lives. Even with all the people, though, I would bet that you have more friends and acquaintances in this village than I had back home. With so many people pressed so tightly together, everyone tends to mind their own business just out of self-preservation. Honestly, I’m not too sad to be gone from there. Last night on the hill was the first time I had seen all the stars in the sky, and the sheer beauty of the hills and mists have utterly charmed me. I’m sure I will miss some things from back home, but I think it was never where I was meant to be.”

Lail squeezed his shoulder sympathetically. “It sounds wonderful and terrible. I can’t imagine a million of anything, let alone millions of people all in the same place. Me, I need to feel the wind in my hair and the soil under my hooves; I do not think I would enjoy living in At-lant-a. Anyway, we are here.” ‘Here’ was a wooden hut with one centaur-sized door and one narrow, high window along the side. “It does not look like much, and, well, it is not much,” Lail admitted, opening the door for him. The inside of the hut was mostly empty, containing just a few sacks of what looked like grain. “But at least it has four walls, a roof, and a clean floor. Go ahead and try to make yourself comfortable inside. I will go fetch you some food and water and a blanket to sleep on. Please do not leave. Eilwen was not joking about changing her mind if you cause trouble.”

Aidan entered the hut, and Lail closed the door behind him. He shrugged the backpack off his shoulders and lowered it to the floor, then rubbed his aching back. Being bound like that for hours made his muscles protest in new and entirely unpleasant ways. Before too long, the door opened again, and Lail popped her head in then entered. In one hand, she held a large wooden plate topped with a pile of sausage and some scrambled eggs, and hanging from the other was a large bucket, which she carefully balanced as it sloshed back and forth with each step she took. She had a thick cloth blanket draped across her back and, once she handed Aidan his breakfast and bath, she took it off, folded it up, and set it on the floor. He thanked her for everything she did for him, and with one last smile, she left. The food was simple but delicious, and after taking a few sips of water from his own waterskin, Aidan took his shirt off and used it as a washcloth to scrub the worst of the dirt and grime from himself and his clothes. Then he wrapped himself in the blanket, curled up against one of the bags of grain, and fell asleep once more.

Aidan
???

When he returned to awareness, a wave of disorientation passed through Aidan. The floor beneath him was softer and had a bit of springiness to it like a good bed, the grain sack behind him was warm and soft and not at all lumpy, and there was a hand tenderly stroking his thigh.

Wait. What?

He sat up with a jolt and looked around wildly. He was definitely not in Kansas anymore; he was sitting on a massive bed in an opulent room. Laying on the bed alongside him was a naked woman, although he couldn’t really tell what she looked like. Her face and form seemed to shift and blend together. It wasn’t like she was changing from one woman into a different woman, he just didn’t seem to be able to wrap his mind around any defining features. He couldn’t describe her hair color, height, skin color, eye color, or even the shape and size of her bared breasts -- although he knew without a doubt that they were magnificent. He was also very sure that her hand felt silky and smooth and very, very warm as it slowly rubbed up and down his thigh.

His head spun with the impossibility of it all, but the woman lightly touched his shoulder with her free hand, and he sunk back to the bed. She exerted no force, and he couldn’t remember actually moving; she just touched him, and the next thing he knew, he was lying back on the bed instead of sitting up. She rolled onto her knees, never stopping the slow movement of her hand, and smiled down at him.

“Pray, do not let alarm claim thine heart, mine/our Chosen.” Her voice, like every other defining quality of the mysterious woman, evaded Aidan’s ability to quantify it. He was also not really sure whether she called him her Chosen or our Chosen, as her words blended together strangely in his mind. “Thou art safe here in my/our Realm. Thou art precious to me/us, and I/we have spent much manna to bring thee here and shape thy Path.” She squeezed his thigh gently and began to trail her hand upwards; Aidan couldn’t help but lift his hips slightly off the bed to meet it.

“I/We must bring to thy attention an important fact. Thou art a Chosen, and I/we have placed mine/our hopes into thee, but thou art not the only Chosen. Know that thou art my/our only champion in all of the mortal Realms; know also that other champions hath been created by beings other than mine/our own self/selves. Some will be of no more threat to thee than any other mortal, but others would seek thee out and slay thee were thy Patron known to them or their own Patrons. As I/we have placed all mine/our hopes in thee, so too do I/we care for thee, and so I/we provide to thee this warning. Know also that although thy time in the Realms hast been short, thine efforts please me/us greatly, and so I/we also give you this reward.” As she spoke, she maneuvered herself between Aidan’s spread legs and propped herself up on her elbows. He had a clear and unobstructed view of her breasts, and although he still could not describe them at all, their perfection drove his arousal even higher. The woman reached up to push a stray hand of undefinable hair out of her face, then began to bend downward.

“Thou shouldst clean thyself up; a visitor arrives.”

Aidan
The Realms
Unknown date (day 2)
Early afternoon
Starchaser tribe village, somewhere in the Mistvale Highlands

Aidan’s eyes snapped open, and he was back in the grain storage hut. A sticky mess covered his groin and belly, and he groaned in embarrassment. “Seriously? A wet dream in a video game?” he muttered to himself, standing up and starting to move over to the bucket of water to clean himself off. Then he froze as prompts flashed into his vision.

“... What. The. Fuck?” He stared blankly at the prompts for a minute, then suddenly recalled the … Goddess’s? … last words to him and scrambled for the water. He quickly stripped down and washed the mess away, then pulled his pants back on. Before he had a chance to get back into his shirt, however, let alone deal with leveling up, he heard a knock at the door, and it opened.