Our embrace seemed to last an eternity. It felt warm, loving, and all of the other mushy feelings. Once we finally pulled away. I started to ask my questions.

“So, what exactly happened with that spell of yours?” I began.

Nina’s ears and tail went downwards, like a guilty dog. “Um, well it seems like neither of our minds were really set on switching places, so the spell misfired, and instead of switching our souls around, it may have… processed your soul into your subconscious self-image? Then altered it to fit with the game’s character creator, I think,”

“Any ideas on why my self-image is a girl, then?” 

Nina rolled her eyes as if I had just asked a question with the most obvious answer in the world. “That one’s on you, sis. I’m not telling you how to live your life,” she replied.

What’d she mean by that? I’d have to ask later. For now, I continued the slew of questions. “So, what exactly is happening with the body in the real world? Er, my body,” 

“You should be able to see for yourself,” she replied, pointing towards the ceiling. I looked upwards and only saw the wooden supports holding the roof together. But, as I concentrated, I saw a faint outline of an apartment room, where a man looked like he had fallen asleep in the chair he was in. Was that… me?

“In all your glory,” Nina replied. “Oh, sorry, I’ll try to stop doing the mind-reading thing,”

I shook my head. “So, am I… dead?”

“Not quite. Your soul is here, but your body is out there. So basically it’s just a shell right now. The spell was only supposed to last a week, so once it ends you’ll either go back, or die with your body, or your soul will be trapped here forever,”

“No-risk adventure, huh?” I recited, recounting the info I had been given.

“I mean, besides the guinea pig part, it was,” Nina shrugged. “So, your option is to wait out a week, and see what happens, or we can try to make it to Kin no Kaigan and hope Amateratsu can fix this,”

That was the game’s main goddess if those hazy memories were correct. That was also an end-game town that I hadn’t been able to make it to yet. The enemies there still had a good 20 or so levels above Nina, if the game’s leveling system meant anything here.

“Can we even make it if we tried?” I asked.

“Maybe,” Nina replied. “It’ll be like climbing a hill that gets steeper the higher we go. And the anti-cheat shield would be after you too since you’re basically a glitch in the system. We’d have a better chance of getting there if we could get help from the guild, but everyone is a bit focused on that raid right now,”

With no good options, we were stuck scratching our heads. I figured we should try anyways, since the alternative was to hope I didn’t die at the end of the week. I was about to suggest it when the door to the room burst open.

“Nina! A woman shouted as she ran through the door. “Is your player ok!?” She was a thin elf, with short silver hair wearing a black top and black leggings to match. A small choker was around her neck, with a tiny red gem resting on her chest. She looked familiar, but I didn’t know why.

Nina, however, looked like she had seen a ghost. She had stopped in her tracks as the woman came in. Her ears and tail again revealed her guilty thoughts. “Oh, hey, Kei,”

Kei! That was Karyl’s character! How could she have forgotten that?

“Karyl logged off early, and I didn’t see you anywhere. Your player wasn’t responding so she went over to check on him,” Her voice had a hint of panic in it. “I checked in later, and she was taking him to the hospital! It looked like he was in a coma,”

“Yeah… about that…” Nina didn’t even have to finish her reply for Kei to eye her suspiciously.

“You didn’t use that swap spell, did you? I told you we weren’t done with it yet!”

“But-”

“No, it didn’t have just a few problems!” Kei was mad, and had clearly heard this argument before. Watching from here, I had a sense of deja vu. Karyl and I occasionally had arguments like this, mostly when I wasn’t taking care of myself. 

Rant over, Kei sighed. “Alright, where’s fuck-up, and how do we fix this?”

“Um, hi,” I said quietly, “I’m the fuck-up, I guess,”

She just looked at me shocked, before turning back to Nina. “Your player is a guy, right? Why would he- ohhhhhhh,” She had figured something out about me, but didn’t seem too keen on sharing. “Well, alright. What’s the plan, er…?” 

“Sylvia,” I answered as she plopped onto my bed. “I think we need to get to Kin no Kaigan. Nina says Amateratsu might be able to fix this?”

“Ugh,” Kei replied, smacking her forehead with her hand. “This is gonna suck, but ok. When are we leaving?”

Nina looked at her in surprise. “You’re coming with us? This is my mistake, you don’t need to,”

Kei shrugged. “We’re supposed to have each other’s backs, right? Plus I doubt my player is gonna come back anytime soon, taking care of yours and all, so I’m gonna miss the raid anyways,” She then turned to me. “You have a very cute soul, y’know,”

“Um, thanks?” It was a strange compliment, but getting called cute made my heart flutter all over again. 

“We need to get Sylvia some clothes and an aptitude test first, then we can buy some supplies and leave,” Nina said. 

“Wait,” I said. “By aptitude test, do you mean like, the guild console where you can change your class?”

“Someone’s done her homework,” said Kei, ruffling my hair. Surprisingly, it felt kinda nice. “Yes, that aptitude test. The more you look like a character, the harder it is for the cheat-guard to find you, and the less likely they'll catch you,”

“What would happen, if I were to die?” It wasn’t a scenario I wanted to consider, but it sounds like I’d be dancing around it in the near future.

“Good question,” Was Nina’s reply. “Well you aren’t really a character, so you probably won’t respawn. You’d probably be lost forever in that coma. Alternatively, you could just die, then and there,”

I swallowed hard. I was literally going to be fighting, life-or-death, to save myself. It was kind of exciting, actually.

“Alright, now that we’ve gotten that settled,” Kei trailed off as she pulled up her console and dug around her inventory. She finally fished out a neatly folded piece of clothing. “You should be fine with Starlight’s uniform, right?”

Starlight was the name of the guild Karyl and I had created. I didn’t remember much about who was in it, but I knew that I could rely on them if I ever needed to.

Tentatively, I unfolded the fabric to reveal a white, sleeveless dress patterned with branches of cherry blossom trees. Scattered throughout the branches were twinkling stars, a tribute to the guild’s name. Memories flooded in of gathering the materials for our first uniform, and of Karyl spending hours getting the design to be perfect. It looked even better in person than through the lens of the computer screen. My heart was fluttering again; I was beginning to think there was something wrong with me.

I caught Kei smirking at me as I admired the dress. “What?” I asked.

Nina answered for me. “Your tail, again,” she laughed. “You must really enjoy being a girl, huh?”

This damn tail! Stop betraying me!

“No! Er, yes? Uhhh…” I stammered.  Why couldn’t I even get that right? Wasn’t that as fundamental as it gets?

“Perfect time to do some soul searching, huh?” Kei laughed.

“Oh, stop teasing her!” Nina chastised, albeit a bit hypocritically. “Come on, let’s get you to the guild,”

Ninichu

Ahh, my poor baby egg. Sylvia is pretty fun to write, as she's so wildly oblivious to her own feelings, just like I was. It's kind of like laughing at yourself sometimes.