The group of felinoids were making everyone tense. They sat at a table together and talked loudly insultingly about everyone else in the beer-garden.

Josh was ready to go over and "release some poison gas" on them, which I first took to mean he planned blowing farts at them, but apparently had something to do with one of his new spells. Even I was tempted to glitter the ass-holes and see what humiliating things I could make them do while they were under my control.

But Roger, the otter-man, warned us against a direct confrontation. "The inn has special protections against violence within its walls. Not only can you not hurt anyone, you're penalized if you do. I think they provoke violence on purpose to watch it backfire. Even if that';s the reason, they're always very careful to never go beyond words."

"So, why doesn't anyone go over there and tell them to shut their fucking mouths?" Sulin asked.

"Because they're Tier 2 adventurers. They've all had they're first full evolution. The six of them are monsters in combat."

I said, "But they can't hurt anyone, so we should all just band together and shout them down."

"Whenever a party to confronts them, they waited outside and slaughter them when they leave the inn. Then, they waltz back in without a scratch and are ten times worse to everyone. So, we just try to ignore them, no matter how annoying they are."

A blonde felinoid with eye-shadow that made her look part tropical fish yelled out, "Hey, weasel-boy what was that you were saying?"

"Nothing," Roger said meekly.

"It better be nothing. Or maybe will start up a game and see how far we can toss those little twerps you're hanging with."

I began to rise out of me seat, my face flushed with rage. But Blossom grabbed my arm gently. "They're not worth it."

Right about then, Rick and Yarrow came back out, holding hands and looking all moony at one another.

A brunette from the evil gang put her hand to her nose. "Gah! That's the problem with this place there's no stable for the livestock."

Our friends looked at the cackling cat-girls a little stunned not quite sure what was going on.

Blossom must have sensed that this could go bad really fast, and raced over to them.

Teresa said, looking at Rick and Yarrow, "Yeah, I hate how they just let these animals mix with real people. The stench is awful."

Rick responded, "What the hell is your problem?"

Teresa stood. "You and your cum-dump is our problem. Do you really think we want to smell a bunch of dumb deer while we're eating?"

Rick said, "Listen, Mrs. Bigglesworth. I'm not going to take that from some crack-whore-looking cat." His grip tightened on his staff.

"Don't attack," Blossom screamed. "The inn's protected. It will turn against you."

"And what do we have here?" Tropical-fish girl said. "A wittle pwincess? Aw, how cute."

Shit. I wasn't going to let them pick on Blossom. I got up and went to her.

The brunette said, "I like that tiara of yours. Give it to me."

"What?"

I reached her side and said, "She isn't giving you shit."

"And what are you going to do about it? Wipe my ass with your head?"

"Same thing you're going to do about it. Nothing," I said.

Teresa pushed her way through her minions to us. "Is that what you think?"

"Well, then, go ahead and hit me, you sour looking skank."

Blossom tried saying, "Look, this is all a misunderstanding. I'm sure we can all be friends." But no one was listening.

"Oh, I don't need to do it here. I'd tell you to watch your back but you probably spend most of your time on it, slut."

To (I believe) everyone's astonishment, Yarrow spoke up and said to Teresa in a calm voice. "Can we stop with the slut shaming. We're all women here." She glanced at Rick. "Well, most of us are. And this game does encourage us to have sex."

"Speak for yourself, Bimbo-Bambi. My team and I aren't a bunch of cock-suckers like you." She turned to Blossom and me as we clung onto another. "Or rug-munchers like you. We're not stupid enough to let this game corrupt us."

"So, you were loud-mouthed dick before the game?" Rick said.

She approached him, drawing a finger up near his chin without touching it. "Oh, those antlers are going to look good in my den. I think I'll rip them out before I kill you."

Suddenly, the old innkeeper was there with a broom. Whether he planned it as a weapon or had just been sweeping up, I couldn't say. "Now. Now. None of that," he said. "This commotion is disturbing the guests. If you don't quite down, I'm going to have to ask you all to leave."

"They started it," I said, pointing at the felinoids who were trying to look the model of innocence.

"Us?" Teresa said. "We were just trying to have a peaceful meal, when they started harassing us."

The innkeeper said, "Now, miss. I wasn't born yesterday. This isn't the first complaint we had about you."

"Who are you going to believe us or a bunch of filthy, low-level—" This seemed to be the start of a long, rambling insult, but the innkeeper cut her off.

"I believe my own eyes. And I won't have you causing any more trouble."

"Those eyes of yours would look good on a chain around my neck," Teresa hissed.

"That's it! You and you're crew are banned. Out you go!"

I don't know what his words triggered exactly, but a beeping sound filled the air like God's countdown timer.

Teresa and the others scowled, reading something in front of their eyes.

"Come on girls, lets go. This dive was beneath our standards anyhow." But before she left, she said to Rick, "This isn't over, deer-boy." The words seethed out of her mouth. She stomped off, knocking one of the forlorn adventurers' steins onto the floor as she passed their table. 

"Thank you," Blossom said to the innkeeper. 

But he just said, "And no more trouble from you lot or I'll ban you too."

As he went back inside, I couldn't help grumbling, "But we didn't do anything."

Blossom ran her hand over my arm soothingly. "Let's sit down and have another drink. They're gone now, and that's what matters."

When we got back to the table, Sulin said, "Great. Now we're going to have to face them when we leave."

"They can't wait out there forever," Blossom said. "We'll just stay here until their gone."

I wasn't sure if it was going to be as simple as that, but before I could contradict her, Mack and Sue returned.

It might not have normally captured my attention, but they didn't look like they had had a good time together. I suspected Sue might have been crying. And Mack seemed jumpy and ill at ease.

"So, what did we miss," she said sitting down.

* * *

It was past dinner time, the sun had set, and we'd moved inside. 

I was feeling a lot calmer. The several hours alone with Blossom had helped ease my anger and stress. The threat of Teresa and her gang seemed far away, and I laughed with the others as we sat by the fire.

I suppose everyone was a lot more relaxed with all the sex we were all having. Only, Sulin and Trogia didn't seem to have taken part. I just hoped they didn't decide to hook up. That would have been very weird and a bit icky. I was also dying to ask Crystal how things had gone, but she didn't bring it up, so I was waiting to get her alone. 

Whatever had happened between Mack and Sue, they seemed to recover. Or at least, they'd drank enough that their concerns were somewhat forgotten. Sue seemed a little sullen, but Mack was as loud and obnoxious as ever. And I may have been mistaken, but she seemed to be flirting with both Roger and Barry.

Unfortunately Roger's party, knew even less about Feronia than we did. Blossom was anxious to find information about her quest, but they had no idea where the valley was.

Although later that night, a few others joined us. They were a bit closer to our level than Roger's group. All three were women and mages. There was a felinoid, a lutrin, and a pixie. I was surprisingly excited to meet another one. I mean, I know, I wasn't really a pixie, but somehow running into another one, it made me want to start asking about home or something. It's hard to explain.

She was super cute, thin and pale like me with a sprout of honey-toned hair. She wore it tied up with a small ribbon, on the top of her head. It was longer than my hair and must have risen four inches above her head. Her eyes were big, gray, and mischievous. Her clothes actually covered her, unlike mine, but were so barely-there, I was almost grateful for me see-through robe. She wore a blue string thong that was cut so low it would have shown bush, if she had any. And on top, she wore a matching bra that was just thin strands of fabric with two little triangles over her breasts. 

"We hear you're looking for Dewy Valley," the lutrin said.

Yarrow said, "We are. Do you know where it is?"

"We might." The male lutrins were tall, sinewy, but heavy with muscles. They had cute round ears on top of their heads and upturned, pointy (although entirely human) noses. This woman lacked the muscles and was lithe with small breasts and an impossible thin waist, which was completely bared and showed off a jeweled belly-ring. Her clothes consisted of skirt and a matching bit of fabric tied over her chest like a bra. "I'm River, by the way. These are my companions Cali and Amber." The felinoid and pixie nodded respectively.

Our rather large group went around introducing one another. It took so long, I'd almost forgotten why thee mages had come by, but Blossom hadn't.

"So, could you tell us where we might find it?"

Cali leaned into the conversion. "That bit of information will cost you."

This caught Mack's attention. She was very drunk, but no less concerned with hanging onto treasure. "Cost us what?"

Amber answered, and was it my imagination or had she circled around out of her way to take a seat next to Blossom on the bench. "You see, we have a problem we hoped you might be able to help us with."

This yielded a lot of questioning looks.

River said, "Right. I'm sure you've all encounter the little problem that effects you once a week or so. Well ... um ... we, the three of us that is, we're close friends, I mean before Feronia. Actually Amber and I are more than friends, we're related. So, anyway... we don't really feel comfortable with helping each other in this matter."

Cali jumped in, "And the girls at the inn are always covered in cum, so we haven't turned to them."

Yarrow asked hesitantly, "Are you suggesting ...?"

"Yes," Amber said. Now it definitely wasn't my imagination. Her hip was pressed up against Blossom's. "We want to have sex with some of you."

Cali repeated this to make it absolutely clear, "Sleep with us and we'll tell you what you want to know."