Seeing Izzy log into Pellan with a smile already written large across her face made my heart swell with happiness. She was going to flower into the most incredible girl once Feslia worked her magic. Speaking of Feslia and her magic, Izzy and I got started right away working on a shrine to the goddess. It was going to be exceptionally crude, even compared with the dilapidated ruin where I had my own fateful first encounter with the larger than life being.

We started with a huge granite boulder and began to carve it up. I slowly sawed chunks off with my energy blades while Izzy summoned non-corrupted wood sprites to grind the edges down with stones. It would hopefully end up being a rough altar and brazier carved from the same chunk of stone. As far as actually turning a carved hunk of rock into an altar to Feslia, I was banking on the fact I was a priestess of hers, and could consecrate the thing in her name.

“Have you considered what your plan might be with your parents?” I asked as we worked.

“Um, no not really. I figured I could just do it the same way you did, talk to them and show them some magic,” she shrugged.

“Well, I guess it’s a proven method now isn’t it?” I smiled.

“Yeah, something like that,” she smiled back.

“Your magic is a lot easier to demonstrate than mine was back then as well,” I added after a moment.

“Yeah, the whole cutting yourself thing… seems extreme,” she giggled.

“Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time!” I mock scowled.

“Yeah, well I think I will try and improve on the technique somewhat,” she teased.

I grumbled something unintelligible and stuck my tongue out at her, then I cracked and giggles started to break through my scowl.

****

The day ended with the shrine having been blocked out pretty well, the finer details of our simple decoration being left for the next ingame day. Over back at the cabin, the rest of the group had built beds for five of the six rooms, along with doors and the start of a dining table. The beds were especially interesting, having taken after modern bed designs instead of the usual medieval fare we had been subjected to within Pellan.

Col had really gone to town trying to make the beds comfortable. Each was made with a rough wood frame, sturdy rope strung in a lattice over the middle. The mattresses were made out of the dried spongy insides of corrupted wood sprites wrapped in sturdy material. There was something viscerally satisfying about sleeping on the corpses of our enemies.

The awkward part came when it was time to assign rooms. Dana and Amra were sleeping together in a room, something Dana was very excited about. Izzy would have her own room, but that meant Karen and I sleeping in the same room. It was a bit soon in our relationship wasn’t it? That’s what society drilled into us anyway.

“Col, why did you only make five of the beds?” I asked with a groan and a raised eyebrow.

“Oh, I thought we’d only need five,” he said with the best impression of wide eyed innocence I had seen. Apart from, you know, every other time he’d pulled that expression.

“You are, the worst,” I said with a failed scowl. I was really missing the beat with these scowls today.

“Or the best, we’ll see tomorrow,” he said with a laugh and a wink on his way into his own room.

“He is a fucking menace,” I grumbled.

Amra gave a snort as she shuffled past me on her way into her room, “Maybe, but I can’t wait to give this female body for a whirl, VR dissonance or no!”

I just rolled my eyes, and Dana poked her head out of their bedroom doorway far enough to capture the taller Amra in a liplock that disappeared behind their slammed door.

I heard Izzy take a deep breath, and I turned to find her standing behind me and staring at the closed doors of my ridiculous friends.

With a strangled giggle I said, “Welcome to the party Izzy.”

“Yeah…” she breathed.

I left the rest of them to it, escaping into what was to be Karen and I’s room.

I stood there staring at the only bed in the room. How were we going to do this? I mean, I wish we could be in the same bed, but I didn’t know how Karen felt about it. Would one of us take the floor, or would we-

I felt lithe, muscled arms encircle my waist from behind, and a voice that was much too husky for my sanity breathed close to my ear, “So... now what, fairy girl?”

“U-uhh…” was all I managed.

Karen made a throaty little sound that was somehow simultaneously a chuckle and a giggle, “Sorry, I think you unleashed an animal on the world when you helped me realise I was into girls.”

“I guess uhm, one of us sleeps on the ground?” I asked tentatively.

“Oh no my little fairy, you’re staying in my arms all night,” she said with a nip to one of my long ears.

I let out a squeal and wriggled around in her embrace until I was facing her, “No, bad Karen, leave the ears out of it unless you plan to-”

I didn’t get to finish my admonishment, because I had made a fatal mistake, I had allowed my lips into kissing range. I felt myself let out a sighing, breathy sound as she pressed me backwards through the contact, one of her hands entangling itself in my hair. Even as she slowly deepened the kiss, she guided me towards the bottom edge of the bed. When my calves hit with a small bump, I lost balance, tilting backwards with a squeak.

Karen then wrested control of my body from gravity, using our embrace to slow my fall, turning it into a gentle lowering of my body until we were horizontal on the bed, tongues beginning their gentle dance in the fleeting gaps our kiss created between our lips. I felt her place a knee on either side of me and she used that new support to free her hands from their Atlassian duty. One of her newly unemployed hands moved to stroke hesitantly up and down my side, while she used the other to run her hands through my hair in slow luxurious waves.

I wormed my way up the bed, holding our gentle, nerve searing embrace and forcing her to follow until we were square in the middle. Our pace slowed as we kicked off unwanted shoes and outer layers, until she was wearing just her shirt and underwear, and I was left in just my shirt-dress. Annoying clothing disposed of, Karen took the opportunity to move her kisses from my lips down my cheekbone and onto my neck, and almost as a reflex my legs reached up to encircle her hips in an attempt to pull us closer together.

“Karen!” I breathed in excitement.

The press of her beautiful lips against the soft skin of my neck drove a tiny moan from my lips and I gently dug my fingers into her sides in encouragement. Her kisses began to slow, and her movements took on a languid grace as she moved her body to lay sideways against me. I shifted my head to bury my nose in her hair, enjoying the rich smell I found. Her smell. I felt my heart swell lazily alongside my lungs with each breath I took.

She slowed almost to a stop, her only movement an index finger drawing lazy circles on my stomach.

“I really care about you,” she mumbled into the crook of my neck.

I hummed in agreement and encircled her with an arm of my own, drawing her closer against me and beginning my own circular finger motions. We stayed like that for a while until I felt even her hand still, and our breathing slowed to a more sedate pace. I moved my lips to give her a light kiss among the strands of her thick hair. My reward? A light rasping breath that was just this side of being a snore. She was asleep! She’d ravished me, gotten me all hot and bothered, and then fallen asleep! How was I meant to fall asleep while- I let out an involuntary yawn. While I felt like...

****

Eyelids fluttering open, I found our positions had somehow reversed during the night. I was now held close against her side, my head resting in the space between collarbone and breast. I felt so utterly safe and content like this, her arm holding to me tight... my claymore lesbian girlfriend’s arm. The other one was flung wide, hanging slightly off the bed, and it was unreal levels of adorable. My dress had ridden up to my waist during the night, and I had one of my tiny legs thrown across Karen’s hips, her tail coiled around the other one. She was so much taller than me in the game it was crazy.

I felt her stir slightly, and I watched her eyes slowly open and close like the wings of a resting butterfly. Leaning forward, I placed a lingering kiss on her lips.

“Hey,” I said softly.

She blinked several times, and I could see her brain trying to get itself fully working again. She eventually responded with a groan, gently pulling me up her body until she could nuzzle my neck.

Her warm breath tickled my neck as she said, “You’re amazing Syl.”

I hummed in response and we stayed like that for a while, holding each other in this intimate embrace.

Eventually our quiet cuddle was interrupted by Col bursting into the room.

“Hey guys, get up! We have-,” he started to say before stopping when he took in our half naked and intertwined bodies.

It was time for some payback on mister five beds boy...

“Yes?” I asked, stretching my leg into the air with a small moan, while simultaneously reaching my hand up Karen’s shirt, exposing her soft but defined abs in the process.

He made a sort of strangled inhaling sound, like one of those squeaky toys reinflating. He stared at me with wide eyes and flaring nostrils, unable to stop his eyes going everywhere.

“What’s wrong? It must be bad if you jumped in and interrupted us,” I laughed.

I felt Karen laugh softly into my neck, and her tail uncoil from around my leg. She snaked it up to my hip, the tip dipping down to slip underneath the fabric of my underwear. I was all sorts of hot and bothered again after that move, and I turned away from Col to give Karen a slow lazy kiss, trying to convey my feelings for her through the medium of my lips.

“There’s a party of people running across the plains and they have a shitload of mobs chasing them, we gotta go see what’s going on!” he blurted and then rushed back out the door.

I sighed, and gave Karen a longing look that I found mirrored in her gorgeous green eyes.

“I guess we have to get up,” she groaned.

“Yeah.”

****

Karen and I were the last to join our friends at the edge of the hill, and they turned at our approach.

“Morning Col,” I said with an evil grin and a wink.

He coughed and nodded, going beet red.

“Thanks for finally joining us,” Liam said with a smile, “Take a look.”

Karen and I stepped up next to our friends and tried to spot what the problem was. It wasn’t hard to spot. About a kilometer and a half away now was a group of six adventurers running full tilt towards us. Behind them was a large horde of corrupted wood creatures that looked about three hundred percent pissed off.

“Alright, I guess we should try and be good guys. Let’s go and hit that train from the side,” Liam said, making a decision.

We all shrugged, and Amra gave a salute.

Racing down the hill as a group, we swung out wide to the right. Our plan being to hit the huge train of angry wood in the middle, splitting it to give us an easier time. With our best pace, we rushed headlong down the hill, and I may have started cheating and using my light skating ability, staying alongside my friends at about chest height. I swapped the way I was sliding on light to mirror a snowboard, just to like, look cooler or something.

A few minutes later we reached a position to launch our attack. The first one to hit the stream of angry creatures was Liam, his mace swinging in a brutal arc that ended in the crunch of splintering wood. His shield was close behind, slamming into the marauding horde with a thunk, several smaller corrupted sprites went flying.

I heard Col channeling a spell, his staff beginning to emit a teeth jarring crackle of energy, and the beam of fire he had been using to melt stone showed its true colours when it gracefully swung through the crowd, burning and slicing as it went. The smell of wood smoke followed me as I set myself up to do a move I had wanted to try ever since I had gotten my light skating ability.

Taking myself up to around three meters above the ground, I brought my legs together and twisted my body, initiating a pirouette. Spinning like a top now, I let shards of light lash out one after another in rapid succession, and I told each one to shatter into a hundred fragments as they left my hand. The effect on the creatures was… something else. The sliding metal sound of the release, followed by the crack of the single large shards shattering melted into a rapidfire rhythm that raised goosebumps on my skin.

All through the horde small chunks of searing light embedded themselves in wooden flesh, smouldering and sparking in their new home. The surprise attack did it’s job, cutting the train in half and allowing our group to deal with one half, while our potential new friends dealt with the other.

I checked my mana, and realised that using both my light skating and so many spells one after another like that had drained me significantly. I touched down behind my party and began my real job, dancing with feather light steps between my comrades as they carved, bashed, blasted and shot their way through the angry forest in front of us.

I rushed forward to lay a hand on Dana, healing a nasty slice along her arm, then supporting her with a quick jab of my light blade into the offending creature she had been fighting.

“Thanks,” she said breathlessly, jamming her two daggers into the thing’s neck and yanking the handles down, popping the head clean off.

I kicked the corpse out of her way so she could engage the next creature, in time to see Amra imbue an arrow with a dark energy that seeped off it like ink in a glass of water. The arrow was released with a hiss of parting air, and I watched, rapt as it tunneled it’s way through a multitude of enemies, becoming lost as the countless monsters closed ranks.

I felt my heart skip a beat when I saw another forest creature within our midst. It was noticeably more human looking than the rest, it’s body made of swirling knots of wood with branches all angled backwards. She, because she was definitely a she, her perfectly feminine form was not something I could deny, was different in many other ways. Her branches all had vibrant green leaves, and her eyes glowed a soothing green.

The soothing green was undercut by the wicked looking barbed blades she had in the place of forearms, reaching almost a meter in length from tip to elbow, and knots of the same energy swirled within. Then she did something that made me blink in confusion.

She giggled, “Killing things is so much more fun when you do it with friends!”

Then she punched one blade arm through a corrupted sprite with a lunge, and with another jerky movement, tore the blade up through the creature, rending it in half. Okay. So the scary green death shrub was Izzy. Righto. Not a healer then I guess.

The enemies in the train were actually rather low level compared to most of us in the group, only Izzy matching them in level if I had a guess. It was fairly obvious from the way my friends and I were going all dynasty warriors on their asses, scything our way through them like seven grim reapers. Grim reapers for weird stick people that is. I imagine their version looks different.

My thoughts were sharpened back to the task at hand when I heard Karen cry out in pain. She was on the other end of the group, shit! I dashed forward, skipping along the ground as I briefly activated my skating to slide between Izzy and her current prey in a sort of limbo move. I caught sight of my girlfriend behind Col, struggling with an eight foot tall wooden monster that seemed made of brute strength and thorns.

She was sliced and bleeding in a dozen or more places and her sword was out of reach a few meters away. I went in to stop the creature first, but I sent a ranged heal in ahead of me with my left hand as the right one bubbled up in my lightning fist ability. Except the spell activated strangely. Instead of forming an amorphous roiling storm cloud, it hardened into a gauntlet that was somehow elegant and severe at the same time. The clouds were still there, but it was as though they had formed a solid, instead of remaining true to their usual gaseous form.

I felt a grin erupt across my face as I realised how much fun it was going to be to punch things with this. I let out a cry that was a mix of exultation and growl, my gauntleted fist crashing into the chest of the creature wrestling with Karen. I was surprised by the force I was able to exert, as though my fist had been fired from a railgun. Thorns snapped, pinging off into the air as I broke everything in the way, then finally into the hard wooden carapace itself. The carapace cracked and split with the unique sound of splintering wood, and I felt my now imbedded fist give a surge, lightning tearing through the creature from the inside.

It stumbled back, a cry of agony beugeling from whatever hole it used for a mouth. I left it to its pain, leaning down and getting to work healing my gorgeous companion. She gave a whooshing sigh of relief as my magic stitched up all the holes that monster had poked in her. When she was back to full health, I had just enough time to block a rending blow from the gnarled and thorny fist of the now very angry wood creature.

I heard Karen rush to grab her sword, and tried my best to stay in one piece as the thing threw blow after blow at me from it’s awful limbs. I failed to block one blow, and it connected with my hip, sending me sprawling. It brought the limb up again for another blow as I was helpless and prone, only to lose it at the elbow when my claymore lesbian sent her sword crashing through it.

“Leave my girl alone!” she yelled in anger, continuing to hack chunks off the thing with reckless arcing slashes of her sword.

Beginning to heal myself with a grimace, I watched her grasp the middle of the blade with one hand and using the extra leverage, drive it point first into the face of the sprite with a roar. It collapsed as though poleaxed. Although I think the correct term in this instance would be claymored? Either way, it slumped lifeless to the ground, and Karen whirled to make sure I was okay.

“You hurt?” she asked with concern.

“I’m fine, ‘tis but a scratch,” I meme’d with a laugh.

“Nerd,” she laughed back.

“Stop calling me names and cut more things up, you brute,” I giggled, motioning to the still raging battle.

“Okay, but just for you,” she said with a wink.