As the group crossed the threshold of the doorway that was originally blocked off by a happy dragon relief, they entered what appeared to be a man-made chamber. The walls were carved roughly and there were stone blocks and stone pillars around the first room. On the right wall of the first room was another relief of a dragon. This one had red eyes to show that it was angry.
It was decided that they would see what was behind the relief first. Fayt approached the stone panel and played an angry melody with his flute which caused the relief to vanish and open the way beyond.
As they entered the next room, most of the group was in shock from the sight before them. Albel and Nel kept calm while Adray had a grim expression on his face. To Thanatas, the sight before her was about on par with one of her laboratories.
Shattered glass littered the floor in places, scientific equipment was locked up in glass displays on a shelf to their right, research papers and reference materials could be seen on shelves to their left. In the center of the room was a table that was stained with old blood as well as an apparatus that looked capable of holding something large.
The biggest shock were the glass cases that held scaly claws and other body parts that belonged to dragons.
“Looks like we found the reason that the dragons called these ruins evil,” Sophia said. “Seems like whoever lived here used them for experiments.”
Thanatas frowned, “Hmph, what a waste. Whoever lived here could have done so much more with the equipment here. They even left the materials and the research behind. As mad scientists, these people were rank amateurs at best. Their bodies wouldn’t even be worth reanimating.”
“It’s still despicable what they did,” Nel growled.
Albel humphed, getting everyone’s attention. “Do you realize how many dragons we’ve killed so far? When you think about it, what we did was really not all that different from what they did.”
“The difference here is that the dragons didn’t die honorably,” Sophia explained. “Dragons have their pride and would prefer to fall in battle rather than in horror as scalpels cut them open. I’m sure you would hate to die helplessly while some puny scholar opens your chest cavity and makes you watch as they rip out your organs and store them in glass jars. In the least, the dragons we killed can find solace that they fell to warriors. Death may come the same way in either case, but the soul does not rest so easily in this case.”
“I can confirm what she said,” Thanatas said. “There are a lot of restless dragon souls in these ruins and each one of them wails about how the people here desecrated their bodies and denied them a fitting death.”
“Tch!” Albel looked away.
Desiring a souvenir, Thanatas decided to take a dragon skull from the lab, despite the scowls she received in response.
The group left the lab and headed down a narrow hallway in the first room where they saw a happy dragon relief at the end. Fayt played his happy tune and the relief opened like a door.
The next room featured a number of tiles on the floor that formed a cross pattern. There were nine tiles in all. There were also three reliefs on the left, right and back sides of the room. The one in the back looked more ornate than the others. Nel also noticed some writing on a plaque beneath the relief.
“It says, ‘Offer the dragon’s cranium within the cross. The dragon reliefs seek nothing more than their favorite sound.’”
Thanatas moved into the center of the room and raised her souvenir into the air but nothing happened. Wondering what to do next, the group looked around the room. As they walked, four of the tiles in the cross lit up. However, they could not light up all of them as some did not light when stepped on.
“There’s probably some means to activate the other tiles somewhere in the ruins. Let’s explore the other areas,” Sophia offered.
The group took the left path first which was blocked by a sad dragon relief, given the blue color of the eyes. Fayt played a sad melody and the relief opened.
They entered an ‘L’ shaped hallway and at one end they found another of those tiles. Roger stepped on it and it lit up. Peppita returned to the previous room and came back to report that one of the tiles that didn’t light up before was now lit. Knowing what they had to do now, the group searched the ruins for more tiles to activate.
The enemies encountered were of the amphibious kind as they were assaulted by toad people and floating tadpoles and lizards. The tadpoles were quick but the enemies easily withered when exposed to the fiery symbology invoked by the spellcasters.
In their search of the west wing, they discovered an angry dragon relief which led to another tile and another door which was very odd. The odd door was blank in regard to the stone it was made of, but there was also light coming from it that took the form of dragon facial expressions. The expressions repeatedly shifted between happy, sad and angry.
Fayt ended up playing a happy melody while the angry face appeared which angered the restless dragon spirits and caused one to manifest before them. They were forced to fight the beast, but it was easily defeated.
Fayt then figured that he needed to play the melodies in the right order as the corresponding face appeared. He played a happy melody when the happy face appeared, then the sad melody on the sad face and the angry melody on the angry face. The door opened which led to more abandoned supplies and research.
With that being a dead end, the group returned to the cross room and headed toward the east wing. The way was blocked by a playful dragon relief. Fayt played a whimsical melody and the door opened.
Just beyond that door was another hallway with a sad dragon relief just beyond the entrance which led to a room with one of the tiles. Once that was activated, they proceeded further down the hallway where they found another tile, meaning that they only needed to light up one more tile to perform whatever ritual the plaque in the cross room wanted.
After some exploration and getting past a shifting door that displayed sad and angry faces, they returned to the cross room to see where they would have to go next. With no other way to go, Fayt approached the ornate angry dragon relief with the plaque and played an angry melody.
Beyond that relief was a narrow hallway which led to a playful dragon relief. One whimsical tune later, and they found the room with the last tile to light up.
The group returned to the cross room to find all of the tiles were lit. Thanatas moved into the center again and raised the skull once more. The tiles flickered a few times before a faint rumbling was heard further ahead, back where they found the final tile.
As they moved to return to the room, an intense wave of heat slammed into their faces, signaling to them that whatever new area they opened up was definitely very hot.
At the same time, the emanations of the final shard that Sophia had been sensing was coming in stronger.
“I’d say we found the Urssa Lava Caves,” Sophia figured.
“Yikes! That’s some intense heat!” Roger cried.
They soon returned to the room where they found the final tile and discovered that the back wall had opened up, revealing a cavern that looked like it could be interpreted as Hell. The waves of heat coming from the caverns was relentless so Twilight made sure to prepare a heat resistance spell for everyone before heading inside.
Before they could head inside though, a floating child that bore a similar appearance to the one Sophia saw in the Depths of Mosel emerged from the cave. The thing that was different with this one was that his clothes were green instead of brown.
“It’s been a long time since someone other than me visited this place,” the child said. “And Twilight and Lyra are with you? Does that mean that you’re all players?”
“Huh? Players?” Fayt asked.
“They are not players and if you break immersion again, I’ll ban your account,” Twilight threatened telepathically.
“Whatever. I’m bored anyway so I’m gonna go ahead and gank all of you.”
“Great…one of those players,” Lyra mentally moaned.
“How about a duel instead?” Sophia offered.
The child scoffed. “You? I’ll own you, noob!”
Sophia showed the child with a toxic behavior an innocent smile which succeeded in annoying him. He sent a powerful tornado against her and smirked as he figured that he would see her flung into a wall somewhere.
That didn’t happen as the next thing he saw was a leg suddenly slamming into his face and the painful feeling of hitting a wall hard a moment later.
When he opened his eyes and emerged from the wall he was partially buried in, the child saw that everyone else was in the previous room while the girl that hit him was standing in the same spot as before with the same mocking, innocent smile. She behaved as if nothing had happened.
“What the Tartarus did you do?!” the child demanded. Sophia simply shrugged. The child growled before shouting, “I will not be made fun of by a loser like you!”
The child then conjured a number of tornadoes around himself and unleashed them all over the room. The room was made of durable stone so it was able to withstand the child’s assault.
With all the twisters he threw around, the child was confident that the razor winds had torn the girl to shreds. There was no way she could have avoided them all.
That was when he was axe kicked from above and slammed hard enough into the floor that he created a small crater on impact.
“Ch-cheater!” The salty child weakly said. The attacks had left him barely hanging on. “There’s no way I should be losing to you. You must be using hacks.”
“Or I’m just that good,” Sophia shot back. “It’s not that hard to avoid your winds if you’re fast enough.”
“No way! There’s no way you could have avoided my attacks. You must have cheated somehow!” He prepared to create another tornado now that his opponent was in pointblank range.
That plan was never executed as Sophia pointed a sphere of potent psionic energy at the child. “As they say in video games: ‘Get gud scrub!’” She unleashed the blast which created a large explosion which expanded the crater and caused the child to vanish. The blast was a little more powerful than necessary, but she needed to drive the point home to the kid that he wasn’t as good as he thought he was. Whoever was playing the character that she destroyed, Sophia knew that they would take their frustrations out on someone else, but that wasn’t her problem.
As the group reentered the room to witness the aftermath of Sophia’s ruthless assault, Fayt asked a question that made Twilight and Lyra sweat. “What was that kid talking about? Why was he talking like a gamer?”
The Elicoorians looked as Fayt in confusion. “Gamer? What’s that?” Nel asked.
“Well, you see…”
“It’s not important right now,” Sophia interrupted. “We need to get to the Marquis’ lair before the Vendeeni fleet shows up.”
“Yeah, but Sophia, don’t you think it’s…” Fayt never finished that question as Sophia’s threatening glare shut him up. “N-nevermind…”
While the subject was far from resolved, Twilight and Lyra were glad to get that reprieve so that they could come up with a reasonable explanation while trying to avoid revealing the true nature of the Eternal Sphere to everyone.
“Thanks for covering for us, Sophia. It means a lot to us,” Twilight telepathically said.
“I hope you have a good explanation prepared. That kid might have given too much away and I’m not sure you can keep this secret from them much longer,” Sophia warned.
“I know, I never intended for them to learn the reality of their existence. I know that it’s inevitable now that they will learn of it. I fear how they will react, though. It’s not easy to hear that your very existence is an artificial creation.”
“You’ll have to tell them something. Maybe you can try to ease them into it. But that will have to wait until we get off this planet.”
With that, the group entered the Urssa Lava Caves. Twilight placed a heat resistance spell on everyone so they would avoid burning under the intense heat.
The first monsters they encountered in the blazing hellscape were red versions of the fire spirits that Sophia encountered in the Depths of Mosel. One look into their minds told her that they were mentally fragile. Fayt was easily able to destroy their minds with his ice-imbued sword. Nel took out more of them by using her Flying Guillotine technique where she unleashed a shadowy disc of blades at them.
Other monsters encountered were ghosts and zombies. However, with their minds as weak as they were, Thanatas saw no value in controlling them. The zombies were running around screaming about being on fire, so she unleashed frosty blasts from her sword that destroyed the zombies. Everyone else used their mind-damaging abilities to make quick work of the monsters.
The one other type of monster roaming around the caverns were not as easily killed as the other types. The living lava monsters bore a similar appearance to the mud monster and the water monster encountered in Duggus Forest and the Mosel Underground Waterway, except these were made of lava.
Since these monsters had much stronger minds than everything else in the area, the group had to resort to using water-type abilities. Fayt slashed at them with his Ice Blade, Nel and Peppita threw Frozen Daggers at them, Adray, Sophia and Twilight all cast Deep Freeze on the monsters, and Thanatas surrounded herself with icy winds and slashed at the monsters with her frost imbued sword while the winds bit at their molten bodies.
As they explored, Sophia led the group eastward through more mentally fragile monsters until they came across a monument. The monument was of a humanoid rabbit. More important was the familiar crystal shard that floated in front of the statue.
The final Ihan Crystal shard.
Remembering the hint from her grandfather from around the beginning of the adventure, Sophia could only facepalm as she realized what the hint was. “You have got to be kidding me…”
“What’s wrong?” Fayt asked.
“I think I have an idea about what my true form is.”
“Really? What is it?”
“You’ll find out soon enough. For now, we need to find some place to relax so I can glean through the last two shards.”
“Hey guys!” Roger shouted. “Look what I found.” He returned from behind the monument to show everyone the thing he found. It appeared to be a key with the head looking like a rabbit’s head with its ears pointed outward.
“A key?” Fayt wondered.
“It might be usable somewhere in the area. Let’s keep looking,” Sophia offered.
Sophia wanted to take her mind off the sudden revelation. It would take her some time to cope with that, but she hoped that knowing that it was the form she was born with might help her to come to terms with it easier.
The group returned to the entrance and took the middle path this time. However, at the end of that path was a door that was blocked off by rocks from a cave in. While Lyra and Sophia could simply blast their way through, they decided to hold off on that until they checked out the rest of the area.
Returning to the entrance once more, the group headed down the last path available to them, fighting their way through more weak-minded monsters.
They soon come up to a door that had the face of a rabbit on it and a note tacked onto it.
Fayt read the note. “It says: ‘No Monsters Allowed! Do not go looking for a spare key! By the Bunny.’”
“Well, the locked door would keep the monsters out I guess,” Sophia said. “But that also makes whoever wrote that vulnerable to would-be thieves who are intelligent enough to read that.”
“I’m pretty sure it would keep bandits out too since they’re too stupid to read,” Roger snarked.
Fayt used the key that Roger found and used it to unlock the door.
On the other side, they were met with an incredible amount of steam that it became difficult to see anything in front of them. They could barely see their own hands in the fog of steam. Navigating the steam-filled area proved to be difficult and aggravating because of the zombies, spirits and ghosts wandering the area.
“Okay, so I guess there really was no point in putting a door there,” Sophia concluded.
“Heckuva lot that did if the monsters are still crawling all over the area,” Cliff added.
Their wandering through the steamy caverns soon brought them to another door that was unlocked this time.
Beyond the door was what appeared to be a workshop that doubled as a house with one corner acting as a bedroom and the far right corner acting as a bathroom that looked like a steaming hot spring. A forge was located in the far left corner.
More importantly, there was a humanoid bunny slightly taller than Roger staring at them. “Who are you?” the bunny asked. The bunny was pink with long ears tipped with bright green. He sounded male, by the sound of his voice. He wore a bright green shirt with a matching mantle, all bordered with yellow. He also wore a matching long cap. “Didn’t you see the message not to go looking for a spare key?”
“Actually, we found the key before we saw the message,” Sophia said.
“Well, no matter. You don’t seem like monsters anyway. So what can I do for you?” the bunny asked.
“Did you actually make that door in order to keep out the monsters?” Sophia asked.
“Yeah, why?”
“Because it didn’t do its job very well since we saw a number of undead monsters on this side of your locked door.”
“They found a way past my door?! Drat! I guess the dark magic in these caves was stronger than I thought.” The bunny sighed sadly. “I had hoped to use this place as my home and workshop where I could craft my wares and sell them to people in Kirlsa and Arias, but this place is starting to get a little too dangerous for me to keep living here. Looks like I’ll have to move back to Surferio.”
“You craft things?” Twilight asked. “What do you make?”
“I originally came from Greeton so I specialize in mechanical engineering. I can make bombs and other weapons that the primatives on this side of the world would scratch their heads over.”
“Why haven’t you signed up with the artisan’s guild?”
“Never heard of it,” the rabbit replied. “Anyway, why are you guys here anyway?”
“First, let’s introduce ourselves,” Sophia said. She introduced everyone in the room and outside the room, since the house was too small for thirteen people.
“I’m Vanilla,” the bunny introduced himself. “Pleased to meet you. So, why are you here?”
“We’re here to speak with the Marquis who rules this area,” Fayt explained. “Unfortunately, the door to his lair is blocked off by rocks.”
“Well, I could make a Ring of Disintegration to remove the rocks, but I’d need a glowstone to make it,” Vanilla offered.
“No need. I can blast the rocks myself,” Lyra said.
“Drat! Is there anything I can sell to you guys? I do still need to put food on the table, even though I’ll be moving soon.”
“How about this, thirty thousand for a contract where you will work under me for the artisan’s guild,” Twilight offered.
“But I haven’t signed for the guild,” Vanilla countered. “Though for thirty grand, I can move out of here in a hurry and sign on as soon as possible.”
Vanilla signed the contract to work for Twilight which would take effect the moment Vanilla joined the guild. Twilight gave him the money.
“Say, Vanilla,” Sophia offered. “Would you mind if I borrowed your bed for a bit? I need to look into something.”
“Not sure what you could see from my bed, but alright.”
“Thanks.” Sophia then sat on Vanilla’s bed and did her best to make herself comfortable while she pulled out the Ihan Crystal and the last two shards. She united the two shards with the main crystal to complete it. The crystal glowed brightly, as if in gratitude for completing it once more.
“Time for the big question, grandfather. Why am I in this whole situation to begin with?”
Once more the crystal glowed and Sophia’s consciousness was pulled away. This time, she appeared in an empty void and her grandfather stood in the middle of it. He had a sad look on his face.
“Greetings once more, my granddaughter. I knew you were capable of defeating me. You are truly worthy of being my successor.”
“I’ve played your game and I’ve learned about my heritage. I think it’s about time you told me why you had me living with the Esteeds,” Sophia demanded.
“Yes, the time has come to tell you the truth. Not only must you learn why you are living with a foster family, but also why I have limited your powers.
“The thing that you must know about our family is our purpose in the multiverse. Timelines, in the countless universes that make up the multiverse we live in, are short. Every universe has a timeline that begins at one point and ends at another. When the end is reached, the timeline resets itself and the events of that timeline are repeated once more. Such is the natural order of the multiverse.
“However, imperfections do exist in this system and this causes deviations to sometimes occur. These deviations may sometimes alter the timeline drastically that the destined ending is not reached and will often draw the timeline to a tragic ending. This is a corruption of the timeline.
“The duty of the Craft family is to observe the multiverse and be vigilant for corrupted timelines. We can fix these things either indirectly, through dealing with threats that the protagonists, or clients as we call them, of the timeline are woefully unprepared for, or directly, by either assisting the clients or inserting ourselves into their party.
“However, not even we can handle our duties perfectly and sometimes the timeline becomes unsalvageable. That is often when we must use our last resort. Something that we call ‘Protocol Zero’ which is when we utterly obliterate the entire universe and force the timeline to reset back to its original form. This does carry its own risks though, as this could potentially erase the entire timeline from the multiverse. Each time we perform this procedure, we take a great risk in erasing timelines.
“Now that you generally know what our family does, now I must tell you where you fall in this. In truth, I was never born with Zerg or Protoss abilities. I was artificially modified against my will by a team of scientists from the last remnants of the Mobeus Corps, much like the group that your templar friend fought before. However the ones who captured me came from a different version of that universe, one where your pony friends did not exist.
“They modified my genes by combining Zerg and Protoss DNA into my genetic code, hoping to create some living weapon that could surpass Amon’s hybrids. While they succeeded in a way, my genetic code became unbalanced because they underestimated the aggressive nature of Zerg DNA. In the end, I was just another infested with psychic powers. While I was still superior to the hybrids, I could not make full use of the Protoss powers within me. The sequences competed and weakened me overall.
“I lost my original powers because of my infestation. I have forgotten what they even were in the first place. It doesn’t matter anyway, my original powers are now lost forever because of my alterations.
“Mobeus didn’t have the means to control me so I broke free the moment I was able. I returned to my family and even found someone to love. I am ashamed that I have forgotten her name after all the eons that I have been alive. I had a daughter with her.
“Sadly, because I couldn’t use my new powers to their full potential, they were inherited by my daughter and she was unable to handle them either. She spent her whole existence as an infested. This power began to feel like a curse.
“However, one day she did find love. She refused to give away his identity but she was able to bear two children for him: you and your twin brother.”
“Wait, I have a twin brother?!” Sophia asked in surprise.
“His name is Sigmund and while he is a strategist like you, it’s not useful in a military setting. He seems to have taken an interest in bounty hunting, but that seems to be more like a hobby while he seems more interested in managing his money. I don’t doubt that he will one day begin a multiversal entrepreneurship. But I digress and you may one day find out more about him if you so desire to return to the family.
“Miraculously, Sigmund didn’t inherit the infestation, while you, sadly, did. I refused to allow the infestation to overtake another of my family, so I used what Zerg powers I could and placed inhibitors on your genetic code to prevent the infestation from overtaking you. However, we underestimated the potency of your psionic powers and I had to place a limiter on that as well. This has caused your Zerg DNA and your Protoss DNA to compete with each other but has also resulted in leaving your human DNA alone while the other two parts are locked in a stalemate.
“Your mother and I hope that one day, you will be strong enough to find harmony between the three parts of you and become the one who will master the power of the three Koprulu forces and end the curse.
“However, my elder sister, who wields the abilities of a powerful shadow demon, asked me why I would limit the powers of my granddaughter when you should be trained to perform her familial duties with the fullest extent of what power you could muster. We got into an argument about it and that eventually turned into a few fights. She began to get more pushy about making me undo what I did to you and let the infestation happen if you were too weak to tame it.
“Neither your mother nor I could take care of you while Suzuka was breathing down our necks. I wanted you to have the option of leading a normal life, at least for a time. Despite the limiters, you are still immortal and if you so choose, you can wander the universe you live in for as long as you would like. I hid you away to live with the Esteeds to keep you out of my foolish sister’s sight. She can be known for being treacherous. It has made her children and her grandchildren untrustworthy in my eyes.
“I hope you can forgive me for being unable to protect you. I couldn’t afford to have her kidnap you and remove your limiters to test your resistance to the infestation. Our family reveres power and wisdom and we must remain strong to carry out our duties. She means well, but her recklessness could have left you with weakened potential.
“As for the Esteeds, they would have had a girl who went by the same name that you do, but I needed you to fit in with them without creating confusion with the naming. I do admit to deleting the original Sophia Esteed and rewriting the memories of the parents. Once that universe resets, the Esteeds will be as they were without you and they will raise the original Sophia Esteed. You may want to take the time to bid them farewell before then.
“At any rate, what you do with your life going forward is your choice, my granddaughter. Not mine, not Suzuka’s, not anyone else. If you choose to live your life without living up to your potential, I will respect that and I will make sure she respects that decision too.
“In the final memory, I will tell you more about your father and give you any final words that I can give.”
The memory ended and Sophia’s consciousness returned to her body. However, she was not done yet. She still had one last memory to see. She took a few minutes to recover from the previous memory.
She took a deep breath and let it out, bracing herself for the last words her grandfather left to her. “Okay I’m ready. Tell me what you haven’t told me yet,” she whispered.
Once more her consciousness shifted to another place. This time it was the same place as before, an empty void with only herself and her grandfather.
“I create this memory on the assumption that you have viewed the other six before this one. I will tell you the things that you need to know going forward.
“As sharp as you are, you have likely already figured out the hint of your true form. Let’s just say that your mother was a lover of furries. At first, your father believed that your mother was some sort of insect anthropomorphic species. Both of your parents had strange tastes and I take no claim in how your mother behaved that way.
“Once this memory ends, your bracelet will come undone and you will return to the form that you were born with. It will take time to adjust to it once more since I did add a means to trick your mind into thinking your current form is natural to avoid that feeling of wrongness most people would feel when they felt like they were in a foreign body.
“But now, I must give you a warning and with this warning, an important choice you will have to make in the near future. The limiters that I have placed upon you give you the chance to live your life away from the influence of the Craft family. While you are immortal, you are still under the radar of the rest of the family. While you are this way, you may choose your own path, but your full potential will be forever sealed away. You will also be unable to inherit my forces and I shall forever remain their leader. A small part of me actually hopes that you choose to do so.” Gerald laughed a little.
“I know that there is one in that universe who is capable of removing your limiters. If you still desire to do so, then your choice is already made. You cannot have your full potential and roam free. The family would not allow a powerful family member to roam the multiverse unchecked. They would perceive you as a potential threat to their duties and would come after you with the intention of eliminating you before you became too much of a threat for them to handle. I dread the extreme measures that we would have to take to contain you and I do not wish this of you.
“If you still desire to have your full potential, then you will have to return to the family and assume your place among us. If not, then this will be the last time we see each other. Your guide (And if it is Thanatas, then you have my sympathies) will not push you into making either decision as is part of their assignment. I have at least convinced the others to allow you to have this choice.
“Your mother and I love you so much and so does everyone else in the family, even if some of them show it in strange ways. I hope you find it in you to forgive Suzuka as well. She means well, but she is a little too eager to get the next generation ready to perform their duties. Regardless, she and everyone else will respect the future you choose.
“Oh, and one last thing before we part ways for what could be the final time, your brother wanted me to tell you to be on the lookout for any store he opens up in the distant future in that universe. He hasn’t named his enterprise yet since he’s still in the process of developing it.
“Anyway, this will either be ‘goodbye’ or ‘until we meet again in person’. Myself and the others eagerly await your decision.”
Sophia’s consciousness shifted once more and she returned to the small house on Vanilla’s bed.
She didn’t get the chance to regain her wits when she felt a small explosion on her wrist that held her bracelet. She looked down at it to find that it became a mess of charred wiring and failing systems. The lock that had been placed on it had come undone and the bracelet fell off her wrist.
Her form flickered and her mind was thrown into complete chaos as memories of her early life began to invade her mind. She clutched her head as she remembered images of Gerald doing something to her, the arguments he had with her great-aunt, everything from her infancy. It surprised her that she could remember things from such an early point in her life.
As the memories flooded into her mind, her body began to experience its own changes. Blue fur began to grow on her body. Her human ears shrank into nothing while longer blue-furred ears grew on top of her head. Her face stretched outward slightly as her nose became smaller and darker. While her features became more akin to that of a rabbit, one feature showed that was very unlike that of rabbits as her teeth became sharper and more pointed.
Once the transformation finished, a thick coat of blue fur covered her body. The fur was a few shades darker than the blue hair on her head, almost indigo. Two long ears were pointed upward, curving back slightly. Her clothes were undamaged as the transformation neither grew nor shrunk her body. Her teeth were sharp enough to tear through flesh like a predator.
Once the flood of memories subsided, Sophia placed her hands on her lap and took a few deep breaths to recover.
“Sophia? Are you alright?” Fayt asked.
“Yeah, thankfully the headache isn’t sticking around.”
“But what about the rest of you?”
“Huh?” Sophia got up from the bed and walked over to Vanilla’s vanity mirror. Her eyes widened in surprise by what she saw. She felt confused by her new look. She knew that she was going to look like a rabbit, but was relieved that she didn’t shrink to Vanilla’s size. She did feel slightly tighter in the chest area though.
Perhaps it’s a credit to her Zerg abilities, but the longer she looked at her new form, the more she came to accept it, though she would have to make adjustments to her clothes later to compensate for the fluffy tail that grew in. She also enjoyed her new dental enhancements. It made her look like a predator who was disguised as a prey species.
“Wow, you actually look pretty hot,” Vanilla complimented.
“So, now that you’re back to being ‘little-miss-monster-bunny’, how about we get out of here and beat an ancient dragon into submission,” Thanatas offered. “I hope he tries to put up a fight, I’ve been hoping for something more challenging than the chumps we’ve wrecked so far.”
Sophia giggled, “You’re planning to show that off to our friends here?”
Thanatas smirked, “You certainly have a good memory if you remember seeing that as an infant. I never expected you to giggle when I tried to scare you with that form.” She paused. “I take it Gerald told you about my grandmother being such a pain in the ass?” Sophia nodded. “Yeah, people like our grandparents can’t keep up with the changing times these days. Only those who can adapt to change have any place in the future. Sure, we need to remember the past and learn from it, but it does us no good if we live in it.”
“True,” Sophia shrugged. “Anyway, let’s go get ourselves a dragon.”
As they were leaving, Twilight and Lyra received an alert on their heads up display. As they read the alert, Twilight’s eyes shrank to pinpricks. “Oh no! Not now! Lyra, we need to get our business done on this planet as soon as possible! We don’t have time to waste anymore!”
“Yeah, let’s deal with the Vendeeni quickly and get these kids to safety while we figure out how to stop this,” Lyra added.
Sophia wasn’t sure what Twilight and Lyra were going on about, but she had a feeling that they were going to find out soon.
One thing was for sure, something terrible had just begun and a powerful new enemy was now on the move.