5.14 – Persistent

5.14 – Persistent

The realization was stunning, mostly because Zoey thought her shards were, well, her own. She hadn’t known that other wayfarers could enter them—or rather, she had thought the shard would reshape itself to become normal again. But maybe it didn’t work like that. Maybe Zoey’s presence permanently altered them. Maybe once Mel had gotten a taste of the ‘more fun’ way to fight, she would start integrating those challenges as a permanent feature. Zoey really needed to talk to that slimegirl as soon as possible.

“So you have been to one,” Helena asked, leaning forward, somehow even more interested in this topic than the corrupted ones. For that matter, Helena probably thought the two shards were related—corrupted in different ways, but from the same root cause. The so-called ‘punishment from the gods’. Zoey obviously knew better. “What was yours like? Did it include a clone?”

For the second time, Zoey was sent reeling. A clone? Not-Zoey? That was the shard Helena was talking about?

“It did!” Helena said, reading Zoey’s reaction. To be fair, Zoey was so caught off guard she’d had no hope of masking it. She was still stumbling to orient to the swerve in conversation. She’d come here hoping to find someone who knew more about the corrupted shards, and while that goal seemed to have failed, she’d found someone who’d been to a lewd shard—which was its own stunning piece of information. “And did it take your own shape?”

“I—I can’t believe you’ve also been. Sorry. Give me a second.” Zoey took a moment to organize her thoughts. Should she talk with Helena about this? There didn’t seem to be any major reason not to. Maybe Helena could shed some light on something—though Zoey couldn’t imagine what. But even if Zoey couldn’t get any practical information, she was curious what Helena’s trip through a lewd shard had been like. “Yes, it did,” Zoey finally settled on. “It mirrored my own body. The reflection.”

“Yes! A reflection. That’s what she called herself. You really were there. And did she—”

Helena paused, then blushed.

“Well, you know.” She gestured down at her crotch. “Have that for you, too?”

Zoey stared at her. She could pick up the implication. In Zoey’s situation, Not-Zoey had actually lost her bonus equipment. It seemed when she’d formed an encounter with Helena, she’d gained it instead.

“Yes,” Zoey answered—skipping the technical correction. “This is crazy. I can’t believe you’ve been there.” It also provided some good news—it meant Helena was either second or third advancement, but probably not higher, since Not-Zoey’s shard had been second. It seemed unlikely a fourth-advancement would be delving something so low. Though, could shards reshape their difficulty? The exact mechanisms of shards were hardly a well-understood topic, much less to Zoey, a foreigner.

“I can’t believe you have,” Helena said. She was the most excited she’d been since the start of this conversation—she had mostly seemed to be tolerating Zoey’s talk of the corrupted shard. Helena glanced at Jacquelyn—Delta—as if remembering they had company, then paused. “Give us privacy, please, Jacquelyn.”

Delta hesitated, sharing a look with Zoey. Delta had obviously also been shocked at the development, though standing behind Helena, hadn’t been seen. Zoey had needed to stalwartly avoid looking at her to avoid giving anything away. At Delta’s concerned look, Zoey imperceptibly nodded at her partner, and Delta said, “Of course. I’ll be right outside.”

When the door closed, an animated Helena turned back to Zoey. “So. Did you?”

“Did I ...?”

“Well, you know. Take up her offer.”

“Her offer?”

“Surely it was the same. An easier boss fight in return for—you know?”

Zoey’s eyes widened. “Did you?”

Helena laughed. The stoic woman’s walls were quickly breaking down. She’d been somewhat stiff during the previous talk, but this one had animated her.

“I couldn’t talk about this with anyone, obviously,” Helena said. “Even the Church elders. I gave them my report, but—someone who’s actually been, it’s different. Liberating, I suppose?” She grinned at Zoey. “And you did take her up on the offer, I can tell by that reaction. Good for you. How was it?”

“How was it? Um, fun?”

“May I?” Helena asked.

“Go ahead? But, uh. They’re clean now, but they’ve been, you know. Used.”

Helena only smirked at the warning. “Can’t say I blame you. I bet the effect is quite potent. That shard in general seemed generous.”

“It’s definitely one of the better items we’ve found.” The sex items as a whole had non-stop astounded Rosalie, and Zoey knew Rosalie was a hard woman to impress in wayfaring topics.

Helena took out one of the larger buttplugs, then inspected it. She shook her head, equally incredulous and amused, turning it back and forth as she looked it over. Eventually, she set it back in.

She gave Zoey an interested look. Considering Helena’s eagerness to talk about this—and excitement when mentioning what she’d been through—Zoey wasn’t surprised to see interest of that sort creeping in. She opened her mouth to say something, a teasing smirk starting to curl her lips, but before she could get out whatever she had planned to say, the door slammed open, and Delta rushed back in.

As in, Delta.

Orange-haired fox girl.

Who should very much be tied up in the utility room.

“Change of plans,” she said breathlessly. “We gotta get the hell out of here.”

And she’d swapped back to her original body? So Jacquelyn was back in her own too?

Zoey and Helena had both bolted to their feet on Delta’s sudden arrival. Helena was completely caught off guard, and Delta didn’t waste the opportunity. Neither did Zoey—her wayfaring instincts were becoming at least somewhat honed, and she snatched the butt plug collection off the table and deposited it into her inventory.

“Follow me,” Delta said, before taking an inspired path out of the building. Which was to say, she leapt through the window. Glass shattered, and the orange-haired foxgirl disappeared over the ledge. Zoey understood why in the next moment—several black-masked Church members rushed through the door, only seconds behind Delta. One was Jacquelyn, looking furious.

What the hell had happened?

Zoey didn’t bother worrying about that; their masquerade was clearly up. She followed Delta through the broken window and out into the alleyway. She’d never jumped through a window before, and was worried about broken glass—but that was a mundane sort of worry, Zoey realized, not something a third-advancement wayfarer had to concern themselves with, even without a physically focused class.

She managed to stick the landing, then followed a sprinting Delta down the alleyway, headed for the streets proper. They were lucky the meeting room had been situated as it was; if it’d been deeper in the building, not on the edge, then escape would have been more complicated.

Though there were still complications; Helena, a wayfarer of some accomplishment herself, was also out the window in the next moment. Zoey thought she was also a third-advancement, so out running her was going to be tricky. It might even turn into a fight.

“Stop! Where are you going?”

Zoey almost paused, and not because of the authority in Helena’s shout, but the confusion and even panicked disappointment. She’d found someone who knew about the lewd shards and had wanted to talk with Zoey more—and possibly do a few things other than talk, from how quickly the mood inside that room had been shifting.

Either way, Zoey couldn’t explain. She didn’t think Helena would be understanding about Delta having borrowed Jacquelyn’s body to earn an easy audience with her. It hadn’t been some horrible crime—and Zoey hadn’t even learned anything important from Helena, besides the accidental reveal of lewd shards working for other wayfarers—so she doubted there would be a massive Church grudge against them, though probably a small one. Still, best not to find out; she and Delta needed to disappear.

Legs pumping as she sprinted wildly down the alleyway, Zoey fled The Church of the Shattered Sphere, a confused Helena pursuing.