The Next Chapter: 18

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The Next Chapter
Chapter 18: How Do You Like It?

"Oh. wow!"

The pale young woman stared impassively back as Tokanwa leaned in slightly to get a better look at her eyes. "Can you see through those?"

"Yyyeeeah?"

"That's amazing! I've never seen pitch black irises before. Though, now that I'm looking a tad closer, your pupils are a tiny bit darker still." She stood upright again. "I wonder if your epidermis is anything like a demon's—like, an actually different pigment, since it's definitely not an unhealthy complexion?"

"I appreciate a curious mind, but I'm not a science project, you know."

"Oh! Whoop, sorry. I'm Tokanwa," the werewolf introduced herself, shaking the shorter girl's hand. "You're Mary, right?"
"Guess you've heard of me, then."

"Uh-huh! Nice to meet you."

"..Same. But I think we're supposed to be going to the dining room now."
"Oh—right, right!" She hurried off that way, and the goth girl shuffled along slowly behind her.

"Okay, everyone—this is Ulrich." She heard Nancy's voice from inside the door, and opened it to find her gesturing at an unfamiliar guy standing next to her. "He says he wants to join up, so I offered to let him meet everyone this afternoon to see whether he'd be a good fit."
"Hi!" the guy waved. "Pleased to make you guys' acquaintance."

L'hoxifel was busy carrying dishes full of food out of the kitchen, and behind her—helping with the same task—was a brown-haired wolf-man who had to be Ed. The rest of OZK's members, aside from Mary, were seated at the table already. Tokanwa had had a chance to meet most of them already, but the two-tailed kitsune sitting across from Jay was new to her. They said their hellos to the newcomer while the werewolf went to take an open seat near the middle of the table, and Mary entered after that. Pretty soon everything was ready, and they were invited to tuck in.

The demon-girl's cooking was as delicious as it had smelled, of course. The whole group seemed like a lot of fun, some of them quiet and pensive while others were rowdy and energetic. Ulrich seemed to fit in with the latter crowd, and made no secret of wanting to join specifically so that the house's magic would turn him into a girl. Tokanwa thought this might be a kindred spirit—at least in that regard—and got into talking with him a little bit more. It turned out his desires were more practical than mere curiosity, but he didn't deny having at least a little bit of the latter anyway.

Someone asked Tokanwa about her major, and she energetically talked about some lab work she'd been doing recently. After a little of that, Nancy interrupted her by saying, "Uh, you like to work out too, right?" It turned out Camilla and Rob the cat-boy were on a basketball team, so the three of them talked about exercise routines and sports teams for a bit. Her ears could pick up some bits of other conversation along the way: Ulrich talking with Ed and Jay about video games, Polaris talking some kind of magic jargon with Kyosuke, and so on.

Near the conclusion of the meal, Ulrich said, "So—hey..what do you guys think? Do I pass? Can I join?"

A number of voices gave their various sorts of assent; Mary nodded. "Seems so," Nancy concluded once the noise died down.

"In that case, is anyone free tomorrow morning? As in, bereft of classes? I shall apparently have need of a chaperon to help buy garments and other necessities. It's crucial that I start living here as soon as possible!"

"Uh...why?" Ed asked.
"I must try out for that part tomorrow! Before the doors begin to shut on this glorious opportunity!"

"Well um..I guess, I don't have a class 'till one," he admitted.

"Anyone else?" Nancy asked the whole group. Tokanwa figured she wasn't really being asked, considering she wasn't even a member yet, and so kept quiet—not that she was free anyway. After a second or two of silence and/or head-shaking, she said, "Well, seems like you're up, Ed—if you don't mind helping us out a little. I'll give you the card and instructions later on~!"

"Uh..s-sure."

"Okay!" Jay suddenly stood up. "Anyone who wants to—let's play Smash!" she pumped her fist high into the air, as if this was a meaningful declaration.

"Uuhh.." Tokanwa's confusion as to what the phrase 'play smash' meant was matched by that of around a quarter of the others in the room.
"It's, a fighting game," Ed explained, his tone betraying a tiny bit of annoyance at Jay's failure to give any context. "Video game. Like, four-player competitive. Easy to pick up and play. There're some copies and consoles in the 'arcade', plus enough TVs..."

"Yeah! I'm so in," Ulrich said.

"I shall demonstrate my superiority easily!" Polaris announced.
Mary mumbled "You wish" in her characteristic monotone immediately after that.

"I, guess it sounds like fun?" Tokanwa said. "As long as it's really that easy to figure out."
"It should be," Camilla said. "I'll help you figure it out."

"I'll join second round," Ed added after most of the other members had announced intentions to participate. "Gonna, help with the dishes here first..."

Ultimately, Tokanwa's efforts to play this game amounted to largely—in the gamer vernacular—"button mashing". She still won several matches, however, thanks to Camilla helping her pick a good fighter for a beginner to play as. Ed showed up in female form around the third round, a slight blush on her cheeks, and seemed too flustered to play very well for her first couple of games. And by the end, Mary went completely undefeated, even coming out on top in a three-on-one match against the night's runners-up. It probably helped her that Polaris didn't seem to want to be a team player with those other two.

All in all, it was a fun evening. She did eventually need to say her goodbyes and head out to her apartment. Her things weren't going to pack themselves, after all!

---

After their tour of OZK's house, Alyssa and Beth headed to a Chinese restaurant in easy walking distance to get supper together. "Hey.." Alyssa asked once they'd been walking for a minute or two. "When you saw that...thing, coming out of Mary's back. Weren't you—weren't you terrified?"
"Uhhh, no? I mean—it was kinda freaky looking, but nothing to be scared of, really...considering the context. Heh, I thought it was kinda funny. Polaris must be enough of a jerk to deserve that kinda treatment sometimes, so if anything it's like, a good thing someone's around to keep her in line."

"Hmm." Alyssa thought carefully about how seeing it had made her feel. It wasn't that there was something conceptually scary in front of her, but her body had gone into fight-or-flight paralysis before the sight had even fully registered, and then her mind had followed suit. "Beth...I'm pretty sure, you actually passed a will save back there."
"What, really? Huh."

As they continued, they passed a couple of guys talking. "I'm telling you, man! A house full of cute girls! Full of them!" One of them was trying to convince the other of something, his body language animated and ecstatic.
The other one sighed, just seeming annoyed. "Whatever, man...I guess it takes that many to think you'd have a chance with one."

"Hey, c'mon, that's a low blow!"

"Well, I'm still not over the..."

They turned a corner out of earshot at about this point. "Do you think..?" Alyssa asked.
"Yeah. Don't know of any other thing that could really be about."

"Surely they'd reject someone with intentions like that."
"I dunno. You can't judge a book by its cover, right?"
"...Maybe not..."

Finally, they got to the front of the place, and the third member to join their eventual group. "H-hi," he said, waving. Zurik was a fellow freshman, a guy so short and scrawny that it seemed like puberty had forgotten to finish its job before he turned eighteen. He had black hair, blue eyes, and a generally nervous disposition—like how Alyssa was around strangers, only with everyone instead. She'd felt a certain empathy toward someone like that hoping to meet people and come out of his shell through DND, and had agreed to let him join the group on that basis alone.

"What do you uh..th-think? I-is the place any...any good?"
"It is pretty sweet," Beth said, giving a thumbs-up. "Plus we've got at least two more players."

"This should be an interesting group so far," Alyssa said. "And they'll let us use the space as 'guests' even if we don't join."

"Th-that's great!" The three of them headed inside to eat together and discuss the details.

---

The group cleared out fairly quickly—those who weren't off to play going elsewhere—and it wasn't long before Ed was left alone with L'hoxifel in the kitchen, working together to get the last few dishes into the dishwasher.

"So...uh..."
"You decided on a male form!" She stood up, pre-empting him, and waved her arms up toward him. "Heehee—sorry. I didn't get a chance to say much in all that noise, but you look great like that, Eddy~."
"Oh..um, g-good. I guess...it's still slightly weird, having fur, but I'm also just so used to it already..."

"Soo—!" She knew he was just babbling, and that it was fine to just interrupt him. She was leaning forward and slightly up with a grin. "I think I might like wolf-boys after all~. Let's finish up here and go somewhere with comfier seats."

"Uh...s-sure." Ed realized at this point that he actually was more used to how a girl's body reacted to someone cute flirting with 'her' than how his was reacting to that same stimulus now. His heart racing and tail wagging were nothing new, though.

The demon-girl grabbed his hand once they were done and led the way to the lounge (which was unoccupied) and then over in front of one of the couches. She reached her arms up toward him with an expectant expression. "Um.." Hoping he interpreted this correctly, Ed gently picked her up into a hug, and immediately she started petting his ears and sliding her tail on his! "Rrrufh!"

"Awwh~, that's kinda cute too," she mumbled in his ear once he started nuzzling her. "Ye~esss, I could get used to this~."

"Mmh...mrrrfh...!" While this still felt very good, he was getting a mounting urge to...

After a while, Ed pulled his head back a bit. L'hoxifel did the same, stopping when they could see into each other's eyes. "Fel. C-can um..could we..?"
"Yeah!" she seemed to read his mind, and enthusiastically pressed her lips into his. So he kissed her back, giving fully in to that urge. One of his hands was on the back of her head, pushing her toward him, and he found himself feeling unusually aggressive, not letting her out of it the first time she moved to try. The second time, he'd recovered enough self-control to pull out with her and let both of them catch their breath.

"Pffh...hahah..hffh...heehee..!" She giggled incoherently in between breaths. Ed thought he was hyperventilating at first, but it seemed like it was just a 'part-canine' thing to pant this fast. "Where've you been..haa~aahff..hiding that!?"

"Um..w-well, I've never kissed anyone before, s-so.."

"You're good at it, Eddy," she said, running a hand up and down his cheek, through the beard. "Again? One more?"
"Uh, s-sure...!"

She didn't want out of this one, it seemed. The demon-girl pushed so hard into him that he fell backwards and wound up sitting on the couch—which, maybe, explained why she'd maneuvered them to in front of one in the first place. Ed had to be the one to decide that they needed to come up for air, and was left gasping for breath even longer than the first time.

"Hffffh...." L'hoxifel's hand slid down his arm to hold one of his, her fingers tracing the edge of the ring currently keeping him male. "Eddy...I know it's greedy of me, but. I kinda want it both ways? Can I, take this off for a bit?"
If anything, this offer was something of a relief. After that second kiss, Ed's body was reacting like it wanted to do something...much more extreme than he felt anywhere near ready for. "S-sure, Fel," he nodded. "Um—d-don't lose it, though."
"I'd never!" She protested, sliding the ring down his finger and then seeming to let go of it. He didn't hear it hit the floor, but there were very swiftly other things to think about.

Ed, of course, began rapidly shrinking and shifting from the instant the ring was off. Only a couple of seconds changed him back into a girl (a soft "Aa~ah!" coming out of her mouth at that moment), and within a couple more her breasts pushed out to their usual size, pressing into the other girl's pair. L'hoxifel grinned at her for a moment, stroking her cheek again with a hand.

"Mm~mh...mrrfh." She felt like...reciprocating this gesture. It was a show of affection, after all. Ed pulled one hand from around the other girl's back to try to touch her cheek back, and bumped it clumsily into one of her horns instead. "Uh—sorry."
"Pffhaha~! Y-you can touch it if you wanna," she said, her face flushing redder than before.
"N-no, I mean—I was going for your cheek, s-so."
She grinned. "Touch it."
"O-okay!"

She gently slid her hand up and down L'hoxifel's horn for a moment. Its surface was largely smooth, with horizontal ridges that seemed to divide one section from the next. The end was a spike, but looked sharper than it felt. The demon-girl shut her eyes, smiling and letting out a soft "Mmm~mmh.." Eventually she pushed herself forward enough to press a nose into Ed's cheek and started petting the wolf-girl again.

For a few minutes, Ed lost track of time, and just enjoyed herself. She hadn't really...fully accepted how nice this kind of thing could feel for a girl until now. But something about L'hoxifel saying she liked 'both', the fact that she could turn back whenever now, made it feel like simply enjoying it wasn't going to trap her.

By the end of this, she was on her back with L'hoxifel on top of her. "Heh...this's nice, Eddy~," she said quietly. "We'd better stop before someone comes looking for you, though."
"Um..rr~rufh...y-yeah.." As soon as the demon-girl had pushed herself up enough to see her face, Ed gently placed a hand on one of her horns again. "Th-thanks, Fel."
"Oh?" She blushed brightly again, a terribly cute expression overall. "Heheh...n-no problem! Anytime!"

---

"I think I have a solution. Hopefully." Fritz had classes earlier on Tuesday morning than her roommate did, but they had agreed to wake up at the same time to try to sort out the 'Hendrix being turned into a dog-girl' problem. Even if the victim didn't seem to really consider it a problem.

"Sweet!" She gave an encouraging grin and a thumbs-up. "What've you got?"

"I've...hopefully..figured out how the ring works. To turn me back. So, I'll just..try to do that. Hold still..."

The blue-haired girl held up her right hand like she was getting ready to throw a baseball; a small ball of sparks gathered into the area that ball would be. Then she gently "tossed" it forward, and the ball floated over to the dog-girl's chest. She jumped slightly at the moment of impact. Then..

"Whoa...aa~aah..heheh! I think i~it's wo~orking..!" It took ten or twenty seconds, but by the end of it, Hendrix's body and clothes were back to normal—he was the same man he'd been before last night's accident. "Cool! You can just do that now! Isn't that awesome!?"

"I..guess so. But, uh, there is a problem." Felix took a moment to slip the actual ring on her own finger; standing across from her objectively handsome roommate as a girl was already feeling very awkward.

"Yeah?"

She waited out the transformation before continuing. Then he said, "Well—this ring would come off if I fell asleep with it on..and then I'd just turn back into a girl. So—I'm pretty sure that will go away if you go to sleep."
"Ah. Well, that's kinda inconvenient."
"...Sorry. I don't really know what I'm doing," Fritz admitted. "But—when they get someone to help me go permanently back to normal, I can take you along, and hopefully they can do something for you, too."

"Heh, well—'till then, I guess it's better if we both sleep as chicks anyway," Hendrix said. "But no napping in class for the next couple days, huh?"
"Not if you don't want to have some really awkward conversations."

---

Here it is! The first chapter of this story to not feature an image. But I don't consider that a huge deal. I think we're close to an average of 3 images per part anyway, and that was never really the most important thing. The next couple of parts will continue to have images, though.