Chương 162: Unveil

"I have decided that Ly͚sy͚rã shall be allowed within the bounds of the temple." Ta'Stralanov'r's sudden voice startled Nyxala. She bit down on her breakfast a bit too hard. Whatever part of the brick didn't get crushed in her mouth was shot across the room in a spray of shrapnel. The Technocult leader took no apparent notice of her difficulties.

"So long as she remains by your side and is bound to a single instance."

"Really?" Nyxala asked, jumping from her seat.

"Then I'll go find her."

"No need. I've already brought the girl here." Then, with a door opening on its own, a rather unsettled looking Lysyra was there. She rubbed at her wrist. A bulky lump of dark steel stood out from the girl's otherwise bright hair and clothing.

"That little device will keep her safe in lieu of proper registration, but should she decide to make any copies, don't expect our defences to be lenient. I shouldn't have to remind you that the temple is currently in lockdown. Keep an eye on her, and don't cause trouble." With that, Ta'Stralanov'r's voice was gone. Whether she still watched… there was no way to know. Nyxala leapt up to meet her.

"I'm surprised they were willing to listen… even knowing you Invowed." Lysyra raised her eye from the cuff at her wrist, but she never stopped fiddling.

"I guess her knowing is the only reason I was allowed in. Still, would have preferred to go without that intensive inspection."

"Was it bad?" Nyxala asked. Lysyra was silent for a moment, before she grinned.

"You've been stuck in here for a few days now. There's a lot you've missed. Scriptures and Bodytwisters have been gutting each other wherever they cross. Fleshsmiths too, I guess, but most of them aren't as inclined to throw themselves into battle. Their higher creeds are… looking for something." The way she held her smile made it clear the girl knew what. Although the why might still be up in the air. Nyxala rolled her eyes. It seemed that even after Invowing, the girl was still trying to hold things on her.

"Yeah, S͍̾ølą̛́̄n̼̙͈̘̄̍̓͘ found out about me after I opened a Dark Star on her Fleshforge. She's been desperate since."

"You… opened a Dark Star?" Lysyra stared blankly.

"Why does that not seem as obscene as it should?"

"Why would you be surprised when the origin of the Dark Star is scribbled onto your soul?" Nyxala shrugged.

"Come. I trust the Technocult, but I'd rather we talk somewhere where we won't be overheard." Well, at least none besides Ta'Stralanov'r.

"And you'll finally show your mutations?" Nyxala glanced back, questioning the enthusiasm she'd heard in the girl's voice. But Lysyra's face was a stone as Technocultist. She quirked a brow, before moving on.

"Sure." ❖❖❖ A few minutes later, Nyxala and Lysyra stood on the edge of a platform deep below the Technocult Temple. She'd lived here only a few days now, and yet she'd already discovered so much empty space that simply never saw a Technocultist eye. The main cathedral seemed to be where most spent their time. Only for maintenance or installation of machinery did they leave. There were all sorts of towering structures surrounding the cathedral. Machines of one sort or another.

Most of which she didn't have access, or more likely, didn't know how to access. One place she had found rather useful was the storage below the warehouse that acted as the Temple entrance. With so much space only filled by racks of storage that sunk to the ends of her sight, it had become something of a testing grounds for her flight. She had been… a touch more careful of causing any more accidents. With the screeching of rails around them, Nyxala deactivated the concealer. She extended her claws.

From their hidden place in her forearm, five twenty centimetre blades slid through her palm and fingers, splitting the doll-like plating of each. The unfurled segments braced the backs of each blade, creating what was far closer to shears with five-points than anything resembling a hand. Lysyra was already staring. She hadn't noticed the claws; her attention was squarely on the three pairs of antennae poking from the sides of Nyxala's head.

She dropped her hood, and took some gratification from the way the girl's eyes widened further as she saw just how strange her hair was. As far as she was concerned, Nyxala had always been a brunette. Deciding to mess with her slightly, Nyxala sliced off half her shoulder length hair, and tossed it at her. Lysyra blinked, catching the mass of semi-translucent glacial blue mould with a question clearly on her lips. It was lost, as she finally took in the claws.

Nyxala snipped them as loudly as she could, startling Lysyra with just how deadly they sounded. The girl flinched slightly, and that's when found a certain little aspect of Nyxala's hair. Her hands were bound. In only a few seconds, the hair had weaved between the girl's fingers, locking them together and refusing to let go no matter how much the girl struggled.

"I knew you were weird," Lysyra said. Why does she sound vindicated? Nyxala narrowed her eyes, but it was lost on the girl before her. Maybe I should leave the mould to grow a bit longer. Lysyra tugged at the mould a bit more, but she didn't seem to mind it as much as Nyxala hoped. Her gaze trailed up, and lingered on Nyxala's mouth. She saw the question coming a whole second before it was asked. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"Smile a bit for me, won't you?" With a sigh, Nyxala did her one better. She opened her jaw until it buckled and widened beyond its natural limit. Lysyra got a full view of both front and back rows of razor sharp teeth before Nyxala lolled her tongue out through the gap, and widened her second maw as well. A single drop of saliva slipped from the appendage, and immediately melted through the floor.

"Damn. Your mouth is more dangerous than Ep̽'N̺an̺o͐r̔sc͈hi̫͑ 's," Lysyra said, waving away the smoke. Nyxala scowled and snapped her jaw shut.

"Well? Come on, show the rest. I already felt those feathers, and I need to know what slimy nastiness you're hiding in those boots. Don't think I can't see something shifting under your cloak."

"You know, I suddenly don't feel all that interested in sharing anymore." Nyxala huffed, her dual tone returning after so long, and went to jump off the ledge. She only stopped short when she realised that meant showing her wings. Lysyra's expression flipped from engrossed and teasing to pleading in a heartbeat.

"Aw, you know I didn't mean it." Her sickly sweet tone irked Nyxala for an entirely different reason.

"…well, I did, but only in the sense that they're better for tearing Bodytwistesrs with." Nyxala laughed. A single puff of a chuckle echoing even before it left her mouth.

"I think I'd rather avoid using my teeth when cutting them down." The girl besides her didn't say anything, but her eyes gave away her doubt. Just because she had the jaw of a dangerous predator didn't mean she had to rely on them. Using them would mean more human flesh on her tongue. Ignoring the insinuation, Nyxala decided to just unveil the rest all at once, rather than drag this out and let Lysyra make any more snappy comments.

As she hooked a claw through the mould of Lysyra's wrists, she mentally commanded it to release. It pulled free easily. With no other use for it, she shoved it back onto her head. The mass added to the rest of her hair less than cleanly, but within the day it would be forced back into its semi-neat cut she kept trimmed to her shoulders. With a flourish that made her feel a little silly, Nyxala whipped off her new cloak. Wings, tentacles, tail, and her sternum eye all unveiled to Lysyra.

Pushy immediately shot down to undo the buckles of her boots, and she stepped out. Well, more like slipped out. Her liquid feet flowed over the high edge of their containers like a viscous waterfall. Now unbound by secrecy or cloak, both Curious and Cuddly rushed towards Lysyra. Nyxala really should have expected that. Curious dodged Lysyra's fingers to poke at the first non-enemy it was allowed to touch, going so far as to tousle the girl's hair and poke at her sternum, where there wasn't an eye like Nyxala's.

Cuddly embraced the girl's touch. While Lysyra feathered her hand along the strange texture of the tentacle, Cuddly wound around her arm. Nyxala glared at the two. Traitors. She was about to jerk away when Shy — Shy of all the tentacles — crept forward. Its apprehensive crawl made Nyxala shudder in embarrassment. Lysyra had no way to know the tentacles held some degree of autonomy. The feeling hyper-inflated when Lysyra accepted the hesitant limb with a shit-eating grin up at Nyxala. That was the last straw.

She commanded the three back, and stopped Pushy from joining them. Shy and Cuddly acquiesced easily, slipping under her robe and hugging her stomach, but Curious was being fussy. The limb couldn't disobey her, but Nyxala could feel the desire to poke and prod in its reluctant return.

"Damned things," she muttered. But as much as Nyxala wanted to dump the blame of this chagrin on her tentacles, they only acted on emotion. Emotion… that was her own. Nyxala had spent so much time hiding herself, and now she had the opportunity to show who she was before someone she knew she could trust. Her tentacles had only latched onto that feeling. Shy would never have left her robe otherwise. The way her tentacles expressed her desire might be… a bit more direct than she'd like, but it was her desire.

Now that Lysyra could see her in her true glory, she wasn't ashamed. She wasn't shy or self-conscious. This was what she was — what she was meant to be — and it felt thrilling to finally proclaim herself to someone she wasn't planning to butcher. Her wings stretched. Her tail swayed behind her. Her slime… well, it dribbled across the platform, but it did so with pride.

"You can fly," Lysyra said.

"I mean, unless those wings and tail are for decoration?" Nyxala grinned.

"Better than you could imagine." She turned her back, straightening. Her tail slid across the ground to accommodate the shift in weight. She crouched, and leapt into the air. The thrust of her tail threw her far higher than her tentacles could have managed. Nyxala shot upward, entirely in control of her heading despite the wings folding into her side. The tail that trailed behind her was far better at control than the mutation they shared a plumage with. Two days she'd had to practice flight with the new tail.

Two days was enough. At the peak of her arc, Nyxala's wings snapped wide. They beat. Her tail cracked in conjunction, slapping at void as if she were a dolphin. The wide fluff of feathers on the limb longer than herself weren't just for show. It was as if she had an entire additional wing. One attached to a whip at that. The combination doubled the acceleration she could manifest with her wings alone. Nyxala caught Lysyra's eye only an instant before she rocketed below the ledge of the platform.

The girl couldn't hide her awe. Maybe, under normal circumstances, she'd assume it was just the Invow instilling that reaction. But right now, she didn't care. The pride in her flight made her relish the wide-eyes of the other girl. Her tail twitched, and she shot under the platform. Around a stack of grenade-shaped objects. Through a hanging chain. Nyxala shot up, and behind Lysyra, barely brushing her with her feathers. Despite how heavy the tail was, it hadn't impacted her aerial mobility.

In fact, the length had only improved it. Before her first flight post mutation, it had been a legitimate fear. Especially after she'd taken a power hit to create O̅s̫stho̲th. Whether the name would prove itself worth the loss was still to be seen. While the weight of her tail had altered her centre of mass, and therefor forced her to readjust her stance, the difficulties it had introduced into her fighting style were not insurmountable.

But until she could get out and fight, she was limited in the ways she adjusted to the tail. She had been frustrated, but now that Lysyra was here, that concern was gone. She simply enjoyed the opportunity to show off. She could worry about getting out there and relearning how to fight later. Nyxala made her way down the line of moving storage shelves until she felt she had enough room to work with. She turned, and beat both wings and tail with everything she had. Her body lurched forward with each beat.

Rhythm strengthened her body, thrusting her forward even faster. Lysyra saw nothing but a streak of black and red, and Nyxala was already gone. With a twist of her wings, her tail swung low. All feathered limbs beat against her flow of momentum. Unfortunately, she could not bring herself to a dead stop. It took just as long to slow as it had to gain speed. In the future, she needed a better way to slow down from immense speeds than her wings. Her claws would be a good start.

When she returned to Lysyra, the girl was on the balls of her feet, leaning at the verge of her platform. Even if she was only allowed this one reflection, it appeared she had ingrained herself with a lack of fear. If she lost that cuff, Nyxala wasn't so sure Ta'Stralanov'r would be so kind as to grant another.

"After showing off like that," Lysyra said.

"You are giving me a ride."

"…no?"

"I guess you don't want to hear any of the information I've gathered on that sceptre of yours then?" Lysyra stepped forward, a knowing grin on her face.

"Shame." She fell.

"I could have just ordered you to tell me," she shouted after the falling girl.

"Too late!" The yell trailed off as the distance grew.

"Fucking…" Nyxala let out a groan and raced after her. Lysyra was getting what she wanted. And who was supposed to be the devotee in this relationship?