Chương 41: More Than It Really Is

Day 2 This time we approached the forest from the southern end. Considering its size, it was well hidden, but eventually we found another entrance. Our little excursion proved one theory of mine, that the Blessing was upping the difficulty. But not to match us exactly. Probably it was time-based, or on the average level of the Blessed. Which meant that with both of us being ahead of the curve and working on incredible synergy, I had my four new kills before the sun fully settled.

Created here were mostly more of the same. Stronger versions of regular forest denizens. The demon shape was really built for combat and cost a whopping three ATP to shift into. But it had baseline stats of 10 across the board. Along with natural armor that seemed to stack with my Dense Muscularity bonus. If only it didn't feel so unsettling. It took me a while to catch on, but it caused me to regard Jamie with a very calculating distance. Even more than my human self did.

Which I could have stomached, if it weren't for the cruelty. In the wake of combat it was harder to keep a hold of those instincts and its instinct was not at all to kill. It was to hurt, to strike fear into my foes, to dominate them. Whenever we'd get privacy again I'd have some hard questions for Lucy regarding their pitch and Hell's objectives. A small voice at the back of my head offered the idea that demons were harbingers of sin and only amplified what was already there.

I shut that shape up by getting the next kill as the cassowary and by making it as fast and painless as possible. That cruelty wasn't me. I could do swift. The dire hyena and gnoll shapes killed in exactly the same way. With a strategic bite to devastating effect. When we left the forest we were once more covered in blood, with me in the dire hyena shape. I had also gotten an unexpected Task Reward. I had changed my shape 50 times. That only made sense if it also counted the shifts back into human shape.

But then, why wouldn't it?

"Imagine, just for a second, how horrible it would be if the Blessing didn't give us an endless supply of warm water. I'm taking more showers than ever in my life. And considering what I sometimes got up to, that's saying a lot. This is horrible for my skin," Jamie said. ["I'd rig one up. I'm no plumber, but I'm a genius. If the fire station falls I'll have a shower up and running in under twelve hours. Also you can totally put lotion on the wishlist. Or I can sniff out a store for that right now."]"You know what?

Why not. I do feel like walking a bit more." ["Since when are you avoiding the fire station?"] I set my nose to the wind and set off in a promising direction.

"I'm not avoiding anything. But I feel like chatting, which is easier the fewer people are involved." That suspiciously sounded like a fancy way to say 'we need to talk.' ["Only counting numbers of participants larger than 1."]"I do have a voice in my head, you know?" ["Fair enough."] And we did just chat, about everything and nothing at all. My nose didn't fail us either. I found a fucking Sephora. I swapped out of the dire hyena shape and watched as Jamie plundered just about everything that wasn't nailed down.

"Make-up? For whom would that be?" I asked.

"You, of all people, should understand the value of contingency. And who says it's not for me?"

"Have you ever used make-up?"

"I'll boldly claim—more than you?" I crossed my arms.

"Elaborate."

"You definitely go out sometimes, and probably used make-up there, but not for your office job. And you hate loud places with lots of people, so you don't go out a lot."

"That explains my part of the equation."

"With my less-than-hyper-masculine build and face? There's a lot of money in knowing how to do make-up." That one shut me up real good. I took multiple attempts at replying. Once more, I settled on, "Fair enough."

"Don't look that shocked. You asked for elaboration. I don't usually rub my profession in anyone's face."

"Besides your client's." It felt good to laugh. It had been a while. By the time we were done night had settled. The bats didn't seem to react to our presence on the streets.

"How is your sleep?" Jamie asked.

"Considering the circumstances? Better than ever." If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

"Right? In the hours after this began I thought I'd never sleep a full night again. That Kim's death would haunt my nights forever." I felt my chest tighten. The most innocuous moment kept reminding me of Mike.

"That's the 'cute gun-nut' you mentioned?" I asked.

"Yeah. He pulled me behind him. Saved my life. I completely froze when I saw that demon."

"It was very similar for me. The Wyrm was messing with my phone, Gabriel was urgently trying to get me to act, and I just locked up. Mike didn't. He heard screaming in the hallway and checked it out. And then—" My voice gave out. Tears started welling in my eyes. Would I spend a single day in this apocalypse without crying? Jamie took my hand and stepped in front of me. He was crying, too. He opened his arms to invite an embrace, but waited for my permission.

I stepped forward and pulled him close before I toggled Oath sharing on again. I feared so many emotions from others, but in Jamie I found nothing but shared grief. We stood like that for a while. As his heartbeat calmed, so did mine. Jamie was the one who pulled back first. Which was the moment that his emotional landscape changed. He was worried, bracing himself for something. Here it comes. I was about to toggle the Oath again, when he spoke.

"Please keep that connection going just a bit longer." I tilted my head but stopped and waited.

"I really don't want this to end in a misunderstanding. I'm going to make a promise and I'd ask you to do the same."

"Go on," I said.

"I promise that I won't make more out of"—he gestured between us—"this, than it really is. Can you do the same?" On the one hand I felt a huge relief. On the other hand, I had no idea where this was coming from. I took a step away from Jamie.

"I can. But why ask this now? Did I do something wrong? Did I overstep?" Jamie gave me a sad smile.

"No, Eve. You didn't do anything wrong. It's not just since the Oath that I noticed how scared you would get sometimes. I just want you to know that what we have is good, and won't suddenly turn into something neither of us wants, okay?" I took deep breaths. I hadn't noticed how my body had reacted through all this. He was right. I was scared. I nodded.

"Okay." Jamie started walking again.

"This also doesn't mean we need to be less than we already were. You can always come to me when you need a hug. I'm pretty comfortable being close to friends. Just, you know, keeping the clothes on." I started to feel calmer.

"Got it. You might have noticed that I'm not that comfortable."

"When you are in your human skin," Jamie said. I could hear the smile in his voice.

"Yeah. I may be a bit screwed up."

"If this wasn't the apocalypse and she wasn't keeping her distance, Claire would get a really stern talking-to." I wanted to reflexively defend her. Which was probably just a confirmation of Jamie's point.

"I'll be out for a bit tomorrow morning. Doing her a favor." Jamie laughed.

"Really? What is it?"

"That's hers to talk about. She just needs someone who can fly."

"I'll ask her about it. Can't not."

"Hey, Jamie?"

"Yes, Eve?"

"Wanna see how fast a dire hyena can go while carrying a paladin twink on her back?" For an urban environment, the hyena was a lot more fun than the unicorn. It didn't reach the same speed, but there was no fear of breaking my legs when jumping over and onto cars blocking the path. And thanks to the stupid tackle spell, I could make tight turns and literally bounce off walls, without the risk of dropping Jamie. Instead of quiet prayers, there were screams of joy.

I slid to a halt in the fire station's common room. At this point not many people were around and those who were didn't even have the decency to act surprised at our arrival. Anthony was playing a card game with Constance. Stephen and Liz were on the couch, each reading a comic book with a pile of comic books between them. Ash sat alone at a table with multiple notebooks and his tome.

"Hey folks," Jamie said, while he slid off my back. I dropped the dire hyena shape and greeted the others as well.

"You've been gone for a while," Ash said. There was a bit of relief in his voice.

"Thought I'd run off and joined the demons?" I asked.

"Not exactly that. I'd have expected Jamie's health bar to drop if that happened." I shrugged. I had nothing to say to that.

"You want dibs on the shower?" Jamie asked.

"You sure need it more than I do."

"Yes, please," I said.

"Hold up," Liz said.

"Before you go let me give you something." She got up from the couch, walked up to me and held out her right arm—into which she summoned a weapon. It was one of the polearms some of the royal guard gnolls wielded.

"A glaive?" I asked.

"I don't think the shield is doing you any favors. You like controlling space and this gives you the necessary reach." I took the weapon from her and felt its weight.

"Thanks." So far I hadn't really thought about how to optimize fighting in my humanoid shapes. But right now I was sitting on three of them. The gnoll and demon would probably do better relying on my natural weapon skills. But maybe the kobold? But more important was my mental state while fighting. Liz was right, I liked controlling space. And the moment I couldn't I started panicking.

"Can we train some more tomorrow?" I asked.

"Sure," Liz said. She was already settling back down on the couch. Under the shower I first accepted the 50 shifts Task. [Mercurial Rhythm - Passive Effect: Regenerate 1 ATP every 30 minutes, up to your normal maximum.] Plain and simple, it allowed me a lot more freedom to use those shapes for utility purposes. Which in turn also meant Jamie could smite with more liberty—my Blessed Cup could fill up his Zeal. Then I turned in two of the first kill tasks to get up to level 14. The other two I banked.

The later I turned them in, the more valuable they'd be. With the attribute points I raised Intuition to an effective 16 and Intellect to 15. I was at 17 different shapes. If midnight didn't give me any repeats I'd reach the next threshold on Mind over Matter by expending a mere 3 ATP to cycle through all the new shapes. With the increased attributes that would mean +5 to Strength and Agility in all shapes.

I briefly contemplated staying up until midnight, but with every minute I let myself relax under the scalding water, I felt exhaustion creeping up. It was now pretty precisely 48 hours since the beginning of the end of the world. It felt like a lifetime. Which was strangely calming. A lot had happened in two days. By the end of that 30 day timer, I could raise 18 levels, if all I did was max out the first kill bonuses each day. Level 32 Eve would surely have options to deal with them.