I made some slight changes to the dialogue and edited one of the lines in the last chapter because I forgot that Cassie had a tunic and sandals, and that Nephis was the only one dressed like an OF model.
That's my bad ;-;.
I'm pretty sure that editing the line erased some of the paragraph comments, so if you commented and had it erased while I changed around some of the lines, feel free to repost, and my fault for the inconvenience :/
Hope you guys enjoy!
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[Audun's POV]
I stared at the three in front of me, deadpanning as my heart roared like a V12 engine.
At this point, I was sweating, the horrified and baffled looks of Sunny and the silver-haired girl felt like they were boring holes through my stomach.
Surprisingly, I felt no unease from the other girl, her big blue doll-like eyes completely vacant. Thank god for that, I don't think I could handle any more.
I felt an unconscious urge to run and hide, to escape this awkward situation I had accidentally created.
An imperceptible tremor snaked its way through my entire body, as the excess adrenaline started doing its thing.
My body was already thoroughly exhausted from the strain of carrying that massive sack of supplies. That, coupled with the crippling anxiety and the sheer embarrassment of saying something so, well, out of pocket, was absolutely fucking with me.
I felt like I was about to throw up, shit my pants, and faint all at the same time.
It was definitely an experience, not a pleasant experience, but an experience nonetheless.
3 harrowing seconds passed in complete silence, three pairs of eyes engaged in a deadlock, and my body stopped listening to me entirely.
My stomach churned, and the diabolical smell of Poseidon's nut sack emanating from the supply bag assaulted my nose, only exacerbated my intense nausea.
Intense ringing resounded in my ears, a burning heat spreading across my face, localized around my ears.
The world spun, and in a moment that would unfortunately be burned into the archive of the Star of Memory, I threw up.
My face was still a mask of absolute expressionlessness, my trait preventing me from showing any emotion, forcing my face and body to maintain the dignity of the strongest.
So what unfolded was a rather interesting scene.
In a glorious moment, the contents of my stomach were emptied, the liquid burning as it shot out of my throat, while I stood completely straight, my eyes and expression not betraying the slightest hint of any weakness.
I threw up with dignity, my breakfast and lunch cascading from my mouth, spilling onto my silky brown robes and the ground.
And then, with the grace of an absolute being, I fainted, standing up straight, my body refusing to lower itself before Sunny and the girls in front of me.
I'm definitely not living this one down anytime soon.
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[Sunny's POV]
Out of all the things that I had expected to happen, this definitely wasn't one of them.
I felt confusion on another level, sheer shock and horror from the unhinged behavior of the person before me.
I had expected denial, acceptance, maybe even a debate or a negotiation.
Instead, the moment he saw Nephis and Cassia, he called them hookers, glared at the three of us, somehow threw up with more grace than I could've ever mustered, and then passed out.
There really wasn't a boring day in the dream realm, huh?
Never thought I'd see the day when Changing Star, the last member of the Immortal Flame clan, would be dubbed a sex worker, but here we are.
As me and Nephis watched Audun's body fall backwards, his figure hitting the ground with a thud thudding, the acrid smell of vomit filled the air.
Cassia spoke up for the first time:
"Uh... Is everything alright? Did he agree?"
Forced to answer her question, I responded vaguely.
"Well, he didn't exactly say no."
Cassia looked a little confused, but I decided not to elaborate, in an effort to save my benefactor a little bit of dignity.
Nephis looked over at me, an eyebrow raised.
"Is he... always like this?"
At this I shrugged.
"Well, he sheltered and fed me, so he's not a bad guy... or at least I don't think so."
Still looking a little rattled by the situation, Nephis fidgeted with her revealing seaweed clothing, a small frown adorning her features.
Turning her attention back to Audun's unconscious form for a few seconds, silence pervading the surrounding area, Changing star cleared her throat.
Pointing at the messy scene, she asked:
"So, what do we do about... this?"
A very good question indeed.
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[Audun's POV]
Man, I had this crazy dream about Sunny bringing back a silver haired stripper.
I've had my fair share of weird dreams, but that one's pretty up there.
I know this bodies young and all, but I didn't realize that the hormones would affect my dreams too.
My mind stuttered awake, consciousness returning to my body.
But wait, what's this?
Huh?
Water?
Why can't I breathe???
I opened my eyes, only for a steady stream of water to assault my vision.
Completely caught off guard, my upper body shot up on reflex, my face and clothes completely soaked, my forehead slamming into a patterned blue glass bottle tied to a rope.
Ouch...
Wait.
Why the fuck was I being water boarded?
I jumped to my feet, alert, as the grogginess began to wear off.
I scanned my surrounds, only to find a surprised Sunny, a silver-haired girl wearing some rather revealing siren cosplay, and a blonde haired girl wearing a simple tunic.
They were sitting around the center of my house, a pan sizzling over my fire pit.
The air smelled of roasted meat, smoke, and... vomit?
Oh
Oh no...
Wait
That
That dream
Was real...?
Sunny and the silver haired girl stared at me with a mixture of emotions, but my flaw kicked in before I could put a name to any of them.
[One who Stood at the Peak] chose now of all times to take a break, so I was left to fight off the crippling social anxiety on my own.
A fight that I was losing.
Performing the fastest 180 of my life, I immediately buried my face in my hands, crouching down, trying to hide in a little corner of my house as an unfortunate "eek" escaping my mouth.
Wow, this fucking blows.
My mind raced as I began to relive the absolute travesty that occurred earlier.
Though, as I began to ruminate in the recent embarrassing past, a voice interrupted my rather extreme train of thought.
A familiar voice.
"You ok? We made food if you want some. Thought you might be hungry after uh... emptying your stomach."
Unable to face the group, I pulled the [Thought Quill] out of my soul.
I'm fine
Short and sweet, no room for any further embarrassment.
I continued to manipulate the feather, another set of words materializing in the air.
I'm so sorry
Groaning, I buried my face deeper into my hands.
Behind me, I heard an unfamiliar feminine voice.
"No..."
It's all over
Maybe if I moved fast enough I could escape back to the labyrinth and forget that this ever happened.
You know what?
Maybe I should just end it all, I might get another chance somewhere else, in a place where I haven't dragged my dignity through a field of cow pies.
Should I just kill them?
No witnesses means this situation stays a secret right?
Yeah...
Yeah, let's go with that...
I reached into my soul, grasping the black lusterless Aikuchi that rested inside my vast armory, my heart accelerating as I prepared to draw sword aura from deep within.
"...problem."
What.
My accelerating heartbeat screeched to a halt, my brain processing the words.
Is she making fun of me or something?
The sudden emotional shift seemed to resuscitate [One who Stood at the Peak], the trait roaring back to life as the anxiety and awkwardness faded slightly.
Thank god.
I rose slowly, turning around as a flawless poker face took hold.
Gathering my courage, I began to walk over to the hearth where the group was gathered, and sat down next to Sunny.
The black haired boy shot the silver-haired girl a glare, before turning to me.
Glancing at me, he offered a portion of the abomination meat to me without a word.
The [Thought Quill] trailed behind me, carefully tracing letters in purple as I accepted it.
Thank you
Turning to the two girls, I bowed my head in apology, trying my hardest to convey my sincerity without the use of words.
The feather danced.
You two can stay as long as you like, and I truly am sorry for before.
I could feel everyone's eyes on me, though, the blonde haired girl seemed to be 'looking' at something else.
A flat voice responded.
"Thank you, and it's... fine."
Exhaling mentally in relief, I straightened my body, raising my eyes to meet a pair of aloof gray ones.
Holding their gaze, I caught a glimpse of their... attire, out of my peripheral vision.
Yeah.
That's not gonna fly.
A frown managed to worm its way onto my expression, the [Thought Quill] resuming its movement.
Give me your hand.
At this, the silver-haired girl raised an eyebrow, shooting me a questioning look.
"Why?"
Clothes
She froze, staring at me blankly for a little while.
The fire crackled as she offered me her hand, the action slow and full of caution.
Taking it, I expelled a couple of the memories floating around in my soul, a current of electricity flowing from my body into hers.
Retracting her hand, her eyes betrayed a hint of shock.
I ended up giving her two garment memories and an awakened armor memory as a bonus.
I still felt pretty bad for calling her a hooker, so it was the least I could do to ease my guilt.
It was also a sort of bribe to make sure that this incident never gets out.
White sparks fluttered around her figure, an intricately patterned white Chiton weaving itself loosely on her form. On top of it, a bright yellow Peplos draped itself over the white garments, attatched to her shoulders with gleaming bronze brooches.
While I was satisfied that the modesty of my pure christian home was being upheld, Sunny's face was full of disapointment, something that went unnoticed by the others.
I slapped his back, his expression jolted back to normal as he shot me an embarrased glance.
Deadpanning at his antics, I turned my attention back to my new guests.
Better?
The Silver-haired girl hesitated for a moment a small smile on her face.
"Yes... Thank you."
Speaking of, I was tired of reffering to her as the "silver-haired girl".
Nudging Sunny once more, a small question wrote itself in front of him, tiny words meant for his eyes only.
Coughing into his fist, he began to introduce them, gesturing towards the blonde haired girl who was, to my mild disomfort, staring at me intently.
"This is Cassia, one of the people I met while I was at the Awakened Academy."
Her doll blue eyes were still aimed intently at me, yet it felt like she wasn't exactly *looking* at me, but rather reading something...
Snapping me out of my thoughts, with a mischevious smile, Sunny gestured grandly at the silver-haired girl.
"Audun, this is Lady Nephis, THE Changing Star, one of the only sleepers in history to have granted a true name by the spell in their first nightmare!"
He declared somewhat sarcastically, to the silver-haired girls mild irritation.
I processed the words for a second, were true names really that important?
Nephis looked at me and shrugged.
"Neph."
A small smile cracking through my poker face, the [Thought Quill] scrawled my name out in purple.
Audun.
I bowed slightly in a mock polite greeting.
Nephis nodded her head, acknowledging my introduction silently.
Turning my attention to Cassia, I noticed that she hadn't seemed to register my introduction, infact, she hadn't responded to any of my "dialogue".
Pointing to Cassia, I issued a question.
Is she ok?
Sunny blinked, before stating hesitantly.
"Cassia's flaw took away her sight."
Wait.
If she can't see what I'm writing...
Then how do I communicate with her?
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(A/N: I hope you guys like the chapter, I tried to put a bit more effort into it.
It's around the same length as the one from yesterday, the words coming out easier than I thought.
Did you guys feel like Nephis and Sunny were a bit more 2D in this chapter or was it fine?
I was reading through the earlier chapters of shadow slave to try and accurately recreate Nephis and Sunny's little habits and speech patterns.
Ima be honest though, I had no clue what to do with Cassie. She ended up taking a massive back seat in this chapter because I'm still wondering how i'm gonna approach their interaction, as Audun communicates through written words and she literally can't see.
I set it up in this chapter, but in the next few chapters I'm gonna tackle their interactions and start advancing the actual main story.
Speaking of, I noticed that I sometimes forget to write filler words here and there when writing.
It might be a side effect of reading too much MTL and having my brain just auto filter the sentances, but I genuinley don't even notice the mistakes until I double check it the next day, so if you see any mistakes just drop a quick comment.
Also
I've eliminated Effie from the fml list
I was reading up on social anxiety and peoples experiences with it, and one of the things that was pretty consistent between all of the accounts was their general distaste of people who push boundaries too much, something that Effie does pretty often.
I thought it'd make more sense to have someone that helps allieviate the effects of his social anxiety, someone that he finds comforting, rather then someone as brash and careless as Effie.
So right now I've narrowed it down to too choices.
Cassie or an OC
I might've been unconciously setting up the Cassie route by triggering his flaw via sight, Audun's flaw literally being named [The Weight of their Stares], and even if I were to ignore this convenient wording, people with social anxiety could actually find it easier to talk to a blind person because of their reduced fear of judgment based on appearance or nonverbal cues, as well as the decrease in pressure to maintain eye contact.
I also might just have a thing for blondies,
Anyway, it's either that or I respect the cannon, leave Cassie single, and make up an entirely new character to fit my needs.
Tell me what you guys want, cuz honestly I'm pretty content with both paths, and if you really want Effie or another character, shoot a comment with your reasoning, if it makes sense and enough people support it I'll see what I can do!
I'm also a firm no-harem supporter.
Anyways, thank you guys for the support, and I'll see you next time!)