We woke up at the same time, completely in sync and all tangled up together like usual.
Elyra yawned and Vespera moaned some complaints about having to get up from the comfortable, warm cocoon of sheets, while I pulled myself up until I was half sitting against the wooden wall of our room. They remained sprawled on the bed, naked, wrapped around my legs like they were pillows.
"You managed to trick me again last night," I said with what I hoped was a stern face.
Elyra shrugged, moving my hand to her back. No, to her wings. She made me touch her glassy feathers and rub them.
Vespera made little circles with her tail on my chest. The appendage left a trail of lubricating liquid that Elyra sometimes licked either from my skin, or by swallowing the tail whole and making the demon moan in pleasure.
"What you gonna do about it, spacer boy?" she asked me.
"Nothing," I said. "I love you, Vespera. I don't want you to ever change."
She stared at me with big, wide eyes that quickly grew wet with tears. I kissed her tenderly.
Turning around, I took Elyra's face in my hands and lifted her chin until she was looking at me. She was already crying. "And you too, Elyra. I love you. I cannot imagine living a life without you."
They hugged me, crying into my chest. I let them, playing with their hair and massaging their bodies.
"We are yours. You are ours, spacer boy."
"All ours, Sol. Forever."
"Forever," I said. "I'm still mad at you, though."
"Well, too bad. We gotta wake up and select more skills," Vespera said. She hopped to her feet and with a puff of magic, her armor manifested around her. "Come on!"
She dragged us out of bed. Elyra and I glared at her.
"It is unfair that you can get dressed so quickly," the angel said.
I agreed. "And my clothes are all drenched. Your fault, Vespera!"
The demon looked at the still wet puddle on my pants. Her doing, last night. "Oops," she said, covering her face with a hand to hide her grin. Her magic snaked out and made all traces of our lascivious activities disappear.
I shook my head at her antics. Elyra was glaring at her. She met the gaze but was the first to break down.
Soon, we were all laughing. When the laughter died down, and we were all dressed, the girls sat on the edge of the bed with me. Their emotions were a storm that churned and roiled.
"Do you really mean it," Vespera asked, surprisingly vulnerable. "When you say that you love us?"
"Of course," I said.
Elyra took my hand in hers, playing with it and kissing it on the back. "I know it might be early to say such things but… it made me so happy. And I know it is true. You really do love us."
"We have the bond, little angel," the demon said. "We already share more of each other than normal people who might have been together for decades."
"Yes. That is true…" she began, then trailed off. I knew she wanted to say something, but there was a heavy lump in her throat.
Vespera grabbed her face and forced her to look at me. "Say it, Elyra. Or I will beat you to it."
"Do you not want to?" she asked, perplexed.
"Oh, you bet I do."
"Then why—"
"—because it would be unfair. I'm brazen, I take what I want, I'm impulsive. You aren't."
"I want you to be you, Vespera."
I nodded. "So do I."
"Then I want us to say it together," she declared. "Right now."
Elyra was suddenly scared. "Right now?"
"There is no better time," the demon said.
Elyra took a breath. Her eyes sought mine and we were lost in each other's gaze.
"No, that won't do," she said. "Let us share minds."
"Share, as in you hop into me?" I asked.
"No," she said in a small voice. "All of us, together."
I didn't think it was possible. It happened anyway. For a moment, and only one moment, we all were in each other's minds. All three of us. We looked at each other from three points of view, a triangle where all the lines touched all the vertices.
"I love you," we said in unison.
We kissed each other, our minds aligned into one, touching the deepest parts of ourselves, laying all of us bare. None of us wanted to let go, and so we didn't. We stayed like that for a long time, reveling in each other's presence, knowing that this was only the beginning of a long journey together.
With our mana regenerated by a good night's rest, we emerged from our room and showed Calyx the shield I could summon with my newest skill. After that, we moved outside. There were no workers. I wondered why, and saw that the guild token was signalling a BTNO value of around 40%. Above fifty and the risk of a flash tide was real, but even forty was a bit too much to venture this far away from Perseverance's End.
"We should probably remain in range of the tree's protection," Elyra said. "At least until we see if the meter moves up or down."
There was still more than enough space to run our experiments. Not wanting to wait any longer, Vespera dragged me to a flat area under the shade of the tree and then stared at me apprehensively.
"Alright, let's see what comes up," I said, activating [Triumvirate's Armor] on the darkness-offense setting.
Magic swirled, and it tasted like my favorite demon in the world. Moments later, I was wielding a huge sword. I mean, huge huge. Oversized, pitch black with red veins that ran through it like otherworldly marble. It weighed nothing, just like the shield had, despite its massive looks.
It was wide, but its edge was wicked, glinting in the daylight.
"Dangerous," the demon said after taking a good look at it. "But heavens, does it look utterly badass on you."
I gave it a couple practice swings. The sensation was hard to describe. The sword itself was weightless, and it was easy to move it around. It felt like I was handling a hologram, or a kitchen knife, perhaps even easier still, like there was some strange component of aim assist or something. But at the same time, it was one and a half meters long, thick and heavy-looking, which somehow translated into a feeling of heft that made it feel solid and powerful in my hands.
The perfect weapon to leverage my massive Strength while not suffering the handicap of a low Dexterity, pretty much.
"Wow," Elyra said after I was done swinging it around like an edgy idiot. "Look at the hilt, Vespera."
The demon ooh'd, running her fingers on the scales that made up the hilt and feeling their glassy texture. Above them, the guard was pitch-black metal shaped like leathery wings, with red talons and veins.
"Do you think, maybe one day, I could get wings like these?" she asked, eyes shining.
"I am sure of it," I said.
"Same," the angel also said. "Then we will both have wings. I cannot wait."
I rubbed her head at seeing how excited she was. Perhaps even more so than the demon herself, or perhaps she was less good at hiding it. A quick check through the bond told me that it was the latter case. Vespera was literally shaking in anticipation, trying to feel her power and her body with her magic to see how far she was from getting wings.
She had never dreamt of wings. But now, it was all she could think about. She had buried the idea of having wings deep inside her mind, where it wouldn't hurt her. Now though, it was back to the forefront. She felt incomplete in a way she had never felt before.
I rubbed her tail, knowing that it was an erogenous zone. She blushed, which was a welcome change since she was usually the one to tease others, and her mind was thrust back to the present.
"You'll get your wings," I said. "I'll make it happen."
She kissed my cheek.
"And now," I announced. "It's my time to choose."
2 Class Skill points available.
[Bound to the Fallen] Class Skills available:
Rejection of Fate
Anchor of the Mundane
→ Aspect Manifestation
"Are you sure?" Elyra asked. I could feel her excitement, though.
"Do you even need to ask?" I shot back. "I can't not choose this."
"Go ahead, Sol!" Vespera said. "Come on, don't keep us waiting!"
I chuckled and selected the skill. The moment it appeared in my status, I immediately went ahead and used it. Like the weapons skill, this one too presented me with a choice. I don't know how to explain it other than saying that it was asking me what to 'pull' from the girls.
I shrugged, did my choice, and the girls gasped.
I blinked, shifting my perspective so that I could see myself from the demon's eyes. And there they were, a pair of pitch black horns on top of my head. Still watching through her eyes, as well as mine, I saw her reach forward with her hand. Gingerly. She stopped when she got near, waiting for my permission.
"Go ahead," I said.
She touched them. I shivered, the sensation strange and alien. It felt like she was touching me in my very essence, somehow.
"Incredible…" Vespera muttered. The horns were nothing more than small, straight nubs of the same glossy materials as hers, but her eyes were full of awe. "This is exactly how my horns feel too, Sol."
"Really?" I asked. I never thought they would be so sensitive.
She nodded. Good to know, I could use her horns to tease her, then.
"What do they do?" she asked.
I tested them and… nothing. The demon raised an eyebrow. But then again, "what do yours do?"
"Ah, I suppose you're right. Now do the angel."
I dismissed the horns, which vanished in dark smoke, and used the skill again. This time, a halo of light appeared above my head.
Once again, it did nothing.
"Strange," Elyra said. "Mine can shoot lasers."
"Beams of… something," I corrected her. We were still a far cry from having actual lasers here.
She rolled her eyes at me, then went to touch the halo. Shit. It was even more sensitive than the horns! I filed the information for later. I had another weapon to tease the angel with.
The sensation was most strange. Her hands went straight through, but the feedback was there. It translated into something like being touched from inside my brain, and it tingled pleasantly. It was also slightly cold.
After some more tests, there was one last thing I wanted to try. What if I used the skill to 'pull' from both of them? It couldn't be done with the weapons, but perhaps…?
Bingo.
"Wooa!" Vespera cried in surprise. "Elyra, look at spacer boy!"
"Mm? Wha— oh, hells, Sol! You are…"
"A Nephilim," Vespera muttered. "Well, not a full one, but maybe one day? Shit, I feel hot all of a sudden."
"Me too," Elyra said, panting. "You are gorgeous, Sol."
I examined myself. I only had horns and a halo, nothing else. Why the reaction?
"You don't understand," Vespera said. "One day, when the skill grows, maybe you will be able to pull more from us. Maybe, you will be able to… to… even…"
"Maybe you are the key to her wings, Sol," the angel took over. "You will bring them out in her, and then you will be able to manifest them onto you as well."
"And?" I asked. "Don't get me wrong, it will be awesome, but—"
"Vespera and I are not complete, Sol. We miss some parts of what angels and demons could be. Do you remember when the System attempted to evolve us from [Angel] and [Demon] to something more and failed?"
"We've been feeling changes, spacer boy. With each level, with each deepening of the bond. With each time we master another aspect of our magic."
"It is like we are exploring a lake with deep fathoms, and we are barely scratching the surface of the shallows near the shore."
"Once we get deeper…"
"Who knows what we might find? But even more importantly, Sol…
"…there is a story. I just recalled it. A flash."
"Me too," Elyra said. "There was a race, a long time ago. Born of the union of the angelic and the demonic. The Nephilim."
"Two sets of wings. I can see them, clear as day. Spacer boy, if you one day manage to manifest all the aspect. Maybe? Maybe… you could become one, if you so choose."