Mob Sorcery 4 - Ch2

“I think you mixed up my apartment with someone’s penthouse,” Vince said, mind finally unfreezing as the nine-tail fox strode toward him.

Her smile turned smug, but she didn’t slow. Aware of how useless putting a few feet between him and the fox was, Vince backpedaled. He slid the soul egg inside his jacket pocket while gripping his cane, ready for a useless fight.

Had Agent’s superiors at Houou sent somebody to deal with him? The nine tails were assuredly an illusion. Or was this a special guest from Knightsgate?

The moment he let go of the egg, the fox vanished. Vince blinked in surprise. He looked around, expecting to see the fox sitting on his furniture or floating in mid-air. This was the same trick Agent pulled.

“How cruel. I finally get a chance to show off to you and you banish me from your sight,” the fox’s voice crooned in his mind.

Ice ran through his veins, but not because of the voice.

No, Vince realized who and what the voice was. Something he should have guessed the moment she spoke.

He recognized this voice.

His fingers gripped the egg in his jacket pocket, and she reappeared inches in front of his. He jumped. She smiled again, her fingers curling out to stroke his jaw.

A pout formed on her gorgeous face, and Vince wanted nothing more than to make her smile again. He forced that emotion away.

Although he did make note of it. This fox was beautiful in a way the succubi couldn’t quite capture. Salome and Bastet were sex on legs and capable of producing erections on command.

This fox? She made Vince think of Helen of Troy. Her face could launch a thousand ships, and make men slaughter each other for her approval. Vince sincerely hoped she lacked any mental magic.

“It’s a shame I can’t truly feel your body, master,” the fox crooned. “Here I am, entrapped within that egg and your mind, capable of rendering your every wish true, yet incapable of granting myself even a morsel of my own desires.”

“That’s, uh, probably a good thing,” Vince said, his mouth dry as a desert. Not from his wit, but utter fear at the demigodly being conversing with him. “I imagine your wishes involve despoiling the countryside and becoming god-empress.”

Maybe he’d accelerate his timetable and return this egg to Agent now. He had their number, after all.

The fox’s face flashed with fury, and Vince worried she might be about to test her theory of being incapable of granting her own desires. She calmed herself and leaned backward. Her arms folded beneath her immense bust, which looked obscenely huge on her slim frame.

Even as he stared at her balloon-like tits, they shrank to a more manageable size. Closer to Pola or Alessia’s bust, rather than Nina’s, which worked better on the fox.

He frowned. “Are you mimicking the appearance of women I know?”

“No. Do you know many nine-tail foxes?” The fox rolled her eyes. “Also, it’s irritating to hear the echo of your thoughts refer to me as ‘fox.’ Call me Daji. I’ve gone by many other names over the millennia, but that one is the only one I’ve cared to recall.”

Several things raced through Vince’s mind in response to the fox’s comment—and she rolled her eyes when he internally referred to her as “fox” instead of Daji. One was that she was millennia old, making her as old as Quintus at minimum. Another was her admission she actively read his thoughts.

But her name stuck out like a sore thumb.

Daji. The Daji.

“Um… Are you saying you’re the Daji from ancient China?” Vince asked.

“The Shang dynasty, to be exact. My first body was destroyed in 1046BC.” Daji appeared bored by the explanation and summoned an opulent lounge chair to recline in. Vince guessed the chair didn’t actually exist. “To answer the obvious follow-ups your mind is doubtlessly forming—yes, I did brutally torture lots of people. No, I don’t regret it. No, I’m not Tamamo no Mae and I don’t know how I got mixed up with that Japanese kitsune. We met once I shifted my activities to Japan, but our aims are very different.”

A frown formed on Vince’s face. “Admitting you don’t regret torture doesn’t exactly endear you to me.”

“It’s been three thousand years. I’m allowed to grow bored with crude methods of torture.” Daji rose and the chair disappeared.

Her tails fanned out around her and she blinked across the room. A shroud of darkness enclosed him as Daji leaned toward Vince, her chest pressing against his torso and her face staring up at his. She smirked as her tails surrounded him in fluffy heaven. Red tips tickled his bare neck.

“This, though,” she whispered, standing on her tiptoes to reach his ear, “I never grow tired of.” Her hand closed around his stiffening erection.

Despite her earlier claims of not feeling a thing, he certainly felt every touch of her body. He gulped as she nibbled on his earlobe.

“As I said, I can be anything and everything you desire,” Daji said. “All I ask is that you don’t send me back to my prison and allow my jailors to return me to the abyss once again.”

Her words brought Vince back to his senses. He tried to grab her sides, but his hands passed through her body. Daji laughed.

“I only exist in your mind, dear Vince,” she said.

At that moment, one of her tail tips went directly into his ear. The strangest sensation he’d ever experienced ripped through his mind, much like when Nina had tried to clean his ear with a Q-tip and sent him to a clinic by accident. Except much fluffier.

Then her tail came out his other ear and the sensation became muddy. As if his mind realized it couldn’t be real.

“And now you realized my limitations. I’m not a succubus and possess no mental magic,” Daji said, leaning back. “I can’t control your mind and make you my toy. At best I can trick your mind into experiencing realistic physical stimuli, but even that relies on your past experiences. If your lioness pet had never tried cleaning your ears, I couldn’t easily have done that.”

A thought occurred to him. “So the pain I’ve felt—”

A cruel smile crossed Daji’s face. “I can replicate that. But I doubt you desire that.”

The question was, what happened when his desire didn’t adhere to Daji’s? For now, she only appeared when he held the egg, but she’d spoken to him even once he’d let go of it.

How long before she manifested even when he didn’t hold on to it? Was she some sort of mental parasite? Was she the shard Black had spoken of?

Daji laughed bitterly. “Hardly. You’re so paranoid.”

“And you’re trying to distract me from your request,” he said.

He took a step back. Daji didn’t follow, and instead eyed him, her tails curling around her body as she held a hand against her cheek and tilted her head to one side. An inquisitive eyebrow shot up.

“There’s a damn good reason you’re in the egg,” Vince said. “More than that, how do I know you’re not controlling my mind? Soul eggs have a nasty reputation, and the fact you’re standing in front of me—”

“I’m an apparition standing in front of you,” Daji corrected. “I can be floating in front of you, if you prefer. Or I can be riding you on your bed, if you don’t mind the mess you’ll make of yourself when the semen has nowhere to go.”

He stared at her while she smiled coquettishly.

“I don’t think that changes my suspicions,” he eventually said after purging that image from his mind. “Japan, or China, or whoever put you in that egg for a reason.”

“And what do you think that reason is?” Daji asked.

“Didn’t you destroy a Chinese dynasty?”

She scoffed. “Hardly. Do you know I was thirty at the time? Do you truly believe I could bring about the collapse of a 600-year-old dynasty in less time than it would take to raise a child?” Daji sneered and fire rippled along the length of her tails, producing a corona of flames around her.

“If you’re a nine-tail fox—"

“Despite the myth, I didn’t possess Daji. I am Daji.” Her red eyes flared with light. “Inside the Shang palace, among all the horrors I’m famous for, I learned how fleeting mortality was. The egg’s seals prevent me from speaking of how, but I transformed myself into this.” She waved her hands at the tails around her body, which swept through the air to follow her motion. “Huli jing like myself are spirits of desire, born of it and made immortal through humanity’s unending pool of it.”

Vince narrowed his eyes. “Huli jing… That’s the Chinese word for mystic fox, right? Like kitsune is in Japanese.”

“We’re all different beings. Don’t compare us, even if we’re often mistaken.” Daji clicked her tongue. “I have no love for those strange foxes. They emerged from nowhere practically overnight, replacing the original single-tailed fox demihumans of Japan.”

News to Vince. And probably the entire world.

He strode toward the door, and the fox spirit frowned at him. “You still haven’t answered my question. I can’t tell if you’re distracting me with all these details or trying to be overly honest.

“Both,” she admitted with a smile. “People who like to think they’re intelligent, but aren’t, can’t cope with an avalanche of information and tend to tune out and merely nod in agreement. I’m not sure there’s an answer that will satisfy you, however.”

“Try being honest.”

She rolled her eyes and hovered in the air, crossing one leg over the other. Her ruffled skirt should have prevented him from seeing her underwear, but she used magic to ensure he got a healthy glimpse.

“It’s obvious. History is written by the winners. The Shang dynasty is written to be corrupt and cruel, which led to its downfall. But that’s a lie. A foolish king besotted with me? Perhaps.” Daji’s smile split her face in half. “But a lie with a grain of truth is still a lie. His foes destroyed the Shang armies, yet feared my power. The new emperor worried I might take root in his realm, or else stop his reign before it started.”

Vince had a feeling he knew where this was going. Hadn’t Nina suspected nine-tail foxes were simply too powerful for most rulers to stand?

Daji claimed to have claimed a level of power that only demigods possessed, at a time when those demigods were actively founding kingdoms. No wonder she’d been branded as evil.

“I’m assuming the new emperor found some allies willing to dispose of you,” Vince said.

“Ah, you get it.” Daji nodded sagely. “History says the Shang dynasty fell because the emperor committed suicide upon learning of his army’s defeat. In truth, the fledgling Knightsgate raided the palace and destroyed it, then slew me.” She smiled with far too many teeth. “Unfortunately for them, it took them some time to learn how to truly stop me.”

“I don’t think they ever did,” Vince said drily.

Daji blinked in front of him and her tails wrapped around him. She patted his chest. “Aw, I’m so glad you think so. You know all the right things to say to warm my heart.”

Vince remained unmoved. “You haven’t exactly convinced me you’re not some great evil. I’m not the emperor of an entire country, with endless magical supplies at my beck and call and the ability to hand over random farmers whose feet you can cut off.”

She blinked at him. “I don’t understand why everyone is obsessed with that story. I didn’t cut his feet off on a whim. I needed them for my ritual.”

Yeah, Vince might want to be careful taking magic advice from this fox. He eyed her warily.

“And don’t downplay yourself.” She ran her fingers along his jaw once more while her other hand pressed against his lips. Her red eyes stared into his. “Immense power and wealth is but a whisper away for you. Imagine that you strode into that puppy’s office, bent her over her own desk, and fucked her into submission. Perhaps even next to her sister. Billions would be yours, alongside an empire.”

“Is that why you’ve been planting those images in my head?” he asked.

“Perhaps. Or maybe I just like the idea of helping you take your rightful place and reminding the others of theirs.” Her lips pressed against his neck while her tails wrapped tightly around him. “Imagine after claiming the Lionettis, that you then take that succubus. And even that fox enchanter and the Yakuza tengu. The unicorn gangleader. I could go on. You aren’t an emperor yet, but you could be. I can make you one.”

The image of almost every woman Vince was close to appeared in his head. Alessia, Pola, Nina, Ally, Nicki, Gabriela, Kiyoko, Fia, Salome… The more he thought, the more women appeared. Lucia, Livia, Juliet, Bastet, Ally’s mother—even Vanna, before she vanished when Vince thought negatively of her.

They knelt before him, completely naked and mouths latched onto his cock, slurping and sucking. He struggled to imagine how all of them fit around his crotch, yet as he looked down, they somehow fit around it. Daji lay on a bed beyond them, stretched out and inviting him.

With a grunt, Vince banished the image. He took a step back and let go of the egg.

Daji vanished. But her voice remained.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” she said, voice reverberating in his mind. “It’s easier if we can see each other.”

“Don’t do that again,” he said forcefully. “I don’t see them like that.”

“You should,” she said, voice colder than normal. “That’s where you stand relative to them. A man with all the magic power and potential in the world, ready to breed them like the willing haremettes they are. Oh, right. You call it your pride, no? Willing members of your pride?”

“No,” he ground out.

He was of half a mind to message Agent right now.

But he stopped himself. Not because of the image, but what it represented.

“What do you want, Daji?” he asked, finally grasping the egg once more.

She reappeared before him. Her expression was serious for once and she didn’t latch onto him or shower him in kisses. She sized him up with a long look.

“To recline in luxury, free from the toils and stresses of the mortal world, with no fear of what may come,” she said. “I don’t want the world, Vince. I want my slice of eternal paradise, and given my idea of paradise, that means a powerful man to fuck me senseless into my bed on a regular basis.”

“Uh huh. And you chose me because…?”

She gave him a look. “Several reasons. I’ll start with the obvious. You’re holding on to the soul egg that acts as my prison.”

“I’m glad you’re honest.” If only about this.

“Second, the egg prevents me from claiming a new vessel. That’s my typical means of escape. That ‘shard’ the lightning-bringer talked of the other night? Spirits such as myself insert them into mortals and consume their essence and body, eventually becoming them.” Daji held a hand to her chest. “I did say my original body was destroyed, no? Depending on your opinion on the Ship of Theseus, I’m not the original Daji. But that ability is beyond me now.”

“How do I know you’re not lying about that?” Vince asked.

“Because Wagner would have sensed such a thing and obliterated it. The power within you is dormant, with no connections to the outside world. Even the link I maintain with you is dependent on proximity to my prison, and extremely fragile. I’m not a parasite in your mind. That’s why I can’t create new experiences for you.”

He suspected she was telling a half-truth, and made a mental note of it. Later, he’d make some physical notes. Daji giggled as she spied on his thoughts.

“Third, even if I could consume your body, I wouldn’t,” she said, and he scoffed. “No, it’s true. Fox spirits are famous for their shape-shifting powers, but I can’t change my gender. I’m a woman, and have no interest in changing that fact. I can transform another woman into my lovely form, but I can’t turn you into me. I want to feel your fat cock inside me, not feel it hanging outside me.”

Despite himself, Vince burst into laughter at her crude words. Especially from her delicate face and beautiful voice.

“And the last reason?” he asked. “I’m assuming there’s one that isn’t purely for convenience.”

She nodded. “It’s the one I know you’ll find the least believable, but it’s the truth.”

“Always an easy way to know someone’s lying. They tell you to trust them,” he drawled.

She smiled at him, softer than usual. “I do like you. There’s a tenacity in the way you fight for power, despite the cruelty of this world and the knowledge of the impotence of your own mortality. You don’t wrap yourself in a bubble to protect your mind from a harsh reality, but face it head-on, even though you know that, one day, something far greater than you will shatter you whole.”

He stared at her. “I thought you said you wanted a life of luxury?”

“I do. But I fought for that. I wormed my way into a palace, and upon learning of my own mortality, conspired to defeat it. Your quest reminds me of my own.” Her expression darkened. “That’s why it bothers me that you refuse to take the steps to seize power. I can help you, but you’d be so much more if you claimed those around you.”

Vince nearly found himself speechless, but one thought did occur to him. It was a trite one, but he did find it meaningful in the moment.

“If I did claim all the women around me like you want me to, would I be the man you claim to desire?” he asked.

Daji blinked. Then she blinked again. She held her face in one hand thoughtfully, drumming her fingers against her cheek.

“Hmm, I suppose that’s what corruption is,” she said. She smiled cruelly. “I can’t promise I won’t grow bored of you if you do give in, but you would be just like me. Once you taste power, you won’t need to worry about me defeating you. You’d bend me over and breed me just like all the others.”

An inviting thought.

Vince sighed. “For now, I just need your power. As much as it pains me to admit it—”

“You lack the power and knowledge to match the foes you’re battling, including those conspiring against you,” Daji said. “I have my suspicions as to who is responsible for what, as I have nothing but time to dwell on your memories, but you’ll never learn if I solve everything for you. A child needs to fall as they learn to run. Just remember to rely on me when you skin your knee.”

With those words, she gave him a deep curtsy before disappearing in a flurry of tails. Vince didn’t believe she’d disappeared. The egg lay in his hand as he looked around his apartment.

After several long seconds, her face appeared over his shoulder. “Oh, did you miss me? I can remain visible if you like staring at me.”

“… you were the one who said it was easier to talk if we can see each other,” he said.

She giggled in his ear before spinning in front of him. “Then let us begin your meditation exercises. We should also practice communicating through thought, so your pets don’t grow suspicious.”

“They’re my girlfriends and friends, not—”

“They’re your present and future cumdumpsters and the parents of your children at best.” Daji rolled her eyes. “I don’t care how you choose to view them, as it matters little to me.”

“And what are you, then?” he asked, trying to be antagonistic.

Her eyes lit up and she grinned. “If I get to be your genuine cumdumpster then all of my plans will have come to fruition, won’t they?”

As off-putting as hearing her call herself such a thing, Vince felt relieved. Then frustrated at his own emotions. Daji wanted to be free, and have a physical form. She’d tell any lie to get her way.

But until the heist was over, she was his greatest asset. He might not need her more than she needed him, but he sure as hell needed her a lot.

Despite her words, Daji made herself scarce once the others began returning to the apartment. Nicki kept herself occupied on the couch with her mobile game. Nina joined him in meditation, and they quickly learned their methods had greatly deviated.

“You exercise as a form of meditation?” he asked, incredulous.

“The point is to distract your mind, right? More than that, I use my magic under constant physical pressure,” Nina explained while doing overhead stretches in her skintight workout clothes, distracting him with her massive tits. “I can do simpler meditation, but I’m more in touch with my magic when exercising. It also gets closer to reality.”

He bit his lip. “I didn’t think of that. I do some stretching but…”

Under Daji’s guidance, his breathing exercises had morphed from the simple ones Nina originally gave him. She shaped the way he thought while meditating and even sat.

“It’s very eastern mysticism,” Nina noted. “A pretty popular style among sorcerers. Downside is maintaining your focus when somebody is trying to dispel your magic and caving your face in at the same time.”

“That’s what my barrier is for,” he said.

She held her hands up. “I didn’t say it was a mistake. Just a choice. We all make trade-offs, Vince. I can’t sit back and hurl powerful spells like you. My entire combat philosophy is about getting in my enemy’s face and punching a hole in it. I’ve heard that the combat styles of monsters like Wagner and the clan guardians merge together, but I’m doubtful.”

Daji’s voice crept into Vince’s mind, even though he wasn’t holding the egg. “Her doubts are wise to have. Age and raw power makes it easier to ignore weaknesses and trade-offs, but they always exist. Magic requires exponentially more practice as it grows in power. A warrior who hones a single technique will always be more fearsome than a warrior who dabbles in a hundred.”

“Got it,” Vince said, nodding to both Daji and Nina, even if he only saw one of them.

Nina smiled and struck him softly in the shoulder. “Let’s meditate in our own way, have some dinner, and relax for the night. We can train tomorrow with Fia.”

That training session didn’t quite pan out as planned, unfortunately.

Fia contacted Vince first thing in the morning to tell him that Kiyoko wanted to begin strategizing immediately. She suspected the tengu wanted an update about Arnulfo and was using the planning session as cover.

Which left Vince and Nina to head out to train, alone. Nicki returned to her work at the hotel run by the Lionetti’s.

“I’ll probably quit after this week,” Nicki mentioned. “Pay will be high this week, as a lot of wealthy assholes will be in town. Maybe next week, too, if we finally get snow.”

“Immanuel will summon a snow storm if the weather defies them any longer,” Vince said. “I don’t think they’ll care what damage it supposedly does to the climate. They’ll care a lot more about their falling income.”

“So much for playing the long game,” Nina said.

Nicki giggled. “But I do plan to quit. The hotel work is boring, and I want to get some flight practice in. Plus, I should change up my appearance. I renewed this look once, but I want to draft up a new one and I might need to buy new dyes. I… still haven’t worked out what I really want to look like.”

Nina ruffled Nicki’s hair and she danced backward, wings fluttering.

“You’ll work it out,” Nina said.

Vince and Nina took the subway downtown. For the past month, Vince had been practicing in his usual location—a park to the north of his apartment complex. Only when he finalized his spell had he shifted to a less flammable location to practice it and found an empty construction site. Christmas meant the construction workers were nowhere to be seen.

Nina had other ideas. “We can stop being cheap now. You can rent ateliers downtown for a decent daily rate. We’ll rent the biggest one we can for a month and share it. It’ll cost a pretty penny, but that means nobody will be spying on our spells, no assassination attempts, and no risk of burning down the neighborhood.”

 He winced. “I have it under control.”

“Uh huh. And what happens when somebody calls the cops on the gigantic flaming tornado?”

“We run?”

Nina fixed him with a glare. The subway cars were quiet as the grave at this time. Between the early hour and being two days into the new year, only a smattering of office workers joined them.

To his surprise, they didn’t head toward the Tri Sommet. Perhaps Vince had simply associated sorcerers with the most famous magical building in the city and expected all the similar buildings to be close.

Instead, Nina took them closer to the northern edge of the sprawling skyscrapers that dominated the southern side of Aulfair’s harbor. Fewer shops here, more office supply stores. Vince couldn’t swing a dead catgirl without hitting a Starbucks. Definitely a hub for office workers.

“I know you didn’t work here, but I’m guessing you interviewed here,” he said as they walked the quiet streets.

A few office workers and sorcerers joined them. As always, Vince picked the sorcerers by their dated fashion or the visible magical foci. Usually both. Nobody would mistake Vince as a professional sorcerer with the way he dressed. His lack of coattails was a huge faux pas.

“Yeah, but I also trained here. The mage colleges cluster around the Tri Sommet or in Albion, if they don’t mind abusing spatial magic. Here? It’s all the companies trying to make a buck off magical research. Startups trying to sell magic fuel pills or summonable girlfriends.” Nina smirked at the last one and elbowed Vince. “Twenty years ago, this place was dubbed Bismuth Valley.”

“Are we in a valley?” Vince asked.

“No. It was just some stupid rip-off name based on Silicon Valley because dumbshits threw all their money at grifters for a few years.” Nina rolled her eyes. “You’d be amazed how many companies from that era are still around. I rent atelier time from one. It has a devoted group of investors convinced this is the year the USA will convert to magical currency, every year for the past 25 years.”

Ouch. Vince worried what sort of shithole they’d be walking into, or how bad the atelier would be.

To his surprise, the skyscraper interior looked modern. A pair of contracted security enforcers manned a slick wooden desk at reception, and Vince recognized their logo as one owned by a major sorcerer investment group. They checked Vince and Nina in, gave them day passes to use the elevators, and sent them on their way.

They arrived at another reception, this one manned by a slim man with horse ears and a tail in casual business attire. He sat behind a desk right out of the nineties with a corporate logo old enough to drink hanging over his head. His computer looked new at least.

“Yo, any ateliers for rent?” Nina asked, striding up to the desk.

The horsefolk blinked at her. He looked both of them up and down. Vince had worn his enforcer outfit, although Nina dressed down as she didn’t feel she’d need it. Her gauntlet hung from one hand, however.

The receptionist’s eyes latched onto their foci. “Sorcerers or enforcers?”

“Does it matter?” Vince asked.

Nina waved a hand at him, but the receptionist shrugged.

“Fair point,” the horsefolk said. “But that’s a good answer. Just we usually get some… friendly visits from enforcers around this time of year.”

Probably the debt collectors knocking. Given Nina’s story, Vince couldn’t imagine why they’d have an interest in this place.

The receptionist played with his computer for a few seconds. “How big? Just for the day? It’s quiet right now, so we have some good deals on weekly rentals.”

“The biggest you can get us for a month,” Nina said.

“That’s big.” The receptionist froze and gave them a second look over. “You been here before?”

“Five years ago. You still have records from then?”

“You’re still in the seven year range, so yeah. Name?”

“Nina Hayes.”

The receptionist didn’t even bother typing in the name. His eyes popped. “Holy…” He muttered something under his breath and scrabbled for the drawer.

Hissing, Nina grabbed the desk. The wood warped under her strength. A yelp escaped the receptionist and he raised his hands.

Everyone stopped, including Vince as he gripped his cane.

“Wait, wait, wait!” he shouted, holding up an old printed ID card with Nina’s face on it. “S-sorry. I just recognized you. You’re the Nina Hayes, right? I remember you topping the enforcer earning ranking in your final year. And you…” The receptionist pointed at Vince. “Vincent Keys. You’re all over the news lately. Everyone reckons you’re the real reason that mansion burned down in Albion. The cops are just covering it up.”

Both enforcers look at each other. Nina sighed and her gauntlet glowed. The desk repaired itself.

“Yeah, that’s us. The fame can be a bitch.” She scratched her head. “So, is a big atelier available? We need big big, not ‘baby’s first meister-tier spell’ big.”

The receptionist nodded and tapped away at his computer while speaking, “Yeah. We recently finished renovating the mega-dome. Marketing bullshit says it can handle virtuoso spells, but I wouldn’t test our insurer on that. Is that alright?”

“For now,” Nina teased.

Vince hit her arm.

When the receptionist gave an eye-wateringly high price, Vince expected Nina to negotiate. Instead, she agreed and handed over her card. Once the receptionist updated her details in the system and added Vince as a customer—and took his card, too—they were both given ID cards. Vince’s was a temp, with no fancy photo.

“We, uh, only take photos once you qualify as a VIP.” The receptionist rubbed the back of his neck. “You’ll qualify soon enough if you rent like Miss Hayes, though.”

Vince shot Nina a look as they left reception. “VIP, huh?”

“It’s just marketing bullshit. Free food, drinks and shit.” She rolled her eyes. “You saw the price we pay. Nothing compared to that. This company is still running because it’s now a front for atelier rental and writes everything off. I expected to find it shut down for fraud when I checked, but nope.”

He understood what she meant as they walked the renovated hallways beyond reception. Unlike the dated entryway, everything past the security gates looked modern and appealing to customers.

Nina led him along the silent corridors and labelled doors to a particularly long hallway. Only a single pair of double doors occupied it. Their passes opened them.

An airlock-style security setup restricted access to a changing room and locker, presumably so they could dump anything important or fragile here. Vince marveled at the fact they could secure the doors from the inside, and the signs advertised that even staff couldn’t get in, except in case of a major emergency.

“I can’t tell if that’s good, or what constitutes an emergency,” he said.

“Alarms going off,” Nina said. “If you’d come in yourself, they’d make you read some legal bullshit and sign off on the dangers. Short version: if you trip and crack your head open, you’re fucked. There are devices in here that we can wear if we’re worried about serious injury that will trip alarms and unlock the doors, but they’ll charge us a mint. Confidentiality is the default.”

He whistled. “So that’s why they charge so much. This is basically a mage college atelier for rent.”

“Yup. If it’s as big as I suspect…”

They stepped inside the “mega-dome” and stared up at it.

No way this room fit inside the tower without a pocket dimension. The interior dome was the size of Arnulfo’s estate, with a metal grille covering it. Metal paneling extended from wall to wall, but made little noise as they walked. Enchantments silenced their footsteps, Vince guessed.

“We’ll sign Fia in when she’s ready,” Nina said. “Need to get our money’s worth out of the place. But for now, I think we can talk before we train.”

His girlfriend turned and placed her hands on her hips, including her gauntlet. She narrowed her purple eyes at Vince.

Concerned about her look, Vince raised an eyebrow at her.

“I think it’s time we talked about how the hell you learned a second meister-tier spell so damn fast, let alone how you brought its casting time down to under 10 seconds,” Nina said, her eyes boring into him.

- - - - -

Commentary: There's a lot to digest with the Daji section, including the way I've integrated history and myth. The fall of the Shang dynasty is written about centuries later, so it's easy to say "yeah, it was mostly bullshit."

Let me know your thoughts on Daji, though. Whether you found her suspicious, convincing, seductive enough, or maybe too much like Agent.

Otherwise, we're finally on to Nina and dealing with the elephant in the room. This was originally written differently (with Vince revealing the egg voluntarily), and I'm of half a mind to go back to that as Nina's been confrontational with Vince lately, but I cut the chapter short due to length (there was a section about Vince's weaknesses that led into the egg that's been shuffled about) and created this new cliffhanger.