Love is the ceiling, feelings are reeling, free as the air

1. Mary – 14.37% +2000 BP

2. Gina – 12.97% +2000 BP

3. Rose – 12.85% +2000 BP

4. Carly – 11.69% +1500 BP

5. Kim – 11.52% +1500 BP

6. Dawn – 10.36% +1500 BP

7. Morgana – 9.44% +1500 BP

8. Dakota – 9.35% +1500 BP

9. Dani – 7.44% +1000 BP

Everyone took a second to look at the poll results and let them sink in.

The person who was most shocked by what she saw was Rose. The blonde woman couldn’t even begin to understand the results in front of her.

“Y… you’re kidding…” She mumbled, shaking her head. She felt numb.

“Not at all!” Sylvia smiled cheerfully. “You see my girl, it’s like I said. The hard work you’ve put in towards being a good friend and supporting the people around you has finally started to pay off. The audience has seen for themselves what you’re made of, and they like it.”

She applauded.

“Keep working hard to support the other girls and win over Nick’s affection, my girl. Don’t let all those votes go to waste.”

Rose just shook her head incredulously.

Third place.

She was in THIRD. PLACE.

In her very first popularity poll, Rose had just barely squeaked away with around 6% of the vote. Now she had more than double that. She was in the top 3!

It was suddenly becoming very hard for her to see. That’s because her eyes were misting up. Sniffling, Rose reached up and wiped away her tears, and a shaky grin spread across her lips. “W-wow… I really… I… I didn’t think this would affect me so much…”

“I’m so happy for you,” Mary gushed, rushing over to the blonde’s side. She didn’t care about her own results or being in first. Seeing Rose get so many votes after working so hard was astounding, and she couldn’t be happier! It was just what she deserved after how supportive she’d been to Mary this entire time.

Rose blinked, and smiled at her redheaded friend. “Th-thanks.”

But Rose’s rise meant other girls had fallen. Gina wasn’t that surprised about being in second, considering where she’d placed last week (she’d actually slipped a few percentage points, in fact) but a few girls were shocked by their poll placements, or otherwise disappointed.

“Oh…” Dani whispered, staring at the results and feeling a pinprick in her chest.

“Dani, Dani, Dani…” Sylvia shook her head and strolled over to the blue-haired tomboy. “What are we going to do with you, my girl?”

“What do you mean?” Dani snapped defensively. “This doesn’t mean anything! You can’t kick me off just for having low numbers in the polls!”

Sylvia gasped, pretending to be scandalized. “What? I wouldn’t dream of it! No, that isn’t what this is about at all! But you’ve gotta admit… things haven’t been looking good for you, recently. Why, once upon a time, you were riding high, getting 13% and 14% of the vote in previous polls! But now… well. I think today speaks for itself. You’re slipping. Quite a devastating fall, from 10% last week. And I think we both know why that is.”

Dani curled up her hands into fists. Oh, she knew why that was alright.

“Because your stupid viewers are bored of me not doing anything with Nick, is that right?” She spat.

“Ding ding ding, we have a winner!” Sylvia smirked, spinning her cane and stopping it with the head pointed at Dani’s throat. “That’s exactly correct, my girl. I admit, ‘strong-willed lesbian tomboy’ was a great draw in the beginning, but now, well… this whole ‘I’m not going to sleep with the master’ thing has somewhat worn out its welcome, wouldn’t you agree? People are getting sick of it, and they’re showing it with their votes. And you can either get with the program, or, well…”

But Dani didn’t back down. She had no intention of being intimidated. After all, what would Sylvia do with her? It wasn’t like she was losing that badly in VP, and even if she was, so what? Winning didn’t matter much to her, nor did whatever rewards she could buy with BP.

No, what she cared about was getting through this damn game with as few invasive transformations as she possibly could. She wanted to keep as much of herself herself as she could.

And if the audience didn’t like it, they could suck a lemon.

Then a hand on her shoulder caused her to tense. She whipped her head around to see who it was, and froze.

Carly’s concerned expression was staring back at her. The cosplayer bit her lip and shook her head.

“Dani… I think you need to take this seriously,” Carly whispered. “I get it, okay? I know what you’re going through. But like she said… you’re the only holdout here.”

Every other girl in the room wanted Nick in some way or another. Some of them had been more stubborn about it than others, but feelings had started to bloom for the rest of the girls, whether in a romantic sense or a sexual one. But Dani was his friend. Just his friend. She didn’t want to be anything else.

She took a deep breath, and exhaled. She wasn’t angry with Carly. How could she be? Her friend was just being concerned for her.

“I know,” Dani whispered finally. She cast a defeated look towards Nick. She didn’t want to do those kinds of things with him, but she also didn’t want to push her luck. If Sylvia thought that she wasn’t playing ball…

Well… Dani didn’t want to know about what might happen.

“Look, Dani, I’m not saying you need to bend over a table and lift your skirt right now,” Sylvia said, shaking her head. “But keep in mind what the audience thinks about you. And from here on out, things are only going to ratchet up on the sexual intensity front. So you need to think about what place you want in this harem, alright?”

Dani didn’t want ANY place in the harem. But she also didn’t want to get eliminated and get stuck warped into a sex toy like Holly was. No matter how happy the young woman seemed to be about it, fawning over Rose’s point total as she was.

“Now,” Sylvia said, turning to the other girls, “as we can see, the results speak for themselves. You girls are doing a fairly good job of keeping your point totals even! More than half of you placed better than average, and about that same number are circling around that average, only differing from one another by a percentage point or two. Those are good stats, my girls! It means the audience really has grown fond of the lot of you! …With obvious exceptions, of course,” she added, glancing back at Dani.

Dani’s expression hardened.

“…But Dani isn’t the only one,” Sylvia continued. “Don’t forget, our blushing bride, Mary, has once again taken first! It’s getting to be a regular thing with you, isn’t it? Can’t say I’m surprised, though. In spite of the negative press about your wedding, there’s no denying the audience is fond of you, my girl.”

“Wait, negative press?!” Mary sputtered. “What do you mean? That was a lovely ceremony! Well… except for the…”

Her voice trailed off and her face turned red. She didn’t want to finish that sentence.

Sylvia just smirked.

“…Yes. Well. As we can see, there’s still a bit of work to be done on the boldness… but we can leave that aside. As I was saying, audiences are fond of you, Mary, but we can’t deny that you took quite a bit of focus away from the other contestants. Which certainly wasn’t good for someone here…”

Sylvia’s eyes landed on a trembling Morgana.

“I…” Morgana didn’t have anything to say in her defense. “I…!”

Sylvia clicked her tongue and shook her head. “Now, now. Morgana, you had a respectable point total. In fact, you’re currently the auditionee who scored the highest on her first week in the game, with 9.44%! But like I said, this was supposed to be your week, and you barely got to do anything, thanks to Mary’s wedding… what a pity. I certainly hope you’ve been building up your relationship with the other girls, because if not…”

Morgana jumped a little, startled by Sylvia’s insinuations. She glanced at the other girls, and realized that for all her hard work, she hadn’t really made any strong, lasting connections here. Which wasn’t a very safe place to be.

But… it’s not my fault! She whined pathetically in her head. I don’t know how to make friends! And I only had a week to do it!

This week had been like a dream. Morgana had been thrilled to be placed in such a scintillating setting, like one of the light novels she consumed religiously.

But the reality of her situation was crashing down on her, and she realized that things weren’t as simple as she made them out to be.

Sure, maybe Sylvia had a point, that all the focus on Mary’s wedding had taken the cameras off of her. But that wasn’t Mary’s fault. It was her own.

She could have worked harder. She didn’t. She had no one to blame for that but herself.

Morgana felt a little sick to her stomach. If anyone’s going to get eliminated, it’s going to be me… or her.

There was one other person here besides Dani with a worse popularity score than Morgana, and she certainly wasn’t amused with the results.

Dakota crossed her arms over her chest and glared contemptuously at the screen hovering in front of her. Then, as Sylvia approached her, she turned that contemptuous gaze towards the blonde instead.

“Second to last place, huh?” She spat. “I couldn’t even beat that loony goth.”

“No,” Sylvia said, shaking her head. “You couldn’t even beat her. And I can’t say I’m surprised, either. It seems the audience is getting sick and tired of your shenanigans, Dakota. Oh, certainly, I’d wager they like the way you’ve started helping out the other contestants with your transformation, but on the other hand… that little trick with Mary at the wedding… forcing her like that… I don’t think it went over very well.”

“But that’s-!” Mary gasped. But she was silenced when Dakota’s cold eyes shot in her direction. She quickly shut her mouth. She had actually been planning on coming to Dakota’s defense; arguing that Dakota wasn’t the problem, that she’d actually enjoyed what had happened, but the intimidating woman clearly wanted to handle this herself.

“All I’m doing is for Nick’s sake,” Dakota growled, turning back to Sylvia. “They should see that I’m doing this for him!”

“Oh, I’m sure they do,” Sylvia nodded, drawing closer to the pale woman. In spite of Dakota’s show of intimidation, she wasn’t scared of the other woman in the slightest. She lowered her voice so softly that only the two of them could hear. “But you see my girl… they’re getting a little tired of all the secrets and lies. If I was in your position… I would consider coming clean very soon. Before they lose their patience with you and just write you off entirely.”

The threat hung in the air, and it made Dakota burn.

Dakota loathed threats. She wasn’t going to be intimidated by the miserable excuse for a host standing in front of her.

But she couldn’t say anything back. All she could do was curl up her hands into fists and refrain from punching Sylvia’s teeth in.

“Now then!” Sylvia clapped, taking a step back as the smile returned to her face. She directed the girls’ attention back to the poll. “We’ve taken a while to get through this, I know, but today has been a really exciting and positive day for a lot of people so far! The sort of cheerful event that perfectly caps off this round, and serves as a grand honeymoon for our lovely couple!”

Mary frowned. She wasn’t so sure of that herself.

“…But we need to move on,” Sylvia continued, clearing her throat. “And to do that, we need to do one last thing. Now, let’s see just how much BP all of you managed to accumulate from these phenomenal results?”

1. Carly – 7600 BP +1500 BP = 9100 BP

2. Rose – 4300 BP + 2000 BP = 6300 BP

3. Dani – 4100 BP + 1000 BP = 5100 BP

4. Gina – 3000 BP + 2000 BP = 5000 BP

5. Dakota – 2700 BP + 1500 BP = 4200 BP

6. Kim – 2000 BP + 1500 BP = 3500 BP

7. Dawn – 1500 BP + 1500 BP = 3000 BP

8. Morgana – 800 BP + 1500 BP = 2300 BP

9. Mary – 0 BP + 2000 BP = 2000 BP

“Well, pretty simple,” Sylvia nodded in approval. “In fact, it’s VERY simple! No major rises or falls, everyone’s BP remained right about where it was. But that’s good, too, wouldn’t you girls agree? For the most part, you’re all increasing at a steady level. Now, the question remains, what are you girls going to purchase with all that, I wonder? A few of you have quite the cache saved up!”

“Excuse me, there’s something I need to do, first,” Dawn said, stepping in as soon as Sylvia finished talking. She turned to Rose with an adamant look in her eye, and pulled up her tablet.

Dawn: 3000 BP – 1600 BP = 1400 BP

Rose: 6300 BP + 1600 BP = 7900 BP

“1600 BP, just like I promised,” Dawn said as both women could feel the results changing. “I wasn’t able to pay it back in full last week, but now we’re even.”

“Yes,” Rose said, smiling gratefully to the other woman. “Now we’re even.”

Dawn seemed a little down after that transaction. Her eyes glanced away and her ears folded in. Instead of flicking behind her, her tail drooped down between her legs.

Rose couldn’t stop her curiosity.

“Dawn, is everything alright?” She asked.

“Hm? Oh… yeah, it’s fine,” Dawn said, nodding. “It’s just that I wished I could have paid you back last week, instead of it taking this long.”

Rose tittered. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about something like that, ma chaton. I was happy to wait for as long as you needed to get the money!”

A slight pink tinge dusted Dawn’s cheeks. “No, um… it’s not about that,” she murmured, shaking her head.

That gesture intrigued the blonde. “Oh? Then what is it?”

“Well… last week, you were really suffering for BP, you know?” Dawn pointed out. “And you were trying to save up for… something big.” She didn’t want to reveal Rose’s plans just yet. It wasn’t her place to say, and she knew the other woman wanted it to be a big surprise. “But then you got that transformation, and you were able to accumulate so much BP so quickly, and then with your huge jump in the polls getting you the rest…”

Dawn sighed. This was so embarrassing to say.

“…I guess I just wanted repaying my debt to be a little more impactful, you know?” She mumbled. “Like, the last bit of BP you needed to make it over the edge, not just… an extraneous pittance.”

She was using big words to mask her embarrassment. But Rose saw right through her.

“Oh! Ma chatte!” She cooed, pulling Dawn into a colossal hug that crammed her boobs right into the other woman’s face. “You’re just the sweetest thing in the world! Oh, merci! Thank you, thank you so much!”

“Boobs,” Dawn grumbled, not exactly thrilled about being buried in Rose’s cleavage.

“O-oh, right,” Rose tittered, giving the other woman some space to breathe. “Sorry about that.”

“I think that’s really sweet,” Kim said, smiling bashfully.

“Um, it’s my turn, too, now,” Mary said, turning to Gina. “Gina, I… I need to repay my debt to you, as well!”

Gina raised her eyebrow. “…Seriously?”

Mary looked at her, confused, and squinted. “Um… yes? Why? Did you not… want me to, or something?”

Gina quickly shook her head. “Oh, no, yeah, of course I want you to!” She said quickly. “It’s just, well… I’m surprised. Usually, when moneylending is involved, I guess I’m used to people not paying back what they owe, you know?”

Mary gasped. “Oh! That’s just awful! I can’t believe people would just borrow money from you and never pay you back! How horrible.”

“…Yeah,” Gina mumbled, averting her eyes. “Borrowing money from me, right.”

“Well, I won’t do that,” Mary asserted. “You helped me, more than I could imagine. If it wasn’t for you, I would have had to wait until today for my wedding. You let me be with my husband on the night that was meant for me, Gina,” she said, glancing over at Nick with fawning adoration in her eyes. “And there’s not enough BP or money in the world to pay you back for that.”

Gina felt a little weak in the knees. Mary’s words of gratitude were pretty damn close to a “good girl” and she felt her lower lips quivering in near-orgasmic shock. She didn’t even register that Mary had pulled up her tablet and transferred over the points.

Mary didn’t even care that she was losing most of her BP again. She’d bought the only thing in this game she’d ever want already.

Mary: 2000 BP – 1900 BP = 100 BP

Gina: 5000 BP + 1900 BP = 6900 BP

Gina smirked. “Heh. Nice…”

Mary stared at her innocently. “Yes, of course I’m being nice,” she said, giving the other woman a small little bashful smile. “But you don’t have to say it directly!”

Gina blinked. “No, I meant… yeah, no, never mind,” she smirked, amused by the misunderstanding. “Thanks, Mary. That really means a lot.”

“Thank you again,” Mary said, and this time Gina really DID almost fall over. She clutched the table for support as her pussy began to moisten, struggling for breath.

“Gina?! Are you…”

“I’m fine, fine,” Gina said, raising her hand. Her cheeks were hot and her grin was feisty. “But keep praising me like that, and I’ll have to be the one to marry you next!”

Mary stared at her in blank confusion.

“Her transformation,” Kim pitched in. “She’s talking about her transformation. You know, the whole ‘if you give her praise she feels like cumming’ thing?”

Mary blinked. Then she turned bright red.

That had completely slipped her mind.

“Oh… oh!” She gasped, waving her arms about frantically. “That’s not-! I mean, I didn’t! I-!”

Gina just laughed. “It’s fine! You don’t need to worry about that!” She cackled with glee. “Come on, not a big deal.”

Mary just fumed with embarrassment. She was used to praising girls where their credit was due, but with Gina, well… she would need to be careful if she didn’t want the punk girl squirting all over the place.

Morgana watched the other girls joke and play around with one another from the sidelines with a glum expression on her face. She wanted to join in too.