On to other things

"Mary can you help me train my imbuing?" You asked as various pieces of clothing were removed.

"Huh?" Mary asked, thumbs hooked into her pants. "Now?"

"Yeah, for some pointers at least. I'm not enthused by the idea of sparing with an imbued sword since I don't know what it would do to them." You saw Green giving you some side eye as you spoke to Mary.

Mary took her thumbs out from her pants. "Sure, how dangerous could anything you imbue be?" The corner of her mouth curled slightly as she sidled over to you and grabbed your hips.

"I don't know, that is why I'm asking for help." Your flat answer stopped her from kissing you.

Mary blinked at you then guessed, "Because you think I'd run away if you were dangerous."

"No, you're the most experienced fighter which makes you the least likely to get hurt and the most inclined to help me."

Mary opened her mouth then closed it as the sounds of pleasure started to echo from her now restored soldiers. "I don't get it."

"He's not trying to tease you, he's asking for help." Green said with arms crossed examining you very closely.

"Are you feeling ok?" Mary asked, deeply concerned.

Feeling. An interesting word to use becasue frankly no you weren't. You could hear the sounds of sex happening around you, you could see how turned on Mary is, but you weren't feeling anything. "No, in the sense that I'm not feeling anything, physically I'm perfectly fine, aside from the missing hand."

"Is this a result of the aura sharing?" Mary asked.

"I don't know but it is possible. Considering the context I learned the technique, there wouldn't need to be a warning about an absence of feelings. Everyone is supposed to be experiencing a religion moment, a singular feeling. Compared to just then with the mixture of pride, fear, devotion, anger and attraction." That last one was being the most obvious at the moment.

"Can I do anything?" Mary's hand strayed to your crotch. There was no response to her touch.

"I think it will be a matter of time. Emotional exhaustion instead of magical exhaustion. It does provide a good opportunity to work on my imbuing." You waited for Mary to come to the same conclusion and remove her hand.

When she did it was followed by an unconcerned expression. "Alright, we can go to my tent." Putting it into terms she can understand settled her. Shame you didn't know if it was true or not, and that the usage of shame was for purely of syntax reasons, you didn't feeling any shame at having possible lied to Mary. Not that you usually did, she still thought you were an eighteen year old part of this world. Now might be a good time to reveal that truth actually, you won't feel guilty or in any bad about lying all this time.

"Mary there is something I should tell you." She opened the flap to her tent and let you walked inside first. It was spartan. Small bed on stilts, table with maps and a stack of papers on it, a sword and spear filling the empty third wall.

"You're feeling up to having sex?" She asked hopefully.

"No, I wanted to tell you that I'm actually a consciousness from another reality, transplanted into this one by a Goddess, who is Clare's sister, along with twenty others to act as a champions in bet. Clare is the Goddess I have agreed to champion for and I need to defeat her sisters champion in order to win the bet, the winner of the bet gets to dom the loser until they leave this world, which could be at the point I and the other champions die or whenever one of them gets sick of being here and they leave. I'm also mentally around forty." There was the stuff about Delilah but it was better to not give too many details about the nuclear bomb kinda sorta being set up with her younger sister by her mother.

"I know. Didn't Mum tell you Blue told us everything." She blinked at you, and stretched out her words, clearly worried how you'd take the words.

"No. About imbuing. After experiment today I believe my sword passes through anything organic, though I haven't tested it on anything living, but connects as normal to anything inorganic."

"I'm gonna go." Green said from the tent flap. "You look like you have everything handled." She let the tent flap close behind her and you saw her sneaking away towards the orgy.

"It sounds similar to some more complex forms of imbuing. You know the basics of what imbuing does right?"

"Yes, it's a reflection of your non-selfconsciousness and how you understand how it works. Extending reach, allowing faster movement, more force, heat or cold to be applied, and greater control of movement among other abilities."

"As it is a reflection of who you are, maybe your imbuement prevents your sword from doing any harm to a person." Mary looked very thought, "It's not unheard of. There are some historical records of training techniques that prioritized swordplay as a purely non-aggressive method of physical training, inspired by a Queen, or Empresses or something, who refused to allow harm her enemies. Though how accurate those records were is in question, I can't think of any reason to teach swordplay whose primary tenet is not to harm your opponent, or have a leader who would never allow her enemies to come to harm." Mary was rambling but her clear interest in the subject made a little smile appear on her face.

"So you think my imbuing prevents me from harming anyone? It would fit with my personality, I would prefer to not harm anyone, though if it became necessary I wouldn't have any issue in harming someone." You duels with Asune being ample proof of both of those facts.

"The only way to be sure would be to test it." Mary drummed her fingers for a moment and looked at her sword. "There are some animal we keep for meat, there aren't any plans to slaughter one today but using one to test your imbuing wouldn't be an issue."

"Alright." You walk over and pick up the sword to check it's material. "Though I won't be able to use this without destroying the blade." You'll need to find a tree connected to Sarean somewhere nearby.

"What?" Mary asked, she sounded surprised and you put the sword done to look at her. "You'd kill an animal just to see if your imbuing works?"

You thought about it for a moment. "Yes, it's that or test it on myself or someone else. And I don't want to lose any more of my body in the event the imbuing doesn't pass through but disintegrates it's target. Is there a tree nearby?"

"No." Mary said flatly grabbing your hips and trying to pull you to the bed, but unable becasue you didn't want to.

"A lot of people say to the me in that exact tone." You comment idly. "I'll just go back to the academy and get the sword, I'll be back in a few seconds."

"No you aren't. Christopher, I don't know what you're going through with this emotional exhaustion but I know that I'm not letting you do something you wouldn't ever do, killing an animal just to test your sword isn't something you would do."

"You have known me for a few weeks, I doubt you have that strong a grasp on my personality." You could just take off with her holding onto you, but it would throw off your balance and aerodynamics.

"I know you'd rather hurt yourself than hurt anyone else, I know that you care enough about people you've never met to spend your entire day helping them. And I know that you'll stand there and let me keep talking until I can attach this to you." Mary finished as you heard a metallic clink.

You looked at your waist and saw a chain attached to your pants leading to the bed. "Why do you have a chain connected to your bed?" You could break free with little to no effort but you wanted an answer.

"Whenever me and Green spar the winner gets to put this on the loser." Mary shrugged as if that was obvious.

"How often do you win?" You were curious, having seen neither of them fight before and only run forms with Mary it was something that could be worth seeing.

"About half the time." Mary answered sitting on the bed and tugging the chain. "And I know that you aren't opposed to having this attached, and I don't think you need feelings to enjoy it."

You turned away from the tent flap to look at her. "I don't." You said it flatly but as she tugged you took a step towards her. Why had you done that?

"See, I know you Christopher. Now come here so I can thank you for helping my soldiers." She tugged again and you approach standing over her. She looked up at you expectantly but you just blankly stared back at her.

"Can you let me go now so I can get my sword."

Mary sighed and shook her head. "Non-sexy way it is."

"Wh-" You don't finish the -at as you are jumped. Mary tackles your front, unable to so much as shift you but she did push her chest into you face and seemed rather focused on rubbing them in. Behind you Green entered the tent and tried to wrap more chains around you.

Any attempt to stop them would only hurt them. So you lifted your arms to grab Mary and throw her at Green, but stopped. You don't even know why your hand just decided to not grab Mary to throw her at her twin. Green managed to get the chain around your arm and with another metallic clink she attached it to the chain from Mary's bed.

"Now you can sleep this off and thank us in the morning." Green said trying to pick you up. "Please."

You looked at the two of them they were really trying to move you. "Fine." If they were so determined maybe you should listen to them, in your current state they might actually know you more than you know you. Kinda like Asune trying to be a person. Does this mean you would be taking advice from Asune? It doesn't seem as bad an idea as you once considered it.

You walked over to the bed with the pair still trying to move you. as you sat down the pair let go looking a little embarrassed. "We'll just call that a win." Green said to Mary who nodded.

You lay down and waited, you weren't tired and had no idea how long this was going to go on. "This could take a while."

"I'm not going anywhere." Mary said laying down next to you.

"But I'm going to the orgy for real this time." Green said smoothly walking out of the tent.