But if one must dream of chasing rabbits, best to hope their fur is white.

Ph

Phoe

Phoenix, or seraphim today, Master?" she asked. Offered. Plead. Begged, arms crossed under her bust with feathers

feathers held in each hand, each hand with either a feather of glowing, burning white or feather of burning, glowing red. Breasts firm as the plumage

plumage long like her tongue

tongue hot and yearning to be met

hot and yearning like her nipples

nipples engorged and heaving like her breasts

breasts wobbling with each breath rolling off her tongue licking the tips of the plumage teasing her swollen nipples pulsing with desire

desire

desire

"I shall have both."

decision.

The cock-tongue encircled the breasts/tongue/plumage/nipples and the maw descended over all.

She giggled, laughed. Cock-tongue claimed one spire of her nipples, hers claimed the other.

Danced together; tongues and nipples alike.

She laughed and moaned and sighed and threaded the feathers into ribbon. Ribbon shining silver over golden threads over maw with tongue that kissed her in the valley of her breasts.

desire

desire

"Furthermore, I desire you."

decision.

Tongues entwined. Her body fell into the velvet. She guided you to her lips, lips guided to breasts, maw encircled all.

Her tongue brought cock-tongue to her throat and cock-tongue gifted to her with seed.

"Ruby or diamond, master?" another she asked, brooches clamped onto nipples. Lips were licked at the sight.

desire

decision.

Cock-tongue wrapped around another she's waist, her arms, her neck, her head for seed to be gifted into her moaning throat.

"Pearl or bone?" another another she asked, badges covering her eyes. Mouth dripped saliva at the sight.

desire

Maw enveloped another another she's groaning head. Seed, spread over her face, running down her neck her breasts her body in rivulets.

Ribbon with feathers, brooches, badges. Ribbon of silver, thread of gold. Pillows of velvet. Bed of platinum – horde of platinum. Horde of platinum with dragon guard.

Dragon guard with need in her eyes. Yearning for her moment. Craving for touch. Submitting to maw. Scales glazed with seed.

desire

desire

yes

Mates. Mates dressed in silk and jewels, sticky in seed, piled and caressing, cooing in want, sighing in slumber.

Unaware of targeted disdain.

shing — the blades rang.

POP — the hatbox called, and robbed. Treasure taken, gold grifted, silver stolen, mates missing, love... gone.

Dusty, decrepit store... remained.

Frayed, tattered threads.

Featherless, rotting ribbon.

All that was left, was nothing.

Then came night, then day, and night again. Endless cycles. Never ending.

Endless cycles. Never ending.

Endless cycles. Never ending, until at last, a Player. Player with gold! Items! Delectable sword!

Delectable sword driven through threads.

POP, calls the hatbox.

Empty, echoes the store.

Endless cycles. Never ending, as day then night then day.

Endless cycles. Never ending, under hot sun.

Endless cycles, under got, hot sunlight.

Endless hot.... hot sunlight —

Sunlight!

Need to escape — you need to escape! You leapt away, but hands, long and clawed, caught you! Holding you back! Holding you, denying you — denying the gold! The treasure! The mates! The dragon! They were- they were they were —

A wolfish snout focused into view against a brilliantly blue sky. Wide, orange eyes looked with startled worry. The hands that held you relaxed their grip, a thumb caressing the edge of your brim.

"I..." your voice failed before you started.

Shadow overtook the two of you as she stepped out of the blinding sunlight behind the massive form of a long, massive, five story building. The columns were ornate despite the time, and what remained of a grand procession of stairs leading up to an entryway was raked with gouges from sets of massive, two-fingered claws. Gouges with rubble and long-dried bones pulled to the massive doorway.

Your wolfen host was at least more than aware of the ominous marks, given the distance she gave the whole of the building. The alley was wider here, more of a proper street or road, and she (and, therefore, you) stood on what used to be a small park or large garden, just inside the shadow the large building cast over it. Whatever plants that had once grown here were long-dead and rotted away, leaving only the hard dirt baking in the sun or the rubble fallen from the buildings that bordered its sides.

Her head tilted, ears lopping to an angle. Here, in proper light, the gentle gradients of her fur were visible. A darker grey gathered around the eyes and brushed back to and over her ears, while a lighter tone struck a bit more suddenly at the square of her jaw to cover her neck.

Again her thumb caressed your brim.

"It seems I am unaccustomed to such vivid nightmares," you said, voice gathering strength as you spoke. While indeed true, you weren't accustomed to non-vivid nightmares. ...or dreams at all for that matter — five years, you reminded yourself. You were missing, or missing for, five years. The world was in such an unrefined state the last you remembered.

Players then, when they spoke their mouths just opened and closed over a series of expressions nonunique to the individual Player — furrowed brow and frown for angry, closed eyes and a grin for joy, so on. The emotion was clear, even if all Players shared it. But monsters? Creatures? There was nothing. You considered yourself lucky. You were a hat. You didn't need to emote so clearly. The Vampires and their Queen outside your door? They took to the habit of verbalizing their expressions. It made poetry club nights infinitely worse.

And yet. This... this almost drone-like worker, as you spoke her face changed. The wide eyes and clenched jaw relaxed. The tension dropped from her shoulders, her hands, her entire body as the frantic worry just... drained from her features, only for it all to further soften with a sigh. The lower lip curled in a pout, the ears drooped, the eyes closed just for a moment to reopen with... empathy?

All of these tiny and subtle notions and features, for a non-Player to have these....

Perhaps the Developer Gods were finally capable of being respected, at least in some small amount.

She brought you to her face, her nose nuzzling your threads before cradling you in the nook of her shoulder, leaning her head onto your form.

It all felt so... overwhelmingly warm.

"I — ahem, excuse me — I must apologize for my initial assumption," you start. Her large, copper-colored eye opened and looked into yours. "On first observation, I assumed you to be some.... Well. You are capable of much more, how to say it... I initially thought your being a, quote, Aware Wolf, unquote, was a deplorable joke. But, my assessment of you as merely a drone was, to say bluntly, wrong to the point of insult, and for that you have my sincerest apologies. Last... night, though sudden and unexpected for the both of us, it was...."

Her eye narrowed coyly, and that long tongue of hers slid from her snout, curling under your brim, licked the edge of your maw. Her wet flesh running over the little nubs of your teeth. She seemed to snicker when she tasted just a tiny bit of your saliva that leaked from her kiss.

"Aren't you a little minx," you murred back at her. "Why is it that you seem so transfixed on me despite—"

The whole of the Aware Wolf's body flinched, and her hands flung open to cover her face and you fell and there came a scrambling of hands as she stumbled to catch you while the world spun and spun and you hit the ground and the everything turned in on itself and then you were back on top of her head. The world still tilted and what were those stars you were seeing circling your crown? They're quite pretty, actually.

It took her a few seconds of frantic searching to realize where you had gone. Her hands held your brim as she visibly sighed in relief.

"That is s-something we will w-work on," you said through the dizziness. "I am... I am not used to a host who is aware of my presence." You squirmed a top her head a bit, trying to find an angle to look down at her properly. "As I was saying though, you seem to be quite transfixed on me despite... have you been in the sun too long? Your face is turning red — mmf!"

You were silenced by her pulling you firmly into place on her head, your maw sinking to rest on top of her muzzle as she huddled in on herself.

You held back a huff. Such a strange creature you found. Though, you couldn't help but find her embarrassment endearing, though over what you weren't sure of yet. Admittedly, admittedly... it did not occur to you that she could blush through a face of fur. Yet all this seemed to be more than simple affection. ...well, even then, it would be best to sate such affection.

Your tongue uncoiled, albeit mostly dry and wholly thin, and gently slid down her snout, coiling around until it found her nose and the lips underneath. You prodded and pushed, and were welcomed in to greet her own tongue in her mouth. She slowly relaxed, and you settled yourself back on her head proper.

"There," you whispered to her as your tongues parted, your slowly reeling back into your form. Her tail wagged behind her. It seemed... wise to move on from prying. "I see you made progress while I slept. How long have you been traveling?"

Her head tilted in thought for a moment before she pointed to where the sun sat in the sky, behind the building. She then lowered it to just above the horizon.

"Ah. Only a few hours, then. And in what direction is the shop where you found me in?"

She turned and pointed behind her with both hands. There was an exasperated huff that came with it, though as you looked you could see why. The road just stretched on. On and up a very large, and rather steep, hill. One you vaguely remember seeing the other side of during your attempts at running to the street corner. With the sun still rising and to your right, that then would be north.

"I see," you nod. The rising concern of being... away from your now-movable spawn location was mitigated knowing that, at least somewhat. "And, our path forward?"

The arms swung, the body pivoted, and the fingers pointed south, where the road stretched through several more city blocks before it entered a tunnel in side of a rather out-of-place cliff. Several hundred meters above the city, atop the cliff, a dilapidated tower stretched to the sky, in a state of repair leagues better than the city it surveyed but not wholly untouched by Gods' whims.

At it's peak, just below the spires of its roof, something glowed a vivid, venomous green, even in the blinding brightness of the day. It drifted to the sky like the smoke of a candle, blowing inwards to the city.

"...if we are to journey to the tower, I firmly ask that you find new employment. I will allow myself as reference."

The wolf shook her head quickly. She made a pointed motion down towards the ground.

"Ah. Excellent," you sighed. The wolf wiped her face with her hands. "...I take it you have been to that tower?" She shuddered, shifting uneasily on her feet. "Let us... take care, then."

With one last shake of her body, she nodded — you were blown off her head as she immediately broke to a run.

For the second time today, you toppled to the ground. This time, though the surprise was sudden, you were gifted with the sight of the she-wolf running at full tilt away. Legs, powerful and strong legs, pushing off the ground, the impact shuddering the flesh up the calve and into the thigh only for the muscles to clench to send that ripple back down and into the ground to push off. Just for the briefest of moments, she was thrown through the air, only to be caught by her other leg, where the impact sent the ripples though its flesh and the cycle continued.

...how does one even coordinate such a feat?

And then, your brim struck the ground and the sight of the she-wolf turning mid-step in panicked worry turned in on itself and you were then atop her head again.

Her hands immediately clamped you down onto her head again.

"I am fine," you seethed through the nausea from the de-location. "I will remind you, the only way you can get rid of me is if I die, or you trade me away. And I'd rather not prefer either of them, at this point in time. You are a much better conversationalist than three-fourths of the Players lucky enough to cross my path."

She made some repeated huffing motions — suppressed laughter, you realized after a moment — and once again relaxed, hands falling away from your brim. This time, however, you made sure to clamp down, not too hard but enough to keep you firmly in place.

The motion was just as sudden. Standstill to motion in a blink of an eye. The speed, however, was that of a jog.

"...fair enough," you sighed. "A full-tilt sprint is probably far too tiring for such a distance, anyway." That, strangely, earned a sheepish nod from her. "Though, in terms of the angle of the sun, when do you estimate we will reach our destination?"

She pointed low in the sky to the west. Not fully to the horizon, but still deep into late afternoon. By the sudden tension in her shoulders, it was clear she also wasn't enthused by it.

"That's an awful long way to go just for wood," you muse. She aggressively nodded, tapping your brim. She huffed, and stepped up her jog just a touch. "I assume it is a Player that orders you to a location for searching, yes? Ah. If this means anything, with all my experience being around Players, this seems like just another standard, nonsensical Player epiphany. Or, a 'Standard Nope', as I like to call such asinine decisions. Why? Because any creature with a lick of intelligence would know such an idea is incredibly, undeniably, stupid and would want nothing to do with it."

More huffed laughter, though much poorly suppressed. To be quite honest, you couldn't help but chuckle with her.

"Oh, trust me, my wolfen friend, being perceived as a mere hat with some magical ability instead of a mimic — the mind-bendingly stupid things I've seen Players do, and yet somehow get away with, is astonishing. Well. Mostly got away with. But I'm sure such tales would be a bit boring, what with this lovely ruined city to behold with all its dust and falling rock hazards."

Her hand drummed excitedly at your brim, almost as fast as her wagging tail.

"Well, if you insist, I suppose I could share a story or two," you sighed dramatically. That got a harsh swat for your teasing. You choked down a laugh. Yes, you were quite wrong with the whole 'drone' assumption. You could think of a few ways to apologize to her, but that would be for the darkness of the evening. "Let's me start with a simpler tale. It involves a Level 4 Paladin Player, one Glove of Larceny, and precisely ninety-six crates of tea and thirty-two sacks of coffee, no more and no less...."