Victoria King

Emilia glances down at the tray in her lap, which had a few strange objects and accessories, mostly it looked like jewelry or carved figurines or something. You and Tori glanced at each other while Emilia made a decision, picking up a glove and sliding it on. "Yes, I think we might as well cut right to the chase. Do either of you know what this might be?"

You and Tori both shook your heads wordlessly.

Emilia handed the tray and its contents to Alice, motioning to the partly-robotic Kelly that she is dismissed for the moment. Kel-AI snaps the journal shut and walks with mechanical strides out to stand next to Alice, turning to observe whatever was about to occur.

"It's an enchanter's glove. You know, in a lot of ways, creating magical spells is not dissimilar to writing computer code today. A programmer can make anything they wish happen in a virtual space, but it always needs refinement, debugging. Enchanters in the olden days had very similar challenges, needing to adjust and tweak magic to find the right words and inflections to achieve their desired effects. Especially tricky to refine are curses, which often respond to certain conditions that could happen rather infrequently. Enchanters had to wait until full moons to perfect a lycanthropy curse before these came along, then they could make werewolves appear with a wave of their hand. In particular, this glove allows for 'curse induction', allowing for triggering a curse even if its requirements aren't met.

Tori's eyes went wide. "Wait, that means..."

"Precisely. I shall demonstrate."

Emilia raised her hand and waved the glove in front of Tori, before pointing at herself. Tori's hand began to glow purple. Suddenly worried about where this might lead, Tori gave you one last look before her eyes glazed over, and she stumbled forward toward Emilia.

"Wait!" You tried to reach out to Tori before she could touch Emilia, but your reaction was too slow. When you grabbed her wrist, the flash of purple had already burst outward, the curse completing its mission. Tori turned to you, but she was no longer Tori... her face looked similar to Emilia's, you could see features of both Tori and Emilia present in her. Tori's wavy hair cascaded down her back, now a rust red in color. Her body looked more toned, more athletic--qualities that Emilia likely wished for Tori to become for her, to experience a more active lifestyle.

You looked at your smiling friend, who seemed particularly thrilled that her experiment showed success! "Alice, mark this result down," she said. "The Channeler curse does not conflict with the Kurushimi curse. That's yet another breakthrough. And one other thing..."

Emilia flicked her wrist so you would let go of it, as she stepped over to the fallen bracelet. She picked it up, examining it for what seemed like the longest moment. You'd been locked in Tori's body for days because of that wretched thing, and now with Emilia holding it in Tori's hands, you realized what she might be pondering as the normally frail billionaire stood in a healthy body before you.

"Emilia, just wait," you said, holding a hand out. "Before you do this, consider--"

"Take this back upstairs to the display if you would please, Alice." She clasped the bracelet shut without any wrist within it, turning a couple dials to scramble the code so an unknowing user wouldn't know how to open it. Emilia turned back to you, crossing Tori's arms over herself. "I'm not a monster, Peter, I just employ them with competitive pay and benefits."

You sighed in relief, bracing against the glass wall. "I really thought you were going to do that..! But, now I'm curious. Why didn't you? Or, why don't you wear that bracelet yourself, if you say you have a curse too?"

Emilia grimaced, puting her hands on her hips. "Believe me, I've tried using it on my own." Her fingers pressed into her rear slightly, and she glanced back. "Ooh, very nice. ...Yes, well, about my curse. The Kurushimi curse is a particularly insidious piece of dark magic, it's resistant to a lot of countermeasures. Curses can be cast to directly resist specific effects, and the original author of the Kurushimi curse made sure to counter each and every known method to nullify or dispel curses outside of whatever the original conditions may have been. However, the curse author couldn't take into account every potential scenario, and I spend a lot of my waking hours searching for magic that the cursemaker couldn't account for, because the effects are indirect--a channeler wasn't intended to suppress curses, hence it hadn't been considered to counter." Emilia watched as Alice walked away with the bracelet on the tray. "Even so, as I said, my curse is insidious. Even if I could wear it with your friend's body, it wouldn't be long before my curse would bleed into her form, and then I'd merely be stuck again. Besides, I can feel her love for you, and... I wouldn't want her to be **** the rest of her days and be unable to express those feelings on her own again. I sympathize with the cursed, after all. She'll just have to live with me borrowing her and her attraction to you for a day."

You nodded, somewhat relieved that you hadn't lost Tori forever in that moment, before you furrowed your brow in realization. "Borrowing her attraction to me?"

Emilia chuckled a little, as she stepped up right next to you, pushing Tori's newly athletic body against you. "Is that a problem, Peter? I don't normally get to have close relationships when a friendly hug might break my spine normally, or a simple kiss might transfer an illness to me that's harmful to most but leaves me bedridden for weeks. This is your half of the experiment--you will accompany me today and we will have a lovely time together. Frankly, your part of this arrangement is quite lucky, because a beautiful woman with a lot of money and a deeply-rooted affection for you is going to take you on a twenty-four-hour date that I intend to remember for a long, long time. And when it's over, then I may have a business proposal for one or both of you, but I'll let you get back to the 'normal' life you crave in the meantime unless you and Tori find that I have some offers you just cannot refuse."

Well, it could certainly be worse! As much as you hoped you could have removed the bracelet and then returned to a channeling with her to return home, you felt like being able to count Emilia among your friends had particular benefits. It meant one more day where Tori couldn't exist as merely herself again, but you would have to make it up to her later. "Alright, Emilia, I'll do anything you'd like."

Emilia smiled, leaning in to give you a quick kiss on the lips. "Delightful. Before we go anywhere, though, I would prefer if you call me Victoria. I'm not Tori, but I will borrow her name briefly. Some of my staff will understand if you called me Emilia, but especially the ones on the ground floor will be more than a little confused, so Victoria King shall appear to be my distant cousin. Kel-AI, build up a modest but thorough social media presence for my cousin Victoria, yes? I don't want people to think Victoria just appeared out of thin air, she should just seem like a little-known corner of the King family. And get some identification and credit cards made by noon so I can travel the town, yes?"

The robotic woman nodded and wandered off. You watched her go, before Victoria touched your chin with her finger, pulling your focus back to her. "As for us, we have a little bit of time to kill before Kelly's back with my temporary identification. I've many avenues of this newfound affection for you that I would like to explore. I'll give you three options: mind, body, or soul. If you pick 'mind', then I'll give you a thorough tour of my mansion, including this floor we're on so you can see how King Enterprises operates and learn about the state of magic in the world today. Choose 'body', and, well... I'll take you to one of the guest bedrooms and you can show me how to best operate my new frame, yes? And if you pick 'soul', then I'll bare it to you in a way that I'd never done before, but I feel compelled to do with you--in that I will tell you about the secrets of my curse and my family, my innermost desires, my ultimate truth, over a nice cup of coffee in my garden. I want to do all three with you, but I think we'll only have time for one to start, before the other fun for the day begins. I actually feel a bit ****, to be honest, I wouldn't normally offer these things to anyone, but I hadn't realized Tori's bond with you would be so strong, so I must abide by her feelings even if it puts me in an unexpected position."

This was a difficult choice! Each option presented fascinating insight into a billionaire that you felt few knew anything about. Even the offer of going right to a bedroom presented an opportunity to learn a treasure trove of information about the King family, where her behaviors in a new body would teach you things about the kind of person Emilia wanted to be. This was not the kind of decision to make lightly.