Moriko was in quite a good mood the m. Kazue had proven quite eaining, and they’d toyed with her through extensive rooming until the kitsune had bee a quivering mass of overstimuted flesh. Then Moriko got to enjoy some personal attention from Mordecai. Things became a bit of a blur after that; she knew Kazue had recovered at some point, and at some point after that there was a bath, but the details became vague.

  While this left Moriko with quite a boun her step, Kazue seemed to have the plete opposite rea. The woman was drifting somewhere between a perfect zen state of being, and just being a blissed-out zombie. It was adorable.

  Mordecai had pletely regained his posure of course, and had called them both cute. Moriko refused to aowledge that naturally, but she was in too good a mood tue it either. Imagine, calling a 36-year-old married woman cute! She had to swallow the giggle that tried to escape at the thought.

  They o behave normally, after all, Kazue’s parents had joihem for breakfast while the delving group got ready to hit the fourth floor. A perfectly normal married trio eating a perfectly normal breakfast with their perfectly normal in-ws. Hehehe.

  Goddess, why was she so giddy this m? Moriko started to sehoughts out to ask if either of them was feeling unusual, and it was like dunking her head into a bucket of pure joy. Kazue was feeling so happy that it was leaking over their bond. Which was kind of nice, and Moriko took it as a pliment of sorts, but it made it a lot harder to think. It was also the first time that one of their emotions had affected her so directly and so subtly. Or maybe it wasn’t, and it just hadn’t been inve at the time? Moriko wasn’t sure now that she thought about it.

  It was kind of hard to be upset, though it could be a bit more frustrating if the kitsune was depressed this heavily or something. There was some simirity to when she’d felt Mordecai’s ahrough his fshback, but that had been more clearly external. Kazue’s feelings seeped through instead. Still, it was affeg Moriko’s thoughts, so the monk started cyg through some mantras in her mind until the meditative process had isoted Kazue’s leaking joy into a nice warm glow off to the side of Moriko’s mind instead of pervadihoughts.

  All this passed while trying to have a normal seeming breakfast. The occasional suspicious looks that Kazue’s parents sent their way suggested that it was clear something was off. Moriko decided to distract them with a question she’d had in her mind for a while. “Akahana, um, would it be rude to ask a question about your shape ging?” she decided to start off obliquely. The kitsune woman was currently in her human form, which she appeared to prefer for eating.

  “You mean why I never developed a hybrid form?” She gri Moriko, obviously guessing the nature of the question. “I don’t have a fox form either. Or druidic shape-ging skills outside of specific spells.” She shrugged. “I just never had much of a talent for it. Having the two forms has worked well enough for me, so I never put in the effort to develop a skill that didn’t e easy. Tailless works well for things like eating and kissing, and my normal kitsune form works well for most outdoor work. Fur protects better than skin does after all.”

  Well, that did answer Moriko’s question. It did not provide with as much of a distra as she would have liked, but it did provide Ricardo with the opportunity to tease his wife about being shown up by her daughter, and Mordecai talked about how Kazue ractig to master her shape-ging to be able to take on almost any humanoid form.

  Kazue was mostly humming happily as she ate, but the versation was slowly drawing her out of her zoned out state, aually she realized she wasn’t tributing to the ongoing versation at all. “Oops, sorry, I was just enjoying listening to everyoalk, I fot to actually say anything!” Moriko wasirely certaihe liween truth and obfuscation was there, and she wasn’t sure Kazue kher.

  But at least the versation had gotten flowing normally now, and before very long, they were getting ready to head back to the war room. The whole process ure luxury to Moriko, which she seemed to be experieng a lot of tely. From their introdu, the bunkin had been very eager to be helpful and the ret flood of visitors, bined with the giant pool of literature to read, was giving them experiend iing ideas. Every meal seemed to have at least one dish that they were modifying out of the books. Of course, things like meat required Mordecai or Kazue to produce the base materials; the dungeon denizens didly hunt each other.

  Which reminded her of something, if ily. “Hey, have you guys beeing any new animals? I know some of the caravaners who had some free time were off trying to capture rabbits and such.”

  Kazue nodded happily. “Yep! And mostly rabbits too, sihat’s what we asked people to look for. We’ve been giving our new residents time to settle in and be fortable before being dire rabbits.”

  “Twenty-nine so far, including the babies from the pregnant ones." Mordecai added, "I’m thinking that we free up a few of our older dire rabbits for some further evolution. There’s an iing new variant I’d like to make for the river.”

  Moriko and Kazue both gave him a suspicious look at the usage of ‘iing’, but they khey’d find out when he was ready to reveal his pn. He liked being the Mysterious One sometimes. Which, to be fair, was not something Moriko or Kazue were good at, so if someone was going to do it, it might as well be him.

  “Hmm, maybe I should get into the rabbit hunting game, too.” Ricardo interjected, which got him a light from one of Akahana’s tails as she shifted forms.

  “You are making enough money from this trip. Plus, you got to marry me. You don’t o think about a few silvers more when you are supposed to be occupied with being a newlywed.”

  “Besides,” Mordecai ented with a smile. “You’ve already given us more than you realize.” He held up his hand, holding two long hairs between his fingers, one white and one bck. “It took a bit to analyze since you didn’t briher of them ihe dungeon, but even magical creatures shed hair onto people, and that hair then falls off ter.”

  Kazue gave her father a narrow-eyed look. “And here I thought Casey being a trained warbird was a surprise. I didn’t realize you were also holding back a secret like this.”

  Ricardo groaned and looked to his wife for support. She simply smirked and looked away. “This is your own fault. I told you those two were trouble.”

  Oh, this was going to be good. Moriko hadn’t wao press Ricardo about the not-horses, but if Kazue wao and Mordecai had information to back her up, Moriko would back them up. “Could you possibly be referring to the bck horse with the poorly hidden malignant aura, and the pretty white horse who tolerated him?”

  “I assume they weren’t irue forms during your travels. That would be a kelpie and an ali.” Her husband replied.

  Moriko suppressed her flinch. She’d known the be was trouble, but a kelpie? “Oh, I have so many questions about that.”

  Ricardo sighed. “It’s not that plicated. I think I cover the basics. So, the aliare is a friend of mine, and I did her a few favors a long time ago. The kelpie is an unmitigated asshole and was harassing me one night when Zara, that’s the ali, stopped by. Tiros was instantly smitten. Things got plicated, but long story short, she’s agreed to py at being a horse aing him stay near her so long as she gets paid by me, which I am rather generous with, and so long as Tiros behaves.” The man shrugged. "It's a little expensive, but great security. Their presence alone wards off most minor beasts."

  “Holy, I was getting tired of Tiros’s crap. He hadn’t mao kill a, but he had taken up a hobby of doing hit-and-runs on the caravan if eo be he river. I was getting ready to get some cold iron traps made a up an ambush. And no, I wouldn’t have accepted one of those bsted ride challenges.” Now he fshed a wicked grin. “However, that reminds me. His harness is what lets him stay away from the water for so long. What he doesn’t know is that it would also let anyone riding him breathe uer. I figure that will be a fun surprise if he gets out of hand.”

  Kazue whi him suddenly. “And you old me? I could have gotten to ride an Ali! And I always was good and fed both of them apples; Tiros could have bitten off my hand!” She sniffed, and Moriko schooled her face to show nothing. That st bit was way over the top, her wife was obviously having fun hamming it up to torture her father.

  Ricardo sighed. “Lass, you know I never like to keep secrets from you. But that art of the bargain. Akahana knew because, well, she’s a druid. her of them could fool her. There was nothing I could do.”

  Kazue tinued making sad eyes at her father until Mordecai broke the mood by rubbing the top of her head. “You’re beio him.” He said with a ugh. “Besides, I was thinking this would be a good pce to see if one of the horses that were brought in might enjoy being a kelpie. Good boss for a river level, don’t you think?”

  Moriko eyed him. “You aren’t going to put my training to waste now, are you?”

  “Gods no. Aside from the fact that I like my limbs to remain intact, a brand-new kelpie is going to ime to adjust. I figure I do that after this group passes through.”

  “What about an ali? Could that be the sed boss?” Kazue asked, beaming up at him.

  He chuckled. “I sidered that, and it does make for an iing pairing, but I think a flying uni would want more space than this level gives. Besides, I have a more river-themed idea for the sed boss anyway.”

  Kazue turned her pout on him, but it was not quite as effective. “You are adorable when you do that,” he said, theheir link came, “and it might be fun to see if you maintain that expression while being spanked. I’m sure Moriko would be willing to help.”

  The kitsune’s pout disappeared as she struggled to keep from blushing. “A-anyway, they are almost ready to head into the library. We should focus on that!”

  The delving party wasn’t quite ready to go, but they were pag up, so everyo Kazue's ge of topic slide as they settled in to watch their private show.

  Zagaroth