This Ascent to Divinity is Lewder than Expected (A Futa LitRPG)

3.03 - Breakfast Together

It wasn't until she and Rosalie met up with Delta that Zoey realized the two of them were holding hands. The fox-eared girl's lips curled in amusement, giving a pointed flick of her eyes at their entwined hands.

"I'm taking it you two worked something out, then."

Rosalie blinked down at her and Zoey's hands, which apparently had gone forgotten for her, too. She withdrew, flushing, but otherwise pretending nothing had happened, in classic Rosalie fashion.

"Zoey will explain," Rosalie said, sniffing. "But yes, we have. Let's get breakfast. I'm starving."

Down in the lobby, served three steaming plates of ham, eggs, and hashbrowns by the innkeeper, Zoey, Rosalie, and Delta convened at a table tucked in the corner of the tiny inn's lobby. The innkeeper had barely left before Delta leaned forward and said, "Okay, spill it. Wasn't expecting you two to be all bright and happy. What changed?"

"Zoey's rune advanced," Rosalie said. "It provided ... a neat solution."

"That's fortunate," Delta said, eying Zoey. "But I can't imagine how."

"It's odd," Rosalie said. Then, apparently not wanting to hold this conversation herself, or maybe honest in how hungry she was, she picked up her fork and pointedly tuned them out.

"Odd," Delta repeated, turning to Zoey. She snorted. "Yeah, what isn't odd with you?"

Should Zoey take offense at that? Probably not. It was a fair enough accusation. "It's, uh, a skill that gives bonus experience the longer we go between shards."

"What?"

"That's ... more or less it. Isn't very specific." To Zoey's knowledge, runes rarely were. The details had to be discovered through experimentation. "So it might not even be a perfect solution. But," she shrugged. She didn't need to finish the statement. Even a potential solution was better than the dilemma they'd been in before.

"Huh," Delta said. "Okay. So?"

"So?"

"We're sticking together?"

"That's the plan?"

"Are we getting more?"

"More, uh, team members?" Zoey glanced at Rosalie. "That's a group decision, I guess. Do we need more?"

Rosalie shrugged. She was shoveling down food with an abandon that was, honestly, a break in her normal composure—enough to give Zoey pause. Zoey wasn't sure what to make of it. Maybe the solution, the relief, had been even greater for Rosalie than Zoey had thought. She did seem to have an ease in her shoulders, a slouched, relaxed posture, that Zoey hadn't seen ... maybe ever.

Zoey fought away a grin. Rosalie might have recognized the dilemma, and been genuinely considering leaving, but it had been something causing her deep conflict. She didn't want to leave—enough that even if it had been common sense to do so, she still might not have.

"Only if we can find someone worth our time," Rosalie grunted. She made a noise of appreciation. "This is good." She skewered another slice of ham and shoveled it into her mouth.

"Easy there, Princess," Delta said, eyebrows raised. She'd noticed Rosalie's odd mood too, the break in her typical composure. "Don't you need to breathe?"

"Or less," Rosalie said. "I could go with less teammates, too."

Unlike her usual scathing comments, this one almost seemed playful. Delta's eyebrows continued to creep up, and she grinned, turning to Zoey.

"So. She got lucky this morning, did she?"

Rosalie choked on her food.

Though God knows why, Zoey thought. How could Rosalie have reactions like that, still? Rosalie had literally had fourteen inches of her cock inside Zoey yesterday, and Delta had watched the whole thing. The implication they'd slept together shouldn't be something that had Rosalie sputtering.