Bunny Girl Evolution [A Monster Evolution LitRPG]

“Kaia!” shouted Maia, running forward.

She was stopped when the two of three remaining bodyguards stepped forward, weapons raised to defend the spasming vampire.

“Stand down!” said Lily

The guards hesitated.

“Do what she says,” said the third guard, who was still standing behind.

All three of the bodyguards had ??? for their level, so Elise couldn’t tell which was the strongest, but based solely on vibes, she would guess it was the one in the back. He was the oldest of the three, and despite the carnage in the room, his eyes were still clear. He was hardly wounded, unlike the other two who were sporting nasty cuts, and though his sword was covered in blood, he still looked like he was full of energy. The other two guards hesitated a bit longer, but then deferred to his judgement.

Maia immediately surged forward, and Elise followed a moment later. Maia fell to her knees at her sister’s side, her hands held in the air, not sure what to do. Elise had a brief thought about how weird it was to show her rear to a person in pain, but quickly suppressed it as she turned around and started raining {Fairy Dust} on Kaia. It had a minor effect, and the pain she was in seemed to lessen, but the blood kept pouring from her mouth, and the spasms didn’t slow.

“What’s going on?!” asked Maia. “Did it not work?”

“I don’t know!” said Elise.

{Fey Bargaining} hadn’t hit her with any curses, meaning that she must have upheld her end of the bargaining, freeing Kaia from her master’s control, but why was she in so much pain, while Lily had been fine? Was Lily just that much stronger? Did Rose have added restrictions, or maybe a failsafe in case she ever broke out? Or was it just that Elise didn’t have enough divine aether to handle the backlash from severing the connection, and Kaia was bearing the full brunt of it?

In the end, it didn’t really matter what caused it. Kaia was dying, and they needed to do something about it. Elise pushed {Fairy Dust} as hard as she could, earning a level in the process, while she tried to think of solutions. She was out of divine aether. She wouldn’t have another charge on the skill for over two weeks. Her regular {Fairy Dust} clearly wasn’t strong enough, and no one else in the room seemed to have any kind of healing abilities to help.

She knew that some of Ostra’s very few healers were on standby, but none were close. She had no idea if Kaia would last long enough for one to arrive, or if they would even be good enough to solve whatever was going on. The best bet was more divine aether, but it wasn’t like she could speed up the cooldown or pause time for Kaia or-

“Oh!” she exclaimed out loud.

I can pause time for her!

She immediately turned around and fell to her knees, putting her hand to the girl. Unfortunately, it appeared she was still conscious, meaning she couldn’t just take her into Astrid’s Star on her own.

“Kaia, I can save you,” she said. “You just need to give me permission. You don’t even need to say anything. Just think about it.”

Her first plea didn’t work. Kaia’s back arched and she opened her mouth in a silent scream, her eyes rolling back into her head as bloody tears rolled down her face. She was still conscious and evidently in too much pain to even think a simple “yes”. Was she really going to die because of that?

“Kaia, please!” she said. “Just think ‘yes’ and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Once again there was no response. However, just as Elise was about to call again, she vanished. Elise was frozen in shock for a second, then breathed out sigh of relief and even started laughing from the stress.

“What happened?” demanded Maia. “Where did she go?”

“She- she’s safe,” said Elise. “I have her in-”

She stopped herself, remembering where she was. Storage items were not all that uncommon, but storage items that could hold living things were. She remembered Hallbjorn’s warning about not letting people know exactly what she had.

“I have her in a skill,” she said. “She’ll be held in stasis until we can get her somewhere that we can save her. She won’t get any worse, and when… that skill I used earlier comes off cooldown, I’ll be able to heal her.”

Maia stared at her in disbelief for a few seconds, then she started laughing in relief as well.

“Lady Lily, could you please explain what’s happening here?” asked the calm guard

“The Blood Syndicate is falling tonight,” said Lily. “Beyond that, I’m not entirely sure.”

Elise could feel the vampire’s questioning gaze on her, and she stood up, realizing that she would probably need to be the one doing the explaining. Maia seemed to have turned into a puddle on the ground as she was filled with relief about not only finding her sister, but having a way to save her. Not all was well, since Kaia was still a vampire, and they would need to wait a while to fully cure her, but with the immediate danger gone, Maia was finally able to release some of the stress she had been holding in for years.

“It’s as she said,” explained Elise. “We’re enacting a large-scale operation to take out the entire syndicate. I can’t promise we’ll get all of it, but any remnants that remain won’t be even close to the original. I recommend you surrender now, as further resistance won’t end well for you. If you make our job easier here, you may even be rewarded when it’s all said and done.”

There were a few seconds of tense silence before the guard finally responded.

“Alright,” he said. “I surrender. I have no attachment to this organization. I’m only here because this is one of very few places I could work and still level up. I am also fully willing to testify of all things I’ve witnessed while working for Blood Syndicate, though I’d hope that would come with some form of pardon.”

“...I believe something like that could be arranged.”

Elise didn’t have the authority to promise anything, but it had been made clear in the briefing that any people like this guard were valuable. The more people they had to testify of the Blood Syndicate’s wicked deeds, the more justified Ostra’s actions appeared. Not that their actions didn’t already appear justified, given the Blood Syndicate’s reputation, but if they could get specific stories to spread around, that would only help.

“Excellent,” he said, nodding. “And I believe these two would like to surrender as well.”

“Y-yes!” said one of the other guards, immediately dropping his sword. “I’m only here for the money. I’ll testify.”

“Me too,” said the other, tossing her spear aside. “Honestly, I hated these people. I always felt grossed out having to be near them.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“My name is Nigel, by the way,” said the calm guard, looking at Elise. “May I have yours?”

Elise narrowed her eyes at the man. Something about him was off. Other than his odd calmness, there was also his lack of battle signs. He had a bit of blood splattered on his clothes, and even a few cuts on his arms and face, but they were all superficial, and they were already healing at a visible rate from his high Fortitude alone. He wasn’t breathing heavily at all, nor was he sweating, unlike the other two, and behind the calm, there was an unsettling glint in his eyes.

“You can call me Alice,” Elise finally said.

Now that she had time to think about it, she didn’t trust the man at all. He was clearly not the loyal type, which made him dangerous. He had probably guessed what was happening at the beginning of the operation, and intentionally hung back to conserve his energy until he was able to figure out who the winning side would be. She wouldn’t even be surprised if he had killed a few of the other bodyguards to help the Ostra members present.

He was well-behaved right now, but she had a feeling that he could take on everyone in the room and survive if he had to. If he decided to backstab them, it would be hard to fight back. It was a risk they couldn’t afford to take right now.

“Alice is a lovely name,” said Nigel. “Do you have somewhere else to be right now? I can show you the way to the other VIP booths.”

“Perhaps,” said Elise, activating {Charm} on all 3 guards, followed by {Fey Bargaining}. “But first, I need to make a few things clear. None of you will attack us. None of you will try to communicate with other Blood Syndicate members unless it is to lure them into danger. You will do nothing to assist the Blood Syndicate at all during this time. If you do, you will die. In exchange, we will not harm you either, and when the operation is over, I will put in a good word with the higher ups for you in order to guarantee you are treated well. Understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” said the younger male guard.

“Yes,” said the female guard.

Nigel smiled. “Alright.”

For a few seconds, Elise felt like her insides were made of dry ice, but it quickly passed, and she got the System notification that her contracts had taken hold. The two younger guards didn’t seem to notice anything, but a look of… something… flashed across Nigel’s face. That only unsettled Elise further.

It was possible that he had already guessed she was a fey based on the skills she had used, but the fact that he had knowingly agreed to the deal she offered was ominous.

“Keep an eye on Nigel,” she told Maia with {Whisper}. “He’s suspicious.”

“Yeah, I got that,” replied Maia, getting to her feet.

“So what now?” the assassin girl said aloud.

“I’ll check in with the others,” said Elise.

“How’s it going down there?” she asked Hans.

There was no immediate response, which made her worry a bit, but it was possible he was just busy talking to someone else. While she waited for the response, she thought about what the rest of the mission would entail.

Assuming that Hans, Penelope, and Jag were accomplishing their mission downstairs, where did that leave Elise and Maia? There were complications, but they had successfully rescued Maia’s sister, as well as Lily, and they had received the surrender of three powerful guards who would likely be able to help with the aftermath. If they were following the plan, they would simply leave now, trusting the other squads to do their own jobs.

Nigel’s offer was fine, but there were other squads taking out the other VIP booths that contained the big spenders attending the auction. Elise’s help was not needed, and might actually make things worse in some ways by throwing a bit of chaos into the mix. She could hear the sounds of screaming and fighting all around, but without a firmer understanding of exactly what was happening, she didn’t dare involve herself.

She looked out from the window, taking a good look at the interior of the arena for the first time. The stands were heavily damaged, many sections on fire as panicked spectators formed mobs trying to get away. There were monsters all around corralling these people and forcing surrenders. All in all, things seemed to be going well for Ostra.

Well, at least in the stands. In the arena, things were odd. There were no members of Ostra there, and as far as she could tell, there was only one person. No, two people. In a stone tower in the center there was a woman lying on a bed, seemingly asleep. At the same time, far below, there was a knight climbing the tower with just his hands, his gauntleted fingers digging into the stone.

Elise was confused for a second, then she peered closer at the woman in the tower. Her eyes widened when she realized that she knew who it was. It had been months, but with her stats increased by multiple evolutions, her eyesight was good enough she could see the woman’s face clearly. It was Bianca.

That meant that the knight climbing the tower must have been Nick. But if they were in the arena, that meant they weren’t underground, meaning that Penelope and Hans wouldn’t have found them. It struck her as odd that they were alone in the arena, seemingly left to fend for themselves while death and destruction surrounded them. It also made her realize with a start that she still had not gotten Hans’ response.

“Hans?” she asked again. “Are you there?”

“Something’s wrong,” said Maia. “Hans isn’t responding.”

“I know,” said Elise. “Something must have happened.”

“Let’s go.”

No further words needed to be said. Elise took a final look at the two in the arena before she turned away. Their situation was odd, but they didn’t look to be in immediate danger. Whatever had caused Hans to be unable to respond was much more pressing, and the more Elise thought about it, the more her heart dropped as she feared the worst.

“You three,” she said to the surrendered guards. “Come with us.”

“Yes, ma’am!” said the young man.

The other two followed suit, and soon, the six of them were rushing back the way they had come. Elise was still suspicious of Nigel, and made sure that he remained in front of her, but at the same time, she was relieved he was joining them. He was strong, and if he truly wanted to help, he would be a valuable asset. She had a feeling they were going to need all the help they could get.