74 Vol 2. pt. 11 Patch 2.0: The Wolf and the Serpen (1/2)

Lying down on the deck with the blanket that Rock has stolen for the two of them, Fenrir cuddles with Rock and gives her plenty of belly rubs and head pats.

”We don't get much time by ourselves, do we?” Fenrir asks Rock.

Rock ruffs and licks his hand.

”Hey, aren't you getting kind of big? You were only like, a fourth of this size a couple of months ago.”

She bites his hand.

Fenrir retaliates by grabbing onto her snout and shaking it around. Their conversation turns into a wrestling match between her and his hand.

By the end of it, the skin from his fingers to halfway up his arm is covered in red marks thanks to her rocky teeth.

”How come you're getting a fleshy-ish tongue, but your teeth are still like pure rock?” he asks her.

Rock ruffs and chomps onto his hand again, but rather than shake and play with it, she licks it.

He reaches his other hand up to her to playfully smack her side a few times.

”I wish I could take you into reality with me and cuddle with you there. Sleeping would be so much easier if I could sleep with you in my bed. Though, I don't think I would ever want to get out of bed if I could do that,” Fenrir says.

Rock rolls onto her back to signify that she clearly has not yet received enough belly rubs.

”Alright, only a few more minutes and then I've really got to get to bed.” His hand returns to her belly once more. She's still relatively blocky and definitely made out of rock, but the rock that consists of her belly is much smoother and warmer than the rest of her is.

Fenrir looks around and notices that Rod is nearby. ”Hey, Rod,” he calls out to it.

The gem pulses once.

”Do you think that it's possible to save the rest of those girls without getting anybody killed?” he asks it.

The gem pulses twice – no.

”Then do you think I just shouldn't even try? If it means not putting lives at risk, would it be better to just let them stay captive?”

It pulses twice again.

”Yeah, I agree, but I have no idea what to do. Part of me thinks that I should just leave with Nehalennia to at least save her, but I don't think we'd be able to make it far before Ull and that fleet of his would catch up with us.”

One pulse – it agrees.

”And to be honest, I really don't want to miss the tournament. This is still a game, and I already got the rest of the crew looking forward to it, so it would be wrong to skip out on the tournament and to run away with her.”

One pulse.

”Do you want to actually participate in the tournament?”

Another single pulse.

”Yeah, I guess it'd be weird for a fishing rod to not want to be part of a fishing tournament. Also, uhh, sorry for being mean to you. I guess it makes sense that you wouldn't have trusted me originally since I had negative Standing, and you apparently only like people with positive Standing. Just for the record, though, I only had negative Standing because we mercilessly killed a bunch of players in this guild that was led by some assholes who…” Fenrir explains the entire situation regarding Cassiel, that weird garlic guild, and Coastedge. ”So yeah, it might have technically been evil or whatever, but they deserved it.”

Rod waits a few moments before pulsating a single time.

”Glad to know we're on the same page now. I wish I could have let Serra try holding you when she still had really negative Standing. I guess blowing up a village isn't good for that sort of thing. Anyways, I don't suppose that you've got any plan where I can somehow save everybody in that prick's 'harem' who needs saving while not putting any NPC lives at risk?”

Two pulses.

”Yeah, I figured as much. Anyways, I'm going to hop off of here now. See you tomorrow, Rod and Rock. Sorry for being so bad with naming as well.”

Fenrir gets two pulses from Rod and a lick on the face from Rock.

”Ready to wake, Saya.”

Fenrir returns to being just Ryouta.

”Hey, Fan,” Ryouta says to his eternally-spinning ceiling fan.

It continues spinning

”For some reason, I actually thought you'd reply somehow. Great, that game is going to make me think every inanimate object I own is somehow going to be able to talk back to me,” he talks to himself while slipping the headband of a headset off from around his head.

He gets out of bed, plugs it into his computer for it to charge since it's been a week since the last time he has recharged it, and gets back into bed.

”Night, Fan.”

The fan spins.

Ryouta falls asleep, but his sleep is interrupted in only a few hours by the ringing of his phone.

He panics from the sound of his phone ringing since it's been so long that he's forgotten what his ringtone even sounds like!