FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Well, the SoFurry downtime caused a bit of disruption in my posting schedule, but now it's time to catch up. If you've been enjoying this and any of my other stories, it would be great if you could consider supporting my Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=802876

It's a bit sparse right now, but I'll be adding more tiers and rewards soon, and anything you would be willing go give would be much appreciated. In the meantime, hope you enjoy. As always, all constructive criticism is welcome.

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"Crusader." I practically spat the word out of my mouth, though somewhat carefully what with the sword at my throat and all. "As over-zealous and self-righteous as ever, I see."

"Quiet, foul magic user." The brilliant white glow of the sword forced me to squint as the person holding it shifted her position, her blade never more than an inch away from my neck. "Though your black magics may have corrupted your soul, I shall not be swayed so easily."

"Oh, I have no doubt there. Your so called holy light had blinded you to any other point of view! Open your eyes, woman! The world is not so black and white!" I retorted.

"Silence!" The hood of my robe was yanked back, exposing my face fully to the holy knight in front of me. Her sword left my neck, only to be replaced by her gauntlet covered hand gripping it ever so softly a moment later.

"There's only one course of action I can take with such a being as yourself..." I shivered a little as I felt her hand move, sliding across my neck to the back of my head and forcing my gaze upward. She look stern and determined, like a woman on a mission as her brown eyes looked at me with deadly intent. Her goal was my singular eradication; that much was clear...

...At least, until her giggles broke the mood of our little roleplay session and she pulled me in for a kiss.

A soft purr escaped me as I gently wrapped my arms around the neck of Silvara Lightkeeper, a Crusader and also my girlfriend. Her silver-white hair flowed down to the middle of her back, while also hiding the similarly colored wolf ears atop her head quite well. Her armor looked like pure silver and hid a body that was arguably as firm and strong as the plate mail she wore. She also had a good six inches of height on me if not more, and while she didn't necessarily need to slide her hands under my thighs and lift me up, it did give a little more leverage to continue our kiss.

We held each other like that for a moment, broken by an occasional breath or slight purr before our lips would meet again. Maybe you could argue it was just the Dream Machine technology that made my heart flutter when she was around, but was it also the Machine that made my heart ache when she was gone? And could it also make me feel those same emotions when I was back in the real world thinking about her? No; the Dream Machine technology was good, but even it has its limits. I was pretty certain what I was feeling was love.

"Hey there, my little black cat." Silvara smiled as she gently broke the kiss to stroke my cheek. That was her pet name for me, referring to the stereotypical black cat that accompanied witches. In this case, the cat WAS the magic user. "How have you been?"

"It's been a bit of a rollercoaster, Silvy." A soft sigh escaped me as I responded with her pet name, wrapping my legs around her waist for a little more support. Her big tail brushed against my legs as it wagged softly. "Some big stuff's been happening lately. And I mean within the past 12 hours kind of lately."

"Oh?" Silvara looked worried. "What kind of stuff?"

"Where do I even begin?..." I thought about filling her in on everything that'd been happening, but decided to hold off for now. "Never mind; I haven't seen you in over two weeks. We need to catch up!"

"Oh, of course we do." Silvara rolled her eyes as she recalled her recent work schedule. "They had me going to ten different cities for work in that time. They even tried to cram in 2 more at the end, and on the same day! I told them to go to hell; I needed a break."

"Well, we're probably going to hell with them, right? At least if we're to believe your parents. You said about half of your whole, 'righteous knight' act is borrowed from the lessons and speeches you got at home, right?" I asked. "I'm always kinda surprised you chose the Crusader class with the stories you've told me about them."

"Well, I think they mean well. They just like all the parts of religion about fire, brimstone, damnation for the non-believers, that sort of thing. I just like the other stuff like acceptance, understanding, and helping others, that's all. Although..." The brief cloud of sadness that hung over Silvara passed as she bought her paws up to my rear and gripped it firmly. "I'm still not convinced you're not hiding some diabolical artifact somewhere on your person."

"Oh? And what if I am? Are you gonna strip search me to find it?" I asked with a mischievous smile.

"Maybe." Her smile matched mine as she turned toward the main area while still holding me. "The temple's too far away; I'll have to rent a room at the tavern for us..."

"Oh no; not the tavern! With its thick walls, and soft beds, and...and..."

"Hmm? Aerilla?" Silvara seemed puzzled as my voice trailed off. She glanced back over her other shoulder at the tiger morph that had been standing just outside the door of the abandoned house. Her red(and I mean really red) hair was dirty and unkempt looking, her clothes in a similarly sad state. They looked like little more than rags, barely leaving enough to keep her decent as most of her tan skinned body was in plain view. The blood that stained her clothes in places along with the sets of metal claws she wore on each hand suggested she'd just gotten out of a fight, though the odd purplish color and lack of wounds on her suggested the blood was not her own.

"Book Katt? There's an... odd name choice." Silvara looked a little flustered herself as she checked out the new character's information, though she came nowhere close to how I felt; I could swear my face was probably as red as the Old Lady's hair. I barely even registered when Silvara set me back down on the ground. "Maybe we should give the new player a hand?"

Silvara's roleplaying tendencies wasn't limited to just our fun time talk, as shown when she approached Book Katt. She knew the starting quest line as well as I did, but pretended to be shocked to see a woman in such a state. Her concern seemed genuine as she asked what happened and where she came from, but Katt(I couldn't bring myself to call her Book) nearly bowled her over as she stomped over toward me. My brain and feet were both stuck in neutral as I tried to figure out where the hell I was going to begin having THIS conversation.

Katt obviously had a lot of questions, judging from her rapid mouth movements and frantic arm waving. Who was that woman? What were you doing? What did I just experience? It could have been all, any or none of those things she was asking, though without any words coming out of her mouth only she knew for sure. She ended up tugging at the black leather collar with a winding golden metal band at her neck in a fruitless attempt to remove it while still continuing to try and speak.

"Aerilla?" Silvara looked puzzled and maybe a little suspicious as she caught up with us. "Do you know this woman?..."

"Um, kinda..." My hand patted around my belt until it found the key that matched the band's lock. I got a close up view of her orange, black and white tiger ears as I leaned in and searched for the lock to insert the key into. "Just hold still a moment and I'll get that off..."

CLICK!

"...and my child is here with some strange woman I've never met before!"

...I immediately regretted my decision to open the lock.

"My child?..." Silvara was familiar enough with my family history to know pretty quickly exactly which parent this was. "Aerilla, your mother is playing Realms?!"

"Yes, I'm playing!" She was roughly the same height as me, though Katt didn't looked the least bit intimated by Silvara's size as her jade green eyes shot their gaze toward her. Her tiger tail swished back and forth angrily as she looked up at Silvara. "And who are YOU to being doing that with my s-mmph!"

"Yes, she is!" Katt struggled to peel my hand that had just shot up to cover her mouth as I spoke over her. "And if she'll just BE QUIET for a minute, I'll explain everything to both of you."

Katt shot me a dirty look, though it disappeared quickly when she saw the even dirtier one I was giving her back. As much grief as the Old Lady gives me, I love and respect her. The only times I've ever given her a real attitude is when I felt she crossed a line or did something really dumb(the time she yelled at me for almost a solid minute for barely getting above the minimum passing score of 65 in a math class after reading my report card one year sprung to mind. She nearly gave me a heart attack, and I almost returned the favor when I realized she misread the 88 I earned as a 68). The look I was giving her combined with me actively trying to shut her up finally caused her to relax and let me lead the conversation.

"So, yes, Katt here is my Old Lady. As to why she's playing, well, something happened earlier today. There was a Breach in th-..."

"Wait! Does she know about... you know, that?" Oh; NOW she's concerned about someone saying the wrong thing?! Katt glanced back at Silvara for a moment while I tried not to face palm right there. "I mean, you said that wasn't exactly common knowledge..."

"Yeah, but Silvara's fully aware of what's happening with the real world Breaches. In fact, the first time we met was when she backed me up during one a few months ago. Since then, we've met up here and... well, we've gotten to know each other really well."

"Y-yes." Silvara stammered her agreement a little as I started to blush again. Neither one of us was about to explain exactly HOW well we knew each other. The Dream Machine is very good when it comes to making you feel certain... sensations...

I quickly filled in Silvara on the events at the bank minus a couple of details before I self-immolated with embarrassment. Silvara shared my alarm at the Breach's timing and location. She chastised me for going solo, though she also conceded it wasn't exactly like I had a choice. Seeing how worried she was looking, I glossed over exactly how bad a state I was in at the end of it.

"This is not good. There's a couple of other Called online; I'll get in touch of them. If the pattern of Breaches are changing, we need to change our tactics." Silvara knelt down before Katt, carefully taking one of her claw adorned hands in her own.

"I'm sorry we didn't mean sooner, or under different circumstances. But I want you to know; I love Aerilla dearly. It's my job as a Defender to shield my fellow players, but even if it wasn't I would give my life to protect her. Please know that however you may feel about me or about our relationship, I will never let anything happen to her on my watch."

"S-Silvy..." I felt equal parts embarrassed, awkward and loved hearing Silvara's words. Katt for her part just nodded in stunned silence. With that, Silvara excused herself to update the other Called on the current state of affairs, leaving me and Katt alone.

"I..." Katt looked back at the main road where Silvara had walked off, the door of the house she'd just came out of, and to me. She repeated that pattern a few times before she finally settled on me with an exasperated look on her face. "I don't know even know where to begin..."

Took the words right out of my mouth, Katt.