I've Turned Into A Fox Girl?

After sorting out Luna's weirdness, we began to talk about what we were going to do. It wasn't a guarantee that we would fight Freja, but depending on how she answers, it might turn ugly quickly.

'I've still got that black box that my mother gave… should I open it now?' As I was trying to come up with any way to avoid conflict, I recalled that mysterious box, which I was told to only open once I reached Tier 10.

'I should wait until we deal with Freja before opening it.' I may have theoretically reached that Tier 10 power level, but stats and actual battle prowess were two different things. A part of me still lacked confidence, so I wanted to prove to myself that I really do deserve to open it.

'I remember the requirement to reach Tier 10 was to kill something at that tier, but I kind of skipped that step.' In the end, this was the final test to end my long training montage, although, if it turns out to be a more peaceful outcome, then so be it.

"So are we heading straight for the palace or are we going to Freja first?" Clara wondered what our specific destination was, as we could head straight to the barrier and see if we could disable it first, but could we really afford to ignore Freja?

"If Freja truly did set-up the barrier, then I would like to have some answers, so we will be heading to Freya's forest." Himeko explained the plan, making me realise that initially we didn't even have a plan. I hadn't haven't really thought about it too deeply as I was too hyper focused on how to deal with Freja. In the end, I probably would have decided the same.

"Makes sense, but can we really fight her?" Elanor was on the more sceptical side, which was understandable. Clara, Silver and Elanor were still in Tier 8 or 9 making it quite daunting to face someone as strong as Freja. Even Luna I assumed was still at Tier 8. She doesn't have a system after all, so her progression should be much slower.

"Don't worry, Shaman and I will take her head on with Luna's support. There is still her little harem of girls, so that's where you, Clara and Silver will come in. They all should be weaker than you, except maybe Kiruya." Himeko Elaborated on how we will fight if it does come down to it.

"Kiruya… She was a great help in Elfhiem. I hope we can at least talk it out with her, but I doubt she will defy Freja." Clara, me and Silver all looked disappointed, as we had made some pretty good memories with Kiruya and it would be a shame if we had to kill her. At the very least, we could try to knock her out. Even then, if we end up killing Freja we may be breaking our friendship beyond repair.

"We can't let personal feelings get in the way. It pains me that we will have to fight Freja, as she is essentially an aunt to me, but she has betrayed me and deceived us all. This goes for Kiruya as well, since she is most likely in on it." I didn't want it to get to us that we would be fighting a good friend, so I tried to be objective about it.

"Shaman is right, it's a cruel world and we can't all be friends in the end. So you better steel yourselves and make sure you don't hesitate where it counts." Luna voiced her determination, not that it was hard for her to do as she had no connection to these people.

"It would be great if we could talk it out, but having known Freja for years she can be very explosive. Which leads me to one thing I want you all to be careful of. Freja isn't dumb. She may try to lead us into a trap as soon as we approach her."

"Whatever you do! Do not follow her through any portals or let her mislead you. She is considered a clever bitch for a reason and has the best poker face. She is an unpredictable master of deceit and trickery, so please be careful even with her subordinates." With personal matters out of the way, Himeko gave us some more advice, as she was the most familiar with Freja.

"She is right, my memories are only of her playful side, but she is definitely someone full of tricks, so don't let your guard down." Thanks to the soul merge, I had clear memories of all the interactions I had with Freja, which corroborated what Himeko was saying.

Everyone nodded their heads. Soon after, our attention was caught by a massive forest in the distance.

"We're close." Silver muttered, confirming this was indeed Freya's forest.

"Get yourself mentally ready, there is no turning back now." Himeko flapped her wings, slowing down slightly, giving us a little more time to prepare.

[Shaman, what about Freya's system?] As soon as we had a moment of silence, Clara messaged the group chat to ask about Freja's system, which I had completely forgotten about.

[Shit, does that make this fight impossible then?] Silver quickly jumped to conclusions, panic clearly showing on his face.

[Wait, Freja has a system as well?] Elanor chipped in, just learning that Freja has a system.

[Yes she does. However, it seemed to be much different from mine so it's hard to say how big of an advantage she has. There seems to be a higher power at play, but they seem to operate separately from the ones behind mine.

For all we know, Freja's power might not even scale off of levels.] I didn't know how the systems came to be, but one thing is for sure is that whoever gave Freja her system is different from mine.

I remembered Kiruya mentioning how she had a system, but it was nothing like mine and was a much simpler version. So there were still a lot of unknowns left about her system. Part of me wished I had investigated more, but I never thought I'd be in this position.

[Still, she may have power that is beyond Tier 10, so please let us know if it's not looking good.] Clara erring on the side of caution made me second guess myself, but like Himeko said, it is too late now.

[If it gets bad, I can teleport to Elysia. Then again, I would rather not come to that since that will mean you guys will left on your own] Using my lover's call was the absolutely last resort, as it would put everyone else at risk.

[There is not much we can do now, but I can always use my shadows to hide everyone, just signal us when it's turning sour and we can turn tail and run.] Silver calmed down a little. With his abilities, I doubt Freja would be able to find them. However, the only issue with that plan is Silver's mana consumption.

We also don't know Freja's skills so it might not be as fool proof as we think since she knows most of our abilities.

[W-we will just have to see, this is under the assumption we will fight in the first place.] Elanor thought about it optimistically, but in a scenario like this, it was hard to see things going down peacefully.

[Hmmm, okay. Speaking of which, has Elysia messaged you at all?] Clara didn't seem to like the plan, but what else could we do? Switch sides? I doubt that would fly with anyone here.

[Nope, she has read it, but there has been no response.] It was a little disheartening since she was messaging us at the beginning, but after a month or two she suddenly stopped. It made me want to go see her, but since she still read the messages I refrained. Whatever she was doing, I just hoped she would come back safe.

[Perhaps leave her a message saying we will be fighting Freja soon? That might make her come back.] Silver brought up a pretty good idea, as I doubt she would stay there much longer knowing me or anyone in the party is in danger.

[Yeah, I'll let her know, she is in this chat, but I'll send a direct one.] Quickly switching to direct messages, I quickly left a message saying we were going to meet Freja in the next 30 minutes.

"Why are you guys all looking down?" However, as we were having our little secret meeting, Luna looked at us weirdly seeing our heads looking down at our system screen.

[We can tell her, right? It's not like we have Rea stopping us from telling people the truth.] Clara was right, we had no reason to hide the system, so we may as well tell Luna.

'Maybe I could give Luna and Himeko a system. I'm pretty sure I offered Himeko, but she said she wasn't quite ready.' I would need to ask, but I don't know if now is a good time.

[Yeah it's fine, no reason to hide it.] Giving the okay, we began to explain the details to Luna, preparing for the possibility of gaining a new recruit to our party.