All four girls bedded down shortly after Eris levelled up Desire’s Reap, since the train would arrive at the capital city of Madaras sometime around six in the morning. They would need to be awake and ready before then, so that meant the train attendant would come by and give a quick courtesy knock at the girl’s chosen time of five.
Eris and Jaxie had been sharing a bed for so long- even before they officially started dating- that the blankets felt cold. Jaxie may have been in the bunk about three feet above Eris’s head, but that didn’t stop the redhead from missing her girlfriend’s arm wrapped around her when she slept. Or tried to, rather. The lack of a second body combined with the general restlessness of being stuck on this train with nothing to do and the anxiety of the next day being the start of the Marrix school year? All that meant Eris probably spent half the night trying not to disturb her cabinmates with her tossing and turning before sleep finally took her.
Eventually, Eris felt herself being roused with a kiss on the forehead.
“Hey sleepyhead.”
“Hnngh?” Eris blinked her eyes open to meet Jaxie’s who was kneeling next to the bed.
“Didn’t sleep that well, huh?”
Eris shook her head while her eyes went to Alex and Nima’s bunks behind her. Even in the darkened room, Eris could see they were empty. “Where are they?”
“Sitting in one of the dining cars while they have breakfast and waiting until we reach the capital. You slept right through the courtesy knock so we decided to give you a few extra minutes.”
Eris sat up in the bed- or at least as far as the top bunk allowed her to. At the same time, she slid over against the wall enough to make space in the small bed. Eris didn’t care if she was being needy- she lifted the corner of the blanket in a silent invitation. Jaxie smiled and slipped into the bed. She also handed Eris a jar of oatmeal and a wooden spoon.
The pair sat silently as Eris ate her room-temperature breakfast while cuddled in Jaxie’s embrace. There wasn’t quite a way to put it into words. Jaxie made Eris feel all warm and gooey inside- even more so now that they officially donned the label of ‘girlfriends’. It was like her heart was wrapped in a warm blanket and being given soft kisses, and that was just by being near Jaxie. Having the tall girl actually holding her, kissing her, or… more...?
Eris was worried her heart would stop altogether whenever it happened.
She was giddy with excitement when the quartet finally stepped off the train at the capital city of Madaras. Just like Sunset Ridge, Eris would have loved to walk around the capital and see everything it had to offer- if for nothing more than to assuage the restlessness that had been building over the sixteen-hour train ride with nothing to do. Unfortunately, the monorail that the four girls would be taking was scheduled barely forty-five minutes after their train arrived. After walking the fifteen minutes between stations, that didn’t leave much time for sightseeing. Besides, it was still dark in the early morning. All that could be seen were the shadowed buildings and a small handful of people walking the streets. The city hadn’t quite woken up yet. The monorail station was a different story.
Matrix was just outside of Madaras, so the easiest way to get there was with a monorail from the capital city. Many of the new students had probably already arrived in the week-long grace period they have to get themselves situated in their new dorms. That meant this monorail ride was holding almost every single one of the ‘final arrivals’ headed to the school. Lots of eighteen-year-old faces filled out the seats and talked amongst each other to encompass the twenty-or-so minute monorail ride.
Eris didn’t talk with any of them, because she was too busy spending most of the trip lecturing Jaxie, Alex, and Nima about the differences between the train’s electroarcanic combustion engine and the monorail’s thermatic arcanum motor.
“I’m sure I missed a few details, but I think that covers the gist of it.” Eris finished with a long breath. As usual, Jaxie looked confused but supportive and Alex’s eyes had glazed over fifteen minutes ago. Nima’s face was just as emotionless as its default state seemed to be.
“Wow, that was very informative. How do you even know all of this?”
“Damian Baxter’s Encyclopedia of Third Century Inventions,” Eris said. Jaxie smiled and wrapped an arm over Eris’s shoulders while leaning back in her seat.
“Ell checked it out so often that the library gave it to her as a present for her sixteenth birthday.”
Nima nodded, then tilted her head. “I’m going to assume that you’re Ell?”
Eris blinked a few times, then nodded. “Right, yeah- uhh… my last name’s Kadell and one of my teachers only ever called people by their last names. Then Jaxie started doing it, and ‘Kadell’ ended up getting shortened to just ‘Ell’. Kinda just a nickname now.”
“Do you have a middle name?”
“Limeen.”
“Thank you.” Nima leaned forward in her seat enough to look past Eris and towards Jaxie and Alex who were on the other side of the redhead. “Just to be clear, are Jaxie and Alex nicknames as well, or are they your real names?”
Jaxie shrugged. “Nicknames, I guess? Full name is Jasmine, but I go by anything. Jaxie, Jazzy, Jay, whatever you want. Take your pick.”
“Middle and last name?”
“Daisy, like the flower, and Kerrot, not like the vegetable. K-E-R-R-O-T.”
“And you?” Nima looked at Alex.
“Alexandra Mena Qualley. M-E-N-A Q-U-A-L-L-E-Y, though everyone just calls me Alex. It’s shorter and easier that way. Why do you ask?”
Nima lowered her shoulders. “I prefer using real names over nicknames whenever I can.”
“So you never use nicknames? Like, ever?” Jaxie raised an eyebrow. Nima let out a long breath.
“People have always been difficult for me to manage for many reasons. One of them is names. Nicknames start, change and end without any warning. t’s exhausting to try and keep track of all of them for any given person. It’s easier for me to have a single, unchanging name that I can attach to each individual.”
“Normally, I use whatever name a person introduces themselves with, unless I anticipate being in contact with them over an extended period of time. In those cases I ask for their real name and then if they would be alright with me using that. Most are. If they aren’t, I ask for whichever name they would prefer me to use. Just to confirm, your full names are Eris Limeen Kadell, Jasmine Daisy Kerrot, and Alexandra Mena Qualley?”
The three girls nodded.
“And you have no problems with me referring to you as Eris, Jasmine, and Alexandra?”
A communal head shake. Nima bowed her head then brought her gaze back up before speaking.
“Thank you. That helps more than you think.”
“So… you don’t like people?” Jaxie asked.
Nima shook her head. “Not necessarily. I just have a difficult time understanding them.”
“What do you mean?”
“My therapists described it as a complete lack of empathy,” Nima said. “I’ve always had exceptional struggles with determining the way that others feel.”
“Therapists? As in plural?” Jaxie asked. Nima nodded in response.
“Yes. I was labeled as an exceptionally rude child when I was younger because of my behaviour with others. My parents sent me to a therapist to figure out if it was a fault of their raising tendencies. I was sent to two more so that there could be multiple opinions about me, and they all came to the same conclusion. I had no detection for the emotions of others and being naturally curious led to many invasive questions and remarks that were seen as offensive.”
Eris furrowed her brow. “That sucks.”
“It is limiting, yes. There have been far too many injured feelings because I wasn’t aware that my words or actions were causing discomfort. I try to read various books about social normalities to make up for it, but people are exceptionally complex and elusive with their feelings. I apologize in advance if I ever say or do something that would upset any of you, and also request that you please make me aware of such so that I may prevent it from happening again. I quite literally will not learn unless you tell me I’m doing something wrong.”
“Will do,” Alex said.
“Thank you, Alexandra.” Even though they weren’t trained on her, Eris could see the way that Nima’s eyes were practically burning holes into Alex’s. Jaxie must have noticed too, because she leaned back in her seat with a chuckle.
“Yeah, that’s not gonna get weird at all.”
Eris would have lightly slapped Jaxie to chastise her for the comment, but Pacifist apparently decided that wasn’t allowed. Thankfully, Nima was already speaking and had her unflinching gaze turned towards the Berserker.
“I’m glad that it’s not weird. I’d hate to do something that made you uncomfortable.”
Even though Marrix was by all accounts a military school, it seemed downright insulting to call it that. This wasn’t a school. It was a city.
A neighborhood of twenty dorm buildings, each six stories tall with ten rooms on each floor, and each room holding two students. On one side of the dorm neighbourhood was the massive Hazard Training Room for all the combatants wanting to test any number of skills in a safe environment. On the other side of the dorms was a building that Eris had only ever read about in wonder.
The Crafting and Development Facility.
Surrounding all of that in a large triangle were parks, gyms, a small handful of basic restaurants, a market square with dozens of storefronts and stalls, a library, an office building for school executives, and even a small-but-permanent carnival ground with various games to play and blow off steam when things got a bit too stressful. That alone would have been impressive, had it not been for one simple factor.
All of that was a single Sector- Sector Saez.
Each of the six Sectors, named Ohn, Tol, Teer, Fura, Feegh, and Saez, were effectively identical. All of them shaped in an isosceles triangle and fitted together to form a single, massive hexagon that made up the entirety of Marrix. Meanwhile, an intricate system of monorails just a touch smaller than the one that the group used to get to Marrix wove over the streets and buildings in raised bridges that dipped back down to ground level at each of the many stations that tied everything together. In the very center of the school-city was the single thing that the school had been purposefully built around- the mysterious Obelisk. The one magical device that allowed for such a large-scale and efficient operation of Syndicate training.
While Eris, Jaxie and Alex were all stationed in Sector Saez, Nima was apparently in Sector Fura. The rainbow-haired girl gave her goodbyes, but did provide Jaxie and Alex with a time and place that they could meet if they wished to continue discussing the possibility of teaming together. When she stepped onto a different monorail alongside all the other last-minute arrivals heading towards the fourth Sector, that left the primary trio moving with their respective crowd towards the sixth. The seventy-or-so students all walked with giddy excitement down the brickwork streets through the dormitory neighbourhood only lit by sunrise and a few magical lanterns on posts.
All of them split up into lines at the handful of stands set up with a blue sign that read “FIND YOUR DORM HERE”. The trio of girls stood together, naturally. When it was their turn, the twenty-something-year-old guy operating the stand greeted them with a smile.
“Good morning, ladies! Let’s start with you- may I get your name?”
“Alexandra Qualley.”
“Qualley… Qualley…” He muttered while looking over a page. “Ah, Alexandra Qualley. You were expecting a combat class from your Gifting. Was that the result?”
“Yes.”
“Nice, that makes things easy. You’re in dorm eleven, room number twenty-two. That’ll be on the third floor. Here’s your key. Next?”
“Jasmine Kerrot.”
The guy started looking through one of his papers. After a moment, Jaxie piped up. “K-E-R-R-O-T.”
“Ah, I was looking in the ‘C’s. Sorry about that.” He switched to a different page. “There we are- Jasmine Kerrot. Did you get a combat class like you expected?”
“Yeah.”
“Wonderful.” He picked out a labelled key from the box underneath the stand. “You’re in dorm thirteen, room number forty-seven. That’ll be on the fifth floor.”
“Cool. Do we only get one key between the two of us, or do we get another?” Jaxie accepted it when the guy passed it over. He raised an eyebrow.
“Your roommate already has her key.”
Eris frowned. “No I don’t?”
The guy looked at Eris, then down at the paper, then over at another sheet of paper that appeared to be every room number along with the names of the individuals in them. “Looks like room 1347 has Jasmine Kerrot and Rebecca Reik, who checked in yesterday.”
“Wait,” Eris furrowed her brow. “We don’t choose our roommates?”
He shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. People with combat classes are in dorms one through fifteen, and crafters are sixteen through twenty. Rooms and roommates past that point are randomly determined. May I get your name?”
“Uhhh… Eris? Kadell. With a K.”
He clicked his tongue a few times as he switched to the ‘K’ page. “Ah, right near the top. Did you receive a crafting class like you expected?”
Eris nodded. He went right back to the paper to confirm a number. “Alrighty, you are in room number- oh...”
His face went slack. All three girls, including Alex who had stepped slightly to the side, perked up at the sudden change. “What’s wrong?” Eris asked cautiously.
He was quiet as he grabbed the key. When passing it to Eris, he wasn’t making eye contact.
“I would like to apologize in advance.”
The guy- Jacob- had given Eris no indication of what she was walking into aside from his apology. That made it worse. Eris would have much preferred to at least know what waiting for her. Was it the room itself? Eris thought all of the rooms were identical. Did that mean it was her roommate?
Oh damn, it must be her roommate.
What could that mean? Someone with enough infamy to make this random guy who volunteered at the stand immediately give pause. What did that mean they were like? Was it a guy? A girl? Were they some reclusive wallflower? Wait, that wouldn’t cause infamy known throughout the Sector.
A stuck-up perfectionist that ridicules everyone? Yeah, that sounds about right. Eris’s new roommate was going to be some awful, pretentious brat that would make her life a nightmare here with unnecessary rules and gloating.
Whoever they were, they were waiting in room sixty of the seventeenth building. Now, Eris had to walk down the long hallway all the way to the end of the top floor. The key was held in a clammy hand. As it turns out, it wasn’t needed. That was because the door didn’t even have a doorknob or a lock- both had been clearly and deliberately removed to leave behind empty holes. As such, the door eased open with just a touch of pressure allowing Eris to look inside the dorm room with a confused eyebrow.
It was bigger than Eris and Jaxie’s room at home, but the train cabin had almost beaten that so it wasn’t saying much. Two beds spaced apart with a nightstand on each side of both, a pair of desks, a pair of dressers, and a pair of closets, all with an attached small kitchen with appliances that ran on thermatic arcanum power and a washroom off to the side. At the very least, the room didn’t appear to be trashed, nor did it seem completely clean and tidy. It was sufficiently lived in. Not that Eris could figure out what that would mean, since her eyes were fixated on the girl sleeping at one of the desks.
For one, she was naked. Completely bare as the day she was born, presenting very lightly tanned skin covered in dark freckles to the world. Although Eris could tell that she was naked, she couldn’t actually make out the sight of anything too indecent because of the way she was slumped onto the desk and lightly snoring atop papers. The girl had probably shifted a lot in her sleep, since her big bushy mane of blonde-and-brown hair was partially wrapped around her head like a cocoon.
Eris quickly looked back at the door- partially to avert her gaze and protect this girl’s modesty, but also to double check the set of numbers on the front and silently pray she had gotten mixed up somewhere. 1760.
Nope. Eris was in the right room.
Eris wasn’t quite sure how to go about this. Did she wake up the girl and introduce herself? That would be more than awkward- she was completely naked. Did Eris just drop her stuff off and leave politely? That didn’t seem like a very good option either, but it was better than nothing. Maybe Eris could leave a note? That could work-
An alarm clock rang on the nightstand beside one of the beds. Eris immediately paused as the girl at the desk started to rouse with a groan. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only movement in the room.
What Eris initially thought was a lump of blankets on the far bed grunted and reached a dark, feminine hand from under the covers to blindly slap at the clock. After she missed for the fourth time, the figure mumbled a swear and threw off the blankets. Eris was met with the sight of gorgeous, supple, dark brown breasts that wobbled slightly as the girl frustratedly silenced the alarm.
“Why do you have your alarm set for seven in the morning?” She asked towards the girl at the desk, completely failing to notice that Eris was standing in the doorway. Meanwhile, the aforementioned desk-girl yawned, wiped her eyes with a hand and started to rake the hair from her face.
“Because unlike you, I got a fuckin’ shop to run.”
“Wait, why are you over there?”
The girl at the desk turned in her seat, giving Eris a much clearer view of her delightful, shapely, and quite large breasts. Eris could even see the outline of the girl’s pussy, and now that she was turned around, the streaks of dried cum on her face. Much like the one in the bed, this girl didn’t seem to notice Eris and her bright-red face either.
“You nutted twice and zonked out. I used a dildo to finish your job and then started planning out some formulae for a few commissions.”
“Oh, don’t start lying. I know you came.”
“I never said I didn’t,” The blonde-brunette quipped. “I’m saying that I was about to cum again when you busted for the second time and went to sleep. I had to get myself off, so thank you for that.”
“Well if you’re so hung up about it, we could have another go?” The black girl grinned and pulled the blankets even further aside to show a nicely proportioned cock that was already hardening. Eris couldn’t force herself to avert her gaze. “How much time do you have before you need to go to your shop?”
The blonde thought for a moment. “About fifteen minutes.”
“How about it? Care for another round?”
“Sure,” she grinned. We could do two rounds and I’d still have ten minutes left over to get ready.”
The black girl glared. “Laugh it up, Princess. We both know who’ll be moaning into the pillow.”
Eris must have made some kind of squeaking noise in her throat, since the blonde looked over at her with a raised eye, then turned back to the girl in the bed. “Oh, looks like the plan’s changed. Get out.”
“What the fuck? Why?”
The blonde shrugged as she stood from the chair, making her sizeable breasts wobble. They looked about as large as Jaxie’s were, but this girl was at least six inches shorter than the Berserker so ‘modestly large and well proportioned’ turned into ‘heavy honkers’ that swayed hypnotically with her movements. Her hair was also about as long as Jaxie’s but seemed to have eight times the volume, along with a small undercut on the left side of her face where it was shaved close to the scalp. Speaking of shaved, Eris couldn’t stop herself from spotting the neatly-trimmed triangular patch of fuzz just above the girl’s pussy. The fur was just as brown as the highlights in her poofy hair.
“Because you’ve had your turn and she hasn’t.”
“So? She can join us if she wants some.”
Both girls looked at Eris, whose face was so hot it could probably be used as a stove. She squeaked again, unable to form words at the depraved sight. The mega-haired blonde gave a sigh.
“I’ll take that as a ‘no’ for a threesome. You grab your shit and scram, and you get your cute little butt in here. We’re gonna have to make this quick.”
The dark girl let out a series of extremely colourful phrases, picked a set of clothes off the floor and quickly slid them on before leaving the room. The blonde raised an eyebrow at Eris.
“What, you want me to strip you?”
Somehow, Eris found her voice. It was still weak and pathetic, but at least she could form a few words.
“Uhh- err… no! No, I’m not- I’m…”
“You’re not here for a fuck?” She asked with a raised eyebrow. “I mean, I usually take alchemy commissions at my shop, but I won’t say no to a potential customer.” She clapped her hands together. “Alright cutie, whaddya’ looking for?”
“I- I’m… roommate?”
The blonde’s eyes went wide. “Oh fuck, that’s today? Shit, my bad.”
“Err…”
“I should probably introduce myself.” She gave an exaggerated, low bow that made her mane of bed-head (or desk-head, rather) tumble forward and graze the floor. When that happened, Eris could look down the girl’s freckled back and see the swells of her bare ass before she stood back up with a smile.
“Bailey Jade Geriege, eldest daughter of King Raymond the Sixth, rightful heiress to the Geriege throne, and ninth-level Alchemist- at your service and at my cervix.”
Eris stiffened. “I’m, uhh…”
“Wait! Don’t tell me!” Bailey held out a hand to stop Eris and thought heavily. “Fuck, they told me last week! What was it? E… something? Emily- no, Elizabe- no that’s not it. It was uhh… Evangeline!”
“Eris…”
“Close enough. Welcome to the room!”