After her final blast of mixed silver–gold energy, the distorted humming vanished, and the energy from her body wrapped around the creature's remaining parts, breaking it apart like fragile glass caught in a storm. Fragments of its form spiraled upward, dissolving into thin ribbons of silver fog that hissed like dying embers.
When the last shard of its body evaporated, silence slammed into the village.
Every lantern tree flickered back to life at once, and every villager stared in disbelief, while the fox, or rather half-fox, half-becoming something else, collapsed to her knees as glowing cracks rippled beneath her.
Her body flickered again, like a light fighting to remain lit.
[Core Capacity: 2%]
[Stability Failing]
[Warning: Collapse Inevitable]
[Core Exhausted.]
[Emergency Stasis Triggered.]
[Initiating Dimensional Drift.]
[Transferring… Transferring… Transfer Complete.]
The ground trembled once more and her vision blurred. For a moment, she could hear multiple worlds, her old one, this one, the Void, overlapping in her ears as static roared through her brain.
Aria screamed for her and rushed toward where she was, but the fox's ears were ringing too loudly to process anything clearly.
Her limbs wouldn't obey. Her body felt numb, as though it was more than her appearance changing; she was no longer shaped properly and her body began giving out piece by piece.
A numbing cold wrapped around her consciousness, she forced her head up one last time. The distortion was gone. She had won.
That was enough; it should be enough to keep her in this world, yet her body flickered like a dying star and she fell.
Everything around her turned black as voices rang through her system like a shockwave, a reminder of the reality she would have to face.
The villagers rage, fear, panic, and confusion could be felt in the very air they breathed.
"Did you see her—her body? What is she?"
"She's not a fox anymore."
"That thing fought the distortion, but… what if she brings another one?!"
"Should we really let it live—?"
Aria's voice cut through them, breaking with fury.
"She is not a thing! She saved us from it, whether you like it or not!"
Hearing that, she did not know how much time passed, but her consciousness swam toward the sound. Something warm was wrapped around her—blankets? A pillow beneath her head? Her body felt heavy, too heavy.
She tried to move, but only pain answered.
Her fingers, not paws, twitched against the fabric, her breathing stuttered, and her entire shape felt… wrong. Stretched. Pulled, almost rearranged.
A flicker of fear broke through her exhaustion and her eyes cracked open.
She looked around and saw she was in a dim room. Wooden ceiling. A soft glow from a lantern. Aria was sitting beside her, exhausted and shaking.
And her body... Seeing it made her heart stop; she wasn't just bigger, nor was she just changing.
She was halfway between a fox, a human and something she didn't have a name for. Her arms were slim but elongated, ending in delicate hands tipped with soft translucent claws.
Her fur covered only parts of her body, with pale silver-white patches along her shoulders. Her breasts were now much larger than the small, apple-sized ones she had in her past life. Fur also covered sections of her thighs and her tail, while smooth, faintly glowing skin appeared in the spaces between.
Her tail was long, too long, and thicker than before, with fur shimmering unevenly as if still forming; her legs were longer, mixed with both signs of a fox, human and whatever else was within her.
Her ears twitched uncontrollably, flickering between fox and humanoid shape, glitching like unstable light.
Her eyes glowed softly with two-layered pupils, one foxlike, one humanoid, blending and separating with every blink.
She felt monstrous, unfinished yet exposed.
Aria reached forward as if afraid she'd vanish again. "Hey…? Can you hear me?"
She looked at the girl and tried to answer, but a sound left her throat, a weak, airy syllable, not a growl, not a whine, but the first fragile attempt at speech.
Aria gasped. "You're really awake—"
The fox tried again, trembling.
"Ar…ia…"
Her voice cracked, raw and unsteady, but undeniably, she spoke.
Her eyes widened at the sound of her own voice. She could finally speak, and a bright smile spread across her face as her heart raced with shock. Then she flinched as the system pulsed.
[Evolution Status: 47%]
[Humanoid Prototype: Incomplete]
[Control: 10%]
[Stability: Fragile]
"Shh…" Aria whispered, brushing a shaking hand to her forehead. "Don't push yourself."
The fox would've leaned into the touch if her muscles obeyed. Instead, her body twitched, unstable, and she flinched from the glimmer of pain.
Outside the room, villagers gathered; she could hear them just as she did before, whispering and arguing.
She could sense it; they were afraid.
"Elder Rean said it's not… natural."
"It could bring more distortions."
"What if it turns on us?"
"It didn't even shift into anything we understand—"
"Aria's keeping it in her house? Isn't that dangerous?"
Aria stiffened, fury flashing across her face.
She turned toward the door and shouted, "If any of you want to get near her, you go through me!"
The room went silent again and the fox's ears flattened, trembling from the stress. Their fear… their mistrust… It pressed on her chest until she struggled to breathe.
Aria saw the panic in her flickering eyes and immediately cupped her cheeks gently.
"Please don't listen to them. You saved every single person in this village." She leaned closer, voice low, fierce, and protective. "And I won't let them forget that. Not now, not ever."
The fox blinked slowly, her vision flickering. The warmth of Aria's hands grounded her more than the system ever could.
Her new body still ached. Her limbs still twitched without warning and her tail quivered from the unfamiliar weight. She didn't feel strong, but she could sense the power within her.
When she whispered Aria's name again, softer this time, it didn't crack with pain; it carried something else.
Trust.
Her system dimmed, whispering faintly.
[Rest Required.]
[Stabilization in Progress.]
Her eyes drifted closed, but not from collapse, from exhaustion and from the warmth of knowing, for the first time since she entered this world, that someone was fighting for her.
Before sleep claimed her again, she heard one last voice, Elder Rean's, through the thin walls.
"...This creature is evolving. And evolution, in beings like her, never comes without consequence."
Her heart tensed.
Aria hissed back, "I don't care what she is. She's mine to protect."
Her eyes narrowed as darkness enveloped her, soft and warm this time, unlike the void she had once known. A mark appeared on the top of her palm, two eyes forming within it. She knew that when she woke, a choice awaited her, because deep down she understood this fight was far from over.