Alex Dewbery pressed the elf's body against the damp rock of the grotto. His fingers dug into her waist, seeking traction against the fabric, while his other hand slowly peeled back the folds of her tunic to reveal the pale skin hidden beneath. Maria, her eyes swimming in tears that looked like spun glass, trembled.
"Please, my husband is waiting for me at home! Let me go!" Maria screamed, with just the right dose of feigned desperation, her breasts flattening against the cold, rough wall.
Alex suppressed a sigh of exhaustion and forced a lascivious grin.
"Relax. If you hate it so much, why are you so wet?" Alex recited his line, sliding his hand toward her crotch.
Just as his fingers grazed the edge of her lace underwear, the "fragile" maiden reacted. Maria shoved him with a strength no script had specified. Alex stumbled backward, losing his footing on the dungeon's uneven floor.
"And cut!" bellowed a high-pitched voice. "Flip, clean the scene! Ash, recalibrate the image stones for the next take!"
Alex landed on his ass in the dirty soil. The impact knocked the wind out of him just as Marcus, the imp director and owner of Horny Quest Productions, called an end to the shot.
"Damn bitch!" growled Alex, dusting off his tunic. "You were supposed to struggle, not throw me halfway across the kingdom."
Maria, already walking away down the dark corridor while adjusting her clothes, stopped. She turned with calculated slowness, and her character's vulnerability evaporated instantly, replaced by the icy stare of a bored diva.
"You useless piece of trash. If you can't handle a little shove, don't waste my time cursing," she spat with disdain.
She observed him for two more seconds, like someone looking at a bug crushed on the sole of an expensive boot, and walked off, followed by her entourage of makeup artists.
Alex watched her go, feeling reality crash against his memories. Maria Hornberry. The biggest star in elven porn, the woman with voluptuous curves and a supposedly "shy and innocent" temperament who graced the covers of every magical magazine. Alex had spent a small fortune on her image stones back when he was just a fan, hours before meeting her in person.
"And to think I was actually excited to shoot this scene at first," he muttered to himself, feeling the ache in his tailbone as he tried to stand.
"Calm down and have some gum." A large, scaly hand appeared in his field of vision before he could unleash another insult.
"Thanks, Sophia, but I'll pass. Wouldn't want the little princess to dislike the smell of cheap mint."
Sophia Winslow, known in the industry as "Milky," shrugged. The imposing dragonkin was a mountain of muscle and scales, and one of the few sane allies Alex had on that hellish set.
"That woman is a viper, Alex. Just fuck her and let's get this over with."
"You say that like it's easy," he retorted, brushing the dirt off his trousers. "With that attitude, if she keeps this up, I won't even be able to get an erection!"
Alex looked around the makeshift set, lit by flickering mana lamps, and felt the usual pang of irony. What a shitty reincarnation, he thought.
He had been an ordinary high school student on Earth. When he died, he didn't feel sorrow, but euphoria. Isekai! Elves! Magic! But fate had a twisted sense of humor. Yes, he had been reborn as an elf, but his mana reserve was so pathetic he couldn't even light a candle, which ruled him out as an adventurer or soldier. His appearance was the absolute average by elven standards. And to top it off, this world resembled a modern capitalist dystopia more than a romantic medieval fantasy.
His "normalcy" was the only thing that had attracted Marcus. "The audience will relate to a loser like you," the imp had told him when he was hired. At first, the idea of sleeping with elves and succubi seemed like paradise. Now, after hours of awkward choreography, drugged-up actresses, and inflated egos, it was just a low-paying job.
"Hey, you!" Marcus's voice interrupted his misery. The imp fluttered over until he was right in front of Alex's face, waving a bony finger. "You better not ruin this, Alex. It cost me a fortune to book Maria for this video. If you don't perform, I'm docking it from your pay."
Marcus flew off, shouting orders at the lighting technicians.
"That bastard..." began Alex, clenching his fists.
"Ignore him," whispered Sophia, leaning toward him. "He's been nervous lately. Rumor has it the mafia is pressuring him to pay his gambling debts."
Alex arched an eyebrow, processing the information.
"Now that you mention it... that half-orc at the entrance does look suspicious."
They both looked toward the mouth of the cave. A green slab of meat, nearly two meters tall, stood there with crossed arms and an expression that promised gratuitous violence. He wasn't wearing the set's security uniform.
"That guy is there to make sure Marcus doesn't run off with the revenue," Sophia said with a nervous chuckle, "though knowing Marcus, he's probably using him as a free guard so he doesn't have to hire real adventurers."
"The cheapskate is capable of it," agreed Alex. He observed the damp walls and the dripping moss. "Where did he get this place, anyway? I'd rather die than pay the rental fee for an official dungeon, but this is ridiculous."
"He didn't book anything. It's a 'virgin' dungeon, found recently," Sophia explained in a low voice. "Apparently, Livia bought the info from one of the adventurers who discovered it and passed the tip to Marcus. It's low-level, so it's unlikely anything serious will happen."
Hearing "low-level," Alex's male pride, wounded by Maria's insults, tried to surface. He puffed out his chest, adopting a ridiculous heroic stance.
"Don't worry, Sophia. Even if monsters show up, I'll protect you."
Barely had he finished the sentence when he felt something cold and viscous wrap around his ankle. He looked down.
"What the...?"
A gelatinous, translucent mass had crept onto his boot. A hissing sound, like bacon in a frying pan, filled the air as the leather began to smoke.
"AAAHG! HELP! GET IT OFF ME!" Alex's scream rang out higher-pitched than Maria's in the previous scene.
The slime began to dissolve the sole of his shoe, and the acid grazed his skin. Alex started hopping and kicking in a frantic, humiliating dance, shaking his leg in desperation.
The half-orc at the entrance sighed, walked heavily toward them, and with a bored motion, kicked the slime. The creature went flying, smashed against the stone wall with a wet sound—SPLAT!—and disintegrated into a puddle of inert goo.
"Umm... thanks," murmured Alex, his cheeks burning with shame, his gaze fixed on the dirty floor.
The half-orc nodded indifferently, let out a deep grunt, and returned to his guard post.
"I don't know what I'd do without your bravery, Alex," said Sophia, biting her lower lip to hold back a laugh that made her nostrils flare.
"Shut up! It took me by surprise, the proximity of the..." he tried to justify himself, but Maria's voice cut through his excuse like a razor.
The elf appeared from behind, arms crossed and wearing a grimace of absolute disgust.
"Loser. If you're done being an embarrassment, I found a decent spot to shoot the final scene," said Maria, pointing with her chin toward a massive stone door at the end of the corridor. "Move it."
Alex swallowed the insult on the tip of his tongue, adjusted his singed tunic, and nodded to Sophia. Both walked toward the indicated room.
Crossing the threshold, they encountered the usual chaos: magical cables across the floor, Flip and Ash setting up tripods, and in the center, an ecstatic Marcus. The imp was hovering over an intricate engraving on the stone floor.
"Wonderful! This is what I wanted!" squealed Marcus, rubbing his bony hands together.
Sophia observed the drawing on the ground. The lines seemed to pulse with a faint, ominous energy.
"Do you know what that is, Alex?" she asked.
Alex adopted his intellectual pose, stroking an imaginary beard.
"Mhmm. After analyzing it with my incredible arcane wisdom, I deduce that... it is some kind of magic circle engraved on the floor."
Sophia rolled her eyes so hard they almost got stuck.
"Thanks, genius. I mean, what is an intact magic circle doing in an F-rank dungeon, and why does Marcus look like he just found a mountain of gold?"
Before Alex could invent another stupidity, Marcus flapped his wings to call them over.
"There you are! Come quick, script change!" he shouted, his voice trembling with greed. "This circle inspired me. Forget the vanilla sex scene for the finale. Listen to this: Alex confesses to being an evil summoning warlock. He stands in the circle, recites some dark words, and summons his 'evil succubus assistant,' Milky. And the scene ends in a wild threesome!"
Silence fell over the room like a slab. The only sound was the click-click of Ash adjusting the crystal lenses.
"Have you gone completely crazy, Marcus?" asked Alex, feeling a mixture of fear and hope.
Marcus descended until he was at eye level. His pupils shone with a manic fire.
"Think about it, Alex. Maria and Sophia. Both of them. Working your 'wand' at the same time and then turning around for you to take them. Imagine the sales. Imagine... the experience."
Alex's eyes went wide as saucers. A threesome? His heart began to race. In his previous life, he died a virgin, and in this life as a pathetic elf, his sexual interactions were limited to scripted, cold scenes. A threesome with Milky and Maria was the Holy Grail.
"That's it! I'm in, Marcus!" he exclaimed, completely forgetting his dignity.
"Wait a minute!" interrupted Maria, stepping forward furiously. "This isn't in the contract. I signed for a simple two-person scene. I never agreed to a threesome with this useless idiot."
"I'll talk to your agent later, script changes are industry standard," dismissed Marcus with a wave of his hand, ignoring the elf's murderous glare. "Sophia, get ready. When cameras are set, we roll."
Sophia looked at the imp, then at Alex's pathetic face of anticipation, and sighed in resignation.
"Fine, Marcus. But I want an extra ten percent in royalties."
Without waiting for an answer, Sophia unclasped her fur coat. The fabric fell to the floor, revealing her statuesque body and the enormous breasts that had earned her the nickname "Milky." The golden scales on her shoulders shimmered under the lamp light.
"Hell yes!" celebrated Alex under his breath.
He ran to the makeshift wardrobe in the corner, looking for something that screamed "evil wizard." He discarded leather suits and loincloths until he found a black hooded robe, simple but effective. He put it on and felt, for a second, powerful.
He walked toward the magic circle while rehearsing his lines in whispers.
"Mhmm... how should I say it? 'Milky, I choose you!'? No, too anime cliché. 'Fall before my darkness!'? Too theatrical..."
"What are you doing?" asked Ash, pointing a recording crystal at him.
"Method acting, Ash. Just doing some tests. Carry on."
The atmosphere was charged. Flip, the goblin assistant, struggled in a corner with a recording stone that wouldn't fit in its mount. The goblin grappled with it, sweating, until the stone slipped from his greasy fingers.
Clack. Clack. Clack.
The stone rolled across the uneven floor, tracing a perfect straight line toward the center of the room. It crossed the edge of the engraving and stopped right in the middle.
The circle reacted instantly.
The lines carved into the rock ignited with a sickly violet glow. The air turned heavy, smelling of ozone and sulfur. Before anyone could scream, a barrier of energy rose from the ground, encasing Alex in a cage of light.
"Alex!" shouted Sophia. The dragonkin ran and struck the barrier with her fist, but the energy repelled the impact with a spark.
Inside the circle, Alex froze. He felt gravity increase, crushing him against the floor. A blinding light began to pour from the runes, engulfing everything. Amid the panic, his simple man-brain could only formulate one final thought: What's going to happen to my threesome?!
Then, the pain arrived.
It wasn't a blow, but a rewriting. Alex felt as if his bones were liquefying and forging themselves anew. His hips cracked with a dry snap and widened violently, tearing muscle tissue that re-knit itself instantly. His skin burned as if submerged in acid, stretching and softening. He felt a nauseating pull in his crotch, a sensation of emptiness and visceral rearrangement that made him want to vomit, but he had no voice to scream.
The light exploded in a white flash that forced everyone to cover their eyes. And just as quickly as it started, it ended.
The barrier vanished with a hiss.
Sophia lunged forward and wrapped the hooded figure in a protective hug, smashing her breasts against her friend's face.
"Alex! Are you okay? You scared m—" Sophia stopped dead. She pulled back slowly, eyes wide open, scanning the face of the person in her arms. "Alex... you..."
"Ash, did you get that? Tell me you got that! This is pure gold!" exclaimed Marcus from the back, jumping with excitement.
"It's all recorded, boss," replied Ash, mouth agape.
Alex blinked, dazed. The body felt strange—light yet heavy in the wrong places. A hand went to the head and felt long, silky hair where short hair used to be. The gaze lowered. Two mounds of firm flesh blocked the view of the feet.
Panic froze the blood in the veins. A hand moved frantically toward the crotch, palpating the fabric of the robe. Nothing. Only a smooth curvature. The bulge was gone.
"No, no, no!" the voice came out, but it wasn't the old one. It was a soprano tone, melodic and terrified.
Running toward Maria, who watched with horror, the mirror was snatched from her hand.
The reflection stared back.
An elf of unreal beauty returned the gaze. Platinum blonde hair, large, moist blue eyes, and full lips that trembled. It was every man's fantasy, and Alex's nightmare.
A high-pitched scream echoed off the dungeon walls, scaring the bats from the ceiling.
"Did I turn into a damn woman?!"