Alfred’s distant voice woke me up from a far too deep sleep. It tried to grasp my attention and attempted to make me force open my eyes, but I felt way too good as I was to even think of that. Instead, I rolled on my other side, away from the nagging paladin, and tried to make myself comfortable again.

The rocky ground under me should be hard and uninviting, it should poke me with sharp edges and assault me with a harsh coldness, but instead, I felt as if I was resting on soft fur. I still felt the stones, I knew they were there, but they felt oh so good for some reason I couldn’t quite grasp.

Suddenly, two strong hands rolled me over onto my back in a final attempt to cut short my well-deserved sleep. I couldn’t help but open my eyes, only to be greeted by a very worried-looking Alfred.

“Marisa!” My name painfully cut into my ears, ears that were in the totally wrong place.

I couldn’t help but grasp for my head, only to discover two large, likely vulpine ears waiting on it. They were soft and warm to the touch, but a single stroke with my careless fingers was enough to send shivers down my skin. It felt strangely good!

Moments went by as I explored this new sensation, each movement seemingly accompanied by a rumbling noise in my chest. A long, fluffy something hit my legs - a tail, it seemed - seemingly attempting to show my pure enjoyment over this weird discovery.

Alfred let me explore the changes to my body for a few more moments before he once again attempted to steal away my attention. With both hands, he shook my shoulders, seemingly in a desperate attempt to make me come to my senses, and it certainly worked. Before long, I had opened my eyes and was staring right at a beet-red paladin. Alfred was visibly overwhelmed by the pure bliss I had shown him.

“So- sorry to interrupt you,” he stammered. “But I think we have a situation at our hands.”

“A situation…”

“What happened to you?” He asked, pointing at my head. I couldn’t help but reach out for my ears again, only to be stopped by the paladin in the middle of the action. “Enough of that,” he shyly demanded.

“I met Cilia,” I revealed matter-of-factly.

“The goddess?” Alfred asked, seemingly still somewhat unbelieving what he was seeing. “She hasn’t been seen in thousands of years, if ever. Nobody even knows what she looks like!”

“She looks just like the statue.”

“The statue? You mean its creator has seen her, too?”

“Maybe she hasn’t…”

Alfred’s eyes widened in shock. It was only a theory among the clergy, but one that did have its fair share of evidence pointing towards it. Gaona, the goddess of love, was famous for changing her appearance over time, always featuring what was thought of as the most alluring female figure. Sometimes she wore little to nothing, other times her clothes carefully protected her from any the eyes of even her most devout believers, much like the women preferred it at the time. And much like her statues changed over time due to new men and women working on sculpting them, Gaona too, was ever-changing. The same was true for almost any god or goddess, especially the more popular ones. For Cilia to not show herself in all this time… was she simply not able to? Was it the girl that had finally given her shape again?

“You can’t be meaning-”

“It was the girl!” It blurted out of me. “The dungeon’s avatar! She has given Cilia that appearance!”

“That- that can’t be true. What about the curses?!”

“It is the only explanation!”

The paladin stared at me in disbelief, then at my new ears. He was almost about to reach out for them when something in his gaze changed to acceptance. Even if it was hard to grasp, this was the only explanation for what had happened to me.

“What happened to you,” Alfred repeated his question. “What did Cilia do to you?”

“I think… she made me her champion?”

“Her- what?!”

Once again his blue eyes searched for a lie in my words, but there was none to be found. And the very fact that my body had changed like this was enough to prove my version of the story.

“What have you gotten yourself into…” He asked with a sigh.

Alfred gently grabbed my hand to help me rise to my feet. It was only now that I caught a glimpse at my other addition, a long, very fluffy-looking blonde tail with a pure white tip that restlessly swayed from one side to the other, only imprisoned by the sheer existence of my legs and my priestess’ robes.

“That will take a while to get used to…”

Before long the paladin had lifted me to my feet, which were a little too shaky for my liking. It was as if I was born anew rather than just sleeping for a while. I felt weak as well, much weaker than I had before. Was this also an effect of Cilia making me her champion?

Of course, Alfred noticed the signs of my weakness. He gently supported me, as if fearing I could just collapse on the spot. But it wasn’t nearly as bad.

“Are you really okay?”

“A little shaky, but I will get used to it.”

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“We should return to the temple. The gods know you need some rest.”

“I still need to check on the girl.”

“There is no way I will enter the dungeon with you in this state!”

“I promised Cilia!”

Alfred let out a deep sigh before hugging me close. “You will not leave my side.”

“I swear.”

Reluctantly, the paladin let go of me again, instead leading me toward the tunnel that separated us from the rest of the dungeon. He never let go of my hand, as if fearing I would just collapse if he wasn’t supporting me. And all things considered, he might be true, as I felt like a newborn fawn taking its first steps. Especially the tail was giving me some trouble, with it trying its best to escape the prison of my clothes.

“Let’s just hope at least the monsters will not give us any trouble.”

I could only nod in answer. For all I knew there could be everything awaiting us in here from slimes over goblins to giant frogs. Maybe the girl even had access to monsters stronger than those. No, it was very much likely that she had gained Cilia’s favor.

It took us several minutes to finally reach the next room. Soon we were greeted by the reddish evening sun casting its light into the tunnel ahead, indicating we had lost quite a few hours by now. Alfred couldn’t help but push me behind his back as he made his way towards the room, seemingly fearing an early attack of the monsters.

When he then suddenly stopped in his tracks just a few moments later, I couldn’t help but steal a peek. Instead of a fearsome monster, I only saw an unexpected sight. Not only was there a wooden bridge leading over a lake or river, but there was also an island to be seen in the distance, with a fire-spewing mountain right in the middle of it. A small number of trees were surrounding its slopes, stormy winds moving their canopy.

Despite the seemingly dangerous volcano throning over the room, the scenery looked strangely peaceful, quite contrary to what one would expect to find in a dungeon.

“It is so big,” I couldn’t help but mumble.

The room was easily hundreds of meters across, much contrary to everything I had seen with my own eyes. Most dungeons preferred much smaller rooms, protected by a handful of strong monsters at most. The dungeon that had grown in this place before was exactly like that, with the few larger rooms being related to very small numbers of much stronger monsters instead - bosses and mini-bosses, as adventurers called them.

This room didn’t seem to be like that at all. There was no arena and no place to fight other than maybe the mountain’s slopes or the colorful meadow surrounding it. If anything, the girl had seemingly tried to make this a home for herself. A very stormy and hot home, but a home nonetheless.

Alfred also seemed to realize there was a lack of danger in the scenery revealed to us. He hesitatingly made a few steps forward and towards the bridge, before urging me to follow his lead. Together we walked over the wooden structure without so much as hearing about any source of possible danger. Even when we reached the shore, we were only welcomed by the flowery meadow rather than a monster willing to fight us.

I was just about to check out the weird, unknown to me blossoms and leaves of the flowers and the grass, when the paladin urged me to follow him around the volcano, always making sure to step only on the graveled path that didn’t seem to hide any trap or danger.

As we walked past the plants and trees, I still couldn’t help but marvel at their beauty and strange forms and colors. There was something like a cherry tree, albeit its fruits were entirely white in color, much like the berries found on the shore of the lake. Something deep inside of me was urging me to try them out at once, but Alfred didn’t give me the chance. Instead, he took my hand and led me deeper into the dungeon.

It was only when we reached a large, circular structure made of stone that the peaceful atmosphere suddenly changed as loud barks and yelps could now be heard coming from all around us. Out of nearby holes in the ground, a number of monsters came charging out, all of them seemingly shaped using dirt alone. Soon even the nearby lake came alive, as a wave quickly ran towards the shore before changing into three canine shapes - foxes, as I soon realized.

Alfred wasn’t the least impressed by the creatures that were now outnumbering us seven to two. He reached for his two-handed longsword before whispering a quick prayer to Idena, his chosen goddess. Before long his blade went up in holy flames, a more than obvious sign that his prayer had been heard.

I couldn’t help but hide behind his armored back before preparing a skill of my own. It took me several seconds, way longer than it should have, to realize I couldn’t gather a single bit of holy aligned mana. My whole body was void of it as if somebody had just stolen it away.

“Cilia…”

As Alfred charged into battle, quickly drawing the attention of the monsters onto him, I hastily closed my eyes to feel for my mana reserves, only to find them mostly depleted and void of the white light that indicated holy mana. Instead of being flooded with the holy attribute that had made me a priestess candidate to begin with, several other colors awaited me.

I could sense water-attributed mana, as well as fire and even earth. These elements were even intermingling, giving birth to several more colors I couldn’t even hope to make sense of. I only knew they were advanced elements, nothing that would help me here.

Alfred suddenly shouted out in pain, tearing me out of my concentration. When I opened my eyes, I found him engaged by two of the earth foxes, with the water ones constantly assaulting him with spouts of water. While he had already defeated two of the monsters, a heavily bleeding gash could be seen on the paladin’s arm, forcing me to make a decision. I had to help him!

I quickly reached out for the foreign energies in me, bringing forth water-aligned mana. I forced it out of my hand and towards my friend, only for it to gain the shape of a watery snake that readily bit into the paladin’s flesh. But instead of leaving behind a new injury, the water soon spread over Alfred’s arm before simply washing away the heavily bleeding wound I had called it here for. It only took seconds for his skin to be pristine again, letting me breathe out a sigh of relief.

Of course, Alfred had noticed I had supported him. He looked surprised, shocked even, but quickly went back to fighting off the still-attacking foxes. Within seconds, he had already cleaved the two remaining earth monsters into two, then made his way towards the still struggling water foxes instead. Without the assistance of their frontline, the healers had barely any chance to defend themselves. One by one they perished, leaving behind blue crystals as their sole loot. We had won.