Upon seeing that Xopil had stopped protesting, the women assumed their animal forms. They vied for his attention as he pet, scratched and cuddled with each of them up until he fell asleep with them huddled tightly around him.

"Honestly..." Xopil chuckled to himself as he slowly looked over them and shook his head.

But seriously... I've thrown a couple theories around in my head and even with what I've experienced, I don't have enough information to know if any of them are right or if there's another possibility. This world feels different enough, it's as though everything changed... does that include me?

"Hm?" Xopil's thoughts were interrupted by a pair of fox eyes staring intently at him, "Something wrong Felicyta?"

"Aren't you going to turn into your animal form?" she asked.

"...I don't think I can." Xopil wasn't sure he had one after all.

"Can you try?" Felicyta looked pleadingly at him and she left the actual reason unsaid, "Just to make sure you're really okay."

"Okay.. let's see here." Xopil rubbed his chin thoughtfully. It sounds like I have done this before, in that case it should be as natural as breathing... right?

Xopil relaxed and concentrated on changing his body. The effort was not in vain. Felicyta's sharp fox eyes stared without blinking as she watched him turn into a skunk.

"Satisfied?" He asked, looking down his pure black snout at her.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"..." wide-eyed, Felicyta could only shake her head. "You... your animal form is wrong."

"Well that figures... nothing has gone right for me since the beginning." Xopil said scratching the back of his head.

"Where's the pillow gone?" four slightly upset women were rudely awakened when their comfort disappeared.

"Sorry sorry... he's not a big bear any more..." Felicyta was apologetic as she looked sadly at the skunk.

"Ohh you lost your spot..." Caly started chuckling.

----------------------------------------

Xopil had no interest in that, so he quickly left to take a walk and think.  I need to organise this flood of information in my head... There never used to be people changing into animal forms.  The important thing to note about this, it's new to me and only me... and that it also includes me.

Next, I went from a bear to a skunk... that's probably important, but I'm not sure how just yet.  Also of note about that, it was a shock to everyone-meaning a change to history had occurred, but if that is the case...why wasn't anyone aware?

Now to try and make sense of what all this means.  The best I can do for now is speculate though.  There's one thing I do know: I did go back in time, and my history was changed.  

A change in the past would snowball through time, right...?  So when I travel back to the 'present' am I jumping to another timeline again?  But I'm also carrying with me changes that occured, at the very least to me, in the past?

The me I am now picked up the properties of this world, and I was modified by what happened in the 'history' when I was in the past.  The fact the girls weren't aware of my change from a bear to a skunk would support me travelling to yet another parallel world while dragging anything that affects me along too...

Xopil stopped walking to rub his temples.  This is way too difficult without a way to control which 'past' I end up in, and it seems it's too much for my subconscious to handle navigation.

Xopil held his hand up in front of his face, and looked intently at his fist.  But, I'm slowly recovering who I am aren't I... I crushed that old mage into dust, even if I don't know exactly how I used that spacial magic, I can still feel it.