Ten years later

Alissa waited patiently as the ogre sniffed around. The ten foot tall man beast was dumber and less skilled than a dog, but the massive club it held was dangerous enough. And given there were three in the room, she needed to approach this fight carefully. Still she was fairly certain her cloak would keep the shadows bound to her.

The wavy dagger in her hand felt warm, as if it was anticipating the bloodshed. Maybe it was. Over the years she'd learned the thing had plenty of nasty secrets. Personality wasn't impossible. Fortunately it didn't talk back like some items did, so Alissa didn't particularly care.

Finally the ogre turned to the side and stepped forwards.

She popped the clasp of her cloak with her free hand while kicking off the wall. Her odd hop pushed her into a sprint faster than the ogre could react. She called up her basic techniques into a Horizontal Slice through the leg artery, leaving the creature to collapse and bleed out.

The two other ogres had turned to her and were currently gaping at her figure. She rewarded the closer one with a Pinpoint Throw of her knife, then drew her sword and charged the last one. He'd barely recovered enough to draw back his club when she lashed out and cut the man's fat belly.

The wound wasn't deep, but it would hurt. And that was enough. The creature groaned in confusion and dropped to his knees, arms instinctively opening wide. She stabbed him through the throat, twisting the blade to tear it free.

Turning she found the other ogre thrashing around on the ground, unable or unwilling to remove the knife that had lodged in its thigh. She walked quickly over and cut its throat as well. Then as the spasms subsided, she looked around to make sure nothing had come to inspect the noise. A solo delver couldn't afford mistakes, and one of the most deadly was assuming that the fight was over just because you'd killed the enemies you'd known about at the start.

Fortunately nothing showed up to make her life more difficult. She first recovered her cloak and covered herself up. Then she checked the bodies, pausing to check her surroundings regularly.

The first two pouches just had throwing rocks and the thick mushrooms the creatures ate, but the third ogre had apparently gathered some eyeslime. It'd sell for a good chunk and maybe she could get a deal on darksight drops at the same time.

With that she took three ears to prove she'd made the kills and started carefully moving towards the exit. This layer of the labyrinth was fairly open. Massive corridors lined with clusters of rooms, separated by foot high walls and irregular pillars lined with broken glass. The monsters and delvers had broken shards off in a lot of places, but that only made traversal more troublesome.

She skirted along the corridor, moving carefully to avoid the gaze of a wandering howler. Fortunately the ape creature either didn't see her or ignored her, and she made it to the stairs without incident.

The metal staircases leading out were free of trouble as well. Sometimes monsters hid there to catch delvers going up and down, but those monsters tended to have very short lives. There didn't seem to be any other delvers either, so Alissa made her way up to the upper layer.

This area was heavily wooded, with thorny trees forming the walls and concrete roads broken by poor repair leading between the more open fields in between the trees. She stayed alert, but stuck to the paths on this layer, letting the heels of her boots clack on the concrete. Surprising a young delver was the biggest danger on these floors. The Jackalopes and dire wolves here tended to avoid humans. It was still the preferred hunting grounds for more cautious delvers looking for some meat or pelts to sell.

She passed a few of those hunters, but fortunately none of them did more than wave or stare as she passed. It ended up being a quick stroll through the upper floors until she reached the entry checkpoint. The well staffed guardroom was free of others, so she was able to get to the elven secretary and quickly lower her hood to show she matched the picture on her guild card.

With that she cashed out the bounty for the ogres, ten crowns each, then she headed out into the muggy streets of the city. The twisty cobblestone streets around the labyrinth quickly made way to straighter roads. It was an easy route to trace to her preferred alchemist, and after a bit of bargaining she turned the eyeslime into five hundred more crowns. That put her well ahead for the week.

"Now what should I do?" she muttered to herself as she folded the bills into her pouch. After a moment she winced. Given she was talking to herself maybe she should look for some social contact.

A look up at the sky told her that her preferred club would be open. And so she went down the streets again, moving from the close packed brick buildings designed to house those that worked with labyrinth goods to the solid wood structures that housed the restaurants and stores people with some extra cash to burn frequented.

Her stop however wasn't on the main fair. It was a street over, and she made sure to approach from the back alley. She knocked on the backdoor, pulled off her hood, and waited.

The door opened to reveal a grumpy dwarf woman holding a shock stick. Her mood didn't seem to improve when she saw Alissa, but at least she didn't try to electrocute anyone. "Oh it's you. You better be paying."

She handed over 100 crowns. "Have I ever not?"

The dwarf huffed but stepped out of her way. "Whatever. Back room as always."

Alissa took that as permission and headed to the small private room closest to the back. Once she was safely inside she sighed and let her hood down before shrugging her cloak to her back. The simple act of removing that flimsy layer of protection seemed to take a huge weight off her shoulders. She wasn't sure how much of that was because of her merge and how much was conditioning, but it still felt great.

"Alissa! It's been a while!"

She looked up to see two familiar faces slip through the door. Juli was the first through, the shapely rabbit girl making sure to only open the door part way. Alissa had known her for a couple of years now. "Heya, Juli. Yeah I finally had a run of good luck so I decided to splurge a little."

Sera slipped past Juli and flopped down on the couch. "Seems like there are easier ways to spend cash, but I suppose I shouldn't complain." Sera was a newer face, but the elf girl had actually become one of Alissa's favorites. She obviously didn't see Alissa as a real customer, which meant she talked freely. Since conversation was what Alissa was after, it was a win.

"Spending cash is always easy." Alissa replied. She leaned back, as Juli slipped next to her and put down a bottle of wine. "But right now I need a break without people trying to kill me or hit on me."

Sera looked askance at her. "Maybe the outfit's part of the reason people hit on you. I think your pouch has more fabric than your 'clothes'."

Alissa hid her grimace by picking up the wine dish Juli had filled. "It's for work."

"I'm not complaining," Juli said. "But I thought you had similar problems even when you wore normal clothes. It's not like you can hide your figure."

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"There's a difference between 'guys uncontrollably stare at you' and 'you stun guys who see you for a few seconds'," Alissa replied. "And when the difference between the two is an ogre hitting you with a club, I want to be safely in the second area."

Sera fiddled with her flower hair ornament. "Might be mental overmerge too. I never needed to be around plants until I became an elf. Fortunately I can just keep an evervine at home but...."

Alissa gave the woman a sympathetic nod. "That's right. You were a desperation merge too, weren't you."

"Yeah. Didn't want to commit to anything but well, it was that or a knife to the throat from a goblin," Sera shrugged. "Could be worse. I know some of the girls got forced into bunny merges to get the job."

Juli's ears twitched. "Bunny isn't too bad if you have to be stuck with one at least. Urge to nibble on things is pretty much the only downside. And unless you're one of those human purists, if you haven't picked a merge by 17 you probably wouldn't have gotten anything better."

Alissa and Sera both looked over at the rabbit girl. "You're just a bunny girl supremacist." Alissa said, shaking her head.

"It's totally her fetish, and everyone knows it." Sera added conspiratorially.

Juli gave her infamous fake pout. "Hey! It's not a fetish, it's a lifestyle~!"

The three women all laughed at that. It was hard to begrudge someone who enjoyed their merge.

A shuddering thud broke up the happy chatter. "An earthquake?" Sera wondered, shifting to quickly head under the table if needed.

The door to the room splintered open as the dwarf bouncer was thrown through. The woman hit the low table and lay there stunned. Alissa looked up in shock as she met the eyes of the angry man standing in the main area.

Her dagger fell into her right hand as she assessed the situation. The man had the blue ear fins and gills of a sea serpent merge, along with a heavily enchanted katana at his hip. One of the club's girls was cowering behind an overturned table with a red slap mark on her cheek. Rich boy who didn't realize this was a hostess club, not a brothel.

And he'd seen her in her combat garb.

"Fuck." It seemed like the only reasonable response to the situation.

The man shook off the initial shock and gave her one of the most disgusting smiles she'd seen in a while. "Oh! Now you're a hole worth a little trouble. What say you come over and apologize to me for what these stupid bitches said to me?"

"I'm a customer, not a worker," Alissa said as she slowly stood up. A few careful steps put her between the other women and the asshole. "And you should probably just consider this night a loss."

The man's smile twisted, and it didn't do his face any favors. "Eh? Think you're too good for men huh? Well don't worry. Jack de Redbur will teach you your place whore. On your knees!"

"Fuck," Alissa muttered again, as he sauntered towards her. Her blade wanted to cut at his unprotected gut, or the top of his neck where the scales didn't defend, but corpses of rich people led to problems. Instead she took a deep breath, waited for him to be mid step, and swung the pommel of her dagger right into the man's jaw.

The crack of the blow seemed to echo through the room. The man stumbled back in shock. For a moment Alissa hoped he'd fall down, but sadly he kept his feet and his consciousness.

"I'm not too good for men. But you look more like a dog," Alissa said with as much force as she could muster. "A dog who should heel!" This was her last chance to avoid bloodshed. Hopefully the man was a closet masochist. That would let her merge abilities take control of the situation.

The rage in the man's eyes as he stood told her it hadn't worked. It was ironic. Orcs and goblins were sadists and rapists, but their patchwork minds still all had a masochistic side. Humans were more variable.

Which unfortunately meant she'd have to kill the man.

"You worthless bitch!" he screamed, running forward, hand on his sword. Some sort of draw cut, she guessed. Alissa tossed her dagger at the man, then drew her sword before unleashing a Pinpoint Thrust right along the path her knife had followed.

Jack stumbled away, but he was skilled enough to draw his katana and bat away the knife before reversing the swing to poorly block the thrust. Alissa twisted her blade to try to cut the man's arms, but his scales blocked the move.

"Hey! What does a girl have to do to get service here!"

Alissa and her opponent both looked up. The woman who'd burst in had all the nobility Jack had claimed and then some. Silver scales and an ornate horn crown showed she was a dragon merge, and while her battle tabard had no standard it was something only the ultra rich could afford. Eyes and hair of gold finished out the ensemble, and Alissa could feel the pressure flowing off the woman.

The dragon woman looked around and sniffed. "Oh. Well that explains it. Seriously, what the hell are you doing?"

"None of your business!" Jack said, before turning back to Alissa. That was to be expected. Once a succubus hooked someone it took work to distract them. However, she could use that to her advantage.

The man rushed forwards and slashed in a half circle motion. "Crippler!" A second rate copy of a technique, but dangerous.

Alissa moved in as well, placing her left hand along the blade flat and catching the swing before it could get a good angle. The blades screeched before the handguards met and locked. Jack spat at her as they pushed against each other, each trying to get their blade into play.

And then a hefty rod came down on the man's head. "Memory Wipe," the dragon woman incanted cheerfully as Jack crumpled to the ground.

Tension flowed out of Alissa's body as she stowed her blade and let her cloak settle around her body. "Thanks. I'm not sure why you have a Memory Wipe spell prepared, but I'm glad you did."

"If you don't have it ready all the time, you'll never have it when you need it." The woman put away her rod and offered a hand. "Rosalina." No last name. That was odd.

"Alissa," she shook. The mysteries of her benefactor were for another time. "So what do we do with him? The police?"

Rosalina laughed. "Far too nice." She grabbed the man's pouch and started flipping off bills. "We split the cash, and throw the rest in the river. He's a sea serpent merge. He'll live." She looked at the girls and a few customers who were slowly poking in to look at the aftermath. "Of course everyone gets a cut."

What few morals people had about stealing from a total scumbag disappeared quickly. Especially when they saw the amount of cash the guy had been carrying around. Alissa was very glad she hadn't had to kill him and deal with his family's wrath. She retrieved her dagger while Rosalina committed larceny.

"Alissa..." Juli had come up behind her, while Sera was tending to the scared girl and the bouncer. "Thank you. I'm really sorry we couldn't take care of it but-"

"It's not your fault. It's the owners," And he'd get to pay for fixing it, Alissa added mentally. "Anyway sorry I can't stick around to chat. We've got someone to throw into the river."

A hand fell on her shoulder and she found Rosalina grinning at the two of them. "Oho, so that's your type huh? Good choices. Shame things got interrupted. Maybe you and I can visit again later~!"

Alissa blinked. She wasn't used to women being that forward to her. Still practice helped her recover fast. "I'm here for conversation, not a tryst."

"Sadly true," Juli said, letting her ears droop. "I keep telling her it's fine, but she insists on walking the line of customer and friend. I'd almost swear she was ace. Over a year of flirting and nothing."

For the first time in a long while Alissa found herself blushing. "I need friends okay! It's hard to meet people with this merge!"

"You totally could just see us on our days off and stuff," Sera said, looking away with her own blush. "You don't need to pay us to be your friend."

That at least was safe ground. "It'd be rude to drag you away from anywhere we might run into men just for a chat. Better to steal you away from work." She looked over at Rosalina. "Anyway please tell me my merge skill isn't spilling over to women. I have enough problems already."

"Hm?" Rosalina's gold eyes sparkled as she handed out bills. "Well, well. A succubus merge? That's not something you see every day." Alissa grimaced but nodded. "Don't worry then! It's not affecting me. I'm just a hedonist."

"That's... good?" She shrugged. "Anyway, do you need help with carrying the idiot?"

Rosalina tossed the man over her shoulder. "Nah. But I'll need someone who can make sure the way is clear." The dragon woman gave a wink to Juli and Sera. "Some other time ladies. For now enjoy the windfall."

Alissa waved to the two. "See you later. Hopefully with less interruptions."

"Be careful," Sera replied.

"Come back soon," Juli added. "Or at least talk to your new partner in crime. You've got way too much stress building up."

"Thanks, Juli." Alissa gave a nod before heading towards the back. Juli was right... but right now was work time.