The old wolf lady was strong, like very strong. I was reminded of Sensei; even in his old age, it had been a futile attempt to out-speed or overpower him. But Sensei was not as strong as this woman. Sensei was definitely faster and more skilled though. It was actually why I had moved as fast to block as I had. If I had even been a second too late, Saki would have been dead. Even then, the block alone sent us both flying backwards.

Luckily, my wind righted me right as the wolf lady reached me. Our swords clashed; I was faster but not by much. But what she lacked in speed, she made up for in raw strength. I felt my arms turning to jelly as another hit sent me flying. I immediately bounced in midair, forcing a landing before sprinting back at the woman. She had already recovered and began to move forward. I sidestepped, dodging her swing easily before attempting an upward slash. Every muscle in my body ached; it reminded me of when Sensei would test me.

She barely dodged my attack and swung down. By instinct, I dodged as my tail wrapped around her leg in an attempt to pull her off balance. Instead, she pulled hard and I went flying towards her. I cursed as I used a small burst of air to push myself to the right. Good thing too, because a ball of molten earth suddenly flew where I had been standing; it went out the hole I'd thrown the guild girl out of earlier. The crash caused the ground to shake for a moment, but I stayed steady as I twirled in midair going for a down slash at her back.

I made contact! Only to realize she had grown molten earth over herself. My katana cut into the molten earth but my sword couldn't reach her skin. I tried to phase it but it wouldn't go any deeper; instead, I phased Serenity towards me, pulling it out of the sticky hard substance. The water cleansed the blade as the woman turned and swung her weapon. I once again easily dodged, only to be caught by surprise when the lady dropped her weapon mid-swing and swung her fist. I still managed to partially dodge. But only partially, I was flung across the room.

The pain was unimaginable, like a whole building had fallen on me. I stood shakily to my feet just in time to raise Serenity and block the blow. The ground crumbled beneath us and I felt my body giving out, the edges of my mind going dark. My ears flattened and my water veil fell as the last of my energy slowly seeped out of me; even my hair started to look frazzled. I began to feel something I had not felt in a long time: fear.

Still, I held my ground, even as I felt my feet digging into the stone floor, causing spiderweb cracks in the already shattered stone as I was pushed down. I flicked my tail, only to have a burst of fire lash towards it; I quickly moved my tail but the tip still got burned. I glanced down at it and a memory began to play. I forced myself to look back, shaking away the memory. Now is not the time! I thought with gritted teeth. I felt my gums begin to bleed and I heard my bones beginning to make snapping sounds.

"I know that style of swordsmanship," the insanely strong wolf woman spoke suddenly. She pulled her weapon back and I stood still.

It took everything I had not to just topple forward. Even as I stood there, I began quickly using my water to heal myself with what little energy I had left, making sure not to pass out from the pain. Ten years and it never gets easier, I thought bitterly.

Still, it seemed the wolf lady knew my Sensei; maybe I could avoid further fighting. Not something I ever thought I would want. "Tama's sensei is the greatest ninja ever! He taught Tama everything Tama knows!" I say with a look of pride on my face, hiding the immense pain as I was pretty sure my wrist was shattered.

Saki finally spoke up and said, "You're the great Ninja Swordsman's apprentice?! As in, THE greatest swordsman to ever live?!"

I watched as the wolf lady's ears perked up, but instead of impressed, she seemed to look amused. "Greatest swordsman my ass. When I knew that man, the only thing he cared about was his pigs. Everywhere he went, all he talked about was how they worked and acted."

For a moment I forgot the pain as I heard the funniest true thing. I couldn't help myself; I giggled at the blonde wolf lady's comment. I nodded before responding, "Yeah! Sensei was always talking about Sensei's pigs! He treated them better than Tama sometimes!"

It was true too. I was always stuck doing the chores and the pigs just got to laze around all day and eat stuff. Sensei even gave them lots of attention! He would rub their bellies and call them cute names. It always made me jealous. I wanted to be rubbed and called cute names!

"That doesn't shock me in the slightest. When I heard he picked himself up a child, I thought he was talking about another pig and dismissed it. But an actual little girl? What was that madman thinking?" she said with an amused smile.

"Tama doesn't know, but Tama has lived with Sensei for as long as Tama can remember!" I said, pain forgotten in all the excitement. Someone understood my pain! I bounced up and down excitedly, letting Serenity fall to one hand. Still, I didn't let it go.

It would be foolish; this could all be a ploy. I wasn't going to be tricked that easily. It seems the lady noticed that despite my good humor, I was clearly still being careful, and as I watched her, she was too. I could still see the tenseness of her shoulders even with the carefree smile she played across her lips.

Saki casually walked over to us and spoke as though we weren't in a battle. I began to relax as I saw the blonde lady did as well. "A friend of yours, Tama?" she asked, her eyes never leaving Saki.

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"Yeah, that's Saki! She promised to help Tama get an adventurer's badge so Tama could do quests and help her!"

"I see. Then allow me to introduce myself. I am Matriarch Talia, the Forge of Fire."

Forge of What? I thought as I looked at her. The name sounded familiar though, then I remembered! Sensei had mentioned her before. He claimed she was one of the best blacksmiths who ever lived and was like, super powerful and stuff.

As someone who had just fought her, I wholeheartedly agreed with Sensei; that fight was intense. "Nya! Sensei mentioned you before! He called you an old coot who was too obsessed with your hammer to ever do real combat!" Tama said with a wide grin on my face.

It was a dangerous taunt, a provocation, but based on the look on Talia's face, she didn't bite. She clearly understood what it was, and instead of rising to the provocation, Talia just laughed... hard. Like, really hard—like it was the funniest thing she had ever heard in her life.

My tail waved back and forth happily and my ears perked up. It seemed she was good-natured and not ready to fight more. Secretly I was very happy at that. Not sure if I could've survived another thirty seconds with her in combat.

"Okay, girls, come with me. I'll personally get the two of you set up with adventuring badges. As for your Sensei, you tell him when you see him again that I shouldn't hear that from the pig-fucker!"

It took me a second to get the joke. Then I laughed harder than she had. I had thought what she said earlier was the funniest thing ever. But Talia had actively one-upped herself. Unable to stop myself from laughing maniacally, I toppled to the floor rolling back and forth as I held my aching stomach. She didn't even need to fight me; she was gonna kill me with her jokes!

After a long moment I climbed to my feet, slowly since the pain was still strong. But it was far more manageable as my water healed me on the inside. From what I could feel, there was a lot of damage. It might take me even an hour to mostly recover, and that was with Sensei's special healing waters technique.

"So wait, everything is suddenly just cool now?" A voice said loudly. "After everything, after myself and a few others being embarrassed and stripped of our clothes. We are just going to act like everything is fine?"

I looked over to see who spoke, it was the lady whose clothes I had removed, she still stood there naked. I felt a twinge of jealousy, I had tried to take my clothes off too but it was clear by everyone's response that I wasn't allowed to. It had been very upsetting, but it was okay. I was used to clothes after all this time.

She seemed upset though, did she actually want her clothes? I had just been trying to make her feel better. I clearly had upset her when I pushed her back. I hadn't meant to push her through a wall. Then she had gotten even angrier and charged at me. So I thought undressing her and feeling her nude form in the air would make her feel better. Then Saki suggested I do it for others, I thought it was a bit weird but three guys stood as if they wanted it too.

Now they are all naked, but they still aren't happy? It couldn't be because of underwear, I had removed that as well from the girl. I know how much the top part digs into my shoulders. So I simply went to ask. Before I could speak however, Saki answered her. "Consider your clothes a casualty of battle, go put on new ones or find where Tama hid yours. You lost this battle, unless you would rather Tama fight you like she did the guild master!"

I looked over at Talia who covered her mouth and was clearly holding back laughter. "This... This isn't fair!" The guild girl said with indignation. "I demand recompense for this insane cat girl!"

I tilted my head and asked "Insane?"

The guild girl opened her mouth to speak, but Talia spoke over her "That's enough Teranthia! You were clearly severely outmatched, you are lucky she didn't outright kill you."

Teranthia instantly clamped her mouth shut and nodded. "As for your clothes," Talia turned to me before continuing "I am assuming you have a strong distaste for clothing like your sensei used to, that man never wore anything but boxers in public and nothing ever at night. Took all of us ragging on him for him to finally start wearing anything."

I nodded emphatically as I pointed at myself "Tama hates clothing, she only wears it cause sensei said it was indecent and made me!"

Talia smiled at me with a knowing look. "Ironic that he would have to deal with the same problems he gave us, still, most people don't share your aversion to clothes. Please give these people their clothes back and, in the future. Don't remove clothing without permission."

I stared at her in disbelief "Are you telling Tama, people like wearing clothes?!" That's insane, I had no words to describe the insanity of her comment. Why were they calling me insane when their own guild master spouted such nonsense!

Still, I didn't want to start another fight over what was supposed to be a favor, and they clearly didn't seem happy about what I had done. So I blinked to the roof and the pile of clothes I had put up there before blinking back down and dropping them in front of Teranthia. "Where even were-- hey!" She had bent down to pickup something from the pile and I had watched her breasts, curiosity overwhelmed me and I grabbed one and squeezed gently.

"They are so soft!" I said in surprise. I looked up to her face, it was red and she glared down at me before quietly saying "Let go of my breast Tama." I let go of the soft mound and took a step back.

She looked at me strangely before adding "You know, when you first removed my clothes, I thought you were trying to demoralize me. But the more I look at you, I'm starting to see you genuinely thought you were helping me didn't you?"

As she spoke, she started getting dressed, and as she finished talking she finished. She tossed the other clothes to the middle guy who sorted it between the three dudes and they began getting dressed as well.

I nodded "Tama doesn't know why you like clothes, Tama hates them, They are so uncomfortable!"

I watched as her face softened and she stepped forward and reached out, petting my head. I smiled and my tail flicked back and forth in pleasure. I loved being petted, Sensei had done so rarely and only when I had truly deserved it.

"Hey Tama, we need to get our badges, come on!" I heard Saki say behind me. I ignored her as I continued enjoying the feeling of being petted. But after a moment the petting stopped and I returned to reality.

Smiling up at Teranthia I spoke excitedly "I hope we can hang out again, and maybe..." My eyes grew big as I said the next part "You can pet me more?"

Teranthia just laughed and nodded "Of course Tama, come by any time for head pats." I jumped up and down excitedly as I turned to Saki. "You hear that Saki! Head pats whenever I want!"

Saki smiled at me and rolled her eyes "Yes Tama, I am glad you're getting your head pats." She sounded like she was holding back laughter but I didn't care, I was gonna go get my badge, then... MOARR HEADPATS.