We put our little tournament on hold for the time being while everyone stays silent and thinks to themselves for a while.

My sister is looking at her hands, opening and closing them every couple of seconds.

Nikki looks at her and tilts her hand. “What are you doing?”

“I mean, if Sam got her abilities from the game… I could have too, theoretically, right?” Lise replies. “I don’t have magic, neither do I have super fast reflexes or the ability to see trajectories easily. The only thing I’m good at is taking hits and being strong.”

“Hmm.” Hilda rubs her chin and walks over to one of the wall cabinets. She takes out something and walks over to my sis. “Here, can you start attaching these?”

I can now see what she brought, they were weights she uses for personal training.

“I will get some more.”

My sister nods and starts attaching weights to the dumbbell.

“Do you know what you can usually lift?”

“I can do a set of 15 easily with 3 kilograms.”

“Nice, that’s quite good already.” Hilda nods, clearly somewhat impressed.

“Hey, I need to keep my muscles toned for my girlfriend, y’know.” My sister winks at Nikki.

Nikki smirks. “Indeed, it’s quite hot.”

“Sam’s muscles are nice too!” I exclaim, not wanting to be underdone by my sister.

“A-Ami…” Sam stutters, her face slightly red.

“Haha.” My sister laughs. “At least my little sis knows what she likes.”

Hilda quickly returns with another set of weights. “Here, try these. This should be 5kg.”

“I’ll start with 3 and work my way up then.” Hilda nods and weights for my sister to start.

“1, 2, 3, …., 14, 15.” Lise finishes a set.

“How did that feel?”

“I don’t know. Felt like it usually does to be honest.” She then adds another kilogram which does slow her down quite a bit. After one more set she puts it down. “Yeah, I’m sure this is just my normal physique…” She actually looks somewhat disappointed about that.

“What about you, Nikki?” Hilda moves onto our next party member.

“I’m a mage… I don’t really feel magical, though I do think I grasp how to cast something theoretically.”

“You can see magical auras right, in-game? Can you try to do that now?”

Nikki closes her eyes and concentrates. “I think I can sense a faint aura there.” She points at me.

“Well, you did see Ami before. Give us a sec. Don’t open your eyes.” Hilda grabs me by my shoulder. “Ah, Lise, could you cover her ears too?”

My sister does what is asked of her and then Hilda starts moving me around the room.

Hilda walks away from me to another place in the room. “‘Kay, Lise, you can let her go now.”

“Want me to point at the aura again?” Nikki speaks.

“Yeah, go ahead.”

It doesn’t even take a second before she raises her arm and points directly at me.

“Okay… that’s really interesting…” Hilda rubs her chin once more.

“Was I right?” Nikki peaks and stares directly at me. “Wow.”

“Good job, babe.” My sis gives her partner a headpat.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Nikki quickly takes my sister’s hand from her head.

“What about you, Hilda?” Sam asks.

“Well…” She looks around her for a second. “I believe there is something I could do, but I probably shouldn’t do it out of self-preservation. I am not nearly flexible enough for that.”

My sister pouts again. “So everyone got something cool and I’m the only one who didn’t?”

“Are you really mad about that?” Nikki asks.

“Wouldn’t say mad perse… Just… disappointed.”

“Hey Ami.” Hilda turns herself to me. “Could you materialize your sword for me?”

“Uh… I can, but why?”

“Just want to test something.”

“Okay.” I shrug and start focusing my mana into my hand. A second or so later I’m already holding my sword which I promptly turn over to Hilda.

“Thanks kitten.” She gives me a wink.

“No problem.” I smile.

“Hey, Lise, catch.”

“Huh?”

Hilda lobs the sword to my sister who is halfly caught off-guard. In a second she stands up and handily catches the sword by its hilt. “Are you crazy? You could’ve hurt me!”

“Just wanted to prove my hypothesis. Plus, we have an Ami here.” Hilda pats my head.

“What hypo… ah…” She stares at the sword in her hand and starts giving it a couple of swings. Her movements are pretty much the same as her character in-game. “Well, that is pretty cool.”

I then make my sword disappear, with a little awh from my sister. “Do you think this is all because of me?”

“I’m not sure.” Hilda scratches her cheek. “If it were only for me and your sister, I would think that muscle memory would explain most of it. But Nikki’s and Sam’s skills are a bit more out there. Especially being able to see aether, which shouldn’t exist on Earth… That makes me believe it does have something to do with you.”

“Hmmm. So what do we do?” Sam asks.

“Probably just keep an eye on it and see if more things change. Right now, none of the things we have really affect us that much. Although you might have some effect with your basketball, Sam.”

“I’ll just try to make shots that I’d normally make so it doesn’t pull attention to me.” She nods and taps her lap to signal me over.

I gladly accept and go sit in my girlfriend’s warm embrace.

“So I take it we won’t be continuing the little tournament?” Lise takes her cue and puts it away in the rack.

“We can do something else, we have plenty of other things we can do. I have this one board game where you all play spiritual mediums and you need to solve a murder together. It’s pretty fun.”

“Oh! Mysticium!” Nikki calls out.

“Yep, that’s the one.” Hilda smiles.

“As long as Ami doesn’t need to move out of my lap that’s fine for me.”

“She doesn’t.” Hilda winks. “Lise, could you help me put a slab on top of the pool table so we can play on top of it?”

“Yep.” My sister helps Hilda for a second.

Sam shuffles our chair closer to the table, trying not to throw me off in the meantime while Nikki sets up the game.

We play at least five rounds, with each of us playing ‘the ghost’ once. The ghost’s job was in practice to give out cryptic hints in the form of images to who the murderer is, where it happened and what the story behind it was. With the images being sometimes incredibly vague and the ghost not being able to give any hints apart from those. It was actually kinda fun. Even failing was incredibly amusing. My sister gave us hints that made absolutely no sense.

“No no no, I gave you images that all had indoor activities on them!” My sister defends herself against Hilda.

“What? Three of these images are clearly outdoors! How was I supposed to know you referred to chess in this one?”

“There’s a tower in the image!”

“And castles have towers too!”

Sam, Nikki and I are just listening to the argument between them while laughing our asses off. It takes them five more minutes before they are finally done ranting at one another.

“Okay.” Nikki wipes a tear away. “That was funny but let’s try a different game now.”

And so we started another game, and another one after that, and one more… right until my stomach starts rumbling really loudly. So loud that the entire room falls quiet.

“Uh, Hilda, I think my girlfriend wants some food.” Sam squeezes me tight and puts her ear against my back. “Yeah, she sounds completely hollow.”

“Hmpf.” I pout. “I’m just slightly peckish.”

Hilda chuckles and takes a look at her watch. “Yeah. Let’s prepare some food. Barbeque is fine for everyone, right?”

“Ooooh! That’s been a while since I’ve had that.” My sister smiles and pats her tummy.

“Doesn’t roasting meat over a fire in Turn of Destiny count?” Nikki asks her partner.

“Well… they don’t have one of Hilda’s great marinades, so no.” My sis violently shakes her head.

“I can make you some ebi sushi while we wait for the coals to heat up, Ami.” Hilda walks over to me. “And for you as well, if you want, Sam.”

“Sounds yummy!” I hop off my girlfriend’s lap.

“Yeah, sounds good.” Sam laughs and gets off her chair too.

Hilda then continues to lead the group back downstairs, turning on a couple of lights in the meantime as it’s getting a bit darker outside already. Including a couple of lights in her garden.

“Lise, can you take a bag of coal from the garage?” Hilda asks while she leads us outside.

“Sure thing.” My sister runs off on a jog.

We arrive on the deck in Hilda’s garden, where we can see the pretty big barbeque grill, standing next to the wall. Hilda rolls it away a couple of meters so it’s more in the open and locks the brakes. At that moment, my sister joins us outside with a big bag of coal in her hands.

“Is everyone ready to start some fire?”

-Yes, give me my nomnoms!-