Bunny Girl Evolution (BOOK 2 COMPLETE) (STUBBED!)
111 – Upgrades, People, Upgrades

<AUTHOR'S NOTE>

Bunny Girl Evolution is now live on Amazon! It's available on both ebook and Audible. Check it out!

Ebook: https://mybook.to/Bunny-Girl-Evolution

Audible: https://www.audible.com/pd/B0FDBJG31C

<END AUTHOR'S NOTE>

With the final item sold, the auction was over. The announcer said some words to thank all the participants, and to invite them all back for the next year’s auction and things like that, then dismissed the audience after a round of applause. Franz offered Elise his arm as they left their balcony, and allowed him to guide her through the crowd of people congratulating her on her purchase. Elise was able to respond appropriately to the people trying to get close to her and her supposed riches, but she felt numb, and her mind kept returning to one singular thought.

Oh my god, I just spent 42000 of Oberon’s gold.

She had no idea what to do. Even if Oberon truly didn’t care about the 25000 he had given her, she had still gone and spent an extra 17000 that she would have to find a way to pay back somehow. Where would she even earn 17000 gold? Would she be stuck working as an indentured servant to him for the next century?

She considered just not paying for it so that the box could go to the next highest bidder instead, but whenever that thought sprang to mind, she pushed it down immediately. She hadn’t recognized it at the time, but whatever sudden urge had come over her to purchase it in the first place was clearly linked to {Rune of Fate}. When she came back to her senses, she found that she had been scratching at her chest right where the rune appeared when she activated it, and the skin right between her collarbones was now red and raw. Whatever that box was, or whatever was inside it, was tied to the rune in a way that she felt was important. She couldn’t just let it go.

So, when she and Franz went to a restricted part of the underground complex to collect the items they had won, she didn’t bring up the idea of taking back her bid. She merely said that she didn’t have the appropriate funds on her person, and that she would send them over shortly. They had still asked for a down payment, so she had to leave 10000 of her gold behind before confirming that she could leave, which she barely managed to do without cringing. With the books she bought taking up the other thousand gold that Duke Larcombe had given her, she was down to 15000 gold, which was still a lot, but it was less than half what she still needed to pay.

While they collected their items, Elise noticed that oddly enough, Franz hadn’t actually won anything. She remembered him bidding on what seemed like dozens of items, but as she looked back, she realized that he had never had the last say in any of them, which she found a bit odd. She still couldn’t figure out what his angle was though. Aside from slipping away during the intermission, he hadn’t done anything especially suspicious.

In retrospect, she actually felt foolish for thinking anything would happen. Con artists weren’t thieves. Their modus operandi was disappearing before anyone realized they had been duped. As long as he was still around as a public figure and no one was coming after him, all the time she spent with him would be generally uneventful. She still couldn’t help but feel like something bad would happen though. Would Oberon really have set her up with someone boring enough that nothing would happen while she was with him?

When they arrived back aboveground, there were two carriages waiting for them, both with Oberons driving them. Elise internally sighed with relief, as she was running up very close against her time limit.

“Darling?” asked Franz, confused.

“I’m sorry, I need to get back,” said Elise. “I’m staying with a friend. I can’t be out all night. I’ve prepared this carriage for you to take you where you need to go, and I’ll send word to you in the morning though.”

“One night won’t hurt,” said Franz, leaning closer and moving his hand around to Elise’s waist.

“It will,” said Elise, gently pulling his hand off her and stepping away. “I’m sorry, but I need to get back.”

Franz smiled and tried taking another step closer, but Elise took another step back.

“Oh, come on, darling,” he said. “We’ve only just met in person. We can at least enjoy a little late-night meal.”

“I’m not hungry,” said Elise. “I’m tired. I want to go to bed.”

Franz looked like he wanted to say more, but stopped himself.

“Well, I can’t keep a lady from her beauty sleep,” he said with a short bow. “You still owe me a dinner though.”

“Of course,” said Elise, smiling and using {Charm}. “And are you still available for dinner tomorrow night?”

“Yes, to meet your friends?” he asked. “Of course.”

“Thank you,” said Elise, checking the timer on {Lesser Transformation}. “I’ll be going now. Thank you for tonight. It was lovely.”

“Not as lovely as you.”

Elise smiled and curtsied, then tried not to appear to be in a rush as she walked toward the frontmost carriage, where one of the Oberons was opening the door for her. As soon as she got inside and checked that the curtains on the windows were shut, she switched back to her changeling form. She still had about three minutes left available, but that was the closest she had ever cut it.

Oberon the maid was waiting for her inside, smiling widely down at her.

“So?” he asked. “How was it?”

“...I accidentally spent too much money.”

“I know!” he said, the freckled face of his maid disguise lighting up with joy. “It was hilarious!”

“How can I earn that money back?”

“Hmm? Oh, you’re already more than earning it. I have you under my wing for at least another three months. The entertainment value alone more than makes up for the money you spent. Don’t worry about it. I’ll pay in full, and you can have your mysterious box all to yourself.”

“...Why?” asked Elise. “Even for you, that’s a lot of money.”

“Do you remember what the 3 F’s of being a fey are?”

“Yes.”

It was something that he had drilled into her head during their lessons over the past few days.

“Tell me what the are.”

“Freedom, Fun, Fey.”

“Correct. And I am embodying them all right now. Freedom because this is my money and I can do whatever I want with it. Fun because watching you is fun. And fey.”

Elise didn’t bother asking him to elaborate on that last sentence because she knew he never would.

“And,” he continued. “This money was a cheap price to pay to teach you an important lesson on the first F. I was worried at the beginning there, but that finale was an excellent display of freedom. Very fey-like. Act impulsively, and run away from the consequences later is what I always say.”

“...I don’t think that’s a very good lesson to be teaching.”

“Why not?”

“Well, what if you can’t run away from the consequences?”

“Talk your way out of them.”

“And what if you can’t do that either?”

“Fight back.”

“What if you lose?”

“Tough luck.” He shrugged. “You had a good run. Better to live freely than die a slave though.”

“But what if you just don’t make impulsive decisions and then you don’t have to run away from the consequences?”

“And have your freedom restricted by social norms? No thanks. Where’s the fun in that? Listen to me, young Snowberry. You are new to the world, and you’ve spent too much time around humanoids. You’re still not thinking like a fey. Consequences are a social construct.”

“No they’re not.”

“They are if you’re powerful enough.”

“But I’m not powerful enough.”

“You will be. And if you want to be powerful, you have to act powerful. You can’t become a dragon by acting like a worm. Would you rather be a worm or a dragon?”

“Well-” Elise started.

“Worm, or dragon?”

“...Dragon.”

“Then you need to act like it. And I’m being completely serious this time. Your evolution options are determined by your actions. If you want an evolution that gives you freedom, you need to act freely. If you want a powerful evolution, you need to act powerful. If you want to continue down the fey line, you need to act fey-like.”

Elise sat in silent contemplation for a few seconds. She didn’t entirely agree with him on his views about freedom and consequences, but he was objectively correct about evolutions. If a worm acted like a worm, it would only get worm evolutions. If it wanted to become a dragon, it would need to do things beyond the bare minimum. She still wasn’t sure what she wanted to be, but she knew she wanted to push for the top, and to do that, she needed to be more powerful.

Whether that extended to spending so much of other people’s money or not, she still had probably the wrong mindset. She had owned up to her mistake, yes, but she had still let it cloud her judgement beforehand. Becoming an indentured servant to Oberon to pay back her debt? That was absolutely not an acceptable option. Why had she even thought of that possibility? She doubted that working like that for a long time would be good for her evolution options.

“I see,” she finally said.

“Great!” he said. “Anyway, wanna hear something crazy I just found out?”

“I guess?”

“Franz Luger is actually a con artist!”

“...You didn’t already know?”

“Ah right, you have {Inspect}” he said. “Of course you already knew.”

“Wait, but you didn’t know that already when you set him up with me?”

“No? Why would I have?”

“Wasn’t that part of your plan?”

“Plan? My only plan is to have fun, and to teach you how to have fun!”

“So there wasn’t anything specific you wanted me to do with that situation you put me in?”

“The only specific goals I have for you are for you to level up your skills to the skill cap. I have some targets that I think will help, like getting that secret out of those noble ladies, but if you decide to take a different route, then that’s fine with me.”

“But how did you set up my meeting with him? Why didn’t he question it? I thought I was supposed to be helping him pull off a con or something.”

“Oh, I’ve been catfishing him for a little while,” said Oberon. “I was going to do something else with him, but then you showed up, and I thought that sticking you with him would be more fun than what I was originally planning.”

“And the surprise items from Carsas at the auction?”

“Oh, I did know about that part, though I didn’t have any plans relating to it. I am curious about the box though. You seem very interested in it. What is it? None of my clones were able to figure it out.”

“I’m not sure either,” Elise admitted.

“So you spent 42000 gold on something when you don’t even know what it is?” he asked, delighted.

“...Yeah.”

“Fantastic!” he said. “Very fey-like. Perfect marks!”

Elise didn’t exactly feel good about that, but some part of her was relieved that she wouldn’t actually have to pay Oberon back for any of it. The fact that he didn’t actually have any plans for what specifically she should be doing also felt freeing. She had been nervous about maintaining her facade with Franz, but if Oberon didn’t actually care what she did with him… Well, the way he had been eying her was a bit uncomfortable, and between that and the fact that he was a con artist, he probably wasn’t a great person. She didn’t actually have to keep pretending to be his lover. In fact, if he kept being sleazy, it might be time for him to reap some consequences.

It might be time for Agent Snowberry’s next mission.

Elise yawned and curled up on the cushioned seat as the carriage rolled on back toward the castle. She hadn’t realized how tired she was until that moment, but as she thought a bit more about it, it was actually around 2 in the morning. It was probably only her nerves that had kept her so alert at the auction. She nearly dozed off before they arrived, and when they got back into the castle, Elise fell asleep almost immediately the moment she touched her bed.

When she woke up, it was almost noon, and her stomach was rumbling. She stood up and stretched out in her bed as she blinked the blurriness from her eyes, and was about to hop out of bed when she noticed the blurriness wasn’t going away. In fact, it wasn’t blurriness at all. It was a System message.

[ You have been invited to participate in a closed alpha test of a new version of the System (v7.1.0). Would you like to accept? ]

[ Yes ] [ No ]

Elise stared at the screen for a few seconds, dumbfounded. Then, Titania’s words from the other night came back to her.

“...you’ll receive an invitation soon, and you should accept it.”

Elise had been wondering about what that would mean, and she had partially assumed that Oberon’s invitation to lessons was what she was referring to, but now that this System message was in front of her, she was sure that this was what Titania was actually talking about. She only contemplated for a moment before shrugging. The beta had been fine, if worthless, and if a literal goddess was recommending that she accept, who was she to disagree?

Yes, she thought.

“Excellent,” said the System. “Please sit tight while we upgrade your system with all the latest new features, courtesy of !@#$%^&!”

[System upgrade in progress. Some features may be unavailable during this time.]

[0%]

[11 hours 59 minutes remaining]

***

After Nigel got the teleportation scrolls from Enya, he didn’t use them immediately. Erin was still home at the time, and he knew she would tattle on him the second he left. Father was still home as well, though Nigel was pretty sure he would be leaving soon. He instead holed himself up in his room and pretended to be sad while he bided his time.

The morning after Nigel was grounded, Father left the compound on a business trip of some kind, and the day after, Erin left too, so it was just him, Enya, and the servants. He spent about an hour setting up an aether clone that would perform set actions on a schedule and should be enough to fool a casual observer, and after triple checking that no one was watching, he tore the scroll.

When the whiteness cleared from his vision, he found himself… not where he should have been. His original plan was to drop himself somewhere in Jelor City, find an Ostra member or three, and figure out where the aetherborn had gone from them. Instead, he found himself in a place that was definitely not Jelor City, and he was standing in front of Rayna, the 9th tier vampire, and the Ostra member that Father was most wary of.

“Sorry about that,” said Nigel with a smile. “I’ll be right out.”

Dammit, Enya gave me one of the prank scrolls.

Rayna was too surprised to respond immediately, and just watched as Nigel produced another scroll from his storage and tore that one. He disappeared in a flash of white… and then reappeared three feet to the left.

“Hahaha,” he laughed nervously. “Well, this is awkward.”

“Indeed,” said Rayna. “This is the second time that fate has chosen to gift me someone this way. I hope you are as interesting as the last one.”

“Well, interesting is my middle name!” said Nigel. “But I really have to get going, unfortunately. Maybe some other time.”

He walked to the door with as much confidence as he could manage, but when he opened it, he paused. He was now standing on a balcony overlooking a city with an architectural style that he had never seen before. More worryingly, it was night time, even though it was definitely the middle of the day when he teleported away. As he took in his surroundings, he suddenly felt an embrace from behind. It was gentle, but firm, and when he tried to pull away, he found that he couldn’t. And worse, there was an aether interfering with his, so he couldn’t even transform.

“Leaving so soon?” said a soft voice in his ear.

“Well, I was on my way to meet someone, but my sister pranked me,” he said, trying not to sound nervous. “Say, you wouldn’t happen to have any way to get back to Jelor City, would you? It looks like I’ve been sent to the other side of the world by accident.”

“I might,” said Rayna. “But there’s no need to rush. I’m sure whoever you’re meeting will understand.”

“It’s very important,” said Nigel. “I really shouldn’t be late.”

“Why not stay for a while?” she asked. “It’s nice here. The people are excellent.”

“Well-”

“Tell me, changeling. Have you ever considered becoming a vampire?”