Maid with Necromancy

“Do we have to do this again?” Alex asked, exhausted from everything that came before.

“Tomorrow is the first day of classes. You need to know you can transform and follow directions safely.” Harmony informed him, hiding her touch of anxiety with [Poise and Bearing]

The days after Alex had come begging for help, still partially drunk, even after a restorative, were a grind with minimum sleep and maximum effort. Every day and night was filled to the brim with welcome week activities, working on Alex’s problem, cursing her class books, and tackling the dungeon. There were numerous changes, leading to reams of information that filled several books of notes Harmony compiled during her minimal free time.

Some changes were aesthetic, such as the new badges for her uniform. Adric's pet rating had come with a new badge for her jacket, a green cat with the number thirteen twenty-eight, putting him as one of the lower-ranked noncombatant pets. A third badge joined it, a deep purple triangle granting exceptions to prerequisite classes. Almost every member in the chosen nine had that one. Three didn’t seem like a lot, but most students only had two before classes began.

Financially, things were looking up, but a blood price was paid for the money and experience, allowing her to fully equip Adric with armor and an extra set of clothing. Their little group of Bowe, Her, Adric, and Hyacinth expanded their harvesting efforts and training in the middle of the night, splitting their rest into two sleep cycles to accomplish the task. Each honed their skills. The pet prince could solo a guard. Bowe also could take one alone. The one the rider and steed had been together, they’d taken down a set of three with ease. Hyacinth could take two just by flattening them. She’d decided that until they could do it regularly without needing minor healing through her or a potion, she wouldn’t let them push for more opponents than that. Eventually, they’d work as a team to clear the first floor of Oorty’s tomb, but they weren’t there yet. The death that paid for the runs every night was Harmony testing her limits until [Stride Before the Fall] rescued her from a fatal end, with memories that could give hints at how to do this better. She’d improved to soloing three guards with only about a twenty percent chance of dying quickly.

Xera hated it. Her body and skills were still undergoing changes. She can add that to not yet being finished with puberty. Hopefully, the girl learned a lesson about making oaths.  

Consequences— everyone had to live with the consequences of their choices. Harmony certainly had. The eraser part of her stared down Alex with his set of consequences and the problems they created. “Now Transform.”

With the lack of a better outfit, Alex wore a red oversized gown for training; the color was on sale, and they’d already trashed many in these attempts. Trying to do it in normal clothing simply destroyed them; these gowns gave you a few uses to preserve modesty. After all her troubles with Night, Harmony could at least relate to that. The transformation took five seconds, down from the fifteen it had started with. Still an exceptionally long time to potentially be more vulnerable between shifts.

Alex’s flesh ripped and split. It looked like he was dying, but the transformation came with a vitality very close to Adric’s in some ways. Visually gruesome, yet practically useless to use with [Manipulate Dead] on. Golden fur burst through wet red fissures as Alex grew into a giant golden bear. It wasn’t a mix of human and bear, like the beast-kin; the end result was an actual giant bear with massive claws and a muzzle full of teeth.  The gown allowed the man to keep his dignity during the parts of the transformation where he was most at risk for exposing himself, but the end result on the bear was a tight red shirt that cut off just a little bit under his arms and was pantsless below that. Fur covered his modesty when he was all bear.

The werebear looked down on Harmony with a gaze that had a touch of complicated fear.

If she actually had a skill like [Bedside Manners], there might have been more to work with. [Shadowed Graves] was probably a more efficient training tool. She at least had plenty of practice with direct soul-level targeting after using it to ferret out mimics and break Gareth’s fear of swimming with the skill.  The bear’s mind was barely connected to Alex’s proper one, so it was kind of like bullying a child; part of the training had been getting those mental parts of the boy to more align. Hopefully, there wouldn’t be more personal consequences for becoming the big, bad, scary woman making the beast behave. If only she had a nice and gentle way to persuade them.

Sometimes she could see a hint of that fear in the man, despite his talkative, gregarious nature. When asked, he talked about vague flickers of memories of what he did after transforming. Alex claimed it felt like a whole different person inside of him. That might have been easier. She’d seen plenty of mergings through bonds, so close they were woven deep into their souls.  Jessica and Tyler,  Max and Saccerate. No, this was more like something dormant and old had been awakened when he gained this body type.

“Are you ready for me?”  Adric asked from the sidelines of their rented practice room.

Adric had been true to his word about working on shaping up and looking at the team in exchange for skipping those pet classes. Beautiful, likeable, dashing about, and involving himself in most of Harmony’s teammates' lives to the point where he saw them more than she did.  Alex’s drinking buddy and help at pulling in the girls. Private training lessons for Tasha, and not the kind most girls wanted, because he was also helping the girl pull in women, as she preferred them to boys. He frequented events with Xera, which she allowed because she wanted to get to know more about Harmony, and Harmony approved to keep a watch on the girl, because, despite letting her suffer from the oath, she was still a child and should be protected as such. Tun-Knee was the tough one.

“He asks me if I’m happy being your pet? And maybe it would be better if I had more rights. I don’t think he’s trying to free me. Primal bonds for life, but he reminds me a lot of those lawyers who get me out of customs.”

“You’re sure he doesn’t know who you are, who we are, and where we’re from?”  

“I don’t know. He’s like a book; I can’t read more than a few pages into him before needing to give up. At least he has his support boosts under control now.”

As a group, they didn’t get good, but they got better. After the terrible initial showing, Adric managed to run them through more complicated drills in what became a regular morning training session. Adric, despite his protest at paperwork,  aligned everyone’s class schedules to create a regular daily time where they could all meet and booked out the training room for the whole quarter.

It got acrobatic at times, “Alex, fly!” Adric demanded, causing Harmony to toss Alex backwards for Xera to catch. She expended her armor until she caught the man, the maneuver saving him from one of the mock-guards. The undead prince was the playcaller when needed, but only temporarily because they’d need to run Oorty’s Tomb without him.

Because of the training, as a human Alex was used to taking her pets orders. The bear in him not so much. 

The big bear could be prodded with fear to act in very precise ways, shivering in fear as the beast moved. The question the night before he had to take Combat 101 was if he'd take orders from someone other than Harmony and Alex was the ideal bridge before a teacher took the reins. This was their last chance to try again.

Werebear Alex growled slightly as Adric walked in front of him. He did not move to attack.  An improvement from the first time they'd done this, where Harmony had to jump in with a practice shield and a [Mana Rotation] boosted [Small Armor] to stop the attack.  In the transformed state, he was stronger than her vital body, but not quite as fast.

Harmony had a small shield ready now, in case of a repeat attempt.

“On the ball, now!” Adric ordered.

The growl deepened. But the large bear moved to the training tools they’d already practiced with. Out of the pedal-powered vehicle, some boxes for jumping on, and a giant ball, the bear moved to the correct one, hopped on, and started balancing.

“Move.” Adric continued.

It was a sight, but the bear was quite agile, walking along on the ball. Good to see that the exhaustion from tonight's final Welcome Week wasn’t hampering him. Harmony’s legs were sore from all the dancing.  One hour earlier, The Academy’s first-year opening ceremony had ended, and in seven hours everyone would start their first classes. Exhaustion, distraction, and someone not nudging the man with fear was exactly the stress test needed.

Bates and Ambrosia had packed several of her nicer dresses she had to choose from to wear for the event, but she didn’t have time to have them to have a tailor modify them or the patience to try it herself and risk messing it up after the exhausting week. So, the long black dress became an extremely tight and short dress, bursting at the seams around her chest and hips, while coming dangerously high up her thighs. Still, decent compared to some of the uniforms Tyler had her in at Coodly Manor.

 She wasn’t the only one showing off skin, or choosing the opposite, with outfits that were nearly head-to-toe coverings as fashions and styles from around the world had [Beautician] working with [Keen Investigative Awareness] to take everything in upon entering the arena-turned-ballroom floor.  

Tun-Knee and the other beast-kin were close to being the most dressed, the women in layered dresses that poofed out, and Tun-Knee matched the other beast-kin in multi-layered black suits, white dress shirts, and a cumberbun around the waist. With five other tigers, it was almost hard to pick him out if she hadn’t memorized his stripes. This time, he stayed with his kind, and the way he pretended he didn’t recognize her had Harmony leave him be for the night.

This was a no-pets-allowed party, so Adric was absent. He said they had their own shindig at a place called The Barn.

The attention her dress brought her wasn’t the most appealing, but she gathered plenty of names, abilities, and details about those whom she absolutely wouldn’t want anything to do with, due to their lack of control and poor behavior at her looks. [Recall] filed everything away to take notes on later.  Those not quite so forward and whom remained respectful, she danced with, working to match whatever local style they brought to this school. It felt good to move to music again, and the skills of the musicians hired for this event were undeniable; all of them were past their second evolution.

It was hard not to freeze or dash off mid-song as a little warning in her soul shivered down her spine. Danger! Not her, but detached and only slight, but enough to draw Harmony’s attention towards the far end of the dressed-up arena. Those little bubbles of oathed energy flashed.

“Excuse me. I have a friend to see.” The student was very disappointed, but gave a bow anyway. Though he did sneak a look at her cleavage as he did so.

It was hard to be invisible in this dress. [Poise and Bearing], along with [Style and Grace], allowed her to dance away from attention both socially and physically as she made her way at a leisurely enough pace to not seem rushed.

Xera’s outfit, a long silk black robe with finely stitched designs in gold and red, was interesting. They’d arrived at separate times, so this was Harmony's first chance to see the girl in the crowd of thousands. What really had Harmony’s attention was the danger that had pulled her this way.

The golden boy, Quartus of the nine, Kevin, leaned over her with a friendly smile on his face, but danger warned of the devil in his mind. What kind of danger? Social, emotional, physical, or spiritual was fuzzy. This was a new part gained by [Two Against the End]. It would take time to explore it.

“Xera, I’ve been looking for you all over!” Harmony cried excitedly, with a bit of those old acting chops borrowed from time with her mother.

“Healer White?” Xera asked, surprised.

Three long strides, and Harmony stepped between Xera and Kevin, and with the experience of a dancer, led Xera in her shocked state several steps away. That sense of danger lessened somewhat.

“We were having a conversation.” Kevin retorted irritably, letting his broad authority show his outrage

Harmony let the dry ‘job done’ tone from being an eraser blend with a hint of her authority touching into that deep hope others had for her half a world away to pierce his shallow connection.“And now you are not.”  

Twelve more steps led the pair into the crowd. [Final Silence] muted the sounds around them. “What was that about?”

“He wanted to recruit me for a project. We’re in the same Deflecting Fatal Blows class. Kevin’s family shares my cultural heritage.”

What had been the danger there? Something similar to those pictures of dead kids, murdered, their deaths covered up as consequences of poor performances in the dungeon? It didn’t feel quite that hard. [Recall] logged the feeling. The only way to figure it out was to put Xera in more dangerous situations.

“Your oath warned me.”

“I can handle myself.” Xera retorted a little indignantly.

Harmony kept herself from cursing Xera’s youth and instead introduced her to some nicer students she’d cataloged so far. No other hints of danger came, but it was an exhausting night. As the ceremony closed the end of welcome week, she knew it was time to give Alex his one final test.

More orders from Adric had her watching the giant golden bear in the tiny red shirt peddle a comparatively tiny vehicle in a circle while her pet prodded and taunted him to see if he’d lash out. He didn’t.

Exhausted Harmony skipped that night's dungeon run for extra sleep to prepare for the long day that was to be the first day of classes.

As for Alex and Combat 101, the next day, one student was slightly mauled, but he deserved it, so both of them counted her training as a success.

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