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My first quest

  The night passed with little fanfare. Something about trying to control the spells had taken a ton of brain power without me noticing. I was just too mentally tired to do anything but sleep. Of course, that was until someone breathed directly into my ears. The noise and sensations were enough to jerk me out of the dream I was having.

  Eyes open, I expected to see Kyla’s face, given how we were facing each other as we cuddled. But no, my eyes were even with her chest. Each of her breaths were blowing against the ears that were on top of my head.

  My ears twitched with each breath. I tried to wiggle up a bit, just enough that I could look her in the eye, but her arms were a bit too tight. Twisting around was also no good as there was something on my lower half preventing me from doing so.

  Giving up the idea of returning to sleep, I tried to tickle her. Again though, her arms were too tight, and I could only move them enough to wrap her in a hug. Smiling, I moved my head forward and kissed along the top of both breasts before moving down to one nipple.

  Pulling it into my mouth, I gave it a slight nibble before releasing it. A single groan told me I had woken her up. “Why did you stop?”

  “Just paying you back for the ears.”

  “What about your ears?” she asked, clearly groggy and confused.

  “You were blowing directly into them, and I couldn’t move.”

  “Oh,” The way she said that told me I had screwed up admitting to her about being stuck. She blew softly into my ear. However she did it, it was no longer annoying but ticklish. I squirmed in her grasp. Something thumping on the bed behind me.

  She jerked up, releasing me in an effort to find what was behind me. Her squeal told me that, whatever it was, made her happy. “Your tail is growing in.”

  Sighing, I pushed her back and walked to the bathroom. She quickly joined me in looking through the mirror at my tail. It was only about a foot long, and all the hair on it was the same color as that on my head. As I watched, it twitched left and right randomly.

  “So, how do I control any of these things?” I asked, wanting the tail to sit still.

  Smiling, she shook her head at me through the mirror. “You can control them if you try to but most of the time they move involuntarily. Reacting to your emotions or the environment. It is similar to blinking.”

  “I meant to ask you yesterday, how does the tail allow a Kitsune to cast spells?”

  “The tail does little on its own. In fact, it is the nanites that are running through your body that will use the tail like an antenna of sorts so that they can pull power from the system as well as a place to grow in number.”

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  “Why do they use the tail as an antenna and not, say, my spine?”

  “Because that is what we got in the deal with the system when we joined as a race. The nanites in your spine just help control the other nanites and connect your brain to the system.”

  “Wait, so Kitsune gained the nanites from the system?”

  “System-specific nanites. We had nanites of our own, but no race has any that are as advanced. In fact, when someone dies, their nanites will vanish back into the system.”

  “So where did the multiple tails come from? I wouldn’t think that a race would need to evolve such a thing.”

  “That was something we added generations ago when we were looking for ways to manipulate more objects at one time. The military project was a failure, though it caught on in the social circles. All the system did was alter it slightly so that another tail would grow to accommodate more nanites as you gained more.”

  “And how do I go about gaining my first nanites?”

  “You have a fair number as a consequence of having your entire body changed,” she said, gesturing to my entire body. “To get any more nanites, you must either get them through system-generated quests or by purchasing them at system stores on core worlds.” As she finished saying that, a quest popped up in front of me.

  I read the quest out to Kyla. She didn’t seem all that surprised. “This is actually one of those quests that everyone gets. Typically, it is when someone is about to go through puberty. Though the system will impose some limits until they come of age.”

  Since I was already up, I tossed my clothes to the side and stepped into the shower. The water turning on automatically. “And what about the rewards? What is a nanite cluster?”

  “Keeping track of each nanite is impossible. So, the system links groups of nanites into clusters. You just communicate and control one of those nanites, and the rest of them listen to that one.”

  Thinking back to how the spells had felt, I asked, “Is that why I have been having issues controlling the spells?”

  She nodded, “I was wondering how long it would take you to try to control only one nanite rather than the spell in its entirety.”

  “And quick spell slots?”

  “Even the system nanites have limits. Each quick spell slot will allow you to save a spell for near-instant casting at any time, though they will never be as strong or versatile as those you cast manually.”

  She came over and helped me clean my ears and tail, showing me how to deal with the hard-to-clean spots. A window popped up in my vision seconds before someone spoke in my head. “Our ship is diverting to deal with a Swarm incursion. ETA ten minutes.”

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