Rebirth of the Nephilim

Chapter 364: Perfectly Jadis

“You leveled?”

“Yup,” Jay nodded before taking a sip of a sweet juice that tasted faintly like kiwi fruit. “Level twenty-seven in my ritualist class now.”

“That makes you CLR fifty-nine,” Aila exclaimed, though she quickly tempered her voice so as not to attract attention from all the priests in the dining hall. “You’re so close to unlocking your tertiary class now.”

“And you got that level from fucking Bridget? With five of you?” Kerr asked, her expression a mix of annoyance and envy.

“I did,” Jay shrugged. “Bridget got a level, too.”

“What?” Kerr yelped, then turned in her seat to glower at the orc who was sitting a little further down the table near Sabina and Syd. “She got to have five of you all to herself for a day and she got a level out of it? Some girls have all the fucking luck…”

Bridget shot Kerr a coy grin, though her attention was more on Sabina who was grilling her for information on what it had been like to have sex with five of Jadis at once. Not the most appropriate of breakfast conversations, but the table they had to themselves in the temple dining hall was separate enough from the other occupants of the room that they couldn’t be easily overheard.

Jadis hadn’t kept her extra two bodies for long, instead choosing to revert back to her typical setup once she’d exhausted Bridget with their day of debauchery. As a consequence, not everyone had gotten to “meet” Jadis’ extra selves, though the fact that she could alter her skills to have five bodies was a big topic of discussion that morning.

“What skill did you get for your level?” Aila asked Jay, refocusing her attention. “Was it a new ritual?”

“It was,” Jay confirmed with a grin. “It’s a good one too. I’ll give you the details when we’re in private, but it’s an emergency healing skill for situations where I can’t get healing from Eir.”

Aila looked extremely interested in hearing more, but she didn’t press Jay for any further information. Even though they were somewhat separated from everyone else, they were still in a huge hall full of dozens of clerics and priests. There was no knowing who might have a skill to help them listen in. Jadis didn’t want to broadcast her new skill details to the world at large, especially since it was then kind of skill that could make a serious difference in a life and death situation.

The new ritual Jadis had unlocked after she realized she’d level some time during her debauched rampage with Bridget was called Ceremony of Licentious Regeneration. The description details were long, but the effect was fairly self-explanatory in Jadis’ opinion.

In essence, the ritual acted as an “Oh shit I’m about to die” button. If Jadis was in a seriously life-threating situation, she could trigger the ritual effect and she’d heal for what would likely be a ridiculous amount. A single charge would only heal her for about twenty-six health points; chump change numbers when compared to her nearly two thousand health point maximum. However, since she had three bodies, just one round of sex with one lover would net her almost eighty stored healing points. And that was just from one round. Jadis rarely went for just a single trio of climaxes, especially not with her many sexy lovers. Even discounting the times where she had sex for the purpose of some other ritual, Jadis was positive that she’d have hundreds, if not thousands of points stored up in a week’s time. Of course, triggering the effect would use everything up in one go and over-healing wasn’t a thing, so there was no benefit to having excess charges stored. Not that Jadis cared about that. She really didn’t have any interest in optimizing every aspect of her life, nor her relationships with her lovers. Still, it was good to have a failsafe healing spell that she could use on herself in dire emergencies.

Actually, now that Jadis thought about it, her calculations were wrong. Not so far as the amount of sex she was likely to have in any given week, but in terms of her attributes.

When Jadis had switched her Debauched Duplication so that she had five bodies, she’d done so to help improve Bridget’s stats. Well, she’d also done it so she could fuck her orc lover five-ways to Sunday, but the stats were a big part of it. In the process though, Jadis had also improved her own stats since she had Bridget’s Stoke the Arden Flame replicated. Due to the nature of the skill, both she and Bridget had increased their four chosen attributes by ten points each. For Jadis, that meant her new totals were looking pretty good. She hadn’t thought to review her main status sheet after her day-long bout of debauchery since her mind had been… hazy. But now that she was far more awake and aware, she could look at her status and smile at the results of all her hard work.

Well holy socks on a naked nun, Jadis actually did have two thousand health points. In fact, all of her physical attributes had gone up significantly. The downside of the boost, though, was that she’d need to temporarily switch her duplication ritual at least once every ten days to maintain it. She was only able to keep the extra numbers as long as she had five of her selves to fuck herself with. That went for Bridget, too. They’d need to make an event out of Stoking the Ardent Flame every week, just to be on the safe side.

Not that Jadis was complaining about the prospect. While she wouldn’t want to have five bodies all the time since it stretched the limits of her ability to multitask, Refracted Mind only helping but so much, increasing the number of her selves had been fun and was something she looked forward to doing again. Especially since it was improving not only her stats, but the stats of her lovers as well.

Bridget’s level up had come from her Ardent Light of the Reborn class, bringing her secondary up to thirteen and her overall CLR to thirty-six. Since it was also an odd numbered level, she’d been able to choose a new skill as well. She’d told Jadis the one she’d gone with had been inspired by their spar, specifically with how big a difference Jadis’ speed had made in their fight.

While the straight attribute boost didn’t seem like much compared to the numbers Bridget had gained from a single night of passion with five of Jadis, much less the increases Jadis was sporting, ten points for a sub-level twenty skill was actually an incredible number for most people. Bridget had nearly doubled her Agility score with one level, and that was nothing to sneeze at.

For her part, Jadis approved of the choice. Bridget was doing her best to balance out her stats so that she was an all-around solid combatant, rather than hyper-focusing now that Jadis was able to help her with her Arcane attribute. Jadis thought it was a wise decision, though maybe that was because she herself was in the position of having high numbers across all of her stats.

With her new improvements, Bridget’s status sheet looked far stronger than it used to.

Aside from the extra numbers coming from the new passive skill and her own Stoke the Arden Flame, Bridget’s Arcane stat had also gone up by another ten points thanks to Jadis’ improved Eldritch stat. In fact, all of her lovers had had their bonded attribute go up by ten points thanks to the skill. Truly, fucking Bridget with five different bodies was a boon to everyone.

Well, almost everyone.

Jadis still hadn’t gone any further than some kissing and maybe a little petting when it came to Sorcha. They were still feeling each other out, getting used to their relationship dynamic. Jadis hadn’t had too much time to spare for Sorcha since their previous date day, but she was still treating her the same way she would any of her other lovers, which seemed to be the right call. Sorcha was growing more and more comfortable among the group, finding her voice in more conversations and feeling a lot less compunction against using her sarcastic wit to point out when someone was saying or doing something stupid.

She wasn’t sure when their relationship would move on to the next level, but Jadis wasn’t feeling rushed about it. They’d get there when they were both ready.

Alex, however, was a different situation.

Dys’ violet eyes met Alex’s three neon blue ones as she looked at her demonic companion. Alex sat across the table from her, wearing the clothing she’d been given without fuss, sipping on a cup of sweet juice. Her plate was empty since the Demon had no need to eat, but ever since she’d gone drinking with Jadis at The Silver Lute, Alex had taken to sipping on sweet drinks, and even occasionally tasting foods if they smelled sweet enough. Alex hadn’t said much since they’d all gathered for breakfast, which wasn’t unusual. While her vocabulary was rapidly expanding every day, the Demon still didn’t like to vocalize her thoughts much, instead relying on her body language to convey her mood and intentions.

Alex wasn’t the only one who had improved her knowledge. Jadis had gotten better at reading Alex’s alien movements, recognizing it for the language that it was. She’d even started to pick up on the various scents that Alex exuded when she was conveying a particularly strong emotion. While she was far from conversant in the Demon way of communication, Jadis felt like she had a pretty good handle on how to interpret Alex’s signals. And the signals she was getting this morning were clear as crystal.

Alex wanted to have sex with Jadis.

That wasn’t exactly a revelation. Alex had been open about her intentions ever since she’d had the right kind of body to be able to convey them. In fact, looking back on how Alex had acted when she was just a little squid in a jar, Jadis was pretty sure Alex had been trying to communicate her intent even then. Ever since she’d gotten a body that was compatible with her, Alex had been straining at the leash to get at Jadis. That was part of why Jadis had finally broken down and given Alex what she had wanted, at least in part. They hadn’t gone all the way, but Jadis had performed oral sex on her loyal Demon, which was a pretty huge step.

For the past week, Jadis had been making passionate love to her companions, a fact that Jadis knew Alex was aware of. How couldn’t she be? Most of the time, she was in an adjoining room, no doubt both listening to and “tasting” the lewd activities. She’d already gotten a direct taste for what those activities felt like. Now that today was her day to have Jadis all to herself, she didn’t seem like she was going to be patient anymore.

“So, Alex,” Dys addressed the Demon woman sitting across from her. “Anywhere in particular you want to go today?”

“Bed…” Alex replied instantly, her strangely two-toned voice lacking the proper inflection, but her demeanor and scent conveying her message without issue.

“I was thinking more along the lines of doing something fun together,” Dys demurred, not denying Alex’s intention but not agreeing to it just yet either. “I was hoping we could spend some time together just talking about, you know, us.”

Alex tilted her head questioningly, a movement that wasn’t part of her natural body language but something she’d picked up from watching others.

“I want to know more about you,” Dys explained. “And I want you to know more about me. That’s a big part of what dates are for. They’re so people in a relationship can get to know each other. If we’re going to be in a relationship like that, I want us to know each other.”

Alex seemed to consider that for a while, turning the words over in her head, probably recontextualizing them in whatever way made sense to her alien mind. Most of the time, Jadis was confident in Alex’s ability to understand what she meant, but sometimes when Jadis said something, her Demonic companion came back at her with utterly bizarre responses that Jadis could only attribute to the differences in their biology. She had to wonder if this was going to be one of those times.

“I do know you…” Alex finally said, her voice confident and unwavering. “I know… Everything… You are Jadis… You are… Perfection…”

That was a startling statement, one that not only drew a frown from Jadis’ selves, but glances from the rest of Jadis’ companions who were sitting near enough to overhear Alex’s words.

“Alex, I’m not perfect,” Dys spoke slowly, worried that she might upset Alex but not wanting her Demon companion to live under false perceptions. “I’m far from perfect. I make mistakes all the time. Big ones. You shouldn’t think of me as perfect.”

Nodding her head in agreement, Alex smiled, the grin on her face not wholly natural, though Jadis could tell by the way her tentacles were moving that Alex truly meant the smile. She reached out one of her large, monstrous arms and placed a hand on top of Dys’ hand in a mimicked gesture of reassurance.

“No… Jadis is not…. Perfect… Jadis can be stupid… Stupid like Demons… But Jadis is Perfect… Perfectly Jadis… As she… Should be…”

Jadis wasn’t entirely certain how to feel about Alex’s words. Her Demon wasn’t treating her like an idol to be worshiped, a significant worry considering Alex had a class dedicated to her name. Instead, she was aware of Jadis’ flaws and simply accepted them as a part of Jadis, seeing her for what she was and not as some kind of idealized version of herself. That was earnestly one of the most touching things anyone had ever said to Jadis.

There was one little hiccup to address, though.

“Did you just call me stupid?” Dys asked, tilting her head in mock indignation.

Alex kept the grin on her face as her tentacles curled in mischievous delight.

“Yes…”