PoV:
1. Sora (Our Fox-Tailed MC!)
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Google Document (In-line Comments)
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The arena’s ambient magic hummed against Sora’s skin like static electricity before a storm, copper and ozone mixing with butterflies escaping inside her belly. It almost felt like something that tasted wrong in the back of her throat.
She rolled her shoulders, tails fanning behind her as the tournament’s announcement magic sparked to life overhead.
Fen. Of course, it’s Fen.
The Huli Jing stood across the platform with that particular stillness animals adopted before striking, her three black tails and single white one curling with anticipation. Something flickered in her yellow irises—not the calculated, envious coldness Sora had grown accustomed to, but something rawer. Hungrier.
Great. She’s in Sora sucks mode… What did I do this time?
A flutter of warmth brushed her ear, and Sora’s gaze cut sideways to the fire fairy hovering at her shoulder. Ember—no, the fairy wearing Ember’s body—moved with that eerie precision that had been gnawing at Sora for weeks.
Every gesture she made was way too proper and controlled compared to the emotional spitfire with relationship problems she’d been introduced to. Sora’s ear folded down upon the imposter’s approach, a previous event bubbling up in her mind.
A memory from Earth that surfaced unbidden, back when Ember was normal: Nilly’s swipe at the fairy, her terror and confusion, but most curiously, calling her a different name.
Firefly… Her mother. Not Ember.
Her gaze darted to Wendy and Nerida, cheering her on from the first row as she proceeded up the steps. Between them stood the nervous, 16-year-old cat girl—tails weaving, mumbling some sort of prayer to Sora’s Grandma Amy.
What did you know back then?
Her focus returned to the proper, stoic girl who floated forward. She would have pursued it further, but it was hard when she coldly cut all contact and disappeared. At what point would she be infringing on her agency?
For all she knew, Ember was normally like this, and the bubbly, silly girl—who happened to be hundreds of years old—wasn’t the right Ember.
Though her gut told her this was the wrong Ember.
I guess I should address it now, or else it will always eat me up inside… Wait, she’s coming to me?
“Sora.” The fairy’s voice carried warmth that didn’t quite reach her formal tone. “We should discuss—”
“There is something we should discuss… Firefly.”
The words left her mouth before she could stop them, and the fairy went still. She felt the color drain from her face before the imposter looked away, a single shiver running down her frame, telling Sora everything she needed to know.
Around them, the arena’s protective barriers shimmered into place. Fen’s ears twitched forward from her place inside the stage, tails still, no doubt sensing the shift in energy between them—no, the whole audience could as Elder Caelia covered her mouth in shock.
“You’re her mother…” Sora’s fingernails curled into her palm, tail bristling as she growled, “What did you do to her?”
Firefly’s flames dimmed by a fraction. Silence stretched between them like a wire pulled taut. Then the fairy’s mournful expression shifted—something ancient and weary bleeding through the fake, youthful features.
The formal mask cracked, and underneath it…grief.
“My daughter is right here,” Firefly whispered, her voice dropping an octave into something that didn’t belong in a teenager’s throat. “I am surprised how swiftly you grew attached to her.”
Every eye turned toward them; the Elder looked utterly lost. Inside Sora, something ruptured. All she had ever wanted growing up was her mother—and now she was watching a mother betray her own daughter.
Fen’s laugh echoed down from her elevated position. “Trouble in paradise? How delightful.”
“Not now, Fen!” Sora snapped back, making the woman’s pouty lips intensify. Yet, she didn’t pursue it as she turned her hot green irises back on the fairy. “All I care—”
“I forfeit my participation.” Firefly’s focus was on the Elder, a bitter note coating a guilty tongue, “This fight is no longer mine.”
The Huli Jing was the first to break the silence, hand on her left hip as Sora only felt nauseous. “Well, well, well. Isn’t this getting messy?”
“No.”
Sora’s words came out as a snarl, fingers sliding off her ignited tail to fling the blaze at the woman, trapping her in a cage of desire-induced flames.
“I won’t let you go until I know Ember is safe.”
Fen rolled her eyes, glancing toward the elder. “Does this have to happen now? This dramafest is rather inconvenient.”
Elder Caelia moved across the restored stadium, the dryad’s face no longer showing the overwhelmed uncertainty of an event executor.
“I would rather not address this publicly. The implication leaves me sick to my roots, Ms. Firefly, but I cannot let this…heinous revelation slide… I will give you the decency of a final confession. Do you wish to do this in private?”
Firefly’s eyes followed the flame-like prison’s flickering that she could likely bypass if she wanted. Yet, she didn’t, her voice holding resigned damnation.
“There is no point of privacy at this point, though few understand the solemness of that reality…” The mother turned to face her, and the youthful features seemed to age decades in a single breath. “This heart of mine becomes blacker every breath. Affection makes me nauseous. I do not want this… But I will hurt my daughter tonight. I only make her cry.”
Sora’s gut cramped at the shift in tone, finding her wrist and applying pressure; it was hard to keep eye contact with those eyes that asked, “What happened to this family?”
“I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.”
Elder Caelia answered with a sobering note. “For her to feel so spiritually close to her daughter, and not raise suspicion at any level… Ms. Firefly sacrificed her own soul to possess Ember. When the possession ends, so too will her soul, and it cannot be recovered. Ember is sleeping silently as her mother uses and leaves her. Why?”
Sora went very still as Fen sniffed, tuning away.
Her grip tightened on her wrist until the ache anchored her, breath shallow, ears ringing as if the world had tilted half a degree off its axis.
“So you’re dying,” she said softly, not a word whispered among the crowd. Her eyes lifted, piecing together whatever her mind could piece together. “Were you protecting her?”
The flames around her tail flickered, uncertain, mirroring the tremor in her voice that she refused to let surface.
“Was it me? High Queen Titania put Ember close to me… Was it because of that?”
She swallowed, the words scraping on the way down.
“Why choose your daughter as your coffin? When she wakes up, you’ll be gone… That’s not what a mother is supposed to do,” she mumbled, tears forming in her eyes, heat running up her nose. “…My whole life, I wanted a mother. You’re taking that away from her. So…why?”
What hurt more was that not a single tear fell down Firefly’s cheeks, her sigh longing for something missed. “This is not what I desire. Life doesn’t care about intentions, only outcomes… I heard a terrible truth that broke me in a way I cannot explain.”
Firefly’s gaze didn’t waver from Sora’s, but something in it finally loosened—like a knot pulled too tight for too long.
“I did not do this to save her,” she said quietly. “At least, not how you are envisioning, you sweet child. Nor to damn her.”
Her flames dimmed further, no longer fierce, just…present. Like embers clinging to heat out of habit.
“I did it because I needed to speak to you,” she continued. “Not as a queen, nor authority. Not even as a mother, pretending she knows best.” A faint, humorless breath left her. “But as someone who has already lost everything that mattered before it was taken away.”
Sora’s fingers curled into her sleeve, knuckles white.
“There are truths,” Firefly mumbled, hugging herself. “Truths that cannot be spoken without breaking the listener. There are futures that rot if named too early within The Darkness. I saw one of them.” Her jaw tightened. “And I understood something awful.”
She hovered to the edge of the flames—not threatening, not pleading. Just close enough that Sora could feel the heat radiating off her borrowed body.
“I was not strong enough to carry it alone.” Her eyes flicked, briefly, toward the distant stands—toward a world still cheering, still unaware. “So I chose to carry it where it would hurt me most.”
Sora’s breath hitched. “You used her…to get to me.”
“Yes.” No hesitation. No flinch. Only steady, guilty eyes that said she’d lost her mind. “And in doing so, I finally understood every wound I ever gave her. Every expectation. Every silence. Every look that told her she was lacking.”
Her voice wavered, just barely. “I feel them now. From the inside. Her desire to make me proud.” The flames around her guttered. “I am not asking for forgiveness,” Firefly said. “I am not asking you to understand. I am only telling you why.”
She lifted her hand, pressing it flat against her chest—as if grounding herself against the unraveling magic.
“I could not leave this world without knowing someone else would remember us. Not the way we were judged. Not the way we failed.” Her eyes softened, painfully. “But the way we tried. We lesser beings, Founders and those like them, treat us as if we are worthless… Not in word, but deed… We are less than empty space. Invisible. Worthless.”
Sora swallowed hard. “What made you believe all that? I don’t look at you like that.”
Firefly smiled at that. Not kindly. Not sadly. Just honestly.
“The things we learn when outside our isolated hearts… But I am already gone, child.”
Her form began to thin at the edges, light bleeding through her like dawn through fog.
“I hate goodbyes,” she said gently, hand rising to touch her daughter’s face. “We only say I love you because that’s what we’re supposed to.” Her gaze locked onto Sora’s, unblinking. “I meant it every time… I meant it every time. So, what happened to me?”
Her voice cracked—not loudly. Just enough.
“I never said I’m perfect.” A breath. “I only ask two things of you… Fight for the useless, imperfect, and powerless empty space. Do not let us vanish… Do not let my daughter vanish… And pass on one thing to my daughter…”
The flames shuddered, then steadied.
“Don’t hate me.”
The fairy’s form flickered. Once. Twice.
Sora was crying, her flames dying with the failing soul.
Then Ember blinked—confusion flooded her features that had been too controlled for weeks—and she looked around the arena with the bewildered expression of someone waking from a dream they couldn’t remember.
“Sora? What… Why am I…” She pressed a hand to her forehead, wings fluttering erratically. “Did I drink too much honeydew? Are we in some sort of game?”
Ember’s voice hit the arena as a dropped glass—small, bright, and wrong in all the silence Firefly had left behind.
For half a heartbeat, no one moved. Not the crowd. Not Elder Caelia. Not even Fen.
Sora’s flames had guttered down to trembling little tongues around her fingers, and her chest was doing that awful thing where it forgot how to breathe unless she commanded it.
The Darkness… It wasn’t a plot to kill me. It was just a broken mother.
Ember blinked again, wings fluttering with unsteady, instinctive bursts. “Why is everyone looking at me like that?” Her gaze slid to the dryad Elder, then to Sora’s wet cheeks. “Sora… Why are you crying? Did I—did I mess up?”
Sora opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
Because what was she supposed to say?
Your mother wore you like a coat, said she loved you, and died in broken grief of being forgotten.
Elder Caelia seemed to find her spine in that moment, stepping forward with the reflexive authority of someone who had stopped disasters before they fully bloomed. Her voice rippled through the stadium, carrying that old, rooted resonance that made even teenagers sit straighter.
“We will be postponing the—”
A hand clapped once.
Not loud. Not magical.
Just…final.
The sound cut through the Elder’s announcement like a blade through silk, and the stadium’s hum shifted. The wards didn’t weaken—if anything, they tightened, pulling into a lattice.
Jin stood at the far edge of the arena, half in shadow, half in the arena’s glow. She hadn’t been on the platform a moment ago. Or maybe she had, and nobody’s eyes had been allowed to see it. Sora didn’t know what to think of the dragon anymore.
Her smile was small and terribly polite.
“Postponing?” Jin repeated, as if tasting the word and finding it bitter. Her gaze slid to Elder Caelia, then to the crowd, then—briefly—to Sora.
The way she looked at Sora wasn’t judgmental.
It was an appraisal.
“A charming instinct, given what just happened,” Jin said to the Elder, voice pitched so the stands could hear and making Ember even more nervous. “But Avalon does not postpone what it has already declared. Not for grief. Not for scandal. Not for,” her eyes flicked to the fairy’s trembling wings, “tragedy.”
A ripple ran through the students. Some leaned forward like this was the best drama they’d ever paid tuition for. Others shrank back, sensing they’d stepped too close to something real.
Elder Caelia’s bark-textured fingers curled. “Jin, I understand you are new, but we faculty must—”
“See the bigger picture,” Jin interrupted, still soft, though her gold-slitted eyes made the dryad shiver. “You can see it, Sora. Right? Your mother is watching.”
Sora’s throat tightened as she stole all attention. Her tears hadn’t stopped, but her mind worked through exactly what the dragon was implying.
The words hit Sora like ice water.
Sora’s gaze flicked up—past the stands, past the ward-lines, past the colossal branches of the Realm Tree. Noelia was magically scrying.
Mom…
Her chest seized with relief so sharp it hurt.
You can fix this. Noelia can… We’re Founders.
We can do anything.
Sora swallowed hard and forced her hands to stop shaking. Her flames—weak moments ago—caught again, thin at first, then steadier, gathering around her fingers like they were coming home. Jin’s smile deepened at that, as if she’d wanted that exact reaction.
“Sora?” Ember whispered again, like saying it a third time would make reality behave. “Why is everyone looking at me as if…I killed someone?”
“Good,” she murmured, then lifted her voice again. “Ember. Fly to Wendy. Nerida. Nilly. Sit. Breathe. I know you are confused. Soon, everything will make sense.”
Ember hovered uncertainly, face pale, eyes darting from Sora to the tight-lipped Elder to Fen’s too-still stance across the stage. The fox was now quiet with Jin on the stage.
Jin’s gaze snapped to Ember. The smile didn’t change, but the air did. “You are not in this competition. Sora is to fight Jin.”
Ember blinked. “They’re fighting? Oh. Umm… Okay?”
Ember’s wings fluttered in a frantic burst, but she obeyed the command. She shot backward, wobbling through the air, nearly clipping the barrier before she stabilized and drifted toward the front row.
Wendy rose halfway from her seat, eyes wide, hands out like she could catch the confused fairy if she fell. Nilly was already on her feet, tail-bells chiming, face torn between terror and furious readiness. Nerida’s lips were parted, turquoise eyes as wet as Sora’s.
Sora watched them for one heartbeat—one selfish heartbeat—like imprinting the image would keep Ember safe.
Then Jin clapped again. The stadium’s magic flared overhead, rewriting the narrative as if it had never been interrupted. And Jin’s gaze snapped to Fen.
“Fen,” she said, the name sharp enough that the Huli Jing went stiff as a board. “You want to beat Sora’s privileged face in. Right?”
Fen hadn’t moved in minutes. Not since Firefly’s last flicker.
Now, her ears twitched.
Her four tails shifted.
And she stroked her white one for comfort, was Sora’s guess—Jin had that effect when her focus was on you.
Still, Fen’s smile was thin, almost absent. Not smug. Not teasing.
Tense.
“Not the word I would use,” Fen murmured. “I am ready.”
Jin turned back to Sora.
“And you,” Jin said softly, sweetly, like she was offering Sora a gift. “The sooner this is over, the sooner you can do what you really want.”
Sora’s jaw clenched.
The grief in her chest didn’t vanish.
It hardened.
There was an answer. There had to be one.
“Fine,” Sora whispered, tears still hot on her cheeks. “Fine. I’ll win this fast.”
Jin’s eyes gleamed as Fen’s fingers twitched at the comment.
“That’s the spirit.”
Sora rose to stand across from Fen, seeing the insult on her face and not caring.
There are more important things in this world than your envy and pride.
The Elder, with stiff joints, moved to talk to the dragon. Not that Jin would wait for her protests.
“Begin!”
Fen moved.
Not forward.
Everywhere.
Three black tails fanned like blades, and the white one snapped behind her like a comet’s wake. Copies split off her body—not lazy illusions, not showy ones—predatory ones. Fens that didn’t just look real; they felt real. Each one carried weight, scent, heat, and intent.
“You hardly know how to use your gifts, and you think you can beat me? I’ve had to face life and death since the moment I was born, kit.”
Sora’s magic surged outward reflexively, and with just a desire, each clone flickered.
It really isn’t fair, Fen… But being born this way isn’t my fault!
Sora ducked as claws flashed where her face had been, rolled under a sweep that would’ve carved her spine, came up with blue flame spiraling around her wrist like a living ribbon. Fen’s tails snapped behind her—one, two, three—catching Sora’s desire-laced kick with fur and force, the impact jarring up her bones.
Fen hissed, pushed back, and landed lightly a few paces away, knees bent, grin widening.
“Better than I expected for a teenage human girl,” Fen said, voice bright with venom. “Now you look like someone worth killing. You know I can inflict as much pain as I want in this format?”
Sora’s stomach dropped.
Okay, why is her tails up her butt today? Is it because we stole her glory? She’s such a diva!
Sora flung foxfire, now a little worried her magic might actually kill Fen past the wards—an extra intentional guardrail wouldn’t hurt. The blaze tore through five copies, burning them into smoke and disappointment.
Yet, more took their place.
Fen’s laugh echoed from too many angles at once, but Sora didn’t chase it. She watched the huli jing’s weaving tails, magic coiling in ways she hadn’t seen before—not that that was surprising.
Every time they moved, the air stuttered, and something weird struck her senses about the white tail she’d placed a spell on.
Did she mess with my ward? Oh, quit going for my neck, Fen!
A copy feinted left. The real Fen hit from above with a savage grin.
At least pretend you don’t dream about strangling me every night.
Sora twisted, caught the strike on her forearms and tails, flames exploding outward on impact. She had to thank Eyia for all the training. The shockwave rippled through the barrier-lines and the stadium lights flickered.
Shoot! What is up with my magic right now… It isn’t strong enough to mess with Elder-tier magic.
Fen didn’t retreat.
She pressed.
Claws raked down Sora’s shoulder. Pain snapped bright. Blood warmed her skin as she winced, and Wendy shouted in anger from the stands.
Sora snarled, drove a knee up, felt it connect with ribs—real ribs—and Fen grunted, but her grin only sharpened in almost a scrappy way that was a little scary.
The white tail snapped forward like a whip.
Sora reacted without thinking—tail flaring, body turning, Founder-field surging—
And their tails brushed…
But that was impossible.
White fur to copper.
For half a breath, everything went silent.
No crowd.
No wards.
No Jin.
Just…contact.
Electric blue lightning detonated between them.
Fen’s scream shattered space like fractured glass.
Sora’s vision blew out to white—so bright it wasn’t light at all, but absence, like someone had erased the concept of shadow.
And in that white…something answered.
Not a sound.
A presence.
It arrived the way tide arrived to a shoreline that had forgotten it was ever allowed to be dry—slow and immediate at the same time, inevitable in a way that rearranged reality.
The world peeled back into the brightest light.
She found herself in a pure-white area with a reflective floor; the emptiness stretched on endlessly. She blinked, and seemingly from nowhere, several humanoid-shaped beings appeared; they held canes and had skin like stone.
Completely baffled, she asked, “W-Who are you? Where am I?”
Their response came from raised canes, pointing toward her. Bright red energy emitted from the sticks as her body locked up. She couldn’t breathe; a blaze burned inside her stomach, slowly filtering throughout her insides.
Her eyes bulged as a tsunami of blue flames surged over her from behind and engulfed everything she could see. The fire was warm and comforting; it didn’t burn, but her insides were still alight with coals, something black burning its way out of her.
The blue flames dwindled until only large pool-sized patches of fire raged across her vision. And a voice slid through her entire being.
Mature. Amused. Mirrored with mirth that could become execution at whim.
“You have not called in such a manner since we were children, Mia … No…”
It was a woman’s voice, the tone held such command that it deafened Sora’s mind; the sound alone carried an authority that Sora could not perceive.
“Fen’s illusion?” Sora breathed, finding it hard to even gasp as the fire inched up her chest, face turning red.
“Hmm…” The voice turned curious, pausing for a moment. “The Spiritual Plane, My Dear? Not an illusion.”
“I-I can’t breathe…” Unable to shift her feet, Sora’s stomach convulsed as she choked. “Why—am I—here?”
“You called me, of course,” the woman answered.
Sora’s wide eyes followed the figure as the woman descended into her vision, her throat going dry. The woman wasn’t very tall, maybe an inch more than herself, pure white hair glowing faintly with the surroundings.
Three thin black marks showed on each side of her smooth cheeks that had the appearance of whiskers, yet almost seemed painted on. Sora couldn’t pull her eyes away from the nine long white tails that weaved behind the fox woman in mesmerizing patterns.
“Aunt Inari…”
The words came with fire as the beautiful—no, gorgeous beyond description—woman closed the distance to take her gently under the chin, staring into her emerald irises to her very core. The woman’s lips lifted questioningly.
“Oh, my… What has my baby sister done now?”
“I—”
The fox goddess’ slim finger pressed against her lips with a gentle shush.
“Be not afraid.” Her finger lingered a heartbeat. “Auntie is here.”
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