Capítulo 110: 25.4 CYOA
Dinner turned out to be a rather lighthearted affair, despite the nuclear bomb that was dropped and the reveal of Ezraphel's true nature as an inhuman interdimensional traveler cohabitating with her younger brother. The fact that she chose to stay in her inhuman form should have made for at least a bit of awkwardness, but Natalie just couldn't find it in herself to pay attention to that.
Actually, she didn't want to think about any of that right now; too many things happened at once, and she wanted to not waste her attention dwelling on them. Besides, thinking about stressful topics makes her lose her appetite, and the last thing she wanted was to waste the delicious meal she had prepared.
It helped that Ezraphel indulged Natalie in some playful teasing at Stanley's expense by regaling her with the retelling of some early moments in their relationship that he omitted for one reason or another. Really, she had no idea why he wouldn't tell her that his first day with Ezraphel involved him running away to camp out in his room, then returning strapped with some airsoft guns to threaten her with.
The look on Natalie's face conveyed to him that she was never going to let him live this down.
It didn't take long into Ezraphel and Natalie's discussion before Stanley decided he was done being the proverbial punching bag for the two women and clapped back with embarrassing stories of his own about Ezraphel. The monster woman now found herself the recipient of a few raised eyebrows that made her pale skin turn almost as red as a tomato. Things didn't go that well when it came to Natalie, however, as the woman had skin thicker than his and more ammunition as the older sibling.
Despite fighting an uphill battle the entire time, Stanley gave as good as he got. Eventually, the tone did shift from exposing embarrassing moments to just retelling stories. None of them really knew when it changed, but no one tried to stop it since the overall atmosphere was nice. They managed to turn a roasting session at each other's expense into something much more productive, and she was all for it.
Throughout the conversation, Natalie got to witness her brother at his most relaxed and carefree. It turns out he had a few positive things to say about both women and could make jokes about the situation without it being at their expense. He was being a big ol' softy, but she didn't call him out on it. They were having a good time, and most importantly, Stanley seemed genuinely happy. She knew this because he no longer kept up his resting bitch-face façade.
She's seen him get like this a few times over the course of her two-week stay. The first time she witnessed it, it gave her pause. As someone who grew up with and helped raise him, Natalie didn't like a lot of things about Stanley's lifestyle choices. No one wanted to see their younger sibling become a closed-off shut-in with a grumpy attitude and no social life. In Natalie's opinion, one of the worst things to happen to Stanley was the loss of his optimism.
Speaking of Stanley, after a lull in the conversation, he suddenly spoke up, earning looks from both women.
"I'll get the dishes."
"Are you feeling alright, Stan?" Natalie questioned.
He frowned "what's that supposed to mean?"
"You never do any of the chores."
Ezraphel also nodded "it is quite suspicious, Stanley."
Stanley looked between the two of them with a deadpan expression before rolling his eyes. "Alright, you got me. I was using the dishes as an excuse to give you two some privacy so Ez can explain how she's going to solve your cancer problem."
"You mean turning me into a Mamono?"
"She already told you," he muttered.
"Yeah."
At her reply, his lips pursed, "are you okay with that?"
"I mean, it's either that or dying," she said, shaking her head with a wry smile "not really much of a choice there."
Stanley looked decidedly uncomfortable "we really did try to find another way."
"I bet," Natalie muttered, though it was more absentminded than anything.
She too looked uncomfortable, and while she wanted to infer more about the process of elimination they went through before arriving at their decision, she hesitated. And with her hesitance came a brief stretch of awkward silence until...
*CLAP*
The siblings were jolted by the sudden loudness and turned to the Lilim while belatedly realizing that the table was cleared of its contents. Now that Ezraphel had both their attention, she stood up, and her height has never been more noticeable than it was now as she loomed over them. Combined with the aesthetics of her true form and the intimidation factor is ramped up, even if she didn't mean it to.
"None of that now," the Lilim chastised lightly, "we will have further discussions on how to proceed in the living room." Her gaze went to Stanley, "all of us."
Stanley grumbled something but acquiesced by heading to the living room. Natalie followed suit, with Ezraphel bringing up the rear. Natalie took a seat on the single-seater couch while the couple sat on the three-seater, with Ezraphel making sure to stick close to Stanley. Natalie is pretty sure she would have sat on his lap if not for the seriousness of the discussion.
Speaking of which...
"So, how is this going to go down?" She asked, feeling a thrill of jitteriness that she attempted to cover with a smile, "Are you going to use your magic to turn me into a sexy monster girl like you?"
"Ugh." Stanley pinched the bridge of his nose with a groan.
"It's not quite so simple, I'm afraid," Ezraphel informed. "Due to the nature of your specific illness, your options are rather limited."
Natalie blinked. "I have options?"
"Of course, there are many Mamono, and I have the ability to convert you into most of them. Although with the illness affecting your blood, you will still find yourself in a similar position as you are right now."
"Huh, so you guys aren't immune to cancer then?"
Ezraphel made a so-so gesture "Mamono generally don't contract human illnesses for the most part. Should we do, it is believed that the symptoms of the illness will be severely diminished especially if the Mamono in question is married."
"How diminished are we talking?"
"Depending on circumstance it can range from a cumbersome annoyance to barely an inconvenience."
"I see.."
"Keep in mind that I am not a medical professional" Ezraphel informed interrupted, "I am unsure of whether there are exceptions to this. Though what I can be certain of is that there is a specific type of Mamono for which all mortal illnesses will become a non-factor as I've mentioned."
"What type is that?"
"The undead type."
Ezraphel's words made Natalie recoiled in her seat, "undead, as in zombies?"
"Zombies are a rather common type of undead but far from the only one."
"Look at the wiki," Stanley informed me, "you should know what you're in for anyway."
"What'll I be in for?" Natalie questioned her as if she never even thought to ask.
"Generally speaking, there are certain personal and lifestyle changes to be expected in becoming a Mamono."
"I can imagine," Natalie muttered while giving Ezraphel a once-over.
It made Ezraphel add "appearances aside, of course."
Natalie pursed her lips "are you talking about the horniness?"
"…among other things."
"It's all in the wiki," Stanley reiterated, resting his elbow on the armrest and his fist on his cheek while decidedly not looking at his sister.
"Please Stanley I'd rather explain it to her."
Even as she says this, Natalie went ahead to browse the MGE wiki, specifically the undead category.
'She wasn't kidding about there being more.'
A full list of Mamono names, including Zombies and…
"Wait, can you turn me into a ghost?"
"Hell no!" Stanley snapped.
"I can," Ezraphel answered in a measured tone.
"You're not becoming a ghost, Nat."
Natalie rolled her eyes "I wasn't planning on it; I was just curious."
Considering this was going to define her future from here on out, Natalie felt obligated to do her due diligence and so went through the entire list. For obvious reasons, however, she inferred on Ezraphel's knowledge to extrapolate on the information provided in the wiki. A wiki that reads like it was written by a terminally online pervert weirdo with an eclectic set of fetishes. The worst part is that, according to Ezraphel, while the wiki had several problems with generalization it didn't necessarily get things wrong. To the contrary it got enough right to be, for all intents and purposes, accurate for the most part.
Natalie knew that it was either this or death, but for fuck's sake! Her dignity as a woman wasn't worth the trade-off for some of this shit. Her only saving grace is that the information presented is based on an actual in-lore encyclopedia written by a literal wandering scholar. According to her brother's speculation, that means it is subject to biases (no matter what the author says otherwise) and might actually have been co-opted by into becoming one big propaganda piece.
Ezraphel tentatively supported this claim, citing the hyper-focus on sexualizing Mamono and reinforcing conservative family values oddly enough. It also glosses over or makes light of the negative aspects of each Mamono or straight up gas lights readers into believing said negative traits to be to their benefit. In the end, it's an encyclopedia, so of course it wouldn't have an in-depth analysis of each individual Mamono. That's where Ezraphel came in, and frankly, she was the saving grace of this entire venture.
Her explanations managed to patch the holes left by the wiki's information as well as give her a better picture of Mamono themselves. It turns out there are layers to them outside of a generalized/targeted description from an encyclopedia. With the relevant information at hand, she managed to narrow down her options to-
"Jesus tap-dancing Christ, Nat, just pick Wight already!" Stanley suddenly exclaimed, earning a glare from Natalie.
Ezraphel gave a disapproving look "Stanley, we shouldn't pressure her."
"Oh, please, we all know what the smart choice is here," he said, looking at his sister "none of the Ghost types are viable for obvious reasons, and most of the rest either have a debilitating weakness or a too-weird quirk that wouldn't be worth it. A Wight is literally the only Mamono that'll have the least impact on your lifestyle."
As much as she hated to admit it, he had a point. Of all the Mamonos listed, she narrowed her choices down to Pharaoh, Ghoul, Vampire, Lich, and Wight. Ezraphel couldn't turn her into a Pharaoh because they are technically servants of the Sun God, and she can't convert humans into Mamono, specifically created through divine means. Ghouls had an oral fixation quirk that Natalie did not want to deal with. As for Vampires, the irony of having a blood disease and becoming a blood sucking fiend was not lost on her, but she liked to actually enjoy daytime without feeling like she still had leukemia.
In the end, it all came down to the Lich or the Wight. As Stanley mentioned, becoming a Wight would have the lowest impact on her current lifestyle. Contrary to what the encyclopedia dictates, Wights didn't necessarily have any inherent personality quirks. Ezraphel has met Wights who weren't pretentious highborns or acted like them, and from what Natalie was told, they seem like well-adjusted people. Post transformation, all she'd really need was a cosmetic spell to keep up her human appearance, and barring the typical Mamono lewdness, she would virtually be the same person.
Compared to that, what did Lich offer?
And as if answering both that and Stanley's words, Natalie said, "yeah, but if I become a Lich, I can do magic."
"Yeah and you'd have the emotional range of a baked potato."
"What do you mean?"
"Liches have magically suppressed emotions that can only be seen through by their husband... or something."
Natalie blinked, 'what?' She looked to Ezraphel.
For her part, Ezraphel went on to explain, "Liches have the ability to separate their soul from their body and store it in a vessel called a 'phylactery.' The ritual allows them to retain their higher thought process and make critical analyses even in the throes of intense, all-consuming pleasure."
She did remember reading about that on the wiki, but "it didn't say anything about suppressed emotions."
"A side effect of the soul transference process," Ezraphel informed, "though for them it's a deliberate choice given how obsessed they are with magical research, analysis, and data collection. They need to have a calm personality and a clear head at all times, even during sex."
"Oh," Natalie frowned as she thought about it "so technically, if I want to keep my emotions the way they are, all I have to do is not port my soul into a phylactery."
"That is correct."
Natalie grinned and turned to her brother, whose eyes were glued to the phone screen, yes shifting as he read what she assumed to be Lich's biography. Eventually, he clicked his tongue in aggravation and glared at her.
In response, she merely raised an eyebrow "what? No rebuttal?"
In response Stanley glared "you can say you won't put your soul in a phylactery, but that means you won't practice sex magic, which is fucking impossible because, let me tell you, as a Mamono, you're going to be naturally drawn to doing that shit. I don't know if Ezraphel has seen a case of a normal person becoming a Lich, so you might not be obsessed with magic from the jump to go that far, but I'm sure it'll make for one of those addictive hobbies you lose yourself in, and with you being undead, I'm betting one day you'll realize you missed a couple days and your sleep cycle is all fucked up."
"Speaking from experience?" Natalie couldn't help but quip, though it was obviously a rhetorical question.
Natalie knew damn well the answer to that already. Not that Stanley took the bait showing how serious he is right now.
"There's no way you're going to avoid researching sex magic as a Mamono. It's a fucking slippery slope, and Liches have a tendency to use their bodies as 'research material' so you'll just end up doing the soul transfer at some point anyway."
Natalie opened her mouth to refute his claim because, as a self-admitted pessimist, of course he would look at it with the worst-case scenario in mind. Yet whatever refute she had petered out in the face of his surety. Then it dawned on her that Natalie really didn't know what she was talking about. She could make a lot of claims with surety in the moment, but in the end, she wouldn't know if she could walk the walk until after her transformation.
"What are the chances of that happening?" Natalie questioned.
Ezraphel, who had been pouting before, blinked at being put on the spot before adopting a thoughtful expression.
Then she answered, "I've never known a Lich to not be entrenched in some manner of magical research to the point of obsession or close enough to one."
Her words made Natalie cringe "in that case, I think I'll pass on becoming Lich then. Magic ain't worth that mess."
Her words elicited two responses from the couple. The tension seemed to lessen around Stanley, while Ezraphel gave her a rather curious look.
It caused Natalie to ask "why are you looking at me like that?"
"Nothing, I just expected you to be more...resolute in being able to wield magic."
"I mean, the only reason why I even mentioned it was because I thought it would make for a cool hobby" she informed the other woman "it's not like I'm out here trying to become a witch or whatever."
She heard Stanley mutter something along the lines of "thank fucking God" but chose to ignore him.
"A hobby?" Ezraphel repeated.
"You know, like a cool thing everyone's heard about at one point but don't learn it because of reasons?"
"You truly are Stanley's sister."
"I don't know whether I should be offended by that."
"It is a compliment, for he too does not care for power for power's sake."
Natalie raised a brow as she regarded him "really? You took a pass on magic?"
Stanley's response is immediate, "hell no! I'm learning that shit" then he added "and its not for the reason why you think."
'So it not because you're weeb nerd?'
Interesting and from the side eye glance he gave Ezraphel she could tell there's a story there.
'Gonna pester him about that later.'
For now she brought her attention back to Ezraphel who spoke "regardless, I am fortunate to inform you that you will still be able to learn magic even as a Wight."
"Really?"
"Yes, they may not be renowned for it, but Wights do have an aptitude for the arcane and even possess magical abilities inherent to them."
"Eh, I might just pass on that if it's going to become a hassle."
If Natalie were being honest, had her life not been on the line and if death wasn't the only other option, she would have passed on becoming a Mamono altogether. It seemed like too much of a bother, and the whole being subservient to and/or dependent on men and their semen thing is a huge turn-off.
All the other perks, such as the 'stat boosts', according to her brother, like being physically stronger, faster, and virtually immune to all human diseases, didn't matter to her. Even immortality didn't necessarily appeal to her much. Sure Natalie wanted to live a long life but in the constraints of a normal human. More than that Natalie wanted to live her best life, especially now that she was being granted a literal second chance, and she couldn't do that while being borderline obsessed with sex and magic.
With sex, she was sometimes down for a good time with a cute guy but would never want to be a nympho. She would also probably want to find the right guy to start a family with at some point, but that's still far off in the future. As for magic, she couldn't even envision herself taking it seriously, let alone becoming obsessed with it to the point of porting her soul to another vessel so she could experiment on herself.
That reminds her that with everything they've been talking about, it nearly escaped Natalie, just how absurd the conversation has gotten. Like, there are actual people out there who are so obsessed with something that they would literally mess with their souls. That feels like a line that should never be crossed and just felt all kinds of wrong to her sensibilities.
"Oh" Ezraphel's sudden shift in tone brought her out of her thoughts "you don't want to learn magic anymore?"
"No, I'd still be interested."
If for nothing else than the novelty of it.
"I just don't want to do something I'll regret you know."
"You won't; I will make sure of it," Lilim said resolutely.
What can Natalie say to that except "cool…cool-cool-cool."
Just then Stanley stood up and began to walk away, "whelp, have fun with that. I'm out."
"What? You're just leaving?"
"Sorry if I don't want to see my sister turn into a hentai monster girl."
"You call me that after this, and I'll magic blast your ass across the walls."
In response, he flipped her off over the shoulder.
Ignoring her brother for the time being, Natalie turned to Ezraphel and asked, "now what?"
"It would be for the best if you were unconscious for what comes next."
"Eh?"
As Natalie looked on questioningly, her gaze became drawn to her deep red eyes, which were now glowing.
"Sleep."
The sound of Ezraphel's voice echoed in her mind, creating a wave of lethargy that washed over her body.
'Not again.'
For the second time that day, Natalie fainted.
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