Gwyn hastily shepherded them out of the firing range, whisking across the hallway and narrowly dodging other bewildered people wandering about the Library, Alice doing her best to keep pace as she was led ahead, like an overexcited puppy tugging their owner along by the leash.

  Their stampeding wove past door after door, the pair gncing at room after room, until Gwyn finally identified what she had been looking for, yet another unremarkable entrance marked off as a practice chamber, the taller girl wasting no time before leading them both inside.

  Whereas the previous room had been almost entirely barren and uninteresting, this circur chamber’s walls were lined with countless articles, dresses and skirts and full body suits and every manner of other piece of clothing Alice could think of hanging there in every manner of color, the massive array ringing the outer area of the room while the inner section merely featured a singur raised ptform.

  “Ok, l-let’s get started!~”

  “…were you teaching me to transform or updating my wardrobe…?”

  “T-This is w-where you learn that!, Or, i-it’s where I did, at least, ehe…”

  Alice idly walked along the edge of the room, running a hand over the hanging clothes, pulling out a particurly fluffy dress, pastel blue and white, the material so wonderfully light it almost felt like holding air.

  “Ok, then the clothes are for… what, exactly?”

  “W-Well, the way it was expined to me is that y-you need to have a strong mental image of what you want to t-transform to… so the Library keeps this whole stock of p-practice outfits to help with it…!~”

  “Aha, allowing one to physically register their preferred appearance to forcibly pre-align it to their internal magical network, thereby effectively storing it within the user’s own muscle memory… a very straightforward method to be sure, but I’m impressed by the simple efficiency of it.”

  “Exactly…! I-It makes a lot more sense hearing you expin it, e-ehe…”

  “Well, the underlying principles are fairly basic at least, but I cannot cim to know the full extent of the process. I have never been a part of one of these transformations before, after all.”

  “So I’m here to… py dress-up. How exactly is any of this shit supposed to be magical anyways?”

  “Oh, w-well, it’s less the outfit itself, a-and more the… they d-described it as like… your ‘i-ideal form’ makes it easier to channel your magic, I think?”

  “Uh huh… so all the frills and shit make you better at magic, is that it?”

  “N-Not specifically, but if you liked the frills and felt c-comfortable in them, then they should, yeah! I-It’s about being comfortable a-and expressing something in yourself!”

  Still perusing the unending options hanging before her, Alice peered at more of the options, pulling out a tight-fitting leotard made of some shiny material, her expression completely indescribable.

  “…not sure I wanna express whatever it is some of these are going for in public…”

  “Oh, well… m-maybe I can help! What are you u-usually comfortable in, or I guess, w-what kind of stuff would you be comfortable in?”

  “Uuuhhh…”

  She peered down at her current attire, her blue jacket hanging off her thin frame like she was a coat hanger, the rest of her outfit nothing more than just a nondescript tank top and thick beige pants, the attire making her look more like a construction worker fresh off her shift than a magical girl.

  “…stuff that’s easy to move around in, I guess? I dunno, can’t this just be fine? I already fought in it fine before.”

  “I-It’s, um… it’s not exactly very magical feeling, b-but… hmm, maybe we can find s-something that fits you just as well? If it’s just ‘easy to move in’, t-then…”

  Gwyn was already moving, hands diving in and out of the racks of miscelneous outfit pieces, looking over everything on offer with a clearly practiced eye as she ruffled through everything in front of her.

  “This one’s… n-no, not that… maybe… oh, d-definitely not… unless… with that… mmm… c-could try this… oooh, y-yeah, and then…”

  More and more items were pulled out and piled into the other woman’s arms, her mountain of clothes swelling out of control as she rapidly lost herself in thought.

  Eventually, she snapped out of the trance she’d entered, her face a bit flushed as she realized how much she’d gathered up, quickly putting a few of the articles back before rushing over to Alice’s end of the room.

  “O-Okay, how’s all this look? I tried getting less d-dressy stuff that seemed like it’d be pretty e-easy to move around, so h-hopefully it’s a start!”

  She shoved the considerably shrunken pile of clothes out towards her, the smaller girl taking them one by one, looking it all over as her self-appointed personal stylist awaited with bated breath.

  A sleeveless bodysuit that stretched from neck to thighs, along with a shawl and skirt to cover overtop of it, a pair of long gloves and tall boots offered alongside it all, rge white bows and matching frill lining along the monochrome outfit.

  “W-Well? Wanna t-try it on and see if it works…?”

  “It’s, uh… well, I guess it’d be pretty easy to move in, yeah… just feels a bit, er…”

  “…n-no good, then?”

  “Oh, um, no no, it’s… it’s good, yeah, just… it’s just kinda… a bit…”

  The longer Alice tried to imagine herself wearing it all together in public, the more her entire body shifted red, feeling herself instinctively curling up into the comfort of her baggy clothing as the bodysuit hung like a lead weight in her hands.

  “…oh, r-right, that’s fair, I hadn’t… I-I’ll try something less… o-open!”

  Gwyn hastily took back the entirety of the outfit as Alice tried not to think too hard about the prospective uniform clinging to her almost entirely featureless body.

  The duo spent a long, long while working though possible outfits, Gwyn frantically searching for anything she could offer her, Alice doing her best to not crush the poor girl’s excitement every time she returned with another pile of options, the two of them slowly and steadily realizing that, perhaps, Alice was not much of a fashionista after all.

  “Hmmm… o-okay, maybe I’m focusing too much on how you look now…? I mean, y-you usually get… a little r-ripped up when you fight, right? S-So maybe we should try stuff that… I dunno, d-doesn’t close your limbs in so much?”

  “Oh, right. I guess something that’s not gonna get shredded any time I fuck up my arms again would be nice, yeah?”

  “U-Um… I didn’t get to see much of it, but… h-how long did you practice that… arm thing from before, a-anyways?”

  “Arm thing…? Oh, the sword? I kinda just… dunno, free-balled it, I guess? Remembered picking up one of those fucking bug’s arms and getting it punched through me a couple times, so I just… thought about that?”

  Gwyn looked on with sparkling eyes as Alice provided a half-hearted expnation, her attention rapidly turning away from their outfit hunting as she honed in on her words.

  “So you just… r-remembered it? And that was enough t-to do it first try?”

  “I mean, the thing was clumsy as shit and felt like strapping a car to my arm, it wasn’t exactly a great idea to begin with… but I guess just tried to remember it real hard, yeah. Is that not how y’all usually learn this stuff? That body memory shit and whatnot?”

  “Well… t-they only ever really taught me the very basics… I figured out how to handle t-transforming mostly on my own, b-but past that, all I can do is… throw rocks, ehe…”

  She managed to force a smile onto her lips, her mostly unsuccessful previous training clearly weighing on her mind constantly.

  “Well, sounds to me like you had some dogshit teachers before.”

  “They were… t-they did their jobs fine, it’s just that I was--”

  “Just that you were getting taught wrong from the start, yeah? I ain’t gonna cim I understand most of this magic shit after I only just started here, but even Eyepatch realized they weren’t teaching you the stuff you’re supposed to be good at to begin with, yeah?”

  “Eye-- I have a name, you know…!”

  “Yeah yeah, and it’s long and hard to remember, whatever. Look, point I was trying to make is just…”

  Alice cpped a hand onto Gwyn’s shoulder, causing the girl to jump slightly, having already started letting her thoughts wander off once more as she was snapped back to the present.

  “I’ll make you a deal, yeah? You help me figure out all this… dress-up shit in a way that doesn’t make me wanna die, and I’ll see if I can’t give you a little better practice than those sanctimonious fucks running this pce. Deal?”

  “W-Wait, you wanna… help me train?”

  “I mean, not like I couldn’t use it myself anyways. It’d be nice to try out stretching my muscles while someone isn’t trying to rip them out of me, heh.”

  Gwyn’s eyes seemed to tear up just slightly, being slowly hoisted up out of her earlier mencholy by her friend’s earnest offer, nodding excitedly as she tried to find her words once more.

  “I-I… yeah, yeah I’d r-really like that, actually. But y-you’re sure? I mean, I-I dunno if what you do is even compatible to how my magic works, a-and it might end up just being a waste of--”

  The hand cpped onto her shoulder raised up to smack gently against the side of her head, ruffling her hair and cutting her off before she could muster up any further excuses.

  “Ok, first rule if I’m gonna help you here? No constantly kicking your own ass like that, or I’m gonna have to keep beating some self-confidence into that thick fucking skull of yours, yeah?”

  “Um… y-yes, ma’am, I-I’ll do my best!”

  Alice fshed her a big, toothy grin, spping her back encouragingly, Gwyn warming up considerably as she felt old tension in her gut finally starting to loosen.

  “S-So… right, I’ll find something that should f-fit better…!”

  “Nah, let’s hold off on the costumes for today, we’ll be here all day if we keep at it… how about the like, actual transforming bit? The little book posing thingamajig you were doing for it?”

  “…oh, s-sure! That’s a-always been the easiest part of it, ehe.”

  Gwyn quickly returned her test batch of clothing to the racks before rushing towards the raised ptform in the room’s center, stepping atop it and pulling her Focus free from a pocket, rolling it in her hands a bit.

  “Okay, first, y-you’ve got yours with you, right?”

  “Oh, that thing, right. Yeah it’s… it’s uh… right, I had it somewhere…”

  Alice dug through her pockets for a long while, miscelneous items spilling out until she eventually located her own hand-me-down Focus, holding it out triumphantly as she finally managed to pull it free once more.

  “Right, knew I remembered to bring it!”

  “Okay, g-good! Next, you wanna focus as much of your magic into it as you can… i-it should feel like it’s open and w-waiting for you to reach out to it…”

  Gwyn closed her eyes as she held her own tiny tome up, holding it between both palms as she cleared her mind, Alice stepping down closer to the ptform near her before following suit, breathing deep and slow as she tried to focus on it.

  She’d tried the whole magical exertion thing plenty of times by now, making sure she was limiting how hard she pushed into it for fear of shattering it like the seals she’d encountered in her first Library visit.

  As the flow of energy slowly trickled out to the tips of her fingers, she could feel the Focus in her hands trembling, stirring like it was coming back to life, hungrily reaching out to start pulling the pooled energy out from her outstretched hands as it consumed the food ravenously, voraciously, the inconspicuous little book only feeling emptier in her hands as she tried to control the wildly oscilting flow of magic she’d begun to offer it.

  Her head started feeling lighter, the girl stumbling backwards a step, feeling like she was suddenly fighting against something trying to consume her whole, feeling Sclera’s presence even starting to rush in to attempt to take control of the internalized tug of war.

  “Is it… guh, is it supposed to put up a fucking fight like this…?!”

  “Then you just… h-hmm? N-No it should just… Alice?!”

  Gwyn opened her eyes again quizzically, finding her companion struggling to stay standing, the muscles in her arms trembling unnaturally as the magic inside of her was pulled back and forth, the Focus in her hands writhing like a caged animal as it fshed and sparked from the energy it was taking from her.

  “Damnable thing…! Alice, release it already!”

  “Trying to… little fucker’s persistent, nngh!”

  She tried all she could to force it back and out of her, invisible roots stuck into her hands as it resisted being discarded, demanding still further sustenance from the corpse that had brandished it, feeling her blood turn to ice in her veins as it forced itself deeper and deeper into her squirming limbs.

  “Out… of my… goddamn… head…!!”

  Alice grunted, summoning up as much energy into her upper arms as she could muster, forcing it forth all at once as she once more shotgunned energy though her limbs and out from her hands, the sheer impact of the sudden release finally enough to dislodge the Focus from her tightly-wound grip, the small book shooting back and away across the room, sliding across the floor before coming to a stop against the far wall.

  As it was ripped off of her, Alice stumbled back in the opposite direction, tripping over the raised edge of the room’s outer ring and falling back against it, trying to catch her breath again as she sat there.

  “Alice, a-are you okay?! W-W-What happened?!”

  Gwyn rushed over to her side, helping her sit up and checking over her from head to toe, finding her only visible injury to be the shredded skin of both her hands, already pulling itself back together again even as she watched.

  “I… shit, they always that hungry? I wasn’t expecting it to need… that much energy, just for that…”

  “No, i-it’s… the whole process doesn’t take m-much energy at all, really. At least, I-I’ve never needed to put that much into it…”

  “…Gwyn, would it be alright if we could try using your Focus briefly?”

  “Hell no, I don’t need to get sucked dry again already, gimme a break…”

  “If you’ll humor me for but a moment? I’m sure I can handle breaking your fingers if it starts trying anything of that nature. I’m simply curious, is all.”

  “O-Oh, um… sure, here you go…”

  She carefully pced her own Focus into Alice’s mostly-healed hand, Sclera taking control of the limb and raising it up slightly as their fingers closed around it.

  Alice braced herself as she felt the sensation begin again, her energy being gathered into her hands around the book… only to feel it begin to trickle into the Focus slowly, the tome making no efforts to take from her, merely accepting what was freely supplied to it.

  “…the hell did you do?”

  “Hmm… I had assumed that was somewhat of an unnatural reaction, but having my hypothesis proven immediately correct is both worrying and reassuring.”

  Alice looked over at the borrowed Focus lying on the floor, completely nondescript and unassuming, the tiny little thing carrying not a trace of how it had come at her like a wild tiger as soon as she opened herself to it.

  “…I believe I understand now why Lonnie was so keen on having it removed from her home.”

  “Why the fuck is that old hag trying to kill me?! She had enough damn chances to do it already, so why the hell--”

  “I doubt this was some manner of intentional attempt on your life. If it had been, she could have simply slipped it into your hand during any of the numerous times you have been unable to move after she rescued you.”

  “I… sure, I guess. So why the fuck didn’t she at least warn me about it?”

  “An excellent question, and one which I myself am very curious about as well.”

  “A-Are you both…?”

  “Hmm? Oh, yes, I apologize for startling you. Everything seems to have already stabilized now, so I believe the two of us are both stable.”

  “…right, yeah, I’m good. Arms hurt like shit, but I’m good.”

  Alice did her best to jump back up to her feet, faltering a bit as the wind was still knocked out of her, her bance shaky as Gwyn quickly braced against her side.

  “Are you s-sure? I… you shouldn’t f-force yourself if you aren’t.”

  “Nah, really, I promise I’m fine already. Don’t think either of us has got a practice session left in us after that though, heh.”

  “T-That’s okay, you don’t need to-- ow!”

  Alice leaned up as Gwyn pressed in against her, bonking her skull into the taller girl’s softly, snorting as Gwyn rubbed at her struck temple before straightening her posture once more and standing upright.

  “I am getting a 1-on-1 with you sometime though, I already promised and everything, yeah? Just, uh… maybe after I go a day without something trying to kill me, maybe.”

  Gwyn started to mutter out another understanding apology before silencing herself before it even exited her mouth, instead nodding and smiling back down at her.

  “…I’d… really like that.”

  Her legs stable enough again to stand back on her own, Alice wandered across the room, cautiously picking up the discarded Focus she’d forcibly torn away from herself, the specks of her own blood already starting to fade into the material as she looked over it, quickly pocketing the book once more before looking back at Gwyn once more.

  “Great, it’s a date then!”

  “…a… i-it’s a…?! Wait, w-wait what do you mean it’s a--”

  As Gwyn felt too many conflicting emotions struggling for attention inside of her at once, Alice had already jogged her way over to the door, smiling back at her friend with a wave before heading out, her feet moving faster than she meant as she started her journey right back to the home of Lonnie Ga.