The Opulent Quarrel - Round One: Mademoiselle Primfel's

Damse would probably be very disoriented by now if she weren't so angry.

It was bad enough running across Mightius yet again. Even Manelaus had more or less given up on chasing her down after Troit, but Mightius just kept coming back for more. And he never grew less irritating.

But a run-in with Mightius was just an ordinary bad day. Being summoned before a god and cursed was another matter entirely. It was a relief to hear that all she had to do were some challenges intended for Mightius; if that musclehead could handle them, how hard could they be for her?

And then Damse was summoned before another god, one she had never heard of. Frankly, if she had, she would have sought him out sooner. He talked just like all the other men she had known, and dared to suggest that she somehow wasn't suited for this battle.

The most annoying thing was that Narra's curse held her back from even trying to resist whatever the Sophisticate had done to her. She was in a story now, a story where she was a "combatant", and apparently that meant you weren't allowed to punch the obnoxious host in the face.

Between that, and the utterly insulting uniform she was apparently expected to wear, Damse was far too upset to think about little things like how exactly the battle and the seven labors fit together.

She wanted nothing more than to tear this stupid uniform apart, other than perhaps tearing the stupid uniform apart after strangling the Sophisticate with it.

But as she held it, she found her hands refused to. It was the same feeling when she had tried to fight off the paralysis.

Tearing apart the uniform was not in the Story. And that meant Damse was stuck with it.

Well, fine. She'd play along with Narra's game, for now. She put the uniform on over her chiton, and glanced at the map to see where exactly she was supposed to go.

***

"A girl's school, hmm?" Pran mused, glancing over the words as they appeared in the book. "An intriguing site for the first of Damse's labors. Now, if we're just starting off, I think we want something that will fit in... let me see."

He flipped through the book, and found a promising passage.

Pigmale the Sculptor had grown weary of the ways of women, and so he devoted himself to his art. For seven days and seven nights, he did nothing but work on his masterpiece, a statue of immense beauty, representing what women should be.

Indeed, the statue was so beautiful that Pigmale fell in love with her, and wished she could be real. So he prayed to the gods with all his heart, and when he returned to his studio that night, the statue moved.

He called her Gally, and she was perfect in every way. She loved Pigmale more than all the world, and cleaned the house for him, and made him sandwiches whenever he asked, and agreed with his every word.

Then, one day, Pigmale caught a glimpse of Damse the Beautiful, and realized she was even more beautiful than Gally. Forgetting every curse he had uttered against women, he rushed out and asked for Damse's hand.

She gave it to him, in the shape of a fist.

Gally saw all this, and at once realized that Damse was to blame for tempting her man. She tended to Pigmale's wounds, and swore that one day Damse would pay for all that she had done.

Pran smiled, and pulled out his pen.

And then one day, Gally found an invitation to Madameoiselle Primfel's Academie sitting in the kitchen. As she picked it up, she found her surroundings changing around her...

***

The map was confusing. Damse was fairly sure she wasn't a Mechanoid, whatever those were, and she probably wasn't a Colossus either. But why were there separate dorms for Humans, Humanoids, Demi-Humans, and Humanlikes? What was even the difference?

Still, the last thing Damse was going to do was let this stupid story go off without a hitch. She might not be able to fight her way out of this uniform, but she could at least delay whatever was about to happen by not going straight to the Human dorm she was obviously supposed to head to.

She followed the route to the Colossus dorm. None of the other girls she saw paid much attention to her, probably because they were about twice her height on average.

She stepped up to the front desk and waited for the black dragon behind it to notice her. Hopefully, that would take a while.

She wasn't that fortunate.

"Young lady, I believe you may be at the wrong dormitory," said the dragon, in a condescending tone of voice that reminded Damse of her mother. "May I see your documents?"

Damse shrugged, and handed the map over.

"Hmm, now let me see... you appear human, but you're not marked for the Human dorm... nor Humanoids, Demi-Humans, Humanlikes, or Lycanthropes... how strange."

"Maybe I'm at the wrong place entirely," Damse said, turning to leave.

"Oh, wait! I see it now. You're in the VIP dorm, not the regular human one. I am terribly sorry no one came to guide you yet, I shall do it myself, and then I shall let Madameoiselle Primfel know of this oversight at once."

"You don't have to," Damse began to say, but it was already too late. The dragon had grabbed her by the arm, pulled her through the grand doors, and started flying her across campus.