1. A Vulpine Guild
Kurumi's POV
Kuyoko Guild Hall
YGGDRASILs last day
I arrived at the Kuyoko guildhall meeting room. My sworn sisters, Tamayama and Yukiko were already present. We found out early on that we were the same age. When we started playing YGGDRASIL a couple of years back, all three of us were 9 years old. We would eventually find out that we share a birthday. I looked in their direction and greeted them and they greeted back. If they were here then their caretakers would not be far behind. We originally all had two caretakers, but after we found each other in YGGDRASIL, we started living together. It would also happen that all three of us had written in our backstories that we were nine years old, which was our real age at the time according to our caretakers. Our time in YGGDRASIL and the Kuyoko Guild would soon come to an end, as today was the last day.
All three of us also have the daughter of Inari class, which made our avatars demi-goddesses. This was a secret class that all kitsune that unlocked it kept to themselves as we would otherwise be hunted until our avatars remained dead. We met some of the other kitsune before that had this class. Actually, I still have the non working mirror of Inari, bought from my favorite outside of the guild store. It was manned by a kitsune couple that put nice fox images on their products. I bought one for shits and giggles anyway and it is actually hanging in one of the vaults.
There is one other thing that we all have in common. All three of us have a username that is merely our real name prefixed by princess. It was the idea of our caretakers. Though we were not in contact with one another, so it must have been done independantly form one another.
Our caretakers also frequently called us princess, or used the hime honorific, when referring to us. Collectively, they frequently referred to us as the three princesses.
"I wonder what the future will hold for us, now that YGGDRASIL is ending" said Tamaya. Unlike my own orange red fur, Tamayamas fur is brown. Both of us have similar white socks and tailtips. It makes us look more like siblings so both of us are very happy with the similarity.
"We will probably go back to the poisonous Earth. Life will go on." was the response given by Yukiko. As her name implies she is a real child of snow, an arctic fox. Her light blue and white fur would definitely help in a snowy landscape. If one looked really well, one might see that she also has white socks and tailtips.
I wanted to bring a more positive mood to this conversation, so attempted to change the subject to our guild. "Do you remember the creation and meaning of our guild?" I asked. All three of us went into our memories. We remembered that we were a medium role playing guild in which all players had chosen the Kitsune race. Our guild never achieved much, but all nine of us had so much fun. However, we did manage to acquire three World Items.
Our guild managed to continue existing mostly due to our averageness. It was established in a largely uncontested area of YGGDRASIL, that did not have access to many valuable rescources. Nor did we have a massive army that anyone could boast defeating. The guild was also not located in a strategic position. And our mostly positive neutral karma meant that people hurting us would see their own karma values decrease, enough to be a deterrent, but at the same time not enough for it to be useful for that. As there were easier and more rewarding methods of doing so.
Another reason for being left alone, can be found in the fact that we produced valuable services. I myself founded the Kuyoko Mercantile Guild. We traded with anyone interested for fair prices, thus getting on many crafters good side. While also doing the same for people that were interested in buying things for a fair price. The profit would go into our vaults so nobody stood to gain much by taking over. Well I say that, but the mercantile guild was mostly a roleplaying thing. Which fit into our guild well, as we were a roleplaying guild.
Though the largest part of our continued existance is likely, the establishment of our guild outside of the human strongholds. On one of the three 'neutral' worlds. Far from the center, requiring quite a trip in order to find. Followed by roleplay defenses, that could annoy people slightly after such a long trip.
Me and my sisters are very glad we chose the kitsune race. We have access to a human form with tails and ears that used to count as demi-human. This helped us survive through our early days of YGGDRASIL. Additionally, we have a skill named kitsune illusion that allows us to pretend to be human completely. However, as all 9 members of the Kuyoko guild got to become nine tailed kitsune, we were now treated as heteromorphs even in our humanoid form.
Being in the form of a Kitsune just put me at ease. Though considering I am human I do not know why. I decided to take the Kitsune race because it came to me in a dream. Yukiko and Tamayama also said the same thing, and just like my own situation, they felt more comfortable as kitsune then they did as human. It felt just like a part of us was missing when we were humans, while looking like a kitsune returned that missing part.
Our guild was established in the city of Yoake. Just like all of its players, many NPCs were of the kitsune race. Though other races were present, those mostly consisted of humans. Some of the nearby settlements belonged to our guild as well.
The name Kuyoko meant nine foxes according to Yuri. And since we were a group of nine kitsune, we decided to name ourselves that. Speaking of Yuri, she just entered the meeting room. Yuri was a pinkish-red vixen, that was just like all of us currently in human form. According to her, she was a teacher and professional caretaker. Though all three of us doubted that as she made mistakes in basic japanese characters. When asked she replied saying that they were the official japanese characters used by the Realm of Foxes. Though what a fictional realm of YGGDRASIL has to do with education is beyond me. However, Yuri was also the one that sought knowledge and uploaded the knowledge into the guilds library as books, so her claim of educator does seem to hold some merit.
Shinichi came in shortly after his mate. He was a blue tod that proclaimed himself to be a magic researcher that is 274 years old. Whenever it was mentioned that they were married, Yuri would always correct the three of us, by saying they were mates. After being corrected for a while the terminology stuck. But seriously, all six of our caretakers were so into roleplay, they extended it into the real world. Shinichi and Yuri proclaimed to have been mated for several decades, and proclaim to have quite the age gap due to Yuri being only 216. However, my sisters and I were glad they were there. Our caretakers did not just take care of us but even found YGGDRASIL after all. Before all of us started living together, him and Yuri took care of Yukiko. It was obvious in the fact that Yukiko had picked up on Shinichis knowledge of survival, and studied on how to survive in very cold climates.
Just then three other kitsune entered the meeting room in the palace. They consisted of a mated couple and Shion. The mated couple is quite far apart. Yoshi was a green furred tod of 302 years. His gray furred mate Yashima was only 169 years old. They also had different professions. Yashima was a farmer, and came to life around a lot of plants. She was very comfortable in her fox form, and was often found in it. Today she has elected to meet everyone in her human form. Yoshi on the other hand was an architect. He designed several of the buildings owned by the guild. His tastes seemed to prefer buildings that appeared to have been grown from the ground, which he claimed was a building style used in the realm of foxes. All of his buildings had underground parts that were large enough for kitsune to be in fox form in. All designed bedrooms also had a basket for the fox form of kitsune. He was adamant that it was necessary and, together with Yashima, convinced the rest of the guild to include it in our own bedroom. Well, I say the rest of the guild, but only me and my sisters needed to be convinced.
Shion was one of my own caretakers. A red furred vixen that according to her bio is 176 years old. She was a cook that somehow often got access to real foodstuff, and her cooking was delicious. Her character specialised in cooking too, she must really love working in the kitchen. I myself had a single class in cook, in her honour.
"Has anyone seen Yasaka? She went into the game shortly after myself." I asked. Yasaka was one of the vixens that was my other caretaker. She was very voluptious and had blonde coloured fur. As for her profession, then my trip down memory lane was interupted.
"That tenko is at the local shrine, saying she wants to give a prayer to her goddess, lady Inari, at a proper shrine while she has the opportunity, rather than do so while wearing a chem-suit at a place of non-worship." replied Shion.
Well, as you heard Yasaka is a priestess, though she insists she is a tenko. She frequently tells us that she is a low on the foodchain tenko, that managed to aqcuire the honour of taking care of her ladies daughters. She did this much more frequently after the three of us aqcuired the daughter of Inari class. According to Yasaka, my real mother, for whom she takes care of me, is also called Inari. But she says the same to Tamayama and Yukiko, so I do not know if she is truthful in that. Though that is partially because she, just like everyone else in this guild, is very into her roleplay.
Between my two caretakers it was Yasaka that had more influence on me. I had for example invested 5 levels in priestess. The deity worshipped? Inari of course. She was wise and frequently claimed it was the wisdom of 250 years. Her more provocative dress style was also slightly copied by me, but not nearly to the same extent. She was motherly and would make a great mother for her own kits down the line.
I just realised how much our caretakers, mostly Yasaka and Yuri, managed to get me and my sister to use fox terms rather than human ones. I seriously could not use words like man, hair, woman, child, teeth, spouse, and fingernail without serious effort. I always found myself using the vulpine equivalents instead. Really, it is already difficult catching myself doing it. My sisters were not much better. We could also recite legends of Inari of the top of our heads, and knew several 'kitsune' costums by hart now.
This made us slight outcasts in school however, because human costums are quite different. But the three of us had each other, and that kept us happy. So what if nobody else understood our moral code, it was the moral code we shared with our caretakers. It also was not as if the morality of Earth was so great considering the fact you could find people publicly engaged in canabalism on the street.
I wonder why none of our caretakers have the daughter of Inari class. They encouraged the three of us to get it, but did not partake themselves. Yasaka proclaims that it would be blasphemous to inaccurately claim descendancy of her goddess. Which is weird because she encouraged us to get it, even handing over the world items so it could happen. Yasaka really likes her roleplay.
But I suppose that in addition to giving that prayer, Yasaka wishes to say goodbye to her students. They are some of her favorite NPCs that she wanted to be priestesses under her. Much like every other NPC designed by our guild, they are written in a way that would make us, as a guild, like to live with them over a long period of time if they were real. They are loyal, many referring to my sisters and myself as princess, but also have their own lives and preferences.
This is mostly due to Kuyoko being a role play guild, that pretents to be a kingdom, or as the case might be a queendom. Because our caretakers left the three of us to rule, while they played the advisors. The influence of the 'kitsune' way of life is certainly not to be dismissed as reason though. Because of the longer life spans of kitsune, we tend to think more long term. Yuri drilled this into our heads, but the conditions of IRL Earth also served as an example to get it stuck in our heads.
My sisters and me also had made our own NPCs. We each had one working as personal handmaiden, right here in the palace. They had different specialisations that we thought might be useful in the ruling of our queendom. Due to the three of us being Inaris daughters and being in charge of the guild, the Kuyoko guild is a vassal state of the Realm of Foxes.
Most of the guilds NPC levels went into population instead. So we could have a bit of a population. Though it meant that we had lot of people with a low level. It gave the guild a nice background for role playing, which is ultimately what our guild primarily chose to do with the game.
Considering that I was hoping to meet everyone here on the last day, I wanted our meeting to begin. While typing a message to Yasaka to come join us in the meeting room, I started by asking "Everyone but Yasaka is here, shall we make a final tour when she arrives?".
"Yes, that sounds good" came from the opening of the door. I twisted my neck to look in that direction and saw Yasaka entering the meeting room.
After the others agreed we started walking through the palace. Through the spa, bedrooms, mess hall, meeting rooms, offices, small libraries, garden and guard quarters. All of the rooms decorated in what our caretakers stated was a style from the realm of foxes. Many of the walls were painted in landscapes, mostly forest like, that kitsune could easily live in, due to them being similar to the habitats of foxes before they went extinct. Though a certain japanese flair could be detected throughout the palace. We always role played that it was the influence of our human subjects, who more adored the style for their own dens. The one village under our guild were humans had the majority favored the style much more than any other place.
We could see the grand temple of Inari from the entrance of the palace, being the second most impressive building in my opinion. Yasaka said that Inari would not mind considering her daughters were living in the palace. The school were Yuri worked was also visible, with its nice spires that housed multiple classrooms. Me and my sisters needed to attend classes there by Yuri.
In addition to those classes by Yuri, which we were frequently forced to attend. Classes regarding the basics of YGGDRASILS magic were also given there. Sometimes the head of magical research Shinichi gave them himself. We knew this was largely due to the three of us, considering that the others said that it was rare for hime to teach. He usually keeps himself to the magical academy. The magic lessons covered the workings of YGGDRASIL spells. Which only makes sense, if one knows how much our guild likes roleplay, as YGGDRASIL spells do not have a working since they are programs.
There was also a library that stood majestically inside the city. This particular library was only for kitsune and contained many books written in Kitsunian Runes, a language that my sisters and I thought was created by Yuri.
We went back inside to continue our last meeting as members of the Kuyoko guild. I was so going to miss this place. Just as I was going to miss my tails. Not having tails was so uncomfortable and felt unnatural.
The seconds of the game remaining ticked away slowly as our meeting continued. I was going to miss this place after midnight tonight. Despite only being around in the game for a couple of years, I build so many memories up around here. A look around the table confirmed that I am not the only one that has such nostalgia. At least, we now live together and the end of the game will thus not seperate us.
Until finally, midnight arrived and the world experienced a brief white flash.
I am going to be fairly truthfull and say up front that I am bad with names. Yasaka is indeed named after the dxd vixen and shares visual resemblance with her. One might also take note that this is from a certain perspective, and that this is the truth from her POV. And yes, I am aware that google translate would translate nine foxes as kyubiki no kitsune.