Leaving the hospital, Kellie was still amazed at the blend of the old and the traditional. Maybe some part of Kellie had been thinking this would be a back-throw to the middle ages, the long lived locals allergic to change. Instead, it seemed light hearted and well meaning Kiko had managed to help introduce the modern world to them.
She also spotted a kitsune in one room with a broken hand lamenting at having to write left handed for a while and hoped his penpals in the other realms understood.
Kellie said, "I still can't believe you lived in this place for eighteen years."
Kiko blinked, "Eighteen years? Mika what have you been telling them?"
Kellie stopped cold. "What do you mean?"
"If she'd been with us for only eighteen years, she'd be toddler! Does she look like she's still in diapers to you? And we'd be INSANE to let any one tail set foot outside our domain usually, but my parents did give our word for her to remember the previous incarnation as a human in a reasonable manner... She's eighty, which makes her kitsune form about eight years old!..." Kiko said causally.
Mika shuddered and bowed to Kelly. "I'm sorry... I was scared that if I told you how long I was really gone, you'd think of me as just some kitsune who had taken Mika's place. Considering the bad first impression my family left on all of you."
Kellie said, "Seriously Mika? We've twisted and warped ages and time so much that years means NOTHING to us! I don't care if you were gone for two minutes or two centuries. You've done nothing but prove you're still our friend."
Mika hugged Kellie. "Thank you!" She nuzzled the human some.
Kiko said, "Oh... before I forget Kellie, be careful ever coming here by yourself, or any of your friends... or you might end up agreeing to be a fortune statue or a perky obedient fox-woman maid before you even know what you're doing!"
Kellie shivered a bit looking around the various kitsune, just being people.
"Would they really do that?"
"It's not against you Kellie," Kiko said. "Trickery is in our blood. Like swindling is in the blood of the Tanuki. It's like with Mika, we always have to include some twist on things whether we like it or not. We aren't being malicious about it. We can consciously repress it, and other things can override it... like family, you're a close friend of Mika's, and that matters to me. But not every kitsune is going to know that... we have many branches."
Kellie nodded "Thanks for the warning, I'll pass it on."
+++
Mia had always found it fun that she'd known so many friends from the other side of the veil, even before becoming a witchling herself. This was the only reality that existed now thanks to the enchanted costumes that Merlin sold every year on Halloween.
Mia's friends for their part had been overjoyed that Mia was now part of their world, even if half of them were very edgy around Rexie... imps were legendary as familiars for corrupting their masters.
And Zack was surprised to learn Mia was friends with a wolf-beast like Winry, who had invited Zack to check out the other side of the veil. Which Zack had convinced his parents was a normal sleep over.
Zack had found it was like camping... and REALLY roughing it... Zack thought it was fun, but he wouldn't want to be without his gameboy and favorite cartoons forever. Whinry's biological family had thought Zack was average for a wolf beast... considering the titanic might that Zack's wolf beast form had... that should say something about what centuries of ruthless natural selection had done for the wolf-beast gene pool.
Still, little Winry's family on this side of the veil were eager to imprint on their daughter all the wonders of the modern world, hoping she could pass on these ideas to the wolf-beast's demi-plane as she grew into a woman.
Drake (Diedrika in a reality that no longer existed), the dragon whelp, was happy not to be the only boy in Mia's little circle anymore.
The mummy Princess Pyrrha was impressed at the people in high places Mia now had connections with.
The adopted siblings Fayth the Fairy and Terumi The Tanuki were excited at the new possibilities Mia was now open to.
Rexie meanwhile, being an imp, overheard the plans of the rest of the dark family... who passed it on Mia, who passed it on to her friends, who passed it on their family.
+++
Under a full moon where the sun never rose, a princess was speaking with her long line of noble ancestors.
Princess Pyrrha could never get over how many people thought vampires were handsome men who believed in eternal love... they were parasitic dark spirits who inhabited corpses going through the memories of their host bodies like pages in a book to impersonate who the cadaver used to belong to. Unless the noble mummy for whom their spirits and flesh were still connected.
Vampires however still had the better PR, and the better business connections.
This had to do with vampires more able to pass themselves off as humans, experts at mind controls, and had many serfs to draw upon. Though mummies also didn't have the slew of weaknesses vampires had to be always wary of. Mummies also had alliances with spiritualist groups across several planets.
There were also the ghosts, liches, revenants, and countless other undead (on the other hand zombies were mindless automatons), but vampires and mummies held the larger power blocks. Having remained just about even in the last two hundred years.
"So we'll offer our services to Miss Kellie first when she seeks out to invite undead to this alliance, we can provided as many mindless corpse puppets as she could want, favors from the gods, ancient treasure ... In exchange, Kellie gives her word that any of her fellows who fall in battle will agree to be mummified upon their deaths. And remember, don't let the blood suckers offer her a better deal! We'll match it and more if we have to! We can't let Merlin's family owe the vampires anything!"
+++
"I see... "
Five sets of different colored eyes spoke in the dark, speaking with one voice implying a beast who had been roused from sleep, but her voice echoed through the cave a shock wave. The floor of the cave was covered in enough treasure to crash the human world's economy in an afternoon, and then buy everything. This included stocks that were sealed in boxes back when some of the world's biggest companies had just started out, making them insanely valuable to share holders (along with some that were worthless due to those companies having vanished into nothing).
Beyond the cave were more caverns, little Kobold running to and fro, so many different colored scales, eager and willing to obey their dragon masters without question, churning out weapons, modern and classical, armor, equipment, and other things. Hot metal pouring and being shaped from resources across countless worlds. Kobolds on their coffee break boasting about the dragon they served being superior to their peers (their dragon said so, so course it was true!).
Towering adult Dragons lined up to offer tribute to their mother and goddess, others there to upgrade their scales with plates of armor.
"If the stuck-up foxes were able to claim one of Merlin's disciples to become of their family. Why should not I ask for the same? A dragon fully versed in magic from Merlin himself who is made of my children, body and soul? They'll become a very effective child of mine. The one who I have sensed shape shifting into one of my children already will do. Make sure that Drake understand it would very good for him to pass along that the Eastern dragons would be a poor fit for a war."
Meanwhile, an incredibly greedy businessman and embezzler, morphed into a dragon, his blinding greed shifting him to her plane of reality, his old existence rewritten. His sycophants likewise shifting into his loyal Kobolds, nothing about their personalities really changing, simply the pretenses being stripped away. The kobolds getting right to work without missing a beat, proudly painting the symbol of their dragon on their bodies. The 'new' dragon saying hello to his rivals and potential mates and partners, each one each to undercut the other for favors for Queen Mother Tiamat... all in all, nothing had really changed for him.
+++
And for Fayth and Terumi ... fairies were known for being unpredictable and dynamic, and Terumi was considered a part of Fayth's family in spite of being a Tanuki... So the fae decided if and when Kellie showed up asking for favors to save her world, and why they should risk their own universe for the sake of hers, they'd just cross the bridge when they came to it!