Author's Note:
A Drow's Dilemma began as a one-on-one roleplaying project and has been converted into a chapter-by-chapter format for weekly posting with the permission and assistance from my partner. It will contain a considerable amount of sexual themes such as femdom, lesbian, straight, 'reverse' rape, BDSM, group sex, romance, and other themes. The main goal of the story, however, is to tell an epic tale of adventures, gods and goddesses, fae, and nymphomaniacs. This episode and every episode to come will be available for free on Literotica for the foreseeable future. All characters that engage in sexual or suggestive situations are mentally and sexually mature: the human equivalent of 18 for their race.
A bit of a filler episode this week. There's lots of character development, but not much plot. Things will pick up a lot next week!
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Episode 83: In-Between
The morning after R.I.S.A.'s non-standard interfacing (as Caleldir called if, after deciding against referring it to 'masturbation'), Caleldir, Tsabdrin, and Ashyr bid R.I.S.A. and Selene goodbye. Selene, after all, had decided that she would stay inside the pocket dimension while traveling happened outside. Selene sighed when most of her party left sight, then turned to wander toward the library, where she would spend the majority of the next couple of days.
The library at R.I.S.A.'s manor house was nowhere near the swollen dimensional size of the library at the Monastery, but it was a substantial room on its own. It had two stories of empty bookshelves; enough to store tens of thousands of volumes. R.I.S.A. had a number of books in non-dimensional deep storage, although nowhere near as much as could conceivably fit here. At the moment only a few shelves were organized at all. And those were thanks to Selene, who was diligently sorting through a stack of history books.
[Enjoying those?] R.I.S.A. asked the drow, appearing next to her in her usual form. [You may have noticed, but I put a permanent Universal Translation spell on this room, so anyone literate can read any non-spell-tome here. All those were originally in Deusterran.]
"I did notice. I had a very confusing time when I took one of the tomes outside." Selene said absently as she flipped through the pages of a particularly large book. She was currently sitting on the floor, for once careless of her dignity. When interesting books were involved, Selene would give up quite a few things. "I would still like to learn the language, though."
[Of course.] R.I.S.A. replied. [It is a very nice language. And you may not want to always have to read all this in this room only.] The A.I. sat down on the top of one of the shelves. [You know, I could organize this library myself in a few moments, but to do so would take a bit of power. But by having you organize the library for me, I actually gain power. It is funny. I thought that I drew power from sex simply because I absorbed a few succubi. That is true, but not the whole of it. It turns out I am a demi-deity and draw power from 'followers' and from my portfolio. Part of my portfolio is storage and inventory management. People organizing things near me give me divine essence. Amusing, hmm?]
"That is... that is actually quite useful," Selene agreed. She quite enjoyed doing all this even if R.I.S.A. could manage it herself. The fact that that helped power her was only an added bonus. "I hope you don't think that this makes me your follower, though. I follow no deity." Not even Lolth, apparently. Selene had no love for that goddess of chaos.
[That is why I put follower in quotes. Not that you can read the text of my speech...] As an A.I., R.I.S.A. actually did have her speech internally manifest as text.
Selene gave R.I.S.A. a quizzical look. The A.I. spoke aloud, but thought in written word? Huh.
"Perhaps next time you should manifest those quotation marks. Make things more clear,"
the mage told her. The thought actually seemed to amuse Selene, since she began to look at the pages in front of her with a slight grin.
[I will consider that] The A.I. smiled back. [Anyway, I do not have any worshipers, nor do I seek any. I draw power from protecting people.] She frowned, considering. [I wonder if I could grant divine spells. I never tried doing so...]
"I do wonder sometimes what you are capable of," Selene finally said distractedly.
[A lot, I would assume.] R.I.S.A. pursed her lips. She closed her eyes, and sighed, the energy going out from her across her domain. Then, her eyes snapped open. [Here. I have now made you my cleric. And I declare that the 'Church of R.I.S.A.'s' main ritual is organizing books on shelves. Now, organize some books, and see if you get any divine spells. Like minor healing magic or something. I am not sure how this sort of thing works.]
"How would I..." But then Selene set aside the book that she was reading and began to shelve some of the books she had already planned out a space for.
R.I.S.A. watched Selene shelving the books with obvious interest, both in the results of the experiment and in the mere fact of Selene shelving books. It was part of her portfolio, after all.
After a couple of minutes of this, Selene attempted to cast an Orison, Virtue, to give herself an extremely slight increase to her vitality. It was the only thing she could think of that she couldn't cast as a mage. Well, she could have cast create water as well, but she didn't want to do so in a library. And... the Orison took effect, just as cast.
[It worked!] R.I.S.A. said jubilantly. [I can hardly believe it, but it worked! I can give people divine magic!]
Selene smiled. It was a bit of a smug expression. She had to admit, it was a pretty cool trick. "I wonder if that would be possible outside of your domain... but perhaps that is a thing to test later. I should not like to interrupt our travels."
[Yeah, that was rather difficult to do. I think that I can empower pretty much anyone I am friends with in here, provided they do things I like, like organize things, craft stuff, or have sex, but outside my domain, I think I would need to have dedicated clerics, which I don't really want. Unless... what if I were my own cleric and could grant myself spells? I think I could be quite useful to you all if I did that. I would have to figure out a way to leave this place, though.] R.I.S.A. looked noticeably thoughtful at this.
The drow let out a short chuckle. "Self-worship at its finest," Selene said. Not that she could say anything about such vanity. "I assume that that would take a good deal of power to achieve. But I agree, a cleric would be useful now that we don't have Althaia."
R.I.S.A. pouted. [I am not worshiping myself.] she complained. [Well, I guess sort of I could be. Being my own cleric is strange.] She cocked her head to the side. [I will have to consider how to devise a way to leave my dimension without collapsing it. And have a physical form on the other side. Right now I am a projection of this place. Even if I feel real to the touch. I suppose that is because I am a real projection.]
The A.I. was silent for a bit longer, then suddenly grinned naughtily. [So... should we organize the Deusterran erotica section? There are some rather nice illustrations in some of those...]
Selene was about to pick up the book she had been reading, certain that the conversation between them was over. The book really was quite interesting. Selene had a place for erotica since she knew of their existence. It wouldn't completely throw off her system if she set this aside and began work on those... "Fine," the drow said with a slight smirk. "Let's see those, then."
The A.I. licked her lips. [Just 'fine'? Heh. I suppose that you are not quite as nymphomaniacal as your cousin. Or Althaia, for that matter, but that was a given. Let me go ahead and pull out a few...]
"No. I have quite a normal sex drive for a drow woman," Selene informed R.I.S.A. Then she got to her feet and watched as the succubus pulled out the books from wherever it was she kept them. The mage couldn't help but notice that the other woman was much more detailed than before, complete with nipples and vulva. But she chose to ignore that fact for the present, instead focusing on the books. The spines looked respectable at first glance until one saw such titles as 'Trapped in the Goblin's Harem', 'The Ravishing Wolfpack', or 'Kidnapped by Succubi.'
[Well, where did you want these?] R.I.S.A. asked as innocently as she could manage. Which was not very.
"I planned on putting all of those over there," Selene said as she pointed to a section of the library where there were several comfortable places to sit nearby.
[On the topic of libido, normal for a drow is still pretty high by the standards of some races. Or perhaps not so much 'higher' as 'kinkier',] R.I.S.A. observed as she floated the books, following Selene. [The Blackdawn family contributed a few of our more scandalous tomes. Like that illustrated work 'Dungeons of the Underdark.' And the Blackdawn were Eilistraee worshipers, so they were mild for drow. Nudists at home, though.]
"Nudists, you say? Interesting. We have a house that's suspected of that. Frehelvi, the slavers." There were all sorts of rumors about that house going around, actually. Which... actually could be said about literally every other House.
[For Ellistraeans, nudism is a religious thing. Their goddess is almost never illustrated as being anything but naked, and their clergy never wear more clothing than is strictly necessary for protection. But the Blackdawns were circumspect about that sort of thing.] R.I.S.A. remembered.