Vape Shop Isekai: A Retail Manager’s Guide to a Stolen World

Author Note: Quick table ruling for clarity: since the party has not learned about Wynter’s name yet, the narration is going to separate the two Marks cleanly for now.

From this point until the story says otherwise, Wynter refers to our Wynter, and Mirror-Mark refers to the mirror version. The characters may not know the difference yet, but the narration does, because the DM said so.

Simone scratched the inside of her thigh and adjusted her miniskirt as she looked down over the island from the top of the high wall.

“It’s already a town?”

“How are we going to find him and separate him?” Raven scanned the city. “And how are we going to separate him from your mirror?”

Simone’s nerves ate at her. Would she be able to resist Mirror-Mark?

“We’ll lose so much time. Wynter should be well inside by now, and we have to isolate Mirror-Mark before he gets to them.”

“Do you know what the worst of Wynter is?” Raven asked.

“That’s a diagnostic I don’t feel comfortable answering, especially given new circumstances.” Simone looked over the edge at the conveniently, almost deliberately placed haystack below. “Let’s start with Cock’s Spooging Goods over on the east side.”

“Catch you at the bottom.”

Raven swan-dived from the wall, tucked, and fell into the haystack. She rolled out and waited.

Simone was tired.

She scratched her crotch.

She fell forward and took that fleeting moment to feel the complete lack of adrenaline before belly-flopping into the surprisingly abrasive hay. She stayed there for an extra second, wanting infinitely more, then took a deep breath, released it, scratched, and rolled out.

She shook herself back to the mission.

“I thought I saw some activity over there.” Simone dusted herself off and looked toward the uncomfortably tense crowd gathering across the thoroughfare. “What’s happening here?”

Raven led them through the alley and into the street.

“Oh shit! They’ve got a little goblin girl!”

Simone’s heart dropped. She clapped one hand onto Raven’s shoulder and stopped her charge.

“Owlbears, Raven. In VMMF shirts.”

Raven gasped. “It changed. It doesn’t say Vape Much, My Friend anymore.”

Simone’s life flashed before her eyes.

“Valiant Misstep, My Friends. What the fuck?”

The shirts were new, but the belts weren’t. Simone recognized the Dong crest stamped into the buckles.

Royal issue.

King Dong’s people wearing Craig’s colors.

“Raven,” Simone whispered, her stomach dropping. “Why are Craig’s colors on Dong’s men?”

“They needed work with their boss in the Void.” Raven yanked herself free. “I don’t know, but they ain’t taking her!”

Simone shoved the question aside.

It made sense.

She stayed on Raven’s heels as they pushed through the crowd. Raven stopped suddenly, and Simone crashed into her.

“Simone, look!”

Raven pointed toward a large shadow looming around the corner.

“Tallywhacker.”

Simone found a stack of crates at the mouth of the alley and pulled Raven behind them.

“We can’t take them alone.”

“Yes, we fucking can!” Raven raged. “They can’t take her, Simone! I’m tired of people bullying minorities they don’t take the time to understand!”

“Then let’s get her back.”

The voice came from behind them.

Simone and Raven spun toward the sound.

A goblin girl perched on the highest crate like she had been poured there by a bad decision. She was short, green, and entirely too confident for someone whose whole body looked like it could be picked up and thrown into the ocean by a motivated toddler.

Massive pointed ears jutted through an explosion of black-and-pink hair, each loaded with enough dangling skulls, crystals, chains, and sharp little bullshit to qualify as a chandelier. Her black leather jacket was painted with skulls and hot-pink chaos marks. Her white wrap top looked like it had survived three knife fights and won two. A ragged purple sash hung from her belt with four hand-painted words in sloppy yellow letters:

TAKE SHINY. LEAVE CHAOS.

“Who are you?” Simone was absolutely certain she had not been there a second ago.

“Gobrielle Graves,” she replied. “You can call me Gobs.”

“How did you—”

“No time.”

She pulled two razor-blade yo-yos from her belt.

“I’ll distract the owlbears and grab the girl. You take Alejandro out.”

Simone peeked around the corner and saw Tallywhacker standing in what looked like a new metal-plated penis guard.

Then she looked toward the young goblin girl in handmade robes decorated and held together with shells, bones, rocks, and junk that looked like every piece mattered.

“She related?”

“My sister.” Gobs’s smile stayed unreadable until, for one fraction of a second, Simone was sure she glitched to the left. “She’s all I got left. I’ll owe you.”

Simone was tired. She scratched and adjusted.

It was sleep deprivation.

And something much deeper.

“No, you won’t.”

“I’ll hit him head-on.” Raven charged from the alley, leading the attack. “Play center, strafe an owlbear, and keep my back clear.”

Simone locked in and looked toward Gobs.

She was gone.

Already airborne.

Were those roller blades coming from the bottoms of her boots?

Medieval Heelies?

Gobs landed smoothly and dashed left and right, ducking and weaving through the crowd as if she were water flowing through water.

Then she wasn’t there.

She appeared three feet to the left, leaving a static flash behind to shock a group of owlbears, then glitched another three feet forward into a smooth skate.

Glitch Rogue?

Handy.

Simone called an audible, ran up the crates, and hopped onto the low rooftops. She split the difference and reached a position where she could see both women as they launched their attacks.

Gobs whipped her yo-yos out and spun them around and through the crowd. She pulled hard to the right and launched herself upward, planted one skate against a wall, then pushed off and twisted, spinning bladed fuckery everywhere.

She glitched and spun toward the ground, shredding the knees of another owlbear.

The first owlbear’s shirt was shredded. A spray of crimson decorated Gobs’s face as she landed gracefully in the splits and slid beneath another’s legs.

There was a shower of viscera.

The owlbear dropped to its knees, howling.

Shit.

She’s good.

Tallywhacker charged.

Raven was already there, meeting him as he came around the corner with a hefty slug to the jaw.

“I don’t think so, bro!”

Tallywhacker reeled and staggered backward, but he didn’t fall. He snarled at the surprise attack.

“Raven? I’ll eat you alive, bitch! Rabbit says you’re free game.”

Tallywhacker roared and swung his massive club.

Raven tumbled aside and rolled clear just before the massive log ripped a trench into the ground with ogre strength.

“You always were a bootlicker!”

Raven’s fists hummed to life with glowing blue energy.

She ran an uneven line toward the brute, sidestepped, grabbed a horse-drawn hot-dog cart like it was a baseball bat, and whipped it toward Tallywhacker horse-side out.

The vendor screamed as he flew into another random haystack. The horses’ front hooves slammed into Tallywhacker’s chest.

It was all neighs and fucks as Tallywhacker crashed through the side of Cock’s Spooging Goods, revealing a crowd of startled people in the wreckage.

But Simone saw them.

In the corner, already ten steps from the exit and back into the wind, were the mirrors.

Mirror-Mark wore an ash-gray robe. Mirror-Simone wore the same functional racial personal-flora wrap and skirt that lived in every wood elf.

Shit.

She had seconds and three options.

Raven was good for now.

Gobs was an untouched, extremely gory dervish, but she couldn’t break the inner line to her sister.

The mirrors won.

But Simone wouldn’t leave a new friend hanging.

She quick-drew four arrows, lined them up, and released the volley into the owlbears. Each found its respective kneecap, giving Gobs just enough of an edge to break through.

Gobs reached her sister, wrapped both arms around her, and glitched through a retaining wall into a perfect landing. She skated into the alley and disappeared from sight.

Simone drew a special arrow from her quiver with lightning speed, nocked it, and aimed for the door the mirrors were approaching.

Innocents were gathering.

She was taking a monumental risk.

She loosed.

The arrow flew straight. The cube-shaped head struck the ground an inch in front of the mirrors and activated the portal to the Void prison.

The portal flashed open.

Then a screaming violet burst exploded from it like a wave of force, knocking everyone to the ground.

Simone stood firm, eyes locked onto the now-pixelated static portal.

“Raven? Gobs?” Simone shouted.

“Alive,” Raven called from somewhere on the ground.

“We’re here.” Gobs stood on the rooftop beside her, pulling another smaller, raggedly breathing body close. “Gobbie’s gotcha, Nyxie.”

The little goblin was still terrified, clinging to Gobs with white knuckles.

A rumble rolled from the portal and shook the ground.

The center looked like a pixelated person walking closer, changing from 8-bit to 16-bit and slowly continuing to improve graphically.

A loading bar appeared above the portal and began to fill as it flared the same neon green and mustard yellow as the shirts.

Another, deeper rumble cracked the foundation of the building.

Wood collapsed onto the mirrors.

The rubble crashed down, and the wall fell over them.

Mirror-Simone released a horrific shriek.

Simone’s heart dropped.

Why did she care?

She was about to move when Raven appeared just as Tallywhacker landed a backhand that sent her flying into the same pile.

Shit.

“Run!” Simone called over her shoulder as she sprinted toward them. “I won’t leave her.”

Her boots hit the ground only a fraction of a second before Gobs’s.

“I’ll hold them back!” Gobs pushed Nyxie toward Simone. “She can move the wreckage! She’s safe, Nyxie.”

Simone didn’t have time to question it before Gobs glitched into an already-spinning yo-yo wheel of death and cut down more of the horde.

Simone looked down.

The terrified expression Nyxie had worn moments ago was gone. She seemed immediately comfortable with Simone, and something in her had changed.

Nyxie tilted her head down and looked up through her long, stringy black hair.

“Incarnate!”

Her dress burst into flames.

Simone’s eyes widened.

The burning dress ripped itself from Nyxie’s body, leaving her in a simple brown wrap top and bottom. Every piece stretched outward, growing flesh and fusing together into a massive nine-foot-tall demon with severe horns and muscles for days.

Simone rushed toward the pile just as Raven pulled herself free.

“It’s on our side!”

“His name is Roberto!” Nyxie screamed.

She flung herself toward an owlbear that was about to attack her sister, landed on its back, and bit into the side of its neck.

Blood sprayed from the rupture.

“He’s a good puppy!”

Simone looked up at the loading bar.

Halfway.

Shit.

Roberto yanked the timbers from the pile as if they weighed nothing.

One.

Two.

Then Simone saw a bloodied Mirror-Simone and moved.

She reached into the wreckage and offered her hand.

Mirror-Simone froze, genuine terror filling her eyes.

“Please don’t!”

She pulled her hands up to brace herself, then stopped when she realized Simone’s hand did not hold the weapon she expected.

“Come on!” Simone looked up at the loading bar. “We don’t have long! Come on!”

After a second and one glance at the nearly completed bar, Mirror-Simone took her hand and accepted the help.

“Where is he? He can’t be alone!”

Simone scanned the area.

There.

On the other side of the pile, directly in front of the town’s residents, Mirror-Mark stood with both hands above his head, bringing down a fireball.

“There!”

Raven was already moving.

She easily cleared the rest of the pile and charged.

“No!” Mirror-Simone shouted. “Don’t hurt him! He can’t handle the guilt! I can help him!”

The fireball slammed down and incinerated a group of people and a building.

On the far side stood a sight for very sore eyes.

Wynter, Cody, Jeffrey McNichol, and a succubus Simone desperately hoped was an ally faced Alenikka and Gavin.

The loading bar reached one hundred percent.

A steady rumble pulsed from the portal as stale lung-butter fog billowed outward.

Mirror-Simone ran to grab Mirror-Mark and join her party. Simone and the others ran toward theirs as everyone turned to watch a massive rabbitfolk step from the portal, adjusting the tie on his once-impeccably tailored suit.

Tallywhacker lowered his club.

The owlbears stopped mid-swing.

Even the royal buckles seemed to point toward him.

“Hello, Simone.”

Craig looked casually bored. He raised an open hand toward her.

“Do you have any idea how long it took me to get that crown-wearing idiot’s kingdom running on a franchise model?”

Cold seeped in so quickly that Simone’s bones ached.

A massive shard of black ice formed above them.

Her pulse raced.

Then a pink bolt of lightning shot from the sky and struck it, exploding the ice into a storm of harmless sleet.

Simone couldn’t move.

No one could move except Alenikka.

She held something in her hand.

Alenikka stood in the center of the group and raised a pink-and-black notebook covered in dick monsters and the same kinds of things found on a teenage girl’s journal.

Gavin pulled the familiar Respec Fairy horn from his bag.

“The source of Tawagoto!” Wynter strained against the force holding them.

“Your journal?” Raven grunted.

“No.” Wynter struggled to force out the words. “Sara’s…”

“It really is a shame that I can’t erase Sara too.” Alenikka looked down at the journal. “But that won’t matter when I become the Queen of Everything.”