Unwritten Destiny [Yuri/Sapphic, Isekai, LitRPG]

Vast fields of red grass grew ever thinner and I knew we were close. After several days of walking, we were all excited to be there already.

Moira sighed. "Kay, explain it to me again? I still don't think I'm getting it."

I threw up my hands in frustration. "I spy with my little eye," I pointed to my eyeball for emphasis, "Something that starts with the letter 'b' and then you look around for that thing." I gestured wildly at everything around us. "It's a travel game to pass the time."

The buff woman cocked her head and shrugged at me. "I preferred the one about counting casks of ale."

"Young people are the same in every world." I grumbled and harrumphed.

"I think it's very clever!" Paz declared and then made a big production of looking around us. "Did you spy berries?" Paz had been... overly sweet to me ever since the hot spring. Like, I was in danger of cavities level of too sweet. I missed her sarcasm and dry wit.

My head bobbed in acknowledgement. "Mhmm! Yeah, it was berries." I grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the others. My ginger looked at me questioningly and I would have sworn I saw a hint of fear in her eye. "Love. I get it. You're scared to death of the big Talk. I'm scared too. But, we're both adults and we love each other. We'll get through this, okay? I don't need you walking on egg shells around me."

Paz nodded slowly and gave a light chuckle. "I've never tried walking on egg shells before. That sounds painful?" She pulled me into a hug and I felt tears on my shoulder. "I-I... yeah. I just..." She blew out a heavy breath to steady herself and pulled back to look at me; her emerald eyes gleaming in wetness like moonlight reflecting on the stormy surface of a lake. Finally, she smiled and pulled me into a gentle kiss. "I can almost believe you when you look at me with those beautiful, earnest sapphires."

"Hey olds, stop making out and keep up!" Moira shouted back at us and laughed. Sterling whispered something sharp to her and she brushed it off with a wave of her hand.

"Come on, we best do as the child says, before she throws a tantrum." Paz laughed and grabbed my hand, entwining our fingers.

"Holy shit!" Sterling shouted as she spun in a circle, staring up at the nearly endless obelisk eclipsing the sky above us. "It's... it's a flying city. It's a city... that flies!"

Moira was staring at her girlfriend instead of the marvel of magic over our heads. "Fuck. I think that's the first time you've sworn."

"It's a flying city!" The tiny infernal woman responded without looking down; her eyes glued to the horizon of Arcadia.

Paz shook her head and chuckled at the young girls. "I miss being that young. When everything was new and exciting."

I looked sideways at my girlfriend as we walked closer to the castle that housed the gravity platform. "I... don't think I was ever that young. Being raised in a cult; I never had any friends and I never left my shitty small town." I tilted my head in thought. "Although, I do kinda miss all the firsts of early transition, now that I think about it. My first bra and my first dress. Oh! I had the cutest denim jacket and a matching purse."

My lovely ginger rubbed my arm, moving through several complex expressions before she smiled warmly. Of course, she had never heard of denim, but her clever brain got there on context. Paz swallowed and blinked as she looked up at the sky city, before pulling me against her. "Come on! We have an upside down waterfall to see!" My stomach twisted into more knots at her tone, but I smiled and nodded.

We ascended the castle and stood on the massive flat rooftop. It was adorned from one corner to the other with an intricate collection of runes and incantations. A number of wizards from the Ars Magika milled around, trying to look busy, but mostly just shooting the shit around the proverbial water-cooler. They were dressed in the traditional white and gold robes of the academy.

Xena slowly turned in endless circles. I was a bit concerned that she would make herself dizzy. "Oh! This is most astounding! A wonder of magic beyond anything I could have imagined. Thank you Miss, for bringing us to this wonderful place."

Jacque took Xena's hand as his other pointed wildly. "You like... haven't seen nothing yet! Just hold onto those pretty little elf ears and wait. Riding the gravity magic is a hella trip. Real far out there, babe."

Paz looked at me with a raised eyebrow. I smirked at her.

One of the mages wandered over and inclined her head to Paz. "Good morrow, my Lady. Six adults and one..." She trailed off and blinked rapidly for several seconds as she failed to comprehend Cerbe. "... Dog. To transport, I take it?"

My ginger girlfriend's eye twitched in annoyance. "Why does everyone always approach me!? She's the nice one!" She pointed aggressively at me. "And she has the money."

The wizard took a few befuddled steps back and turned to me. "Apologies. I meant no disrespect. But I do need seven gold pieces from someone. I don't care who."

I nodded politely. "Yeah, that's not a problem." I dug into the side pocket on the Bag of Magic Stuff, pulling out seven coins and handing them to her."

"Very good, my Lady." She gave me a curt nod and moved back to stand near the other mages. The mage grabbed the crystal around her neck and her magically amplified voice carried easily over us and the only other group of travelers. "Please secure any loose items or young children. We suggest tucking your arms and legs in, but it is not required. The journey should take about five minutes and then you will land in the arrival station. Now then, is everyone ready to go?" We all nodded and murmured our agreement. "Very good. So brace yourselves and you will launch in..." She held up her other hand, fingers spread, and began counting them off. "Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Have a safe journey!"

I grabbed Paz's hand and everyone screamed as the runes under our feet lit with arcane energy, the ground falling away from us. "Awooooowoooo!" Cerbe howled pathetically, his terrified little body somehow having achieved maximum centripetal force as he spun in nauseating circles.

Jacque, the one among us experienced with this journey, was doing flips and barrel rolls like the most experienced skydiver. "Xena!"

"Ahhhhhhh!" The tall elf had been squealing since we took off.

"Come on, babe. You gotta relax." He swam over to Xena and grabbed her hands to steady the poor woman.

"Oh! That is much better. Thank you, Jacque." She seemed to be enjoying herself now, although I couldn't say if it was more because someone was holding her steady, or that it was Jacque in particular.

I squeezed Paz's hand. "So, is it as exciting as you remember?"

"AWOOOOOOO." Cerbe went spinning past us, although he might be having marginally more fun with it?

My ginger girlfriend giggled. "It is fun, but this is my first time."

My head cocked at her. "Oh, you teleported last time?" I knew she had visited before.

Paz nodded and squeezed my hand back. "Mhmm. I did. Now, ROLL!" She twisted her body, cackling madly as we both began spinning out of control.

"Is this..." I closed my mouth and breathed through my nose for a few beats as I struggled to control my nausea. "A bad time..." I took several more deep breaths and mentally counted to ten. "To mention that I get motion sick?"

Paz stopped spinning us and pulled me into her arms as she wrapped me in a hug. "I'm sorry, love." My eyes fluttered closed as she kissed me. That helped a lot.

"Wooo!" I heard Moira go sailing passed.

"I'll catch you, and then you'll be in trouble!" Sterling's voice zipped by, hot in pursuit.

My feet gently set down in the arrival room and I gave a quick prayer of thanks to... bleh. Fuck it. Myself. "I don't really want to do that again any time soon." I leaned on Paz for support as I waited for the room to stop spinning.

Cerbe lay on the floor gently complaining. "Awooo...."

"Sorry little dude, that ride isn't for everyone." Jacque knelt down and scratched the Hellbeast's stomach as compensation.

I looked over to Xena, who unlike everyone else, was perfectly in order and didn't look like she had just been through a tumble dryer. I turned to Paz. "How does she do it!?!?"

My ginger shook her head and tried to straighten her wild hair as she gave the tall elf a dirty look. "I don't know. I suspect dark magic."

Once we all regained our balance, we found our way outside onto the streets of Arcadia, the Great Flying City, home of the Ars Magika Academy and Queen Bellanora's castle.

"Hey Jacque, do you know if there's a map or something around here?" I gestured around us helplessly.

"No doubt, Blondie. No doubt. This way. Jacque knows all. Jacque sees all." He pointed down the street a ways.

Paz leaned over to me. "Jacque could stand to see fewer mushrooms."

I giggled and kissed her cheek. "Oh, shiny!" I spotted the map and walked over to it. "Okay, so according to this, there are ten inns spread throughout the city. Here we are, at the southern arrival platform." I traced a finger across the map. "The upside down waterfall is in the northwest corner. Oh, looks like the Infinite Library is there too. Alright, so the closest inn would be the Mystic Meadery. So, Moira and Sterling, would you two mind going there and renting the rooms and the rest of us can meet up there later tonight?" I turned to the two youngest members questioningly.

"Yup! That's no problem, boss." Sterling threw me a salute.

I dug three cobalt coins out of my bag and handed one each to Sterling, Xena and Paz. "These are our allowances. After the inn is paid for, go crazy. Spoil yourselves."

"Fuck yes!" Moira pumped her arm in the air and did a little dance.

"Oh Miss, this is most generous. Thank you." Xena gave me a deep curtsy.

"Alright, great. So, everyone understand? Then go have fun!" The group nodded and split off in separate directions. I took my girlfriend's hand. "Come on, love. Let's go get some food and then see that waterfall." I looked down to Cerbe. He looked up at me. I lifted my chin towards Moira and Sterling's retreating figures. "Keep them safe for me, boy?"

"Woof!" He wagged his tails and pranced along after the girls.

Paz nodded to me and we made our way into the flying city. She stopped on a connecting walkway and peered over the railing at the distant mountains and trees below us; so small that they looked like props for a model train set. "We're so high up. It really makes me miss flying!"

"You've flown before?" I arched a disbelieving eyebrow up at her.

She turned toward me and looked wistfully into her memories. "A little, many years ago. A friend had a pair of enchanted boots."

"That sounds really fun. Maybe we should look for two pairs to buy while we're here?"

"Oh!" Paz clapped her hands and bounced with excitement. "I would love that." All the light and passion died from her eyes as quickly as it had appeared. "Depending on how tonight goes, I guess." She looked away from me and seemed to be fighting back tears.

"Hey. None of that." I cupped her chin and pulled her into a tender kiss, my lips very lightly brushing against hers. "I told you that we'll figure it out. And we will."

My ginger nodded, regaining some of her lost composure. "Yeah. Yeah, we can do anything, so long as we have each other." She pulled me into a tight hug and mumbled into my boobs. "I love you so much."

I gently stroked her hair and kissed her forehead. "And I love you even more."

She pulled back and some of that fire that I loved so much lit in her eyes. "Oh, no no no. Let's not even go there."

"Scared of losing?" I teased her as my hands found her ass cheeks and pulled her against me.

"Please! I would destroy you!" She cackled melodramatically and then slipped out of my arms. "Now let's go eat, I'm starving."

We continued our stroll through the city, admiring the intricate, beautiful and downright awe inspiring designs of the various buildings. "I really want to live in a house." The words slipped out while my mind was wandering around, thinking about different things.

"Oh yeah? With a little yard for Cerbe and a big kitchen so you could make me all kinds of delicious meals and pastries? Mmmmm, I'd get so fat!" Paz laughed until she snorted. "But yeah..." Her voice drifted off into wistfulness and dare I say, hope. "I'd really like that."

"Well then, I'll have to make it happen for you." I squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Oh! What about that place?" I pointed to a street vendor with my other hand. He looked to be serving up tacos of some description.

"Mmmm, yes please! That smells amazing." Paz rubbed her stomach and dragged me over.

Tacos in hand, we continued on our way; walking and talking and eating as we went.

"Holy fuck! It's gorgeous!" Paz ran to the mithral railing and craned her neck as she looked up at the pool above us.

There was a ring in the floor through which we could see the distant ground, and rising up out of it was the titular upside down waterfall. I know, I know. It's a crappy name. You come up with something better and I'll change it, okay? About a hundred feet above us, the waterfall splashed down into a pool. And by pool, I don't just mean a body of water. Around it, there were beach chairs and a bar with a little restaurant. I could see several hundred people swimming or lounging around or eating.

"Oh look, they even have changing rooms." I pointed over to some privacy booths as I slipped the Magic Bag of Stuff off my shoulder and started pulling out some clothes for swimming.

We ran over to change and I started to follow Paz in, but she stopped me, pointing to an adjoining one. "Love, if we try to change in front of each other, we're just going to stand there staring for thirty minutes."

I nodded reluctantly as my shoulders slumped. "Yeah. I know you're right."

She smiled encouragingly at me. "Hey, if tonight goes well, then who knows?"

A little drool may have come out as my mouth fell open and I watched my beautiful girlfriend walk into the booth and closed the door. Successfully having changed into clothing appropriate for swimming, we made our way back to the railing. The waterfall was actually subtly sloped and I realized that you're supposed to ride it down. "Last one to the bottom is a rotten egg!" I shouted as I hopped over the railing and fell towards the waterfall.

"Hey! No fair!" Paz tried to protest in between laughing fits as she followed me.

I did the rollercoaster scream on the way down before the waterfall dumped me into the pool. I really, really love swimming. I leisurely did laps while Paz... kinda just floundered. She was not a very strong swimmer. "Hey slowpoke, tag!" I splashed water at her.

She glared death at me and looked for all the world like a wet cat. "I will get you for that!" And did her best to chase me. I, of course, let her catch me. We alternated between kissing under the waterfall and lounging on beach chairs until things started getting dark as dusk set in.

We changed back into our normal clothes and walked along one of the many boardwalks, taking in the sights and sounds of the vendors. There was a wizard using magic to make cotton candy which blew my mind and we grabbed some. "This reminds me so much of my old world." I wistfully licked the spun sugar as I looked around. "I bet I'd make a killing if I invented funnel cake."

Paz nibbled on hers and lit up with excitement. "Fucking Hells! This is exactly what I imagine you taste like."

Now, it would be unfair to our protagonist to say that she walked into a wall just as she had previously done to a tree. So you can just use your imagination about how she got a bruised face and a hysterically laughing girlfriend.

The Mystic Meadery came into view as we weaved our way towards the residential areas. With each step, Paz's pace ever so slightly slowed, her reluctance to put one foot in front of the other becoming apparent. I wrapped my arm around her and pulled her to my side. "It'll be okay." She nodded wordlessly as we stepped up to the proprietor. "Hello. We should have a room in our name. Alexis and Paz?"

The elven woman looked down her very long nose at us and smiled politely. "Ahh, yes. I have you here. Room 4. Just go up those stairs and down the hall. It will be the second room on your left."

I found my way to the room easily, with Paz following behind me in what had become a full trudge. We let ourselves into the room and my doomed girlfriend went over and flopped onto the bed. I sat down beside her and folded one leg under myself. "Okay. So, where do you wanna start?"

Paz sat up and took my hands in hers. "Well... I guess I'll start with how I'm not like most other women."

A snicker escaped me before I could stop it. She glared at me. "Sorry! Just funny to be on the other side of that sentence. But, uh... I know what you have down there. I've seen you naked a lot. Neither prison had all that much privacy. Plus there was the hot spring. Hells, I was the same before I woke up in this world."

My ginger relaxed a fraction of a degree and chuckled weakly. "Not where I was going with that, but thank you. Obviously, I knew you were okay with that aspect." She paused and swallowed nervously, blinking back the threat of tears. "What I'm trying to say is that I'm not the girl you met in Ninira. Physically speaking. I'm not a half-elf anymore." She blew her bangs out of her face with a huff. "Okay, well I am a half-elf. But again. I wasn't that for a very long time in between."

I nodded and squeezed her hands encouragingly. "Okay, I'm with you so far. And hey, no big deal. I didn't used to be infernal. I was a human in my old world."

Paz looked down at our entwined hands, avoiding my eyes. "Yes... I know. But, you went from one mortal to a slightly different color of mortal. You didn't go from mortal to multi-dimensional personification of anti-divinity and back to mortal."

My hands jerked out of hers as I tumbled off the bed. I knew those words. I wrote those words. No one else on Illith Aranor could know those words. My hands shook and my vision swam as I finally made the connection in my stupid, STUPID head. "You... thousands of people died because of you!"

Her gaze shot up to me and now the tears were flowing like the levee had been breached. "P-please don't look at me that way! I'm not a monster! I didn't know. I didn't know..." But, she was a monster; the big bad evil meant to terrorize my campaign. She rocked back and forth, her entire body shaking with the force of her crying. The woman I had never really known reached a trembling hand out to me.

I flinched and took an unconscious step backwards.

That was exactly the wrong thing to do because now she was looking at me like I had ripped the beating heart out of her chest and ground it under my boot. Paz... No. That wasn't right. It was a nickname; it would be short for... "Lapazulalei."

She collapsed into a ball, sobbing into her knees. "H-how do you even know about t-that?" The stranger on the bed gasped out each word between sobs before finally pulling her head up and looking at me again, searching for some explanation; anything to make it all make sense. And then I saw it click in her eyes as she gazed up at me; the very moment something connected the dots in that clever, CLEVER brain of hers. "I... am a m-m-monster, aren't I?"

"Paz. No. I-" I started to shake my head before she cut me off with a vicious snarl.

"I AM A MONSTER!! BECAUSE, I'M THE MONSTER YOU MADE ME TO BE!!!" Paz scrambled backwards across the bed until she thumped against the wall. Her entire body was trembling and shaking as she hyperventilated. "It's all j-just a g-g-game to you! P-please, just leave me alone!" Her head dipped between her knees as she cried too hard for any more words.

I fled, sobbing from the room until I was outside the inn. The cool wall was a comfort against my back as I broke down and slid into a pile on the ground.

It was all my fault. It had been me all along.

I unleashed the Elder God.