Thanks to the hard work of Adalyn, I looked like a brand new angel ready to take on whatever demonic challenges awaited her.

  The excitement had me up in the air of the fashion studio, gracefully soaring about on my wings, getting adapted to the slightly extra weight of the armour. It was incredible how easy it was to move around in this outfit, even more so than what I had worn before. The metal parts felt so light, yet they were even stronger than steel. The fabric was soft, but also durable too.

  Aside from the physical benefits like a stronger defense, there were actually some other bonuses too. For instance, it had a minor light affinity, making it useful when protecting against dark aligned attacks.

  “Eeeh!” Adalyn squealed, throwing me a thumbs up. “I’m so glad y’all love it! Nothin’ makes me happier than seeing my clothing joyfully worn!”

  I fluttered back down to the ground and landed on my feet, sharing a smile with Adalyn the whole time until she snatched me up and captured me in her loving bear-like grip.

  “Gah!” I uttered, squirming as I felt like a stress relief plushy.

  “I’m so happy! May that armour protect you with my love!”

  “Love, yeah, great!” I was practically being strangled by it. “Please let me go!”

  “Oops, sorry!” she released me, then patted my head nicely as a further sign of apology. “Can I ask y’all to do one more thing for me?” she sat back in a seat and folded her leg over, as if patiently waiting for me to put on some kind of a show. “Do that transformation thingy again. I need to see if the outfit can hold against that power.”

  That’s right… When I transformed the first time, it blasted away the armour I was wearing. The issue with her request was that my body was still recovering from this exhausting day, so I wasn’t going to be able to use it yet.

  She gave a peshaw wave of her hand and reached into a bag beside her, pulling out some sort of orange coloured drink. At first I thought it was one of those orange sodas that Cynthia gave to me, but this one was much smaller, like something that could fit in my pocket if I wanted.

  “Need some strength? Try this!”

  “Hmm…” I took the little bottle from her and sniffed an orange scented aroma coming out of it. “What is this?”

  “It’s a potion that should rejuvenate your strength,” she explained, taking a sip of a red variant. “Y’all think I run on coffee? This stuff is miles better, and less carbs too.”

  Upon her insistence, I took a sip. My taste buds welcomed the orange flavour, happily tingling while sending a message to the rest of my body to chug down this drink. The orange liquid was gone moments later.

  My eyes widened, feeling the rush of energy pulse through my veins. Suddenly, all my systems felt restored, like they’d gone into a temporary overdrive state, but quickly came down from that initial high point.

  “Woah!” I uttered, reeling my fists in eagerly and cheerfully wiggling back and forth. “That was wicked!”

  “It’s a rush like none other, ain’t it?” she took a final sip, finishing off the drink. “Too bad these lil things are so pricey. And don't drink too many all at once!”

  Potions were expensive to get already. Based on my experience with RPG’s, that made sense, especially in regards to stamina or energy potions. They always seemed to make those either really expensive or hard to find at all. Devs did that to make sure you couldn’t cheese a battle by just regenerating stamina for super moves.

  “Alright, ready to show me that power of yours?” Adalyn asked.

  Oh yeah. I could definitely test it out after that!

  “But, Miss Adalyn…” I looked all around us, noticing the messy fashion studio that was likely to be devastated by the transformation. “It might not be best to do it here.”

  Adalyn clapped her hands twice, summoning a few of the servants who were standing outside the door. They all scattered around and pushed all the clothing and mannequins away into storage rooms off to the sides. The studio suddenly looked more like an empty gymnasium.

  “There,” she uttered as we watched the hired hands complete their task and leave. “Give me a good show, okay, lil darlin’?”

  Now there really weren’t any excuses. I had the energy, and the space.

  I took to the center of this now surprisingly roomy studio. Then a few breaths got me internally focused, allowing me to fully tap into my stardust powers.

  Before opening the command console to try and reactivate the transformation, I made sure to pull Samael out of my hair. He slithered over to Adalyn, who let him coil up on her wrist.

  “Good boy… such a good boy…” she amusingly petted his head.

  “Sss…” he relaxed at her careful touch. She was really good with snakes.

  Normally, Samael was pretty daring and able to withstand the pressure of my combat mode, but without some more experimentation, I didn’t want to risk him getting hurt.

  “All right, here I go!”

  -Combat Mode : Active-

  My muscles swelled up, enhancing my strength past its limits. All systems dedicated to my other senses gained a heightened state of focus as well.

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  It seemed like the armour was just fine in this mode, but this wasn't exactly the best case for stress testing.

  “Positive results…” I commented in response to the experiment, but began internal preparations for my transformation.

  “Oooh…” Adalyn cooed out like a child watching something wondrous. “Show me more!”

  In order to go into the False Theta Form, I had to open up my command console and input the proper codes. At least, that was the only way I knew to access it as of then.

  -Entering False Theta transformation-

  An explosion of light ripped out of my skin, rapidly scattering across the room. The energy was pouring out of me so fast and violently that I felt like I was being torn apart from the inside out.

  I clenched my hands tightly at my side, as if gripping onto the power and forcing it to work with me. A drawn out growl left my mouth as I attempted to tame this wild energy. It focused along with my will, eventually ascending upwards like a weak aura.

  Things that Indena said during our sparring fight were surfacing in my mind. Calling me a daddy’s girl... Reminding me of all those people that died because I was weak... mocking my God… Those thoughts were making me lose focus and get angry, destabilizing my aura.

  I usually just let things Indena said go, because she was an idiot who ran her mouth when she shouldn’t have, but those things stuck with me because they felt true. I loved my best friend like a sister, but if I wanted to prove all the things she said wrong, I needed to get a grip on this power and use it to protect the world.

  “This is for humanity!”

  The aura became smaller, condensing down until it was a sparkling layer over me. Once it was nearly paper thin, I let out a yell and felt my body swell up even more than in my combat mode.

  My hair grew longer and shinier, waving with the wind that generated from my power. The halo I’d become accustomed to seeing also appeared above me, slightly glowing this time, as opposed to its dim appearance before.

  My eyes and heart began to flash between white and blue, settling on a brighter hue of cyan.

  For some reason, this time the transformation felt different. Calling it weaker wasn’t the right term, but it certainly felt different. There was less rage running through me, so I felt more focused and calm. It was like the energy was centering, rather than trying to escape outward.

  The armour seemed just fine too. It was even glowing a tiny bit, possibly channeling some of the energy flowing through me.

  When I looked over to where Adalyn and Samael were, both seemed to be hiding behind some sort of crate in the corner, peeking their heads out and watching me from as far a distance as this room could afford them.

  “Are you both okay?” I asked in a deeper, yet calm voice.

  “Just peachy,” Adalyn signed me an OK symbol with her hand. “I think I might have to shoot that question back at you.”

  This form made me feel stronger, but it came at a pretty high cost. It consumed stardust and magic power like crazy, not to mention my stamina was going down the drain. I'd probably only be able to hold it for a few minutes at best.

  It also made sense that I wasn't using the full potential of this form just yet, considering it was ‘false,’ but I had no idea what to expect from a true version. The UPGRADE menu didn't have anything on it just yet, so there had to be other methods to enhance it.

  Rather than waste my strength, I threw out a series of punches and kicks, further testing the capabilities of this transformation and the new armour. My speed and strength were greatly multiplied from base, and it seemed those increases stacked with my combat mode, but as expected, that was using up a lot of my body's resources.

  As far as the armour keeping up with my movements, it was just fine. My INVENTORY menu was showing that it’s durability wasn’t even going down from me wearing it in this strenuous condition.

  My body began to suddenly convulse uncomfortably as the strain of the transformation set in. I was twitching and grunting to try and deal with it, but I inevitably had to power down back to my base.

  “Phew!” I wiped the non-existent sweat from my brow as I was unburdened by the extreme inhancments. Then I took a power pose and shot a thumbs up at my friends. “This is great! I feel really cool. Thank you so much for all your help, Adalyn!”

  If we hadn’t come to her house, I never would have unlocked this power so soon, and I certainly wouldn’t have gotten this armour. She really was kind to us, and I appreciated her for it.

  “Aww, it was no trouble at all!” she put a hand to her heart as if accepting my words into her deepest most core. “Just stay close to me forever. I couldn’t bear to part with y’all, my lovely little darlin’!”

  She always sounded so dramatic, but I had to assume that ran in the family. Miss Lauri was just like her in a way.

  “Now, why don’t you run around the house and show off my work? I bet everyone will praise me for this one.”

  That sounded good to me! Once Samael was back on my head, I bolted out of their and flew down the halls to look for any of my friends.

  I passed by the door I’d blown up before, and it looked like two of the servants were almost done replacing it.

  “I got new armour! I got new armour!” I called out to them while flying by.

  “Mistress Adalyn seems to have kept her distracted,” said the male servant.

  “Good,” snickered the maid. “Less work for us,” she winked.

  My friends had to see me now, but almost everyone was on the other side of the house on the north wing.

  Yamin was the closest on my map, being just above me on the roof. Judging by how it was starting to get dark, she was probably stargazing. That view was going to be perfect tonight, I bet.

  It was also the perfect opportunity to show off my new look to her! I was a star, after all. The Eighth Star, to be exact. Tee hee...

  I flew out an open window and ascended straight toward the roof. Once passing the railing at the edge, I twirled around and landed just a few meters behind where Yamin was, following up my motion with a ballerina twirl and cute pose on my tippy toes.

  “Yamin, look at me…” My words froze mid sentence as I noticed she was in the arms of some random guy. It looked like they were about to share a smooch!

  “Kissy face!” I cried out, pointing their way.

  “Gah!” Yamin, who was startled, blushed and threw the man off her, almost shoving him over the railing and off the edge of the roof.

  “Woah!” he let out a surprisingly confident sound and grinned. “My lady, don’t push me away when we're just getting to know each other,” he winked with a snide voice.

  “Sh-shut up!” Yamin shouted at him, looking extremely uncomfortable doing so. “You’ll give her the wrong idea!”

  “I like this feisty side of you! I’ll do whatever you say, my lady.”

  I was just absolutely baffled on every level of this encounter. Who the heck was this guy, and where did he come from, and why was he simping over Yamin? Actually, why weren't my sensors detecting him either?

  “Yamin, what’s going on here?” I asked her.

  She had a conflicted look on her face, but took a breath and sat kindly on an outdoor chair next to the roof's pool.

  “Well, it all started after your fight with Indena…”

  -We have some guest art from @CenturyRobot! It's 1 of 3-

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