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"Why don't we sit-- umm…" Uma step

Grace couldn't believe what she was seeing. She could only stare with utter disbelief as Kalea approached Rich. "I don't think y--," she stopped mid-sentence, biting her lip. 'Should I really be trying to stop her?' She mused, attempting to consider her goals.

"Yo! Rich, how are ya?" Kalea asked as she stopped before the farmer with her hands on her hips.

Rich stopped tilling and looked up with a scowl. "I'm pretty busy here; we have a tight schedule, you see. Mind movin' over so I can keep going?" He curtly responded.

Kalea brushed her fingers through her deep red hair and sighed. "Hmmm… Yeah, I don't think I will." She stepped forward, standing a foot from Rich as she peered down at him. She had a few inches on the farmer.

Rich's face contorted into a severe glower. "Mistress Yulia won't be pleased with you."

Grace watched the confrontation unfold before her eyes. Uma had implied Kalea was quite unhinged, so she wasn't stunned. It only took her a few seconds to understand how beneficial this situation could be. She would see firsthand what happens when one of the contestants causes an uproar; furthermore, Kalea was an adult who could make her own decisions. It wasn't her place to babysit her competition.

Kalea grunted and rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I don't really give a shit. You know something about the second game, right? Does it have something to do with all this farm bs you're doing here? Why don't you help me out?"

"Just stay out of my way while I'm out here working. I'm not saying anything else, so move it along and let me do my job," Rich said coldly as he unflinchingly met Kalea's gaze.

As the argument continued, Grace honed in on what Rich just said. 'Stay out of his way while he's out there working?' She mused.

Gina and Edith approached from behind the house before stopping and watching the spectacle. They kept their distance from Grace, standing ahead of her and to the right. She decided to ignore them, returning her focus to the brewing fight.

Kalea looked pissed. "Dude. I'm fucking tired of this shit. We're already treated worse than livestock, and now you won't even tell us the rules for whatever the hell we're supposed to be doing?" Her face then contorted into a wide grin. She placed a hand on the farmer's chest and roughly pushed.

When Rich didn't budge an inch, Kalea's grin was quickly replaced with an expression of shock.

"Please. Do you think I'd be threatened by a little girl like you?" Rich laughed. "You deserve to be punished for laying a hand on me. But, if you walk away now, we can forget that anything happened."

Phoebe and Ruby approached Grace after leaving through Verdant Manor's front door. "Hey!" Phoebe waved, running over to Grace. "What's going on here?" She asked in confusion.

"Hey," Grace turned toward Phoebe. "Kalea picked a fight she won't win," she quickly replied before looking forward.

"Little girl?" Kalea winced, her face turning red. A glint of rage flashed in her eyes. Without warning, she leaned back and put her entire body into punching Rich squarely in the face with a loud thud.

"THUNK!"

As the onlookers gasped in horror, Kalea suddenly screamed in pain. "AHHHH!!!" She fell to her knees, trembling as she feebly held her wrist. Two of her fingers were severely broken, her knuckles bleeding.

Ruby put a hand over her mouth, staring in horror while Phoebe winced from the cries of pain and scrunched her eyebrows.

Grace was startled by the cries of pain but didn't feel much sympathy toward Kalea. She should have easily known better after watching Yulia overpower Rose during orientation. On that note, they all witnessed Ella as she rapidly transformed into a half-horse creature.

Rich shook his head and tapped his ear with two fingers. "I just heard from Mistress Yulia. She's given me an extra thirty-minute break, so I'll be on my way while you receive your punishment," he stated calmly before walking toward the stable, whistling the whole way.

"P-- Punishment? Fuck-- what are you made of!?" Kalea stammered as she held her hand in front of her. “My hand-- it’s so fucked up…”

“Attention, everyone!" Yulia's voice boomed, causing everyone except Rich to completely freeze. Her voice was enough to send a chill down the girls' spines. "I assume you recall what happened to Ella during your orientation. It will take approximately three minutes for Kalea's hand to heal, at which point, her punishment will be administered." She continued after a moment of silence. "Please let this serve as a reminder that challenging our rules will not benefit you in any way." With that, Yulia's voice ceased.

Ruby frowned. "I can't stand to watch this. No one is forcing us to this time," she sighed before leaving.

Phoebe glanced at Ruby as she disappeared before turning to Grace. "Well, I guess this is happening today," she muttered.

A plethora of different thoughts wracked Grace's brain. Seeing Kalea in so much pain was unfortunate, but she didn't have time to waste. What had she learned from this whole debacle? For one, they now had confirmation that Rich had superhuman strength, much like Yulia. Additionally, punishments would be dished out to those who broke the rules. While it was nice to have this information confirmed, these facts didn't seem immediately helpful. On the other hand, she felt she was on the cusp of understanding something fundamental about the second Mollusk Match game.

"Grace?" Phoebe asked, tilting her head.

"Oh, sorry!" Grace weakly smiled, turning toward Phoebe once again. "I'm a little lost in thought; apologies."

"Don't sweat it; I don't blame you."

While they conversed, Kalea let out a low moan as her hand began to crack and pop. After a few seconds, her index finger snapped back into place, the mangled bones healing while the skin of her bloodied knuckles healed.

Grace was snapped out of her trance upon witnessing Kalea's healing; she had never seen anything like this before. She should have expected medical technology like this to be possible after everything she had seen, but seeing such serious injuries disappear instantly astonished her. It was only a short time before her middle finger healed, and all visible wounds faded.

"Oh, shit…" Kalea stood to her feet while still trembling. She looked at her hands, her lips curling into a smug smile. "Is this the big punishment? I'll be disappointed if this is your idea of justice!" She shouted, staring up at the sky.

Just as Kalea spoke, she suddenly doubled over, wrapping her arms over her stomach.

"Ugghhh!" Her body immediately broke out into profuse sweating.

Grace's heart rate picked up, her blood running cold. It was easy to emotionally distance herself from Kalea's suffering after she brought the pain upon herself, but this was different. After living with Ella as a constant reminder of what she had to lose, she didn't know if she had it to watch a repeat orientation performance. She recalled her vivid nightmares and the desperate cries of Ella as she moaned out from behind her bedroom door.

'Maybe I should leave,' Grace told herself. Ruby had a point; no one was forcing them to watch Kalea's descent into beasthood.

Crimson feathers sparsely sprouted from various points on Kalea's body while her bones popped and creaked. Amidst her horror, the look on her face contorted from a visage of horror to a strange, blissful smile. "Fuuuuck yes… This is a real punishment!" She growled as her legs bent and contorted.

The girls gasped and stared in awe. Phoebe winced and flashed a look of disgust. "Wait-- what? Is she for real?" Grace wanted to look away but couldn't. She watched as Kalea fell to the ground, feathers rapidly appearing as they coated her arms and legs. 'I assumed a bird, but--' she briefly mused before noticing something pointed ripping through Kalea's shoes.

"Uggggh!" Kalea's body spasmed as sharp talons quickly tore through her sneakers. All the while, her lower legs thinned while wrinkles formed.

Grace put a hand over her mouth and closed her eyes, taking a slow breath. What was she supposed to say or think? Kalea served as another poignant reminder of what each contestant had to lose, but she also brought it on herself.

Moans and purrs filled the courtyard as Kalea's toes merged and elongated with razor-sharp talons at the end of each. The toes at the front of each foot merged into only three, while a fourth extended outward from the back of each heel. "Oh man-- I'm a fucking bird for real, huh?" Kalea spat before letting out a deranged laugh. Her laughter cut off when her hips suddenly jerked upward, and she rolled onto her stomach with a wavering moan.

"I think I'm good on this whole thing… Take care, Grace," Phoebe said quietly, placing a hand on her shoulder before leaving.

"Y-- Yeah, no problem," Grace muttered. She opened her eyes and saw Kalea on her hands and knees, her hips jutted upward in the air as feathers poked out from the gap between her shirt and pants.

“Ugh-- my fucking-- feet… I'm a real freak now, like Ella!" She cackled as her tailfeathers grew and fanned out from her tailbone. While most of her right arm was now coated in feathers, the transformation there seemed to stop after her nails took on sharp points. Her left arm, however, was a different story.

'Crrrrick!' 

The fingers of Kalea's left hand fused together and elongated, stretching as they converged into a couple of barely defined, claw-like digits. "Heh…" Kalea shorted between labored pants, holding her hand up. "Only need my right; what-- ooooh!" She suddenly let out a shrill cry as feathers quickly bloomed from her new pseudo-wing.

Grace was vaguely aware of Edith vomiting and Gina taking her from the scene. Before she knew it, she was the only one left to witness the end game of Kalea's transformation. All she could do was watch as Kalea's arm grew outward, expanding as it took the shape of a wing with crimson-red plumage. Kalea must have made a few enemies considering no one had been willing to wait and see if she would need any help post-punishment.

Kalea leaned forward, her chest pressed against the ground while her hips pressed upward. “Mmm-- oooh…” She moaned and purred, writhing and twitching as her sweat-soaked clothes clung to her taut body. Her legs appeared completely avian, with thin, wrinkled legs that led to four-pronged talons. Tailfeathers fanned from her rear, and her left arm had wholly become a wing.

Grace hesitantly stared, not realizing her body was trembling. Images of a freshly transformed Ella darted through her head. She heard her moans and pleas for help as she masturbated behind the walls of her room. She thought she had somewhat come to terms with the Ella situation, but Kalea's transformation shocked her in a way she couldn't quite describe.

'This could be me-- or Arina….' She grimaced, trying not to visualize herself or her best friend getting rapidly changed into something decidedly less than human. She tried to get a grasp on her emotions as simultaneous pangs of dread and numb indifference coursed through her. The others chose to walk away, so why did Grace stay? Was it wrong of her not to feel worse for Kalea? Instead, her concerns focused on her Ella-related trauma and her mission to survive Mollusk Match. The only thing she knew for sure was that she had been far more upset watching Ella morph before her eyes.

"Oh god…" Kalea moaned, shakily sitting up as she stared down at her feet. A strange look spread across her face as she moved her new toes and examined her new form with ragged, adrenaline-fueled breaths. She held her left wing up and stared for a solid minute before laughing. "Damn, I'm really fucked, huh?" She asked, turning toward Grace. "A couple more losses, and I'll be pecking birdseed. Might even lay an egg."

Grace wasn't sure how to respond. "Are you, umm--... Are you okay?" She asked quietly, knowing it was an incredibly dumb question.

"Never better! So. Do you know what you're turning into?" Kalea demanded. "Let's face it, we're fucked. I hope you're not too fond of your thumbs," she said with a wide smirk.

CHAPTER END

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