Chapter 16

She was suddenly woken by a loud, persistent knock on her door. Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, Laura tried to get up, just to forget about the limited space between the bed and the closet again, which lead to her tail getting caught between it and her feet. Letting out a decently loud curse over the pain, the Kitsune slid out of bed more carefully and walked over to her rooms door, sliding it open a bit, before remembering her current appearance.

Focusing for now just on covering her eyes, she stopped opening the door the moment she could peek outside, doing her best to move her tails to where they wouldn't be seen. Standing before her door was Daiki, with a rather concerned expression on his face.

"What's up?" Laura asked, just barely awake, her ears, hopefully from the other student by the door, flicking back and forth in annoyance.

"I was wondering if everything is alright with you, Gabe just told me what happened." the black haired student asked, sounding as worried as he looked.

"Well everything is alright as it can be." the Kitsune replied, before interrupting herself with a yawn, "Would have liked to enjoy my nap some more though."

"Ah sorry for waking you, but dinner is starting in about half an hour, and I assumed you would prefer to be woken from your nap rather than miss it." Daiki explained to the half asleep spirit.

"Thank you for that then, give me a bit to get ready, I'll meet you in front of the dorm if that's alright." Laura replied, and after the japanese man responded with a nod, she closed the door again.

Stretching a bit, Laura turned to the closet, deliberating what to wear. After a few minutes of deliberation what would be most comfortable to wear with her tails, Laura came to the conclusion that nothing would fit as good as the yukata made for spirits like herself. But as that was both dirty and probably hard to explain where she got it, the Kitsune instead went for a simple shirt and skirt combo, with a pair of tights pulled up to her tails' base, to minimize what a twitch of her tails could reveal.

Another minute later she had recreated the illusions hiding her new nature and made her way out of the dormitory. Just as she had suggested, Daiki was waiting there.

"That was faster than I expected." the young man said as Laura walked up to him.

"Why would I take any longer than absolutely necessary to get ready for food?" The Kitsune asked, her stomach giving a loud growl of consent. "Especially when I'm this hungry."

"Ah well with how asleep you looked, and you know media, I thought you would take as much of that half hour as you could get away with." Daiki admitted, looking down at Laura's feet.

"Ah no worries, let's just get to the cafeteria to get in line before we have to wait outside the actual building." the orange haired woman said before grabbing Daiki's wrist and dragging him across campus. When they reached the cafeteria there were still 10 minutes left till the doors would open to let the students get their food, but even so there were already a handful of people waiting in line. While reading through the information of what was on the menu this evening, Daiki spoke up. "So you still up for trying out Kendo the day after tomorrow?"

"Was definitely planning to." Laura replied, careful to keep her back close to a wall, so no one would run into her hidden tails. "I do hope that I won't need my own equipment right a way though."

"No need to worry about that, for the start you'll only need a shinai, gi and hakama anyways, and even some of the older participants still borrow equipment form the university." the young man explained to the spirit.

"That's good then." Laura replied before scratching one of her hidden ears as she asked. "Kitsune Udon was noodles with tofu right?"

"Yeah, and most of the Udon in the cafeteria is good enough, so you can't really go wrong with it." Daiki informed her

"That's good, a warm soup with noodles is just what I need." the kitsune says, rubbing her rumbling belly in anticipation of warm food.

"You're in for a treat then."

A quarter of an hour later, after Gabe had joined up with them, the three of them were looking for a place to sit down and enjoy their dinner. Sitting down comfortably in the plastic chairs the cafeteria used proved quite a challenge for Laura. In the end, she settled for sitting on the very edge of the chair, with her, still invisible, tails taking up all the space between the back of the chair and herself.

"So next week classes begin, any tips on how to handle them and assignments professors hand out?" She inquired as she picked up her chopsticks, looking forward to eating the bowl full of noodles and hot soup before her.

"Well try to take as many notes as you can, especially in the purely japanese classes you have. As for assignments try getting them done as soon as you have the time to spend on them, or they will pile up way faster than you expect." Daiki explains between bites of his own dinner, consisting mostly of tempura shrimps with a side of vegetables and rice.

"Mhm this is indeed great." Laura said as she swallowed her first bite of tofu. "And thanks, I'll try to do so."

"So what have the two of you planned for tomorrow?" the japanese student inquired of his two companions.

"Well the Rugby team seems to have their first training session tomorrow afternoon, so I will be occupied with that. Otherwise not much yet." Gabe replies, before focusing more on enjoying his food.

"I am going to mostly relax, maybe go into town to get some snacks in the supermarket." The Kitsune replied between mouthfuls of food, as she seemed to be inhaling her food, a frown spreading over her face after she ate the last bit of fried tofu.

"If you don't mind I'll join you on that shopping trip." Daiki commented, which got promptly responded to with a shrug before Laura swallowed "Sure, I don't mind."