Game Night

[System 316: Quest complete! Redeem rewards?]

Iris dismissed the system notification for later. There were far too many witnesses right now and it would not be good to make a book appear from nowhere. Even if her tribe mates couldn't tell anyone, the fewer people who knew about Iris's system, the better.

After the group dispersed, Iris invited Holly and Fawn over to her house to hang out. Everyone but Ember would have to go out to work today so Iris was feeling lonely. It would be good to spend time with her friends for a while.

Holly and Fawn both had to meet up with their own families first, but easily agreed to visit. Thus, Iris returned home first. As Ember returned to incubating the familiar egg, Iris informed him

"I invited Holly and Fawn to visit today. I know you don't like me working too hard while pregnant so I won't do anything but sit and chat today. It's a real shame to not be able to bake cookies or anything, but I won't do it and cause you to worry."

Iris brushed her hand against Ember's feathered beak as she spoke. Ember couldn't reply in his Phoenix form, but he was happy that he wouldn't have to argue the matter today. Although Ember could tell that Iris seemed sad to not have the freedom to do as she pleased, Ember was happy she was behaving.

Iris was already more than halfway through her pregnancy so she was prone to getting dizzy and feeling off balance. That wasn't to mention getting clumsy and absent-minded or how sore she always was. Really, Ember was bitter that he had agreed to raise an egg for Iris rather than taking care of her. It would be too much if he had to worry about her getting into trouble on top of everything else.

Iris sat on her bed as she waited for her guests. Since she has free time, Iris redeemed her quest reward. A book titled "Ancient Woodworking" appeared in Iris's hands and Ember looked at her curiously. Since Ember had built a nest in the master bedroom to incubate the egg, he was easily able to keep an eye on Iris.

Iris gave an awkward smile to Ember as she replied

"That was just the reward for the task we completed by making the laws. It's another book, but I'm just going to put it away for now."

Iris still had her dimensional bag with her as she always liked to keep it close by. Caspian and Basil had taken out all of the stone and piled it up when they first arrived in the area so Caspian did not need it to make stone bricks. Basil was too busy farming all day to be running around treating people so he didn't need to bother with borrowing the bag either.

When Basil treated patients at night, he would just invite them into their living room and borrow the bag until he was done. There had yet to be any wild animal attacks or other emergencies so Basil did not need to borrow the bag in the daytime.

As the stone brick homes had neither windows nor doors, visitors could not knock when they came to visit. Thus, Holly could only have her mate loudly declare their intention to visit Iris from outside their home.

"Holly is here to visit Iris. Fawn is here as well."

Iris slowly waddled downstairs and lifted the animal skin covering the door. Iris smiled, happy to see her two friends and hugged Holly as she greeted

"I'm glad you both could visit today. My mates have all been so busy that it gets a bit lonely at times."

Fawn, who had fifteen mates now, could not understand Iris's pain. She bluntly replied

"You should get more mates. I can send ten of my mates out to work and I'd still have five mates at home. Surely there are males in our tribe who would agree to become mates with you?"

Iris gave Fawn a flat look. Even if it was normal to have several dozens of mates in the beast world, Iris was not going to rush into relationships. She still wanted males who would get along well with each other and whom she could care for.

"I appreciate your suggestion, but I can't just accept anyone into my family. Since my family is treated so we'll be everyone, I should choose my mates with care. I can't risk choosing a bad apple who would mistreat the tribe by taking advantage of everyone's trust."

Holly hung off of Iris's arm as she practically bounced around in excitement as she exclaimed

"I know, right! It was so cool how everyone was willing to agree to your new laws and your family being in power. I was so nervous that I'd be alone in wanting to support you since I know you always take good care of me!"

Iris smiled sweetly at Holly as she patted her head like a small child. Iris simply could not get over how cute and pure-hearted her friend was. Fawn began to feel impatient about waiting out in the heat and asked

"Can we go inside now? It's too hot outside since it's still the hot season."

Iris apologized as she led the way inside the house. As it would be rude to enter another's home without a good reason, two each of Holly's and Fawn's mates stood guard outside Iris's house. Iris felt guilty making them stand around outside, but knew it was not a good idea to invite them in. Thus, she ignored the matter as she led her friends upstairs.

Iris had her friends go to her room and gave them pillows she stole off of her mates' beds. The floor was too uncomfortable to sit on and there was still no furniture in the house. While Iris would happily make furniture for her house, there was too little manpower both in the tribe and in her family to do so currently.

Iris was running low on jerky and had already run out of sunflower seeds. So she could only pull out some berries and dried vegetables for them to snack on while they played games. Since Manacala and Checkers were small enough to fit into her bag, Iris obviously brought them with her.

Iris and her two friends took turns playing and spectating with the winner playing whoever sat out the previous round each time. Even with Iris's initial advantage of growing up with games like these, Holly and Fawn had already caught up to Iris in skill. The three often hung out so it was only natural that they would improve with time. However, Iris did not mind if she won or lost as much as she enjoyed their company.

Holly was chatty as always while Fawn was still very quiet. Fawn never said much of anything and Iris had never seen her hang out with anyone else outside of her own family. So Iris did not think much of it when Fawn remained quiet throughout most of their visit, even when Fawn seemed to be staring at Iris.

"So, Iris, are you pregnant with cubs? You never seem to eat much yet you've gained a lot of weight recently."

Iris turned red as her eyebrows twitched. If Iris did not consider Fawn a friend, she'd think she'd just been called fat. Iris cleared her throat awkwardly as she replied

"Err, yes I am. That was why I was wearing a dream flower around my wrist during our travels. I would have thought you knew."

Holly's eyes lit up as she excitedly exclaimed

"Wow! You must be so excited! You're going to have cubs running around the house soon. Do you know when you are due?"

Holly made it difficult to say anything negative so Iris did not tell her how conflicted she was about having children. Instead, she just answered

"Well, we spent two months traveling then it's been almost a month since we arrived here. So I'm maybe four months along now? I guess that means I'll be giving birth in another two months..."

Holly's tail happily swayed as she happily chattered about the new cubs. Iris felt guilty that Holly almost seemed more excited about her having cubs than Iris was herself. However, Iris could not help that raising children just sounded like far more responsibility than she was ready for.