"New Skill?" asked Lily looking up at the drake while tapping her chin in thought.
"Yup! I leveled up too! I can create rope out of nothing now, I don't need to have a store of the stuff or anything!"
Lily laughed and high fived the tigerkin, beyond pleased that the teenager was getting stronger like herself.
The drake spat a few loose strands of hemp from his mouth and glared at them.
"Let me go! I wanted nothing to do with this!"
"Hmm. Okay!" said Tami.
The drake blinked at her. "Y-you will?"
"Sure, if you tell me why you wanted to kill me."
The drake swallowed nervously. "I- I didn't it was just the job…"
"The job?"
"Yes! Gods you people really have no idea. It's Bine! This city! What? did you think you could just open up the economy like this and have zero repercussions?"
"I… don't know what you are talking about…"
The drake looked a little exasperated. "Think about it, you've made one of the most welcoming cities there is for merchants to come and do what they like, unbothered by the dragons like in other cities."
"And that's bad?"
"Yes! The capital, Draconica! The short lifer species merchants are slowly moving their business from Draconica to Bine, away from the capital, do you know what that means? Gradually there's been less and less gold flowing in, less and less gold for the old dragon nobility to leech off and snatchup. They don't like it, they don't like it at all. They don't like that their source of treasure is buggering off here to Bine. They know full well it's happening and are trying to put a stop to it."
Lily looked up at the drake, suddenly feeling utterly lost in something she didn't understand. She was just a smol rural otterkin girl who grew up miles away from any city, this was far far beyond her pay grade. "Wh-what about Queen Excalavania?" she asked, wondering if she was asking something ignorant.
"She doesn't give a shit, she's already filthy disgusting rich, she has mountains-, Look, this is about the old nobles only, they are the ones who can't let go of their greed. They gave us the job, kill the daughter of the merchant with the most political reach, the most social influence, the one who's pushing the city to open up the most."
"B-but that's insane! That wouldn't make mother stop, she'd push ten times as hard!"
"Dragons. Dragons don't understand subtlety, they understand overwhelming dominance and threats, sending a message. 'Mess with us and we will kill your loved ones'. It's absolutely going to work too, who in their right bloody mind wants to draw a dragon's ire?!"
Lily glanced between the two, suddenly worried for Tami, her friend.
"Uhm, so what now?"
A shadow passed over her.
"Nothing for you Lily, your captain needs you."
She looked up to find a still smartly dressed and very preggers Flora floating above. The gnome flicked her hand and Lily yelped as she was dragged up into the air.
"W-wait!"
Tami let out a breath and looked up at her friend. "It's fine Lils, I can handle this, I'm not my mother's daughter for nothing. Go and do your adventuring stuff, I'll send for the city guard, gods knows now we know what's actually going on there's going to be hell to pay."
"...but" said Lily forlornly. She drifted out of the hole in the roof and hovered up next to Flora. The gnome girl squinted at her suspiciously.
"Why are your breasts suddenly so large?"
"Why are yours so small!"
"A dairy did... nevermind, we're leaving, come on."
--
Flora flew the otterkin girl over to the AG where they met up with the rest of the band, after a small stop off for Lily to grab a bed sheet to cover over her now far larger breasts of course.
A lot of the band had grown so large that it was getting tricky to fit in the crowded interior of the AG, and would at the very least mean some uncomfortable close contact. As it was Vivi, Flora, Kayla, and now Lily had elected to remain in a deserted alley around the side of the building.
Vivi lazed on the back steps of one of the buildings, a tentacle holding a platter full of snacks to one side of her while another held up a beer for her to sip from on the other.
"And that's why all of us aren't quite as milky and full as before," she said, finishing her story of what happened at the cowkin dairy.
Lily scratched her cheek still feeling a little lost. "But like, people really buy that stuff? At a premium? Not that I'm complaining but milk is kinda just seasoned water right?"
Vivi yawned lazily, "Yeah, like cheese is a loaf of milk."
"And meat is just really well processed grass," said Flora from where she hovered, chin cupped in hand, elbow on stomach.
"Okay, maybe that was a silly way of putting it, but it's still just milk!"
"Platinum grade milk. That's special, special meaning filthy rich fuckers are willing to splurge on it so they can feel superior to us commoners."
"I… I guess that makes sense…"
"How's the bra I stole Lils?" mumbled Vivi tearing a fox toothed bite out of a chicken wing.
Lily took a few wobbly steps forward, her enormous chest coming with her, although reluctantly due to sheer inertia. What was more surprising was that she didn't immediately faceplant onto the paving as her torso covering breasts clearly made her ridiculously front heavy. Instead, she remained upright, her chest pushed up and normal as any other bra would, just on a larger scale. She turned on the spot, her boobs wobbling to the side as she went.