The ancient trees were so tall you could barely make out their top, their trunks wider than barrels. A persistent canopy of leaves and branches filtered the scant sunlight. Min had to watch her step to avoid tripping on roots or sinking into the hidden piles of mud strewn around the forest floor.
According to the information they gathered, Liana was a red-headed renegade wizard that had set up camp somewhere in the forest. She liked to pass the time by stealing from any caravan that dared to cross her immediate vicinity.
All her robberies had been bloodless so far, but she had developed a particularly depraved reputation among the townspeople after her latest heist. Liana had stolen everything that a passing caravan was carrying, including the clothes on their back. The merchants, and the noble travelers with them, arrived empty-handed and buck naked in town.
While she wasn´t one to normally sympathize with the plight of such wealthy citizens, Min felt a fire burning in her heart to deliver some justice in this case. The memory of her recent naked misadventures still gave her goosebumps. She would rather no one else suffer a similar indignity.
Tracking Liana was a trivial matter for Celeria, who moved across the woods with the ease of a wild animal. They found her little camp on a glade next to a shallow river.
Liana appeared to be sitting alone eating her lunch, roasted fish. She wore an oversized grey robe and had her magic staff resting at her side. The mage was kind of short, at least half a head shorter than Celeria, and somewhat pale. Min expected an old witch, but this woman was barely older than she was.
"So, a renegade mage. How are we going to take her down?" Min asked. She was prone on the floor, hiding behind some bushes next to Celeria.
"Good question. She is wanted alive, so I can't just snipe her. But, she is a mage, so we can't charge blindly either. First, we need to separate her from her staff."
"Yes, of course… why?"
"Because you can't cast spells without an arcane conduit?"
"But I saw you cast spells earlier by just chanting an incantation."
"Yes, but I'm an elf. My body generates mana on its own. Humans need to draw it from the environment with a wand or a staff. Come on, you are an adventurer. You should know this."
"…Yes, of course, I knew that… I was just making sure things worked the same on this side of the world."
"Right..."
Min coughed. "Anyway, she seems to always keep that staff within arms' length. I don't think we'll be able to take it from her without a fight."
"Then we need to disrupt her concentration. Make her too angry, agitated, or flustered to cast a proper spell."
"Flustered, huh? I've become something of an expert on that emotion as of late. I think I have an idea."
Heeding Min's plan, Celeria crouched and stealthily let three arrows loose toward the ground around Liana, they all hit their mark silently with pinpoint accuracy. Wow, Celeria was the picture of a seasoned adventurer. There was nothing she couldn't do. Would Min ever become as cool as her?
Min shook her head. What was she thinking? Of course not. She was going to become much cooler than the elf! She was destined to become the world's greatest heroine, after all.
While Min hidden and biding her time, Celeria jumped into the glade.
"Hey shorty, did your grandma give you that robe, or are so incompetent a robber that you can't afford something made this century?"
Liana dropped her fish in shock at the sudden appearance of the elf. But her surprise was short-lived.
"Big talk from the soon-to-be fried elf." Liana grabbed her staff and aimed it at Celeria. "Why don´t I show you exactly how good I am at my trade?" Electric sparks formed around her body, her eyes started to glow, she got up and-
"Eeep!"
Liana´s robe ripped apart. Celeria's arrows had pinned the old garment to the ground, and when Liana stood up in a hurry, the tattered seams finally gave in. The fabric bunched up uselessly near the mage's sandaled feet. The mage's face became red out of shame and anger. A loincloth hid her womanhood, and a white cloth wrapped around her torso to support her modest chest. "That was my grandfather's robe, you bitch!"
"Knew it!"
Min exited the bush and tiptoed behind the mage, aiming to nab her staff from under her nose. Her plan worked! The woman was distracted. And now she was about to take down a freaking mage using nothing but her wits.
Min giggled to herself, a bit too loudly. Liana turned around and spotted her. "Crap, I´m surrounded." If she zapped the elf, her partner could plunge a dagger into her back while she was concentrating on the spell, and vice versa.
"Better not take my chances. How did the teleportation spell go?" Liana mumbled something, the first sentence Min couldn't understand since she started her new life.
"Oh no, you don't!" Min ran to tackle the woman, standing from her crouching stance and moving her legs as fast as they could. A flash of light emanated from the staff, bathing the glade in blinding warmth just before she could touch Liana.
"Huh? Nothing happened!" Min pointed out the obvious. Liana was still standing in front of her, bent over her knees and panting her lungs out after casting the complex spell.
"Err, Min," Celeria called out. "You might want to look down."
"COME ON!" Min stomped her bare feet into the wet grass. She could see her fluffy nipples rising on her chest with each breath. She could feel the wind flowing around her naked chest.
"Crap, I teleported the wrong things," Liana muttered.
"You think?! How could you make such a stupid mistake?!"
"Casting spells is not easy! Magic takes a lot of concentration, and the intonations are quite simila-"
"Celeria, the bounty said to bring her back alive, right?"
"Yes?"
"Then I'm going to owe you even more money because I'm going to kill her!" Min jumped at Liana like a leopard, her fingers stretched like claws to try to scratch the mage´s face and/or throat. "Give me back my clothes!"
Liana barely had enough time to raise her staff and put it between Min´s assault and her pretty face.
"S-stop! Go away! What was the pushing spell? Mighty Push? No, that was not it. Great Wave--Ack!" A torrent of water poured out of Liana´s staff. Like a high-pressure hose, the current pushed Min back into the ground. "That oughta to teach you! H-had enough?"
Min lifted her face from the ground, the water had mixed with the soil and covered the back of Min´s skin in a thin layer of mud. She quickly crossed her legs and folded one arm over her sprightly chest.
"You strip me of my clothes, and now you cover me up in mud? I think I know why you stripped the last caravan you robbed. You are a pervert!"
"I´m n-not! It´s really your fault for-"
"Give me that staff! Let´s see how you like it if I teleport your clothes for a change!" Min grabbed Liana´s staff from the ground and used it as leverage to get to her feet. Without letting go, she tried to yank the staff away from Liana, starting a tug-of-war for the arcane conduit.
"Let go! You are going to break it! You don´t even know any teleport spells!"
"How hard can it be if even a pervert like you can cast them?!"
"I´m not a per- Wait, I feel like I´m forgetting something. Ah, the elf!" Liana looked left, Celeria was mid sprint and about to reach her. Her fist was already closed and her arm winding back for a powerful left hook aimed at the mage´s head. "This is bad. I need to teleport for real this time!"
Liana mumbled more arcane words, and the staff shone much more powerfully this time.
The light blinded Celeria's sensitive eyes, and she crashed headfirst into another woman. They tumbled into the ground and then slid into the shallow river.
Luckily, the only thing hurt was her pride. Celeria rubbed her eyes. She could still only see white. "Ugh, I guess she got away, huh?"
"Oh? Y-yes. That dastardly mage is long gone. But I think I saw her somewhere behind you. Quick! Run over there and don't look back."
"…" Celeria opened her eyes. A blurry Liana was standing on the other side of the river. "You teleported Min away, didn't you?"
"If you mean your companion, I-I guess I accidentally did. As I was saying, teleportation magic is quite compl-"
Celeria pounced on the mage, knocking her onto the muddy river bank. Liana held her staff horizontally in front of her torso, trying to push the elf away.
"Where did you teleport her?!"
"I don't know! I couldn't concentrate with you two brutes fighting me!"
"So, you could have teleported her to the middle of the ocean? Or a thousand feet in the air?!" Celeria pushed strongly, pressing the staff against Liana's neck and almost choking her.
"N-no! Ack! The spell only takes you to places you have already been! She should be fine. I p-promise!"
"Well then, it's your lucky day. I'm taking you back alive."
"Y-you wish! Third time's the charm!"
With a swift knee to the elf´s stomach, Liana pushed Celeria away and chanted her spell. The staff began glowing again. Celeria closed her eyes just before the flash of light came out. Was Liana gone?
No, she wasn't.
"Ha! Third´s time the charm, was it?"
"…"
"You are the worst mage I ever met."
"You know? This could be considered karma for what you did. I bet the Gracious Sisters are laughing at you right now."
"… haha, yes. So, now that the universe has deemed it fit to punish me, there's no reason to take me bac-oww!"
Celeria flipped Liana over like a pancake, tying her hands behind her back with a rope. She forced the mage to her feet and began marching her away from the forest.
"You wish. The townsfolk are going to love to see you like this."
The nerdy mage was naked, having accidentally teleported her remaining clothes AND her staff as she did with Min. Compared to the athletic elf, the woman barely had any muscle on her limbs or curves in her slender physique.
She wiggled her hands, desperately trying to get free, but Celeria knew her knots. Liana grimaced while looking down at her milky white skin, some freckles adorning the collarbone on top of her bare breasts. She teleported everything away, even her sandals.
The elf couldn't march Liana into town like that, could she? The milkmaids were going to point at her little tits and laugh! Barbers would make snide comments about the lack of grooming in the fiery-red bush growing on her crotch. The guards were going to mock her pathetic noodle arms! Liana gulped. "N-no! Let me go! I'll double your reward!"
"Seeing you squirm like this is already worth more than your bounty. Start walking."