Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was probably about time I gave up.

The sunlight pressing down on the back of my shoulders made it so that, even if I could find a comfortable position to fall back asleep in, it’d become uncomfortably warm, which would lead to my clothes and hair becoming damp with sweat. If there was anything that could make this journey less bearable, it’d be that sensation dogging me through what remained of it.

To say nothing of the fact that I’d have to drape a book over my face just to keep the sun out of my eyes. Midday was maybe an hour away, and the trees casting shade along the road were becoming inconveniently sparse as the coach neared my destination.

Accepting my fate and sitting upright, I glanced first at the pile of exhausted reading material in my lap, then at the other passengers on board. There were four besides myself, which made the ride a bit crowded.

Up to this point, there had been relatively few others riding with me for the week-and-a-half journey. There was one man – a fellow with graying hair and a prickly aura – who had boarded not long after myself, and stayed on for long enough that when he got up at our most recent stop, I was surprised, and maybe even a bit disappointed.

Not because he was good company, but because I couldn’t think back to a moment where we exchanged words the entire time. He kept to his own collection of reading material, and left me to mine. There was a certain camaraderie in meeting-without-meeting someone who knew how to mind their own business.

Conversely, when the current set of passengers replaced him, I found them eager to stare at me in bewildered fascination; stares that would dart away when I met their gaze. I suppose that was understandable, given I was dressed in a full set of armor.

My business in Iorys was of a sort that required such peculiar paraphernalia, and while I didn’t wish to draw attention to myself, the coach did not have nearly that much room for personal effects, and the next best option was to simply have it on my person.

◄—•—►

“Iorys, South Gate! 10 minutes ‘til arrival!”

The coachman’s call came as something of a surprise, as I had mentally steeled myself for a longer few hours than what had ostensibly just passed. In tune with his words, though, the muffled clopping of horse hooves on dirt turned into stony clacking, signifying the beginning of Iorys’ cobble roads.

A handful of the other passengers scrambled to peep through the tiny windows on either side of the carriage, letting out awestruck “oohs” and “ahhs”, presumably at the sight of the gargantuan tree, Yggdrasil, to which Iorys arguably owed its existence.

My intent was not sightseeing, however.

I kept a blasé mien to the front of the carriage to assure the other passengers as much. As the minutes passed, excited chatter over what element of the city to experience first mingled with the noisy grinding of the wheels and growing roadside chatter from outside. Then, at last,

“South Gate! Explorer’s Guild, Twilight Tavern! Lodgings!”

The carriage came to a halt. I waited to allow everyone else to disembark who would. A couple of expectant glances passed me on their way out the door, while more still remained in their seats. This was the moment of truth. Was she an explorer-to-be, venturing into the labyrinth at the very heart of the city? Or was she just some loon on a joyride in plate armor?

Well, perhaps I was playing up the captiousness of their stares in my head. Nonetheless, I was not a loon nor looking to seem as one, and so I stood to my feet, granting my onlookers eye contact for the first and only time as I passed them, offering a slight nod.

I walked up to where the driver sat. Seeing me coming, the short-haired Brouni flashed a grin of acknowledgment, then leapt off his seat and lifted the cushion to reveal the chest underneath. Gingerly, he lifted my musket and delivered it to my hands. "Come t' give Yggdrasil a run for its money, I take it?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes," I confirmed as the driver handed me my ammunition bag.

"Explorer's Guild building's down that way," Pointing behind me in the direction we had come from, he continued, "Once you go under the bridge, take the third left and keep going, you'll see it plain as day. Looks like a big ole stone fortress. Good luck to ya."

"Mmh." I watched the driver hop back on his seat, check the window to his back to see that no one had boarded, then take off once again.

My intent was not sightseeing, however... Iorys was undeniably a fascinating city to behold.

That the city had been built around Yggdrasil both literally and as a figurative statement on its raison d'être seemed, upon observation, as true as the reverse idea that the massive tree's roots grew around and stretched across a city that had been there first. Roots cascaded down from above the highest tier of the city and snaked around roads, traveling over and under and, in some areas, through the brickwork. Bridges were made of the roots that arched high over the buildings below. Benches and rest areas located themselves in the shade of an overhanging wooden tendril, while playgrounds and gardens were made of the clusters of Yggdrasil's arms that had simply flopped onto the ground with no particular direction.

Just as I was about finished taking in the view, a sudden and heavy impact to my right shoulder nearly threw me off-balance. I looked over to see what had assailed me.

"Gorgeous city, isn't it?" At my side was a taller woman who had rather obnoxiously perched her left arm on my shoulder. She stared ahead at the view I had been admiring with beady, olive green eyes, and a self-assured grin. Tresses of bright orange hair toppled messily over her shoulders, topped with short cat-like ears that distinguished her as Therian. At her hip was a single katana in a dark purple sheath, with a matching tassel on the end of a golden hilt. Similar tassels hung from hairpieces that she wore on either side of her head.

"Supposing I agreed," I shoved her arm off my shoulder, taking great care to make my irritation apparent in my voice, "Wouldn't you think it a better conversation starter to grant someone your name instead of, say, using them as an armrest?"

The Therian woman looked down at me, her expression unchanged. "Xinyi."

"Well, Miss Xinyi... what do you want?" I asked flatly.

"You just so happened to catch my eye. 100 ental says you're here to be an explorer!"

"Your deductive prowess has me swept off my feet," I gestured to my armor-clad body, testing how much sarcasm I needed to throw into a statement for this woman to pick up on it, starting with 'as much as possible'.

"Well, listen! You're in luck, because ole Xinyi here's willin' to find you some guildmates absolutely free of charge!"

A waste of my time, as I expected. "I don't need any. I'm doing this myself. Alone."

I didn't make it more than a few steps away before hearing the annoying persistence I dreaded: "Hey! You need guildmates."

"I just said, I'm climbing Yggdrasil on my own."

"Okay, let me rephrase: you need guildmates."

I stopped and spun around. "What do you mean?"

"The Explorers' Guild doesn't let you register a guild with less than five people anymore," Xinyi explained, "Something about an increase in casualties and odds of survival— I dunno, the reason's complicated. Point is, you wanna enter Yggdrasil, you gotta be a part of an official guild. To do that, they're sayin' five people minimum now."

The color must have visibly been draining from my face, because Xinyi's impatient frown turned into one of concern as she looked on at me.

No, no, no. This was entirely against the point. I hadn't heard of this before. To come all this way only to be forced into... working with other people? It seemed too cruel to be a joke.

"Hey, you good?" Xinyi assured me. "It's no big deal. I just said I'll help you find guildmates."

I pinched the bridge of my nose and let out an exasperated sigh through gritted teeth. "Fine. I'll go along. So, what exactly was your plan for helping—"

"Hell yeah! So first off, I know the perfect guy straight away. He's, uh... somewhere in the city, fuck if I know. We'll find 'im. Come on! Let's go!" A terrifying burst of energy possessed Xinyi in an instant, and she shot off down the street nearly at a full sprint.

"Hey! Wait!" Calling after her was predictably ineffective. Confused about her motive for helping me as I was, there was no denying I'd have an easier time letting this woman handle recruitment than doing it myself, so I had no choice but to run after her.

◄—•—►

By the time we found our nebulously defined destination, even Xinyi herself had tired of running, and I was able to catch up to her. The comprehensive constitutional of Iorys' southeast district had led us to a marketplace where a variety of stalls occupied both sides of an alleyway, and overhanging tree roots offered a means to clutter the space with rugs, paper lanterns and the like which sellers wished to display.

If not for intermittent breaks in the roots that let patches of sunlight in, they would practically have qualified as a ceiling. We stepped through a gnarled arch from which hung a sign: "Syrik's Adventurer's Prep— Your Ascent Begins Here!"

A young, bright-eyed Brouni boy in flashy gear was immersed in conversation. Xinyi pointed my attention to the other member of the conversation: A tall, svelte figure with a knuckle to their lip and the other arm crossed under the first, in a gesture of intent listening, though their mouth moved and smiled as if the exchange were light and pleasant. A well-combed mane of striking pink fell all the way to their hips in a fashion that seemed as if they had long since done away with the hassle of styling it, and simply let it grow out.

Xinyi drew a finger to her lips as she looked at me, and then began tiptoeing toward the Celestrian fellow, though her "stealthy" gait was better suited to conveying its intent than accomplishing it, and the tiptoes seemed unnecessary, given that it would've been difficult to pick up on regular footsteps over the persistent marketplace chatter.

Ordinarily, I think I would've stopped her, or called out to ruin her plan, but there was a small bit of me that was just too fascinated with the fact that the merchant boy also didn't seem to clock Xinyi's approach, despite the fact that he was facing her.

As she came within inches of her unsuspecting victim, she curled her fingers into crooked claws, and then: "GRAAHH!"

"AAARGH!!" The poor man's back arched forward as his entire body tensed and he let out a yelp that made me second guess if he was in on the act, and just putting on a slightly melodramatic performance. He'd have leapt into the air if his assailant hadn't gripped his shoulders as part of the scare.

Xinyi's victim spun around upon hearing her break into a fit of devious cackling. "Gods, 'Ni, what'd you do that for?!"

The onlooking Brouni didn't seem much phased by this turn of events, save for nearly jumping from fright himself. Was he familiar with the two?

"...Okay, okay, I'm a little sorry. There, feel better? Listen, I've managed to find a possible guild-mate." Xinyi looked toward me, and gestured in my direction.

The pair walked toward me. The sort of robe-like jacket the man wore – a muted dark green with gold trim – I recognized as the kind of outfit befitting a magic practitioner of Sidonia, though it was quite decorated. If it was a uniform for an academy, then it must've been a rather illustrious one. Regardless, a mage might not be a bad idea to have, as I myself knew nothing of magic.

Xinyi began introducing us. "Ash, this is— ehh... uh..."

"Perhaps it slipped your mind to ask for certain critical information before sprinting through the city?" I folded my arms.

Xinyi sneered at me, then restarted. "Ash, this is Miss Smart-Ass. Miss Sm—"

"Yulia." I shot a glare back. "Yulia Mavenroth."

The fellow Xinyi introduced as Ash hovered a hand over his heart and took a short bow. "Pleasure to meet you, Yulia. If I understand right, we're both in the market – figuratively, anyway – for somebody to form a guild with?"

"Right. Well, not entirely by my choice, but—"

"Heya!" The merchant from before interjected, "Sorry to butt in, but did I hear you right saying you were an aspiring adventurer?"

"I wouldn't say 'aspiring adventurer', but I have intent to reach and see the top of Yggdrasil," I said, careful to stay divorced from some blithe notion of Yggdrasil as an excursion to walk away from with a few new friends and a healthy menagerie of memories.

The boy continued, "Hey, all the same to me! Just wanted to introduce myself. I'm Syrik; I buy and sell armor, weapons, and various goods that adventurers – err, explorers – like you would find handy! I see you're already well-outfitted for the job, but I can always work your equipment into something new and improved with the rare materials the labyrinth has! Oh, and speaking of that— I also buy valuables off of guilds, so don't be shy!"

"Right... I'll keep that in mind, then, Syrik."

"So, not to be nosy, but it sounds like you and Ash are grouping together?"

Ash and I turned to look at each other simultaneously. He spoke, "I'm not fully apprised of the situation, but I believe that to be the case."

"Eh? What's she gonna do, say no?" Xinyi joked.

"I could." I was not joking.

Ash cut in before Xinyi could get further riled up: "Well, on behalf of my partner here, allow me to apologize for any miscommunication that has allowed for uncertainty in your decision. And, allow me to ask formally: Would you lend us your abilities, and form a guild together by which to explore Yggdrasil?"

Though they spoke elegantly, contrary to my expectations for what kind of company a girl like Xinyi had dragged me in circles around the city to recommend, I did not have a pulse on the Celestrian's capability. Plus, what Xinyi had told me was still playing on my mind: I'd be dragged down by not one, but four strangers if I wanted to even make it past the forest's entrance.

If I had answered a second sooner or later, maybe my heart would have flickered in a different direction, and I'd have given a different response. Though, really, if my conviction were that flimsy, I could never have hoped to climb Yggdrasil in the first place, alone or otherwise. So my answer came, with all the enthusiasm you'd expect of someone making a life-altering decision:

"I suppose."

Chapter Text

"WOOOOOOO YEAAAHHH!" Xinyi pumped her fist and jumped into the air in a sudden burst of excitement. "Half of a guild, baby! We're halfway there!"

In spite of her excitement – or perhaps because of it – I felt compelled to point out: "Two out of five is less than half."

"Huh? We have thr—" Xinyi visibly winced as she cut herself off. "Uh, well, I'm more of a glass-half-full type, Miss Half-Empty."

"The glass," I took a deliberate pause, "Categorically is not full enough to make either of those assessments."

"Yeah, okay, whatever. My glass sure as hell isn't full enough, I'll tell ya that! And I know just where to fill it up: Mirina's!"

The name seemed to startle Ash. "H-hang on, Xinyi! Are you serious? It's still the middle of the day! And shouldn't we maybe have a whole guild to celebrate about first?"

Xinyi scoffed and waved a hand. "Hey, I didn't say we had to get drunk; just some drinks. Now let's go."

"W-wait up!" Ash attempted to rein Xinyi in before she could get too far, a display that seemed more and more like an established routine by the minute. "Listen, this is Yulia's first day in the city, right? Why don't we take a quick detour and show her a place to sleep for the night, so we don't have to worry about it later?"

"Alright, alright, deal. If this takes too long, though, I will get hammered when we get to Mirina's."

"Fine. Acceptable." Ash sighed, then turned to me. "Sorry, this is... she's like this."

"Aww, c'mon, you like me this way," Xinyi grinned.

"You are... allowed to think that."

◄—•—►

The place we ended up, at the behest of Ash, was a half-timbered two-story building that stood apart from its neighboring architecture only in two respects: first, that its roof was a bright green, dispelling the idea I was entertaining that red roofs were an ordinance issued by the city of Iorys; and second, that a wooden plaque inscribed "Jenetta's Inn" hung from a nail above the doorway.

"This is where Xinyi and I have been staying," Ash explained to me. "It's pretty affordable, and actually not too bad. The only thing is, it's a family business. Jenetta's the middle kid, and her little sis does all the cleaning. If that one isn't getting along with one of the other two, well... you can tell after a few days."

Xinyi sighed loudly. "Come on, are we going in or talking all day?!"

"You know you don't have to wait on us, right?" Ash replied.

"I'm not the one who wanted to go here. I am waiting on you!" Despite her words, Xinyi opened the door and walked inside.

I followed behind Ash, taking notice of the somewhat lacking height of the doorway. Where Xinyi ducked slightly under the plaque, Ash moved to brush it out of his way, only to clip the doorframe with his forehead. He grabbed his head and muttered a curse, but otherwise continued like it hadn't happened.

The inside of the building was a distinctly rustic atmosphere, adorned with tall-growing potted plants in every otherwise-free corner, and more of the same along where the walls and ceiling met, as if in place of molding. The entrance opened immediately into a dining area, with a table and cart in the center that still carried what looked to be guests' after-lunch mess. In the waiting area beyond that, I noticed many of the windowsills had a bowl of food scraps next to an open window, and on further observation, there were one or two on certain corners of the floor, too.

Behind a counter lined with stools was a Therian woman in the process of noticing us. "Oh! Welcome in!" She sung, bringing herself around the counter to greet us.

"Hey, 'Netta, we got a new one, we brought her over to get a room set up for her," Xinyi's eyes seemed to be darting back and forth between the innkeeper's chest and her hips as she approached.

"Oh my! Congratulations on the new recruit, you guys!" The short bob of fluffy green hair on this woman matched her dress, and left me to wonder if her sisters also matched the color scheme. "I offer rooms for 5 ental a night! That includes a warm breakfast and dinner! Oh—! And where are my manners?! I'm Jenetta, owner of... well, Jenetta's Inn! It's simply fantastic to meet you!"

"She bites," Xinyi warned upon seeing Jenetta extend a hand.

I took Jenetta up on her handshake, making sure to give Xinyi a sour look. "Only if you're unwise enough to wave your hand in my face. Yulia, by the way."

The bubbly innkeeper clapped her hands together. "That's a lovely name! Well, Miss Yulia, you look like you're tired of stomping around in that armor, why don't we get you a room right away where you can store that?"

When I heard the suggestion, it hit me how much harder all of this running around had been thanks to the metal on my back.

"Me and Ash share a room 'cuz Ash is poor," Xinyi explained. "I can pick one for you."

Ash's face displayed an array of emotions before settling on a confused frown. "First of all, I'm not poor, I'm just practicing frugality. You never know when you'll need it. Secondly, Yulia can pick her own—"

"I don't care," I shrugged. "It doesn't matter that much. Just make it something close to the end of the hall."

"Cool! I'm on it!" Xinyi was taking stairs two or three at a time before she was even done with her sentence.

Jenetta called after Xinyi: "As long as it's unlocked, it's vacant! That, or we have a careless customer..."

Save for the heavy footfalls from Xinyi on the floor above, the room was silent. It occurred to me then that no one else was in the lobby besides us three. A nice reprieve, all things considered, though I imagined the place wasn't always going to be this quiet. I had to wonder where Jenetta's sisters were, too. Despite all that, it did have a certain coziness to it, though I couldn't quite place what it was.

Without taking his eyes off the top of the stairs, Ash posed a question to me: "Did you let her do that just so you'd get a moment away from her?"

"You're observant," I granted.

"Eh. It's not that difficult to tell. You make a face like you're trying a food you know you don't like whenever you have to interact with her."

"Hmm. Do I?" I didn't think I was that unsubtle.

"Oh! Speaking of food," Jenetta perked up as if she had been daydreaming, though I'm pretty sure she had been listening the whole time, "I still have to clean up the lunch mess! You're welcome to whatever we have left in the kitchen, by the way!"

I watched as the fluffy-eared woman piled dishes from the dining room on top of each other, and then carried the stack precariously over to the kitchen. As she did so, she peeked into some cookware atop a stove, then corrected herself: "Well, okay, we don't have any food left! But if you'd like, you can take what you want from the bowls by the windows!"

"We... appreciate the offer, but we're fine," Ash declined politely. Then he restarted our conversation:

"So, I take it you've figured out that Xinyi and I have been looking for guildmates for a while now, right?"

"I got that idea. Syrik seemed pretty familiar with you. Xinyi is pretending like she's just 'helping me find teammates', but..."

"She's not that altruistic. She also has a difficult time not blurting out whatever she's thinking."

"She may want to consider hiding the katana a little better," I added.

"Xinyi used to lead a guild of her own, but they didn't get along very well. After one of their members took an injury that forced them to leave the guild, the whole group kind of disbanded, and a lot of the blame was put squarely on Xinyi." Ash turned his head to me. "I get the sense she's going to try to add herself to your guild at the last moment. She's probably afraid she won't be wanted, should other options be at all convenient to consider."

"Mm." I folded my arms. "And what's your story?"

"I haven't been here quite as long. Somewhere in the realm of three weeks, I'd say? I was going to live here quietly, but I needed more money before I could afford a home, and I didn't hold the prospect of working an ordinary job day-in-day-out in terribly high regard. Exploring Yggdrasil seemed lucrative, and soon enough I ran into Xinyi."

The bigger picture I was getting of the two did not inspire optimism. "Well, I don't really have a choice but to give you two a chance. Though, having a mage taught in Sidonia's schools could hardly be a bad thing."

"Ah! W-well, I'm not actually— ha... um, you'll... my abilities might not be quite what you expect, but if you'll give me a chance, I'm sure I can prove useful..."

Before I could inquire further, Xinyi re-emerged from the top of the stairwell. "Alright! Come on up!" She yelled. "I got you the one across from mine, since it was pretty close to the end of the hall anyway."

Jenetta popped back into the conversation once more. "Lovely! Let me just grab the key for that room real quick... now, which one was it...?"

"Come on, hurry up!" Xinyi moaned. "Mirina's tavern is waiting! I wanna need HELP getting back up these stairs at the end of the night!"

Ash sighed. "For the last time, that is not what we're going there for."

◄—•—►

Upon entering the "Twilight Tavern", I was immediately washed in a warm orange glow from a plethora of low-light lanterns, and the faint smell of a recently mopped wooden floor. A stray patron or two occupied disparate sections of the bar, each nursing their own unique choice of drink. In one's hand, a glass radiated the vibrant hue of its drink. Assuming it was safe to ingest, it was probably a parlor trick of an enchantment by the owner.

"MIRINA! Come on down here!!" Xinyi did not waste time in making herself known.

"Y-you don't have to yell, darling, I'm right here..." A matronly voice replied through gritted teeth.

Almost immediately to my tour guide's left was a taller woman with platinum-blonde parted bangs and a graphite complexion. She regarded us with crimson eyes peering over a pair of small, round glasses perched on the end of her nose; whether they were practical, or for achieving a certain look, I couldn't really say.

"Ooh. Sorry. You know how I like my entrances," Xinyi apologized.

"Well, I certainly won't forget that now," The so-called Mirina put a hand to her heart and took a deep breath, waiting for it to settle. "So, what's it gonna be today?"

Xinyi stepped aside and flourished with her arms to present me. "New teammate!"

Sensing a cue, I stepped up to the bar. "Yulia Mavenroth. I suppose I'm in charge of these two, now?"

Mirina chuckled over top whispers of leadership conflict coming from behind me. She leaned forward, resting her forearm on the counter. "I'm Mirina, or you can call me Ms. Mirina; whichever's your preference. I've been keeping these two in check for you up to now, and I run this little bar on the side."

The pose she was in as she introduced herself struck me as practiced, and a perhaps intentional very good look at her chest from my vantage point. It had been the better part of a minute when I realized she, in turn, had been taking a prolonged look into my eyes. "Uh, what are you...?"

"Mm, sorry, hun. There was just something mesmerizing about the colors of your eyes," She explained. "And I presume you're satisfied with your end of the bargain?"

"Er, that's not—"

"Only teasing, darling." Mirina chuckled softly. "Have I made you uncomfortable? Here, why don't I get you something to drink, on the house. Consider it half-apology, half-welcome-to-the-team."

I put a hand forward and shook my head. "I don't really drink that often." To be more accurate, I hadn't, ever. But I wasn't going to share that.

"I'll be her surrogate!" Xinyi chimed in promptly.

"I'm quite sure you're willing," Mirina smiled as she pulled a glass mug from beneath the counter. "Though perhaps we should ask your friend first. Yulia?"

"If it ends this interaction, no objections." Except perhaps to being called her friend.

"Well," Ash threw his hands up dismissively, "I kept her at bay for as long as I could."

As Xinyi raved on about her incoming drink, my head turned to a bulletin board at the back of the room. Papers decorated with varying qualities and styles of script covered it, some of which featured accompanying illustrations of bizarre, unfamiliar flora and fauna.

"That's the request board," Ash explained. "That's the other thing Mirina's tavern serves as. You take jobs posted by the public, and receive a reward in exchange... provided you do them right."

At that moment, the door behind us opened. I took a furtive look behind me to see two figures in sepia-colored hooded cloaks pass us, then take a seat next to each other at a table isolated from most of the other patrons.

The first one to pull their hood back was a character with dark skin and an unruly head of bluish-black hair, topped by short, pointed ears. They glanced about the room with eyes of striking color – one blood red, and the other a bright autumn orange – but a mote of weariness within them. I was certain they'd caught me looking at them, but their eyes didn't stay on me for more than a second.

Upon a gentle elbow nudge from their compatriot, the second of the two followed suit, and pulled their hood back. Tall, furry ears flopped out as a girl with many similar features unveiled herself. Her bob of hair was more distinctly blue, with a bun in the back. Her eyes were an emerald green, and they stood alert and focused – almost nervous.

As the two began conversing with each other, Xinyi leaned over to me and began speaking at a normal volume very closely to my ear. "You thinkin' what I'm thinkin'? Those two look like mighty fine teammates to me."

"They do? They just walked i—" Despite my uncertainty, Xinyi grabbed Ash's attention, and the two of them began approaching the strangers at the table. "Well, okay then."

As I followed a few steps behind, I saw the two strangers turn their attention to us. The flame-eyed one leaned over and whispered something to the other. I was pretty confident that only I had seen the glint of the girl drawing something from under her cloak around her hip, as neither Xinyi or Ash gave any hesitation.

Xinyi slammed her hands down somewhat loudly on the table, despite already having their attention. "Hey! You two look pretty tough. We're— I'm helping someone recruit teammates to explore Yggdrasil with. Any interest?"

The pair exchanged glances briefly, and then both relaxed slightly. I myself relaxed quite a bit, upon seeing the girl subtly put away whatever she was gripping.

"You're... asking around for people who want to explore the Yggdrasil labyrinth?" A deep, mellow voice came from the scruffy individual.

"She's not asking you to do it for free, for the record," Ash interjected. "You'll get a cut of what we make as a group."

The flame-eyed one leaned back in their chair and folded their arms. "What made you so sure we have any talent as explorers, or any hunting or fighting ability?"

"Er, we didn't know. That was this one's hunch," Ash pointed to Xinyi.

"Hey, I can just tell! You pick enough fights, you get a sense for who's been in one," Xinyi puffs her chest out proudly. "And you two... yeah. There's somethin' there."

"Hmm." The apparent representative for the two sat back up, stroking the stubble on their chin. They shared another exchange of looks with the bunny-eared girl, then looked up at Xinyi. "Give us a minute."

The pair turned away from us, huddled together and began muttering quietly to each other. Xinyi and Ash grouped in with me, though I didn't have anything to say.

"You know, 'Ni, I know you just well enough to know you weren't bluffing back there," Ash said. "How do you tell?"

Xinyi grinned, eager to reveal her technique. "What, when someone knows their way in a fight? Well, there's two parts to it: the first is if seeing them makes me want to kick their ass. The second is if I feel like I could kick their ass. If it's a 'Yes, No', then they know what they're doing."

Ash seemed to be at a loss for words. "That's... well, I'm glad that's working out for you. Assuming it does."

A short while later, our two prospective teammates turned back to meet us again. Once again, the girl left her companion to do the talking:

"Alright. We'll join your... thing, on two conditions. One," They lifted a finger into the air, "Understand that this is a temporary job for us. We might have to dash at any moment. If that happens, we're not sticking around to say goodbye. Which also means we want our portion of the pay in our pockets as soon as it can be.

And two..." Instead of lifting another finger, they turned a thumb toward the bunny-eared girl who had thus far given us the silent treatment, "...she remains in my sight at all times. Under any circumstances."

"Hey, whatever floats your boat," Xinyi shrugged. "All in favor?"

Ash gave a moment of pause before raising a concern: "I... would like to ask more about this second condition."

"Well, tough," The pair's speaker crossed their arms. "I laid out our conditions. You know everything about them that concerns you. The choice is yours. If this is a deal-breaker, my feelings aren't hurt."

"Ooooo-kay," Ash shrunk away awkwardly, "Then how about this: can I ask your names?"

The girl turned to her companion as if asking for conformation. Upon receiving a quick nod, she faced us again and uttered, in an impassive monotone: "...Kris."

"Flare," The other added.

"Alright. I suppose there will be plenty of time for icebreakers in the future," Ash relinquished. "Yulia?"

At this point, I'd have been hard pressed not to prelude a sentence with an exasperated sigh. "This team is already as slapdash as can be. I see no point in protesting."

"Alright! Welcome to the team!" Xinyi seemed about to burst with excitement.

Amid Xinyi's bragging to Ash and I about the success of her "gambit", I saw Flare tap Kris' shoulder and point to a chalkboard behind the bar; a brief menu including the day's specialty drink and meal. The pair walked up, flagged down Mirina, and began ordering food.

On seeing that I wasn't particularly paying her boasting any mind, Xinyi also caught eye of this. "Hey, you know what? I'll pay for your meals. My treat. We're a team now."

Kris' face lit up with interest, the first time I had seen a clear sign of mood on her. To contrast, Flare grimaced, though it softened significantly when they saw the hopeful glimmer in Kris' eyes.

"Actually," Xinyi mused, "Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm damn hungry, myself. Let's all eat!"

Though I wasn't terribly hungry myself, nobody was particularly willing to spoil the mood or the meal, so we all ended up sitting down at a table together. The ordering process quickly got out of hand, and in the end, we ended up requesting a portion of everything on the menu, for each person to sample whatever they wanted. Over the distant din of metal utensils clanging and food frying as the kitchen staff attempted to fix up a veritable feast at the least busy time of day, we made idle chatter about our near future. Or at least, Xinyi and Ash did.

Flare threw their hood back over their head and attempted to get some form of rest. Kris stared at the table or her lap to try and avoid being spoken to. I almost posed a question to her myself, but just as I really began to contemplate doing so, plates of food arrived.

A truly massive seafood paella, fried potatoes, cheesy meat pie, fruit salad; as the dishes rolled out, I had to wonder how expansive a menu this Mirina thought it was necessary to have. Then, as they continued, I had to wonder if Xinyi truly intended to foot the bill.

Still, I wasn't going to waste what was in front of me. Flare became a bit more amicable to conversation as they ate, and I gathered that they and Kris had wandered into the city no earlier than I had, and, in their own vague terms, "were looking for work". None of this explained conditions number one and two, but I was far from a conversationalist, so it would, at their discretion, remain a secret.

Then there was the other matter. Which it was probably best to address then and there.

"So, Xinyi..." I began, "You've launched into a celebratory mood both times you've managed to recruit someone to my team for me."

Xinyi offered me a surprised stare coupled with a stuffed mouth. "Yesh. Ahnd?"

"Furthermore, you've yet to provide motive for why you would help me do this at all. You met me all of, what, four hours ago?"

Xinyi swallowed her food, now aware of where this was going. "Sure, okay. What's your point?"

"Let me put this another way: Why all of this—" I gestured to the table full of food, "—when I only have four guild members figured out?"

"Oh ho," A devious grin came onto the Therian's face. "But you already have a full guild of five."

"Oh? Really? Who would the fifth be?" I asked, entertaining her against my better judgment.

The sunset-haired girl jumped out of her chair as if the entire room's attention just turned on her. She took the sheathed katana from her waist, held it out in front of her, and pointed a thumb back at herself.

"You've got me!"

Chapter Text

"Hmm..." A gruff grunt of doubtfulness echoed from inside the black-steel helmet of Iorys' Guildmaster Egar, as he looked us up and down.

From behind the cross-shaped visor, I could feel his gaze pierce through me, shattering my veneer of confidence. Or perhaps he was just staring behind me, at whatever idiocy my teammates had chosen to engage in while I had my back turned to them. I couldn't turn around now to check.

"Well, you five seem to check out." Egar unfolded his arms, and walked over to his desk to retrieve a set of documents.

"...Really?" I hardly found it believable.

"Oh, I don't scrutinize newcomers, or anything like that. There's little we can do to assess your readiness without letting you walk into the labyrinth. At least, not without making registration a much more arduous process." Egar fanned a set of five papers out toward the end of the desk facing us, then set a pen on top of them. "I mainly check to make sure newbies are at least smart enough to have some armor and a weapon on them."

"Huh." I walked up and grabbed the pen, beginning to fill out one of what was a set of official guild membership forms.

"Mind you, there is the qualification exam; the Arcania Council is who you're really seeking approval from. After this, you'll go to Council Hall and talk with one of the Council members there. Most likely Prince Ramus."

Ramus? As in, the royal Earthlain prince? That was an odd thought, that someone as high-ranking as him was delegated to handling such menial tasks. Though, as part of the Council, I supposed he would have other duties, too. His parents must not have wanted to deal with this kind of thing, and pawned the work off on him.

As I passed the pen to Xinyi, the Guildmaster sat up and blocked her with a hand over the papers. "Not you. I still have yours from before," He rummaged through a desk drawer, and produced an identical document, already signed with handwriting neater than I'd have expected from Xinyi.

"One of these is for the establishing of a brand new guild," Egar picked up one of the papers and held it in the air. "Whoever of you will be named the guild's leader will fill this out."

"That'd be me," I announced. I skimmed over the document, giving a quick read of the terms of ownership as everyone else took their turn walking up and signing their name on a membership form. My eyes stopped as I came to a particular empty field on the paper. "Guild name?"

"Ah, yes," Egar mused, as if he himself had forgotten to mention this. "Every guild, critically, must have a name, a title to be referred to by. It mustn't be terribly long, but that's the only stipulation. You may decide whatever it is as a group."

I turned to everyone else, expecting suggestions.

Flare shook their head. "I really don't care what it is."

Kris remained silent.

"I've been told I shouldn't be allowed to name things," Xinyi mentioned.

"We could use your old guild's name," Ash offered.

Xinyi's face scrunched in response. "Let's not. They were losers."

"Antares." The name left my mouth before I could really think about what I was saying.

All four of them spun their heads toward me. Flare was the first to pass judgment: "That works for me," Kris backed them with a quick nod.

"...yeah, that's not bad, actually," Xinyi agreed.

"Antares..." Ash repeated. "I like the sound of that."

I turned back to the table, and scrawled the name down on the blank line.

"Well then..." Egar took the forms in his hand, and shuffled them into a neat stack. "Welcome to Iorys, Guild Antares. I hope that you will stand out against the disappointing amateurism that has taken hold of the latest wave of newcomers."

◄—•—►

"So, I guess the cat's outta the bag, huh?" Xinyi said, scratching one of her ears sheepishly.

"Yes, Xinyi. I already knew you had an old guild." I confirmed as I watched road signs to follow the path Egar gave us to Council Hall.

"WHAT?!" Xinyi blurted. "You did?! What shithead told you?!"

"Me. I'm the shithead," Ash raised their hand, "Could it have been anyone else?"

"YOU! Get over here!!" Despite her demand, Xinyi immediately ran over to Ash, put him in a headlock, and ground her knuckles against his scalp.

"Ah, ah, agh! Y-you're doing that harder than you think you are!!" Ash whined.

"I'm doing it EXACTLY as hard as you deserve!"

Eventually I felt sort of bad about it. "It's not that big of a deal, Xinyi. You know I would've found out anyway. Let them go."

A few moments later, I heard Flare snort out a long sigh, followed by low grumbling. "You'd better be sure this is the right way."

They had stopped in front of a lengthy, curving staircase, which passed underneath a decorative arch, then slowly met with the giant cliff of entangled roots and dirt that crowned Iorys, and held atop it the Council Hall.

"Yes, this matches 'you'll know when you get to the way up'." I repeated Egar's instructions.

"Race you to the top!" Xinyi yelled as she dashed by, taking stairs two at a time.

"Highly inadvisable," Ash protested, to no avail.

Flare simply shook their head. "We'd better not have to go here often."

◄—•—►

In the end, it was Kris who surmounted the staircase first, taking jaunty steps the whole way up in an impressive show of stamina. Xinyi had wholly exhausted herself taking the first half of the staircase at a dead sprint, and so had to rest for long enough that we passed her up. Despite that, she still made it up second, as Flare and I were engaged in a competition to deliberately ignore Xinyi's challenge more than one another.

"Auuugh... why would they... build this... affront to nature..." Ash panted.

"...you should be better physically trained if we're taking you into the labyrinth with us," Kris stated.

"C'mon, up you go, ya baby," Xinyi plucked Ash off the ground and slung him around her shoulders, then carried him into the large building in front of us.

"Don't pretend you didn't run out of breath, too," Kris muttered to herself as we followed suit.

The inside of the Council Hall was predictably ostentatious. An incredibly high domed ceiling meant that our steps echoed off of the checkerboard floor. To either side, larger-than-life marble statues depicted warrior figures, some with wings or other embellishments, but all holding some manner of weapon and usually adorned with a helmet, shield, or likewise. The golden glow of the late afternoon sun shone in from the large windows on the west side of the hall, and bathed that side's statuary.

At the opposite end of the room, standing under a high-hanging chandelier, was a young man with navy blue hair covering his ears, with bangs parted to show off a golden diadem. He appeared to be lost in thought until, upon noticing us, he began walking down the aisle to greet us.

"Greetings. I am Prince Ramus, Earthlain representative of the Arcania Council," He spoke warmly. "You appear to be adventurers, though I don't believe we've met— well, most of you... I seem to remember..."

"Yeah, it's me, Xinyi," The katana wielder said as the prince drew a finger to her.

"Right. Well, I'm glad to see you're back in action with a new guild, Ms. Xinyi." He cleared his throat and continued, "Provided you are indeed new adventurers, I'm sure you're here to take the qualification exam.

For this exam, we will have you fill out a map of the labyrinth's first floor." Ramus fished a blank map out of an unoccupied desk nearby, and extended it toward us. "Additionally, as part of the exam, we'd like you to collect a piece of Yggdrasil's roots from inside the labyrinth, and a soil sample from a specified location on F1. The site will be clearly marked."

"Anyone fancy themselves a cartographer?" Flare glanced at us, already stepping down from candidacy.

Silent, awkward stares were exchanged as Ramus' arm began to withdraw. Seeing a stalemate forming in the group once again, I dragged a hand down my face in exasperation and sighed. "Fine. I'll do it."

A bit of relief passed over Ramus' face as he handed me the map. As I returned to the back of the group, he asked: "By the way, I haven't had the pleasure of your names, yet. Nor your guild name."

The other three gave their names in their typical fashion: Flare and Kris curtly, and Ash adding a quick bow. Then, it came to me.

"Yulia Mavenroth. We are, ah..." It felt a bit embarrassing to say it now, in an official capacity. "This is Guild Antares."

"Antares, hm? That's an interesting name. It'll be a memorable one, I'm sure." As if I hadn't stifled the scoff that went off in my head, Ramus clarified: "It's best if you take this as no more than what it is; a basic test of your exploration capability. You do need to come back in one piece, but I have a feeling you five will be fine, and I'd like to think I'm a good judge of character."

Chapter Text

I'd been warned of this; an idyllic woodland dotted with ponds and gently burbling streams that seemed to invite you to an afternoon nap.

A picture so quaint, it was easy to mistake the monsters waiting to prey on you for the docile forest critters many of them imitated.

This was why it was called the Tutelary Forest; it served as a lesson to those in over their head, whether from gullibility or hubris, and let those who took that lesson to heart not soon forget it.

Still, if you peered in peculiar places, you'd see traces of our ancestors' handiwork, reminding us that this tree, which likely predated us, had always been a point of interest, for better or worse.

◄—•—►

"GRAAAAAAAH!" Xinyi roared as she brought her katana down upon a wild-eyed acorn monster, splitting it cleanly in two with a crack like hollow wood. She stood back up, and began boasting – "Oh yeah, it's good to be ba— ACK!" – only to be tackled to the ground from behind by another of the rabid acorns.

"In case you haven't noticed, I can't defend you if you keep jumping in front of my shield!" I griped, training my musket on her assailant and then firing.

In the next moment, I saw an arrow split the air mere inches in front of my face. I turned to its source.

"Sorry! I was aiming at—" Was the last thing I heard from Flare, whose eyes were on Kris rather than me, before a giant weight toppled onto my head, and my vision became obscured by the body of a flying squirrel.

As I squirmed on the ground, attempting to pull it off of me, I felt sharp jaws clamp down on the squirrel around my head, and tear it off of me. The sun flashed in my eyes as it was pulled free, and I turned to look at Flare's hound mangling the unfortunate critter that had messed with me.

After I got back to my feet, I saw Kris dart across the grassy floor to pierce another of the balloon-shaped rodents with her sword. In the same moment, a long-armed plant monster stretched its hook-shaped claws toward her. I stepped in and threw my shield up, feeling the ineffectual clank of the monster's attack against it.

I put my gun through the port on the top of my shield and fired back. Xinyi followed up promptly by running up to the creature in its dazed state, then shredding it to bits in an excessively flashy whirlwind of sword strikes.

"Where's Ash?!" Xinyi yelled as she swung her head around furiously in search.

"Over there." Flare pointed to a tree. Ash peered out from behind the tree.

'Why's he all the way back there?!"

Staying behind cover, Ash shoved a finger in Flare's direction. "N-nobody warned me that they were going to fight with a huge dog!"

Xinyi slapped a hand to her forehead and groaned. "What? What's the problem with—"

Unfortunately, her words were cut off as an errant acorn took the opportunity for a surprise attack, and gut punched Xinyi with its whole body. The winded Therian keeled over in pain. "Will you cut that out?!" She rasped.

Flare's arrow pierced the monster's hull at nearly the same time Kris' rapier did, and on further inspection, it appeared that it had been the last of this skirmish. Feeling my head still pounding, I helped Xinyi to her feet.

"Keep your eyes and ears on the enemy if you don't want them to do that," I scolded.

"Yeah, yeah... urgh..." Xinyi moaned.

"...Thanks..." Kris muttered as she passed me, as if she wasn't sure she wanted me to hear her.

As the adrenaline of the situation began to wear off, I got the briefest of glimpses at the rapier Kris wielded before she quickly tucked it back in its scabbard; which she seemed all too eager to do.

It was a highly peculiar thing, fashioned as if it was made by one continuous rod of ivory metal. Where the cross-guard would be, the hilt jutted out at an extreme angle, forming a zigzag that then melded into the blade. The blade itself repeated the pattern in tapering degrees before straightening out into a long point. The only detail to set itself apart from the rest of the sword in appearance was a small, round amethyst embedded in the pommel. The whole of it seemed more of an ornamental design than a practical one, though I had seen the girl use it effectively enough.

I had many questions about where Kris had obtained the sword, and why it was designed in such a way. But I was of no inclination to believe she would freely divulge that information, given her track record.

"You can come out. She's not gonna bite," Flare raised an eyebrow toward the tree Ash had hidden behind.

The quivering Celestrian took a few steps toward us, keeping one eye on Flare's hound. "...S-Sorry, I just... am not so good with big dogs..."

"I've never had her..." Flare took a pause, then rephrased. "Ghost doesn't attack people. I've trained her well."

Ash approached slowly, never letting "Ghost" out of their sight.

"Kneel down and let her sniff your hand. She just wants to get to know you," Flare instructed.

With frequent bouts of hesitation, Ash obeyed. When Ghost got close, the Celestrian instinctively pulled away just a bit, but ultimately let the hound's snout graze his palm.

While Ash stood frozen in watchful anxiety, I finally got a good look at the wolf Flare called Ghost. Like with Kris' sword, there was a peculiarity or two that didn't stand out until I had gotten a good look: the matted fur on top was a darker gray than that on its legs and belly, but was noticeably faded with age; moreover, there was a seemingly glowing insignia – the center of which resembled a small flame – on its forehead that curved down to the eyes, which themselves had the same light blue glow.

"How long have ya had her?" Xinyi asked, sating my curiosity when I wouldn't have bothered to ask.

Flare looked toward the sky in contemplation. "Mmm... 'bout 10 years, maybe 11."

"Oh, so she's..."

"Yup, she's a bit of an old girl. Wasn't exactly a newborn pup when I found her, either. Still, she's got some fight left in her."

Not soon after, Ghost's ears perked up, and she turned away from the hand scratching under her chin, towards the woods to our back. Following suit, we turned and saw rustling in the underbrush, and a large silhouette fast approaching. As we readied our weapons...

...a giant, snarling hound, with fangs jutting out from the corners of its mouth as long and sharp as a butcher's knife, leapt out and growled at us ravenously.

I took one look behind me, but by the time I had, only the dust our pink-haired companion had kicked up was visible. Off in the distance, I caught a glimpse of Ash sprinting away, the distance he had covered in those few seconds being a frankly impressive and unprecedented display of athleticism.

"Oh, fuck you," Xinyi pointed her sword at the wild dog.

Great. Just what we needed.

◄—•—►

The last rays of sunlight were growing thin when we realized Ash had fled a lot farther than we initially thought. The forest became a foreboding array of transitional purples and dark oranges as the chirping of insects and birds grew quieter and running water became the predominant background noise to our search.

I heard one of the others inhale sharply, then turned to see Xinyi with her hands cupped around her mouth. I watched Flare nearly smack her in the face with a palm meant to stop her.

"Let's... not... yell at the top of our lungs for him," Flare proposed. "It's getting late, and I'd really rather not deal with all the hungry monsters that are looking for their last chance at a meal, yeah?

"Uuuugh..." Xinyi complied begrudgingly. "But think of how long it'll take to find him! We can come get him in the morning, right?"

"Absolutely not," Kris shot her down posthaste.

"Yeah, absolutely not," A voice from above stopped us in our tracks. "I'll remember you said that next time you get lost, though."

Sitting upon the branch of a tree just behind us was Ash, seemingly no worse for wear physically. He leapt down promptly, and brushed off his jacket.

"Sorry I ran away. I was on edge already, and..." He sighed. "Well, I can't excuse my actions when it endangered you all. I apologize."

"Okay, well, apologies don't make up for lost time. Let's get a move on!" Xinyi commanded.

A somewhat obnoxious groan came from Flare. "Seriously? Weren't you the one who was just wanting to call it in for the night?"

"I was joking! Mostly. Like, 60% joking."

"Only 60?" Ash asked, horrified.

"You're right, that's even more concerning when you think about how specific it is," Kris mused. "You're kind of corrupt, aren't you?"

"I'll corrupt you if you don't pipe down," Xinyi threatened.

"Clearly we went into this without thinking about it," Flare said. "We've been lucky to have made it this long without losing body parts. I say we regroup and come back tomorrow."

Xinyi threw her hands up in the air. "Come on, this should be easy for us! Prince Ramus said so himself. Do you really wanna disappoint him?"

"Both of you are hopeless," Kris sighed.

At some point I stopped listening to the argument. Frankly, this was about what I expected from these four. If only I had been allowed to go it alone, I'd have been done with this hours ago. I'd be eating supper or curling up in bed with a nice book. How much simpler it'd be. If only...

"Enough!" I spoke firmly, hoping I wouldn't have to raise my voice to catch their attention. It worked. "Just stop."

I pointed a finger toward Xinyi. "You stop jumping in front of me and throwing yourself on the enemy like you're invincible. You're not.

And you," I moved my finger to Flare, "Watch what you're doing instead of what she—" I pointed at Kris "—is. I don't know what your concern is, but it can't be more important than the things that want to kill us."

Finally, I directed my attention to Ash. "And you... I don't even know what you do."

Wordlessly, Ash clapped his hands together at his chest. Between his fingers was an apparition of a card with an unfamiliar emblem on it. Without taking his eyes off me, he mouthed something, and I felt a slight surge of what I could only describe as resilience.

"...I'm a shaman. I commune with spirits to ask them to empower us with their blessing." The card dissipated, and his hands returned to his side.

"That would have been great to know much earlier. If I have to take you all along with me, the least you could do is contribute to my efforts." Now finished with my outburst, I glanced around at the four of them, unsure what kind of response I wanted, if any.

"Okay, and you stop being such a massive asshole jerk," Xinyi grumbled.

For some reason, getting that response was what made me sure I would rather have had dead silence.

I whipped around, my back to them. "You know what? I'm sorry for getting you all into this. I should have turned around the moment I knew I needed teammates. At least then I could've minimized the amount of time I wasted here. You all do what you want. I guess I'll see what kind of work I can get here until it makes me enough money to go back home."

"Wh—?!" Xinyi sputtered, "Wait, wait, wait! Hold on, you're giving up? You can't do that! I mean, we don't have anyone else! We're so close! You haven't even really given us a chance!"

"Actually, I agree with that," Ash added. "Sort of. The part about being close, mainly."

"What are you talking about?" Flare asked, seeming as unconvinced as I was.

"Okay, maybe I should've mentioned this before this whole argument, but in my defense, I don't really do a good job of talking over others or asserting myself—"

"Get to the point."

"Right. Well, see, we're actually pretty much done already. While I was running away, I kind of happened upon the area that I'm fairly certain is the marked point for the soil sample collection." Ash pointed to the west.

Following Ash's finger, I saw a clearing in the distance, barely illuminated, where the ground was dotted with small flags in an enclosing arrangement.

"Now," Ash continued, "We already collected some of Yggdrasil's root a while ago. So, that just leaves filling out the map. Yulia, how much of the map do we have left to go?"

I took the map out of my pocket. Though it was hard to see with the rapidly dimming twilight, it did indeed look fairly comprehensively filled out. I moved my left thumb to see that the only spot we hadn't visited was the soil sample area right in front of us.

And I was so close to finally being able to give up, too.

◄—•—►

The exhaustion set in the moment I laid eyes on a bed. I may have passed out the instant I made contact with a pillow, if not for the vestigial aching of my head. As to whether that was from the actual cranial injury I received from a squirrel, or a culmination of everything else that went wrong in the past 24 hours, either was a valid guess.

Who were these strangers?

That was odd; I had time to contemplate a thought. That hadn't happened since I was in the coach this morning. Now that I was assessing the decisions I had made, they all seemed odd...and poorly thought-out.

I didn't like strangers. Even when I did get to know someone a bit, I tended to not like them, most of the time. So what compelled me to go this far? It's not like I was beyond turning immediately back around and accepting the waste of three weeks I took to go to Iorys and back home.

Whatever. In any case, this would be a much more arduous journey than I had originally thought; that much I had ascertained. I could only hope that the view there at the top, that sublime moment of lonesome peace that I pictured in my head, would be worth it.

I wanted to believe that nothing could stop me from experiencing that.

Chapter Text

"So... is she like that forever, now, or...?" Flare scratched their chin curiously.

"No... no, I think she'll go back to normal, eventually? Or... there should be a cure." Ash uncertainly flipped through a field guide he had picked up a few days earlier.

Meanwhile, Kris poked the petrified Xinyi from various angles, as if testing for a reaction. Having done some research on my way here, I could have told them Ash was right on both counts; petrifaction was temporary, and curable with Theriaca should a more immediate solution be necessary. But I kind of enjoyed the quiet.

That said, it was surprising to see such a nasty tactic employed at these low levels of the labyrinth. It would be good to keep in mind what these creatures were capable of.

A heaving, hacking cough erupted through the air, and the stone began to crumble away like it were just a shell, reduced to dust before it could effect a sound by hitting the ground. Xinyi's whole body came free all in the same second. Her immediate reaction was to snatch the waterskin from Kris' hip and guzzle it down desperately.

"You have your own, you know," Kris pouted, which prompted Xinyi to throw the now-empty container to the ground and repeat the process with her own.

"FfffffffUCK, Cyrus never said anything about it being that bad!" Were Xinyi's first words upon finishing her own supply of water. She coughed dryly again, emitting a cloud of dust from her mouth.

"I think you should be a little more concerned that there's sand in your lungs," Flare raised an eyebrow.

At this point, it was probably better that I clued them in. "It's not real. Or at least, not forever. A handful of monsters known to us will 'petrify' you, but it's really just toxins that paralyze you and create a convincing facsimile of stone on the surface of your skin. It tends to get in your airway if you open your mouth when it wears off, which is hard not to do if you don't know not to, since another commonly observed side effect is the sensation of extreme dehydration."

"...wow. You're surprisingly knowledgeable," Ash snapped his book shut and tucked it back into his knapsack.

"It's only natural to want to know what you're up against," I shrugged my own bag of supplies onto my shoulders and began back on the path we were on, "The point is, the 'sand' will dissolve into nothing shortly thereafter. It's not great to swallow it, but a less pressing concern than you might think."

"See, I would've said all that too, but my lungs were full of sand," Xinyi insisted.

◄—•—►

"What I struggle to understand," I explained, "Is how all of you collectively fumbled to overcome a turtle."

"Hey, I didn't see you tryin', Miss High-and-Mighty!" Xinyi pouted. "That little fucker had a nasty bite."

I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes. "Use your katana? I can't believe I even have to say this."

"We use our weapons on monsters," Kris defended. "Not cute, innocent creatures."

"Still, I'm not sure the coin we found was worth the effort," Flare griped.

Xinyi, on the other hand, refused to accept her efforts as wasted. "Hey, you don't know. It could be some rare ancient artifact worth thousands of ental! This is exactly the kind of treasure that a labyrinth like this is worth exploring for!"

"I hate to rain doubt on your parade, but I don't think that's the case here." Ash stuck his hand out for the coin, which had been cleaned of the mud that it was found in... Or at least, all the mud that hadn't dried onto it. On reception, he flipped it around a few times to see both sides. "It seemed familiar to me somehow, but not in a... way that screams value, if that makes sense? I just think I've seen it before."

As I turned my head back to face in front of me, something distinctly dark caught my eye. I came to a halt to try and relocate it, and as a result, felt Kris walk directly into my back, almost hard enough to push me a step forward.

"What are you doing?" Ash inquired.

As the fluffy-eared girl took a step back and sheepishly pretended not to have audibly clanged her head against my armor, I scanned the surroundings on the other side of the small stream to try and find the shadow. Easy enough; it wasn't actually moving. In fact, it was rather still, and possible to make out as a person as a result.

"Hey, that's a dude! Let's go talk to 'im!" Xinyi leapt into action as soon as she had followed my gaze to the figure.

"That's not— Ugh..." By the time I thought to protest, the other three were following along, and there was little I could do but sigh and catch up to them.

The figure hailed us with a nod as we made our approach, and it soon became clear that their shadowy appearance was in large part thanks to the full set of jet black armor they wore, which became increasingly familiar as I got close enough to make out the armor's gold trim glimmering in the forest sun.

"Ah, Antares. How has the labyrinth been treating you?" Egar recognized us as if this weren't barely our second or third meeting. He sat at the edge of a pond, his legs hung over what was apparently a sheer drop into the water, and a line cast further out.

"It's been more of a bother than I'd prefer," Flare said, reaching down and brushing their hand along Ghost as she circled their legs.

Ash gave an optimistic take. "We're improving, I think. It's taking us a while, but there's progress."

"Mmh. I admit, I heard your performance in the exam was lackluster. But you're taking notice of your flaws and adapting to each other's methods of combat and exploration. Later down the line, your practiced unity as a team will save you from unnecessary struggle, or even death." Egar mused.

I had my doubts about that. It hardly felt like we were adapting.

"Well, one thing that's pleasantly surprising is how well my prayers are working in here..." Ash paused. On thinking over his own words, nervousness crossed his face, and he stammered out: "...I hope I'm n-not supposed to take that to mean a bunch o-of people have died here!"

Egar chuckled. "While lives have been lost even on the first floor, I would not wish to spook you with exaggerations of this place's fatality rate. Yggdrasil is more central to Arcania's history than most people think. I would explain further, but I think it'd do best to let you see what I mean when you get there. Assuming, of course, that you do."

"Ah... no, I believe I know what you mean." Ash nodded.

I was not especially informed on the subject, but hearing their conversation jogged the memory of reading about a power struggle regarding Yggdra—

"Hey man, are you actually fuckin' fishin'?" Xinyi blurted. "I didn't think people did that for real. Like, for fun."

"Why yes, I find it quite relaxing, actually," Egar confirmed. "Fun might not be the most apt word, but it is meditative. Plus, it brings home food to put on the table, provided you're fond of seafood."

"Why bother going all the way up here? Seems like a pain," Flare inquired.

"There actually aren't very many fishing locales around Iorys. None as close as here in the labyrinth, anyway. As for why I'm here on 2F instead of the floor below? Mostly, I get fewer run-ins with greenhorn adventurers. But I've also grown fond of this particular spot... the scenery's quite nice."

Xinyi leaned over to me. "I think he's telling us to piss off."

"That'd be the first time you've taken that hint." I returned.

"Still, isn't it a bit dangerous? I mean, it is the labyrinth, after all," Ash asked.

"Ha ha!" Egar's laugh carried a bit more kick than his usual amused chuckle. "Your concern is appreciated, but I'm no amateur. It'll take more than what crawls around down on these low levels to put a dent in my armor. Besides, this particular spot is safe from monster attacks. On the rare occasion that monsters do show up here, they're coming to drink and catch easy food. They don't want to mess with something that fights back."

"Huh." Xinyi shrugged her shoulders. "Whaddaya know. I thought fishing was like, a senile old person thing."

"I enjoyed going fishing when I was younger," I offered.

"Okay, grandma." Xinyi glanced at me, almost with disbelief.

"Grandma? You don't even know how old I am."

Xinyi's face scrunched as she carefully inspected me. "Twentyyyy... five?"

"I'm nineteen."

"Huh, so that actually means you're... three years younger than Ni." Ash noted.

"Naw, there's no way! You're so... so...!" Xinyi spun her hands around to try and coax out the word she was looking for.

"Wise beyond her years?" Egar suggested.

Flare shook their head. "Not quite. It's more like... weary beyond her years."

"I don't know how to feel about either of those," I grimaced and pointed at Flare, "Especially coming from you."

"Well..." Flare scratched the back of their head, "When I think of a nineteen-year-old, I usually picture someone full of ambition, or at least still figuring out their place in the world. You act like you've seen it all, and you're kind of cranky about it."

Hm. Refreshingly honest, if nothing else.

After reeling his line back in, Egar grunted and stood to his feet. "Well, it does seem about time for me to head on home." The length of thread with a sort of pearlescent shine to it caught all of our attentions as he pulled it out of his knapsack and began wrapping one end around his finger. Egar paused and looked up at us.

"Something the matter?"

◄—•—►

"I guess it slipped my mind to tell ya, since Xinyi technically already knew about 'em, heh heh." Syrik chuckled sheepishly.

Kris and I both turned our eyes to Xinyi, who put her hands up to stave us off. "I would've told you! I just, was excited to finally have a new guild, and sorta... forgot to, y'know?"

"Hey, honest mistake, right?" Syrik offered. "And you're no worse for wear for it, though you're certainly lucky sons a'guns to be able to say that."

The Brouni continued seamlessly, pulling out a spool of the same pearlescent wire that we had seen before. "This... is Ariadne thread. A hundred ental will getcha one of these, which will get your whole crew outta Yggdrasil and back to town in a pinch. Now, don't actually get yourself in a pinch first, 'cause they take a moment to go off. You gotta hold it taut for about... 20 seconds, I'd say? Oh, and make sure everyone who wants to go home is touching it or the person holding it."

"Can you use it to transport elsewhere?" Kris asked.

"Ha ha, unfortunately, no. It really only has an eye for getting you outta Yggdrasil, for whatever reason. It's impotent outside the labyrinth. But hey, good question. I reckon we'd have a way different transit system otherwise, right?" Syrik chuckled at his own quip.

Kris stayed fixated on the spool of thread, with more questions evidently still brewing in her head. "Can it take anything with it? Or is it just living things?"

"Well, it takes your clothes and anything on your person with you, thankfully. I'm not the expert on it, but from what I've heard, just about the only things it won't take are things that don't want to go, things that are stuck in place, and stuff that's much larger than a person."

"If this is such a life-saving tool, why isn't it offered freely?" Kris' line of questioning was bordering on becoming fierce.

"Business is business. The demand is always there, and they mostly just take time and effort to make, so I keep them cheap."

"100en isn't cheap. I could feed myself for nearly a week off of that much."

Syrik chuckled nervously as he continued to fend off Kris' interrogation. "Well, you're right, for the average Joe, that ain't cheap. But adventuring's a life-risking endeavor, and the toll's mental and physical, so it pays well. We buy materials from the labyrinth for a pretty penny. A hundred might seem steep for now, but once you get way up there, the more valuable stuff's gonna rear its head and you won't mind that price one bit."

"A-Alright, I think we're satisfied with that answer now!" Ash stepped forward, putting an arm in front of Kris lest she fire off more questions. "We'll take two. Can't hurt to be safe, right?"

"Right you are, my friend!" Syrik flashed a thankful smile to Ash, and he began clipping off two lengths of Ariadne thread as requested.

"Oh! And..." Ash dug into his pockets momentarily, then produced a familiar metal trinket stained with dried mud. "Is there any chance you recognize this coin? I know it's unlikely, but..."

Syrik took the coin between his thumb and index finger, and cupped his chin. "Hmmmm... I can't help but think you're onto something, having me look at this... It's ringin' a bell. A far-off one, but it's there..."

Syrik picked a bit of the mud of with his fingernail, then set the coin down and turned back to finish cutting our threads, stealing glances at the coin as he did so. Upon handing us our thread, his face lit up, and he snatched the coin up again.

"Aha! It just hit me! I know where I've seen something like this. Us Brouni have the mercantile lifestyle rooted pretty deep in our history - at least for the gents. It's not as much of a thing as it once was, but part of that was, we'd make play money for ourselves as boys and pretend to be like our papas. This little hunk 'a metal looks an awful lot like the kind you'd buy for your kids nowadays if you wanted 'em doin' that kinda thing. I reckon it's a prototype from a good while ago?"

"So it's not rare treasure?" Xinyi asked pitifully.

"It's absolutely worthless, ha ha. You're gettin' maybe 30 ental tops outta this thing from an antiques dealer, unless you find one with a hearty helping of nutcase on their plate."

'Well, that's good to know." Ash received the coin back, and pocketed it. "Thank you for all your help, Syrik. I think it's about time we were on our way."

As Ash turned to leave, Xinyi grasped his arm with both of her own, falling to her knees in the process. "You'll help me find a nutcase, won't you, Ash?"

Ash gazed upon Xinyi's wet-eyed plea, unmoved. "I have a feeling I'd not be looking very long or far."

◄—•—►

Nearing the end of another day of modestly fruitful exploration – a thing that was becoming gradually more common as we acclimated to the lifestyle and each other's eccentricities - we stood at an impasse; a towering stone wall that seemed to stand in place of what should've been an exit further upward.

On the opposite end of the room, there sat a stone statue of a stubby creature which did not resemble any of the monsters that I could recall us seeing thus far.

"Great. So, do we have to bust this thing down, or what?" Flare crossed their arms.

"I don't recommend that. It'd take a while, especially with the magic barrier protecting it." A distinctly high-pitched voice responded, echoing from the treetops.

I whipped around and had my firearm trained on where I thought the voice's owner was positioned as quick as I could.

"I also don't recommend that," The voice was as inscrutably playful as it was mockingly unconcerned. "It wouldn't go as well as you're hoping. And besides, it's not a very nice thing to do."

A tiny, young-looking Celestrian girl dropped down from the branch she had perched on, and pulled back her hood to let free a bundle of fluffy pink hair. The coffin mounted on her back made plain her profession as a Necromancer.

I lowered my gun slightly. "State your name, then."

"I'm Lili. I'm a veteran explorer." The innocent smile on her face, contradictory to the rest of her dour appearance, didn't show signs of leaving. "I've heard about a new guild making a name for themselves, so I wanted to meet you!"

"Have we?" Flare seemed skeptical.

"Sure have! I mean, it's been a while since a fresh guild has gotten this far in just a few weeks. Some guilds give up before I get to explain this part to them!"

"Do you always... wait around here to do this?" Ash inquired.

"Hee hee, don't be silly. Of course not!" Lili toyed with the jawbone grimly fashioned into the necklace she wore. "Anyway, this is something a lot of adventurers don't know about this forest at first:

There was a group of Celestrian mages that created the golems in this forest. They're sentries made to guard against invaders, after a foreign monarch attempted to take Yggdrasil as his own territory by force. But since their creators died, the golems' power has been weakening. That's actually part of why the Arcanian council opened Yggdrasil back up, you know? But, there's a big papa golem at the top of this stratum. If he doesn't recognize you, he'll try to stop you from going any further up Yggdrasil. That's the first big challenge adventurers have to face."

Right after Lili took a deep, exaggerated breath, Kris immediately fired the question that was on my mind as well: "How do you know all this?"

"Well, I've done it all myself, silly," Lili bounced cheerily in place, her body never becoming quite still. "But I also knew how magical this forest was even before that. Celestrians have a sixth sense for magic, you know." She tapped her forehead.

"Wait, really?" Xinyi seemed surprised. It was, in her defense, not really the kind of thing that would get brought up unless you were deep in the study or practice of the arcane arts.

"Sure! For example, there's a very fascinating magical aura coming from your friend's sword right there." The Necromancer leaned in toward Kris ever so slightly too close, and pointed at the unusual rapier sheathed at her hip.

The Therian took a defensive step back as she twisted her body to shield the weapon away from Lili's point. The beads of sweat budding on her forehead marked the closest to a break in composure I'd yet seen from the girl. I was feeling less and less justified keeping my thoughts to myself about that odd-shaped rapier, as the intrigue surrounding it only seemed to grow.

"Did you know that too, Ash?" Xinyi turned to her elegantly dressed companion.

"That the forest has magic imbued in it throughout? I could faintly feel as much, yes. If you're asking if I knew about the sword, though... that, I had no idea about." Ash's eyes paced back and forth between Lili and Kris. "It must be an advanced magic, I'd assume. I never studied magic proper at an academy, so my Mana detection could be considered lackluster."

Xinyi stepped behind Ash and began patting his ears carefully, then pointing them synchronously in different directions.

"...those are my ears, for the record. Not antennae."

Flare cleared their throat loudly and leaned back against the large statue resembling one of the forest's golems. "Alright, so that's real nice and all, but where does that leave us with finding a way up to the next—"

Their inquiry stopped short as they jolted upright, and the statue fell backwards with a thud. Stone-against-stone grinding sounded out behind us. In a serendipitous turn of events, the rock wall that perplexed us was now gone, and in its place, a staircase leading up.

"Wow, you're a natural at this," The Necromancer winked playfully. Then, she walked right up to me, getting slightly too close just as she had with Kris. "Say, I never got your name?"

The girl was half my height at best, but she seemed content to stare up at me, undaunted. As I loomed over her, deliberating whether or not to comply with her request, Lili stood up on her tiptoes, and a shade fell over her face that seemed to intensify her stare.

"I think when people meet someone new, they usually give their name first instead of pointing a gun at them, don't you think? So the least you could do is tell me your name now, right?"

If it gets you out of my personal space quicker. "...Yulia."

"Great! It's nice to meet you, Yulia!" Satisifed, Lili's bubbly demeanor returned, and she put some much-needed distance back between us. "Anyway, I think it's about time I got going, but I'd like to give you this, as a way of saying 'good luck'!"

Lili produced from inside her jacket an amber-tinted glass jar, and thrust it into my palm.

Upon inspection, I deemed the honey-like elixir inside to be a Nectar; a medicine which purported to bring you back from the brink of death, and even beyond it, if applied quickly enough.

"Well, it's been lovely meeting you all! I hope I get to see you again - on the 2nd stratum!" With those parting words, Lili skipped off, taking the newly revealed stairs upward two at a time.

I tossed the bottle in my hand off into a nearby pond as soon as she was out of sight.

"Yules, what the hell?!" Xinyi shouted at me. "That was the good stuff!"

"What, do you think I just accept gifts from creepy little girls? I don't need help from her."

Flare shook their head. "Much as I hate to turn down free stuff, our captain does have a point. Even from the most optimistic viewpoint, that girl was a bit suspicious."

"What do you suspect her of?" Kris jabbed. "Do you think the Nectar she gave us was poisoned? What reason could she have for doing that when she doesn't even know us?"

"Regardless of her intent, I didn't ask for her advice or generosity. I'm perfectly capable on my own, in case you all had forgotten that I'm not with you by my own choice," I stated.

"Peace, please," Ash interjected. "What's done is done. Let's move onward to the next floor. Lili said she wants to see us again on the 2nd stratum. When we meet her then, we can interrogate her further. But for now, let's focus on staying together as a unit, so that we can make it there."

We traded tense stares with each other before each gathering the various things we had set down on the ground. Xinyi mumbled passive-aggressively, but I paid her no mind. An awkward sort of quiet accompanied our ascension of the stairs to the next layer of the labyrinth, though it was broken once by Flare, toward the back of the line, as they called out: "Kris. Come on."

Chapter Text

The thunk thunk thunk of the knife in Flare's hand hitting stone as it cut into the forest mackerel I had caught paired nicely with the burbling of the pot full of broth and vegetables next to it. I had to admit, I felt my hunger growing as I listened to the euphonious duet between roiling stew and surprisingly adept knifework.

"Hmmrmghh..." A sigh to grab attention. From Xinyi, no doubt, as neither Ash nor Kris would dare to interrupt a stew's symphony with such a callous note.

"Something to say?" I gave a glance without moving my head, just to tickle the hook without fully taking the bait she had so amateurishly laid out.

"Well," Xinyi began, "I mean, don't get me wrong, I never turn down good food..."

"But?"

Xinyi gestured to the pot with her arms. "BUT, like... fish again? For real?"

Hook, line, and sinker. Which was to say, I had Xinyi where I wanted her, and all that remained was to give the tug that'd overpower her and pull her off her feet.

"You're always welcome to catch something yourself, if you want. We'll cook whatever you bring in." Though there was a certain je ne sais quoi to food you personally put effort into, and I'd miss that just a bit if Xinyi really were to take my suggestion, against all odds.

"Actually, I don't know how much there is to catch besides fish that's not... a monster." Ash speculated.

"Do any of us know how to cook a monster?" Kris further inquired.

After throwing the chunks of fish into the pot, Flare leaned back, folded their arms, and gazed up into the sky as if pondering the scenario. "Ehhh... seems like too much of a pain. I'll stick with fish."

"Gah! You're all scared little babies." Xinyi threw her arms in the air, then stood up. "I'm gonna go look for something else to eat with this."

"I'll keep an eye on her," Kris quickly sat up and began following after Xinyi. A valiant escape attempt, but in record time, Flare's hand was gripped on the back of her shirt's collar, and she nearly fell back into her seat as her momentum was halted.

"Mmmmmmmmnope, you're staying here with me," Flare scolded.

"I'll watch the food so you can go with her, if that satisfies you," Offered Ash.

Flare grimaced at Ash, then took a fatal look into Kris' pleading eyes. A long, weary sigh. "Tch. Fine."

"If it's all the same, I'll also go on this little group venture. Someone needs to appraise what Xinyi finds." I said. Truthfully, I just needed to put some space between the food and me, as the fragrence was fit to turn me ravenous, and I could tell that ere long I'd make a show of myself not meant to be seen.

"Ah, hold a moment..." Ash pleaded. He quickly assumed prayer stance, after which he explained: "I know you won't be gone long, but this is still the labyrinth. Just in case."

◄—•—►

It wasn't long before scattered beams of sunlight directed Xinyi's eye to a distinct glimmer hidden under a tree's verdant curtains. "What're those?" She asked curiously, pointing. The muscled woman's eyes implored me for an answer, sure that I had one for whatever reason.

In fact, I did. The golden skin that had caught her eye belonged to something quite familiar to me...

"Moon Apples. That's... actually a pretty fortuitous find. They grow natively where I used to live, and they're just about the most delicious thing that can be called a fruit." I explained, "I'm honestly surprised they grow here in the labyrinth. I wonder if someone cultivated them here on purpose...?"

"Oh, sick. You all can thank me later," Xinyi began strutting toward the apples.

"Have you never had them?" I wondered aloud.

Just as Xinyi placed her hands on the tree to begin climbing it, a screeching hiss stopped her in her tracks. We turned toward its source - a dark-gray-furred primate with large, round ears and a taunting look in its citrinne eyes, hanging from a branch of the very same tree.

"Huh? What do you want? Piss off," Xinyi spoke to the monkey monster.

Flare walked up and snatched a bruised apple that had fallen to the ground. "Here's how you deal with guys like this," the scruffy Therian explained. They brandished the apple quite deliberately to the monkey, then feigned winging the fruit at it with full force.

The long-clawed primate flinched, then screeched. It plucked its own ammunition from the tree, and flung it back at Flare in retribution - not bothering with the feinting element. The fruit split over Flare's head, and they reeled back in pain, muttering curses.

"You're supposed to let go when you throw it, dumbass," Xinyi scoffed, and took the apple out of Flare's hand. Xinyi wound up her toss, and then let it fly at the monkey.

Holding up one of its long arms, the monkey caught Xinyi's apple as it whizzed by its head. It held its position to show off its catch mockingly to us, then returned the gesture to Xinyi's forehead.

"Aaghhh! Godsdamned monkey..." Xinyi griped.

Howling laughter and clapping from the primate made it clear it was enjoying making a fool of us. It swung itself upside down and hung from its perch by its feet, saucily awaiting its next competitor.

"Maybe you two could get farther if aggression wasn't your first resort," Kris reprimanded. She held her hands up in a catching formation, inviting the monkey to toss her the fruit as an act of generosity instead.

The monkey nodded, reached behind itself for a fruit, and...

...an overripe, rotten lump of mush splattered over Kris' hair, causing the bunny-eared girl to visibly cringe. Another bout of amused screeching and claps sounded out.

"See where that got ya? That monkey had 'bastard' written all over 'im from the get-go, and I knew," Xinyi bragged.

"Well, I think that means you're up next, Yulia," Flare suggested.

"Shoot it. You have a gun," Kris urged vindictively as she wiped her head of pulverized fruit.

I knew better than to tango with a monkey that had been this clever thus far (not to give these fools too much credit). "Mmm... I think I'll pass—"

"...hey, are all of you okay? I could hear whatever was happening from our campsite, and I got worried you were ambushed or something..."

No sooner than I had registered that the voice was Ash's and that he was here, I witnessed something large and gray launch through the air and toward the slender Celestrain. It was already too late when it occured to me what it was.

"AAAAAAIGHH!" Ash flailed wildly as the primate assailed him, yanking his hair, scampering all over his body, and avoiding Ash's attempts to swat at the thing. "Get it off! Somebody get it off!"

By the time we all ran over to help, it was already done tormenting its sudden and unsuspecting victim. It kicked off of Ash's head to make its getaway into the distance.

"Holy shit, are you okay?!" Xinyi extended a hand, as if to brush off some of the dirt the thing had tracked all over Ash.

Instead of acknowledging the concern, Ash immediately began rummaging through the backpack we kept all our supplies in, which we had left with him at camp.

A pause. Then, Ash gave us a wide-eyed stare. "Oh no."

With no further explanation, the unathletic Celestrian broke into a full sprint in - oddly enough - the exact direction the monkey had fled.

"Hey! Wait up!!" Xinyi called after Ash ineffectually. She didn't need any more convincing to take off after him. The remaining three of us took short glances at each other before accepting that we, too, were being dragged into whatever this was.

On catching up, I caught wind of the breathless back-and-forth Xinyi and Ash were having.

"What's 'oh no' mean?!" The blade-wielding Therian asked.

Ash was noticeably winded in his reply. "Th-that thing! It took... it took our thread!"

"Thread?! You mean like our Get-Home-Thing?!"

"Wh... what else would I be running after it for?!"

"Oh shit!" With that realization, Xinyi sped up, easily and swiftly overtaking Ash and following the distant gray patch of fur that was hopping from tree to tree, branch to branch.

The rest of us trailed behind, gradually losing the Masurao who was making through the forest's twists and turns like a fired shot, until the streak of orange hair and steel took a sharp left and disappeared from sight. Still, we continued giving chase, knowing the consequences if that primate were to make off with our only thread on-hand.

"Hey, watch out for—!"

I could hear Xinyi call out as I made the same turn she did, but I couldn't see her for as close as her voice sounded. That is, until my line of sight suddenly dropped from its usual height to about a couple inches up from the ground.

"—the mud pit..."

Three more decidedly telling squelches quashed any hope that one of the others would heed Xinyi's advice in time.

"Ooooooooohk eeee eeee eee!!" A familiar and grating cry directed us toward the gray-furred beast, whose poised stance told us all we needed to know about how purposeful it was that our chase took us to this location.

Pinched between its gnarly claws was the ethereal Ariadne Thread, almost translucent in direct sunlight. Deliberately, the devilish monkey gripped the other end of the thread and pulled it taut, giving us a look as knowing as its beady yellow eyes could give.

"H-hey! No, no! Put that down!" Ash panicked, futilely attempting to wrest free of our shameful sludgey prison, "Be a good chimp-thing! Here, here! Good chimpy!

...please?!"

"Yules, you got your gun, don'tcha? Blast that thing to smithereens!" Xinyi begged.

One look at where my musket was told me I was not lodging that thing free in time. "It's jammed with dirt. And besides, I'd be destroying the thread, too."

"Sheesh, how can you stay this calm?! Somebody do someth—" Too late. The brief pulse of light and sound of rushing air came, and then our tormentor was gone. We stood sunken in the ground, dumbstruck, for a minute or two.

"Don't suppose the folks back in town'll be able to handle that one without us?" Flare asked.

◄—•—►

Whether two hours or thirty minutes had passed by the time we stepped foot back in Iorys, I personally could not have said. We frantically looked for clues and asked for the whereabouts of the monkey monster, and eventually fell upon an inkling that it had, at one point or another, been in Mirina's tavern. We made our way there and flung the doors open, prepared for the worst.

The devestation inside was difficult to describe. In fact, there was so much of it that it became mindboggling to conceptualize how it all went down. Drinks were anywhere but in upright mugs, mugs were everywhere and in myriad pieces, furniture was flipped; and the list went on.

We saw Mirina first among a presumably long list of victims, her hair disheveled, her glasses crooked, and a scowl affixed on her face.

Xinyi ran up to the barowner. "OHMIGOSH MIRINA. Have you seen—?"

"A monkey? 'Seen' would be one way to describe my experience with the monkey, yes. I have more words for it if you'd like to hear them and don't have any children around." Mirina was practically advising us not to admit we were at fault with that statement.

However, it seemed that message did not get across to Ash. "Ms. Mirina, I am deeply sorry on behalf of our guild, we'll do whatever you ask to help as soon as we get this situation under control. That being said, do you happen to have a clue where it is now?"

Mirina produced a small cloth from her pocket, and began wiping her glasses free of the flecks of alcoholic beverage that were on them. "You may also want to apologize to my patrons, in that case." The glasses still didn't quite sit right when she placed them back on her face. "And yes, it took off toward the market once it was done tearing up my bar."

Glancing over, the patrons that Mirina mentioned all seemed to be staring at us with varying levels of animosity. All of them had some sort of evidence of an unfortunate interaction with the monster monkey, save for one. A whiskered old Therian man, his hair toward the grayer end of salt-and-pepper, held a contented grin that made him seem almost oblivious to the situation.

"What did the monkey do to you?" Xinyi pointed to the older fellow.

"Ah, heh heh, nothing really," The old man admitted sheepishly. "The darn rascal actually started picking fleas I didn't know I had outta my hair. I thought I'd been scratching the back of my head an awful lot lately, too."

◄—•—►

A quick perusal of the market proved that this menace was as unpredictable as it was troublesome. Syrik confirmed sighting of a monkey tearing through the place at breakneck speed, but it hadn't seemed interested in doing to this place what it had done to Mirina's. Asking a few other people led us at last to Jenetta's inn. Trepedatiously, we opened the door, prepared as we could be for the worst.

The place was absolutely pristeen. A cautious sort of relief washed over us. Then, Jenetta popped into view.

The innkeeper gasped. "Ohmigosh, what happened to you guys?!"

"Jenetta, get that demon off of you!" Xinyi shrieked.

"Huh? Whatever for?" Jenetta cocked her head toward the monkey perched contently on her sholder. "What's going on?"

It was a group effort to summarize our misfortunes at the hands of the primate in front of us, but Jenetta listened patiently, and at the end of it all, she seemed to have a good enough understanding.

"Hmmm... really? This little cutie did all that?" She scratched under the chin of the beast lovingly. "I find it hard to believe, seeing how friendly he's been to me this whole time. But then again, the state you five are in DOES add up with your side of the story..."

It was only then that it occurred to me that we hadn't had time to do anything about the mud that soaked our clothes up to our shoulders. A long night of scrubbing this armor was ahead of me.

"Well, whatever the case, I suppose what matters is that we caught him," Ash resigned. "So now, back into the labyrinth he goes."

"Awwww, can't I keep him?" Jenetta whined.

"Keep him? Jenetta, he's a monster. From the labyrinth that only trained explorers are allowed into," Ash explained.

"But I can take care of him! I keep plenty of animals around the inn. Strays find their way in and, boom! They like it here, and they have a new place to stay. Dogs, cats, chickens, owls... what's one monkey?"

That would explain the food scraps she left out by the windows each night.

...wait, cats?

"I don't think I've ever seen this level of excitement in Yulia's eyes," Kris mentioned. "It's kind of scaring me."

"So? I can keep Dr. Simmons, right?" The emerald-haired innkeeper pleaded.

"...fine, I suppose." Ash gave in. "But you have to promise me, if he so much as hurts anyone - even one of the inn's other pets - you hand him over to us and he goes back where he came from."

And like that, it was over. The uncomfortableness of the mud-caked outerwear I still had on was now setting in, so I couldn't have cared less how this concluded, though Xinyi still seemed a bit vengeful. A couple of adventurers entered the inn behind us, holding conversation with each other.

"...yeah, it was really weird. Just a whole pot of stew right there, smack dab in the middle of the forest. I 'ad half a mind to call it a really elaborate trap by some crazy smart monsters, but nah. Just a delicious stew someone up an' abandoned. A bit cold, but hey, you won't hear me complainin'."

Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw Xinyi giving the monkey the middle finger.

Chapter Text

Ash kept giving everyone glances periodically, as if anticipating one of us to say something, or invite him to. Whenever our eyes met, I quickly directed my gaze down at the half-finished egg scramble and untouched honeyed toast on my plate. The fruit medley was already gone, but that was about as much appetite as I could muster for an early morning meal. It was more typical of me to skip breakfast.

I was given to eating quietly before we headed out, either as a group to the labyrinth or on our own individual errands, but the complete and utter quiet at our table this morning was a bit more perplexing. Xinyi would usually yammer for the sake of it, or Flare would grumble passively about being up this early, which would kick off some sort of discussion that'd bounce between us and, infrequently, even get me to offer my two cents.

I had a feeling I knew what Ash wanted to say, and by extent what everyone was thinking. But I decided I'd let him be the one to bring it up. And eventually, he did. "So, it's come to my attention that—"

"We need more money," Kris interjected tersely.

"Well, yes. That," Ash agreed, "But moreover, I thought we should discuss what we're going to do about it... together. Xinyi and I have been working part-time to help reimburse Mirina for the damages to her tavern, as I'm sure you all know..."

"Yeeeeaaaahhh, I'm pretty much flat broke..." Xinyi glanced off to the side, wedging her pinky finger into the fluff of her ear, "I kinda went overboard ordering all that food when we met. I ended up in the red, and Mirina was cool about it, but that's where my money's been going... not countin' a little pick-me-up drink, every now and again. It'd be nice to have a little somethin' in my pocket."

"Yes, clearing our debt with her would be... pertinent," Ash reinforced. "That said, any ideas?"

I pulled a piece of my honeyed toast off and offered it to Ms. Cocoa, the calico who had been sitting patiently by my seat since this discussion had begun. She took it eagerly, allowed me to ruffle the fur behind her ears, then trotted off.

"I'm not exactly itching to put hours in at a job, myself," Flare admitted, "But Mirina's pub offers requests. Those'd probably be some quick cash, and we can do them while we're out and about in the labyrinth."

Xinyi sat upright. "Oh man, that's actually a wicked smart idea."

"Couldn't hurt to try," Ash shrugged. "All in favor?"

◄—•—►

"So you see my situation; I have come to Iorys to see my daughter home," The well-to-do man grabbed a handkerchief from his breast pocket and cleaned his monocle as he explained. "However, I cannot find her at present."

"Tsh. You want her to study... being polite or whatever, she wants to be an adventurer. See the problem here is—" Xinyi cut herself short in response to a firm-yet-powerless elbowing from Ash.

"Ahem. Regardless of your personal thoughts on the matter, Xinyi, our job is to complete the client's request, as requested. Now, good sir, may I inquire as to any sort of identifying features to help us find her?" Ash mediated.

"Ah, certainly. Word among the guilds here purports sightings of a griffon-helmed adventurer as of late – that would be our family's coat of arms, and therefore, her."

"And, if she were to refuse to come along with us, what should we bring back to verify that we contacted her?"

"In all honesty, old chap, I don't intend to compensate you for any job done short of you bringing her back here to me." The monocled man clarified.

Flare made a particular noise like a grunt which had, in a way, become familiar to me as their trademark expression of begrudged acceptance. "Well then, we've got our work cut out for us. Any idea how far up she'd be?"

"From what I've heard? Upper first stratum. I trust you all understand where that puts her, though my knowledge of the parlance leaves me clueless. She means to challenge a great guardian of the forest, from what I've gathered? I do so hope you can make it to her before she pulls any such stunt."

"Welp, you heard 'im, boys and gents!" Xinyi declared, prompting a hushed correction from Kris regarding the number of our crew whom could accurately be referred to as either 'boys' or 'gents', "Let's get rollin'!"

One thing, however, still bothered me, even as the rest of my guild turned toward the exit of the tavern. "Why not ask the other members of her guild to find her for you? Wouldn't it be much easier for them to track her down?"

Our client fastened his monocle back onto his face as he looked up at us, apparently having been unsatisfied with his first attempt at cleaning it. "Ah? I thought it was fairly obvious. My daughter intended to – and to the best of my knowledge has – pursued a solo career in the adventuring field."

◄—•—►

I paid no mind to the forest's greenery as I trampled it underfoot in my single-minded forward march. I wasn't in the greatest of moods, to be sure. Perhaps I was hoping to outpace my guildmates until they had to search for me as well, and then I could have some time to sort out the conflicting thoughts in my head. Or perhaps I was only swimming in circular anger, in outrage that was stirring up every grievance I could think of that ailed me in recent history, and all of my thoughts were otherwise clear and organized.

"Hey, hey! Slow down! We're looking for someone, you know!" Xinyi called as she jogged to catch up.

Anyone with lesser reflexes than her would've been jabbed by the finger I pointed up as I whipped around. "Did you think I'd never find out?!"

"...Well, at first, no. But then... yeah," Xinyi admitted.

"She had a point back there, y'know," Came the nonchalant voice of Flare, "We are looking for somebody. You two can sort this out after we're back in town. That way we'll get a noise complaint at worst, instead of every monster in a mile radius on our tails."

I picked up a somewhat slower pace, though still enough to keep them to my back. Better that I didn't have to look at them. Even then, I could only hold my tongue for a little while. "Who's to say I don't kick you all out of my guild the moment we collect this reward?"

I didn't need to see Xinyi to know I made the right threat. "Well... y-you can't! Because... it's in the rules, yeah... you can't remove others from your guild without their agreement to it."

Now that she was grasping at straws, it was becoming more infuriating that I had been tricked by this girl. I could have said a million things to her, but I hardly wanted to honor her with a response. I didn't have to, however, because Kris spoke for me:

"Not true. A guild's leader is the sole person within it who can claim the right to make official changes to its roster without a cosignatory. So, being our leader, Yulia is expressly the exact person who can remove us from her guild without our say-so."

"I liked you better when you were quiet," Xinyi grumbled.

"Everyone, hang on a minute." Ash rushed ahead of us after calling out. He picked something off the ground at the foot of a pond, and examined it. I stepped up beside him. What he was holding froze me in my tracks.

It was splotched with dried blood, but there was little doubt about it: a helmet emblazoned with a crest resembling a griffon. Looking around only confirmed what the bloody helm and its lack of a present owner suggested: there was a sword jammed blade-first into the ground, and a large patch of upturned soil in front of it below Ash's feet (at least, until I pointed it out to him and he leapt off).

"Well, this is it, isn't it?" Ash announced. Almost mournfully, he brushed his hand against the clean part of the emblem. "House Fenplume... I thought that emblem sounded familiar. I didn't want to jump to conclusions, but this really is them, huh?"

I would have chimed in with a 'do you know them?', but neither my mood nor the air of the situation lent themselves to idle curiosity.

Ash hung the helmet on the hilt of the sword. "Sorry. I'm going to offer her a prayer. I'll not be long."

The forest air was still for a moment as Ash closed his eyes. With this prayer, there were no spectral cards or gentle magical hum or any such effect that came with the prayers that he used in battle to empower us. If this were a normal prayer, it was the first I'd seen from him. Or, perhaps this was another side to his shaman background; one that didn't conjure visual elements because it was meant to bring peace.

An agonized scream shattered the tranquility in an instant. Recognizing Xinyi as the source, we all turned to witness a large mass of matted pale blue hair sinking its wickedly long fangs into the Masurao's shoulder. Blood cascading down the right half of her torso, Xinyi began flailing and attempting to rip the thing clean from herself, wailing wrathfully: "Motherfucker! I'LL KILL YOU!"

I loaded a shot into my gun and readied to aim, but Flare was quicker; an arrow dug into the creature's hide, weakening the grip of the thing's jaw and allowing Xinyi to pull it off herself. As she threw it across the ground for Ghost to chase after like a stick, the periphery of my hearing picked up on hastening movement through the nearby bushes.

Another of these creatures leapt out of the bushes to my right, aiming to sink its teeth into Ash. My body moved to intervene, and I stuck up my shield to meet the beast. The sound of its failed attack raked down my shield, shrill and awful. When I lowered my shield to raise my weapon to it, I got a glimpse of what the things were:

Generously, they could be called hares. They stood upright on their hindlegs, though their forelegs were too small to do much with – not that they needed them. The only other parts of them that weren't covered in unruly, overgrown blue hair were what mattered: their long, chisel-like buck teeth, and unsettling orange eyes that held only hunger in them.

My movements were just a bit too slow, and the wretched hare lunged at my leg; I got a taste of what their teeth could do then. They weren't the most efficient at puncturing and tearing flesh, but what they could do rather well was rip open leather and metal. Piercing pain injected into my calf, and shot up my leg. I stifled a scream and began bashing my shield against the thing's skull.

After the third or fourth hit, it came away – though perhaps some of my flesh went with it – and I used the opportunity to brace my shield as a landing pad, and fall onto the hare. I heard a satisfying crunch of bone, but then my shield wobbled beneath me, indicating that it was still squirming. I aimed my musket around the corner of my bulwark and fired.

The creature's movement ceased, and I presumed it dead. But then I heard a series of voices yell. They sounded like several, if not all of my guildmates, but my injury left me a bit dazed, so I had no idea who or what they were yelling at.

Then, I felt those teeth sink into me again, from behind. It was only then that I realized what the hares were doing. It was viciously clever, and for what little time I had to think about it, it made sense that our missing person would have fallen to these things. When they launched their ambush, they were aiming for the neck.

The jaws of the hare sunk deep into me, and my head swam. Their clever hunting tactic was foiled by their apparently lackluster aim, but this one needed only be a few inches to the right, and it'd have bitten down on something vital. I fell over, my strength failing me rapidly.

I heard my guildmates rush to my aid, and within seconds the crushing force of the monster's jaw was missing, presumably skewered on Kris' rapier or playing chew toy for Ghost, or bisected by a vengeful Xinyi's katana. But my vision was already blurred beyond use, and my other senses were following suit. Numbness overtook my body in seconds, and then, unceremoniously, there was nothing.

◄—•—►

I'd say my hearing returned to me first, but really, all of my senses came back nearly at once, so jumbled that I had to take a moment to process any of them. There was something hard and smooth at my lips, and a taste with both a cloying sweetness like raw honey and a stark sensation like mint coating my mouth. It was thick.

I opened my eyes. A glass jar, cracked slightly along the bottom. Held up to my mouth by a supple hand of umber skin. Kris' hand. I felt her other hand gently holding up the back of my head. Then came the throbbing pain on the inner part of my left shoulder, and a slightly duller one in the back of my left leg. I groaned.

"There might've been a little lakewater mixed in. I'm not the one who threw it into a pond, though," The rabbit-eared girl spoke flatly.

"Yules! Are you okay?! Shit, that was crazy!" Xinyi leaned over me, dangling her bright orange hair in my face.

Right. The hares. The request. I was still in my armor. I could feel the grass of the forest floor tickling the back of my neck now. I propped myself up on my elbows, then pushed up into a sitting position. "Nghh... Uh, I'm fine. Where's the helmet? I think we should probably bring that back to our client."

Xinyi grabbed me by the shoulders. After seeing me wince in pain, she lowered her grip to just above my elbows. "Man, you're nuts! You almost died there and that's the first thing you're gonna worry about?"

"It's still on top of the sword," Ash pointed back behind me. "I'll go get it."

"Oh, yeah, by the way..." Xinyi switched gears suddenly, "So that fancy guy and his daughter, they're like, totally rich, right? The... Penflumes, or whatever. How'd ya know them, Ash?"

"Ah, umm..."

"Fenplumes, first of all. And secondly, I've got a question or two about that, myself." It was Flare, of all people, who corrected her. With our attention, they turned to Ash and addressed him: "Tell me if I'm wrong, but the emblem at the bottom of your coat... that's the coat of arms for House Firblynn, of Sidonia, isn't it?"

Ash practically recoiled to hear the name from Flare's lips. "Uhh, th-this isn't mine, I just... picked it up from somewhere. I don't even remember where."

"It's got your name stitched into the inside of the collar on the back."

"Whaa...?" Ash tugged his collar and craned his neck back to see. "I thought Neena was joking about doing that..."

"Honestly, I was already confident about the emblem. I ID'd it pretty early on when we met, but it took me long enough to realize what was bugging me about it: House Firblynn was dissolved nearly two years ago. Its sole patriarch was caught in a scandal, and ended up incurring a long enough prison sentence and a big enough debt that their property was seized by the Sidonian government."

Flare scratched the back of their head, looking to the side nonchalantly.

"But, it's odd. If memory serves, I'm pretty sure it was a point of pride for Lord Firblynn that he had a..." Flare's sentence trailed off as they looked up at Ash's quiet expression, and their eyes lit up with revelation.

"My father was set up as a scapegoat, for the record," Ash spoke as if the subject were bitter in his mouth, "He was a fool for falling in with the group he did, but he wasn't responsible for what they blamed him for."

A measure of silence hung in the air between us, as no one seemed eager to speak further of the matter. But still, there was an obvious question this left to be asked, even if it was me who had to:

"Now, Flare, why do you know so much about Celestrian politics?"

Flare froze, apparently aware they had shown too much of their own hand. "Hm. Well, let's say... my old job took me traveling. I happened to pick up on the political happenings of the places I went, from time to time."

It wasn't the most satisfying of answers, nor was I entirely buying it, but it seemed better to let it go for the time being, and Kris was eager enough to substantiate my feeling with some reasoning: "Let's get back to town before any other monsters get any wise ideas. Besides, us standing here won't make reporting back to our client any easier."

◄—•—►

"I... see." The overdressed man turned the helmet over and over in his hands. "Ha... so she made it all the way to the fifth floor on her own?"

"It was an impressive feat by her. Many guilds go in as entire groups and give up before reaching anywhere near the heights she did," Ash consoled.

A somber smile hatched on Lord Fenplume's face, conveying anything but happiness. "I'd expect no less from my daughter. Now... in light of the circumstances, you've done as much as could reasonably be expected to fulfill my request, so I've left your reward in full with the propietress. With that... I believe I need to be alone for some time. Good day."

The dour noble stood up from his seat, gave a short bow, and left the tavern at a brisk walk. We collected the money from Mirina, who assured us that she had already taken the sum we owed her out, and offered some consolatory words that I didn't really pay attention to. Then we stepped outside.

Before we split up – as I'm quite sure all of us were done adventuring as well as seeing each other for the day – I approached Kris, feeling I had to at least acknowledge a certain something.

"Hey. Thank you."

Kris looked up at me, a bit surprised. "Don't mention it."

"You... uh, saved my life. I think. I'm pretty sure."

"I know." Kris paused. Then she posed a question of her own. "...so, are you going to kick us out of your guild now?"

"...Oh, that. Don't... don't worry about that. I'm not planning on removing any of you from the guild, for the time being."

The lithe girl nodded as she looked down at the bunny-shaped hairpin in her hand. "...Good."

Supposing our conversation had gone as far as it was meant to, and having conveyed what I intended to, I turned my back to her and walked off. Though, I couldn't help but hear something else she had said. It was something of a mumble, but to my mind, I heard her say,

"I like it here."

Chapter Text

The hulking stone door in front of us bore the likeness of a face we had seen before, on the statues that guarded the forest's entrances and exits, but also elsewhere, peeking out from crevices and corners all throughout this labyrinthine approximation of nature. Two dashes, slanted inward toward a tri-pointed frown and nose not unlike a simplistic rendering of a cat's.

Here it was engraved into the door, supposedly the work of a council of Celestrians the last of whom had passed before my time. If there were any indicator of where this "big papa golem" would be, this was it.

"So... we can guess this thing is big and made of stone," Flare went over the facts.

"And that's about it." Kris added.

"I can ask the spirits to imbue our weapons with elemental magic. That should help to penetrate their rockier aspects," Ash provided.

"Cool." Xinyi paused. "Welp, that's about enough strategizin' for me. Won't know what we're in for 'til we're in it."

"Can't say I disagree, actually," Flare shrugged. "Let's get on with it."

With Xinyi and I each pushing one of the hefty stone doors aside, we entered. The clearing behind it formed a room of sorts, the boundaries defined by more of the forest's commonplace ponds. Across the room, we could see another door, one that presumably led to the stairs up to the next stratum.

Quaint as this little part of the forest seemed, it was but a facade. We took only a few steps forward before movement on the edges of the room caught our eyes. Stout little statues, no taller than Flare's hound, congregated from the shores of the ponds toward the center of the room, blocking our direct path to the door ahead. Some of them hobbled, while others used the distinct roundness of their overall shape to roll remarkably fast.

These golems jumped and climbed on top of each other, forming a shape that grew increasingly curious as it developed, before finally it was cohesive as a bulky and monstrous yet ultimately humanoid form. Its limbs hung heavy and low to the ground like hammers to be swung, a testament to the grip strength of the ones that served as its pauldron-like shoulders. The head was but a neckless lump atop the whole mass, though the face on an individual golem did adorn it. Its torso made "barrel-chested" seem an inadequate phrase, and brought to attention that many of the golems faced inward to the body, with their backs to us.

"So, somebody was in charge of giving them buttcracks, right?" Xinyi sought to confirm.

Ash shook his head disapprovingly. "Not now."

The Celestrian joined his hands in front of his face and closed his eyes. A blue, mist-cloaked apparition of a strip of paper materialized between his slightly parted fingers, and just as quickly vanished in a burst of light. That ethereal mist was then surrounding our weapons, and even the steel of my rifle's barrel became chilled.

"I don't suppose we can make a break for the exit up?" Kris asked.

Another headshake from Ash. "There's magic coming off it. It's sealed shut."

"Then let's do this!" Xinyi brandished her weapon toward the hulking sedimentary beast.

The Amalgolem's immediate response to being challenged was... in all honesty, I could not describe it more succinctly and accurately than the way that Xinyi, of all people, would later put it:

"I wasn't expecting the thing to fucking explode."

"Behind me!" The command left my mouth when the gaps in the monster's form went aglow with orange, violent rays. While it was true that my experience with magic was relatively low, I did have one trick up my sleeve in an event such as this, where a sheet of steel, however reinforced, might waver.

Translucent shields of mana erected themselves in front of my allies. Flames and bits of stone pelted the magic barrier, most of which did not make it through to harm them. The clang of stones hitting my own shield rang in my ears. When it seemed over, I put down my guard to observe the remains.

The body still lay there. It was twitching, as a thing without limbs might to try and move. Golems scattered across the floor all got to their feet at once, and began heading back to the body to reform. Xinyi and Kris both rushed past me and started cutting down the little Golems. Their swords sliced and pierced deeper than I think either of them expected; the things were more like dried clay than pure stone.

I took to gunning down the stragglers heading in toward the body. Still, they were hearty and difficult to take down, and outpacing our efforts to cull their numbers. The newly formed head roared a gravelly war cry, and yet more began rising from the riverbeds. Xinyi made a swing to behead the Amalgolem in response to this, but by then the arms were already reforming.

The new components to the Amalgolem's rapidly reforming body were getting wise. They rolled around to evade my shots, and tackled Xinyi and Kris' legs to sweep them off their feet. No matter; I didn't need to be on my feet to aim a gun. I laid low to the grass and trained my weapon on the golems that were still emerging from the waters. Each shot pushed another one back under, proving more effective at control than picking off the ones that were already swarming the main body.

Yet still, we were losing control of the battlefield. It wouldn't be long before the Amalgolem was fully formed again, and weathering another of its explosions would take a miracle.

"This isn't working," Flare growled. From next to me, they took aim with an arrow, still cloaked in icy mist, and fired it dead center into the Amalgolem's chest. The Golem in the center of the chest fell away, crumbling to rubbble on the ground. All five of us took notice of a single, glowing red-hot Golem inside the resulting gap.

"Ash! Keep our weapons cool!" Flare instructed.

In unison, we focused our efforts toward the chest of the giant construct. It now had its arms and head back, and was swinging wildly at Xinyi and Kris as it waited for the formation of its legs. A golem quickly jumped to close the gap in its chest, so Flare and I focused our fire there, and allowed it to fully reform in exchange for keeping its weak point open.

Now the Amalgolem had back all of its limbs, and the creature was whole again... except for one gaping hole in its chest. Content to ignore this, it began flexing in the same way it did when it initially exploded.

"NOW!" Xinyi called to Kris.

The latter began sprinting toward the former, who interlocked her fingers to provide a platform for Kris to boost off of. With lightning speed, Kris sprang into the air, drawing back her sword as she descended on the now-glowing Amalgolem. With a decisive thrust carried by the full weight of her body, Kris impaled the heart of the Amalgolem completely through.

The massive creature froze in place. We watched, with bated breath, as the central Golem's burning incandescence cooled, then faded away completely. The fist of the right arm fell off first. Then the entirety of the left arm collapsed. One by one, each constituent member of the Amalgolem fell away and rolled back into the lake from which it had spawned, until there was nothing left.

The forest fell back into its tranquil rest. Still, none of us moved or spoke. We shared glances in an attempt to confirm what all of us thought, but were too wary to state aloud.

"...the seal on the door is gone." Ash announced, after what felt like hours.

"WOOOOOOO! Take THAT, you big buncha rocks!" Xinyi screamed. She held her hand up for a high-five as she ran towards Ash. Ash held up his own in acceptance, which Xinyi swung at with the full force of how she'd swing her katana at an enemy. A thunderous clap echoed out, and Ash's face twisted in stinging pain as he pulled his hand back toward his chest to soothe it.

Far from depleted of celebratory energy, Xinyi ripped fistfuls of grass up, and held them triumphantly over her head. "KING OF THE JUNGLE, BABY! My old team could NEVER do THAT! WOOOOOOOO!"

"This is a fores... hah, never mind," Kris simply shrugged.

"Well then, I guess that's that," Flare scratched the back of their head while looking in my direction. "I'm not sure what you've gotten us into, but I guess it's as good a pay as anything."

"Believe me, this wasn't really my orchestration," I put up my hand defensively. "...that said, maybe I do still have a shot at making it to the top of this tree."

Right about then, I thought something that I had never thought before. It wasn't with a great deal of enthusiasm that I thought this, nor did I linger on it too long, but nonetheless it did cross my mind.

Maybe.

Maybe... this guild would work out alright.

Chapter Text

His vision strained against the blinding rays in front of him, everything awash in a tangerine haze. No hills or trees or landmarks to speak of; just a clear shot to the horizon in every direction. To be able to see ahead for what felt like miles... it made him feel small and lonely in equal measure.

But neither of those sensations were at the forefront of his mind. It was the dryness of his mouth and throat that pressed into his every thought. He wondered, if he tried to speak, would anything come out? It had been a very long while since there had been anyone to hear him, and therefore any reason to speak. Now, he felt it would be better not to try, lest the air around him reach into his open mouth and pull the last of the moisture right out of him.

Another step forward. Another step forward. Though he had no idea where he was going, let alone where he should be going, the only thing that seemed to matter was that he kept walking ahead. Even if his aimless path was a futile endeavor, standing in place was a certain demise. So he moved forward. Each step was accompanied by ragged breathing and an effort to keep his senses in focus.

The pink strands of hair dangling in front of his face used to be damp with sweat. But that had all dried up some time ago. There was no clean water along his path. Even if he had found a water source, he knew no way to purify it... And he shuddered to think of what might enter his body if he simply drank.

The hunger was there too, but it hadn't grown nearly as bad. Sometimes his body trembled with weakness, and the emptiness of his stomach would ache, but he was just as helpless to satiate it as with his thirst. He had been hungry before, and he had gotten lost before. But never like this.

At least the howling had stopped. Or at least, he thought that it had stopped. He ran through the night to escape it, but all the next day the wind would taunt him with sounds he couldn't quite be sure weren't the calls of wolves, back again to finish the job, or perhaps having never left, just patient and keen in equal measure.

That was the reason everything had gone wrong. He had only meant to pass through the Chryse, to get to the next in a series of destinations that, ultimately, only constituted purposeless wandering. After all, he was left with nothing; not even the falsehoods that he had foundationally built his past life upon. Those had been stripped forcefully from him. So he traveled, and hoped that if he went far enough, he'd find a place that knew nothing of him, and would welcome him to start anew, to forget about the troublesome existence that had left him displaced.

No such luck. No, it seemed his luck had all but run out. When he had settled down to build camp the first evening, the howls of prairie wolves set him on edge no sooner than he could get comfortable. As evening progressed to night, the looming sense of being stalked grew until it had dissuaded him from even imagining getting sleep.

In the periphery of his vision, lapped at by the incandescence of his campfire, he swore to have seen the shadow of a hungering hound. He needed no further convincing; he leapt from his spot on the grass, and bolted away in a blind panic. It was that damnable panic that bade him leave every last one of his supplies. He took with him no food, no water, no shelter, and his mind did not clear until he had become thoroughly tired, and thoroughly lost.

Retrospectively, if a wolf had actually been there, so close to him, and interested in making a meal of him, then he would be dead, and there would be no contesting that fact. He knew he did not run faster than a wolf, and he did not imagine wolves to be capable of the degree of cruelty required to let prey go free for the purpose of hunting it a little longer. A hungry wolf was a hungry wolf; it would not play games with its own sustenance.

As these thoughts stirred in his head, his focus slipped for just long enough. He wasn't sure if it was loose rubble or an incline he hadn't watched out for, but all the same his body tumbled toward the ground. His reflexes had waned, so the side of his head impacted the ground without his arms or hands to cushion the fall. His vision flashed white, and a shot of pain rattled his skull.

Mercifully, he hadn't landed too hard. A blurry image of the landscape around him gradually came back into focus. He reached his hand up to wipe at the point of impact, and it came away clean; there was no bleeding, at least. But when he pressed his palm to the ground to push himself back up, it became all the more evident how weakened he was. Standing to his feet now seemed more effort than he could muster.

What has my life amounted to?

An odd question to ask, here and now. But in the face of what seemed to be his last waking moments, what else could he have thought of?

On initial observation, the answer would have seemed to be "not much". He was, in light of recent events, very definitively the last in a long line of nobles belonging to and called by the name Firblynn; a footnote distastefully tacked on to the miserable end of a long, slow, and hard to watch decline into mediocrity by what once was considered greatness.

Well, perhaps the end of House Firblynn really only began with his father. The story of Lord Alfonse Geraint Firblynn was a tragedy in its own right; his birth was met with a resounding shrug of disappointment, and a resolution to try and have the second child be a daughter. But alas, Alfonse's parents never managed another child, and as little Alfonse grew up, their cold indifference gained an edge of resentment.

Once Alfonse realized his attempts at earning the affection of his mother and father were a futile endeavor, he turned his efforts toward ensuring his own children would not have to endure the same fate. While attending a magic academy, he met and married a woman of great intellect and talent for the arcane arts, perhaps at the sacrifice of his own romantic interests and desires.

"Your mother died during childbirth," his father had once told him, the words chosen carefully to avoid placing blame on a young child. Certainly, Sir Alfonse felt some genuine grief for the loss of his wife. But there was no doubt that what ate at him more was that for all his effort, the universe seemed to spit upon him; for the pregnancy that took his wife away gave to him in exchange... a healthy baby boy.

Had there been anyone by Lord Alfonse's side in the years following his child's birth, they might've thought him to have gone mad. For he gave the child an unusual name for a boy, and dressed him in unusual clothes for a boy, and taught him unusual etqiuette for a boy as well. For Lord Alfonse Firblynn had a daughter, and he could say so precisely because he was alone, and there was no one to tell him otherwise.

But the one thing that Sir Alfonse could never hide was that his daughter, no matter how hard she tried, had hardly an ounce of magical talent within her, and of course that was the most damning evidence of all. After all, the superstition within House Firblynn was that only the women of the family would turn out to be talented mages.

In the end, it all came tumbling down. Whatever his father was planning, it went awry, and his collaborators – if they could rightly be called by such a benevolent title in the first place – pinned the blame on him in a very swift and calculated motion. All the while, through the court proceedings, his father looked upon him pleadingly, insisting that it was all to help his only daughter.

The court's findings never enlightened him to what his father was doing, or in what way it would've helped.

He had to wonder, when did the superstition start? Up through generations of Firblynns who had suffered from the demand to produce a daughter in order to validate and keep their noble status, there was a traceable origin of the idea: Baron Adrasteia Firblynn, who had earned her title of nobility in the Legendary War of so long ago.

He could imagine the tilted prairie in front of him as a battlefield with her in it. With an intricate motion of her arms, the phalanx in front of her would go up in vicious flames, reducing ten or twenty men to ash before they could even scream. Or, so went the historical depictions of her might.

What would she think of her bloodline ending like this?

It seemed absurd to occupy his last thoughts with concerns over a long dead ancestor. He was the one wasting away in the middle of nowhere, not her. Maybe he felt for his father, who had dedicated his life to making sure his children wouldn't have to live under the shadow of the superstition that had haunted him, yet ironically managed to guarantee that his one and only son would never escape it.

Maybe it was better to think of the happy memories he and his father had shared instead. He knew there were some.

Yet, as he closed his eyes, he couldn't quite picture those moments clearly.

◄—•—►

Maybe it had been a terrible dream. After all, he was waking up to the embrace of a warm blanket, and the gentle crackling of a campfire. It was entirely possible that he had simply passed out, and he never did all that running and getting lost and...

He opened his eyes. Well, that wasn't right. He didn't remember there being a caravan with him. Or another person.

"Here. Drink slowly," The figure shoved a flask in his direction as he sat up.

No, it was all very real, sadly. As he took the canteen in his hand, the sloshing of the liquid inside reminded him of how very thirsty he was. He very nearly tipped his head back and began emptying the contents into his mouth, before he considered the words he had just heard, and took as restrained a sip as he could muster. An unexpectedly acrid taste met his tongue, and he was suddenly very thankful to have repressed his instincts.

"What's in this?" He lifted the flask to the stranger who had handed it to him.

"It's water. Well, guess y'could call it tea if you wanted? It's got medicinal herbs mixed in. Courtesy of our botanist – my wife – Patty." Getting a better look at the stranger, there was a warmth to his smile – not just because of the glow the nearby campfire set upon it – and a sort of eagerness upon his freckled caramel complexion at the mention of his spouse. For a moment, the gesture of a caring gaze, one such thing which he had not seen in many days, moved the lost Celestrian so deeply that he'd swear he could cry.

"I, uh..."

"C'mere. Sit," The friendly gentleman offered one of a few seats fashioned out of logs arranged around the campfire before taking one himself. Only when the Celestrian got up did he realize that the gentleman only came up to just above his knees, and that he was in the presence of one of the Brouni nomads that traveled the Chryse Prairie.

"Now, we gotta lotta questions, but I don't wanna overwhelm you none, and I'm sure you've got your own," The man twirled a lock of his curly, sandy brown hair as he negotiated, "So let's just get introductions goin', and we can work from there, alright? My name's Nico. I ride around in this beat-up old cart sellin pretty much whatever. Got a couple'a freeloaders with me too." After a brief pause, Nico leaned in and whispered: "That's a joke, for the record, son. Don't let 'em know I said that or I ain't ever gonna hear the end of it."

"Right... Well, my name is Ash—" The Celestrian's voice caught in his throat. For Ashley Adrasteia Firblynn was no more, and there was no reason for him to give that name to someone. He was certain that Ashley had died under the watchful rays of that setting sun, if not sometime much longer ago. The only problem was... now who was he?

"Ash, huh?" Nico folded his arms as if he were contemplating the name. "Well, nice t'meet you, Ash. And take it easy on your voice. Your whole body needs some rest, honestly."

"Coco!! You ain't told us the feller woke up already!" A slightly plump Brouni woman barked. As she trotted from the door of the caravan over to the two men, she held the bun of her mostly gray hair flat against her head with one hand, as if it would fall off otherwise. "Look atchya! You've gone an' started interrogatin the poor bugger an' you ain't even given 'im anything to eat! For shame!"

"Stars above, Ma, I wasn't meanin'—"

Not waiting for Nico's response, the woman turned her bronze, slightly wrinkled face to Ash. The severity on it all but vanished, then she addressed the gaunt Celestrian: "You must be starvin', hm? I'll getcha somethin fillin, right quick!"

After the older woman turned back toward the caravan in no less a pace than she had approached the men, Nico relinquished a sigh.

"I wasn't all that starved, really. I mean, I'm sure I'll shovel down whatever she brings once it's in front of me, but the hunger was nothing compared to the thirst," Ash explained.

Nico shook his head. "No, no, she's right. Bad manners on my part not to put a plate in front of ya. And, uh, that was my Ma, if ya couldn't tell. She makes the textiles we sell. Love 'er to death, but sometimes me and my brother could do without the nitpickin and all. Oh, and there's my little brother, Runo. All told, it's me, him, one'a his buddies, my wife, and Ma. Been runnin this ship for 12 years 'n countin."

"That's impressive. You've been going for more than half my life." Ash commented.

"Sheesh, don't remind me how old I'm gettin," Nico huffed. "That does make you pretty young, though. Woulda been a darn shame if we hadn't found you."

"Oh, speaking of that, how did you find—"

A clamor of excited voices erupted from the caravan, and out came three other Brounis that Ash assumed to be the other members of the mercantile troupe that Nico mentioned. They all rushed at Ash, nearly pushing each other for the chance to greet him.

"You're awake, are ya? Sorry that drink don't taste better, I'd've thrown in something to curb the bitterness but we had no idea whether you'd just plopped down for a nap or were on death's doorstep when we found..." A tanned girl with a puffy cloud of faded blonde hair and dirt-caked fingernails began, but was quickly overpowered by other voices.

"Boy, you're lucky we found ya. Take it you're not from around here? It's the pink hair that gave it away. Nah, I'm kiddin. The bein' about two-and-a-half feet taller'n the rest of us, though..." A gruff, powerful voice came from a grinning blue-haired man in a soot-caked apron who rested a hammer over his shoulder with the end of the shaft nestled in the bend of his forearm and upper arm.

A third voice was mixed in but quieter to the point of being indistinguishable, but it appeared to come from a man quite similar to Nico in appearance, with shorter and darker hair, and a pair of small hexagonal-framed spectacles worn high upon the nose doing much of the work to set the two apart.

Despite not hearing a word from him clearly, the pen stashed behind his ear and the rough-hewn notebook labeled "ledger" sticking out from the waistband of his pants made it plain to Ash that this was the group's accountant.

"Alright, alright!!" Crowed an elderly voice. The cacophany immediately hushed, and the trio of Brounis cleared the way for Nico's mother, who carried an assortment of vegetables, some cheese, and some dried meat in a woven basket which, all in all, was a generous portion of food. "Wish I could give you more, darling, but our pantry ain't as well-stocked as I'd like, at the moment."

As she laid the basket on his lap, Ash reassured her: "You've done so much for me already, this really is—"

"Eat up! And if any'a these hooligans are botherin you, come get old Neena and I'll get em off your back."

As Neena returned to the carriage, the two boys who had bombarded Ash with greetings followed suit. The woman who was most likely Patty walked over to Nico and took his hand in hers, rubbing it affectionately. Nico leaned down and gave his wife a quick peck on the lips. For a moment, it was silent, save for the faint chirping of distant insects, and the crackling of the fire.

"So... was that my eyes playing tricks on me, or did that flame... grow and turn blue when Mrs. Neena yelled?" Ash posed the question with a bit of hesitation.

Nico's eyes followed where Ash pointed, to the campfire. "Ah. Yeah, that wasn't you. Ma's a... a Shaman, I think is the official name the folks in Iorys have for it? In their words, spirits of the dead are highly receptive to her emotional state, blah blah blah, it can cause some unusual phemon— ...phonom— oh, blast it! It makes nutty things happen sometimes."

"S-spirits of the dead?" Ash quivered at the thought.

"Ho, whoa! Didn't mean to give you a fright, there. They're friendly spirits," Nico put his hands up to gesture for calmness.

"It's more like that they don't really bug people, unless you talk to 'em on purpose like my ma-in-law does," Patty clarified. "Pshaw. 'Friendly spirits'... don't be daft, Nico."

That did do something to curb Ash's nerves. As husband and wife bickered mildly, he considered how close he was to becoming one of the spirits Neena might commune with, and promptly sipped from his flask of herb-infused water. "Is it magic?"

"What, talkin' to spirits? I don't think so. Best I can tell, anyway," Nico answered. "If you're talkin about the type o' magic you Celestrian folk conjure up? Naw, it's a far cry from that stuff. Which... speakin of, do you mind terribly if I ask: how did you get here, an' where were you headed?"

"I don't mind. It's the least I can do to repay your generosity for saving me," Ash nodded.

"We only did what any good man'd do comin' cross you as you were," Patty waved a hand dismissively.

"Well, it's a bit of a complicated answer," Ash gazed at the ground, both hands on his canteen. He didn't want to admit he was completely directionless. "Ultimately, my destination is... Iorys. I've been taking my time with getting there, though. I was crossing through here to get from one place to the next, but admittedly, I was less prepared for the journey than I realized."

Nico blinked. "You ever look at a map, son? If you've been trying to head to Iorys, it ain't anywhere near here. You've been headin' the wrong way for quite some time."

"...Circumstances became complicated. I ended up losing my supplies and my direction along the way."

"I'll say. Anyway, you come from somewhere fancy? That's a real nice coat, dirt an' wear besides."

"I..." Defensively, Ash turned his head away from the Brouni couple.

"Sorry. Pryin' question, I know. Pay me no mind." Nico retracted. The middle-aged Brouni looked past his wife, into the flames at the center of the campsite.

Many moments passed in quiet, each member of the campside conversation stuck in their own head, contemplating a different matter. The newborn night sky had matured into a deeper, darker blue almost indistinguishable from black, and the shadows cast by each person or thing on the wide open field underneath the vast network of stars reminded whosoever stared into them that the wind grew ever so slightly chilly while the sun did not grace these plains.

"Hey, here's a thought..." Nico broke the quiet at last, "Gatherin' what you've told me so far: You don't have anywhere to be in a hurry, you're travelin' basically for the sake of it, you are – no offense – not very good at travelin' alone, and you recently lost most of what you have to your name 'sides the clothes on your back. Do I have that right?"

"...That is as apt as I myself could put it," Ash admitted.

"Then why not stick with us for a while? Wouldn't sit right with me to let you free tomorrow morning, 'specially when the best we can give you is food, water, and a set of directions, all of which certainly didn't do you good your first time around."

"Are you sure, puddin'?" Patty raised concern. "I mean, we could drop him off at the next town. Not that I mind, myself, but..."

"Next town's three days out from here, if we're bein' generous to our travel speed. We got a business to run, and as much as I want to do everything I can for this guy here, I'm darn sure Runo's ledger don't read 'we got a week to waste goin' into town and gettin' back'. It'd be better if he came with us. He can help out around shop, pick up a trade or two to take with 'im, an' get a sense a direction he clearly don't have now." Nico turned to Ash. "Whaddaya say?"

"Uh..."

"S'okay. Tell ya what, you think on it. You don't gotta answer now." Nico hopped off his seat, and started toward the caravan. "I'mma get some covers for us real quick. It's darn nippy."

Patty watched Nico stroll out of earshot."...Sorry if my husband got a bit assertive. He's a great guy at heart, he really is. It's just that this business is his livelihood, and he had some issues growing up with making ends meet. So when he talks about keepin' the business on its feet, he's really talking about keeping all of us healthy 'n happy."

"No, I understand completely," Ash replied. "I didn't mean to sound ungrateful for the offer. It actually sounds quite nice. I'm just... still processing what's happening to my life, is all. Every day is a change, and every change sweeps me completely off my feet. A few hours ago I thought it was all about to come to an end. Now... I might have a future again."

Ash looked down at his lap. The basket of food was still there; it had no doubt gone cold by now. His stomach rumbled, at last fed up with his constant insistence that hunger was not an issue when, all along, it was shaking him. He grabbed a hunk of dried pork, and brought it to his mouth. It was with no small amount of effort that he tore off a bite, but no one was watching who would look down on him for it. He chewed, relishing the taste of food far better than anything his coin had bought in months of travel.

It would be nice to have a home again.

Chapter Text

Rising triumphantly from the forested lower levels, striations of brown, red, and yellow crag crowned the landscape; a monument of solid rock sculpted haphazardly, a sheer drop on all sides.

The stone pillars that towered over us swayed in the wind, the shadows they cast serving as a reminder of their tenuous balance as we passed through them, at once a temptation and a threat.

The rock formations dotting the landscape mimicked the shape of shrubs and branches, a mocking parody of the vegetation from the forest below, and a reminder that the labyrinth was still the labyrinth.

In that selfsame way, the Jagged Reach mocked the idea of a summit, and the explorers who would think themselves near such a thing.

◄—•—►

Ash hovered a hand above his eyes as we climbed. Xinyi wiped sweat from her brow. The temperature had lowered from that of the Tutelary Forest, but the sun only beat down on us harder and brighter as we emerged from the staircase upward. There was no canopy of trees to shield us up here.

Xinyi whistled. "Look at that."

To our backs was a clear view of the world below us, sprawling outward for miles. We were higher up than I had perhaps realized. Iorys was already a crowning peak among Arcania's topography; the surrounding earth inclined toward Yggdrasil as if the monumental tree were pulling the very land up toward itself.

To be this high up, where the clouds and the city below seemed equally within reach as the other, and have a clear view out to the horizon? It felt unreal, as if you couldn't possibly be the same person who had once spent their years in the little speck off to the west that is a town.

Flare put an arm in front of Ash very suddenly. "Whoa, there. You good?"

Ash righted themself as they recovered from a swoon. "S-sorry. Not used to heights like this."

I spared the time for a glance around the area; it seemed as though our only path was around the perimeter of the floor. There was something kind of nice about the bracing wind and the openness of this stratum compared to the last.

I led our group around, promising that we were only doing a quick scout of the area before taking an Ariadne thread back to town. Our path ducked behind the wall of stone that blocked our way towards the center of Yggdsrasil, away from the sun's rays. There was a chill to the wind when you were in the shade, which brought an odd back-and-forth to the stratum's temperature.

We came at last to a parting in the stone wall, which provided a corridor into where the maze began in true. An odd figure stood guarding it, her arms crossed, and one foot propped backwards up against the rock as she leaned against it.

Her eyes were sharp, her thin lips brought into a frown balancing boredom with impatience; her features equipped her well for an unapproachable look that I almost kind of envied. The deep purple of her eyes and hair mirrored that of the blade of the enormous scythe propped up on the wall next to her.

The Earthlain girl eventually acknowledged us with a slight cock of her head in our direction. She pushed herself off the wall, scythe in hand, and turned to face us.

"What are you all looking at?" The woman's height lent to her imposing aura as much as the size of her weapon did. She was perhaps taller than even Xinyi (whose ears eked out a height advantage over Ash if you included them), and she was aware of it. She brandished this fact when she spared me a downwards glare.

"We're an adventuring guild from Iorys," Ash stated.

"Yeah, I figured that part out. You just finished dealing with the Amalgolem?" A smirk appeared on the woman's face. "Looks like it roughed you up pretty good."

"I don't see how it's any of your business," I said.

She looked me up and down once more. "I guess you really don't know who I am, huh? Well, whatever."

"Why would I know someone like you? As far as I can tell, you're just some nutcase in ridiculous clothes with nothing better to do than—" I gestured widely to her entire person, "—whatever this is."

"Hmph." She scowled. "Well now you've got me curious. You sure talk a lot of smack for someone who only comes to armrest height of me."

"I mean, you're welcome to discover the consequences of putting your hands on me. I'll just warn that most people are wise enough not to."

Xinyi interjected then, staring in bewilderment down the corridor that this belligerent weirdo had been guarding. "If you guys wanna put your little catfight on hold, I got a real big question: what the flippin' HECK is that down there?"

All of us, save for our scythe-wielder, walked over to peek at where Xinyi was pointing.

To her credit, it was a sight worth a flipping heck; the corridor ended in a roughly carved out room, at the center of which was a stream of purple-ish pink light that glittered and spiraled upwards as far as our visions stretched. It seemed as a stationary object, but there was a flow of sorts to its movement pattern which suggested it was spilling from a source, a well of energy or something else.

"It's a Geomagnetic Pole," the mystery girl had finally decided to be helpful.

"A Geo-mag-what-ic Huh?" Xinyi asked.

"You know those threads you buy to take you back home? This is like a renewable one of those. Except it stays in place."

"Oh. sick."

"I have... a number of questions," Kris said.

The Harbinger shrugged. "And I don't have any answers for you. It's weird. Get used to it. That's all this place ever is."

"Welp, I'd say we're pretty banged up, so this seems like a good a time as any to test that thing out," Flare said.

I turned back to the as-of-yet unnamed woman, my arms folded. "So, I suppose if we're to know who you are, you'd care to give us your..."

I did a double take when I glanced past her. Sure enough, it was what I thought I saw: a familiar, tiny blue-and-pink creature jogging in our direction, coffin to her back. When she got close enough to pick out who we were, she waved a hand over her head in big, sweeping motions.

"One vial of scorpion poison, freshly extracted! Sorry you had to wait around, Solor. The one I found was so cute, and he was playful, too! I almost got carried away. But it looks like you found some company, at least!"

"I was better off without the company." This Solor seemed at least as familiar with Lili as us, though it was always hard to get a read on the latter.

"It looks like you guys made it past the Amalgolem. Great! I'm so happy we get to keep being alive and friends."

Ash stepped up next to me. "Yulia, there was something you wanted to ask Lili, right?"

"I'm all ears," The little Celestrian smiled.

"Yes. Well... ahem. Thank you for the Nectar you gifted us, Lili. It was very helpful." I considered forcing a smile of my own, but thought better of it. "That is all."

"Yay! I'm glad you liked it." With that, Lili strolled away toward the Geomagnetic Pole. "Let's go, Solor!"

But Solor didn't listen to Lili, because she was too busy staring at me like I had taken my head off and put it back on.

"Something wrong?" Seeing Solor speechless, on the other hand, brought a devious grin to my face quite naturally. Lili called to Solor once more, then the Harbinger took her leave of us. It was only afterward that I realized my own crew had been looking at me much the same way.

"Yulia, are you feeling alright?" Ash asked. "Are you running a fever?"

Xinyi nodded. "Yeah, I'm with Ash. Did golem guy knock something loose in your head? There's no way I heard that out of your mouth."

"I don't see the problem. Did you all think me incapable of being cordial? Was I supposed to interrogate her to scrutinize her motives?" I asked.

"Well... yeah, kinda! To all of that!" Xinyi threw her hands up.

"To be fair, you were just being a jerk to purple girl. By anyone's standards, much less yours, that was—" Flare twirled their finger next to their head and made a sharp whistle, "—a complete one-eighty."

"In my defense, it was Solor's choice to introduce herself the way she did. Ultimately, she was the navigator of that ship," I elaborated, "And besides, that was before I knew Lili was going to show up."

"Still..." Ash scratched his head, "...I suppose there's a first for everything, but are you sure you're okay with that? I thought you didn't trust Lili."

"Circumstances have changed."

The conversation fell into awkward muttering, through which we routed ourselves back to the matter of our own weary condition. We had all but agreed upon testing out the newly introduced Geomagnetic Pole and getting some rest and recuperation back at town, when Kris regaled us with one last order of business on her mind:

"There was a backpack over the ledge, that I saw when we were admiring the view earlier. I think I can grab it, I just need a little help."

"Whoa, do you think that means someone fell over the ledge?" Xinyi asked, "That'd be messed up."

Exhausted but willing enough to oblige, we made our way back to where we initially surfaced on the floor. True to her word, there sat an olive-colored knapsack, tattered but hanging resolutely by its strap off of a branch sprouting from the cliff face. The only inconsistency, if you'd call it that, was that it was much, much further down the drop than Kris' earlier account had, to my mind, implied.

"...have fun with that." Flare's response echoed my thoughts precisely.

Xinyi, meanwhile, immediately began forming a gameplan. "Alright, so whaddaya say I lower you down by the legs, and once you're close enough you grab it?" As she sized up Kris' stature with the drop, she stopped at the Therian's hips. "I, uh, won't look up your skirt. Promise."

"If you held me upside down, my skirt would be compromised entirely," Kris mentioned.

"Guys, no. We are not doing this. This is beyond stupid." Ash butted in. "I'm not watching one of you two dangle the other over a cliff we can't even see the bottom of."

"Right! 'Cuz you'll be closing your eyes while we do it," Xinyi gave a thumbs up.

"No! Thumbs down! Thumbs absolutely down!" Ash protested.

Flare was already seated on the ground, with their legs swung over the edge. They gestured an arm to the empty space next to them. A tempting enough offer, given the alternative.

"I don't think I really appreciated this view the first time," Flare said, scratching the fur of their hound as she took a seat next to them. "Though, maybe the sun going down is adding to it a little bit."

"Well, best of luck to you this time around," I nodded my head at the imminent spectacle to our right.

Xinyi's voice rang out. "Alright, you ready? I'm gonna start lowering you down!"

"Oh gods, this is gonna end so badly. I think I'm getting dizzy," Ash's followed.

What if this was it? What if this moment was exactly the same as how it'd feel when I'd finally reach the top, complete with a band of morons to my back, doing gods-know-what? And, if we were being honest, would it happen at all? I was confident in my competence, but even then, I never denied the odds. I was no one special. There had to be a reason no one, throughout all of history, had yet been able to reach the top.

"So I take it you're sticking around with us for now? Not a big enough pain for you yet?" Flare said.

"Bunny-pattern, huh? ...I dunno how to feel about that."

"You said you wouldn't look."

"I didn't think about the fact that they'd be right there!"

'Yet' seemed to be the key word there. "Don't go pushing your luck. Not that I expected you would be around this long, either."

Flare shrugged. "This gig's better coin than I thought, I guess. Can't imagine Kris being any less of a pain anywhere else I'd take her, 'sides."

"...Don't tell me you're too short."

"How is this my fault? Maybe you're not lowering me down far enough."

"Hey, I'm all the way to my hips over the edge, here! You want us both to fall off?!"

"I think I'm going to throw up, you guys are gonna make me puke—"

"Wait, if I... I think I can get it with my sword..."

"Speaking of her, I suppose it'd be presumptuous of me to inquire further about what, exactly, the hell is going on between you two?" I asked.

"You suppose right. I know you can always kick us out, but that's how it's got to be. We'll just have to take our chances with your good will."

Not a terribly surprising answer from them. Though, while I wasn't going to say it out loud, I did realize that I didn't feel good about that threat anymore. It just... wasn't right.

"...Got it."

Some sort of metal-on-rock clang sounded out, and a bit of loose stone crumbled off the cliff face and into the depths below.

"Uhhhhh... Was that important to you?"

"...we can worry about it later."

"Welp," Flare stretched their arms up over their head, and grunted. "Sounds like it's about time we got going again."

The two of us stood up and regrouped with a woozy Ash, a proud if disheveled Xinyi, and Kris, sans one unusual sword and plus one backpack whose contents she was already rooting through.

"We can go home now right?" Ash asked weakly.

"Ah, ah. First, the bag." Xinyi said.

A suspenseful moment. Then, Kris procured an untouched loaf of bread. She sniffed, broke a piece off the loaf, and tossed it in her mouth.

"Ow! This bread has several 100-ental coins baked into it for some mysterious reason!" Xinyi affected, then gestured theatrically to cue Kris on her line. "...Riiiiiight?"

In response, Kris plunged an arm back into the bag and fished out a handful of copper coins. She presented them to Xinyi.

"Yes! A whopping...!" The excitement on Xinyi's face died quicker than I thought possible. "...antique coins."

Kris extended the loaf of bread out to Xinyi as she swallowed the piece she had sampled. "Try some. It's pretty tasty and not even that stale."

◄—•—►

It wasn't until we were back inside the halls of the Arcania Council's parliamentary building that it occured to me we hadn't been here since first turning in our initiation exam. As if it had been mere hours since then, Prince Ramus was milling about the entrance hall just as he had before, though this time he was tinkering with some food on top of a hot plate.

"Ah, Guild Antares. What brings the three of you here today?" Ramus asked.

"Smashed that big boulder into pebbles, no biggie," Xinyi bragged. "Whatcha cookin'?"

Ramus lifted the frying pan off the flame, wedged his spatula underneath the layer of pale batter flecked with what I imagined was cinnamon or a similar seasoning, and in one synchronous motion of both tools in his hands, flipped it cleanly. The side now on top was attractively browned. The prince looked pleased in that particular determined way which, when you saw it in someone, let you know that their accomplishment was reached through many attemtps and failures, rather than blind luck.

"I am trying out a pancake recipe taught to me by a Celestrian baker," Ramus explained, "Their skill and deftness in their craft was always a marvel to behold. I almost wish I could go back to those days, when we would wake up early to sit at their storefront and bask in the scent wafting out from that kitchen."

"You can't go and do that now?" Xinyi asked.

Ramus moved to grab a plate on the desk behind him. "Sadly, no. I don't have quite as much free time nowadays, and the baker's business was back where I used to live. More to the point, it is no longer there. Their goods did not sell very well, and they had to move back to Sidonia. That's why I have their recipe for pancakes, among others. They feared they would not get the chance to bake for a living again, and so passed down their family's generations of knowledge to me, since I was their biggest fan."

In the time since Ramus had begun talking, he had plated up his creation and topped it with fresh berries and a drizzle of honey. It seemed to me it would've been easier to do this in an actual kitchen, rather than bring all of this out here, but que sais-je.

He held out the plated pancake to us. "Would you like to try?"

Xinyi took the first bite. After chewing for a moment, she handed the plate off to Ash, who began examining the best angle from which to get a bite with the desired toppings.

"Damn, I think I actually just forgot what we were here for, this is so good." Xinyi said with a full mouth.

Ramus chuckled sheepishly. "It's a pale imitation of what I knew in my childhood, but I'm delighted to hear your praise nonetheless. That said, I may have forgotten why you were here, myself."

"We took care of the Amalgolem," Ash said.

"Ah, I see! Congratulations. I'll see to it that Guild Antares is officially certified to explore the second stratum, then."

Lastly, the plate reached me. The other two had evidently enjoyed it quite a bit, as between Xinyi's huge bite and Ash's more-than-one, the pancake was already halfway gone. Though, to their credit, it was remarkably light and fluffy, and the fruit and honey made for a delectable flavor, as I would find out upon taking a bite. If this baker were everything Ramus had cracked them up to be, then I, too, would have waited outside early in the morning for this.

"So are weirdo girls stalking around the labyrinth a usual thing around here?" I could swear Xinyi was purposefully blurting her most ill-advised sentences when I had food in my mouth.

"Hm? What do you mean?"

"I mean, there was this purple girl with purple hair and kinda big boobs - or maybe it was just that she had 'em out most of the way - and she was just standing there and looking at us like we were the ones who were stupid for being there?" Xinyi continued while I chewed as fast as I could. "What was her problem? Do you know anything about her? Oh, and her scythe was big, too."

Ramus cupped his chin and stared at the ground, perplexed, until his powers of recollection enlightened him all at once. "Ah ha! You must be talking about Solor and Lili."

"Yeah! You do know them?"

"They are a renowned guild, one of the finest in Iorys. They are at the frontier of exploration, having paved the way in reaching what are currently the highest floors we've seen of the labrinth."

"So there's more to their guild than those two?" Ash asked.

"Oh, no, it's just the pair of them. They came to Iorys quite a few months ago... actually, perhaps it's even been a year by now. They are incredibly strong, in many respects. They seem to have an objective other than reaching Yggdrasil's summit, but they haven't said what it is. Still, they're well-liked, as they frequently fulfill requests, and guide new adventurers in the right direction. Mostly at Lili's discretion."

"I'm sensing a rivalry coming on. What's their guild name?" Xinyi asked.

"Ah, let me think... they don't normally go by their guild's name, but I believe they are Swan Song, perhaps owing to Lili's being a necromancer?"

"Dang, that's pretty good," Xinyi mused. "Why didn't we go with something like that?"

"Because that would necessitate being clever," I said. "Which I have heretofore not seen from you."

Ramus spoke up as I handed his pancake back to him. "By the way, I've been hesitating to ask for fear of the worst, but where are the others of your guild? They didn't...?"

"Oh, heavens no, they're alive and well," Ash said. "They just had some other business to take care of and couldn't make it here."

◄—•—►

Footsteps from noisy adventurers were not uncommon at this time of night. After all, some guilds chose to explore nocturnally. It was as they clamored down the hallway, closer to my room, that I began to hear familiar grumbling. Though, surely that couldn't be them? I had assumed they'd returned from their "personal matters" quite a long time ago.

I threw the blanket off my lap, and slotted a bookmark into the novel in my hand, before shutting it and setting it down on the nightstand, next to the solitary glow that I kept on to read past the setting of the sun. Bracing myself, I stepped into my slippers, and opened my door out into the hallway.

Sure enough, it was Flare and Kris, making their first appearance to me since we had returned to town. They stood as still as statues, eyes locked on me. Their disheveled appearance paired well with the twigs and leaves scattered in their hair and the exhaustion played on their faces. More notably than that, though, was the zig-zag blade that had returned to Kris' hip.

"Uhh... g'd'evening?" Flare offered.

"It's 1 AM." I rejected. "Did you two just now get back from searching for that?"

"Mmmmmmaaybe..."

"Yes," Kris confirmed. "Did we wake you?"

"No, I was read— ...I was already up. Is it really that important, that you had to go searching for it for... what, ten hours?"

"Closer to twelve, really," Kris said.

"Honestly, it would've been longer without Ghost's help." Flare paused, then looked up toward the ceiling. "Not that I wanted it to be."

I sighed. "Fine. If you two want to be cryptic and mysterious, that's none of my business. Just count yourselves lucky you didn't wake me up."

I turned my back to the pair, and shut the door as I headed back into my room. Before my hand left the knob, I paused to hear a last bit of muffled chatter.

"But I wanted to tell her about where we found it." Kris pouted.

"Eh. You can tell it to Ash and Xinyi in the morning. I'm gonna go pass out."

Chapter Text

There was no knocking to the invasion of my room which woke me up, unless you were to count the door violently slamming into the stopper. The only person who would have done such a thing was, of course, Xinyi.

"Come on! Get up already!" She yelled.

I didn't open my eyes. I wasn't quite ready to.

"Wh—?! Get off her tits, you lecherous fiend!" In an outrage, Xinyi grabbed the white-furred cat off of my chest. Sir Snowball protested loudly, digging his claws into my top in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to defend his position. Humphrey tightened his grip around my left leg upon seeing his comrade go down. Sensing that she wasn't going to take no for an answer, I rubbed the grogginess out of my eyes and sat up.

Xinyi scowled at me from the foot of my bed. "So I'm not even your favorite cat, am I?"

"I honestly thought you had gauged that the moment you had competition." I said. "What's your problem? Why are you waking me up?"

"It's damn near half past noon! If it weren't you, I'd be checking to make sure you're alive."

"Well, it's me, so why are you checking? We weren't going to go into the labyrinth today, unless I'm sorely mistaken about the current date."

Xinyi frowned at me. "Because... Ugh! Listen, we do have stuff to do, so c'mon! Don't make me tear the cat off your leg!"

It was clear enough by this point in the conversation that I was too awake to rectify my consciousness, so I shooed Xinyi off with a promise that I'd be downstairs in 15 minutes. Humphrey did not initially abandon his post on my leg, but did so with gusto once my pathway registered to him as heading toward the baths. After bathing, I threw on a lazy choice of clothes and met the rest of my guild in the dining hall of Jenetta's inn.

"Morning," I called out.

"Close," Flare responded.

I scanned options set out on the mess table with confusion before realizing that it was not, under even the most charitable of interpretations, a time that could be considered breakfast, then started over with that in mind.

"You know, when we first started out, I kind of thought Flare would be the late sleeper, not Yulia." Ash marched their fork across their plate as they talked.

"Flare is a late sleeper. Yulia's just worse somehow." Kris said.

I watched the innkeeper cross the room as I took a plate, mostly with fruit and other things that didn't particularly suffer from having gone cold, to the table where my guildmates sat. "I know my body and its limits. And I know to work with them, not against them."

Xinyi rolled her eyes. Flare changed the subject. "Well, we were gonna run a few errands, right? Let's get it over with."

"I'd like to make a plan so we can minimize the running about—" Ash was swiftly interrupted by Jenetta's impassioned delivery of one of the longest and most drawn out sighs I'd heard in my time.

"Something on your mind?" Kris asked.

"Hm?" The innkeeper cocked her head toward us, as if it were a surprise we were present. "Oh, no, I... Was it that obvious?"

"I thought you were trying to get our attention." Flare said.

"Oh... well, alright, I guess I can tell you guys, since no one else is around. I have... a guest who's caught my attention. He's a smart, handsome little guy, but I can't win his heart with just words."

Xinyi sat straight up, looking distraught, like it had personally offended her to hear this.

Jenetta continued. "I thought about giving him a gift, but, well, my sisters are both out of town for the week, and I can't just leave the inn unmanned! Or un-bunny-ed, if you will. I'm worried he'll be gone by the time I get the chance to go get what I need!"

"We were just on our way out the door, and we'll be out most of the day. We could pick what you need up for you." Ash said.

"Oh! Really? That'd be lovely!" Jenetta clapped her hands together. "Let me just grab some money to give you guys!"

"You can just pay us when we get back." Kris offered. "What is it you need?"

◄—•—►

When we left the inn and set out to the streets, Xinyi looked, to put it lightly, pissed off. "Why did you guys do that?!"

"Do... what? A favor for Jenetta?" Flare replied.

"Yes!! You're not supposed to root against me! What the hell?!"

"Uh... what do you mean 'against' you?" Ash was as confused as I was.

"Duh! Isn't it obvious?!" We stepped out from the shaded alley into the main road, prompting Xinyi to continue in a hushed tone. "If we're helping Jenetta get a guy, that means...! You know! We're not helping her get me!"

All of our heads turned in succession. In hindsight, perhaps I should have picked up on this sooner. I had taken Xinyi for— to borrow a phrase of her own devising —a lecherous fiend, since she had never really spoken on matters of the heart. But then, I was no expert on the subject.

"Are you... interested in Jenetta like that?" Ash asked.

"Don't make me spell it out! But like, yeah, okay?!" The cogs in Xinyi's head turned visibly as she realized she was being put to the test of articulating her feelings. "I dunno, there's something about her. You guys get it, right?!"

"...Can't say I do." Flare shrugged. Kris shook her head to mirror the sentiment.

The disbelief on Xinyi's face was growing rapidly. "Tell me none of you have ever been in a relationship! Been interested in someone?! Ash?!"

Ash turned a sheepish smile away from us. "Well, there was someone I used to go to school with, but... let's just say things were... different. Complicated, back then."

"Kris?!"

"Negative." It had been a minute since I heard the girl answer so brusquely. As much as she had opened up in the past few months, she still kept personal details close to her chest.

"Yul—! ...Actually, I can believe that from you. No offense."

"None taken." I replied.

"Okay, someone's gotta throw me a bone here. What's your type? Long hair, short hair? Taller than you or shorter? Big or small?" Xinyi hovered her hands over her chest to elucidate the meaning of the question.

"There's more to attraction than breast size, you know," Kris said.

"Oh ho, so you're more about the backside, huh?" Xinyi prodded.

"I'm not going to honor that with a response."

This charade of Xinyi trying to cajole us for our personal taste in partners instead of elaborating on what exactly she saw in Jenetta continued until we reached the street faire that Ash had wanted to browse.

On either side of the street ran a row of various temporary stalls, wooden counters or tables set up in front of artful displays, with merchants of all kinds to advertise them. Some beckoned us closer as we walked along, taking the many shops in, while others simply waited patiently for their wares to draw in curious customers, or else were busy chatting up someone already reeled in.

We stopped and sampled raw honey packaged and advertised by the brother of a beekeeper. Xinyi tapped her foot impatiently at each stall we stopped at that didn't include something she could eat or try for free. Kris was immediately enamored with a small yarn bunny trinket when she saw it, and that instantly became one of the few purchases any of us made.

One of our last stops through the faire was one of the more unorthodox shops. Rather, it wasn't a shop, but a show: A school for fencing had two of its instructors locked in a bout of immaculate swordplay, a delicate dance where neither combatant could land a touch on the other, but which never lacked for convincing attempts. Their battle didn't seem like it conformed to any sort of ruleset, but was instead meant to draw in a crowd with flashy showboating and performance. And, to their credit, it was doing so spectacularly.

Once a pause in the action came and the crowd dispersed slightly, Kris went up to the commentator. She didn't have her sword with her, though she hardly ever did unless we were venturing into the labyrinth. When she returned, she told us that the school itself was only a few blocks down the road from where we stood, and she had signed up for lessons in swordfighting.

"...Really?" Ash spoke. "Aren't you already better than these guys?"

Kris shook her head. "I actually haven't ever been taught professionally. In the labyrinth I just kind of stab things in places that seem right, and it works out."

"Huh. That might be more impressive, actually."

Flare was leaning against the lamppost behind us, their arms folded behind their head. When Kris looked at them as if for approval, they regarded her with a lazy glance, one eye open. "It's your money. Do what you want with it."

Kris' face brightened at Flare's not-a-no repsonse.

Afterward, we had pretty much concluded our meandering at the faire. We bounced around various parts of Iorys, mostly in the name of buying supplies for future exploration of the labyrinth, until at last we stopped in front of the Twilight Tavern; a hunter who butchered his own game and sold it here would be here today.

On pushing through the doors to the tavern, we saw the barowner herself chatting with a taller man who looked like he'd been quite powerful in his earlier years. He had in his arms, swaddled in a blanket, an infant.

"Aww, cute baby!" Ash cooed.

In the same moment, I must've audibly grunted with disgust, because Xinyi turned back to me with a raised eyebrow. "You good, Yules?" She asked.

"I'm fine," I shook my head. "Just not one for... infants."

"Oooooo-kay," Xinyi said. "Whatever. I know you're not a people person, but like, it's just a baby. They don't do much."

"Correct. What they do do, though, is cry and barf and mess themselves and leave you to clean it up."

"And you used to be one of them," Xinyi pointed at me. "Anyway, I think they're cool. Everything is still new and crazy to them. Plus, they can't talk, so they can't say dumb crap yet."

"You can go get the meat from Jaimie while we introduce ourselves," Ash offered. 'Flare? Kris?"

"I'm not good with children," Flare said.

"Pass," Kris added.

Xinyi shrugged. "Suit yourselves."

The five of us split off to our respective tasks. Kris volunteered to handle buying the ingredients, so Flare and I sat down at a table and minded our own business. Well, they did. I watched Xinyi and Ash from afar.

The man smiled and nodded at the two of them, then offered forth his child for them to fawn over. Now that I could get a better look, I saw the thing had a couple of disparate features from its caretaker: a wisp of blonde hair on its head, to the fading oak locks of its father; and long, pointed ears that it wiggled curiously, when the man carrying it was Earthlain.

As Ash leaned in to say hi, it looked up at him with big, awestruck eyes, and its fingers in its mouth. It took that hand, wrapped its glistening digits around a fistful of Ash's pink hair, and stuffed the hair in its mouth like a horse would chew a clump of hay. Ash laughed awkwardly, and the man scolded the baby, trading the hair for a pacifier before it could start to complain.

Even though I stopped watching after that, the man was not a naturally quiet speaker; I picked up the broad strokes of the conversation as he caught Mirina up on where his life had taken him: he was an old flame of hers, and an ex-member of their dissolved guild from a number of years ago which they would not say exactly, but alluded to being double digit (my guess was they had already disbanded by the time I was alive).

To cut to what was immediately relevant, he and his fiancée, to whom the baby belonged, were in the city to help his cousin here.

"Wait, you don't mean Isaac?" Mirina said. "Gosh, the little squirt could barely even walk last time I saw him."

"Yeah, I know, I know," The man sighed fondly. "He's... been through some stuff. But he's doing well. I think. I hope."

"What do you mean, stuff?" Mirina asked.

The man continued under his breath, and while I could hear Mirina making "mm-hms" and I could look up to see her nodding along, I didn't really hear what was said, and I figured that was the point of the volume change. Not long after, Kris returned to us with the requested meat in hand. She nodded toward the exit, eager to leave, so we regrouped with team pro-baby.

"Oh! Are you guys outta here already?" Mirina asked. An explanation of our favor for Jenetta came courtesy of Ash, which seemed to amuse the proprietress very much.

"Really?" Mirina said. "That's a surprise. I've heard about her guests confessing and getting turned down plenty of times, so after a point I thought maybe she preferred the ladies, and then I just kinda assumed romance isn't on her roadmap at all."

"Yeah, it surprised Xinyi over here, too," Flare said.

"Ha ha ha ha ha, very funny! It's getting late, let's go!" Xinyi swung her arms behind Ash and Flare's backs to scoop the two up towards the exit, eliciting complaints from them both. In the process, Ash's foot caught on a floorboard sticking up, he tripped his way toward the door, which swung open, and a soft impact alongside a racket of confused footsteps sounded out.

"Whoa!" A young man matching Ash's height held him by the shoulders to steady him after the two had run into each other. "Sorry there, didn't mean to..."

As he looked up at all of us, he blew at a few of the strands of his slicked-back copper hair that hung in front of his face. A look of bewilderment, almost like he didn't quite understand where he was, fell over him as he took us in for just a bit longer than seemed normal. Then he looked back down at the Celestrian in his hands, catching them in the act of gawking. Ash's cheeks went red hot.

"Sorry, you probably want back up on your feet, huh?" The odd fellow said, standing Ash back upright and letting go of him. "These your friends?"

"H-huh? Oh! Oh, yeah. Yeah." Ash's head whipped back and forth like he was checking who we were.

Mirina was staring at her old friend, mouth agape, when I spared her a glance. THAT'S him?, she mouthed. Her friend grinned and nodded.

Isaac leaned in toward Ash and said in a bit of a quieter tone: "Hey, I'm a little busy right now, but if you wanna meet me here tomorrow? I'll buy you a drink, ah..."

"Ash."

"Ash. My way of apologizing for just about bowling you over. Besides, I could use some company that's not my cousin over there. He used to go out with the lady who runs this place, and I'm not about to be implicated in that train wreck of a night. Deal?"

"Uh, yeah, definitely. S-see you then." Did I miss a part of that conversation? How did that happen so fast?

When we stepped outside of the tavern, Xinyi shot a look to Ash, who was still wide-eyed and ruddy-cheeked. "Well, shit. You're welcome, I guess."

◄—•—►

The afternoon sun was hot on our faces as it dipped down behind the city skyline. The five of us returned to the inn, and handed Jenetta the ingredients she requested.

"Ah, there we go! Thanks so much guys!" Jenetta said, handing us what even from a distance I could tell was more money than we paid for the groceries. "I'll be back in just a second!"

We all took a seat as Jenetta hopped over to the kitchen, humming a tune. None of us were entirely sure why she wanted us here for this, but we all supposed we were invested enough in this supposed romance to justify knowing how the confession went.

"Maybe it's me," Xinyi grumbled. "Maybe the guest is me and I'm the smart and handsome one."

"I'm pretty sure she called the guest a 'he'," Flare said.

"Maybe she thinks I'm a guy. I've gotten that one before. I could pretend to be a guy," Xinyi said.

For a moment, my eyes met Kris', and I knew we shared the same thought but chose not to speak it: For how long?

A soft but rapid tapping of feet from outside broke the quiet, and caught Jenetta's attention. "Oh! There he is now! He must smell it already."

I watched a gray-furred cat hop onto the windowsill and step its way inside. It made its way over to the counter separating the kitchen and dining hall, its tail swaying with intrigue.

"Oh, Mr. Friedrich! Mr. Friedriiiiich!" Jenetta called. She inhaled for a third, presumably longer callout, but stopped short when she turned to face the kitty.

"Oh! There you are! My dear Friedrich, I have a very special proposal for you: I'd like you to stay at my inn... as a permanent guest! What do you say?" Jenetta presented her concoction of the ingredients we bought for her, which the cat happily dug into, purring with contentedness. "Oh, that sounds like a yes! Yaay!"

When I happened to spare Xinyi a passing glance, her face was as bright red as I'd ever seen it. Her eyes did everything in their power to avoid meeting another human being's gaze, and I'm sure if she were wearing something she could bury her face in, she would be deep in it.

I could have exercised restraint when the thought popped into my head. But... I'd be lying if I said I wasn't enjoying seeing her like this.

"Looks like you're not Jenetta's favorite cat eith–"

"Can it."

Chapter Text

"Hang on, hang on," Xinyi stopped us right before the stairs to the next floor. She took off her left shoe and shook it until a few pebbles rattled out of it. "Cool, we're good now. That was killin' me."

Ash gave a concerned frowned. "How long were you walking around with that in your boot, Ni?"

"Since those damned moles. You know any other thing that likes putting dirt everywhere except under your feet?"

"That was at least an hour ago."

"Yeah, maybe more. I dunno, I was tryin' to find the right place to. Never know when there's gonna be more monsters." Xinyi parked her gaze at the ribbon braided into Ash's hair. "Oh, hang on, where'd you get that? Is that from your boyfriend?"

"Huh? I mean, yes, but we've only been on one date if you could even call it th—"

"We talked about this when we met up this morning," Kris said. "I even helped him braid his hair."

"Really? I wasn't paying attention." Xinyi shrugged.

"You're hopeless."

Flare muttered something about being bored, and we all took it as a sign to get moving. The top of the stairs deposited us onto a mostly featureless platform branching off into a few short-lived dead ends and one way forward that passed under a stone arch; nothing new of note. However, this single pathway led to what was easily the largest open space we'd seen of the labyrinth yet. From end to end, it could've easily been a half mile.

"It's huge," Ash said. "This could be the entire floor!"

"Doubt it'd be that easy," Flare shook their head. "This place has something against making things easy for us."

"It's not sentient," Kris refuted.

I started walking ahead as the others talked. Something was off about this huge room. Not only was it unlike Yggdrasil to have such an enormous chasm, but I got the sense this floor wasn't supposed to be like this. The scattered rubble all about this area called to mind that maybe some walls were knocked down. Though, what could have cleared out an area this massive, I could not say. "Man-made" felt far-fetched for this feat.

It was at that moment that I felt the ground vibrate, and my head rattled with a thunderous sound. I turned to the east, where I thought I heard the sound come from, and felt my heart sink as I gazed upon a sight out of a nightmare.

It was colossal in such a way that your first instinct would not be to consider whether it was a living creature or not for how absurd a reality that'd be. But I needed no convincing, because its trunk and body swayed as it took earth-shaking steps forward. It could've easily been standing fifty feet tall, and its tusks, as absurdly far out as they grew from its face, curved viciously upward over its head. It was like watching Council Hall rampaging through neighborhoods in Iorys.

I could have spent so much more time taking the terrifying sight in, but critically, one of the first things I had noticed about it was that it was charging toward us with murderous intent.

I lowered my head and whipped around to find my guildmates. "Run—!" I called instinctively, expecting them to have not even noticed yet. But they were already gone; perhaps I had been the one who was slow to notice. I turned back to the door we came from, thinking I would find them making for that exit. Only, they weren't there. It must have already occured to them that the rampaging giant would get to there before they could.

That meant it would be getting to me very, very soon. Naturally, I started hightailing it in the opposite direction. For once, I cursed the armor on my body. I had the stamina to run for a very long time, but in this situation, my lackluster ability to sprint proved troublesome.

"Yulia!" Ash called back to me. He was dragging behind the other three. Kris and Ghost led in front, while Xinyi ran slightly behind them. The distance between the front of the pack and Flare, then Flare and Ash and me, grew wider. Each moment brought a new set of footsteps crashing down, and I could feel their tremors set into me a little deeper, rattle my armor a little harder, each time.

"We can't outrun it!" Ash yelled. "We have to thread back!"

Flare didn't argue. They pulled out the Ariadne thread and pulled it taut. This was our only escape, but it would require outrunning this monster just a little bit more, and I saw its shadow starting to swallow mine.

"Kris! Xinyi!" Flare hollered, holding up the thread for them to see when they turned around. In response, both of them slowed, and let Flare catch up. They each grabbed onto one of Flare's arms, and Xinyi scooped Ghost up in her free arm. Their awkward interlocking of limbs slowed them down enough that Ash had an opportunity to latch on, if only by Xinyi's hair.

But I was still behind them. My heart was pounding, my breath ragged, and I could see that closing the gap wasn't going to happen in time. Each of the monolithic elephant's stomps shook my vision. If I told them to slow down, and I was even slightly wrong about the timing of the thread, we were all going to be trampled.

Xinyi could see this, and made a decision for me. She issued the command: "Stop!", and planted her feet against solid ground. They all nearly toppled over from Xinyi's weight dragging them down. But me? I was going to run full force into them. There was no way for me to halt my momentum in the seconds I had before crashing into them.

We skid across the ground, everyone's bodies folding over each other, and I was certain Flare had lost their grip on the thread in the chaos, and that we were at the mercy of the hulking beast closing in on us. I landed face upward, not toward the sky, but toward the white fur of the beast. It lifted its trunk-like leg over us, and I had time to see the rubble-caked sole of its foot blotting out the sun and coming down on us.

I squeezed my eyes shut as sunlight beamed into them very suddenly. Clusters of leaves rustled in gentle winds. I rolled off of someone else's body and picked myself up from brick pathway. We were at the entrance of the labyrinth.

"Everybody okay?" Ash asked after a moment.

"Besides my bones? Yeah I'm good." Xinyi laid sprawled out on the ground where I had just been.

"That seemed not normal." Flare said.

"What do you mean?" Ash asked.

"If that were a known feature of the labyrinth, you'd think we'd get a warning, at least? 'Hey, watch out for the biggest elephant ever'. That kind of warning." Flare brushed the dirt off their sleeves, then off of Ghost.

"Well, that's true... but what do you want to do about it?"

"We could inform the Council," Kris suggested.

◄—•—►

"So you saw it as well, then..." Prince Ramus said.

"You could at least be a little more excited, y'know!" Xinyi grimaced. "It's not like we almost got killed finding out about this, or anything." Ash nudged her to check her manners.

But, the prince seemed to take it in stride. "My apologies. Truth be told, this isn't the first I've heard of this. In recent months, sightings similar to yours and in roughly the same area have popped up before. Twice, in fact. I wasn't sure what to make of it, but given your account, a lot of details are corroborated which leads me to believe that what we have on our hands is a Primordiphant."

"Primordiphant?" Flare repeated back. "So what's this thing's deal? How do we take care of it?"

"Well, as I'm sure you have guessed based on your encounter, dispatching it with force is... likely infeasible. When I first got the suspicion that this might be a Primordiphant, I did some research. Supposedly, they originate from Kinmeria, far West from here. They were, according to history books, ridden in wars. Hordes of them would rush out onto the battlefield, shaking it ceaselessly and terrifying their foes. There are even accounts of them linked to the Legendary War."

The scene my mind conjured was stark and vivid. I saw the sunless fields, legions of soldiers stepping through the blend of rainwater and soil, their boots pounding in a deafening rhythm that drowned out rational thought. And then, the Primordiphant's foot would crash down, rendering the soldiers' march inaudible. With each stomp forward, the Primordiphant would crush dozens of lives underfoot as its rider gave the command to charge. It would have no way of knowing whether the tiny things it stepped on were its enemies or allies, and it had no reason to care. It was only one of many of its kind on the battlefield, and all of them felt the same edict to blaze a path of destruction forward.

Ramus was still talking, but I couldn't make out the words. They blurred together, refusing to solidify. My eyes itched and a sour, metallic taste like blood lingered on my breath. I felt an impulse to scream, breifly, but I think even if I had chosen to act on it, my body would not have responded. It felt cold and stiff, like it wasn't my own. Something gripped my leg, something rough and caked in dirt. The ground under my feet, which should have been— no, had to be —marble tile, felt soft and yielding like recently moved dirt. I looked down to see what was there, but instead saw a miasmic purple fog trailing from my lips. That was the taste. Somehow, I knew that was what was causing the taste of blood in my mouth and it was pouring from me it was coming from inside—

"...lia. Yulia." Xinyi snapped her fingers repeatedly a few inches in front of my face. I gasped, expecting to inhale something that would rot me from the inside out, but the smoke wasn't there. Neither was that paralyzed feeling. I wanted to act like nothing was wrong, but Xinyi flinched when I turned to look at her. I could tell how intensely I was staring.

"You're freakin' me out with that look, Yules."

"It's not like you to be out of it like that," Flare agreed. "You were staring at the floor really hard."

"Are you okay?" Ash and Kris both asked in tandem.

I massaged the scar between my shoulder and neck. "Yes. I'm fine," I said, giving them all as reassuring a look as I could. It didn't help much; the worry in their stares didn't ease up at all. I couldn't deny that I wasn't making a great case for myself.

"Truly?" Ramus asked. "Well, I won't press the matter if you don't wish. In any case, if you should end up dealing with this Primordiphant again like I suspect, I can offer you this: one such tactic for dealing with these creatures that appeared multiple times in my research was to flank them from the sides, as they turned very slowly. I wish you luck in your adventures, Antares."

◄—•—►

The air here was as thick with dust as it was turbulent. The sight of this barren expanse summoned the ache in my shoulder once more. I looked over at Kris. She was watching me back.

"Everyone understands their roles?" I asked. Yesterday's experience had been the first time in at least a month that I had come close to death. For everyone else, it may have been their first time, period.

"Yeah, yeah," Xinyi said. "We got it. And everyone has their own thread if it doesn't work out." That was a costly expense, one that would've been borderline unaffordable in our nascent days. But if we were to run into the Primordiphant again, it was a necessary precaution.

"Alright. Into your positions. Whenever you're ready, Kris."

Kris nodded to me. She crouched down, and then sprinted off toward the eastern end. The sound of rubble crunching under her shoes played rhythmically over the drone of the wind, then faded behind it, and at last disappeared as her figure gradually shrunk into the distance. When she came to a stop, I recognized the way she reeled by the fact that I had done much the same my first time seeing it.

Kris pulled her sword out and waved it above her head wildly. "HEY, UGLY!" We heard her yell. I suppose it was a bit too late to tell her to workshop that insult.

As soon as she was done, Kris began running back toward us. "Ready yourselves," I warned the others. Ash began a prayer: he plucked a phantasmal paper charm from the series of them that encircled him, and held it in front of his closed eyes. As it dissipated, a gossamer energy filled my chest, spreading out through my limbs and ending at my fingertips with a buzz like fluttering wings. The feeling of my armor's weight left me, and my body jumped at any chance to move, as if it were on strings primed to pull me toward my desired motions.

I turned to look at my signal. Kris was seconds away from the threshold. I lifted my rifle toward where she'd be momentarily. Xinyi was hopping up and down in place and pumping her arms. "C'mon, cmon! I'm so ready to go! I feel like I could FIGHT this thing!"

I shushed her instinctively. Here was the pull: to have a teammate so fast that I could lead my shots and still be a step behind. I fired my shot at the teetering stone pillar in her path right when Kris was still a second away from crossing under its path. "GO!" I yelled to everyone else.

I started running last, my legs kicking faster than they had ever before. I made constant checks at what was now behind me: the Primordiphant was in full chase, and the crag formation had smashed into the ground directly in its path. The hope was that it was too tall for the titan's stubby legs to simply step over. Kris had successfully crossed under the pillar before it fell and, in her usual form, catching up to me even without the benefit of Ash's blessing.

"Remind me to help you with your goading insults next time!" I shouted to her as she came up from behind.

"Keep your criticism! And don't think I didn't catch you getting cheeky with your timing back there!" Kris replied.

In the time it took for that exchange, she was already pulling ahead of me. Hell, I'd have believed it if you told me she'd slowed down to give herself time to talk back to me. Another look back confirmed my hope; the Primordiphant was clunkily manuevering around the fallen pillar to pursue us. Up ahead came part two of my plan.

As we rounded the corner of the arena's central wall, I shot at another loose hanging portion of it. The playing field was just how I wanted it: having passed the first pillar, the Primordiphant would have another to move around whether it chose to follow our path or turn back and try to meet us. The only task that remained was to find an exit to this place.

I was trailing behind my guildmates, but collectively we were in a comfortable position. I scanned the rubble-blasted space for any sort of door or pathway that was too small for the Primordiphant to follow us through. I could feel its enraged glare from the other side of the arena; it knew we had trapped it and was slamming itself against the wall dividing us. It would be in our best interest to find a shortcut on this floor that took this room out of the equation, if its inhabitant was smart enough to prevent others from using this same trick.

"This way!" I heard Flare call out. We followed them into the gorge that Kris had dragged the Primordiphant out from in the first place. At the very end was a door. The colossal beast's movement still shook the ground as we tumbled through the door and out onto the ground.

We broke into a chorus of gasping breaths. Those of us who weren't sprawled out on the ground were leaning against a wall.

"Hoo... yeah! Let's fuckin' go!" Xinyi hollered as soon as the initial wave of exhaustion had passed. She held up a high-five to Flare, who took a moment to repsond.

"We're crazy... we're crazy!" Ash laughed. "We actually did it!"

The moment I got up to my feet, Xinyi wrapped an arm around me and tousled my hair. "That's our leader! Man, I don't know how you came up with that!"

"Okay, I get it," I shoved my hand in Xinyi's face to push her away. "Stop sweating on me."

As Xinyi continued to suffocate me with her body odor, I glanced at Kris. She smiled at me. No genuine resentment there, I suppose, so that was good. Though maybe a little bit of help— Wait. Have I ever seen this girl smile before?

As if coming to a similar realization, Kris' gaze redirected to nothing in particular, and she downplayed the curve on her lips, though notably it didn't ever fully go away. I looked at Flare, who was scratching behind Ghost's ears as they fed her berries. Ash leaned against a rock and wiped the sweat from his brow, satisfied but not taking his eye fully off the door we had just come through. All of them beamed with pride; mostly in our team, but there was an unmistakable pride in me as well.

Don't let it get to their heads, I prayed.

Chapter Text

The days in Iorys grew chillier quicker than they did back home. This I now knew, because I had dressed typically lightly for myself today, and started to regret it. I had some inkling that the city saw a cooler climate, given its higher altitude, but even still, for a cloudless late-Aries day, this was a bit beyond my expectations.

It was some fifteen or twenty minutes past noontide, by my estimate, as I strolled down a residential road sequestered from the bustle of the city's thoroughfares. My goal when I set out a few hours ago was to find a place to get lost from my guildmates for a day; somewhere I could read or nap or meditate or just sit in peace, somewhere far enough that they'd not go looking for me without good reason.

I had been here for the better part of half a year now, and somehow not done this. So I simply packed some reading material and something to curb my hunger if necessary, then took off, purposefully without direction save for intuiting where fewer people would be. Iorys was rife with small parks and quaint coffee shops, so I had my pick of places. By now, I could've chosen a spot and tested it out for sure, but the walk itself was so pleasant I had kept on going just to see more.

It was as I realized I would have to take a turn off my current path to avoid heading back toward livelier streets that a shaggy Therian man rounded a corner and bolted toward me with equal parts determination and fear. I thought I might have to duck out of the way, but he crossed over to the opposite row of houses and disappeared into an alleyway.

For a second I mulled over what he might've been running to or from, before a much stranger sight mimicked him: a purple-haired girl, eyes ablaze with focus and fury, lacking her scythe and trading adventuring attire for a (much better-looking, in my opinion) navy sweater and white skirt, but familiar to me nonetheless. She was, without a doubt, moving faster than the man she was chasing despite being behind him. Moreover, though, her torso, shoulders, and forearms were cloaked in a roiling black miasma that rung somewhat similar to the smoke I had coughed up and never recieved an explanation for.

This I could not just let go, despite wishing to have a normal day. There was no way I could keep pace with Solor's breakneck sprint, but if I kept at a light jog I could call it following behind. So I did. Solor dove into the alley where the scruffy man had gone— a stroke of luck or just good intuition —and I followed suit just seconds behind. When I caught sight of her again, Solor stood stationary. She slammed her fist into the brick wall beside her with astonishing force. A pulse of the miasma covering her forearm billowed out toward her fist, obscuring the moment of impact but seemingly adding to its ferocity.

She still had her back to me and was muttering curses in frustration. Her knuckles bled, but not without equivalent exchange, because unless my eyes decieved me, the part of the wall she had punched sported cracks that weren't there before. It seemed safe to assume that the man had used his headstart wisely enough to lose her. Solor inspected her bloodied fist, and then the miasmic armor swirled around rapidly and vanished. Some of it seeped into her wound, sealing it. She suckled the trail of blood off her knuckles, erasing the last evidence of her outbrust.

"What was that all about?" I asked. Spur of the moment decison to break the silence, but she was liable to turn around soon anyway.

"Urgh!" Solor jumped. A little shock, a little annoyance. A reaction rather suited to her. "Oh... you."

"Yes, me. Sorry to disappoint."

"What do you want? Why did you follow me here?" Solor narrowed her eyes at me.

"I didn't follow you so much as you followed someone else to where I happened to be. My question first."

Solor groaned. "No, I'm pretty sure I... rghh."

The both of us stood staring across this alley at each other, waiting for the other to fold. Our equally matched stubbornness proved this to be a rather lengthy and pointless war of attrition. At last, Solor spoke again, though not to surrender:

"Look, clearly we got off on the wrong foot last time. Can we not do this? I don't think I even know your name, still."

"Yulia."

'Right. Yulia. I'll go first: That prick I was chasing stole something off of Lili. I wouldn't have let it happen, but usually people are smart enough not to try and nick something off of well-known high-ranking adventurers like me and her."

"Well, maybe that was his key," I responded. "Maybe he was counting on you not expecting him to be so bold. It looks like it worked out for him."

"Ugh." Solor rolled her eyes. "Well, that's my story. So are we gonna keep doing this? I gotta find some way to replace what he took off Lili."

"You seem surprisingly loyal to her," I said. "What's with you two?"

Solor seemed a bit surprised and a little perplexed, at first. Then she snorted: "Nosy, aren't you? Though I gotta say, you've got a keener eye than you might realize. I'm 'loyal' to her because I work for her. I don't suppose anyone told you that?"

I shook my head. "Maybe I do have a keen eye. What kind of contract involves both of you being equal parts of a guild exploring Yggdrasil?"

Solor laughed a short laugh again. "That's my client's personal business; I'm not at liberty to give that info away. You'll have to ask her directly if you want to know. What I can tell you is, I was a mercenary working odd jobs before I met Lili. And what we're doing here doesn't necessarily just involve getting to the top of that big damn tree."

"Hm. So you're arguably the strongest guild in Iorys, and that's what you tell me. You're getting me curious."

"Well, tough luck there. I gotta keep my secrets." Solor slumped against a wall and slid down into a sitting position. "What's your deal? You don't strike me the type of girl to pull together the merry band of adventurers you have."

Now it was my turn to scoff. "Well, you're on the nose there. I didn't; it was more like I got tricked into being part of a team. I wasn't happy about it at all, but they pull their weight in a fight. So I keep them around. For now."

"Fair enough. Lili's an oddball, but she grows on you. Even did on me. And I respect her reasons for hiring me. Pay's not half bad either."

I walked over to where Solor was sitting and took a seat of my own against the wall opposite her. She seemed almost lost in thought as she gazed toward the far end of the alley, her eyes unfocused and her arms resting upon her knees brought close to her chest. All of a sudden, she turned toward me and started talking again:

"What're you doing this for, anyway? Clearly it means something to you."

I cast my eyes toward the ground as I thought of an appropriate answer. "...well, I'll have to give you my own brand of client confidentiality. Let's just say I'm doing it for someone."

"Yeah, I should've guessed you were gonna pull that one." Solor smirked, not seeming amused. She tilted her head and closed her eyes contemplatively. "Well, whether I like it or not, you're our only hope for breaking the unlucky number. So I guess I'm counting on you."

"I'm sorry? The what?"

"Really? You don't know?" Solor gave me a look. "The Mastery Titles. The thing the Explorers' Guild gives you when you reach the 3rd stratum."

I just shook my head.

"Sheesh, they don't have any faith in newbies anymore, then. Listen up: after floor 10, the third stratum begins. Nobody's found anything higher than that in years. It's also a way, way more dangerous place than the lower areas. So they started giving guilds "Mastery Titles" to distinguish who had made it up there and was allowed to go into potentially completely uncharted parts of the labyrinth."

"Right, so... what does the unlucky number thing have to do with it?"

"Right now, there's 13 guilds with Mastery Titles, officially. Lili and I were the most recent ones, making it 14, but then some other guys retired, putting it back down. Ever since it's been 13, nobody's been able to find their way further up. Everyone thinks the number's cursed and are waiting for it to move again."

That, of course, left me with one big particular question on mind: "And you're expecting my guild to be number fourteen?"

"Yeah, since I heard you... well, the rumor is that you guys killed a Primordiphant. Which is obviously bullsh—"

"We maneuvered around one, yes. I'm not sure how it got spun into that kind of tale. Xinyi embellishes things, but she doesn't outright lie like th—"

"Well, whatever. Clearly, you guys are strong. You'd be the ones, if anyone, to take care of that giant bird freak that's been killing folks who make it to floor 10."

Big papa golem. Giant bird freak. What happened to calling things by their proper name? "Why don't you two or any of the other Mastery guilds kill it?"

"Who would want to risk their life just to let more competition in? All the other guilds want to be the first to forge the way to the "fourth stratum", if there even is such a thing. As for me, I don't put my neck on the line without Lili's say-so. And yeah, it is weird that she hasn't said so yet. She's been... off, recently. Something's got her anxious."

Anxious. Speaking of anxiety, it wouldn't really make sense for me to have spent all this time talking to Solor and not mention the thing that initially caught my interest.

"Solor... that smoke that was surrounding you earlier."

"What about it?" Solor asked.

"What... is it? I understand it's the miasma that Harbingers like you summon, but..." I paused, unsure of how to phrase my question. "...How does it work? How do you summon it?"

She looked at me curiously, at first. Like she was scanning me for an ulterior motive. Then, she scratched the back of her head, formulating her own explanation. "Well, no one really knows what it is. So that makes it hard to explain. It's not magic like Celestrians have magic, and it's not the same thing as whatever Shamans do to talk to spirits. It's more like a... death... thing. You gotta have some tie with death. Lots of people who almost died can summon it. Others have to... kill something. Or just carry around remains, if you wanna be weird about it."

A tie with death... but if that was the case, then why hadn't it happened sooner? And why was what I saw different from what Solor— and presumably other Harbingers —used? This simple of an explanation just wasn't adding up, but I couldn't prod further for details without saying too much.

"So do you have to summon it or purpose? Or can it just... come from you, one day?" I asked.

Solor shrugged. "I dunno. I didn't know to summon it when I did the first time, but I definitely did something to make it happen. I was just a fourteen-year-old, though, so I didn't know shit regardless. Maybe it just happens to some of us. I don't ask questions. I just use the power I have."

Whatever was happening to me, I didn't think it was the same thing. My sight line drifted back out of the alley, toward the street I would otherwise have been long gone from by now. At the same time as I caught myself doing this, I also felt a pang of hunger that wasted no time letting me know what I had packed wasn't going to do it. Now was probably a good time for me to head home. I got to my feet.

"I imagine you'd like me to stop bothering you now," I told Solor as she, too, stood up. "Although I do owe you an answer I never gave to your question."

Again, Solor shurgged. "I don't even remember what I asked."

"I followed you because of the miasma. I wanted to know more about it, and, well, now I do."

Solor raised an eyebrow at me. "You're a weird girl."

"Maybe. Maybe I'm starting to accept that. I don't know how else I could've ended up in this situation." I put a hand out to Solor. "But, earnestly, your advice was appreciated. Especially since, once that unlucky number is out of the way, we'll be competing to see who finds the top of Yggdrasil first."

A mischievous grin flashed across Solor's face as she took my hand and shook it. "Tch. Good luck. Won't be much of a competition, though."

Chapter Text

With little warning, Ash stopped walking and thrust his arm out in front of us. "I think we're near to it... or it's near us."

"Says who?" Xinyi challenged.

"Says... them." Ash gestured to the air around us.

"Theeeeem...?" Said Xinyi, mimicking him.

"They mean the ghosts," Flare said. A certain hound's ears perked up. "Not you."

Ash shivered. "Don't call them ghosts. They're spirits. But... yes, I think this could be the Hippogryph's nest. There's a sort of passive hum... I don't know how to describe it, but when a great enough spectral presence is nearby, a Shaman can feel it. Mostly, it takes the presence of many spirits in one place for me to notice."

The blank look on Xinyi's face held for a few seconds, before realization flickered to life. "Ooohhhhhh... you mean a bunch of adventurers died around here! Fucked up."

Ash winced. "W-well, yes. But I was doing my best to leave that part unsaid."

Flare grunted, keeping a disinterested gaze toward the ground at their side. "Any chance you can chit-chat with these spirits? Y'know, maybe they can give us a little heads up on what's got so many of them pushing up daisies."

This got Ash to fold their arms and contemplate how to summarize a richly intricate and complex topic. "Is something like that possible? Yes, certainly. Skilled shamans can do so, in limited fashion. But we're talking about someone who is well, well above my skill level. Even my mentor, who was talented beyond belief, with decades of experience, told me she could not do it. It is something I have zero hope of ever accomplishing."

"Huh. Shame. Welp—"

"Moreover, you need to be close to where they died, and know their real name to call them by."

"...What counts as a 'real name'? The one they were given at birth? Or does it depend on legal documentation?" Kris asked.

"Yeah, and what if you've got multiple names? What then?" Xinyi added.

"My understanding is, your 'real name' is whatever name you use that rings truest to your heart. Something you'd answer to no matter who calls it."

"And if you don't have a name like that before you die?" Kris pressed.

"Then no shaman of any caliber could summon you," Ash answered. "...Or so I'm told."

Kris and Xinyi confirmed their satisfaction with matching "hm"s. Flare was now boring a hole into the ground with the intensity of their stare, looking as if some grim realization had dawned on them.

After long enough, they noticed me staring at them. "...I think we should get going," They spoke to snap out of their trance.

The walls of the corridor we moved through stretched dauntingly up towards the sky, and then yawned open into a vast canyon, its borders sheer and unscalable. On the far end, a narrow passage mirrored the one we had just exited, save for sloping upward to form a staircase that ascended in that familiar way, teasing the next floor to us. This was 10F; if Solor's word was to be believed, then this was the home stretch. The third stratum awaited.

Something above us blotted out the sun for a brief moment, and going by the sound it made, it was as huge as it was fast. We craned our necks toward the sky, futilely attempting to glimpse something already far elsewhere. With a ground-shaking impact, it alerted us to its new location, this time deliberately letting us see it. Feathers of lime green, black, and red covered a confoundingly chimerical body: a horse's hindquarters, forelegs ending in razor claws, and wings that flared out into giant hands that could close around one of us completely. Its birdlike head did nothing to bandage the lack of cohesion.

It split the air with a hawkish screech, and then faced us with something that felt deeply wrong, something no monster had shown before: a deliberate glare toward us. It looked into our eyes the way only a human combatant would, with something deeper than an intent to hunt or survive.

It was a disturbing experience that drew beads of sweat to my face, yet it passed just as quickly as it came. The Hippogryph took off toward the sky after its unsettling declaration of war. I raised my gun after it, only for something in my peripheral vision to distract me.

"RRRRRRRRRRGHH!" Xinyi lunged toward me with her katana. The blade glanced off my shield before I even realized I was putting it between us. Over the metal barrier that saved my life I saw my ally snarling, her teeth clenched and her eyes wide as part of a fury-twisted grin.

"What the hell are you doing?!" I demanded.

"EVERY SWORD SLASH IS A WINNER!" She cried, taking another brute force swing at me as if she could crumple my shield with enough tries. I had no other choice; as she drew her sword back to swing at me a third time, I slammed my body into hers with my shield as a brace. Xinyi tumbled to the ground, losing her grip on her weapon. I pressed my foot down on its hilt, then kicked it as far away as I could.

My mind raced, and I realized I had taken my eyes off the enemy for far too long. I frantically scanned the sky for it, but just when I found it, a sharp and crushing pain clamped down on my thigh. I yelped, and looked down to see Xinyi angrily biting me.

"Agh! What is wrong with you?!" I couldn't bash her head or shoot her or anything; she was an ally after all (at least, I was pretty sure she still was). But this was combat, and urgent action was my first and last line of defense here. So I grabbed as much of her hair as I could in my hands, and started yanking it while kicking my leg. My blood rounded my knee and trickled down my shin and smeared over her face, yet still she clawed at me and dug her teeth in deeper.

But my scream had evidently alerted my teammates, because Kris was running to my aid, and Kris was evidently a dirtier fighter than I had thought to be, because she readily took advantage of Xinyi's position on her knees to deliver a running kick very successfully to her crotch.

I felt Xinyi's jaw release from me as she drew in a gasp of air. I tried to ignore the unspeakable wail that followed and get a read on the Hippogryph's location, but unfortunately the latter element of that was all too easy, because it was already nosediving toward us, claws splayed murderously.

Rock shattered and a blinding wave of dust kicked into the air. I fell backwards, evading a direct hit from the avian monstrosity, but losing all sense of position and having only the panicked screams of my teammates to tell me their condition. I lifted my shield up, expecting a follow-up from the Hippogryph, but none came. I got up and backed out of the dust cloud to see it was soaring into the air to attempt the same tactic again.

The incandescence of one of Ash's prayers hummed to life from within the veil of debris, clearing it out and fortifying my resolve. I saw Ash and Flare; they were bloodied but standing. Meanwhile, the Hippogryph circled the clifftops outlining the perimeter of the battlefield, biding its time for another chance to strike.

"Aim for its wings! We need it down on the ground." Flare instructed to me.

I fired off shot after shot, but with its height and speed, I wasn't getting a hit in. Flare's arrows were falling short as well. "Wait until it's coming down to us!" I yelled.

As I kept my focus on the Hippogryph circling us high above, I heard Kris wrestling Xinyi to the ground, and two sharp palm-to-cheek impacts before the latter barked: "I'm normal! I'm normal you can stop!"

Just as it got behind us, the Hippogryph dived down, but we were prepared: I shot at its left wing while Flare loosed arrows into its right. Its trajectory jolted suddenly, and the beast catapulted over our heads, colliding into the ground behind us. I readied another shot while Kris darted toward the thing, and Xinyi went for her katana, which was still laying on the ground near the Hippogryph.

But the monster wasn't entirely thrown off its feet by our stratagem, and it recognized an opportunity in Xinyi trying to retrieve her weapon. Just as she swiped it off the ground, the Hippogryph seized Xinyi in its claw, and began scurrying toward the nearest wall to begin climbing it.

I knew if it got high enough to drop Xinyi to her death, her fate would be sealed whether it dropped her or we knocked it down, and there'd be nothing we could do about it. I racked my mind for options, and immediately found just one. It wasn't something I wanted to do, but it was either my convenience or Xinyi's life, so I started packing as much black powder into my rifle as I could in the seconds I had. I aimed at the Hippogryph's head, and fired.

The sound split the air and forced its way into my ears, letting nothing else into them. The end of the barrel burst with a massive orange flame, and pitch black smoke billowed out, tracing the trail of the shot all the way to the monster's head. It put a hole through the creature's beak, and from that hole, the excessive smoke filled its mouth and eyes, and sent it into a coughing fit. The Hippogryph reeled back, tossing Xinyi into the air as it lost its grip on her.

Xinyi's body twirled rapidly as she soared over the Hippogryph's head. Somehow not disoriented, she held fast to her katana and carried her momentum into a brutal slash into the Hippogryph's throat on her way down. As she continued to fall, Xinyi found purchase on the only thing around her by plunging her sword deep into the front of the Hippogryph's chest, pulling it down with her weight and tearing the monster open like a zipper would a jacket, clean down the center of its torso.

The katana caught on something— perhaps bone —and the halt in momentum flung Xinyi off of it, though her display of grip strength was no less impressive for it. The fall was much less severe by that point, though she took it face down. The Hippogryph gave a gurgling cry as it collapsed on the ground, but it wasn't a death wail: rather, it was a last attempt at taking us with it, as from the same mouth as the blood-muddled screech came bolts of lightning that arced through the air, desperate to strike anything as much as us specifically.

Quickly, Ash assumed a prayer that put a thin barrier around us. A lightning bolt came within inches of my face, only to bounce off the barrier and terminate in a harmless scorch mark on the ground. Seconds passed, and then the lightning faded alongside the Hippogryph's life, leaving a crumpled mass of gory feathers slumped against the wall.

We immediately ran to Xinyi's side. She peeled herself off the ground to look at us.

"Are you okay, Ni?!" Ash kneeled in front of her.

"...I could throw up for at least eight different reasons," Xinyi replied. She pointed weakly at the body of the Hippogryph. "My katana needs me."

Ash scanned us with impatient eyes, waiting for someone to volunteer for the retrieval. Kris groaned, then jogged around the massive corpse to its frontside. Xinyi gave up on trying to get into a sitting position, and simply perched her upper half on her elbows. This left her with little defense against Ghost's attempts to lick her face clean of blood.

Xinyi grunted. The first person her eyes went to wasn't Ash, but me. "...I'm sorry I bit you."

I think, for a moment, I actually felt bad for the girl. Factually speaking, her offenses included biting me in an enemy-induced bout of madness. Meanwhile, I had retaliated with relative impunity and disarmed her during potentially deadly combat, which had had clear consequences. Yet somehow she felt the need to be the one apologizing to me.

"It's okay, you got what you deserved." And a whole lot more than that, in fact.

Kris returned with the katana. A trail of footprints followed her, courtesy of the Hippogryph's blood. In fact, her boots in their entirety, alongside her hands up to the wrists and every inch of the weapon, were painted with gore. Xinyi didn't do anything in particular with the sword when she got it back, she just sheathed it. Eventually, Flare turned to me.

"So does this make us that Master thing, or what? What do we do now?" They asked.

Good question, I thought.

◄—•—►

The Guildmaster's Hall had an air of familiarity to it, not because I had been here often— it was only my second time —but because I had seen this situation before: the five of us faced down by the steely mien of the Guildmaster, waiting for him to do something like pass judgement.

"Well, Guild Antares, it has been a great while since I've had the pleasure of bestowing upon a guild the honor of Mastery Titles," said Egar. "So... what titles shall I pen for you?"

I blinked. "Sorry, come again?"

Egar folded his arms. "Ah. I take it no one explained this to you, then?"

"Explained what?" Flare asked.

"Understandable. It has been a long time since anyone's been through this process, after all. You see, when you're registered as a Master Guild, it's not just drab officialities. You give yourself a title— anything, really —and that becomes how we distinguish and refer to you in any to-be historical documents that should need to, should history be made."

"Oh." Ash said. "In that case, I kind of wish I'd been thinking about this. I might need a little—"

"Just put me down as whatever, I don't really care," Flare waved their hand.

"I..." Kris glanced around the room. "...also don't care."

"Ooh, I got one!" Xinyi exclaimed.

If Egar's could have folded his arms tighter in that armor, I imagine he would've. "Let me guess: Stabdaddy?"

Xinyi's jaw dropped. "WHAT?! HOW'D YOU KNOW??"

Ash frowned. "Xinyi, no. You're not calling yourself that."

Egar gave a knowing chuckle. "Few can resist the allure of Stabdaddy."

"What about you, Yulia?" Kris asked. "What are you gonna name yourself?"

I shuddered at the thought of penning an epithet for myself to be called by, like some campy storybook hero would have. I shrugged and said, "Frankly, this entire idea seems trite."

My words strangled the last bit of enthusiasm out of the room. We avoided each other's eyes and took turns filling the silence with a throat-clearing or a cough or grunt, until at last even Egar was fed up with us:

"Well, isn't this a fascinating dilemma. Well, since I do need something from each of you to move this paperwork along, I have a proposal: why don't I decide your titles for you?" Egar said, "...It is something that I've been curious to try out. After all, I've had to officiate the titles of every guild that's ever received them, and I've never done it myself."

We traded looks with each other. "Sure, whatever," Flare said.

The Guildmaster stepped forward. "Very well then! Let us begin with... you." He pointed to Xinyi.

"Now, let's see... one Liu Xinyi, I have witnessed your combat prowess in tandem with the fluidity of your movements, your resilience, your ability to adapt to your situation. In honor of both your skill with a katana, and your stubbornness to continue swinging that katana at any sign of resistance with yet more force, I bestow upon thee a title representing two of your greatest boons as a fighter: Grace & Fury."

"Sweet. I can dig that," Xinyi nodded.

"Moving on, to the individual before me known as Flare: I find myself picturing your starkly colored eyes as the last thing many monsters see; unblinking orange and red flames, watching as the embers of their prey's life whimper out. That, coupled with your trusted partner's name, Ghost, has led me to dub you the Phantom Flame."

"Sure, whatever," Flare huffed.

"Now... Ash. You, a Celestrian who has learned the Brouni traditions of spirit channeling, have traveled far across Arcania, and yet ended up here in Iorys. Your poise and grace lend to an air of divinity about you, and your ability to rouse the spirits of the deceased to grant your allies protection, even more so. As such, I see fit to grant you the title of Holy Wanderer."

"...I see. Thank you," Ash said.

"And Kris. Your supreme precision and unrivaled speed are among your many boons that make you a fearsome adversary. Within the tumultuous throes of combat, your movement confounds your foes, bringing about their end before they can tell you apart from a trick of their own eyes. I offer you a name suiting a speed of that nature: Fata Morgana."

Kris remained silent, only giving a short nod of acknowledgement. However, there was a sort of sparkle in her eye that told me she liked the name more than she expected to.

Then, Egar moved to me. I felt the eyes of my guildmates locked on me, waiting to see what I would become.

"Ah, Yulia... our fine leader of this Guild Antares. I admit, I struggled at first to think of an appropriate title for you... there are many traits which you possess as a fighter, a leader, and a person, but none come close to defining you in your entirety. Then, as I looked into your eyes but a moment ago, their color brought to mind those of the early dawn sky, still dotted with an expanse of stars but beginning to see the sunrise. And it occurs to me now, that your complexity, your countless aspects mirror the many stars in the sky just as your eyes do. And so this title I see fit to give to you: the Astral Dragoon."

I tried to muster the kindest response I had within me to that name.

"Very well," I said.

"Alright, so are we finished now?" Flare's response came with folded arms and an eagerness to leave.

Egar laughed heartily. "So long as none of you object to my evidently dubious artistic vision, you need only give your signatures on these pages, and you are dismissed."

It was done in a flash. As we headed out toward the door, Egar imparted upon us one last piece of advice:

"Your true journey begins here. At the upper levels, the labyrinth only becomes more perilous, its inhabitants more hostile. You are among Iorys' greatest now, but don't let that get to your head. The summit of Yggdrasil is within reach, but only your keenest mind and greatest strength will get you there. Stay safe, Antares."

Chapter Text

Making it in was not such a hard task: on the east side of the building, there was a shoddily-built window low to the ground. With a little finesse, you could jiggle the latch undone, and pull it open. It was an awning window that opened at the bottom, designed to let air into a basement and not much else. Most would not call it enough of an opening to slip through. But she knew better than to constrain herself to a common person's idea of an entrance, and for it she had her way into a rather well-to-do-looking estate.

The lean Therian girl, who had not given her name to anyone since arriving in the city, and had not given her real name since an even longer time before that, had lived a lifestyle of ditching town whenever things went sour and authorities caught on to her presence for years now. When she first found herself without a home, she was too young for most people to willingly put her to work, and besides that, the kind of labor she'd be met with in her home country was grueling and dangerous. Without an education, one typically became either a soldier or a miner; such was the way of a culture that prided themselves on strength.

By the time such circumstances might've changed, she was used to pickpocketing and heisting, perhaps even preferred it. So it was that she found herself here, deciding to stake out a mansion among mansions, just to satisfy her curiosity, just to see if she could pull off her biggest heist yet.

A disorganized pile of junk broke her fall, sending a cloud of dust into the air. The little specks glimmered in the scarce rays of moonlight offered through the window. Nothing worth taking with her cropped up when the girl sifted through the junk, though she did find a few items she was rather glad she didn't land on.

She followed a set of stairs up to the only door, and pressed her long, furry ear to the wood. Though her rabbit-like ears lent to her a damn good sense of hearing, they were also a double-edged sword, seeing as they were also a dead giveaway to her identity. A Therian in the country of Celestrians would not be hard to find. That meant staying out of sight or bundled up beyond recognition was a necessity even during the daytime.

No sound from the other side. She gently twisted the ornate metal knob, and pushed the door open ever so carefully. Up until now, she'd believed that every door with wood or hinges had its creak, but this one opened up hypnotically smoothly. She slipped through the gap as soon as it was wide enough, and shut the basement back up.

Unlit sconces were spaced sparsely across the walls of the hallway. Where windows existed, moonlight illuminated patches of the floor, but those were few and far between. The lithe girl produced a bulky pair of goggles from the rucksack intended to hold her imminent haul, and affixed them to her face.

They were specially made goggles meant to imitate Celestrains' night vision, which she had won two weeks ago in a game of cards that took place in the basement of a restaurant not mentioned in the property's listing. Her opponent had cheated, but she had cheated... dirtier? Better? Well, she had won, was the point. The Earthlain man seemed sad to let go of his valued goggles, but almost proud to lose to a girl who so obviously didn't belong where she was, and yet had walked in as coolly and calmly as anyone.

Of course, she knew the whole time she was sweating bullets, not the least reason for which was that she also knew what she had put up on her end wasn't the real deal.

But that was in the past; it had earned her the device now strapped to her face, and it had taught her a valuable lesson: that games of deception and risk were not for her, even if she had a good poker face. Even if her win rate was technically 100%. The lens took on a sheen, and her surroundings gradually came to life with color and shape. The borders between objects were a bit fuzzy, and the colors were murky, but all things considered, "a little scuffed" was pretty good for something won in a game with no fair players. Plus, it was a lot better than trying to see without them.

She continued down the hall carefully, keeping her footsteps light and peering around corners. Crimson rugs stretched down every corridor she went, leading her to wonder where one got such lengthy textiles. Just as she rounded a corner, her ears twitched to the sound of footsteps coming from somewhere she couldn't see on the opposite end of the hall. She scanned her surroundings for a hiding place, and found a small cabinet topped with a vase. The door was made of glass, so she opted to hide beside it rather than inside it. Not ideal, but her options were limited.

The footsteps paused. The girl peeked out from her cover and down the hall. At the far end was a fist-sized golden flame suspended in the air, shedding raidant light on its surroundings. Like a phantom haunting its old home, the disembodied light began drifting down the hall. The girl quickly ducked back into hiding. She watched the sconce on the wall and the cabinet she hid behind grow longer and longer shadows, and then the searchlight flame peeked into view... and stopped.

The golden ember flickered silently in front of her. Eyes wide, the girl pleaded anxiously in her head for it to keep moving. As if in direct defiance to her wishes, it started approaching her. She didn't feel any heat coming from it, but sweat was budding on her forehead nonetheless. The closer it got, the more it felt like there was a face staring back at her from inside the flame.

Just before she had resolved to bolt back the way she came, the flame backed away and retreated back down the hallway. The girl heard a gruff voice, and looked down the hall to find its source.

Two night watchmen stood across from each other at the intersection between hallways. The one on the right held his palm out, hovering the flame above it like a toy to fidget with. The guard on the left, just a notch taller and with short greyed hair, shot an impatient look at his colleague. He put his hands on his hips and barked: "What're you doing?"

"D'nno, boss," The flame-holder shrugged, "Feels like I've been seein' things just off all night. Been lookin' around, tryin' t'see if I can't catch an intruder red-handed."

The older man hissed with distaste. "That's because the whole crew's a bunch of incompetent louts who can't keep their hands offa shit or put it back the way it was when they're done. Anyway, the way you're wavin' that fire around like you want 'em to know you're here ain't catching shit."

The fire dimmed shamefully in the subordinate's hand. "Tch. Well, I ain't used to guardin' some fancy folk's home anyway. I patrol warehouses and stand in front'a casinos 'n all that. I'd like to at least know what it is we're guarding. Won't tell us a thing. Just goin' over the whole place every night with a damned fine tooth comb."

"Quit yer yappin'!" The taller man's shadow grew as he chided his colleague. "Pay is pay. Work is work. Ya don't ask questions you don't need t'know."

"You can say ya don't know, ya know."

"I do know! And you don't, and there's a reason for that: 's cuz I'm the boss, and you're not. Now follow me. I've still got to write tonight's report and do an inventory check. I need you to cover for me over in the west wing."

The older man turned and walked out of sight. Briefly, the reprimanded guard glanced down the hall toward the girl, giving her one last scare, but then he sighed and took off after his boss.

You may be right, but I'm not sloppy enough to leave evidence like that, the intruder thought.

That close a call was enough to tell her it was time to grab stuff and get out. She began her search for a properly valuable haul, finding a kitchen with a luxuriously stocked pantry, multiple washrooms, and a variety of other features that highlighted the disparity between her own living and whosoever owned this estate. On the third floor, just as she was getting ready to call the venture an unfortunate bust, a rather ornate door caught her attention. It was locked, of course, but she had picked a lock before. A few short minutes later, as she turned the knob, she wondered to herself if she knew whose estate she was robbing. Did it matter to her? No, perhaps not. But it gave her a moment of pause, to think that she might be messing with someone truly powerful.

Inside was a difficult scene to describe. It might've struck her as an arms vault, for the multitude of weapon racks the room contained. But every space along the walls that wasn't occupied by swords and spears was mounted with paintings or statues or something appropriately ostentatious so as to function only as an art piece. It was like an absurd parody of a museum, made all the more grotesque by the fact that it all belonged to one person.

But there along the back wall, seeming to act as the display's centerpiece, was a single sword that defied description among a league of trinkets and knick-knacks meant to tangle words. It rested on two hooks, one at the hilt and the other at the blade's tip, but where the hilt ended and the blade began was itself difficult to determine: the whole thing was one uniform rod of ivory colored steel spawning from an amethyst-adorned pommel, which flared out erratically in zigzags that tapered the further down the blade they went.

It was a confounding design. Surely a blade like this wouldn't function in combat? It'd snap like a twig when met with any sort of resistance or strain. There were such a thing as ceremonial blades, of course. Perhaps this was one; something that needed only to be able to cut, and otherwise look pretty. If that were the case, it could fetch a tidy sum if she could pawn it off in the next town over... though, if it really were worth that much, it might be wise to put a little more distance between herself and its owner before stopping to sell it.

Regardless, the fact of the matter was that she found herself creeping toward it. If any room were booby trapped, it would be this one, so every step she made was calculated to exactness. Touch nothing but what gravity forced you to. Mind every crevice, every kink, in the walls and ceiling. And eventually, she was in front of the strange blade, close enough to reach out and grab it. It hung just above her head, so that her ears could brush with it. From this distance, the sword seemed... otherworldly.

Carefully, she cupped her hands and lifted it by each end, and when she pulled it toward her, she took her left hand off the tip of the blade and wielded it like a sword proper. In her grasp, it felt light. In her grasp, the metal of the blade didn't feel like metal at all. It was not cold or heavy or brutal as a longsword would be, it was not fragile or precious or vicious as a dagger would be. Instead, it filled her with a strange sensation, of a sort like she had picked up an ages old thing with a storied history, like she were being handed an heirloom that had passed through generations, like someone else had given it to her knowing that, by doing so, they had sealed her fate, and so could only look upon her with pity. It...

Well, there wasn't time to grapple with the sensation fully, because something clicked and whirred above her head. She looked at the shelf the sword had been on and saw it rising. Then it shuttered into place with a heavier clunk, completing its ascent. She realized, then, that the display wasn't for holding the sword up, but the sword was for weighing the display down. The sword itself had been a trap.

A row of parallel beams of humming magical energy materialized between the girl and the door. In tandem, a loud, sourceless alarm began blaring. Tentatively, the Therian picked up a dagger, unsheathed it, and tossed the scabbard at the magic barrier. It bounced off the glowing bars, emitting sparks and a harsh buzz as it did so. She looked at the scorch marks on the sheath as it rattled to the ground. Probably shoudn't try getting through that, she concluded.

There had to be another way out of the room. Hiding was no option. In her mind, she ran back through all of the faults and oddities in the room she had been so careful to notice and avoid, until some loose boards in the ceiling popped back into her head. Using a marble sculpture as a stepstool, she pushed the wood planks up and uncovered a passage into an attic space.

The girl tossed the sword— her only chance of coming away from this night with anything worthwhile —up into the hole. Then she latched onto the ledge, pulled herself upward, and swung a leg up to find purchase. She hoisted the rest of her body up, and rolled over to put some distance between her and the gap. The alarm still wailed, but she set the moved boards back into place in hopes it might deter her pursuants just a little. Maybe they didn't know this was here.

Far away from where she lay, there was a small arch-shaped window that beamed hope into the dark attic. A way outside. Perhaps there was a balcony, or else she could climb up to the roof and go from there... wasting no time, she crawled her way across the attic space, moving around support beams and doing her best to stay nimble without making noise that would alert anyone potentially below her. She saw her escape through the window: the expanse of closely trimmed lawn surrounding the estate, its opulent neighbors surrounding it and then the less ritzy homes packed closer together in the distance, all washed in the midnight moonlight.

She pressed a hand to the glass, feeling its coolness moderated by the brisk Taurus night, and pushed the window open. The air rushed in, reminding the girl of the frigid nights that had befallen her, spending the past few months on Sidonian soil. Not having a place to shelter in was a terrible night, indeed. But this chill was nothing compared to that. She was pretty sure she'd not be staying in this country much longer, anyway.

Peering down and out the window, she found her hopes realized: a balcony just a short drop below her, on the third floor. She pushed the window open wider, and leapt through it. With a roll to soften the landing, she made it safely onto the balcony. She stood up, and turned around...

Two figures stood frozen, staring each other down. One, a dark-skinned Therian girl in rags with a clunky-looking pair of goggles strapped to her face. The other on the opposite side of the glass doors, a Celestrian man in a watchguard's uniform, a twinge of suspicion that had been in his eyes all night turning to mixed vindication and realization.

"You..." He said, his voice clear even over the siren's whine from further inside. A swirling flame formed in his palm, and though it wasn't the radiant gold one the girl had seen before, it was still enough for her to realize she had seen this man before, even if he hadn't seen her.

She cocked her head in either direction, as if she'd find a way out of her situation. Miraculously, she did. She turned back to the guard with a smile, tapped her index and middle finger to her forehead goodbye, and leapt off the side of the balcony to her right.

An explosion of glass and fire rocketed out behind her, scorching where she was but a second ago. She dropped down a story, before catching a flagpole flying Sidonian colours. She turned around to look back up at where she had just been, and saw the guard grimacing at her, one hand conjuring another fireball and the other gripping the baluster as he leaned over it. The girl quickly looked downwards for her next platform.

As she released her grip on the flagpole, she felt the blaze that engulfed the Sidonian flag singe her forearms. She fell onto the awning below, then ripped through it, though the subsequent landing on the brick patio below was greatly softened. She opened her eyes, and saw the still water of the swimming pool a few feet in front of her. She was outside and on ground level.

But she was not home free yet. She got up and sprinted across the lawn, a few stray bolts of fire incinerating patches of short-clipped grass behind her as she ran, and a frustrated guard's cursing shrank away. She felt the swaying of the bizarre sword strapped loosely to her hip as she ran, and her boots hitting cobble road as she made it into the city streets. Still, she continued running.

She weaved through the roads and alleyways, taking as convoluted a path as she could muster in case anyone was chasing after her. Her heart raced. Her head began to throb as she ran herself out of breath. When she started to think that maybe she'd have to stop and rest, an image played in her mind, of the homes behind her lighting up, young couples opening their doors and stepping out onto their porches with curious, bleary eyes to confirm for themselves that they had, in fact, seen a Therian girl running at a dead sprint down their nieghborhood, and it reinforced her resolve to keep running until she made it out of town.

Ten minutes became twenty, then twenty turned to thirty, and thirty into sixty, until at last she passed by the last row of homes and broke out into the open road, like crossing a finish line. She kept going until the houses behind her were distant motes, and then she let herself stop, and the weight of her body on her trembling, aching legs forced her to collapse onto the ground, and at last catch her breath.

Laying on the side of the road, she rolled over and stared up at the stars. Her thoughts at last caught up with her, and she began to consider what her future might entail: for sure, she'd have to keep traveling throughout the night. She needed to put as much distance between her and whoever was now very much aware of her presence in their home as she could. Though, that could wait a few more minutes.

Whatever the sword at her hip was, its previous owner cared about it a fair bit; that much was certain from how deceptively guarded it was. The girl wondered what kind of artifact it was that'd merit that kind of security, what kind of person was its owner, that they'd lay it out so openly, almost like they wanted her to take the bait? She had no way of knowing the answers to those questions. Though it was obvious that they were extraordinarily wealthy. The puzzle pieces were beginning to come together, and they were forming a picture in which she might be chased for a very long time, and maybe across very far distances. At the bare minimum, she'd be getting out of this country, pronto.

A distant rumbling pulled the girl out of her thoughts. She looked ahead to see a caravan rolling down the road, toward her. Well I'm sure as hell not getting caught now, she thought. She crawled into the nearby bushes, and waited.

With yet more time to think, another matter regarding what she had stolen began to play on her mind: what was she even going to do with this thing? Was it worth anything? Did anyone even know what it was? Maybe some historian or antique collector would pay a premium for it. A few hundred ental, maybe. Though she had honestly hoped for quite a bit more than that out of this night. Moreover, would someone who knew their stuff also know who this really belonged to? They could report her to them, and then...

She took the sword in her hands and inspected it. Unlike when she first picked it up, it felt almost completely like a normal sword. Had she hallucinated—

Iorys.

The name pressed into her mind like it had been her very own thought. Yet, she could've sworn the sword— of all things —had spoken it to her. She shook her head. That's absurd, she told herself. That's storybook stuff.

She looked back down at the sword, like she was waiting for it to say something again. It didn't, but the thought from before was settling inside her, and as it did, it became fuller.

...go... to Iorys...

Did the sword want to be taken to Iorys?

No. No, that was a ridiculous thought.

Maybe the sword was enchanted. Perhaps it magically knew where to find the best value to pawn it off at? No, even more ridiculous. Though, not a bad idea for a magic sword. At this point, if the sword had been responsible for any of what she had felt in the past minute, she could no longer tell. The thought of going to Iorys still sat with her, but it didn't feel like it had ever been anything but her own idea.

The caravan had long since passed, its passengers none the wiser to the girl's presence. She had to admit, there wasn't zero appeal to the prospect of heading to Iorys. Years ago, long before her career of thievery had ever started, she daydreamed of the stories of Iorys' adventurers, brave explorers who risked life and limb to ascend the Yggdrasil labyrinth at the town's summit. Perhaps she even wanted to be one, to an extent. It was, of course, a childish fantasy that faded away with time and hardship, but maybe it would bring her younger self a little closure, just to see those adventurers in person.

Besides, she didn't have anywhere else better to go, and at this point, she didn't feel like she could simply pawn this damned sword off just to fill some pockets that would eventually go empty again.

Somehow, the girl could feel that she had stayed in one spot for too long. It was time to get moving again, though a bit of soreness still tinged her legs. Though it had come to her as if by dream, she had a destination, and she supposed that was better than nothing.

Gripping the blade tightly, she took off once more into the night.

Chapter Text

The landscape shifted rapidly, the rock footholds softening into clammy, moldering dirt and the chill air becoming rife with sulfuric stench and astringent earthen notes not unlike rotten vegetation.

Scarce rays of sunlight shone through in this place, a tortured hellscape pierced through and saturated with blight and darkness, haunted by a grisly page in history.

Yet here we pressed on, through the muck and the mire, as if it were our only recourse, because in many ways, it was. No soul that had come so far would falter, even at this, and go no further.

Graves marked and unmarked at our backs, lonely murmurs on all sides; our ceremonious inauguration into this stratum was cold comfort. Yet here we trudged on, thankless and resolved.

◄—•—►

"6.

...7.

...

...9? No— ...8? Wait. Shit. What was the last number I counted?"

I raised an eyebrow to Xinyi. It was Flare who asked the question that, sooner or later, I myself would have: "What are you even counting, anyway?"

Xinyi waved her hand in front of her nose. "Anything to get my mind off this shitty stink," she said.

"That's decomposition," Kris clarified. "Mostly."

"Yeah, I know. But, uh, anyway, I'm hunting for graves with names on 'em."

"You too, huh?" Flare stared off to the side, as if passively scanning for such tombstones. "There's not many, and the ones there are usually just have family names to 'em. Definitely going for function over form."

I looked out over the rows of graves we stood between. Sectioning off and delineating this particular yard were short stone walls, cobbled together and buried under untold decades worth of dirt and rotten ivy pasting over each other in layers, until the stone bricks underneath slanted under their weight and you could barely tell they were there to begin with. This was but one of many such gravesites, and I could only imagine that, if for no other reason, these dividers were here to keep the scale of the whole site manageable to one's mind. The thought of all the graves across this stratum being one miles-long field of tombstones, row after row without end in sight, was as dizzying as it was dire.

Xinyi stared upwards in deep thought as she counted out something on her fingers. "I found three that had the names of people I knew," she proclaimed.

"Huh. Two," Flare said. I heard a hushed tone that might've been a "One" from Kris, but hearing voices in this stratum was not entirely out of the ordinary.

I myself had seen zero such named graves, but then, I wasn't looking out for them as closely as I presumed the others had, and I likely had fewer names to draw from than the others, predisposed as I was to keep the list short. I turned my gaze toward the approximate center of the yard, where a flood of sunlight pushed through whatever served as this floor's canopy and provided a precious warmth. It was small, barely large enough for the five of us to squeeze into its space. Others like it existed sparsely throughout this place.

"Hey, wanna see if we can find graves with our own names on 'em?" Xinyi's face lit up like she had found a fun new thing to do.

This finally broke Ash's quiet attempt to ignore the conversation: "I really, well and truly would rather not."

The fact of the matter was, the reason we sat in this graveyard was not to go on a macabre sort of scavenger hunt, nor was it to bask in a coveted beam of sunlight; we simply found ourselves at a dead end and had been searching fruitlessly for a way through for— by my estimation —some two or three hours. We had taken to inspecting even the finest details of the most innocuous features of the landscape.

I sighed. "This feels like we're missing something. Like we're looking in the wrong place, or... for the wrong thing."

"Whaddaya mean? We've already checked everywhere else, tip to toe. And I think it's pretty obvious what we're looking for: a nice-sized hole that we can walk through and it goes up." Xinyi said.

Kris shook her head. "What she means is—"

"Anyone got a shovel?" Flare interjected. "I hate to say this, but, uh... I think we're gonna have to start... digging."

"Can we not?!" Poor Ash pleaded, his voice rising with fright.

It wasn't exactly what I was proposing, but it was a good point: this labyrinth didn't have to adhere to any rules about giving us a way forward. If disturbing graves was on the menu for making progress, then we'd simply have to grab our spades. As we deliberated on our options, a voice familiar yet distinctly not among our own numbers piped up.

"Heya guys! Looking awfully gloom and doom there. What's wrong?" It was Lili, her spirits no worse for wear in a pit like this, and ever uncanny with timing her appearances.

"Hey, squirt," Xinyi replied. "We were just about to do something that's a medium amount objectionable."

"Mildly to moderately objectionable, depending on how much value you this place as a relic of history," Kris added.

"Wholly objectionable, if my opinion is to be valued," Ash threw in.

"Oh? Should I... be stopping you?" Lili asked quizzically, and not without the slightest hint of eagerness to deploy force.

"We were gonna dig up these graves to see if the way forward was under them," Flare said in an attempt to make our position more tenable.

"Ohhhhhh... you guys are stuck." The little Necromancer voiced her realization, "Pssh! That's an easy one."

"It is?" Asked Ash.

"Yeah! Anyone got a mirror?" Lili held out her hand for a moment, as if this were an obvious thing to produce. "No? No worries, I've got my own!"

Lili shrugged the coffin she backpacked around to the ground, then put a hand flat to its lid. Promptly, a sky blue aura engulfed her hand up to her wrist, dancing as a candle flame would, and Lili swept her hand back around toward us. The coffin lifted into the air and gently followed Lili's motion at a slight delay.

Seeing it hovering just in front of the girl, you'd notice that it was really only about 3 feet end-to-end, lengthwise. It could hold a small enough pet, but any human would be cramped in there. With seemingly no gesture from Lili, the casket rapidly expanded to more than double its size, towering over the girl by a grand margin. She closed her hand into a fist, and the aura around it dispelled. Her coffin dropped onto the dirt with a muffled thud, then fell onto its back, landing with a significantly heftier slam.

Lili walked up to her casket and threw open the lid. She started rummaging around inside, treating it like it were little more than an oversized, poorly organized suitcase. Next to her, a loosely spherical cloud of shadow rose up over the edge of the coffin, opening two red pinpricks that seemed to be its eyes. The thing mounted the rim of its container like a child clumsily climbing over a fence as tall at themselves. Without looking up at it, Lili shoved a hand on the shadow creature's head and pushed it back into the depths of the coffin.

"Ah-ha! Here we are!" Lili held up a small, fist-sized mirror set in a wooden frame flecked with remnants of pink paint that had mostly chipped off. The glass itself was cleft by a large diagonal crack down the center. Nonetheless, Lili took the mirror over to where the light shone down in the graveyard's center.

We watched her angle the mirror until she had a feel for controlling the thin beam of light it sent out. She moved it along the north wall that had gated our progress, hunting for something with a familiarity of its location just shy of exact knowing. To our surprise, when the light hit a seemingly inconsequential section of the wall, it reactively twitched. Then, more movement, and it became clear that what was moving was in fact a very thick brush of dark, slimy vegetation.

The tendrils curled into themselves to retreat from the light, averse to even the slightest shine. Some that were slow to move out of the way gave off traces of a smoky gas which, given a moment, proved unpleasantly pungent enough to assault our noses even from a good distance. Truly a plant which could only grow in this stratum.

A minute or two of this, and the tangle was cleared enough to reveal a tunnel we had overlooked for the past many hours. Lili stepped out of the light.

"There we go! Just like that," Lili winked and clicked her tongue. She twirled the mirror between her fingers and held it up, "You guys want one of these handy for these floors. You don't get much sunshine up here so it helps to be able to point what you do get where you want," Then tossed it back in her coffin.

"Sheesh. I'd have quit and gone home before figuring that out," Flare said.

Lili closed the lid to her coffin, shrunk it back down to its miniature size, and hoisted it onto her back again, then said, "Oh, yeah, it's like this all the time in this stratum. You really gotta pay attention to your surroundings!"

The girl paused for a minute, looking at the ground near our feet pensively.

"Something wrong, Lili?" Ash asked.

Xinyi agreed. "Yeah, where's what's-her-name? Soleil? Shouldn't she be with you?"

Though she probably didn't know why, Xinyi was making a good point: why wasn't Solor here? It was quite literally her job to protect Lili, and it was the Harbinger herself who had warned me of how dangerous this stratum was.

Lili looked up at us, with a delayed realization that she had a question to answer. "Hm? Oh, Solor... she wasn't feeling well, so I gave her the day off. I'm fine on my own, this far down the stratum. It's actually one of my favorite parts of the labyrinth. You're very kind for worrying about me, though!"

Ash's slight frown didn't shift. "Hmm... well, okay. Thanks again for your help."

"Of course! It was my pleasure. And don't worry; I'm sure you guys will get the hang of this stratum and you'll be racing through in no time." Having perked back up, Lili trotted toward the path she had just opened up. She turned around and waved to us one last time. "Well, good luck! And watch out for the skellies up ahead!"

There was a pause as we all watched the Necromancer disappear into the tunnel she had opened for us. Long after she was gone, Flare said perhaps the most, if not only, fitting thing that could be said of our inscrutable benefactor: "Strange girl."

"I agree," Said Xinyi.

◄—•—►

The inviting glow coming from the windows of Jenetta's inn were a welcome sight by the time we reached them. As the five of us shambled through the moonlit streets to comfortable beds, I wondered if anyone would think we were undead, escaped from the Necropolis... Not that there was anyone around to see us. I pulled open the door, thinking that it must've been a quarter 'til midnight.

Inside, the first person to notice us— out of the 3 or 4 who were still up —was Isaac. He had taken a rather elaborate position in a seat at one of the dining tables, which seemed like a steadily acquired taste in terms of comfort, but his head was already turned and he was alert to us by the time I noticed him. He stood up rather briskly: "Oh, there you are! You were starting to get me worried—"

Ash practically toppled their partner as they launched into a full-bodied embrace with speed I could confidently say they had never demonstrated in battle. Ash let out melodramatic sobs, burying their face in Isaac's chest.

"...Yeah, I missed you too," Isaac wrapped his arms around Ash, gently stroking the back of their head. Then his face scrunched in repulsion. "Boy, you reek. Rough day?"

In passing, the innkeeper Jenetta sniffed the air. Her own expression soured slightly, and she tapped a finger to her cheek thoughtfully. "Yep, that's the stink of a Master Guild, alright. Can't say I missed it!"

Ash barely stopped sobbing to voice their grievances. "Uwaaahhh... ohhhh it was awful! They— it —aauuuuugh!"

Isaac, like the rest of us, was not able to decipher Ash's mournful wails, but he had gathered enough to flash us a disapproving look. "What did you do to my boy? Stars in heaven, he looks like he saw—"

"He did." It was all four of us who answered, with an exasperation that could only be conveyed in unison.

Isaac blinked. "...Really? It's that bad, huh?"

Kris said, "Frankly, it's worse. I don't understand how the part that's hard to get past is the gho—"

"THEY DON'T EXIST!" Ash cried out. "They shouldn't exist! I specialize in communicating with the remnants of the souls of the dead! Sentient, malevolent manifestations of those same souls is ontologically impossible!!"

"Yeesh. It's okay, bud, get it all out." Isaac pet Ash sympathetically. "Here, how about we go sit over there and you can rest your head on my lap. That sound good?"

Ash nodded without taking his face out of Isaac's chest, then the latter began walking his partner over to one of the settees in the lobby. I briefly pondered why Isaac chose the rigid wooden chairs of the dining hall over any of the lobby's far better options, but I supposed it wasn't my business. Seeing the convenience of sofas in action, Xinyi stumbled over to another such seat and flopped into it, tossing her head back and groaning loudly.

"Ooghhh, I'm beat," She announced. Xinyi's groan caused the toll the day had taken on me to finally set in, like she had uttered some sort of curse and placed it on me. I took a glance up at the wall clock in the lobby. Only five past 11. I had overestimated how much time we had spent in the labyrinth. This did nothing to assuage the heaviness of my eyelids.

"Oh! Aren't I glad I saw this? I nearly forgot..." Jenetta spoke from across the room, grabbing something from one of the cubbyholes in the wall, which were used to store gifts and mail for long-term residents, chiefly adventuring parties. She shuffled over to us and presented us a letter closed with a bold, red wax seal. The ring of text around the perimeter of the logo that had been pushed into the wax read "The Arcanian Institute for Archaeology and Anthropology".

Flare plucked the letter from Jenetta's hand and broke the seal. They pulled out the letter and studied it for a few seconds before they started reading aloud:

"Dearest Guild of Antares,

I write to you on behalf of the Arca... blah blah blah, yeah, to extend the opportunity to work with us. We are... mm-hm, uh-huh... have recently been granted approval by the Arcanian Council to attempt the retrieval of these four artifacts in light of our long-held suppositions that (1.) these artifacts hold major historical significance likely related to the Legendary War, and (2.) the location of these artifacts can, with reasonable certainty, be narrowed down to a given radius within the labyrinth, being sufficiently substantiated in the Council's eyes.

Uhhh... let's see... as such, I am acting as emissary for the A-I-A-A in this endeavor, and have been advised to enlist your guild as a necessary measure to ensure the artifacts' retrieval proceeds as intended. Payment for services rendered will be provided, please meet our representative at the following location on the listed date..."

Flare gripped the letter in their hand and looked up at us. "This honestly doesn't sound worth it, to me."

"Hold on just a moment," Kris sidled up next to Flare, trying to read the letter from their hand and then eventually just taking it into their own. They studied it intently. "...I think we should at least hear this person out. Meet up with them."

"...Really? Why?" Flare itched their temple in puzzlement.

"...There's not enough details on this page. It doesn't even mention how much we'll be paid for the job. We can get more information if we rendezvous with their emissary. Worst case scenario, we turn them down and it's just a tiny bit of our time wasted. But it could be big."

Flare sighed. "I don't particularly get the sense it'll be big, but fine. I'll submit to a vote. All in favor for Kris' plan?"

In response, Kris raised her hand up to her ears, and Xinyi stuck hers as far up as she could without lifting her head — unclear if she was participating in the vote or trying to reach the ceiling in a fit of boredom.

"All against?" Flare raised their own hand. Xinyi kept hers up, but no one else voted.

A more irritated sigh from Flare, after they lowered their hand. "Alright... anyone wanna explain why they didn't vote?"

"Huh?" Ash looked up from Isaac's lap, suddenly just attentive enough to respond. "What? What were we voting on?"

Flare's gaze fell on me. I explained, "You know my vote is against anything superfluous or secondary to our main objective. I withheld it so that it'd only matter in a tiebreaker."

"Okay, well, Xinyi was the only one who voted, and she... voted for both sides. So..." Flare said.

"I didn't want to sit through some boring meeting," Xinyi volunteered her rationale.

"So just vote no, then," Kris said.

"But hunting for ancient artifacts sounded kinda fun!"

"..."

Flare turned to Kris, visibly at wit's end. "We can go. We'll see what happens. No promises. All I know is I'm hitting the hay. Good night."

Kris watched Flare shuffle off. I heard her whisper "Thank you" just out of their earshot, then she followed them off to their room. I stood for a moment, entranced by the quiet of the lobby, until I saw Jenetta passing me by with a blanket outstretched; it was only when I saw her moving toward Xinyi with it that I realized I was hearing the girl snoring. I watched Jenetta gently lower Xinyi's arm back down to her side, then tuck her into the blanket. Jenetta backed up next to me.

"If only my older sister were this cute when I did this for her," Jenetta said.

It took me a minute to find the sentence strange. "Do you... do this often? For your sister, I mean."

"Oh, not so much, anymore. She used to come home drunk a few times a week. She'd probably be tottering in right about now, and then I'd find her passed out somewhere in here, guaranteed. Eventually my li'l sis set her straight. Now it's only once a week, most of the time."

Strange family. I might've said something in response, but instead I just looked up at the clock again. Now it really was a quarter 'til midnight.

'Well, don't worry about her. I'll be up for a little while longer, so I'll watch over her and make sure she stays safe," Jenetta said. "That way you can get your beauty sleep without worrying. Good night, sleep tight!"

I nodded ever so slightly as Jenetta trotted away. "Yeah. G'night."

Chapter Text

The Therian woman that had invited us in set a porcelain teaset on the low table between us. Steam rose gently from the spout as she placed a cup in front of each of us— Xinyi and I on the settee on one side; Kris, Flare and Ash across the table from us —then wrapped a thick cloth around the handle of the teapot and began pouring us tea one at a time.

"I originally called for a duo by the name of Swan Song," She explained as she went about the process, her glasses hanging precariously on the tip of her nose, "But they turned me down. They did forward me to you, however."

Curious. As I picked up my filled cup, I couldn't help but wonder if it was Solor or Lili who rejected this woman. Ordinarily, I could see it as an intentional competitive jab on Solor's part, but Lili's demeanor as of late had shifted from her usual altruistic self to something more determined and focused. On what, I couldn't say, but it seemed to have something to do with whatever might be at the end of the Necropolis.

I looked down into the cup. A fragrant aroma wafted from the dark liquid inside. The paint on my cup was faded and in some places entirely absent, matching with the teapot's own state of wear. An old but well-used set, it seemed. I took a sip, realizing I had lost track of the conversation— or, more accurately, our chattery host's monologue —but from what I could tell she was still going on about the inconvenience caused by not getting her first pick of Iorys' guilds.

Then, the tan-skinned, freckled Therian clapped her hands together, as if to reset the dialogue for my very benefit. "Right then. To make proper introductions: My name is Yvonne Elison, I've been working with the A.I.A.A. for 11 years now. And I've been the project lead for this excavation for the past three."

She cleared her throat and continued. "So. I'm sure you all have some idea of what you're in for, but let me explain a bit further. The going theory for the existence of the Fetid Necropolis, as you adventurers refer to it, is that it was the site of a long, brutal, and final battle for the Legendary War, wherein a foreign emperor— name unknown and thereafter called "Despot" —attempted to lay claim to Yggdrasil, and ultimately failed. The aftermath of the war, and our ancestors' attempts to prevent the repetition of such a war, is of considerable consequence to our culture and, as you might imagine, a big talking point in the field of anthropology."

Having rattled off a preamble faster than I had been prepared for her to, Yvonne paused to suck in one large, preparatory breath. Though she glanced around at us, she seemed perfectly content to keep talking with or without the requisite listeners. "Some years to a decade or so ago, records of a written account of the events of the war were uncovered. More followed, and one critical detail was corroborated between them: that a great and fierce Dragoon turned the tide of the entire war by going on a bloodthirsty rampage in which he alone took out a great chunk of the enemy empire's forces.

For a long time, Arcania's brightest have chased after some concrete proof that such a Dragoon actually existed, and their efforts have culminated in this: it is believed that the Dragoon's effects were intentionally scattered and buried or otherwise hidden in the Necropolis. To what end, we don't know. But we are at last here today, and I can say that we have not only a strong belief in our theory, but an idea of where these effects could be buried."

Yvonne slammed a map down on the table punctually. "Preliminary efforts by an investigation team have turned up four mana readings from objects that seemingly aren't there. In other words, something likely underground is giving off fairly strong magical pulses. The belief is that the Dragoon's armor and weapons are what was scattered. We don't have any clue why what should be ordinary armor is firing off extraordinary mana signals, but the popular theory is that it isn't ordinary armor. Legendary armor to fit a legendary Dragoon to fit a Legendary War."

After riling herself up quite a bit, Yvonne lifted her hand off the map. Compared to my own maps of the labyrinth, it was... perfunctory, focused far more on scribbling big attention-drawing circles around key locations than leading you clearly to those locations. Despite this, a quick mental side-by-side helped me to identify this map as being of the Necropolis' second floor.

"So our part in this whole thing is... what, exactly?" Ash asked.

"It was detailed in the letter," Yvonne said. "Or, so I meant for it to be. Frankly, I was a bit delirious and more than a bit frustrated when I was writing it, considering I had only just found out I wouldn't be getting the help I initially sent for. But! That is none of your concern. Your role in this will be to guide me through the labyrinth, to these locations, and help unearth these artifacts so that I can take them to be studied in a proper laboratory. In other words, largely what you do normally as an adventuring guild, except easier because you'll be treading ground you're already familiar with. You... are familiar with this area, correct?" She tapped on the map.

"Yes, we've been to that floor before," I confirmed.

"If you have an investigation team that already knows where this armor is, why hire us? Why not have them do it?" Kris asked.

"There's a plethora of reasons, really. But to give you the big ones, our investigation unit isn't trained or licensed to excavate relics, and the terms negotiated between us and the Arcanian Council only allow us to send in one representative on our behalf— that's me —plus one officially licensed guild— that's you —during the actual excavation attempts. Of course, I was going to make damn sure that that one A.I.A.A. rep would be me. And, well, it wasn't exactly a subtle play on the Council's part; it's all but in writing that a guild will be involved so that the Council can stake a claim in the credit if anything of historical significance comes out of this. I'm sure you're all bright enough to understand that you and every other guild are basically an extension of the Council's political reach."

"What are the chances that this turns out to be a revolutionary discovery?" Ash asked.

"Frankly, I wouldn't worry about that. It'd be a miracle if even one of these mana signals turns out to be anything but a dud. If we actually procured a piece of what we're looking for, I'd be over the moon and you should be, too. The more likely end to this story is that we come up dry, and then it takes several more months to a year before we have another lead that'll convince the Council to negotiate a contract with us again. By then, other institutes will be in on the hunt, and our chances of being the names behind the big discovery scatter to the wind."

Flare sighed. "Alright. Fine. Kris, are you still up for this?"

"You wanted to know how much they were going to pay, right?" Kris responded.

Yvonne answered expediently. "Oh, for that, well, you'll be compensated based on time spent using a calculated estimate of income from selling monster parts, or whatever. Frankly that stuff goes over my head. There's also a base pay of 8,000en for hiring you, though it's my understanding that you'll be making much more than that overall."

Kris and Flare looked at each other. The latter shrugged; whatever you want to do.

"We're in."

"Great." Yvonne said. She maintained the same distant and impatient look she had held through most of our meeting, like obtaining our services was just another rigid, procedural part of her job. "It'll be a few days before we can actually get started, since the Council requires a contract to be written on your behalf, but I'll go ahead and give you the low down: we were approved for two seven-day periods where we're allowed to do on-site work, likely with allowance for downtime due to sickness or injury in mind. To be clear, I intend to be on-site all fourteen of those days, which means you will be, too."

◄—•—►

We had been waiting at the labyrinth's entrance for about five minutes when Flare spotted Yvonne coming to meet us. She was dressed in khaki shorts and a short-sleeved green button-up shirt, with clean white kneesocks sprouting up from brown leather boots, and a small cap with a chinstrap hanging loosely. To her back was a pack of supplies nearly as large as her, which seemed like it would pull her off her feet if not for her apparent experience lugging the thing around.

"It's not much warmer in the Necropolis than it is down here, y'know," Flare said once Yvonne came up to us.

"We'll wait if you want to go and throw on another layer," Ash offered.

Yvonne simply shook her head. "I'm fine. I'd rather not waste time. I run hot, anyway."

Flare shrugged. "Suit yourself."

Xinyi pointed to the Geomagnetic Pole. "By the way, uh... about that. Can she use it?"

"No," I told her, "Which means—"

"We're gonna have to get up there the old-fashioned way."

"This first time, at least, yes."

Yvonne hitched her slouched backpack back up onto her shoulders and pushed her glasses further up on her nose. "Well then, we really should get going, yes?"

◄—•—►

The better part of our first day consisted of ferrying Yvonne up the first two strata of the labyrinth. She insisted on touching the Geomagnetic Pole in the Jagged Reach in case we were not able to make it to the Necropolis in one day, which was a valid concern and good precaution to take, but I'm pretty sure she just wanted to know what the warping felt like. Our biggest concern, the Primordiphant, also turned out to be a non-issue. We were prepared to come back in the middle of the night to try and sneak by it during its slumber, assuming it was a diurnal creature, but as it turned out, the Guildmaster worked out a plan to bore a tunnel that evaded the thing's domain entirely. When we learned about it from the man himself, he seemed somewhat depressed that his alternative solution— that being to convince the Arcania Council to let him slay the thing —was rejected, on the grounds that it was unlawful to hunt such a rare species, and that it'd probably render him a thinly spread red paste even if they did let him try.

Along the way, Ms. Elison seemed remarkably willing to trudge directly through the mud pits and shoulder-deep ponds of the Tutelary Forest. Wet clothes or mud-filled boots didn't seem to bother her. At one point, as Yvonne was about to take a shortcut through a river, Xinyi grabbed her by the back of her collar and pulled her backwards.

"Are you out of your mind?" Xinyi leaned in close to Yvonne's face, staring her down with an unusual intensity. "There could be monsters lurking in there. And not just any."

Xinyi let go of Yvonne, and searched the ground until a suitably palm-sized rock struck her fancy. Then she kneeled in front of Yvonne, a less threatening posture, and said, "You wanna know what happened to my first guild? It's not these guys. We were just goofin' around. Taking a break to enjoy the scenery. We started skipping stones on the lake."

Xinyi lifted up the rock in her hand. "Mine was just like this," She said. Then she whipped the stone out toward the river. It skipped twice, then plunged under the surface with a plonk befitting its size. Nothing impressive, but not too shabby either, for the rock she was dealt.

We all waited in anticipation, as if Xinyi knew how to recreate the exact scene she were describing. Of course, nothing happened, but we all gave it time to anyway.

"My throw hit a monster and pissed it off. Here, follow me. I'll show you." Xinyi took Yvonne by the arm and lead her further up the river. As if on cue, a giant crustacean head poked out the water, looked around, and then swam onto shore. The whole of it stood around 10 feet tall, and from head to tail it probably reached 15. Of course, its height wasn't the most intimidating thing about it. Rather, that was its giant, razor sharp claws. They could probably clip the little bunny-eared archaeologist clean in two with just one go. The five of us were well familiar with it.

"One of those," Xinyi pointed at the crustacean. "Not a fun time. We barely made it out alive, and our Dragoon got his legs crushed so bad he couldn't walk anymore. So... just sayin, those could be in there! I don't want you to become shrimp food! ...If they'd eat ya. I dunno, what do shrimp eat?" Xinyi looked over at us.

"Don't think it counts as a shrimp," Flare replied.

"Well, whatever." Xinyi turned back to Yvonne. "You get me?"

After that point, Yvonne wasn't nearly the danger-blind wind-up toy soldier she initially was, though she still proved a little too gung ho. But it was an odd and fascinating spectacle, to see Xinyi talk some sense into someone. I had hardly ever seen her so deadly serious, either.

Then, at last, we arrived at the Necropolis. We guided Yvonne to the Pole, watched her use it, and then waited for her word on what to do. It was nearing nightfall, but we still had an hour or two to burn.

"We'll use what time we've got," Yvonne gave the answer we expected of her. "Everybody ready? Now would be the ideal time for a trip to the latrine," She gestured to the Pole.

"If you gotta do it in the dirt, this place ain't getting any stinkier," Xinyi joked.

"Speaking of, Ms. Elison, are you handling the, uh, stench alright?" Ash asked.

Yvonne gave a shrug. "I'm fine. They warned me about it when they heard I'd be going. It's honestly nothing too bad."

I had to wonder if there was something worse that came with her job, or if she was just naturally that tough. Regardless, the woman did not seem to be putting up a farce.

We carried onward to the Necropolis' next floor, where the artifacts supposedly lay buried. Yvonne indicated to us that the closest of the relics, and therefore the one we'd have the best shot at accomplishing any progress toward, was to the northeast in a rather toxic marsh that spanned quite a distance. We were familiar with this area, as it was essentially where the stairs up dumped you out into.

"So, how are we going to find a mana signal?" Ash inquired. "We don't really have a proper magician in our ranks."

"Not to worry," Yvonne said. She pulled out from her backpack a boxy metal contraption that fit in two hands and was mostly featureless. "I've come equipped with a mana detector, already tuned to best locate signals like the ones the relics give off."

Yvonne lead us through this poison swamp, with occasional help from us to be mindful of the more toxic, non-solid portions of the ground. Her route was a trial of detours based around feeling out how the detector worked, but despite it clearly being her first time with the damned thing, we had ostensibly arrived at our destination... just barely before the sun had set.

The issue, of course, was where we had ended up.

Flare cleared their throat. "So, is this the place...?"

"No. That is," Yvonne pointed out toward the distance, a mound of dirt just barely short of earning the title of "hill". On all sides of this mound was a lake of the noxious sludge we had avoided up to this point. Between us and the mound was enough of the stuff to comfortably say even the best of us couldn't clear it with a leap. Neither did there seem to be anything long or sturdy enough to make a makeshift bridge.

"Fantastic," I sighed.

"I don't suppose anyone'd be up to head home and think this one through over a good night's rest?" Flare said.

Of course, nobody entertained the idea of spending the last hour making it here just to call it quits. We paced around for a good few minutes, trying to think of a solution, but mostly just got a noseful of the sludge lake's odor.

After some time, Xinyi spoke up. "Hey Yules. When's the last time you've given a piggyback ride?"

I stared at Xinyi, then the lake, then the others, with no small amount of confusion before piecing together what she was suggesting. "If you're asking me to ferry all of you across the lake, I'd have to say that the rancid air here has done something to your head."

"Nah, not everyone. Just Yvonne." Xinyi clarified.

Ash, who had been staring down at the the burbling toxic waste, was apparently listening to us as well. "I... don't think that's a whole lot better, Ni. Have you touched it yet? It could take our skin right off, for all we know," He warned.

"I mean, fine, I'll do it, then. I guess I'm tallest, which is better for Yvonne?" Xinyi shrugged at her own logic, then walked up to Yvonne and kneeled. "All aboard."

'Wait a minute," Yvonne said, seeming uninterested in Xinyi's proposition. "Look at this."

Yvonne walked the perimeter of the poison, tracing it until she reached where the mound's shadow blocked what little light was still making it through to the ground.

"See that?" She pointed and asked. Xinyi leaned in closer, but didn't seem to be catching on. "The poison has receded further back around this part. In fact, the whole body seems shallower within this shade. Almost to the point that it's fully dried up."

On a closer look, Yvonne was 100% right. "Then we wait until nighttime?" Kris asked.

"Exactly what I was thinking," Yvonne smiled. "The light might be what's drawing out this liquid from below ground. If I'm right and we're lucky, we might get a clear cut path to our relic."

Time proved her right; we settled down for about 20 minutes, by which point the Necropolis was as dark as dark got. Not only did a pathway open up for us, the entire body of poison more or less vanished. We made our way toward the island, and felt out where the mana signal seemed strongest. We decided our game plan for this relic was that we'd focus on other ones in the coming days, and spend a few hours each night separately trying to unearth this one.

A few days in, and I found an odd glint sticking up out of the crater I had dug. With help from the others in pulling it out, the glint revealed itself to be an enormous rifle, befitting a Dragoon larger than myself. The barrel was gilded on the outside, otherwise seeming to be made of iron. The gilding was remarkably unmarred. Its weight in my hands let me know how powerful a weapon it was. Yvonne immediately got in close to inspect it with me.

I held the stock up to my face and inspected the lever on its end. Unlike the rest of the gun, this part was rusted and in disrepair. There was a good chance if I tried to pull the cock back, it'd snap off, so I left it alone, but it was clearly meant to hold a piece of flint. "I didn't know there were flintlocks this old," I said to Yvonne.

She got her face very close to the mechanism I was inspecting. "There aren't. Though, you're right, this does look like one. It could be a very early precursor. Whoever owned this must've had this custom made." She rubbed her thumb and forefingers together to emphasize the expense.

"I almost wish I could give this thing a try," I said. I flipped the rifle around and stared down the barrel. Packed full of dirt, of course. "Huge bore. Must've fired like a cannon."

"I'd have to guess this thing fired an eighth-pound shot," Yvonne said as she stuck her fingers down the barrel. She pulled out what miniscule bits of dirt she could, but mostly just got her fingertips grimy.

The two of us drooled over the antique gun for quite a while. Who knows how long it would've been if Flare hadn't been there to snap us out of it. "Alright, you two, let's hurry it up. It's getting late here," They complained.

In response, Yvonne lifted the gun out of my hands and swiftly whisked it over to a wooden chest with a cloth-lined interior. She wrapped the weapon in even more cloth before setting it down in the chest, shutting the lid, and lifting it onto a small cart which she had pulled along by hand. It was fascinating to see that the cart had indeed come through the Geomagnetic Pole with her, despite being a fair bit larger than her.

Yvonne turned back to us, beaming with pride. "Well, there's our miracle. I've got a good feeling we can bargain for two. Let's head back to town for tonight though. Good work, crew."

◄—•—►

Miracle number two came some days later, at the tail end of our first week. A great amount of confusion came out of trying to hone in on this mana signal, until we found a false wall that led into a dilapidated old blockhouse; a thoroughly ruined space in which the floor was layered over with dirt, and ancient skeletons slumped against the crumbling stone walls. Upon clearing away a portion of the dirt on the floor, we found rotten old floorboards in such miserable disrepair that, rather than lifting them up, Xinyi simply stomped her foot down and kicked right through them. Her leg did go through the hole, and she smacked her head against the ground rather concerningly, but lucky for her, the worst she recieved was a think-before-you-act penalty stamped on her forehead for the rest of the day.

Kris dropped down underneath the floor, where a small two-foot tall crawlspace held a gilded shield. She pulled it up, and handed it to Yvonne from below.

Yvonne began swiping at the front of the shield, attempting to clear what was almost certainly centuries of dust and grime. Some sort of emblem made itself apparent, though finer details needed a more thorough cleaning to see. "Hmm... This could be a family coat of arms or a military heraldry, but it doesn't resemble any I can think of off the top of my head. That would make sense for the period, at least. Hopefully we'll make sense of it in the lab."

The shield went quickly and carefully into the same kind of chest as the gun did, got loaded onto the same cart, and at the end of the day, disappeared to wherever our client was safekeeping these things.

Surprisingly, our luck didn't end there. We uncovered a chest plate, greaves, and pauldrons matching what we had seen thus far of the Dragoon's effects, at the end of a long and lonely pathway. But it wasn't as simple as wandering into it, as there had been a rather deadly obstacle in a more open field preceding the area.

"AGH!" Ash yelped, jumping backwards nearly a foot and toppling into Xinyi.

"What?! What's— oh shit!" Xinyi yelled.

Where Ash had stood, an enormous skeletal arm sprouted from underground, holding a rusty rapier which it had stabbed into the dirt. Whether careful or aimless, the strike had been alarmingly close to skewering Ash's foot. The arm quickly unearthed itself the rest of the way, revealing a warrior of bone which towered over us by a good few feet.

A quick look around revealed that it wasn't the only one of its kind, either. I tried putting it down with gunfire, but it proved nimble and difficult to hit given the gaps in its body you'd not normally find in a human foe. On top of which, once I did manage to put a hole in the monster's head, it didn't seem particularly bothered by my handiwork. We opted to run.

Our getaway was an awkward, uncoordinated dance, but one we all made it out of unscathed. After which point, we made it to where we would then dig up the armor pieces. There was a text carving in stone, which was not in a language my guild or I understood. Yvonne inspected the carving for some time, intently going over it with her eyes, and tracing its symbols with her fingers. Then she turned to us:

"I can't read this."

"Good grief," Flare grumbled. Nonetheless, we had the mana detector, and did not need to read the text even if it was a hint to the armor's location.

◄—•—►

At last, on the second-to-last day of our work, we came upon our final quarry. Yvonne had recited many times over that turning up empty-handed for our fourth mana reading would not undermine the legendary results we had procured from our first three readings. I don't know what the others thought, but with how often she said this, I imagined she was trying to manage her own expectations more than anything.

The obstacle between us and our last reading was, once again, the giant skeletons. This time though, they rose to form an impregnable row, a clear and militant strategy to give us no quarter. They stood still, waiting for our own movements. Just when we thought we'd have to fight our way through, Yvonne stepped to the front of our pack and addressed us.

"I've been thinking about our last encounter with these gentlemen in the days since. What I saw of their movements... I think I understand their pattern," She said. "They must operate in accordance to our movements; either a magic-controlled response to environmental stimuli, or very simple beasts with very simple behavior. I've worked out a way through. Follow me closely... but, in case I am wrong, be ready to retreat the instant you see me do so."

After her equal parts concerning and convincing pitch, we followed Yvonne in her attempt to manipulate the monsters with fancy footwork. Her movements were erratic and convoluted, but they proved to be a well-calculated gamble with every sword-swing that missed us by mere inches. In time, we had breached the skeletons' defenses with much less hassle and chaos than our previous encounter.

Xinyi wiped the sweat off her brow. "I dunno how you figured that out, but I'm fine with that."

Our journey continued until we came to a dead end littered with branches and wet, fallen leaves. The trees left standing might've constituted an orchard many lifetimes ago, but whatever magic the Necropolis worked kept these trees in a state of death before decay in perpetuity. Central to them all was one gargantuan husk of an oak, with ashen exterior and a haunting web of a shadow cast across the whole field, claiming it as its territory. A large hollow at its base gazed back at us like a large, grotesque pupil.

Yvonne tread forward with detector in hand, quickly coming to rest directly in front of the large tree. She twisted her head back at us and watched us expectantly.

Once we walked over to meet her, she explained her findings. "It's inside there," She pointed at the hole.

"How do you know that? Couldn't it be underground?" Ash asked.

Yvonne shook her head rapidly. "No. I just know."

"Well, who's gonna get it out?" Xinyi asked, looking around at us. "What are you all scared of? A monster? ...Okay yeah I mean I'll give you that one. But it's not like it's gonna be more skellies... I'm pretty sure."

"I'll go," Flare offered. They peered inside the tree briefly to no particular effect, then stuck their hand in and felt around. Their arm disappeared up to their shoulder as their search became more fervent. After a minute, they retracted their arm and shrugged. "Nothing in there."

"That can't be right. You just missed it," Yvonne insisted.

"Here. I can see in the dark, at least a little bit. I'll go." Ash proceeded to do largely the same maneuver as Flare, also coming out empty-handed. "No, there really is nothing in there. I saw nothing, I felt nothing."

"Well, my arms are the longest, so lemme try,' said Xinyi. Needless to say, arm length was not the problem.

Kris didn't even preface her attempt with a justification for why she might be the one to get results, she simply walked up and plunged her arm in. There may have even been a bit of resentment from her when she, too, had nothing to clutch between her fingers after the fact.

The eyes of my guild were all on me, of course. I saw little reason to resist. "I suppose I'll try."

It pressed into my palm with a pointed tip, not sharp enough to draw blood, but cold and metallic like something that would. It made no effort to conceal itself from me.

When I pulled it out, it made its form known to me: a helm perfectly matching everything we had seen thus far, save for one unusual element. Around the top of the helm, there sat six tines evenly spaced apart. Shining golden but somehow less lustrous that the rest. If one were to look at it as I did, they would see the design intent clearly: a helm that was a crown that was armor that was status.

The six tines stood as great obelisks in the sea, the waves crashing ineffectually at their base, never enough to topple. Never enough to topple. They stood as a monument to madness, to violence, to conquest, of a world that was uninhabitable. It was no place to live, and it was no sea that you'd call a sea. It was a sea of purple, a great obscuring cloud that choked and muddled the mind. It was violent and whirring and a great, awful reminder to the fragility of life, a painting of the end that a thousand thousand lives met by a bullet or a blade. It was blood before blood, and I could see it pour into my hands from my mouth as I held this helm, these obelisks. The sea was of me, from me, and I could feel myself crash against the looming monuments to futility, helpless to end my struggle. No change. Never a peaceful day. Never a sign of relief. I felt my life in this meaningless gesture, repeated over and over and over and—

The helmet was snatched away from me in an instant, and I was pulled forcefully from my daze. I jerked my head up. Flare held the crown, and was looking at me with deep concern, maybe even a mote of anger.

"Aaaall-right, that's enough. You've had your turn with it." Their sentence was mixed with nervous laughter. They tossed the helmet to Kris, who fumbled but ultimately caught it (much to the nearby Yvonne's distress). "Hurry, put that thing away before she tries to put it on. If anyone's getting possessed by a cursed helmet, I don't want it to be her."

Possessed? I asked Flare, "Did you... see something?"

"Huh? No. What're you talking about?"

"...Nothing. Never mind." It seemed once again that only I saw the miasma. But whatever the others were seeing, I was certain now that it wasn't just me daydreaming out of nowhere.

Yvonne snatched the helm out of Kris' hands and packed it away just like with the others. Despite the pissy grumbling about our "callous handling of the relic", she was clearly ecstatic at our complete and total success. I resolved to put the experience behind me, and join the others in relishing the fruits of our labor.

◄—•—►

The coachman grunted as he lugged cloth-draped boxes of varying shape and size into the vehicle's storage trunk. To my side, Flare jubilantly counted out coins from a rather large sack. In front of me stood Yvonne, who we had not seen without a smile more or less since she left the labyrinth with us for, presumably, the last time.

"Thank you all again for your hard word, Antares guild," She extended a hand to me. "This expedition has been a rousing success. If what we've dug up is what we think it is, you may have earned yourselves spots on the pages of future history books."

I accepted her handshake, frowning at the idea her words drew up. "The payment is more than enough," I said.

Yvonne then went around shaking the rest of my crew's hands, talking all along the way. Extra compensation was in talks, in exchange for outstanding results and for possibly uncovering major historical and anthropological breakthroughs. As all this happened, I glanced over at Kris, whose hand and eyes drifted toward her sword frequently, in fact at basically every moment except when Yvonne came to shake her hand. There was something of a disappointed look in her eyes, like she had been expecting this task to be somehow enlightening or revelatory.

The coachman slapped the side of his caravan twice and whistled sharply, signifying the luggage was loaded and he was ready to take off. At this, Yvonne repositioned herself next to the carriage door and faced us one last time. She gave us a salute ill-suited to us, then hopped into her ride which promptly took off toward the city's edge.

All of us, save Flare, stood and watched Yvonne Elison ride away until she disappeared from our sights. Xinyi and Ash even waved, though I doubt Ms. Elison was actually looking back at us. Personally, I had nothing but relief stored for this moment; the past two weeks had felt mostly like a waste.

Flare finished counting the coins just as the caravan completely vanished from view. They stood up, and gave a satisfied sigh.

Xinyi shook her head. "Wackjob," She said suddenly.

"Oh yeah," Flare nodded. "Total nutter."

"Okay, maybe she was a bit kooky, but she had passion for her work, and I can appreciate that," Ash gave a charitable defense of the girl.

"Okay, but I had to discipline her," Xinyi gestured with both hands, as if her given anecdote was right in front of her. "Think about that. Me telling someone else they need to use common sense?! It's too late for you if that happens."

"A commendable amount of self-awareness on your part, Xinyi," I teased.

"A commendable amount of bleh-bleh-bweh," Xinyi repeated in a mocking tone. "Ash, this girl's gonna drive me to drink... in fact, Flare, how much money is in that bag?"

Flare rolled their eyes. "Yes, Xinyi, we can go for a round of drinks at Mirina's. We have the money now."

"Siiiiick, let's go! Who's in?!" Xinyi pumped her fists in the air.

Part of me— no, honestly, most of me —would have rather gone home and taken a nap, but I decided to take a chance on the part that didn't really mind watching the others drink the night away. Besides, I knew at least Xinyi would beg me to come along. I caught one last glimpse of Kris before we took off for the Twilight Tavern; she was watching the other three joke and laugh, unable to hide a soft smile on her own face. She didn't seem the least bit concerned about her sword anymore.

I supposed that was a good thing.

Chapter Text

With each forward step, the soles of my boots pressed a little deeper into gray mud. My focus flickered between my map and the gradually softening landscape ahead of me. Unfortunately, it wasn't much help in this situation; I had long since wandered into the vast ocean of uncharted blankness on the parchment, but this was not a situation where I felt inclined to stop to fill it in. Nor was I able to avoid it, as there was every chance the others had wandered into it as well.

I looked up again. Flat and featureless mire for miles— or at least what felt as long —but no hostile fauna, either. An empty and dull, if recalcitrant, landscape was preferable to being one-on-one against something that might decide it needs a meal... assuming anything here ate human flesh, or ate at all. If they did, I mercifully had not seen proof of such. Though, if forced to guess, I'd wager the corporeal creatures were detritivores.

Many minutes of scanning the land for either friend or foe passed. The mud deepened until it was halfway up to my knees, so that when I finally saw a patch of dry land, there was no question that I'd go out of my way to rest on it. Kicking and scraping the mud off my boots made me aware of how much added weight the caked-on sludge had me lifting.

I took a seat on a gnarled tree stump. Perhaps it wasn't a surprise that no particular creature deigned to dwell in this area. I thought back to the thing that put me into this situation; even among the denizens of a place called the "Fetid Necropolis", it was a fright. It came to us looking like a coffin, but crawling across the ground at an unsettling speed via long, gangly arms that protuded from the lid— its underside. Each arm was wrapped in old bandages up to their wrists, but the exposed hands were the dark purple of a fresh bruise, and easily large enough to grip a watermelon. The unnaturally long fingers hooked into the dirt with sharp nails and traversed the ground like a centipede's skittering legs.

When it lifted to show its underside— a sign of aggression that we should've taken as such much sooner than we did —the lid swung open, and we saw what the crawling limbs were attached to. It was... difficult to describe. Like someone had crammed ten humans into that single coffin by sheer force, but only after frustration had overcome their attempts to consolidate the bodies mindfully. Limbs were intertwined and tied tightly, with no regard for how joints or bones should function. Heads stuck out at different points, but it was impossible to figure what belonged to which body, and the whole of it was a bit disorienting to view comprehensively. I don't know where the enormous, barbed ribcage encompassing the bodies came from, but I think it was probably a mercy that most all of it was wrapped in bandages.

The thing struck erratically, quickly, and with terrific force. Just its initial onslaught had caught us unaware so badly that we collectively agreed to launch our "emergency evacuation" plan before ever thinking to fight back. This plan, of course, was to run in all different directions, and reconvene at our earliest convenience.

I took my gaze off my muddy boots, and scanned the wide stretch of marsh before me once more. The issue was, we had not agreed on a place to reconvene. On each floor, we would agree on a landmark to return to, should any of us get separated. But this floor was new to us, and we had done no such thing before that demonic thing had given us its idea of a welcome greeting. So now...

I sighed in frustration, and pulled out a few more of my own maps. If this stratum's structure was to follow the tendencies of its predecessors, then we were currently on the uppermost floor. That was a huge "if", however. There was no shortage of nasty surprises in the Necropolis.

I was beginning to worry that this ordeal of finding my guildmates might be much longer and more perilous than I first took it for. I wasn't worried for myself; I did have a spare Ariadne thread tucked under my chestplate, which I did not tell the others about because I didn't want them to think I'd abandon them in the labyrinth on a whim. Though they would be right to think that, once upon a time. No, the problem was that I couldn't rely on everyone else to have an emergency thread of their own (Flare and Kris might. Ash, less likely. And Xinyi, definitely not). Not to mention that they'd likely still search for me without knowing I was safe back in town.

In pondering my situation, I had begun to wander, and before I realized it, I could not see where I had initially sat down. Instead, what I did see up ahead was none other than the inscrutable Lili. She was on her knees, facing away from me. I inched closer, and saw what she was doing: playing with a dog.

Well, that is how I describe it, but to put it as gently as possible, the pup she was playing with was... dead. She was not toying with a motionless corpse, no; the mutt's half-missing tail wagged, and it gave the girl plenty of puppy kisses. But the tongue was splotched with a sickly rainbow of discoloration, its right hind leg was worn down to exposed bone, and its fur was matted with grime or pus from infected wounds. But the affection she gave it was nothing if not true-to-her.

"Oh! Yulia, it's so good to see you!" Lili noticed and greeted me before I had registered so.

"I might say the same," I said. I watched the dog circle around Lili as she stood and walked toward me, its appetite for attention apparently infinite. "That's your dog, I take it?"

Lili giggled sheepishly. "No, not really. I just come and visit it every so often."

"All the way up here?"

"Yeah. He... doesn't have anyone else to take care of him."

I took another look at the dog. It was smaller than Flare's, and definitely a different breed. "Isn't it just some wild animal?" I asked.

"No, you don't really see dogs up here, normally. This little guy was brought up here, and then he died." Lili frowned as she said this, then started scratching behind the thing's ears sympathetically. "He was like your friend's puppy. He was an adventurer's companion."

"Then, the adventurer died as well?"

"I thought so too, at first. I found this little buddy months and months ago— before you and I had even met —and when I found him, you could tell he was confused. He was looking for his owner still. I felt bad for him, so I took care of him while I asked around town if anyone had lost their dog. It took a while but I found out that the owner had made it out safe, but losing their pet in battle was so hard on them that they retired from their guild and went home. After that, finding that person was kinda... out of my hands. So I just take care of him myself now!"

I looked down at the dog again. It sat by Lili's side, gazing back at me curiously with its tongue lolling out of its open maw. It looked about as happy as it could. I thought it wise to withhold my own thought that, had it been me in her shoes, I'd have simply put it down as cleanly as possible. Then I started to wonder if doing so would actually work. I shook my head clear and looked back at Lili. "That's nice, but it doesn't explain who brought it back to life."

"Oh, no one," Lili said confidently. "The necromantic energies of this place were enough to just... do it on their own, over time."

"Really? I guess you'd know, since you're..." I paused as Lili produced a treat, wagged it in the air, then tossed it to the dog, who caught it in its mouth midair. "Does that work? Does it need fed?"

Lili gave an amused laugh. "Nah, he doesn't need food or water. As long as his revivification gets renewed regularly, he's fine. And that happens on its own as long as he stays up here. But he likes being fed, even if he can't taste it."

This whole dead dog thing was beginning to raise questions that reminded me why I never studied magic. "So if a person died up here, could they end up like that?"

Lili shook her head pretty firmly. "Even powerful necromancy from someone way smarter than me couldn't revive a human properly. Small animals and simple lifeforms are no problem, but something as complicated as a human wouldn't come back with its personality in proper order. What you'd get would be... something worse than the sum of its parts."

I waited for Lili to expand on what "worse than the sum of its parts" might mean, but she seemed content to end her explanation there. After a quiet moment in which the dog curled up on the ground for a nap it may not have needed, Lili spoke up to say something different.

"Yeah, it's a sad story, but I'm glad for it. Finding this little guy was what made me sure he would be here, after all." Her voice was pensive, and maybe directed at herself more than her audience.

"Who would be here?" I asked.

Lili looked up at me like she was noticing me for the first time. Only then did her own words hit her.

"Urk—! Ah, ha ha! Hahaha! Oh, I didn't mean anything by that! Ha..." Lili's face was no more composed than her nervous laughter suggested. I didn't think a girl could look more cornered.

"It seems you crack easily under pressure," I said, "One slip-up and that mysterious air about you has vanished completely. It's almost disappointing, considering how hard it was to read you when we first met."

"I..." Lili's face was frozen in a guilty smile. Her eyes couldn't settle on one spot to rest on, but neither could they look entirely away from me. It grew clearer with each passing second that she was looking for some way to weasel out of explaining herself, but only finding frustration.

"Just tell me what's going on," I said. "Can it really be that bad? If you're plotting to kill me and my guildmates, there's hardly a better time than now to start. You've got me alone. Wasn't wise to wait until we were evenly matched, but maybe you wanted me to put up a fight."

"Fine. I'll tell you everything," Lili sighed. "How much do you know about the Tower of Sorcery?"

"Mm... It's a vault of knowledge for arcane practices, about as far up north in Sidonia as you can get."

"That's true. There's artifacts, too. Some very powerfully enchanted items are kept safe there. Over the centuries, some have gone missing. Stolen, most of 'em. There was this one, though..."

Lili looked back at the napping dog, then to her hand, inspecting it for something, or the absence thereof. She continued, "It was called the Ring of Undying. A focus of necromantic prowess so intense and powerful, when it was discovered it was immediately stashed in one of the highest floors of the Tower. They say the more dangerous a magic relic is, the further up the Tower it goes, where it's more closely guarded and harder to reach. Normally, though, something bad has to happen for a relic to move up the floors. This Ring just went straight to the top."

"Okay. And this is related to you, somehow?"

"Well, a long time ago— I don't really know how long —the Ring of Undying was stolen right out of the tower. The culprit was one of a pair of siblings, Crow, with his sister being called Swan. Crow fled with the ring, and did many terrible things with its power. A lot of the blame was pushed onto Swan, by Sidonia's people and its government alike. To clear her name, Swan took it upon herself to slay her tyrannical brother and return the ring to its rightful keepers. But, in the end, Crow won, and ended up killing Swan. Before she died, Swan swore vengeance upon her brother, no matter how long it took."

"Sounds like a fairy tale. A legend. Like out of a child's storybook."

"Well, I wouldn't fault you for thinking that... It's not very well known history. After all, Crow doesn't seem to be around making a fuss anymore. And it was a simple grudge between siblings, hundreds or maybe thousands of years ago. Even if one of them stole something very important, who would remember it after all this time?"

"...Are you asserting that you are somehow personally invested in this story?"

"With her dying breath, Swan swore vengeance on Crow, by any means, over any amount of time. Swan had children before she died. Maybe that's what her last words meant: that future generations of her family would carry on her will to see Crow dead. All the way down... to me."

"You... are claiming that you are one such descendant of Swan." I believed I was beginning to piece things together in my mind. But it seemed so absurd, I found myself trying to gauge if she was joking, or spinning a lie wild and elaborate enough that I'd simply give up on getting the truth out of her.

"I am," Lili nodded. "Which makes it my duty to continue the hunt for Crow."

"You are pursuing an unfulfilled vengeance from uncounted years in the past, predicated on public ridicule spurred by events that seem to have largely gone unremembered to oral tradition and written record alike, with no definite proof that— and I should know better than to presume someone with "the Ring of Undying" deceased —that your quarry is still around to receive comeupannce, and insofar as I know, no personal stakes in the matter to begin with? Are you going to tell me that Swan's final words were a spell to magically compel her offspring to avenge her?"

"No. Though they might be why I know the story so well."

"Wouldn't you have heard it being passed down through your family tree?"

"I think maybe, if that was all there was to it, then someone somewhere down the line would've decided they just didn't care, and the grudge would end there. I think what Swan's last words genuinely did do were to plant a seed of knowledge in her descendants' minds. I can't remember ever being told the story, but I can tell you that some of my earliest memories were of knowing the story of Swan and Crow. Of drawing it as a picture book."

How remarkably creepy. I remained as glad as ever that I was not born a mage. "But you don't actually have to act on that knowledge. So, I assume you have some reason for hunting down Crow? Ah— no wonder. It's been staring me in the face the whole time. You don't want revenge on Crow. You want the Ring of Undying's power."

"No, not necessarily," Lili shrugged. "I suppose it'd be nice, but... I've always considered myself a plenty powerful necromancer."

She certainly pulled her own weight and more, if she was capable of making it this far up the labyrinth. "So then... you genuinely just want to return it to the Tower of Sorcery?"

"Ha ha! I mean, sort of. You could put it that way." Lili seemed quite amused. "I don't want to just give it away for free."

"You're using an ancient and immensely powerful artifact as a bargaining chip."

"Is that bad, do you think?" Lili smiled.

"...I can't speak on the morality of such a thing, but I will grant you that if I believed I could make it work, I might do the same."

Lili laughed, much more uproariously than before. "You say interesting things, Miss Yulia." After calming herself, she sighed. "Still, I think I am called to the idea of Swan finally being able to rest peacefully in the afterlife, even if it's silly. I guess I can't help that part of me that wants to do good for others."

"Not my business to judge the selflessness of your motives." I shrugged. "I take it Solor knows all this as well?"

"Yeah. She does. I don't think she would've given up her mercenary work if she thought I just wanted a guildmate." Lili seemed troubled at the mention of Solor.

"Where is she, by the way? Don't you pay her to keep you safe?"

"Ah, I'm letting her take paid leave for a little while. Like I said before, I'm a pretty powerful necromancer. I'm basically in my element here."

It didn't seem like a matter she wanted to talk about terribly much. "What will happen when you find Crow?"

"I'll slay him. Or maybe he'll slay me. Then someone will have to avenge me."

"And if we find him first?"

"..." Lili looked down at her feet. "Say, where's the rest of your guild, anyway?"

Lili nodded along as I explained my predicament. The beats of my plot seemed to flow like a familiar melody to her, and she even chimed in with a "Ooh! Yeah, those'll get you" when I described the coffin demon. Finally, I had brought her up to the moment I had met her.

"I see, I see! Well, if you want, I can help you find your guildmates. I know this floor pretty well, after all." Lili offered.

I paused. "That... would actually be quite appreciated, thank you."

◄—•—►

The following evening, I sat with the rest of my guild around a small table in Jenetta's inn, as we cycled through all the various card games we knew how to play in an attempt to stave off boredom. My mind was drawn to some of the things Lili had said, as well as the fact that we drew ever closer to truly unexplored parts of the labyrinth, more than what the cards fanned out in my hand meant for me. Jenetta had been banned from hovering around our table, as she proved unable to stifle yelps of excitement whenever she saw winning plays in one of our hands.

I had no uncertain feeling that Kris was primed to lay down a game-winning move when the sound of someone barreling through the doors turned all of our heads. It was Solor, and she looked as ill-composed as I had seen her in quite some time, if not ever. Sweat ran down her face as she surveyed the room, perhaps looking for Jenetta, but eventually settling for us.

"Have any of you seen Lili?!" She asked. Desperation played on her voice.

I had, in fact seen her yesterday. We all had, in fact. But that was yesterday. I thought about it, and realized that she had never come back to town with us. Nor did she provide any concrete information about what she was doing thereafter.

"Whoa, what's wrong?" Xinyi sat up in her chair.

Solor stepped inside, after being reminded that she was blocking the entryway by a pair of guests. "Lili's missing. I've been asking around all over town and no one's seen hide nor hair of her. I haven't seen her since two nights ago. I'm used to her going into the labyrinth on her own, she's done it before and she's always been fine on her own, so I figured it was just that. But she's never gone this long."

Solor's side of the story called back certain things Lili had said to me, and I was beginning to piece together a sequence of events. In exchange for her help, Lili asked that I tell no one about our conversation or its contents. Had I been less desperate for help, I might've voiced my suspicion before agreeing to her terms. She had been quite careful and clever in all of this.

I relayed to Solor when and where we had all seen Lili, being selective with certain details so that she could put together what this probably meant; a bending but not breaking of the terms I had agreed to. I saw Solor's face grow a shade paler as she reconstructed the same timeline as I had. After I was done, she stared at me, wide-eyed, for just a few seconds, before the utterance hanging on her lips escaped into the open air:

"Fuck."