Beneath the Dragoneye Moons: Immortal Moments

by Selkie Myth

Dedication

This story is dedicated to my wonderful wife, Lauren, without whom this wouldn't be possible. Her endless love and support keeps me going.

This story is also dedicated to my beautiful daughter Flora, whose smiles light up my every day.

I would also like to acknowledge my beta readers, who put up with my endless typos, fix my mistakes, and help guide the story, so it can be the best story possible.

I'd like to thank all the other supportive authors and writing communities, and all the kind words they have.

Lastly, I'd like to thank Royal Road. My story and success wouldn't be possible without their website.

Thank you, to each and every one of you.

Chapter 241 - Kickass Kissing

Serondes embraced me as we kissed, causing tingly sparks of electricity to run all the way down my body to the tips of my toes, which curled in pleasure. My body practically singing with the sensations. I gave a little happy one-legged back kick.

Kissing was totally awesome. I had no shame in admitting that I had no solid experience with it, but, just, wow.

Also - he liked me! At least, that’s how I was interpreting his enthusiastic kisses.

He rolled me over so he was on top of me, my back pressed against the grass with his cute eyes framed by the night sky.

Long kisses on my lips, short pecks on my - and having gotten the idea his - neck, and deep, exploratory smooches. They all made me feel great, had me arching my back, had me reaching up like a baby bird demanding MORE whenever a kiss broke.

Serondes held me tightly, as my one free hand eagerly explored, slipping under his robe to feel his perfect chest and smooth abs. I wasn’t much of a chest or abs woman, but his were nice. Nice to feel, nice to touch, nice to grasp as I brought him in for another kiss.

The other hand was keeping the egg protected and warm, and I had a brief moment of insanity where I considered putting it to the side to better embrace Serondes.

Serondes wasn’t just a still kissing machine either. One hand had threaded its way into my hair, using it to bring me in for a kiss when he wanted, while the other was wrapped around my waist. I could feel his fingers, the heat of them burning into me while we continued melding our mouths together, separating for a moment only to find a new, better way of kissing.

[*ding!* [Passionate Learning] has leveled up! 377->378]

I half-jumped at the notification, clicking my teeth awkwardly against Serondes’s, the first non-graceful moment in our passionate embrace.

Also - I was going to murder the System for its terrible pun. I was learning all sorts of new things, and I was passionate about it, there was no doubt.

I don’t know how long we stayed together, a mess of thrashing limbs and sucking noises. I was all too aware of his leg between mine, and how excited he was to be kissing me. I occasionally took my hand out from his robe, wrapping it around his waist, pulling him in tighter.

I gasped as he kissed my neck, softly nibbling and sucking on my tender flesh. When he was done with me, I struck back, performing my best vampire impression on the side of his neck.

I was hickey-proof. He wasn’t. Just a heck of a lot harder to show I’d been here.

It was pretty fun, until I realized I’d just remove it with [Cosmic Presence] passively healing him.

Ah well. The only thing I could try was sucking harder and longer to make it last.

Then again, elves were such bullshit that bruises probably faded in a day or two anyways, before my skills or their vitality kicked in.

Serondes rolled us over, so I was on top, and he was on bottom. We shared a kiss, as his hand moved from my waist to my chest.

"Whoa there!" I broke the kiss, sitting back on his stomach, using my one free hand to grab his wandering hand.

He didn’t say anything, just quirking an eyebrow at me in a question. I glanced up at the sky, and realized the time. We must’ve spent hours making out and petting each other.

"Let’s take it nice and slow, ok? We’ve got the time." I said, clambering up from my oh-so-hot fleshy perch that was all mine.

Serondes got back to his feet, and with his oh-so-musical voice, leaned over so he was speaking in my ear.

"As you wish." He whispered, and oh boy did that do good things to me. Sending a massive thrill through my body was just the start.

Annnnnnnnnnnnd he killed it all by copping a feel anyways through the Mistweave. Was not a fan of being touched after I’d made it clear I didn’t want it right now, but I wasn’t going to make a huge deal out of it. Not while I was still riding the high of kissing the totally cool Serondes. Serondes, the badass mage. Serondes, the kind and helpful. Serondes, the smart and suave. Serondes, the architect. Serondes, the cute. Serondes, the supernaturally perfect. Serondes, with the Lava eyes, and the short tousled hair that was just so. Serondes, with the adorable little goat horns.

Serondes, the I-gotta-know-more-about-you.

Serondes, the I’m-not-trying-to-eat-you, and the I’m-not-telling-you-to-quit-your-job-and-become-my-housewife. I wasn’t sure which dates had been worse. I banished those memories from my mind.

We traded one more kiss, then I grabbed his hand as we walked back to Castle Serondes, the massive walls having been raised by him. We made it back to our sleeping section, where he picked me up for one last kiss.

I wrapped my legs around him, and made it more like thirty "last kisses", before tapping him to put me down. He stole one last kiss, which I didn’t mind, and put me down.

"Good night Elaine. Sleep well." Serondes mimed blowing me a kiss, which I mimed catching.

"Night Serondes! You too! I’ll be thinking of you!" My heart was still going a million miles an hour.

He liked me!

I entered my tiny little room, as Serondes kept hanging out.

"Wanna invite me in?" He outrageously flirted, and I giggled at his forward approach. I knew if I said yes, he’d be coming in a lot more than the room, and I just wasn’t ready for that.

"Good night!" I leaned out to give him one more kiss, then skipped back into the room. I settled into my bedroll - another elvish loan, they were all far too nice - and stared at the ceiling.

He likes me! We kissed! A TON! Oh what else are we going to do? What’s next? How do we…

My thoughts kept running through my head, until a nastier one came to mind.

Serondes was, by all measures, a lot stronger than I was. He was a stronger mage, physically stronger, bigger than me, and heavier than me. When he was on top, if he didn’t want me to leave or escape? There was no way I’d be able to. I was entirely at his mercy, and I didn’t like the idea or the feeling at all.

I grimaced to myself.

I didn’t think I could do terribly much about it. On Pallos, there was always going to be a personal power imbalance between couples. Heck, on Earth there was as well, but on Pallos it was magnified. Either I was the one with overwhelming power versus my date - like with Jaclyn - or my elvish boyfriend could flip me around like a pillow. How did the elves put it before? Ah, Yes... Fragile...

Was there much I could do besides take sensible precautions, then put myself out there and hope for the best? Even when it made me feel uncomfortable.

The dawn arrived as I was musing over the question, working it over. I figured I should just get up at that point, and work on no sleep for the day. I had [Sunrise] and a boatload of vitality, I could get through one all-nighter. Especially with the powerful infusion of energy Serondes had given me!

It didn’t stop me from sleepily dragging myself out though, seeing Serondes and the rest of the elves already at breakfast, feasting on leftover hydra.

He was looking annoyingly fresh - darn all the elves and their obnoxious perfection.

"Good morning Elaine~" Serondes shot me his dazzling eyes, which caused my heart to go all a-flutter again.

I opened my mouth to say something back, but Awarthril interrupted.

"Elaine!" Awarthril hustled over to me, shoving a plate of food into my hand. She hooked her arm in mine, and like a force of nature, walked me out of the castle.

Serondes had widened the narrow crack needed to get in, which was the only way Awarthril managed to get me outside, out of reach of the other elves.

"Um, hi, good morning Awarthril." I was unsure why I’d been rudely hustled out. Awarthril turned to me, picking some grass out of my hair. I went red.

"Ok, Elaine, you’re totally safe here. Just checking, everything ok with you?" Awarthril fretted over me, smoothing out my Mistweave and brushing imaginary grass pieces off.

"Yes? Why?" I was still puzzled.

"Serondes didn’t do anything untoward? Didn’t take any liberties with you? I’ll totally kill him if he did, you just tell me."

And I was ready to die of embarrassment.

"Buh, uh, how did you know?" I stammered out.

Awarthril tapped her nose.

"The nose knows. Enhanced sense of smell, remember?"

"Well, he had his way with me in a way I really enjoyed." I gave an impish grin back, as Awarthril threw her head back and laughed.

"HA! Alright, just remember. We girls need to stick together. If something happens - if Serondes does anything bad - you tell me immediately, ok?" Awarthril was holding onto me, staring directly at me. Her words were light, and her tone wasn’t.

"Yeah, of course!" I readily agreed, but I was feeling a mite defensive. It was Serondes. He wouldn’t do anything bad, right? I’d already kinda wrestled with the question last night, and had decided to go for it. I couldn’t spend my life hiding under a rock, scared of any attachments I might make.

I knew that was the hormones talking, but cripes, they were loud.

We walked back to where everyone else was still eating breakfast. I hadn’t gotten a chance yet, not with one hand holding the egg, and the other still holding onto my rapidly cooling breakfast.

"Any chance I could get some sort of sling or something?" I bounced the egg in my hand a few times in front of everyone, making it clear what I was talking about.

"I think I can arrange a carrying method." Serondes was clearly flirting, putting some double meanings in his words.

He took the egg from my hand, and I saw Lava erupting as I chowed down, creating a nice warm bed for the egg while he worked.

Serondes generated a single fine strand of sand, a loop made out of single grains of fine sand against each other. He spent a careful moment checking over the line, before flashing Lava through it, turning it into glass. He started to sing, and I wished the moment would never end, an eternity of listening to his musical voice.

It was like windchimes.

He made a second loop, interweaving its creation with the first one.

Strand by delicate strand was made, Serondes neatly weaving what looked to be a fancy sash out of layered strands of flexible, magically reinforced glass. A sash-cross-basket, with a neat pocket, perfectly sized for an egg.

"Arms up!" Serondes said, and I happily complied. He lowered it onto me, and if his hands did some extra brushing, lingered a bit?

Well, that just came with the dating territory.

I made some little adjustments, finding to my delight that I could beam my Radiance through the glass, into the egg. Sure, I lit up like a Christmas tree doing so, the glass refracting and sending light everywhere, but hey. It worked, and kept my hands free.

"If it’s stupid and it works, it isn’t stupid." I had a goofy grin on as I said that, to Aegion’s mirthful chuckle.

"Ain’t that the truth."

Honestly, the only problem with the harness was it made cuddling with Serondes a bit awkward. I couldn’t comfortably use his lap as a seat, I still tried as I ate though.

"So what now?" I asked between bites of leftover hydra. They were still fresh cuts from last night, but I could tell they were starting to go off a bit. I wouldn’t eat them for lunch, just jerky.

"We were just talking about that!" Awarthril eyed a hydra steak, pushing it away from her. "We’re going to spend a few days here, decompress from the fight, then keep going. The only question is, how long do we spend?"

"A week." Serondes jumped in, shooting me eyes with promises of what, exactly, he hoped to spend the next week doing.

"Three days. Look, we might be Immortal, but Elaine’s got somewhere to be." Awarthril argued back.

"Let’s just split the difference at five." Aegion weighed in.

Kiyaya and Cordamo were both agreeing with their respective bonded Elf.

They turned to me, at a 2-2-1 tie.

"Why wait around at all?" I asked.

"Well, if our life is nothing but fight fight fight fight, it’ll drive us nuts. Make us lose touch with our elfanity. We need to deliberately relax after every fight, otherwise the weight of centuries of fighting without rest will crush us." Awarthril kindly explained.

That made way too much sense. I was already flighty, jumping at shadows when I was the slightest bit intoxicated, and I was 20. I was already on track to be a bitter PTSD victim by 40, forget 400.

"I imagine you’ve never seen an Immortal lose it and go on a rampage." Serondes added in. "Not pretty."

I could barely imagine. Someone with thousands of levels, snapping and deciding to take as many people down with him as possible?

I resolved to work on my mental health, but deciding what was the right balance was hard. The longer we stayed here, the more time I had to snog Serondes, the later I’d get home. Kiyaya’s time limit was a ticking bomb in the back of my head, making me all too aware that I needed to level, and level fast.

Hormones, once again, decided the issue for me.

"Three days." I voted. I could tell my thinking was somewhat muddled, my brain going into stupid overdrive every time I saw Serondes’s smiling face. I wanted to rebel somewhat against that feeling.

"Right, three days it is!" Aegion hopped up, going over to tend to his barrels. I wondered what the base of his beer was?

"Come on Kiyaya! Let’s go play, and leave the two lovebirds alone."

Serondes and I locked eyes, as the elves gave us room to ourselves.

"Have you ever walked in a garden of glass?" Serondes got up, offering me his arm. I slipped my hand into it.

"No - why don’t you show me?" I said as we started to walk out of the castle.

Kiyaya and Awarthri were playing fetch, the elf throwing sticks at incredible speeds, with Kiyaya shooting after them almost as fast. Arm in arm, we pivoted, going in another direction. I didn’t say much, just looking at the handsome Serondes, as he forged a path for us. With every left step we took into the open field, Sand formed into shapes of wild and fantastical flowers and plants, each one different. With every right step, Lava surged, merging and transforming the Sand into wondrous glass creations. Serondes started to whistle, shaping and forming the glass, turning the rough cut into polished perfection.

It was a wonderful, grand date, and in the middle of the garden we’d traced out, it seemed like a good time and place to practice kissing some more.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 412740/412740]

[Mana Regen: 275034 (+356755.875)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 91]

[Strength: 941]

[Dexterity: 1468]

[Vitality: 11166]

[Speed: 11166]

[Mana: 41274]

[Mana Regeneration: 41363 (+35675.5875)]

[Magic Power: 18178 (+340837.5)]

[Magic Control: 18178 (+340837.5)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 420]]

[Celestial Affinity: 420]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

[Center of the Universe: 420]

[Dance with the Heavens: 420]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 420]

[Mantle of the Stars: 420]

[Sunrise: 344]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 345]]

[Radiance Affinity: 345]

[Radiance Resistance: 345]

[Radiance Conjuration: 345]

[Solar Flare: 1]

[Nectar: 345]

[Sun's Heart: 345]

[Scintillating Ascent: 313]

[Kaleidoscope: 345]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 217]

[Egg Incubation: 44]

[Bullet Time: 420]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 395]

[Persistent Casting: 291]

[Passionate Learning: 378]

Chapter 242 - Stony Statues

Serondes and I spent three days, ah, decompressing, getting a little more comfortable with each other.

Doing things like working on my magic!

"At this point, you should be able to reheat rock until it turns back into lava." Serondes said on the afternoon of the last day before we were going to leave. We were busy cuddling inside Castle How-Did-You-Make-So-Much-Lava, ignoring the potentially poisonous fumes coming from Aegion’s workspace.

I looked up at him, from my place curled up on his lap, arms around his neck.

"Oh?" I asked, somewhat surprised. He gave me a quick kiss before resuming.

"Rock is often just hardened lava that has cooled off. By heating it back up, you turn it back into lava. Could be useful to you in a pinch, and any Earth mage would lose control over the liquified rock. Unless they’re specialized." Serondes hedged.

That made some sense. I was pretty sure there were rocks besides igneous rocks that might not melt under heat. Then again, I wasn’t the Lava mage, so what did I know?

"Got anything for me to practice on?" I asked.

Serondes gave me an "are you serious" look, then smiled and gestured around. To the walls of the castle.

I gave him my best Look.

"You’re just trying to get me to demolish the castle for you." I accused. He laughed, his magical, musical voice tinkling like glass windchimes.

"Naturally! At the same time, there’s no way you can bring it down fast enough, so I’ll need to help." Serondes stood up, while I firmly clung to him like a barnacle.

I glanced down, making sure the egg was well-secured. Were the golden lines starting to glow a bit?

I wriggled my way out of Serondes’s grasp, planting my feet on the ground and looking up at the walls, doing some thinking.

If I wanted to punch right through the walls, I’d focus everything on a narrow beam. That would drill through the quickest.

However, if I did that, then tried to sweep it to "cut" through the wall? It’d just cool and resolidify back into rock behind me. A plane - or a cone - was the best way of handling this.

I walked up to a more or less random part of the wall, and started burning a ring into the wall, focusing on heat and destruction.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 1->2]

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 2->3]

I turned the notifications off before they could get too annoying. Serondes wrapped his arms around me, resting his chin on the top of my head. Quite distracting.

I focused and burned, and burned, and only when a slow leak of molten rock trickled out of the bottom of the circle, the edges of the ring glowing hot, did I realized my dumb mistake.

"I’ve got no way of getting the lava out once I melt it." I groaned to myself. I figured I’d ask the expert. "How do I get the rocks out once I melt them?"

I could feel Serondes shrug, his solid arms half-lifting me up with his movement.

"Just wait for them to drain out. It’ll be a slow process." He said.

Well, screw that. It’d probably just re-harden back behind it. Looked like I wasn’t going to be melting through stone anytime soon, as neat of an idea as it was.

It was good to have the knowledge that I could do it, tucked away in the back of my mind.

"We just need to demolish the place, right?" I asked, getting an idea.

"Well, yeah." Serondes was like an innocent lamb.

"Great!"

I went a little nuts. [Kaleidoscope] and Radiance beams went everywhere, and for eight glorious seconds I unleashed the full destructive force I had at my fingertips onto the poor innocent walls.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 3->26]

That was more like it!

Aegion came tearing out of his room, sword on his belt, bow and arrow ready.

"Where’s the attack!? What is it?! Is everyone ok?!" He called out, as Cordamo flew up into the air like a shot.

I bent over in half laughing.

"Yeah, we’re... We’re fine, just… redecorating... A bit." I gasped out through peals of laughter.

Aegion eyed all the various pockmarks and Lava smearing down the wall, rapidly rehardening. He rolled his eyes, and put his weapons away.

"Right. Enjoy yourselves." He walked back to his brewery. I realised that if his fumes were explosive, that could have gone badly.

I looked at the walls.

Maybe if the fumes had been explosive, I could’ve done some real damage. The wide-ranging attacks I’d launched, and the basically non-existent damage on the walls was a good reminder that Radiance liked to be compressed and focused into a small point or line, and not some big splashy thing.

I glanced at Serondes, who was looking at me.

"Wanna do something fun with me?" He shamelessly flirted.

I showed him that, yes, I did.

We - and by we, I mean Serondes, while I mostly cheered him on - demolished the castle over the rest of the afternoon and evening, practicing the art of leaving no traces - and not having a ticking time bomb of any sort hanging around for some poor soul to find. It’d be all too easy to imagine someone coming along, setting up home, then the walls falling on them one day as the material decayed away.

We got up bright and early, and kept on traveling. The three elves seemed even more determined to tell me things than before, and a week later I was up to my ears in yet another lesson.

"Every Immortal has a curse." Aegion was telling me, as I walked hand-in-hand with Serondes through the vast fields. There was a forest coming up, and a few randomly scattered mountains, but for now - ferns and grass. "The curse is the same for all Natural Immortals of the same species. For example, all liches share the same curse."

My ears perked up at that. There were liches?! Masters of undeath, who could only be killed by destroying their phylactery? I had to know more… although the lack of shambling zombie armies seemed to imply none were nearby.

Actually - of all the things I’d seen, I’d never seen zombies, and I would’ve expected to at least see some in Remus. Weird. Out of all the fantastical creatures in existence that the gods had happily plagiarized, were zombies the only ones that got skipped?

Or was there something more to it? Was -

Focus on the important Immortality lesson!! My musings had also killed my chance to ask about liches. Damnit!

"While those who have attained Immortality," He gestured at me, giving a sign of respect. "Generally get custom curses. I will say, I’ve never met someone with an active Immortality skill who hasn’t used it, but hey, I learn something new every day. Candy?" He offered, holding his hand out while seamlessly transitioning from one thought to the next.

I accepted the hard ball of sweet deliciousness he called candy. As terrible as his brewing was, his little sweets were delectable.

"Right, curses." He got back on track. "Curses are an Immortal’s biggest weakness. They range from benign to downright lethal. Liches probably have it the worst." Aegion finished up, as Awarthril smoothly stepped in.

"Pine trees over there! They’re super cool, they stay green all year long. Their sap is a pain to deal with though."

Awarthril kept lecturing about pine trees, which I was all too familiar with. I wasn’t going to interrupt though - it’d be rude, and maybe she knew something I didn’t.

"... and the resin is interesting though. Wood, Forest, Ooze, and, of all things, Decay can handle the stuff or be affiliated with it."

See! Knowledge! No [Passionate Learning] levels though. Ah well, they were slowly trickling in anyways.

"Liches can’t make more of themselves." Aegion started back up from where he’d been interrupted. "Every lich that exists was made during creation. At the same time, they’re nearly indestructible."

The topic was interesting enough that Awarthril decided to butt in.

"You’re going to get cursed one way or another. You should consider just getting it done and over with."

"Nah, that’s silly." Serondes dismissed. "Enjoy life as much as you can. Enjoy the sun. Enjoy food. Enjoy being able to cross running water. Enjoy seeing things, feeling, hearing. Drinking. Warmth. Curses come in all shapes and sizes, and you never know if you’ll catch White Dove on a bad day."

"Yeah, rumors have it that being nice and polite to White Dove when she comes calling helps." Aegion added in.

"No, they say that being rude hurts." Awarthril retorted.

"Same difference." Aegion muttered, clearly unwilling to argue it further.

Be nice to the Grim Reaper. Got it. I didn’t think that was ever a question, but maybe I could get some birdseed or something? Hopefully it wouldn’t be pissed at all the times I’d dodged it, or yanked people out of its grip, or…

Shiiiiiiiiiiit I’d probably pissed off Black Crow something fierce already.

Which brought me to the next logical question.

"What’s the elf curse?"

The three elves stopped walking, going very still. They all traded looks with each other.

"I can’t tell you." Serondes finally answered.

"It’s taboo." Aegion added in.

"Any elf let slip what our curse is? The Wardens move in, kill everyone who spilled the secret, the people it was told to, and anyone who could’ve remotely heard it." Awarthril added in. "They do so in a very public manner. Don’t ask. Don’t even think about asking. And don’t say you ever did ask."

I shut up. Message received, mood killed. Serondes and I stopped holding hands.

We walked in silence, the elves not even bothering with their lessons, as we entered the forest.

It was an old pine forest, large trees rising into the sky, coating the world in dark green light. Old pine needles crunched under our feet as we walked along. Cordamo flew off to explore, and Kiyaya, fur regrowing, oblivious to the mood, had fun rolling in piles of pine needles, horrifying Awarthril.

After some time, Aegion pointed off to the right.

"Cordamo’s found something interesting. Let’s go see?" He suggested, turning and heading off that way without waiting for our response.

The rest of us glanced at each other, shrugged, and followed Aegion. What else were we doing? I mean, sure, I wanted to get back home, but we were going roughly in the right direction anyways.

A bit of walking later, and we made it to a clearing. An old ring of stones, a campfire long cold was in the middle. Three ugly as sin statues, of large, humanoid creatures with hideous features and tusks were around the fire, in various poses of shielding themselves, looks of agony on their face. Someone had dressed the statues in frayed, rotting clothes. A tiny skeletal figure was in rusted chains between two of the trolls, time stripping away the flesh but somehow the skeleton itself remained.

"Well." Awarthril said, putting her free hand on her hip. "Speaking of curses. Trolls here have a nasty one. Turn to stone in the sunlight. An ironic curse, given their strong Light affinity."

I eyed the scene again, the statues taking on new meaning. Some clever creature had been captured by the trolls, and managed to keep them talking until sunrise. Said clever creature wasn’t clever or strong enough to break the chains though, and had joined his or her captors in death.

"Think there’s a settlement nearby?" Aegion asked, pacing around.

"Should be. Want to say hi?" Serondes squatted down near one of the trolls, intently looking at something on it.

"Um. Is that… wise?" I ventured.

"Hmm? Oh yeah, trolls are fine. Bit grumpy during the day." Aegion chuckled weakly at his own joke.

"Could even say they’re lifeless." Serondes added.

Awarthril punched him in the arm for that. The crack let me know I needed to work my magic on Serondes. Again.

The elves spent some more time poking around, and I did some of my own.

Old statues. That’s what I was getting out of this.

We trudged on, and hit a large clearing before the lonely mountain that was just kinda hanging out.

I was split on whether the solitary mountain was a whim of the gods creating the world, or a powerful Classer deciding that, yes, right here was just perfect for a mountain.

In the clearing were dozens upon dozens of statues of the same ugly creatures.

The one that immediately caught my eye was front and center, posed heroically. Defiantly. A deliberate act, facing the sun and turning himself into stone for eternity.

Others tried to mimic the pose, or do similar things. One was holding a rusted sword high, another had two rotted clubs. All seemed to want to show off, to prove how cool they were forever more.

Some just looked tired. Old, tired, weary. Done with life, finding a final end in the harsh rays of dawn. A burden, lifted from their shoulders.

One of the statues just looked like a sleeping figure. A deliberate statement? An absent-minded accident? A cruel joke? A successful murder attempt?

Quite a few of the statues were frozen in running poses, when they hadn’t fallen over and broken. Trolls who had stayed out too late, and were caught by the sun, instantly turning to stone mid-stride. Most had been laid flat on the ground, cracked into many pieces as their leg never caught their final stride. A few lucky ones were still upright.

One broke my heart. A troll, curled up protectively, making a shield with her body. A tiny stone face, peeking out from an arm. A mother’s final act of sacrifice, of protection, rendered moot by a child’s inability to understand the dangers of the sun, and why mom wasn’t moving anymore.

One area seemed to be set up as an altar, with a number of trolls in fresh-looking robes preserved forever, the height of some ceremony captured for all who passed by.

Here and there were stone feet, the trolls for whatever reason deciding some petrified brother or sister of theirs no longer worthy to be part of the gallery.

One troll had his pants around his ankles, clearly in the middle of relieving himself when he got turned to stone. The statue looked fresh, and I had to wonder - drunk, or one last defiance?

Then we were at the yawning mouth of a large cave, and Awarthril called in a language I didn’t understand. Grunts and snarls came out of her mouth rapid-fire, echoing down the cave.

We waited a few moments, then a different set - I assumed - of grunts and snarls came back, and Awarthril’s face lit up.

"Oh good! They’d love to have us for dinner!"

"Uh, wait, what?!" I said, my words falling on deaf ears as the elves and their companions happily entered the cave.

Well. Time to meet trolls, I guess.

Chapter 243 - Fall Festival I

We entered the cave, walking deeper and deeper without seeing a soul.

"Where are they?" I asked, seeing minor signs of civilization. Worn footpaths, some doors closing off side-passages.

"What, you think they hang out near their lethal enemy? Nah, they’re all deeper in." Serondes replied.

We went a bit deeper, finally emerging into a large cavern, haphazardly lit with torches jammed into the wall. Trolls were scattered about, sleeping on and under piles of furs, while only a few signs of civilization were around. Some stretched tannery racks, a couple of crude firepits, a big horn, from an elephant or a triceratops or something equally large, some extra-wide bowls with weird chunks floating in it, and other signs that made me think that the trolls were basically a stone-age civilization, without too many aspirations for more. Most of the trolls were snoozing, with a few grumbling and rubbing their…

Well. Not their eyes. They were making the motions though.

Almost all of the trolls were wearing bone masks. Each one was the skull of some animal with a few bright, artful, jagged lines painted onto them. The only ones without a mask were the younger, smaller looking trolls.

"Should we really have come while they’re sleeping?" I whispered over.

Awarthril pursed her lips.

"I… no." She finally admitted, sounding pained to admit any sort of fault or failing. "But we’re here now!"

The biggest, baddest troll, with the largest mask came over, and started to snarl and grunt at us. Awarthril turned back, and started snarling and grunting of her own, an entire animated discussion erupting between them. More of the trolls woke up, some of them joining the conversation, others rolling over and piling more furs over their heads. I did a quick [Long-Range Identify], and universally, they came back as [Warriors]. Their levels were all over the place, from kids at level 20 or so, to shades of orange that I wasn’t familiar with.

Higher level than the elves, that’s for sure.

The big, bad troll was a lime-green, which told me nothing other than "stronger than the Inevitable Shluggoth".

I looked at Aegion and Serondes, who were eyeing the cavern and looking at the trolls respectively.

"Do either of you speak troll?" I asked.

Aegion shook his head, good naturedly replying.

"Nah, I never bothered. Like, I should, and one day I will, but it’s a niche language in the first place." Aegion shrugged. "Think they’re up for some beer?"

Serondes and I looked at him with equally horrified looks.

"They’ll murder us in our sleep!" Serondes protested.

"Poisoning people isn’t nice." I rebuked.

Aegion looked offended, muttering under his breath. Something about "I’ll show you all!" and other stereotypical villain one-liners.

Finally, finally Awarthril finished her conversation with the trolls. Or at least paused.

"Hey! Autumn Equinox is coming up, and the trolls throw a huge party. I figured I’d check with you all, but do we want to spend a few days here, and party with the trolls?"

"YES!" Aegion jumped in with such ferocity and vigor, that it completely killed the objection that had been forming on my lips.

I did want to get back home, and the fact that it was mid-autumn was a nice kick in the pants that I really should get moving. However, Aegion clearly wanted this, and wanted it badly. He’d always given off "party animal" vibes, and with the prospect of a party coming up?

Cordamo was furiously nodding his head, long sibilant hisses indicating his approval of the idea.

Serondes and I looked at each other.

"Sure, why not!" I agreed, trying hard not to dampen Aegion’s enthusiasm.

"I think we should stick around a bit." Serondes agreed.

"Would you mind if we speed up a bit after this though, to make up for lost time?" I threw on my best puppy dog eyes at Aegion.

"I’ve got no issue with that." He said.

"We seem to be in agreement then. Hang around for the festival, then hurry up?" Awarthril asked.

Nods went around the circle.

"Right! Let’s set ourselves up outside of their cave. Wouldn’t want to intrude." Awarthril snarled at the trolls, communicating our new plan, and our desire to stick around for their festival. The troll was clearly happy, slapping Awarthril on the shoulder so hard that she nearly fell over.

Such a love tap would literally flatten me, and I was extra-happy with Awarthril’s plan on setting up our camp outside.

We left, and Serondes started to make a modest hut, for all of us to share together. I eyed it, a sneaking suspicion percolating.

"We’re worried about the trolls, aren’t we?" I asked.

"I’m not." Serondes replied.

"You should be." Awarthril glared back. "Their chief is triple my level, and trolls aren’t known for their strong sense of justice. They dislike something? They smash and kill it."

"Why are we staying?" I asked the obvious question.

"Because it’s a party!" Aegion happily jumped in, already taking out his barrels. Had they somehow managed to multiply while we weren't looking? I looked at them skeptically.

"What are the odds that Aegion’s shit beer gets us all killed?" My question wasn’t rhetorical.

"High." Serondes was eyeing the barrels. I could practically see sabotage in his eyes. Heck, I would help.

"Low. We’re here because they’ve asked nicely, and we don’t go through life being rude. As long as we don’t do anything to massively piss the trolls off, like drag their kids into sunlight or something, we’ll be fine."

"Or poison them all with bad beer." I muttered under my breath. Everyone heard me of course, but Awarthril bulldozed on.

"Look at Elaine here! She flew over to us, and she’s a fraction of our level. The world is full of imbalances. Just because we’re on the wrong side of it for once, doesn’t mean it’s something to be avoided." Awarthril pointed out.

"It’s the handshake problem." I realized.

"What’s that?" Aegion asked, busying himself around the barrels.

"Pretend a room of ten Immortals all have the same curse. They can only shake hands with someone shorter than they are. How many handshakes occur?"

The elves spent a moment thinking about it.

"None." Serondes said.

"Exactly!" I paused a moment for the rest of them to digest the idea.

"With that being said, hanging around people with a reputation for violence isn’t the best idea."

I completely ignored the hypocrisy of my own sentence with my history. Rangers weren’t exactly known for peaceful mediation, and Artemis had killed a kid in cold blood the first day I’d met her. In hindsight, not exactly the most stable people to go running off to.

Then again, what other options did 14 year old me know of? I at least knew and trusted Artemis, although I almost got wrecked by Julius not wanting me around. Got lucky in the end.

This situation didn’t call for luck, but I doubted I could convince the elves. I figured I’d give it a shot.

"No chance we could just…" My sentence trailed off as I saw Aegion’s crestfallen face, knowing the rest of my sentence before I said it.

"Look, look, it’ll be fine." He got up, and started walking around the hut, animated as all heck. "I’ll handle it. I’ll make sure everything goes alright, and the trolls won’t decide to tangle with us. Who likes attacking elves anyways? The troll’s old enough to know what happens. Just trust me, and if it starts to go sideways, I’ll take responsibility, ok? Hey, Awarthril, can you teach me some troll? Better for me to talk with them and negotiate all this."

I mean, it didn’t matter much if I was dead, but I reluctantly nodded.

Awarthril started talking more about the trolls and safety, and how it was going to be OK. I started to do some thinking.

If this went sideways, I was going to totally murder him.

Which brought up a question for myself - was it worth sticking with the elves? They had a hubris problem. They believed themselves to be nearly invincible.

No - that wasn’t quite it. It was close to the truth, but inaccurate.

They believed, with proper effort, that they could overcome any obstacle. The world, so far, hadn’t seen fit to smack them with a healthy sense otherwise. They were like teenagers in that sense, although they were a bit old to be acting that way.

Wait.

WAIT.

Was that the elven curse!? Were they doomed to a belief that they were superior to anyone and everything? Were they doomed to believe they could overcome any problem? Was White Dove forcing them into fights wholesale, to better collect?

It might be the case. Or, it could just be the case that life hadn’t ever gone poorly for them. They tackled the hydra, being a few hundred levels lower than it was. A smart hydra, in its lair, when almost half the team couldn’t do anything against it.

And they won. With some injuries, sure, but not anything they couldn’t have handled themselves with time and rest. Maybe, just maybe, they were as good as they thought they were.

And from the looks of the discussion, they were going to stick around.

Right. The only question was - should I stick around?

I briefly thought about Serondes, and his wonderful arms, and how we’d be in close contact together - going to a party together! - and acknowledged it’d be very nice.

I tried to put the thoughts aside, but I couldn’t deny that they were there, lurking in the background, subtly pushing me.

It came down to a risk-benefit analysis. By sticking with the elves, I had high level protection, a guide through these strange lands, multiple comforts that made traveling easy, and a map home.

Stacked on the other end was the occasional insane risk they took, regardless of the reason.

Powerful monsters roamed the world. Heck, even a relatively mundane goat had rammed the point home! No, protection was key.

I couldn’t ignore the fact that I liked the elves. They were nice traveling companions, and romantic feelings aside, Aegion and Awarthril were pretty cool. Sure, Awarthril was a bit too mothering at times, and Aegion’s constant attempts to poison us all were getting old, but there were never frictionless interpersonal relationships. I wanted to hang out with my friends more.

It wasn’t that close of a fight. Sticking with the elves was the best move, although maybe I wouldn’t get too deep into the party.

Or wait - could I get away with flying the entire time? Just be like, a one-woman lightshow? It’d keep me out of their grasp, while still participating.

"Elaine? Everything ok?" Awarthril asked me. Going into the "thinking tank/Bubble of Contemplation" hadn’t gone unnoticed.

"Hmmm? Oh, yeah!" I snapped out of it. "Was just thinking. What now?" I asked.

"Let’s go hunting!" Aegion finished tweaking something on one of his endless barrels. I wrinkled my nose, and slipped my arm into Serondes’s.

"Any chance you could make a hut for the two of us?" I batted my eyes shamelessly at him. Anything to not sleep with Aegion’s noxious messes nearby.

Plus, we would have our own little cuddle-corner! Win-win.

"Yeah sure." Serondes replied.

"Hunting time!" Aegion whooped, getting out his bow. "Let’s go!"

We all exited the hut, and I got to see what, exactly, Aegion’s definition of "hunting time" was.

Cordamo took off, flaring his wings and making large circles, high up in the air. Aegion went still, closing his eyes - all the better to see through his bond’s eyes, the two of them sharing a special connection.

They snapped open as he smoothly drew his bow, making minute adjustments as he prepared his shot. Then he fired his bow with a thunderous roar, the arrow arching high into the sky with a crackle of Lightning, and a howl of wind.

Aegion squinted as he looked up, then cursed.

"Hate trying to shoot things through trees, always goes wrong." He muttered, nocking and firing three more arrows. Hand over his eyes, he went back to squinting, before nodding.

"Right. That way, about a mile and a half." He pointed, and Kiyaya and Awarthril traded looks.

"Small boar. Kiyaya could grab it." Aegion said, and the wolf in question was off like a shot.

More looking, another trio of shots, and Awarthril took a leisurely walk to grab his latest hunt.

Frankly, this was entirely unfair to the poor animals. They might have their own classes and skills, but surprise Lightning and Gale-empowered shots out of the blue? Without any warning that they were being hunted?

"Unsporting" came to mind, not that there was any such thing when it came to survival, instead of, well, sport.

Serondes finished making our sleeping spot, and Aegion promptly had instructions for him.

"Blackberry bush about two miles that way." He pointed up the mountain.

I glared murder at him. He smiled sweetly.

"Apple trees another half-mile east once you get there." He added on.

Serondes grabbed my hand.

"Let’s go before he gives us any more tasks." He started to walk, and I happily fell in step beside him, totally game for a romantic walk in the woods.

"Some honey on the way!" Aegion shouted out, giving one last instruction. I liked honey.

"What are the trees like where you grew up?" I asked.

"Oh, they’re things of wondrous magic! Few trees are truly mundane, with most having some special property or another. We grew Firewood, which gets its name from the fact that it burns far longer and far hotter than it has any right to. It gave me an early affinity for Fire, which is how I ended up taking Lava as my first class. I…"

Woo! Go team Fire!

I loved listening to Serondes talk, as we took a romantic walk through the woods. There was no need to hurry, no desire to rush.

We made it to the blueberries, taking a few pauses to kiss. Serondes made us a basket out of Lava, then, while we waited for it to cool off enough to not cook everything we were about to pick…

"She shoots! She scores!" I crowed out, as I tossed another blueberry into Serondes’s mouth. He snorted at me.

"Open your mouth skywards, and don’t move." He said, and I complied. He tossed a handful of blueberries up, and with some sharp whistles, they all neatly fell into my mouth.

Show-off.

Serondes - Sweet in my mouth, sweet on my mouth, sweet on the ears.

We went and picked wild apples next, chowing down on the hardy fruit that had somehow managed to eke out survival in the middle of the wilderness. They weren’t nearly as tasty as cultivated apples, but hey, couldn’t have it all.

I jumped as a triple booming roar of arrows flew by, Lightning crackling from them. Their sheer speed caused my hair to whip around me, although maybe that was the Gale empowerment on them.

A few minutes later, Awarthril jogged by.

"Hey Serondes! Elaine!" She waved at us.

"Awarthril! Catch!" I tossed her one of the apples, my stats making every move supernaturally smooth.

"Thanks!" She caught the apple and smoothly bit into it without breaking a stride, juice running down her chin. "Good stuff! Keep it up!"

We did just that, until Serondes’s basket was overflowing with nature’s bounty.

Then, hand in hand, we walked back to where Aegion was continuing his unfair hunting spree, to get our next task.

Chapter 244 - Fall Festival II

"Hey Serondes?" I asked as we were walking through the woods, back to Aegion and his growing pile of food.

"Yeah?" He replied, as I slipped my hand out from his.

"Piggyback ride!" I cried out, jumping onto his back, then clambering into position.

"OOf - what? Oh fine." He said, as I got one arm wrapped around his neck, one hand gripping his horn.

What else were they for, if not for great head handholds? And this was nice. Intimate, without any undertones.

Plus, going downhill was a lot easier than going up.

We leisurely strolled back to our staging area, where Aegion was standing next to a variety of woodland animals. Mostly small, boring herbivores of the dinosaur and mammal variety. Still! They were all going to be tasty, yummy yummy in my tummy.

"We brought the fruits!" I cheered from behind Serondes’s head.

"Great! Can you put them there, and Serondes, can you start cooking? Hoping to slow cook the entire lot, give the trolls something they haven’t tasted before." Aegion gestured to a spot. I slid off of Serondes’s back as he put the baskets down.

"Work work work." He muttered, as I kissed his cheek.

"Hey, let me do some of the cooking!" My motives were entirely selfish. I wanted to sear my piece juuuuust so.

"Eh, sure, grab the…" Aegion gestured to a small dinosaur that Kiyaya had clearly brought back. Kiyaya was a firm believer in either government taxation, in middlemen, or that the transporter deserved a cut. Either way, apart from the massive holes where Aegion’s arrows had half-blown the poor dinosaur in half, there were large wolfy bite marks all over. The choicest parts gone.

Happily, Kiyaya’s idea of the best pieces and mine were different.

Serondes glanced at what I was going to cook, and with a few sharp whistles, sliced the entire thing apart. No deboning for me! No digging out entrails! Just easy peasy cook mode!

"Thanks! You’re… the best!" I gave him another kiss, then skipped over to my portion of the cooking.

I noticed a hair too late that Aegion had hijacked all the fruit - he had asked for them anyways, but half got dumped into the large pit Serondes was making, while the rest vanished into a barrel that was already belching purple smoke.

I stayed upwind of whatever terrible brew Aegion was working up this time. For novelties sake, I grabbed some rocks, and cleared out a circle for a firepit.

"Why didn’t you ask me to make that for you?" Serondes asked, sounding a bit hurt, practically appearing outta nowhere. I jumped.

"Ack! Thought you were busy." I said. He swept me in his arms for another kiss, which I greedily reciprocated.

"Tell me if you need anything." He said, his hands doing a bit of wandering down my back.

"Oh, I will." I tried to purr it back, to sound all suave, and, well…

Lemme just say it didn’t work. Serondes went back over to deal with the large pit he was handling, as Awarthril came back with another poor sniped animal.

Honestly, I was starting to feel bad for the animals.

"Aegion! This place is a mess!" She scolded him, sweeping a critical eye over the haphazard operation he was overseeing. "I already told you to clean it up once, and, tsk." She finished, bustling around and getting things swept up.

"Also, if nobody objects, I think we should switch to a night-day cycle. Be nice to chat with the trolls, instead of one of us always sleeping." Awarthril was happily chatting away. "We so rarely get to talk with one of our kin like this, and it’d be a shame to just snooze the time away."

"I agree!" I chimed in, for totally different reasons. I didn’t want the trolls thinking that Elaine was on the menu, and taking a bite while I was sleeping. Awarthril was still going round, cleaning up, and with some minor Awarthril-induced guilt, I looked at my campfire area. I had some scraps here and there, which I’d normally not think twice about...

I used some short bursts of high-powered Radiance to remove the evidence of the mess where I was cooking.

"Honestly." She tutted at Aegion. "We’re guests here! We can’t be leaving a mess, and we need to leave a good impression on them."

She wandered over to my much tidier, much smaller little fire. Evidence removed! Well, mostly. I quickly scuffed over some burn marks in the dirt with more dirt, doing the camping equivalent of shoving it under my bed.

"Looks tasty! Good job keeping it clean over here. Much better than the boys."

I had no idea what to say to that, so I changed the subject.

"Hey! Anyone ready for another story?" I asked.

"Yeah!" Aegion’s voice echoed weirdly, and I looked over to see the elf head-first in one of his endless barrels.

"I’d love a story." Serondes’s musical voice floated over. I spent a moment looking at him, dozens of small skills - like his mage’s hand made of sand, hey that rhymed! - zipping around, all for the mundane task of cooking.

In my moment of distraction, Cordamo struck, diving down into my campfire and stealing half of my dinner.

"Cordamo!" I shouted, taking flight and chasing after him. "No! Bad couatl! That’s mine!"

Kiyaya didn’t help matters by rolling over and laughing from the ground, as Cordamo furiously flapped away from me. With the way his head was jerking, he was chowing down as fast as he could, eating the evidence of his crimes.

A pair of hands, large enough to belong to a giant but made out of Sand, erupted from the ground, seizing Cordamo, bringing him down to Serondes who was glaring at the poor beast.

With one last huge swallow, the evidence of his crimes vanished down his greedy throat.

It was with murder in my mind that I started telling stories as night started to fall. I was aware that the trolls would show up soonish, but eh. Until then, it was story time.

"Let me tell you all the tale of the serpent Python and the god Apollo…" I started, thinking of the first tale I knew where the snake died.

That was the theme for the evening. Apollo slaying Python. St. Patrick and the snakes. Thor versus Jormungand - slightly edited. Perseus and Medusa.

With pointed glares I told the story, and Cordamo seemed to have gotten the message. Steal my roast, get roasted in the stories.

The trolls were out and about though, and a few passed by our campsite, giving us uneasy looks. Awarthril just snarled at them - somehow, in a friendly way - and they mostly passed.

A couple of maskless trolls hung out near the edges of our campground, grunting and snarling to each other. Most of them were wearing loincloths, and I wish I could say it was all of them. I watched them warily, as they were eyeing us. The maskless trolls were, as a rule, all smaller and lower level, which made me think they were young.

Young, and stupid. Not a great combination.

Awarthril snarled and grunted at them, and beckoned them over. With a few sniffs, and some quick talk among each other, the trolls cautiously, then with increasing boldness, wandered over.

They were sniffing around our cooking, and Awarthril generously gave them a rack of ribs to split, while Serondes and I were cuddling. Aegion was running around - once with his hair literally on fire, but generally normal busybodyness.

The young trolls happily tore into our offering, and through the trees, I saw the occasional flash of white, another older, meaner troll keeping a wary eye on the young ones.

One of the trolls, emboldened by our generosity, reached into the fire pits to grab another slice for himself. Awarthril yelled at him, and he yelled back, the two of them arguing in trollish. Some of the other young ones piled in, and I got the general gist of it from the body language displayed.

In short, they felt entitled to more. Their reasoning was obtuse, but "dumb entitled kid" was a truism the world around.

Awarthril was holding firm though, and the caretaker trolls was just watching from the dark woods, the lines on his mask starting to glow.

The trolls tried to just grab the juicy stuff from the pit anyways, and Awarthril summoned dozens of chains, blocking off access.

"Serondes?" She called out sweetly, in the "you better do something now." voice. Serondes gave me a quick squeeze, then Lava flowed out in a narrow trickle, expanding and completely covering up the food, to better slow cook it without greedy little troll hands dipping in.

The trolls sulked off, kicked the ground and generally acting like rowdy, disappointed teenagers with no respect for other people’s property. Growth spurts and teenage years made barbarians out of perfectly reasonable, civilized people. I had no illusions that in a tribal, barbaric society that it’d pull a reverse, and make civilized people out of brutes. It’d just make their risk-reward analysis even worse.

One of them started rifling through the discarded parts pile, just carelessly throwing parts all over the campsite.

"Come on! We had that all clean!" I protested, not caring that there was no way the troll would understand me. He looked at me, blew a raspberry, then carried on, throwing a cracked hoof my way.

[Mantle] flickered and stopped it, and I felt a hair smug as I beat Serondes’s shield. Go go instant shields! I could feel his grip on me becoming tighter, as he got a little pissed on my behalf.

Or maybe it was just on his behalf. We were cuddling, it was aimed just as much at him as it was at me.

With a triumphant squeak that tried to be a roar, the troll grabbed a boar’s head, raising it above his head. The other trolls crowded around, pushing and shoving, throwing crazy shadows in the poor light.

However, something pissed off the caretaker troll, and it stomped in with a roar. We all got to our feet, Serondes pushing me behind him, but we weren’t the target of his ire.

No, it was the troll holding up the questionable trophy that was the focus of his wrath. He stormed over, the other trolls scattering before him, and with a snarl, he smacked the other troll so hard that he flew into a tree, a sickening crack as the troll broke dozens of bones.

Then I was off, jumping over a fire, running over to the troll, hoping I’d get there before…

Well, shit.

I felt all sorts of dumb.

With a grumble and more cracks, the troll’s bones all reformed, and with a series of grumbles, the troll just got back up. With an evil look towards us, he and his fellow teenager trolls stalked off into the night. With one last look at us, the caretaker troll followed.

"Well then."

We stayed up for the entire night, watching the trolls. I claimed a nice spot in Serondes’s lap, and with all the energy of a new couple, we were able to keep ourselves well entertained. To Aegion’s disgusted noises.

After one bout of kissing, followed by fake retching noises from Aegion, I’d had enough.

"Your actions make me want to retch as well." I pointed to the barrels. Aegion mimed taking an arrow to the heart and falling over.

"Ack! Awarthril! Save me, our little Attained Immortal has barbs!" He called out, lying in the dirt. Awarthril probably just rolled her eyes - I had no idea, I was busy looking at Serondes’s.

"You totally deserved that." She said, staying out of it.

Aegion, at the very least, was something of a good sport about things, and left us well enough alone. I considered asking Serondes for more magic lessons, but…

Kissing and touching was just far too much fun at the moment. From what I’d seen and heard, this phase would pass, the frantic energy and enjoyment of each other was just a passing phase. Magic could wait for another day, I had unlimited new days.

This? This was for but a moment, a brief flash in the pan, as I felt my connection with Serondes growing deeper by the day.

Before light even touched the horizon, a long, low hornblast blasted out from the direction of the troll’s cave. We saw flashes of trolls bounding through the forest, some with game, some without, as they tried to make it back to the cave before the first light of day.

The horn stopped before dawn broke, and we retired at the same time.

"Hey, scoot over." I nudged Serondes as I crawled into the same hut as him. I had asked earlier, and, well, I was ready to take the next step.

Sleeping together!

A lack of proper sleeping clothes was a pain, but bless Mistweave for being easy to work with. As Serondes shifted over, I took off the basket made out of woven glass, carefully lifting the egg up and readjusting its temperature, then re-tying it off with [Persistent Casting].

Serondes seemed to have some ideas in mind, transmitted by his eyes and the way he was looking at me, but I was tired. I just wanted some cuddles and sleep, preferably being cuddled to sleep.

We shifted and turned, and I found myself staring into Serondes’s magical eyes, our noses touching. His hand rubbing up and down my side.

"Good night - err- morning Serondes." I said, trying to put the emotions and words that were so hard to properly hammer out into my tone, conveying affection in my tone.

"Good night Elaine." His voice was magically musical as always, and he closed his eyes and went to sleep.

Awww. Happy feelings welled up inside of me, as I tried to fall asleep, our noses practically touching, my arms around Serondes. It’d be so romantic! Holding the egg in the hand that was over Serondes was a bit weird… but I’d make it work. I hoped. The whole romantic aspect was slightly dampened by the fact that Serondes wasn’t holding me back, buuuutt… eh. I’d live. Maybe tomorrow night?

Except for his hot breaths, breathing out stale air right into the space I wanted to breathe in. And my arm rapidly getting numb and tingly. I tried to gracefully extract it, but there was no easy way without disturbing Serondes. After what must’ve been ten minutes or so of staring at him, and trying to get comfortable enough to sleep while also getting a good look, I resigned myself to turning over and sleeping.

The idea of two people sleeping, practically kissing in their sleep was super romantic.

The practical execution? Just didn’t work.

Shame.

Chapter 245 - Water Worries

I was rudely awakened in the mid-afternoon by Serondes practically rolling onto me. I had a brief moment of panic, thinking I was under attack, before realizing what was going on and calming down.

Didn’t make the bicep to the face any more pleasant though. The bicep in my face was pleasant though!

Then I had another panic attack as I realized I might be squashing my poor egg! I shot my hand out, breathing a sigh of relief as everything seemed fine.

Just how tough was this egg!?

Serondes was, at this point, half-hugging me in his sleep, his arm wrapped around me. However cute it was, however nice it might be, I was awake, I had needs, and I wanted to be up and about.

"Geroff you big oaf." I murmured as I wriggled free of his grasp.

"Mmmm, mornin honey berry." He groaned, then turned over.

My heart did a little flutter at that.

"Honey berry?" I poked at him.

The mighty Serondes is sleeping. This beautiful elf has enough Lava magic to entomb me instantly!

I’ma poke him with my finger.

The lazybones just kept snoozing away. I rolled my eyes, and grabbed the glass basket.

I settled the egg into it, made sure it was warm enough, then left the hut.

I wanted to squeal in excitement! We’d slept together! I had a nickname! I liked nicknames. Loved my own name as well, but!

"Morning Elaine! Did you sleep well?" Awarthril asked, while Aegion waggled his eyebrows suggestively. I wanted to throw something at him, but didn’t have anything handy. I just flipped him off, and sat down at the table that Awarthril had pulled out, along with numerous healthier non-barbeque foods.

"Slept alright! How about you?" I asked, taking a bite of breakfast.

So good. New goal in life: Get an elvish cook. I could probably trade a favor somewhere down the line for a cook for a year or two.

"Oh, I slept fine, thanks for asking!" Awarthril was extra-cheery this morning. Aegion just nodded, then a small puff came from one of his barrels. He was off like a shot.

"No. NO no no NO NO!" He cried out at something going terribly wrong with his moonshine. He hurried over, and banging noises started coming from his direction.

I didn’t want to know how cooking liquids ended up with banging. Ignorance was bliss in this case. I had no desire to level up [Passionate Learning] here.

"Wanna move the table a bit?" I asked Awarthril, jerking my head towards Aegion and the now-shaking barrels.

"I think that’d be wise." Awarthril agreed, and with a bit of effort, we shifted things over such that a catastrophic explosion would only wreck half the table.

I finished my morning ablutions - we’d camped out near a small stream for ease of access - and got back to the campsite.

The elves had everything. Including a towel, which I was using to dry my hair.

"Hey Awarthril?" I asked.

"Yes Elaine?"

"I’m all for helping Kiyaya, but, like, right now I’m getting close to no experience. Do you have any ideas on how I can get a ton of experience to help out?"

The question had been bugging me. Awarthril had wanted me to level up a bit, but didn’t seem to provide a good way how. Like, the fight with the hydra had potential, but no. She’d been against me even participating. It was frankly impossible that she didn’t know how classes worked and got experience, and it was only natural that I would need to fix people up to get more experience.

Which led back to the question - if I was wrapped in silk, living in a bubble, how would I ever struggle enough to level?

"Oh, there are programs for people to level back in the Tympestshard Council." Awarthril blithely replied. "It’s faster for some classes, and slower for others. Healers are a mixed bunch, where depending on how many of you there are, you’ll level faster or slower. I’d front the entire fee of course, provided you give restoring Kiyaya an honest shot." She flapped her hand like it was nothing.

Huh. I suppose the elves were a bit more with it and cooperative than humans were, and had industrialized leveling in a way humanity hadn’t figured out.

I almost asked why she was here and not there, but remembered that she was looking for something for Kiyaya. Aegion didn’t seem too interested in levels, more in searching out new and exotic items for his drinks.

Why was Serondes out though? I thought he wanted levels. I’d have to ask him.

We hung out a bit and chatted, and while talking was fun, I was feeling a bit antsy.

I needed a hobby that I could do on the road.

Well. Last time I was bored on the road, I wrote the Medical Manuscripts. I should do that again, give a copy to the elves.

"Hey Awarthril, got some paper and ink?"

"A few sheets, why?"

I kept the disappointment off my face.

"I was hoping to write you a copy of my Medical Manuscripts."

"Hmmmmm. That could be nice! Sadly, no, we don’t have enough paper for it."

"And we’ve got no spare books I could scrape and overwrite." I added in.

Asking about books had been one of the first things I did, especially when we’d spent that time with Tyriss and I’d been bored.

Serondes appeared a while later, blinking the sleep out of his eyes. I bounded over, as excited as a puppy, and wrapped my arms around his neck, giving him a kiss that he greedily reciprocated.

My mind whirled as we kissed, and I came up with a nickname on the spot.

"Morning lazy lips!" I greeted him. I had the best naming sense. He gave me a Look - he must like it! - and his mouth was in the middle of opening when an almighty bang came from Aegion’s direction.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Naming]! Would you like to replace a skill with [Naming]? Y/N]

Naming: You need serious help. Please seek professional help, or better yet, stop giving out names. Dramatically improved naming sense per level. Not that this is a high bar to clear.

OH COME ON. It wasn’t that bad.

Right?

It wasn’t that…

Ok, I guess I was calling my boyfriend lazy, and also somehow implying he was a terrible kisser at the same time. Maybe that wasn’t my best name, but I’d been busy when I came up with it!

Serondes cursed at Aegion, spitting foul invectives at him.

"You Pachy-fucker! It’s first thing in the afternoon! Don’t you dare have that blow up on us!"

Aegion whirled around, brandishing a ladle at us. Well, mostly Serondes.

"Yeah!? Well, you’re a -"

Aegion glanced at me, and swallowed his words, instead throwing a one-figured salute at Serondes. A hissing of steam from yet another barrel, and he was back at it.

I slipped my arm into Serondes’s.

"Why don’t we go for a nice walk?" I suggested. He half-shook me off, freeing himself. Missing my crestfallen face - unless he had eyes in the back of his head - he headed over to the breakfast table.

"Sure, give me a few minutes to eat and wake up and everything else." He grumbled.

That… was fair enough. I could be grumpy rolling out of bed.

Serondes grabbed food with rapid, practiced efficiency. I followed along, because I wasn’t doing much else. He ate, then we went for a walk in the woods.

We made some idle chit-chat, then I remembered what Awarthril had said about leveling methods.

"Hey, Awarthril mentioned something about leveling up in the Tympestshard Council? What can you tell me about that?" The fallen pine needles crunched in a most satisfying way under my feet.

"Oh, the Academy? They’re slow. They’re alright for crafters and healers and the like, but for anything involving fighting, they’re close to useless." Serondes’s tone made it clear what he thought of them. "I briefly attended, but found them worthless. Soon after, I heard about the Shimagu." He shrugged. "Here I am."

He had mentioned something about schooling before this adventure in his life story before, but it was good to get the details. Also nice to hear confirmation that it was decent for healers. Given the level the elves were working at, it sounded like a decent place to head. Go home, talk with everyone, make sure everyone was OK and alive, turn back the clock so everyone would stay alive, then head back out? Help the elves with the Shimagu, head to their Academy, get a ton of levels, upgrade [The Stars Never Fade] to work on Kiyaya, head back home?

Sounded like a solid 10-year plan. Like any of my 3-year plans had ever worked out. I think the best I’d ever done was two years at Ranger Academy.

No wait. That was half-interrupted by the frontlines. It wasn’t exactly standard.

Hmmm. Roughly 21 months traveling with the Rangers I guess? Even that hadn’t quite gone to plan… more like 18 months of traveling had gone to plan. Which was roughly the same as the part of Ranger Academy that had gone to plan.

"Hey, wanna play a game?" I asked Serondes, having an idea in mind. He waggled his eyebrows at me.

"Only if there’s kissing involved."

"Oh, there is." I tried to flirt back, somewhat successfully.

"Well then, I’m all ears." He took me in his arms. I shuffled the egg basket out of the way.

Must. Not. Make. Ear. Joke.

"Elaine!"

I was tackled by an oddly familiar grown up human woman, much taller and stronger than I was. It took me a moment to process what I was seeing.

Who I was seeing. In the middle of a forest in the middle of nowhere, far from any human lands.

"Lyra!?" I exclaimed. "But? What? How?!" I asked, confused to see her alive, and from her energetic greeting, well.

She just laughed.

"Sorry about that! I was never going to get anywhere in Aquiliea, not with the way my parents were. You saw them, what they wanted me to be and do."

She clenched her fist.

"Never." She spat out. "That was never going to be me. No, I faked my death and escaped."

"I saw the System message! We burned your body!"

"Oh, I just faked that."

Joy, impossible hope welled up inside me.

"And you’re alive!" I cried out, hugging her. Letting tears stream out, letting go of the guilt that had plagued me for over a decade, for more than half my life.

"I’m alive! And I’m not going anywhere!" Lyra said, and I woke up with a gasp, headbutting Serondes in the nose. His arms were wrapped tightly against me, and I struggled free as he woke up with a swear, his hand going to his face.

"Owe! Elaine, what was that for?" He complained at me, as I sat up, heart racing.

"Just a dream. Just a bad dream." I spat the last part out. "A fucked-up dream."

Serondes pinched his nose, massaging it.

"Well, it was just a dream. Everything’s fine honey berry. Next time, try not to headbutt me." He said the last part teasingly, trying to lighten the mood.

"Yes, I’ll make sure to control my sleeping self better. Like you and your elbows." I drily responded, putting the egg in the basket and getting up.

"I’m too awake now, you should get some more sleep." I told Serondes on my way to the door. I swear he was asleep before I left.

Would it have killed him to be a little more comforting? Then again, he’d demonstrated remarkable consistency with being grumpy after waking up. Everyone had their own little quirks, and I was no different. He was perfectly pleasant once he’d had time to wake up.

In time, everyone else got up.

"Big party tonight!" Awarthril brightly cheered as we were all sitting around the table. "Everyone ready? Everyone excited?"

I was less than thrilled by the idea of partying with the trolls. There had been a different violent episode each night, and those were just the ones we could hear and see. The troll’s natural insane regeneration meant they were more than happy to brutally tear into each other, knowing that nothing they did would be lethal to each other.

Aegion glanced up from a mug he was carving out of wood, large enough for troll hands to get an easy grip on.

"Yeah! Things are going great! I’m super excited and ready for this!"

Aegion threw his arms up in the air, his sentence punctuated by one of his barrels blowing its lid cataclysmically, spraying us all with…

Beer would be too generous a term for the goop that was raining on us.

The five of us exchanged looks, as Aegion rushed over to his barrel.

"No! No no NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" He cried out. Serondes wiped a smear of liquid off his robes with a displeased look.

"Why don’t we all wash up before the party?" Awarthril’s words were nice, but her tone was anything but. If looks could kill, Aegion would be my newest source of healing experience. Kiyaya was whining as she licked her short fur, trying to get everything out.

When Team Mom suggested we wash up, it wasn’t exactly a suggestion. Still, I was all too happy to get cleaned up.

Aegion took a moment to extract himself from his latest disaster, pointing eastish.

"Lake’s that-a-way!" He reminded us, ducking back into his barrel.

Well, he was atoning somewhat. Grabbing some towels, we headed off towards the lake, leaving a trail of poorly-fermented beer in our wake.

"Cordamo! No! Ack! Stop!" I yelled, as the couatl wrapped himself around my neck, starting to furiously lick at the beer stains on my shirt. I tried to rip him off without hurting him, but failed, flailing around as he had his way with me.

"A little help!" I asked, and a moment later a wedge of sand extracted Cordamo from me.

Serondes clicked his tongue at Cordamo, who hovered in the air, hissing angrily. The flying danger-noodle then half-tackled Serondes, furiously licking him.

Awarthril marched forward, determinedly ignoring the fiasco behind her. Kiyaya trotted along, but I felt obligated to help my boyfriend.

"Bad snake!" I wagged my finger at Cordamo, not wanting to get involved in the mess of thrashing limbs. Eventually, a much-molested Serondes broke free, and like an arrow, trailing a slipstream, Cordamo shot over to Awarthril.

Only to get bounced off of an Ooze-pad.

"Don’t you dare." Awarthril didn’t even look at Cordamo. He hissed his displeasure, but flew in lazy circles around us as we walked.

Hang on.

Hang on!

I’d been a dumbass! [Scintillating Ascent] improved by watching butterflies primarily, but I’d gotten some decent mileage out of hawks, crows, and flying dinosaurs. Cordamo should totally be on the list!

How had I not thought of this?

Serondes’s hand slipped into mine, and I was reminded why. General prejudice against scaly things, never making the connection between "flying snake" and "butterfly", and hot elves all conspired to knock the idea out of my head.

Speaking of.

I hadn’t been leveling that much recently, but maybe that was a good thing. I’d been in go-go-go life-and-death mode for far too long. Not leveling three times a week was normal. I could use some more normal in my life. Less screaming and murdering. Fewer limbs chopped off. Not increasing my "how many times have I stripped my old body" count.

Focus.

Squeezing Serondes’s hand, I watched Cordamo’s flight, whatever Serondes was trying to say to me going in one ear and out the other. I was a little busy here, studying his wings, the way they caught the air, how his body twisted and turned, snaking through the trees in a serpentine manner.

We made it to the lake without too much fanfare, and I wanted to keep studying Cordamo. Sadly, the couatl had other ideas, happily diving into the water and splashing around. I needed more time with the scale serpent.

"Hmmmmmmmm." Serondes eyed the large pond - small lake? - critically. "I’m going to make it better."

Saying that, the master got to work. Water hissed and boiled as Lava roiled underneath, creating warm spots and walled off sections. Arches of Sand criss-crossed the area, being flashed into glass by Serondes’s Lava overlapping with it. He started to whistle, carving and shaping the glass from the roughly-shaped forms it started with, into elegant flows.

It was like something out of a picture book when he was done. Glossy, hardened Lava formed multiple "bathing pods", while glass arched, crossed, and lined everything, creating an elegant and high-class look.

Everyone stripped and went to their own respective bath. Serondes had made a bunch, each one heated by a pillar of still-hot Lava, kept molten and warming the water near it by sheer mana expenditure.

"Want to join me?" I invited Serondes, as I stripped out of the Mistweave.

"Sure!" He eagerly agreed, slipping into the water next to me.

We spent some time touching each other. It was nice.

Chapter 246 - Dancing in the starlight

We made it back to the campsite as the sun was falling. I didn’t need to be carried back, but I was more than a little wobbly after Serondes’s tender ministrations. Aegion had been busy in our absence. Barrels were on their side, stacked neatly between two trees, each one with a tap. A number of the extra-large wooden mugs Aegion had been carving were neatly stacked in a pyramid beside them, for easy access.

More tables were out, and Aegion was somewhat antsy.

"Serondes! You’re back! Quick, crack open the Lava." Aegion was already prodding at one of the firepits, sealed off with Lava to preserve moisture and better slow-cook the food inside.

With a flicker of thought, the hardened Lava cracked open, and Aegion darted an extra-large fork in. He made a stabbing motion, then brought out one tiny whisp of meat.

"Right. This is… really well done." He eyed the meat, so tender it was all falling apart. "Why don’t we just raise it, and make the tables here?"

Serondes muttered something about his talents, but made it happen anyways. It made for an odd effect, the formerly somewhat well-laid out campsite now having a maze of altars with offerings of overcooked flesh.

"Food! Drink! Entertainment! We are ready to PAAAAAARRRRRRTTTTTYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!" Aegion crowed, getting into the swing of things as the sun cast longer and longer shadows.

"Woo! Woo! Wooo!" He chanted a few times, grabbing a mug and pouring off some of his beer. His energy and enthusiasm was infectious, and I could feel myself grinning.

Aegion filled up more mugs as the sun finished setting on the most balanced day of the year. He passed them out, and the trolls started to appear.

It was obvious this was something of a Big Deal for them. The trolls that had bone masks had fresh layers of paint on them, and paint crossed their bodies in primitive, tribal streak. I saw the same patterns repeated often enough to know there was some meaning to the paint, but not what it was.

They were also wearing their best furs. Even all the maskless trolls were wearing something.

They went to work with vigor, grabbing and ripping up numerous trees, then snapping them into thirds before piling them up. A number of other trolls vanished into the woods, moving at high speed with a hunched over pose. I’d eat my hat if they hadn’t gone out hunting.

Crude drums, leather pulled over hollowed out tree trunks, were pulled out and distributed.

One of the larger trolls went up to the pyre, and started to ritualistically dance around it. The other trolls formed a circle, beating on the drums in a slow beat, getting quicker. The largest troll was watching in what passed for fancy clothing - it looked like it had religious significance - surrounded by a few other priestly-looking trolls. While his displayed class was [Warrior], I could totally believe he had a [Priest] class in one of his other class slots. Low thrumming chants started, causing my heart to race without any skills being involved.

"They’re praising the god and goddess of Night and Darkness." Awarthril translated for us, as we stared transfixed at the scene. "They’re praising them for beating back Light and Sun, and encouraging them in their, ah, ‘eternal-forever never-ending fight-war-battle.’ That one’s a bit hard to translate."

Interesting. Given their minor issues with sunlight, it made sense that their religion would center around the sun, or lack thereof.

As the beat reached a crescendo, the pyre-troll threw his hands up. With a roar of flames, with a roar from the spectators, the entire pyre went up in flames.

"For whatever reason, the fire’s supposed to empower the gods." Awarthril commented, with an amused twist to her voice.

"Yeah, but the sheer ritual, power, emotions, mana, and if they’re up for it, offerings, will." Aegion pointed out.

Huh. Never realized. I just wasn’t all that interested in religion. I’d mentally made a note a few times to look into it more, but I was a little busy. Still, I re-added a note to not laugh at religion or the gods, because they were very real, and relatively active while being powerful enough to crush me like a bug.

That was the start of the festivities, as the hunting trolls came back one by one, simply skewering their prey whole near the bonfire and letting it roast like that.

One of the maskless trolls came back with some medium-sized dinosaur, the lizard abruptly ending halfway through, having been ripped in half. He hoisted it up above his head, and walked around the bonfire a few times. One by one, the other trolls noticed what he was doing, and started to give hooting approvals. The ones with drums started to do a drumroll, quickly picked up by the others.

"Oh interesting." Awarthril commented as we watched the troll throw the body into the fire, the entire thing vanishing into the roaring flames.

"That sure looked like an offering to me." I drly commented.

The flames spat, and a bone-white mask, the skull of the offered animal, came spinning back out. It tried to brain the troll that had thrown the offering in, but he deftly caught it, putting it on his face. Shouts and hollers of approval came from the rest of the trolls, half of the seemingly descending upon him. They hit his back with literal bone-breaking slaps of approval.

"Well, that troll’s now an adult." Awarthril translated. "First successful solo kill against a creature large enough to provide a mask, during…" She seemed to briefly struggle, then shrugged. "During a ceremony, I guess. Troll is hard."

A few animals were ritualistically thrown into the fire by the troll-priest, a few words were spoken, then the party expanded. It wasn’t just around the fire, now trolls were socializing, eating, dancing, grabbing a partner and vanishing into the woods.

"Sounds like the troll celebration is in parts." Awarthril finally parsed some of the words the priest said. "They celebrate each of the eight elements. This portion was celebrating Light, Dark, Wood, and Fire. It’ll end with a celebration of Water, Earth, Wind, and Metal."

some of the trolls were heading our way, sniffing at the enticing bounty we’d laid out.

"Let’s goooooo!" Aegion walked up to some of the trolls, and with just a few mimes, and a mug of his brew shoved into hands, he had two new best friends.

All without saying a word.

"I gotta check something real fast." I said, bringing the beer up to my nose.

It smelled… acceptable, and I gave it a try.

It was good! No wonder Cordamo had been trying to lick us all clean on the way to the lake.

"Whoa."

At my pronouncement, and more importantly, the fact that I went back for more, Serondes and Awarthril gave it a shot themselves.

Awarthril threw her emptied mug at Aegion, expertly hitting his head between the table of trolls that were sitting and drinking with him. It naturally bounced off his horns, but the message was…

Well, not really clear.

"Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiabargle! WHY CAN YOU SUDDENLY MAKE TASTY DRINKS!?" Awarthril yelled at Aegion. "We could’ve been drinking this the entire time, instead of your usual swill! Whyyyyyyyyyyy!"

Awarthril was practically crying, but that didn’t stop her from storming off to get another mug.

Serondes and I followed, then we raided the slow-cooked food. I grabbed some tender, honey-glazed dinosaur, while Serondes was favoring the apple juice pork.

Ew.

Pork.

Still, disliking pork was a personal preference of mine, and I wasn’t about to go around demanding nobody else eat it.

We tried to mingle a bit, and while Serondes fit right in. Not as naturally or effortlessly as the resident party animal, but Aegion was in his element.

I was not.

I was sticking with Serondes, and a fish out of water would’ve had a better time than I was having.

Ok, fine, maybe that was an exaggeration. Tasty food, and people I couldn’t talk with made it somewhat palatable.

Still, I felt my mind wandering away from the party, back to the last place I’d had a good party.

Home.

I was missing my friends, my family. I was missing the Rangers and Sentinels. Autumn. My parents.

Surely whatever nonsense was going on with that mess of a looming civil war had to be over by now? Hopefully between my letters, Night and the rest, and the fact that they were in frankly not terribly important positions meant that they’d be safe.

I couldn’t do anything from where I was, and I had to admit, with the benefit of hindsight and space, that my presence would probably increase the risk they were under. Night was right, I’d be pulled into the war one way or another - just on the basis of healing and fixing people - and that’d put a target on me. Put me on stage at the theater, in front of everyone. Get people looking at me, and at my friends and family, seeing if there was a way to influence me through them.

Then there was the issue of actually getting home. I could try to take flight, and get home. I had a rough idea of the direction.

I also had a rough idea of the scale of the distance I was working with. The dwarves had believed that Lun’Kat was nesting somewhere in their mountains, and I’d exited from her lair. But the mountains I’d seen from both sides had seemed endless, and even with [Pristine Memories] I didn’t recognize any of the mountains. Heck, the trees were even completely different on this side of the mountain range! It gave me a new appreciation for just how big the area was.

I had close to no supplies or tools. I’d managed to make it work so far, but I didn’t know what terrain I’d face, what dangers were present. Was there a large sea in the way? Mountains? Forests with monsters over level 3000, a forbidden zone of the sky filled with flying castles and giants? Was there some lich king in a castle, ruling over a vast swath of land that I shouldn’t touch? Was there some magical cloud of rain that’d stick to me, trap and ground me?

Heck, forgetting all that. How many high-level goats would take offense to my presence? The dwarves had talked about vermillion birds, and how powerful they were. The dwarves, with a much higher average level than humans.

I knew nothing about the world outside of Remus. Inside of Remus I’d be fine. I knew what was what, I knew the dangers and threats. I’d be fine.

The deadzone was going to be incredibly unpleasant though. I wasn’t looking forward to the sick feeling from it, nor was I looking forward to my leveling rate getting cut. Ugh. Blech. I’d rather drink Aegion’s bad beer by the kegful first.

Also, I did have vague plans of leaving the dead zone again, and working with the elves to get some serious levels.

Focus.

Outside of Remus?

Well, I was willing to give it a strong shot myself. I’d been relatively happy traveling solo, but mostly because I’d had no other options. I wasn’t about to build a home on Lun’Kat’s doorstep and go "well, I guess I’ll wait here a few hundred to thousand years until humans find me again."

I had a team again. People that could protect me, that built shelters at night, who had supplies. Who, if it wasn’t for their sheer damn arrogance, could watch for threats at night. Who could fly up high and scout, who could smell problems on the changing breeze.

They were slow. They weren’t quite going to the same place. They took silly breaks, like this party with the trolls.

They were, on the balance of things, dozens of times better than traveling alone. I’d rather take the slower, steadier route home, than try to sprint home by myself and die. There was no seeing my friends and family in that case.

It was like my class selection all over again. I had the fast and risky option, versus the slower and safer option. On the balance, weighing the pros and the cons, the slower and safer option was better.

It wasn’t like my home was literally on fire, and my family needed rescuing right now. I hadn’t gotten an emergency letter saying I needed to be in a place this second.

Heck, part of my plan for once I got back to Remus was to hijack a Ranger squad and have them help me get back home. It was a horrible abuse of my Sentinel status, but I was allowed to, and I don’t think anyone would begrudge me getting some extra over-the-top help after I’d been on a single mission for over a year.

The worst that would happen is Night would yell at me for that. If he started, I’d just distract him with my adventures with Lun’Kat, and that’d just overshadow anything else I’d done.

Sentinel Dawn! Confessing all her sins at once, so the greatest one overshadows the rest of them!

I finished eating, and was eyeing up what new and interesting dinosaur I’d eat next, when Serondes interrupted my plans.

"My lady, would you like to dance?"

He had his best "romantic" tone, and given the innately magical quality of his everyday voice, I was entranced.

I also had no idea how elves danced, but eh. We’d figure it out on the fly.

"Of course!" I said, letting Serondes gallantly sweep me into his arms, then sweep me into the sky.

I snapped my wings open, not expecting my thought about "figuring it out on the fly" to be quite so literal.

As we held each other, moving through the air, pillars of glass formed around us, connecting to each other in elegant arches. A wave of Sand, then of Lava materialized below us, making a ballroom-like dance floor of glass. Serondes whistled softly, etching detailed patterns into all of our dance area. Small torches of Lava appeared in exacting ways around the edges. I contributed to the effect with a soft glow of Radiance, which bounced around crazily as it was refracted and deflected by all the glass.

[*ding!* Scintillating Ascent has leveled up! 313 -> 314]

I leaned in, and we danced under the stars, between the trees, inside the magical glass arena. I don’t know how long we danced, but Cordamo flew through at one point, and glancing down I could see the party kept going in full force, the trolls occasionally looking up and pointing at our display.

Being the entertainment was kinda fun! Extra-so that I could show off my super-cool wings, and give just a glimpse of day and sunlight to the poor trolls, doomed to live in the dark for eternity.

All good things must come to an end, and a few long horn blasts from the big troll indicated the start of the ending phase. The trolls gathered, and guttural grunts came from the big priest-troll to all the assembled trolls. Awarthril, with agile steps, jumped from branch to branch and nimbly landed inside the arena, where Serondes and I had stopped dancing.

"They’re doing the second part now, the last part." Awarthril translated. "Going to the holy-big-water, and venerating-praising-blessing the last four elements." She explained, as the trolls started to file off in a familiar direction.

My face paled.

"Hang on." I said. "The holy water?"

"Well, it could be translated as sacred, or revered." Awarthril hedged. "Nuances between different languages."

"Nevermind that." I waved her concerns away. "They’re going towards the lake."

"Yeah, and?" Serondes said, not seeing it.

"The holy lake that we just threw a ton of Lava and glass all over?" I confirmed. I hadn’t seen Serondes remove any of the improvements he’d made.

"Probably, why?" He asked again.

Awarthril twigged to what I was saying, as the last troll left in the procession.

"Praaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaghflpbflpbflpbflpbflpbflpbflpb. They are going to be so pissed." She said, with barely a whisper. Then she sprang into action.

"Aegion! Get those barrels packed away! Kiyaya! Go…"

Awarthril started barking out orders, jumping down from our dance area and grabbing the Spatial Box. The rest of us moved, following her every command.

"Go, go go!" She encouraged us as she blurred, grabbing all the various items we were throwing at her and unceremoniously dumping them into the Box. [Rubbery Rope]s sprang out, connecting to each of us.

An enraged roar came from the directions the trolls had gone, followed by dozens of overlapping noises of rage.

"Annnnnnnnnnd we’re OUT!" Awarthril shouted, picking up the box and running. The [Rubbery Rope] went taut, then started pulling me - and everyone else! - along in her wake.

Serondes was muttering angrily.

"How could I have known they’d take offense? I improved it!"

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 412740/412740]

[Mana Regen: 275034 (+356756)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 91]

[Strength: 941]

[Dexterity: 1468]

[Vitality: 11166]

[Speed: 11166]

[Mana: 41274]

[Mana Regeneration: 41363 (+35676)]

[Magic Power: 18178 (+340838)]

[Magic Control: 18178 (+340838)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 420]]

[Celestial Affinity: 420]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

[Center of the Universe: 420]

[Dance with the Heavens: 420]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 420]

[Mantle of the Stars: 420]

[Sunrise: 344]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 345]]

[Radiance Affinity: 345]

[Radiance Resistance: 345]

[Radiance Conjuration: 345]

[Solar Flare: 26]

[Nectar: 345]

[Sun's Heart: 345]

[Scintillating Ascent: 314]

[Kaleidoscope: 345]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 218]

[Egg Incubation: 47]

[Bullet Time: 420]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 395]

[Persistent Casting: 291]

[Passionate Learning: 379]

Chapter 247 - Perilous Purses

Awarthril ran through the woods, crate on one shoulder, Kiyaya bounding next to her, while the rest of us were attached to her, bouncing around like kites on a string. Cordamo flew next to us, the fast couatl keeping up, providing a strong gale to help carry us along.

For all I knew, he was also directly buffing Awarthril’s speed, but I had no way to tell. Kiyaya’s growls did seem to be doing something, not that I could get much benefit out of any buffs right now.

It was not particularly comfortable, extra-so since I was in the middle. I had [Scintillating Ascent] going, lighting up the woods around us, and trying to get some height.

Awarthril’s running kept pulling me down, the [Rubbery Rope] giving a strong downward pull, connected to me through Serondes. That would be manageable, if it wasn’t for Aegion behind me, taking long "speed leaps" to stay with Awarthril. That kept pulling me down in a second direction. I could handle the downward force from one of the elves, but not two. The end result was me bouncing me off the forest floor before I could regain my balance and fly back up, only for the ropes to pull me down again. It was like I was the biggest, slowest ball being dribbled along. Without the extra-tough skin.

None of it was dangerous, but it sure was painful, and somewhat embarrassing. One particularly nasty knock almost dislodged my egg, and I gave up.

I wrapped myself up with [Mantle of the Stars], saw that being bounced, then dragged along the ground wasn’t enough to blow the shield - although my mana was draining at an alarming clip - and called it good enough.

I basically half hamsterballed, half ball-skied my way out.

I did occasionally need to drop the shield to regenerate mana though, and I swear Awarthril went through every single bramble bush and every tree reached out to smack me when it happened.

Still, I shielded the egg, and after enough time had passed, I was able to expand my shield to fully protect myself again.

I was going to be ravenous after this.

The chase was short, as a new set of horn blasts heralded the rising sun, the trolls choosing not to get turned to stone for a futile chance of catching us.

We cleared the forest, Awarthril turning sharply to head north, and kept running.

Poor Aegion, stuck at the end of the line. He got snapped around like the crack of a whip. I just got tumbled around.

Honestly, once I’d determined I was safe, it was kinda fun. Except for the rocks. And the thorny bushes. Or the mud pit, that Awarthril gracefully jumped over and I went into face-first. Or the…

Ok, slightly less fun.

Awarthril kept running, with only the shortest breaks to take care of biological needs, and two days later, I just wasn’t having fun anymore.

"Do we need to keep going?" My voice was significantly whinier than I’d expected.

I got what felt like a judgemental yip from Kiyaya, and I gave her the evil eye.

"Listen you. You’ve got a fur coat, and you’re running on your own. I’m over here getting bounced around. So I don’t want to hear any sass coming out of your jaw."

Oh yeah. I was definitely cranky, to be grumping at the dire wolf who was literally as tall as I was, and whose jaws could casually bite me in half.

I didn’t quite think we needed to keep running, not with the trolls unable to handle the light. And, you know, the two days of putting distance between us and them. Awarthril started to slow down, then finally, blessedly stopped.

"Egarblegarglebargen." Awarthril had another one of her strange elvish curses. I was still taking notes on them, but I wasn’t getting too far. "That was a disaster. Serondes! What were you thinking!?" She yelled at him.

I didn’t think that was very fair, plus, he was my boyfriend. I jumped in.

"Hang on, you didn’t say anything when he was building the baths!"

"Also, I didn’t mean it. I had no way of knowing the lake was sacred to them! Without Aegion’s insistence on staying, that would never have happened." Serondes added.

Some of his reasoning seemed a hair suspect, but I brushed over it for now.

Much grumbling was had. Aegion was pissed that the party got cut short, nevermind that it had been winding down anyways. Awarthril was bothered that we’d been incredibly rude, left a mess, and ruined their sacred site. Serondes was irritated that everyone was blaming him for it going wrong.

I was unhappy that the elves were all yelling at each other, with the companions occasionally throwing in some noises of their own. Unhappy noises.

"Look, why don’t we all just… take a walk?" Awarthril’s growling noises as she suggested that kinda ruined the cooling-down suggestion she was making.

I turned on my heel and was out. The elves, so far, had been the epitome of arguing well. They didn’t try to murder each other, they didn’t try character assassination, they stayed on-topic. I blessedly didn’t get dragged into it, nobody attacking me for anything I did, and I wasn’t pissed at anyone. I did occasionally try to defend Serondes, but I didn’t want to get too involved in it all.

Maybe because I was more used to things going wrong, and rolling with the punches. The elves seemed to have things almost always go perfectly for them, and they were handling a minor defeat poorly.

Maybe that was their curse? Or could it just be tangential to it?

It was still too heated for me, and the fact that they hadn’t started a friendly brawl to work it out told me it was more serious than usual.

They’d been perfectly fine so far. I was all too aware that any one of the elves could snap me in half like a twig, and keep snapping until I was dead. I didn’t think it would escalate that much, but it was scary.

Serondes joined me a moment later, shoulders hunched over, muttering under his breath.

"Imbeciles. Idiots. Morons. Primitive brutes."

I wasn’t sure if he was talking about the rest of the team, the trolls, or both.

Either way, we took a long, angry walk together in silence.

Good thing Serondes wasn’t a storm mage, otherwise there would’ve been little clouds and lightning bolts around him.

We made it back, and with barely a word, in spite of the sun blazing high up in the sky, we set up camp.

I suppose we’d been awake for… time was hard to track with how long we’d been awake for. At least it was for me.

Blasted elves probably knew exactly how long we’d been up, to the minute.

For that matter, why did they even need to sleep!?

Serondes was either being petty, or careful, as he made six different huts, all spread out from each other. One per person, per companion. He didn’t say anything as he made them, but he was still fuming, as were the rest of the elves.

"Sleep well!" I said as I gave Serondes a quick peck on the cheek. He didn’t really reciprocate, but he did give me a one-armed squeeze in return.

As I laid down, staring at the glass ceiling - Serondes was really so thoughtful, he’d noticed how I hated being under stone and made it glass for me - I was somewhat conflicted.

On one hand, boo to being sent to my own place to sleep. I didn’t feel like Serondes had been particularly cuddly or attentive.

On the other?

Dude was mad, and was maybe just keeping a lid on things. Maybe he wanted his space. The glass ceiling showed some care and attention. Everyone else had their own sleeping spot.

This relationship stuff was hard. I should maybe talk with him about it. Unless he didn’t want to talk about it?

Argh!

I woke up to the evil eyes of the moon glaring down at me, baleful red light rudely interrupting my sleep through the glass ceiling. I groaned and rolled over, realizing that I wasn’t feeling all that sleepy.

Guess I’d gotten enough sleep. I did need to figure out wood or something non-transparent, non-stone alternatives for a bedroom.

I yawned and rolled out of bed, seeing Awarthril gazing up at the moons, a mug of something warm and steaming in her hands. I silently joined her, and she quietly passed me an already-prepared second mug. Kiyaya sleepily padded over from Awarthril’s side, then forced her head under my hand.

Hint taken. I started to scratch her absent-mindedly.

I wordlessly took the mug with a small smile, and we just watched the stars and the moon, sipping our drinks in companionable silence.

"Could’ve gone better." Awarthril eventually broke the silence. "I think we should go back and fix things."

I thought about it for a moment. It seemed like a good idea.

"Is there any reason not to?"

Awarthril gave a big, deep, pained sigh.

"The trolls will absolutely try to murder us either way. Heck, they might even be trying to hunt us down right now!"

She calmly sipped her drink after that dire pronouncement. I couldn’t figure if she was yanking my chain or not. We were days away from the trolls, who could only travel at night.

I figured I’d play along for now, and see what happened. I took a sip myself, the warm brew magically filling every inch of my body with heat, staving off the cold autumn air.

"What are we going to do about it?" I asked.

"Well, they can only travel half a night’s distance to try and get us, and we’re probably far past that range already. Once everyone finishes waking up, we’ll get going."

I noticed there was no mention of being tracked or not, or disguising our trail. More arrogance? Or against an entire tribe of creatures that went out and hunted their meal nightly, was trying to hide our tracks an exercise in futility?

I took another sip from my drink, spraying it all out as something landed and impacted on my shoulder. I slowly turned my head, only to see an owl, feathers as starry as the night sky, as beautiful as my [Mantle], looking back at me.

"Why hello there." I craned my neck back, just to get a better view of the bird. It was close!

"Whooo?" It hooted back, cocking its head at me.

"Whuuu." I tried to coo back.

"Whooo!" The owl cocked its head the other way, studying me.

"Whuuu!" New owl buddy!

A soft, soft voice whispered in my ear.

"This is almost exactly how Kiyaya and I met. Whoo knows?" Awarthril’s voice was quiet, just barely on the edge of my hearing. Kiyaya had gone entirely still to boot.

Bless the System, and all the stats it gave me. It gave me the strength to not groan and facepalm at the utterly horrendous pun Awarthril managed to slip in.

I decided to check what I was dealing with.

[Barn Owl] was the result, and that was an incredibly light shade. Low level, even by Remus standards. Possibly young, although that only spoke to a System and personal power aspect. It said nothing about character, personality, or drive.

"You are Sasha!" I declared, only for Sasha to dart her head forward, pecking me on the nose.

It hurt, but between my anti-pain skills, and general "don’t jump around the wild Celestial owl that’s trying to make friends with you", I didn’t flinch.

I felt something a little wet and greasy get pressed into my hands, then Awarthril slipped away, Kiyaya having silently removed herself.

Nothing that big and dangerous should be able to move that quietly. I was 99% sure at this point that Kiyaya had anti-sound skills, to make herself completely silent.

I stuck my tongue out at Sasha. No owl was going to bite my nose without consequences! The Consequences being the Dreaded Tongue Sticking!

Sasha immediately called my bluff, trying to peck my tongue. I rapidly sucked it back into my mouth, and glanced down at what Awarthril had stuffed into my hands.

Meat. Leftovers from the party, if the texture was anything to go off of. Not exactly appealing, with how long we’d been going for, but then again the Spatial Box seemed to have some preservation aspects to it. My stomach rumbled, reminding me that I was due a good long chow-fest.

I offered some up to Sasha, who looked quizzically at it, then darted forward, taking a neat bite of food, carefully not hitting my hand. I continued to hand-feed the feisty owl, not quite believing my luck. I wanted to stroke Sasha, but I didn’t want to risk startling her. Plus, my other hand was covering up the egg. I didn’t think there’d be a problem, but owl + easy food wasn’t a formula I wanted to play around with. I think owls ate eggs, anyways.

Sasha finished the treats, a content look appearing on her face. She then took flight, and I felt my heart plummet for a moment at the loss of my new owl friend.

However, all she did was fly in large circles in front of me, happily hooting.

"Whoo! Whoooo! Whoooooooooooo!"

I seized the moment to study the owl, her body practically vanishing against the night sky as her wings blended in perfectly, her flight entirely soundless apart from the noises she was deliberately making.

I had no way of telling, but it wouldn’t surprise me if [Scintillating Ascent] was going to evolve off of this. Given the skill’s incredibly flashy nature, I doubted it was going to get anything remotely related to visual stealth, but I could believe that my flight would get quieter.

I mean, it was already nearly completely silent, but maybe it’d do something with the air currents or something?

Either way - it was a nice chance.

An owl companion. I’d never thought of it, but it seemed nice. Owls and crows absolutely hated each other, and there was something appropriate there, about how I was constantly locked in mortal combat with Black Crow.

After a few loops tiring herself out, she landed back on my shoulder. I braced myself this time, but it was barely more than a light tap as she landed.

From my shoulder, she lifted a claw up, pointing it towards my face.

"What! Don’t you give me a faceful of claw! I just fed you!" I complained at the bird. Sasha just twisted her head.

"WhuHooooo!" She insisted, twisting her head again.

The penny dropped.

"Oh ok." I said, taking a leap of faith and turning my head. I had full confidence that even if Sasha decided to try and kill me - why would she, I had just fed her and wasn’t being threatening - that I’d be able to defend myself, even though she was right against my head.

I felt the claw grip my hair, yanking my head to the side in a flurry of wings. I felt more claws dig in as I straightened my head, Sasha working her way up to the top of my head.

"Well hello there." I said, rolling my eyes upwards.

"Whoo!" Sasha leaned over, looking at me up-side-down, hooting her excitement to be up on her new perch. "Whoo whoo!"

I was pretty happy, but now somewhat worried. Dealing with the egg was hard enough, now it was looking like I might have to deal with an owl on top of that?

Was I going to collect a whole menagerie? What was next, a toucan?

I wanted to show Serondes though, so I carefully, slowly got up, stats making the transition between awkward poses smooth. Sasha wobbled briefly, her claws digging into my hair - and scalp, that hurt - but managed stayed balanced on top of my head.

I threw in some healing for good measure. New owl buddy needed to be 100%! No disease! No parasites! No small hidden injuries! Life in the wild was tough, and it was the rare animal that had no scrapes or bruises at a minimum.

Slowly, I started to walk over to Serondes’s Lava hut. I saw Awarthril, who was giving me a great big grin and two big thumbs up, while Kiyaya was sitting next to her, giving us an approving look.

Awarthril’s face contorted, and chains launched from her as she screamed.

"NO!"

I felt an impact over my head, my scalp being half-ripped off by the force, half-bowling me over in an explosion of starry feathers.

I looked up to see Cordamo flying through the air, an owl-sized lump distending his body, his face covered in blood and feathers.

"CORDAMO!" I screamed out, my heart breaking at losing my friend that I’d met just 10 minutes ago. "I’M GOING TO TURN YOU INTO A PURSE!" I yelled at him, launching myself into the air with [Scintillating Ascent], forming butterflies with [Kaleidoscope].

Cordamo’s hissing laugh of triumph and joy was cut short as he saw me winging towards him, murder in my eyes and radiant butterflies around me.

The sneaky snake was off like a shot as I chased him, intent on getting my pound of flesh for my poor, lost friend.

Chapter 248 - Pound of Flesh

I chased after Cordamo, the shithead couatl much faster than I was.

I was going to pluck his scales off, one at a time. I’d get Serondes to trap him with Lava, then find a rusty knife somewhere.

He wasn’t faster than my Radiance beams, but he was quicker than [Kaleidoscope]. At least, for the majority of the butterfly’s lifespan, while they were accelerating up to speed.

I was going to eat the tastiest food right in front of him. And give him nothing.

As I twisted and turned through the air, performing impossibly acrobatic feats thanks to the flexibility and agility of my beautiful wings, courtesy of [Scintillating Ascent], I carefully held onto my egg. Making sure it stayed warm, and didn’t fall out of my basket.

I was going to have to be extra-vigilant about Cordamo and the egg now. He was showing an alarming lack of concern for anything I cared about, versus his own greedy desires.

I wasn’t using my beams for a very good reason.

A cursed reason.

I couldn’t hurt Cordamo!

He was clearly intelligent, regardless of what the System message was sending back. He was clever, smart, and Aegion’s bonded companion. My [Oath] stopped me from hurting him, because while I could defend a patient, there was nothing in my [Oath] about revenge, vengeance, balancing the scales, or anything similar.

Dead people weren’t patients. Given the massive disparity in stats and levels between Cordamo and Sasha, and given his poisonous nature, I would be deluding myself if I thought Sasha was being digested alive or something. No, Cordamo would never risk a creature with skills trying to slice him open from the inside.

No, my ability to defend Sasha with lethal force died with her. All I could do was chase Cordamo with murder in my eyes, and make the snake sweat a bit.

On one hand, right now, I wanted to modify my [Oath] - as impossible as that was - to let me counter-attack. On the other, I knew down that path lay madness - and a snake-leather purse.

I wasn’t an avenger. I wasn’t a killer who went out of her way to exact pain. I was a healer, it was my art, my calling. It meant, at times like these, that I was bound, unable to take the actions I wanted. At the same time, my [Oath] was keeping me grounded, reminding me of who I was, and what I believed my purpose in life to be.

Still.

There was nothing in [Oath] about not making aggravating danger noodles sweat. More importantly, I’d been keeping a lid on my [Oath] around the elves. Sure, I was baring myself to Serondes, but there just hadn’t been a need to share the details of my [Oath]. What they’d said about granting Immortality still rang in my ears, and while I liked and trusted the elves, "hi I can’t actually fight back" might just be too tempting.

Heck, if Awarthril got super desperate, she could kidnap me back to the Tympestshard Council, sell my services, and get enough money to buy the services needed to make Kiyaya Immortal. As much as I hated the idea, if I was in her shoes, and I was told "Hey, you need to enslave this one person for 6 months and your parents, brother, Artemis, and everyone else you know and love get to be Immortal forever"?

Yeah, I’d be breaking out the whips and chains. I hated the thought that I could ever get involved in something like that, but morals, wants, and needs were a hierarchy.

Actually - I should discuss that with Awarthril. Instead of powerleveling me, why not head back and try to make a trade? I raise some funds helping other people, use said funds to help Kiyaya?

Autumn would have an aneurysm if she knew how much money I was considering giving away just like that. Actually, she’d have an aneurysm once she did the math on how much I could charge. She’d insist that I acquire a swimming pool full of gems. As a spare thought.

I shelved the thought for another day. We should have the discussion at least.

Stealing was wrong, but what if someone was stealing to stay alive? An old loaf of bread from the garbage?

Murder was wrong, but what about killing a Classer who might be the one killing an entire city on their own?

Given enough incentive, given enough of a reward, and many people would find that some of their highest, most closely-held beliefs broke down. It was like that famous joke.

"Hey beautiful lady, would you sleep with me for 10 million rods?"

"Well…. sure."

"How about 10 coins?"

Shocked gasp! "What do you take me for, a prostitute!?"

"Well, we already know that, we’re just negotiating the price!"

Cue laugh track.

It was a crude joke, meant to demean women. Meant to imply that all women were prostitutes, and we’d spread our legs for absurd amounts of money. I didn’t like the joke very much.

However, there was a different seed of truth to the joke, which was that people's morals were flexible, for the right price. Or, if money couldn’t move a person, there was always a lever, a button that could be pushed. Only when an absolute core value was threatened, would we balk and refuse, no matter what was offered or the pressure applied.

For example, I’d never hurt my family. In turn, that made my family a lever - "Do this or your family gets hurt."

If I was threatened with "Go steal something or we kill your parents.", I would… probably go talk with Night and the rest of the Sentinels, and figure something out from there.

Bad example.

The elves had been great, and who knows, maybe they were above such things. Maybe they had ironclad morals.

At the same time, when two of the morals collided, one of them had to break. Looping back around, sick, starving family member? Well, either the "protect the family" moral was going to break, or the "don’t steal" moral was going to bite the dust.

At least, that’s how I saw the world. [Oath] helped ground me, helped declare which morals I considered core, which ones were most important to me. I hadn’t had it conflict with, say, protecting my family, but I had serious doubts it ever would.

No jinx.

Back on topic - I was chasing Cordamo, throwing butterflies at him and flying at full-speed towards him. Sure, I was never going to catch him, and I was never going to be able to hurt him. He didn’t know that though - I could make him run!

And if he was stupid enough to attack me back, then I’d be able to go for him. Wasn’t sure I could actually win a fight though, not with the huge level gap, amplified by the fact that he was past level 512.

I cooled down a bit, and decided to seize the moment. Cordamo was in full flight mode, twisting and turning as he snaked through the sky. I’d gotten a gift from Sasha, some aspect of my flight improved, and I was determined to extract a similar price from Cordamo, given how my last attempts at studying him had been interrupted - either by the lake, or by a branch smacking me in the face.

Down below, lit by the moon, I saw Aegion and Awarthril arguing, the former holding his bow in his hands, Awarthril with her hand on her hip, wagging her finger in his face.

Hmmm.

Yeah.

This probably looked really bad to Aegion, who naturally would want to keep his bonded companion alive.

With one last blinding flash of light at Cordamo, I stopped chasing him, landing near Awarthril and Aegion, hands up to hopefully indicate I meant no harm.

I didn’t know if elven culture had the same connotations. For all I knew hands up was a deadly threat.

Aegion blew an exasperated raspberry as I landed.

"Awarthril filled me in. Thanks for letting Cordamo off the hook. I’ll have a chat with him."

I had done no such thing about letting him off the hook!

The last part was more ritualistic than threatening, and I didn’t think Cordamo would be getting much more than a slap on the tail. I hated it, and I disliked it, but cooling off for a moment, and stepping back, I saw his point.

He was much closer to Cordamo than me, and when push came to shove, he’d always side with Cordamo, regardless of how right or wrong the couatl was. In all fairness, I would probably be the same. My bonded companion ruined someone’s day? I’d defend them.

Cordamo landed on Aegion’s shoulders, wrapping around his neck like a scarf. Aegion absent-mindedly reached up to stroke the snake, who appeared to be…

That snake-faced bastard! He seemed to be sobbing into Aegion’s shoulder. I could only imagine the tales he was weaving, of "The mean Elaine was chasing me, trying to kill me! I did nothing wrong, I swear!"

I was probably reading too much into it, but hey.

Kiyaya made some harsh, reproaching barks at Cordamo, making her feelings on the matter clear. Cordamo’s crocodile tears intensified.

Aegion glared at the snake.

"Now none of that. No flying around for two weeks."

The fake tears intensified.

"And you’re doing the cooking, the cleaning, fetching water, and doing whatever Elaine asks of you for the same time."

Ooooh, I was getting some ideas what I could make the feathered snake do. Hop on his head?

… I was not good at coming up with cruel and unusual punishments. I generally either killed a threat, threw them to the guards to be fined, or healed people. This "in-between" business was hard.

Hang on.

How could I fine a snake? I probably could, I’d just need to be inventive about it.

Hisses of protest.

"You keep that up and it’ll get worse." Aegion threatened.

Serondes emerged from his hut, saw us all standing around, yawned, stretched, and walked over.

"Hey." He gave me a one-armed hug, which I leaned into. "What’s going on?"

Everyone looked at Awarthril, agreeing by silent consent to let the relatively neutral party explain what was going on. She gave a concise, accurate explanation. In the end, Serondes just gave me a squeeze.

"We’ll find you a nice companion. I promise." He gave me a quick kiss, then went off to find breakfast.

A nice compan-!? WHAT ABOUT MY DAMN EGG!?

I didn’t say that, but I did glare murder into the back of his head. I quickly redirected my ire towards Cordamo, who deserved it.

With the lack of light pollution on Pallos, a good, cloudless night, combined with enhanced vision from the System made seeing at night fairly easy.

"We should get a move on once Serondes is finished. We did say we’d move fast, and, well, we’re up and awake now." Awarthril proposed, already starting to clean up.

My stomach rumbled, reminding me that I’d only had a drink with Awarthril, and not a proper breakfast, and that I’d run a serious calorie deficit. Aegion, Serondes and I sat down to eat. The meal was a little tense, a little awkward, but nothing happened.

Cordamo had enough grace to slink off somewhere out of sight while we were eating.

"Sooo… North?" I asked, trying to mentally remember the map. I set down my fork, only for Awarthril to whisk it away.

"North!" She happily agreed - seemingly skipping right over the discussion about the trolls, and making amends - and in no time at all, we were off!

We spent two weeks traveling at a relatively good pace. The pace was a brisk walk, up from the slow walk from earlier, and we were no longer stopping for lunch, instead going until the sun was threatening the horizon.

A truly blistering pace. Mmmhmmm.

The world was a wild, savage, and untamed place. Dinosaurs roamed by in herds, hoovering up as much of the plantlife as they could, trampling the rest. Carnivores large and small trailed the herds, looking for weaknesses. Picking off the old and the sick, keeping them healthy.

I frequently sent Cordamo on "errands", generally fetching one of the bigger, meaner monsters for lunch or dinner. This backfired somewhat when Aegion happily reported that they’d both leveled, which was cause for a minor celebration.

Not what I’d been hoping to accomplish. I did insist that Cordamo stay far away from me and my egg, and he was, to his credit, respectfully obeying.

He did seem a little more contrite after I’d heard Aegion having a loud conversation with him about why it was wrong. The couatl was just a wild beast in the end.

On one memorable occasion, the biggest, meanest brachy in one of the herds stormed towards us, Wind gusting ominously around it. The level was slightly concerning, but we didn’t need to kill it. We’d already secured our lunch, and dinner was hours away. Well, Serondes started to make a move, but Awarthril and Aegion stopped him, instead electing to move faster, getting out of the way.

Birds flew in the sky, from flocks of carrier pigeons, to the occasional large thing that flew at a dramatic height, only visible due to its sheer size.

I didn’t try [Long Range Identify]ing that. Not worth the risk. Not after her. I tried to study it, but with the distances involved, and the fact that it was just a shape, I’m not sure I got anything out of it. I was glad to see that the elves were occasionally jumpy when the sky got dark, glancing up to see what had flown over this time.

As we trampled over ferns and grass taller than I was, disturbing all the critters hiding in it, I was reminded just how wild and untamed this world was. Remus was looking positively civilized in comparison.

I woke up one morning, half-sprawled across Serondes’s very nice chest. I opened my eyes, and had a minor heart attack, entirely skipping the need for [Sunrise] as I saw Cordamo right next to me.

I practically leapt out of my skin, getting ready to swear vengeance. We’d basically made peace, and now he was scaring me first thing in the morning!?

Oh shit.

The egg!

The thieving little shit came in to - wait, no, I still had the egg. And why would he leave evidence?

I finished waking up, all my mental processes turning on.

I then realized I was a bit of an idiot, and that wasn’t Cordamo - it was his skin. I picked it up gingerly, feeling the soft, leathery feel in my hands.

I felt Serondes waking up and sitting up beside me.

"Morning." He yawned and stretched, and I was distracted by the nice stretching.

"Morning!" I came in for a quick kiss, which became a long one, hands doing some wandering.

"MmmmMM!" Serondes was making pleased noises as we broke from the kiss.

"Elaine. I love your starry blue eyes, your delightful brown locks." He said the last part, entwining his hands in my hair in a way that was just so.

"Well, I-" I started to say, but was interrupted.

"Your slim waist, your firm ass, your -"

It went rapidly downhill from there, but I didn’t mind. I felt my face burning as I soaked in his shameless flattery, snuggling into his chest as his hands stroked me, pressing up to each body part he named as he described why he liked it.

"flattery won’t get you anywhere." Was a saying that was, quite frankly, somewhat wrong. It would get someone many, many places, just not everywhere. Either way, it was nice.

As much as I wanted to continue the sweet pillow talk, we had things to do, places to be. Like taking a nice walk together! And figuring out what Cordamo was doing.

Serondes noticed Cordamo’s skin.

"Well. Would you look at that. Cordamo’s molted, and he’s given it to me." Serondes grabbed the shedded skin, looking it over. "Quite the gift. Want me to make it into something nice for you?" He asked.

Serondes was occasionally insufferably self-absorbed. It did not bode well for the long-term prospects of this relationship, but then again, my short-term plans didn’t have that much room for Serondes in them anyways. Something for me to examine in-depth another day.

It clicked.

"I had promised to turn Cordamo into a purse." I nodded towards the shedded skin. "Think he’s delivering?"

Serondes looked thoughtfully at the skin.

"Yes, it seems like Cordamo is giving you the proper apology you deserve. I don’t believe there’s enough here for a proper handbag, but a very small purse should be doable."

I gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"Thanks! You’re the best!"

We got up and out, and began traveling in no time at all. I figured it was time to bury the hatchet with Cordamo once and for all.

After all, end of the day, I’d known Sasha for all of five, maybe ten minutes. I’d spent a lot more time with Cordamo, both before and after, and holding a massive grudge over a single owl wasn’t reasonable. I’d nursed the heck out the grudge, but end of the day it didn’t have the emotional weight, time, or investment to last.

"Hey Aegion!" I whispered conspiratorially to him. "Got a treat I can give to Cordamo?"

He eyed me, a mix of appraisingly and knowingly.

"Yeah, sure, here you go!" He fished around into the crate for a moment - Awarthril lowering it for his easy access, having overheard our conversation.

I eyed one of Aegion’s infamous candies dubiously.

"This is, like, actually good, and not something that’ll make Cordamo hate me more, right?" I asked him, remembering the minor prank war we had going on.

".... Let me double check that." Aegion said, hurriedly taking the candy back from my hands. He put it up to the sun, squinting at it.

"Mmmm. Yeah, it’s ok." He finally said. Given how dexterous he was, and how often it had left my sight, I could believe he pulled off some sleight of hand at some point, swapping a prank candy out for a real one.

Or maybe it was always a good one?

Either way, I was overthinking it. Cordamo was smart - he knew where the candies came from.

The devil himself landed with a whumph on my shoulders, wrapping his tail around my neck, his tongue flickering towards the hand that was holding the candy.

Still not fully trusting him - which had nothing to do with burying the grudge we had - I covered the egg with my other hand, while feeding him the candy with the free hand.

He hissed in delight, coiling around my neck in a way most disconcerting.

Kiyaya, not wanting to be left out while I was handing out good stuff, came up to my free hand and nuzzled it, her nose almost as large as my hand. She then deftly flipped my hand up and over her head, making it clear that she wanted scratches, and wanted them now.

"Alright, alright." I grinned, scratching her behind the ears. Cordamo hissed in a way I’m sure he thought was soothing into my ear, but just ended up giving me the creeps. The nope-rope then took off, flying off into the air.

"Glad to see everyone getting along!" Awarthril cheerfully butted in. I had many things I wanted to say, but held my tongue.

Instead, I changed the conversation.

"Awarthril! Question for you!"

"Answer!" She happily chirped back.

"If your goal is to make Kiyaya Immortal, why are we still heading towards the Shimagu? Wouldn’t heading back to the, er, Tympestshard Council work? Like, we go around, charge an arm and a leg for me to restore people, then use those funds to buy restoration for Kiyaya?"

Serondes gave an undignified snort at that, showing what he thought of the plan as Awarthril answered.

"Bluntly, we couldn’t keep you safe. Sure, maybe we’d be able to hire some people high level enough for protection, but there’d quickly come a point, no matter how much we wanted it to otherwise, where they were calling the shots, not us. We’d get muscled out, and then it’d be hard to tell who, exactly, was in charge. Would you be in charge? Or would it be whoever’s in charge of ‘security’ and your day to day schedule that was in charge?"

Awarthril paused for a moment, thinking.

"There are all sorts of ways they could try to convince you to stick around, most of them kind. It’s likely that they’d approach it with a soft touch of sorts. Make things nice for you. After all, they’d want you to perform for them. Well, they’d say it’d be for you, and they just get paid by you. Either way, you’d find it hard to replace anyone. At that point, who’s really in charge?" Awarthril’s question was rhetorical, and Aegion and Serondes were both staying uncharacteristically quiet.

"Granted, you’d live one of the nicest lives in existence… within a designated safe area. Be able to meet and see whoever… the guards decide is safe enough for you to meet. Do you want that life? We can detour over if you’d like?"

Awarthril’s tone was almost pleading in the end. It was obvious, even to me, that she was twisting things slightly, and putting a negative spin on things. At the same time, she was denying a potential path to making Kiyaya Immortal. Given how badly she wanted that to happen, I was inclined to take her word for it when she thought it wouldn’t work.

I was reminded of the dwarves, and how they’d done almost exactly the same thing. A golden cage, for someone with valuable skills. It sounded like the more things changed, the more they stayed the same, and I wasn’t exactly clear just because I was away from the dwarves.

And hey! Bonus! It meant that even if they knew about my [Oath], they were unlikely to drag me away kicking and screaming!

"Elaine probably wants to wait until we’re stronger, and can properly protect her before trying something like that." Serondes added in at the end.

Hmmm, yeah, that was also a valid option. Didn’t much like him putting words in my mouth like that, but he was kinda right.

Cordamo returned, landing at high speed on Aegion’s arm. The couatl was light, but his speed was so high that he ended up causing Aegion to stagger anyways as he landed. He then seriously hissed something long and syllabant at Aegion.

"Oh." Aegion offered his arm, Cordamo wrapping around it. "There’s a road about three miles west of us."

Chapter 249 - Caravan Concerns I

"Ooooh, a road! Let’s go!" Awarthril stopped dead, shifting her weight from foot to foot in her excitement. Kiyaya barked, birds flying up in terror as the sound of a large predator making noise touched a deep and primal part inside of them.

I was busy removing yet another sticky seed from my leg. Mistweave was great, until it wasn’t. Sticky seeds seemed to count as "damage" to the material, so it entirely bypassed my clothing and went straight to the source.

"I vote roads!" I called out, now trying to get the damn sticky stuff off my fingers. Honestly, as luxurious as traveling with the elves was when it came to camping, the Rangers had it figured out when it came to the actual moving from A to B part of it.

Lounging in the wagon beat bushwacking. Or [Rubbery Rope]-whacking. Although, I was only lounging in the wagon when I wasn’t the one driving it. Or Julius wasn’t making me run beside it. Or Artemis wasn’t drilling me by the side. Or Arthur wasn’t showing me some new plant. Or…

I might have some rose-tinted lenses.

"Yeah, sure." Serondes was in agreement, and we turned and headed towards the road.

Aegion was muttering about how the sides of the roads were "always picked over" and "he’d find nothing good", but followed along anyways. Cordamo was still wrapped around him, waving his head back and forth like a happy little nope rope.

We made it to the road, and it was like a breath of fresh air. I could walk unhindered, and as effortlessly Awarthril and Kiyaya could plow down the plants in front of us, they looked happy to be on clear road as well.

"Roads!" Serondes stretched his legs out, giving each of them a little kick. He hadn’t given up his robe, and while things kept catching in them, they inevitably fell out and the robe repaired itself. Not before giving him a little tug, before being a hair annoying. I wasn’t surprised that he liked the clear open space.

"Roads mean people!" Awarthril didn’t mention anything about clearing grass out of the way, but I noticed her pace had picked up significantly, dragging us along in her wake.

"Hang on." Aegion said, vanishing back into the tall grass that swayed to either side of the road, like golden waves.

I wanted to bet, but I didn’t have much to bet with.

"Hey Serondes!" I slipped my hand into his, trying to be somewhat coy. I was probably falling flat on my face, but he’d said nothing negative so far, and I loved him for it.

He lightly squeezed my hand, letting me know I could continue.

"I bet three kisses that Aegion comes back with something inedible." I squeezed his hand back, giving it my full effort in an attempt to feel like it was just as light as his earlier squeeze.

"I mean, let’s forget how broad ‘inedible’ is for a moment." Serondes’s tone was playful. "What do you want if you win?"

That only took a brief moment for me to think of it.

"A backrub!"

"Deal!" Serondes spun me around, sealing the deal with a kiss.

Honestly, kinda a worthless bet, given how much we liked kissing.

"Awarthril, wanna determine who wins?" I gave Kiyaya some extra scratches with my free hand.

Awarthril just half-waved to us with her back turned, reluctant acknowledgement of her role in all this, putting one foot in front of the other on the road we’d found ourselves on.

Speaking of the road - it was weird. There was no way it wasn’t made by a skill.

Or multiple skills.

The road was a single sheet of brittle stone, an impossible formation in an impossible location. Nobody grabbed sheets of brittle rock for construction material, no sheet of rock was that large. The road was also wavy along the edges, and a close look revealed that it was like many overlapping circles. Like someone had casually gone for a stroll, every step radiating the crappy rocks used to build a road.

A very straight stroll. There were basically no curves or deviations to the path at all.

The road had natural cracks and breaks, long lines running through faults in the rock, yet plants weren’t invading through the holes in the way I’d expect them to. Some persistent skill? It would imply whoever made the road was still alive.

Either way, it was cool!

"AHHA!" Aegion burst back from the side of the road, holding something that looked and smelled like green moss. Awarthril just glanced at it, and delivered her verdict.

"You both lose."

Oh no. How terrible.

"Oh, Elaine, we should keep up the lectures. This here is a thrice-chewed moss, named for the fact that most animals that try to eat it spit it back out. Try a bite!" Aegion half-thrust it towards me

Oh no.

It was terrible.

We were on the road for just a day, when Kiyaya stopped and sniffed the air.

"What’s that?" Awarthril asked Kiyaya. She paused a moment, then closed her eyes, deeply sniffing the air.

"Smells like wolf." She said after a moment. "Could be gnolls."

"Could also be wolf companions! Or werewolves!" I helpfully added in. I’d never seen one, but between how magical Pallos was, and the fact that I’d been offered a related class once upon a time?

I’d met a fair number of species at this point, and I wanted to add werewolves to the list.

A white blur launched from Aegion’s arm, Cordamo launching himself to take a look. Aegion closed his eyes, and started speaking.

"Caravan of wagons. Cleverly hidden. Awarthril’s got it right, they’re gnolls. We’ll meet them around lunchtime. They’re using centrosauruses to pull their wagons. I’d like to look at them, I’ve never seen one in the flesh before."

Of course Awarthril would’ve gotten it right. Blasted perfect elves. Fortunately, I had enough self-confidence to not get a complex or anything.

"Meeting them is slightly unavoidable." Serondes drily remarked.

"There is only one road." I added in.

Awarthril couldn’t resist piling on.

"Typically, when two groups are heading towards each other on a road, they’ll meet up."

Aegion just made a disgusted noise, as the three of us traded high-fives. We carried on, with a spring in our steps.

In no time at all, Awarthril was waving, presumably able to see them. I squinted, but yeah, no. Nothing. Her eyesight was just that much better than mine.

Still, it showed that we were friendly, and with the distances and skills involved, it meant we could slowly approach each other. I know I’d be jumpy if someone suddenly appeared next to me, and jumpy people who shot first and asked questions later tended to live.

Like Artemis! Couldn’t wait to see her again.

With how wild and untamed the area was, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the gnolls were also jumpy. Especially since Aegion described their wagons as ‘cleverly hidden’.

We approached, and I could see their wagons slowly appear in the distance. I studied them as we got closer.

The first thing I noticed were the creatures pulling the wagons. They were dinosaurs that looked like small triceratops, with only one horn on the nose. Their frill was oval shaped, with a small gap in the middle, and they were a warm, light brown color. They only had one to a wagon, and with the size of the wagon and the apparent ease they were pulling with, I had to assume they were strong.

[Long-Range Identify] returned [Centrosaurus], which was like, level 180 or so.

That, or some [Dinosaur Tamer] had guided their skills in the right direction, or they were being buffed by a [Wagon Driver], or there was some expert [Caravan Master], or…

The possibilities were endless, and it reminded me of just how much I LOVED magic.

Maybe they’d have a Radiance mage! More tricks to learn!

Onto the wagons!

‘Cleverly hidden’ was right. The wagons had a flat top, extended forward to shield the dinosaurs, and it seemed like they were growing an entire field up there! Grasses and ferns were on top, exactly the same as all of the surrounding plant matter. and I wanted to give it a butterfly’s-eye view. I bet they’d blend right in with the nearby grasses, making them nearly invisible to the numerous predators that lurked in the sky.

Which would partially explain why there were no trees on the prairie-go-rounds.

That, or trees were just too damn heavy to cart around.

All in all, it was a neat arrangement! A beautiful little travel garden. I should see if the Rangers wanted to adopt something similar. It would need a special revamped wagon, multiple redundant Wood-aligned Classers, and constantly changing the greenery out as the climate changed.

Mmmm. Maybe there was a reason we didn’t have any wagons like that. That sounded both expensive, and like it needed a specialized Classer. For a caravan though, it was pretty sweet.

We got closer, and Awarthril kept waving to them. Soon, a flag was waving back.

"Let’s go!" Awarthril didn’t wait for us before launching herself down the road. Bless her releasing her [Rubbery Rope] and not dragging me along. Aegion followed at a good clip, while Serondes and I took the scenic route.

Awarthril - and the gnolls - moved fast. In no time at all, the wagons were circling up, and bright, colorful flags and silks were coming out.

I’d never seen gnolls before. They were humanoid - or as Serondes would say, elvenoid - so two legs, arms, one head, bipedal, the works. They looked like a cross between a dog and a hyena, with short, flattened snouts, and a hunched-over look as they walked around, occasionally moving and dipping like they wanted to be on all fours, but remained on two legs.

They had medium-length tails, and generally had short fur, in any number of different muted colors. Some had spots. Their noses were constantly twitching, and there was a near-constant snuffling noise in the background of all the other sounds they were making.

The sides of the wagons opened up, and some of the gnolls were hanging out there, while others were tending to their dinosaurs. Some broke out some entertainment. I recognized dice, no matter how many sides they had, along with crude cards and balls. Anything to keep oneself sane on the road, a little touch that civilized creatures all shared with each other. The elves would probably call it some fundamental elvish trait or something. Some of the guardy-looking gnolls stayed on alert, using a combination of large boar spear in one hand, and sick, curved knives on their belts. One weapon for large creatures, one weapon for small critters. One of the gnolls came to meet us.

In any other world, he’d be a weirdo. Here, his look was probably related to his class and skills. He was coated in large eggshells, the bright overlapping shells creating a dizzying array of looks, colors, and patterns. His fur was a light brown with large splotches of grey, signs of age in a human. Possibly also a sign of age in a gnoll.

More obvious was the way he moved, the slow, careful steps of bad arthritis, of age starting to snap at his ankles. It caused me to look more closely at him, and I saw some swollen joints, patches of thin fur, and drooping jowls.

With the way the other gnolls were getting out of his way and generally deferring to him, I was guessing he was one of the caravan bigshots.

"Krrrrrr. Welcome. Name Thukrur. Lunch-eat?" The gnoll made an elaborate bow. I practically winced at how slowly he moved, careful not to hurt himself. I could practically feel the age radiating off of him, and I felt like I was getting older just watching him. He gestured towards where a chef was busy throwing food into a stew.

I bit my lip in excitement. He spoke the same language as us! Someone to talk with! The elves were great, but after the last few encounters where I didn’t speak the language, I’d been feeling left out.

Sure, his mastery wasn’t great, but I’d take it!

"Hi! My name’s Elaine!" I was trying to deliberately pick easy words, or words I’d heard him say before.

"Serondes." The man in question pointed to himself.

Old eggshells bowed towards me.

"Healer. Injured. Heal?"

"Yeah, of course!" I started to take a step forward, only for Awarthril to grab my shoulder, and babble something quickly in another language to the gnoll. The language was rolling, with a silly number of r’s everywhere. I swear my tongue was cramping up just listening to the language.

"Right! Elaine, they’re a trading caravan. We’re going to do some trading with them, and I’ve negotiated some credit with Thkrur here for you, in exchange for your services. Also, the gnolls take hospitality seriously. DO NOT break any rule of hospitality."

Awarthril glared at all of us, promising vengeance upon any one of us who broke any of the laws of hospitality.

Remus, for how shitty it was, had its own strong code of hospitality. It was nearly impossible for non-Rangers to travel around without it. Tokens were broken and given to a family resting at a place, a promise that someone with the token could receive similar treatment on the other side.

Of course, that only applied to the wealthy, but that was the way of the world. People who weren’t wealthy could rarely contemplate traveling, short of bailing out of one village to try and make life work in a town. High risk move.

She gave me a Look, and I could see a flash of Autumn in her eyes. I wanted to roll my eyes at her and tell her ‘yes mom’, but I refrained. She was just trying to look out for me after all.

I started with Thukrur, hitting him with [Dance with the Heavens]. It helped some - he rolled his shoulders and popped his fingers, suddenly spry again.

It did nothing for his jowls, patchy fur, wrinkled eyes, or dozens of other minor ailments. There was only so much [Dance with the Heavens] could do.

We walked around some, Thukrur leading the way. The gnolls all sniffed at us, occasionally laughing in a high-pitched manner. There was some great joke surrounding us that I didn’t get. They tended to wear fur-like clothing like one great big wrap, neatly tied off to one side or the other.

Thukrur pointed out four gnolls, each with some obvious, but not life-threatening injury. The first one was sitting on the side of the wagon, blankets covering his lower half. With the way everyone was moving around him, I was guessing he’d been crippled somehow. Probably a broken spine.

Second one had a ferocious eyepatch and a mean look. No prizes for guessing what went wrong with him!

Third gnoll was missing her left arm, but was energetically running around, helping out with her one good hand.

Fourth was flat on her back, eyes closed. Only faint breathing indicated that she was still alive.

Well, nothing for it. I started off with gnoll #4, putting my hand on her, pulsing [Dance with the Heavens] through her. I saw my mana barely flicker as the gnoll drifted off into a deeper sleep.

That felt good! It’d been ages since I had a proper patient to heal. Lun’Kat barely counted, and the dwarves were practically ancient history at this point. It was like a breath of life for my soul, a warm breeze through my mind. It cleared cobwebs, and helped me refocus and reevaluate.

Gnoll number two waved me off.

"Eye. Women." He said, having a worse grasp of the language than Thukrur, but the way his tail wagged made it abundantly clear what he was talking about. Thought he was now a handsome devil with the missing eye, and didn’t want it healed up.

I mean, it was dumb. He could always just wear an eyepatch, and wouldn’t run the risk of infection, and have two working eyes as he went through life. However, his stupidity wasn’t hurting anyone else - unless, like, he made a critical mistake in a fight or something because of it - so I wasn’t going to force the issue, and force healing on him.

Aegion laughed at that, and offered a fistbump. After a bit of miming, gnoll number two figured it out, and the two of them bumped fists.

"Awarthril! I’m going to break out the good stuff!" He shouted, heading towards where Awarthril had put down the Spatial Box.

"Please don’t poison them all." Awarthril knuckled her forehead, clearly imagining Aegion breaking out his ‘good stuff’ and the usual reaction to that.

‘Gave everyone an involuntary firehose from both ends’ was generally considered to be breaking quite a few rules of hospitality.

Although…

"It could be great experience for me if he does!" I cheerfully poured gas onto Awarthril’s worries, chuckling internally as the crease lines on her forehead deepened.

"Same stuff as the trolls!" Aegion happily informed Awarthril.

She put a hand to her chest and gave a sigh of relief.

"I thought that was finished four nights ago!" I protested.

Aegion snorted.

"Did you really think I’d let all of a successful brew go, and not reserve a few for myself?"

"But…" I weakly protested.

"He’s right you know." Serondes’s words just twisted the knife.

I shut up before I could jam my foot deeper into my mouth, and tagged gnoll number three as she ran past.

She didn’t speak a word of elvish - Creation? - but the way she threw off her bandages, and was whooping and hollering as she ran around the camp, showing off the new arm to everyone, made it more than obvious what her feelings were on the matter.

"I’m going to make sure Aegion’s not about to poison everyone." Serondes started to walk over to where Aegion had gotten a barrel of his brew out, and was busy making a dozen new friends. Free beer was free beer, no matter the culture.

Suuuuuuuuuuuure he was.

"You’re just trying to get a drink before it’s all gone!" I accused him, his motives as transparent as Awarthril’s invisibility.

"Nope." Serondes wasn’t convincing.

"Save me one!" I called out.

No way was I getting any. Not with a caravan of thirsty gnolls, Serondes and Awarthril digging in, and the absolutely prodigious amount that Kiyaya could lap up.

Such was my life of hardship and sacrifice for the noble greater good.

I easily dodged a die thrown at me, which helped hammer home a point that until now had been abstract. My speed and vitality were doing good things for my reflexes, even before bullet time came into play. Heck, I had enough stats in them to keep up with weaker physical classers!

Of course, my definition of "weaker" was around level 200 or so.

It was going to be interesting when I got back to Remus.

Focus.

I looked at the direction of the thrown die, only to see gnoll number one looking in sheer horror at one of his buddies. He tried to smack him, but fell over as his buddy danced away.

Said buddy looked terrified at what he’d done, and quickly caught him and steadied him, as gnoll number one frantically babbled something at me that sounded like an apology.

I hurried over, and focused on the image of restoring a spine, of reconnecting nerves and restoring cartilage.

I got some krrrrrrrr’s, like a purring kitten, as gnoll number one kicked his feet happily, then gave me a bone-crushing hug.

Quite literally, I lost a few points of mana.

Then he and his friends were dancing, and old eggshells came over.

"Good. Take. Two small items, or one medium item, no charge. Discount on large."

I did a double take at the sudden improvement in Thukrur’s language, then wanted to smack myself.

At this point, it was blindingly obvious that this was a merchant caravan, and Thukrur was a trader. Knowing a bunch of languages to sell stuff in was basic good merchant stuff 201, and of course his command of the language would center around buying and selling.

We started to walk around, Thukrur talking with the gnolls at each of the wagons. Most of the gnolls at this point were either at the stew, the beer, or on guard duty, with just one gnoll at each wagon.

They had tons. Clothing, so finely woven as to practically be magic. Exotic spices, so expensive that even a half-pinch counted as a "large" item. A different mobile savannah full of gems wrought into exotic jewelry, another filled with books, a third with pretty clothing, a fourth with fine weapons and fancy weapons. Potions, carefully labeled and kept under protective locks in reinforced cases, dried herbs that made me dizzy just sniffing at them. Proper merchants, moving goods with high value and low volume.

Books - all written in different languages. I needed to become a polyglot. Or get someone to translate for me. A language skill or three would be nice, but I didn’t have the spare slots.

He left me to my browsing, each wagon guarded by a keen-eyed gnoll who’d gotten instructions on what I was and wasn’t allowed to have.

I was leafing through the books when [Bullet Time] activated.

Chapter 250 - Caravan Concerns II

[Bullet Time]. The skill hadn’t activated since the hydra fight, and even then it had barely mattered. I was still all too familiar with the sensation of the world slowing around me, of an early indication that my life was in mortal peril.

I didn’t bother questioning the who, the why, any of it. It’d been ages since I was last attacked, but time hadn’t dulled any of my reflexes, nor had it slowed my reactions.

I was outside, on the outside of the ring that the wagons had made, looking in at some of the books for sale. There were only a few I could read, and I’d been browsing one of them, seeing if I was interested in buying it.

It was a complex political treaty, and it was as dry as it was long. Irrelevant now.

I instinctively wrapped myself in [Mantle] as I started to throw myself forward, figuring whatever was coming was trying to hit me from behind. Even if it wasn’t, movement would hopefully foul any shot. Standing still was just dumb. A moment of bullet time later - a fraction of a fraction of a second - I realized my old way of thinking was probably bad, and readjusted.

I turned my [Mantle] off, and instead wrapped it around the egg, still in its woven glass basket-sash in front of me. If I was going to be doing any tumbling and falling, I needed the egg protected. Plus, I could heal myself. The only thing I could do with a broken egg was break out a frying pan and some salt.

I started summoning [Kaleidoscope] butterflies, the tiny golden flutterings primed and ready to cause destruction and mayhem. I didn’t have a direction for them yet, but once I did?

I was stretched out, halfway through my tuck and roll when I felt cold metal violating my back. My spine was the first to go, snapped cleanly in half as the spearhead plunged into my body. I felt myself starting to collapse, my trajectory changing as I lost all sensation in the lower half of my body. My knowledge of anatomy hadn’t been weakened by losing [Medicine], and I was all too aware that it was my stomach’s turn to be perforated, every agonizing twist and muscle ripped transmitted to my mind in slow motion.

[Bullet Time]. Great for detailed, up-close analysis of how, exactly, I was being ripped apart. My least favorite aspect of the skill.

Now that a spear was piercing through me, I had a lot more information. Like the nature of the attack, and the likely proximity and direction of said attacker. I wasn’t dealing with an Aegion-style snipe, there weren’t poison gases being pumped in, there wasn’t a bird dropping out of the sky. Just a good, old-fashioned skewering.

Again. Honestly, I wanted to complain about how often I was being stabbed in the back, but it was just plain good sense. Why attack someone from the front when they can hit me in the back? Why give a warning of an attack? It didn’t benefit them. It was too much to hope that the people trying to kill me were morons.

One upside of them being smart though - they were aiming for the center of mass, and not some fancy move like a headshot - which was the only attack that actually scared me.

It was a heartfelt attack, in that I could feel it in my heart.

Another benefit of being attacked in the same way, with physical weapons? I knew how to handle it. I had training, experience, and reflexes for these types of fights. I knew what the best course of action was, and I’d practiced it endlessly.

Uncaring about any books that might end up in the line of fire, I launched my butterflies behind me, roughly along the axis of the spear that was busy going through me. I then fired a pinpoint Radiance beam behind me, aiming for what I thought might roughly be the center of mass.

The irony of aiming for the center of mass right after rolling my eyes about the attacker aiming for mine wasn’t lost on me.

As I fell, as I burned and bled, I started to turn my head. I wanted a better view of what was going on, to change my Radiance attack from "hit something" to "brain and kill." As I was falling, I felt a cold corrosion start to spread from the attack, eating at my body, some skill working against me. I had a realization, pieces of a puzzle clicking together.

A trade caravan from up north. A surprise assassination attempt. Gnolls who didn’t want to be healed.

Shimagu.

I finished turning, finished falling, the egg bouncing out of its pocket sash-basket, rolling safely away inside of [Mantle]. I finished feeling the cross of the boar spear slam into my back, the tip emerging from my stomach, only to promptly pin me to the ground. The one-eyed gnoll was leering at me.

His face was locked in a vicious snarl, and the muscles and technique suggested a warrior. Not that it mattered. My butterflies were swarming nearer, about to explode. I’d burned straight through his chest, hitting a lung if his anatomy was anything like a human’s. Years of training and combat experience had me reflexively beaming a ray of needle-thin Radiance through his head, aiming for a quick kill.

Then I realized - if he was being controlled by a body snatcher, couldn’t the body be controlled, even if the brain was dead?

I flipped my Radiance beam to be more like a plane, trying to burn the gnoll clean in half from his left shoulder to his right hip, figuring I’d hit whatever was inside of him and kill that as well. I spared a second smaller "slash" for his neck, figuring that decapitation was also a good move. I wasn’t sure how large a shimagu was, or where they tended to be inside of a body.

If I removed enough pieces of the body, if I sliced him into little parts? Sheer anatomy and biology would dictate that the corpse couldn’t move anymore, and I’d be safe one way or another.

I didn’t spare any mana for trying to blind him. The only skill I had for that was [Radiance Conjuration], and all of that was busy trying to cut him in half. I was feeling the loss of [Lantern] just a bit.

I didn’t have the practice of rapidly flickering my Radiance attacks like Hakka did, and I wasn’t going to start trying now. Old patterns and habits had served me well so far.

Which it was doing with remarkable effectiveness. [Solar Flare] was doing work.

The gnoll was twisting the spear, trying to rip and shred my internals, turning a localized area of me into paste. The creeping coldness was spreading, and I spared a half-thought towards it - why wasn’t my healing just destroying it?

The first wave of butterflies hit, and it was all over from there. Wave after wave of glittering explosions erupted over his body, the loudest noise that’d occurred so far.

Hang on.

Shimagu.

Body-snatcher.

Controller.

I didn’t need to kill the host!

Yet, all of my training and experience had directed me elsewhere, had deeply ingrained lethal reflexes into my psyche, my habits. Someone came at me with a spear? Kill them dead, as quickly and efficiently as possible.

I was concerningly good at it.

The thought flitted through my head, right as the third wave of butterflies were exploding, each lepidopteran turning into a bright ball of Radiance.

Something gave way.

Everything happened super fast, practically on top of each other, even with [Bullet Time] speeding my perception up insane amounts.

[*ding! You have slain a [Vekrr Caravan Guard Leader] (Metal, 301)//[Hunter of the Open Plains] (Forest, 278)]

As I got the notification, he crumbled, and my Radiance "slashes" went right through him, neatly bisecting him and taking off his head.

Shit. I was totally going to get penaliz-

[*ding! You have slain a [Cruel Tyrant] (Ooze, 311)//[Harbinger of Curses and Corruption] (Dark, 290)]

[Reminder: Oaths are binding. -1 to all levels]

The words burned in my mind, the System reminder searing my brain as the pain started.

The pain inflicted by the System, the penalty for violating the oath, was full-body. It ignored pesky things like "My spine is severed and I can’t feel my legs" - the punishment didn’t care about that. It started off as full-body pain, dialed up to impossible heights, entirely bypassing [Center of the Universe].

I screamed as I jerked on the ground, acting like a fish out of water. I tried to hold my head, rub my arms, hug myself, bang on my thighs, anything, anything to get the pain to stop, to get the agony to lessen. The thought of killing myself to end the pain briefly flitted across my consciousness, but to that, I held strong. One enduring thought entered my mind, and I held onto it.

It gets better.

Dimly, as I spasmed on the ground, I was aware that I wasn’t healing. Not healing properly, at least. I had [Dance with the Heavens] on persistent casting, and in a brief moment of lucidity I tried to pulse the skill again. My mana continued to steadily trickle down. The only thing that I could tell was happening was the pool of blood - my blood - that I was lying in grew larger, as my renal artery did its best firehose impression, trying to dump the entirety of my life’s most vital fluid onto the dirt, mixing it into a disgusting mud.

Mud that I was coating myself in as I jerked in pain, hot brands pressed to my flesh. I swear I could smell myself cooking. The creeping agony of a rotting leg trickling through me, the System sadistically showing me how Lyra had felt in her last days, her last moments.

I gritted my teeth, grinding them so hard they’d break if it wasn’t for my absurd vitality and puny strength. I bore down on the problem again, focusing my healing on one small part of my injury. I could feel that section closing off, but other parts of my wound started to open up.

Then my focus was broken, as a new wave of System-inflicted torture washed over me.

The pain of my fingers being clipped off, of a cloth covering my face and water being poured over it, of losing a loved one, of my bones growing into my flesh, nails on chalkboard, terrible smells and awful visions. The System was a sadistic monster, finding dozens, hundreds of new ways to torment me with each second.

I was yelling, screaming, trying to make it stop. My cries of pain petered out as I forced more and more air out of my lungs, unable to pause long enough to draw breath.

Bleeding.

Bleeding.

Bleeding.

So much blood, all of it mine.

Was this the end? Coated in filth, tortured to death by the System as I slowly bled out, my mana pool 80% full and not doing anything?

Had the System restricted my skills while I was in the penalty period?

I saw the elves finish rushing over, the entire ordeal having only been a moment.

So far.

I saw Serondes, fist coated in Lava, punching down at me. I wanted to scream, but I had no voice, my (now-ex) boyfriend trying to straight-out murder me when I was down and out. More pain, more heartache, adding into the sheer torture the System was putting me through.

A familiar crow perched on his shoulder. My mind clearing for a brief, lucid second as I gazed upon Black Crow’s visage. He was here, at the end, waiting to claim me.

Well shit.

Serondes’s punch landed, the Lava-coated fist punching straight through my shield, straight through me.

The pain lessened, as there was less of me to feel pain, and the bleeding briefly slowed down, as the heat seared and burned my insides to a crisp. The familiar smell of pork reached my nose, and with how fast it happened, I couldn’t tell if it was real, or the System taunting me, reminding me of the people I’d burned alive. Then he pulled his hand back, re-destroying me on the back stroke, and with a snap, like the world coming into focus, my insides all healed up, perfect flesh replacing my destroyed organs.

Which launched me into a whole new world of pain. I forced myself to breath, just to curl up and scream more.

And scream.

Scream.

SCREAM.

All bleeding stops, either because it’s stemmed or because a patient bleeds out.

Screaming, as it turned out, was the same. The only thing that stopped my cries of agony was my voice giving out, refusing to move.

Trying to move, adding new pain, new sensations to the ceaseless torture the System was putting me through.

When it finally ended, I found myself curled in a sobbing, miserable ball in Serondes’s arms. Tears had rolled down my face, mixed with blood and scrapes of skin and flesh where I’d clawed at myself, literally half-tearing myself to pieces to try and get the pain to stop.

Serondes was holding me close, holding me tight, his fancy outfit utterly ruined.

"Has it stopped? Is she awake? Elaine? Elaine! My gods, Elaine!" Awarthril rushed over and knelt down next to Serondes, helping lift me up.

I was wobbly on my feet, and I couldn’t support myself. Serondes and Awarthril threw one of my arms over their shoulder each, and half-carried me.

With the height difference, that had my feet dangling in the air, and after a moment they gave up, and Serondes just scooped me up.

"Elaine, come on, speak to us! Tell us something! Anything?" Awarthril was practically begging.

"She’s hurt! She just stopped being in pain. I think we should give her a minute." Serondes bit back.

I mutely nodded, a tiny signal that I was aware, and that, like, I hadn’t gone insane from the pain. It was entirely possible.

I started to piece together my thoughts.

First, where was I?

I was… being carried by Serondes. Yeah. That was a good start.

Speaking of, Serondes was re-promoted back to boyfriend. The Lava punch had quite literally saved me. Or maybe not? I had been… bleeding. Bleeding quite badly. My injury hadn’t been healing, but the major concern was rapid blood loss leading to death. As much as I liked food, as important as I considered eating, it wasn’t super-duper-instantly critical, the same way missing my stomach, and my liver and kidney being pulped were. And the blood loss. Yeah.

Whatever had been interfering with my healing hadn’t stopped me from regenerating blood - or from throwing up a shield to try and block Serondes. Hadn’t been-

Shield. Shield had been protecting the egg.

The egg!!

"....eh…" I half gasped out, my voice failing me. I tried to wriggle free of Serondes’s grip, only failing because I was as weak as a kitten.

Awarthril was there in a flash, hovering over me like a mother hen.

"Yes Elaine? What is it?" She said, leaning over in an awkward way so her ears were near me, without goring Serondes on her magnificent horns.

I tried to swallow, half-coughed, then managed to get enough saliva to swallow and try again.

"Egg." I whispered out.

"Egg! Serondes?" Awarthril neatly stepped back.

"I have secured the egg Elaine." Serondes turned around, showing me a pillar of Lava where the egg was neatly nestled.

Best. Boyfriend. Ever.

"What happened?" Serondes looked down at me, care in his eyes.

I paused for a moment. I didn’t want to reveal my [Oath] contents - although they knew I had a restriction skill - but they should know what had happened.

"[Oath]." I was starting to get my voice back, but I still felt like shit.

Awarthril made a pained noise, sucking in air through her teeth.

"Ooooh, those can be nasty. It’s why I never took one. Bound to the same ideals forever, and generally the same line of classes? An eternity of it? Noooooo thank you. You’re braver than I am for taking one of those."

I was too exhausted to point out the obvious, that I had no idea that I’d be Immortal when I took the oath, that I’d been a dumb kid playing with magic for the first time.

I weakly pointed at the egg, and Serondes carried me over. I grabbed at the egg, my fingers slipping off of it.

Hang on. I was dumb. Or rather, not thinking well because of what had just happened. I pulsed [Sunrise] through myself, energizing and revitalizing myself.

Somewhat. Not everything I’d been through could just be waved off with one skill.

I reached out again, grabbing the egg firmly and cradling it near me. I slowly rolled it around, checking it over. Everything seemed fine, and I held it close, putting the heat back in, making sure it was all good with [Egg Incubation].

I wanted to put it back into the sash, but there was too much dried blood caking every inch of the flexible glass.

"Elaine, I know you’ve had a bad time of it, but can you please confirm that no other gnoll has a Shimagu? We’ve got them arranged for you." Serondes said.

That was somewhat ominous, but I weakly nodded my assent. What else was there to do?

Serondes carried me over to where the gnolls were, and I winced slightly at the sight. All of them were on their knees, with some having a collar of hardened Lava some of their necks, connected by hard stone to similar manacles around their wrists and ankles. I could see the faint remains of burn scars, and I mentally noted that I should get some good [Cosmic Presence] levels from all this.

The rest had a mixture of manacles and Ooze binding and wrapping them up, Awarthril and Serondes having bound and chained everyone down.

Cordamo was flying in lazy circles above them, making sure nobody tried anything, while Kiyaya silently prowled behind them, occasionally making some soft growls. Aegion was a distance away, his bow out but relaxed, an arrow ready to be drawn and fired.

I wasn’t entirely sure about it, but there didn’t seem to be as many gnolls now as when we first met up with them.

The sun was cooperating, and nobody was in the shade. With a thought, I turned on [Dance with the Heavens], increasing the range with [Wheel of Sun and Moon]. I focused primarily on burn injuries, focusing on how the raw heat of Lava caused proteins to denature, on how damage propagated through tissue. I then added in killing, destroying, and removing parasites, and added in an all-purpose "heal" to the end of it, figuring I’d catch any small, lingering problems, and putting the gnolls all to perfect health as my way of apologizing for what the elves had done.

I lost around 30% of my mana. The cross-species penalty, the range they were at, the mediocre image, and most importantly, the number of gnolls needing to be healed all contributed. I didn’t get any notifications about killing Shimagu, and I felt my blood run cold.

I’d just tried to actively kill an intelligent creature that had done nothing to me. Holy. I’d just gotten so lucky. I didn’t want to imagine what would’ve happened if I’d violated [Oath] twice in a row, back to back like that. And violated it that deliberately, that badly.

I needed to do some thinking on that thought. Why had I assumed trying to heal someone else from a shimagu infestation would cause an [Oath] penalty? Was that right?

Well, I didn’t want to risk it right now.

"Done." I croaked out. I might be strong enough to stand now, but Serondes holding me was nice. I wanted comfort.

The bindings started to crumble, the gnolls being released. They mostly stayed still, and I stopped paying attention to them.

My mind wandered back to the attack, and my inability to properly heal. Well, I had been healing, healing almost everything else besides the attack. I’d been able to heal blood loss - hence not passing out - and I’d still been able to use my skills.

Which was suggestive that there had been counter-skills at play. I replayed the incident in my mind, how my wound had kept opening, even without additional help from my assailant.

Yeah, I’d bet a bunch of rods that I’d been hit with a half-dozen curse or wound-enhancement skills, and one of them just so happened to be a healing rate-limiter, or something like that. I’d only been able to give a trickle of healing towards the injury, which had fought back against the healing by trying to open shit up more. A neat one-two punch, designed to kill the target in one blow - even if a healer got to them.

I almost had to applaud the combination. It was good. Didn’t make me any happier to have been on the receiving end of it, especially with the [Oath] penalty.

"Ok, Serondes, bring Elaine over here." Awarthril beckoned Serondes over, and we went into the tall ferns by the side of the road.

A glorious vision awaited me. A hot bath, with a pillar of Lava keeping the entire thing hot.

"Right, we need to get you cleaned up." Awarthril brought out soap and a brush and other implements of dirt destruction.

Bless her.

I had some serious thinking on [Oath] to do.

Chapter 251.1 - Ethical Examinations

I stripped, my clothes remaining annoyingly clean and pristine, and gratefully sank down into the hot pool. I tried to do it smoothly, but my legs betrayed me, and I plonked into the bath instead. I idly pulled on my fingers one at a time, double-checking that, yes, they were still there.

Still intact.

It hadn’t been real. Well, not real real. Felt real enough.

Fuck [Pristine Memories] so hard right now. I needed to evolve the skill, and get some "selective deletion" going on.

I was Filthy with a capital F, bloody mud mixing in with fleshy scraps all over my body. I was still trembling somewhat, which didn’t go unnoticed by the elves.

Awarthril joined me a moment later, armed with a brush and a bar of primitive soap.

Seriously, was there anything the elves didn’t travel with?

"Serondes, shoo, get. I’m sure Elaine loves spending time with you, but not right this second." A naked Awarthril menaced Serondes with a brush. He held his hands up in surrender.

"Alright, alright. I’ll be in earshot if you want me." He raised some privacy walls for us as he left.

Awarthril started to attack me with the brush.

"Um. Awarthril." I said, half-drowning under her ‘tender ministrations’.

"Yes?"

"Can I do this myself?"

Awarthril looked at the brush like it’d personally offended her.

"Of course." She said after a moment’s hesitation. She thrust the implements of dirt destruction into my hands, and gracefully, without even making a splash, barely a ripple, left the pool.

I slowly started to scrub, not really focusing or paying attention to what I was doing. I was grime incarnate, it didn’t matter where I was cleaning, I was getting gob after gob of crud off of me.

My mind wandered back to my [Oath], and what I’d done wrong.

The obvious violation was "First, do no harm." The penalty had come right as I’d killed the gnoll, although the timing of everything had resulted in me managing to kill the shimagu right as the punishment had started.

Lucky me. If things had gone just a hair differently, I would’ve died, crippled by pain and easy pickings for the shimagu.

Speaking of - what the fuck had been the shimagu’s plan?? It wasn’t like I was about to force a heal, nor did it seem like he’d been at any risk of discovery. The attack was out of the blue, and I couldn’t figure out why. It didn’t seem that important. Best thing I could think of was [Cosmic Presence] had been strong enough to cause some serious issues to the shimagu, and I didn’t look like I was leaving quickly enough.

Right.

Shimagu were a new twist on [Oath], and something I needed to figure out. I’d worked with Night a bunch, figuring out the ins and outs of my [Oath] and restriction skills, but this was a new twist.

Well, I should start with the basics. What was Night’s wording again? The basic fundamentals on Restriction skills?

[Pristine Memories] to the rescue!

Some significant editing of the memory was needed though, to remove all of Night’s thoughtful pauses and steps we took in between, the ancient vampire giving me time to process and comprehend what he was saying.

"Restriction skills are a strange beast. They are among the most powerful, complex, and convoluted aspect to the System that I know of. You must believe, in a powerful way, the words you speak and, in your case, the Oath you have chosen to bind yourself with. The words form the basics, the Restriction skill creating an absolute baseline from which you can not violate. However, if that was all there was to the skill, it would not be nearly so complex. No, your beliefs form another large portion of the skill, what you are and are not capable of doing. One who attempts a Restriction skill, intending to only fit with the bare minimum of the requirements, does not posses the correct mindset to gain such a skill. Your beliefs and values will change and evolve over time, and even another, having spoken the same words and taken the same skill, may not be operating under the same principles that you are. An action you believe to be permissible could be anathema to them, and the opposite holds true. A good example of your beliefs changing, if I recall correctly, would be how your mind changed on sparring. Additionally…"

Gods, I missed the long-winded bastard. Home. Soon.

I should emulate his example, and take on apprentices now and then, or at least train people. Keep me grounded and young. Thoughts for another day… but I could see the value in it.

The baseline he was talking about was the same for everyone with the same Restriction skill. To put it another way - there was the spirit of my [Oath], and the letter of my [Oath]. I needed to follow both.

I had some flexibility on what I believed the spirit of [Oath] was, but practically none on the letter. The closest I came to bending the letter of [Oath] was in defining what "Harm" was.

Accidentally bumping into someone in a crowd wasn’t harm.

Accidentally stepping on someone’s foot wasn’t harm.

The only harm in punching Artemis’s arm was when she punched me back twice as hard.

Speaking of harm, there was my current fighting style. I had no illusions that my current style would remain my style forever. As my skills evolved, as I got a new class, as my stats grew, I’d find new optimal methods of combat, and would need to constantly readjust my thinking with [Oath] to accommodate it.

Radiance magic was great for a lot of things, and terrible for others. I loved it to death, but being blind to its flaws was a great way to end up dead, and I’d worked too hard, struggled too much, to make a dumb mistake that’d get me killed. One of the great advantages of Radiance was my ability to hit exactly what I wanted. My narrow, burning beams of destruction could snipe insects out of the sky if I wanted to.

I should totally practice that, thinking about it.

Focus.

Right now, my combat focus was on narrow Radiance beams. Good for a lot of stuff, but I had to be careful with it. Specifically, I needed to worry about what happened once I burned through someone. If there was a second person behind them, lower level?

Oops, I wasn’t careful enough wasn’t an excuse for [Oath]. I could maybe, if I squinted really hard and tilted my head, see someone else with the same Restriction skill not be penalized for that sort of mistake, have their spirit of the rules permit that type of careless collateral damage.

I knew I was better than that, so it wasn’t an excuse.

"Yes, I burned down an entire town, but I was defending my patient! Sure, 20,000 people died, but my patient’s ok!"

That would never fly with me. At all. I just didn’t believe it.

Apart from potential "burn-throughs", between my own ethics, and Radiance’s ability to hit exactly what I wanted and nothing more, I was pretty darn good at only hitting - and killing - people who were attacking me.It wasn’t Lightning, which could branch and arc to new targets. It wasn’t like Earth, where people could move out of the way before an attack landed. It was narrow, focused, targeted, and instant.

I’d been attacked by the gnoll, or at least, it had looked like I was being attacked by the gnoll. However, the poor dude had been body-jacked. It wasn’t him attacking me, it was the shimagu in the driver’s seat. The body was just a puppet, the poor gnoll trapped inside his own mind, screaming as someone else piloted him to infiltrate his group, then commit murder. In all this, the gnoll himself never tried to attack me. Never tried to hurt me.

Never lifted a paw against me.

That was how I saw it. I recognized that I was being a hair militant here, and was stretching the spirit of [Oath] in the most generous direction. Most people probably would be fine with the actions I’d taken. I believed I was better though. I had to be better.

It’s just who I was.

What was interesting was the difference between self-perception, and reality. It mattered if the gnoll was a willing participant or not, regardless of my knowledge of it. If the gnoll had been a willing collaborator, I wouldn’t have been punished, even if I thought he was unwilling. There was both my perception of the events, and the reality of the events. If the reality overrode my perception, I was off scott-free.

For example, if I was walking down the street, and I randomly killed someone, just because. If the person was an illusion, a mirage?

I hadn’t violated [Oath]. Because nobody had been harmed.

My beliefs and perceptions influenced the rules of [Oath], not the determination if I’d violated it or not.

There were some aspects of the [Oath]-rules that asked "What did I see/know around me?" - but the rule asked about what I saw and knew. I couldn’t, like, pretend I hadn’t seen a sick patient.

For the sin of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I’d killed him, and that was unforgivable to [Oath]. To be precise - I saw it as an unforgivable crime, one of the worst things I could do to someone. There was no unwinding murder.

It was probably stricter than needed, but perhaps that unwavering belief was part of why my [Oath] was so powerful. That… didn’t quite make sense, thinking about it. How would the [Oath] back then know what I’d be like today?

Kiyaya chose the moment to lie down next to me, and gave me a few concerned licks.

"I’m ok girl." I twisted, scrubbing the top of her head lightly with my brush. She just gave me a concerned whine, and her tail betrayed that, yes, she was feeling somewhat worried.

I had strongly suspected - no, known - during the fight that he was being controlled, and upon reflection, I had other options. I could’ve poked holes in him until I killed off the shimagu while keeping the gnoll alive, I could’ve tried to heal the shimagu dead. I wasn’t in the habit of trying to heal people attacking me though, while I did have years of reflexes shooting Radiance at people.

I’d been trained on how to kill people attacking me, in a hundred different ways. I had some experience and training on non-lethal takedowns, and when I had the extraordinary luxury of time, space, and power, I could be merciful. Jaclyn was the best example of that.

I didn’t believe I had any of those luxuries, let alone all of them, so I’d fallen back into the well-worn grooves in my training. Kill the threat.

Interestingly, I hadn’t been penalized for drilling holes in the gnoll. Clearly, there was some leeway in my [Oath], some sense of proportionality in my beliefs. In my interpretation of [Oath]. I wasn’t penalized for every little jostle in life, I didn’t scream in agony every time I stepped on someone’s toe. There was nuance to my [Oath], recognition - from myself - that it wasn’t possible to be perfect, simply that I had to strive for it.

By the same token, being body-jacked and attacking me let me perform considerable harm on the gnoll without any penalty. However, murder was a step too far.

Interesting that I thought that way. Why did I think that way?

I’d always tried to avoid collateral damage, and today’s events reinforced that - I could only lethally attack people who were attacking me. I only wanted to attack, and hurt people who were attacking me. Bystanders were off-limits.

Which had some interesting implications, that I had always subconsciously thought, but never vocalized.

Chapter 251.2 - Ethical Examinations

[Oath] was like my own personal safety. Nobody was allowed to be attacked, nobody could be harmed. Unless they were attacking me, or a patient of mine. Then, it wasn’t that I was allowed to do anything needed to protect myself or my patient, no. I was simply allowed to fight the attacker back, with lethal force if needed. However, I couldn’t, for example, blow up a barrel that would kill someone else and the attacker. I couldn’t burn a building filled with people down just to get a half-dozen people who wanted my life.

[Oath] had always only ever allowed me to attack people who it was reasonable to assume were currently, actively trying to cause great immediate physical harm to me.

Back to the gnoll. If he had, say, been trapped in some magical contraption that was moving his limbs, and said movements were trying to hurt me, killing the gnoll wasn’t the answer. He didn’t want to be there anymore than I did. The answer was destroying the magical contraption that was forcing him to move, and it was good to know that I believed that could cause me issues.

I couldn’t just get up and change my beliefs, not without serious discussion and thought as to the why. There needed to be a good reason, a belief that I was serving people better as a result. The sparring was an excellent example of that - I went from "no, hurting people a bit during a spar is harm, and therefore bad" to "This helps them down the line, makes them grow and improve. A few minor bumps, bruises, and cuts now could save their life tomorrow."

An evolution in my beliefs, changing how I perceived the world, and the rules [Oath] operated under.

I should stick with someone who could protect me from silly situations like that. I glanced at the egg.

Maybe one day. I had the time, after all, I just needed to get to a place safe enough, for long enough. I was totally going to ask Night for a long break once I got back to Remus.

Which came to another aspect of how I saw [Oath]. I couldn’t be the one giving orders, but if someone else was doing the killing? I had few issues standing by. Like the Rangers executing Hesoid. Zero problems there. I didn’t feel the need to step into fights, not unless someone asked me for help or the "fight" was just a slow torture.

The last part wasn’t [Oath] enforced, just how I saw things.

The pirates hadn’t been the same as the gnoll. I had every reason to believe that all of the pirates actively meant me harm. The pirate captain had ordered his troops to murder me, I’d told them how to surrender, or indicate they were out of the fight, and from there, it was reasonable to assume that I was being attacked, and I responded in force.

Even the poor pirate I’d used as a meat shield - he was an attacker at first, and when he became a thick, renewable fleshy shield, he was still an attacker. I was throwing him in front of blades, but that style of attack was legitimate. The only grey area that I wasn’t entirely sure about, was if it was ethical to keep healing him, and keep him alive.

There was something to be said about "Not using my healing to effectively torture someone", but in the end, he’d been one of the survivors. The fact that I hadn’t been penalized for my actions told me that I believed in life, above all.

Now, helping a torturer? Fuck no. That’d never be me.

That being said, I couldn’t grab random passersby to use as meat shields. There wasn’t too much difference between stabbing someone with a spear, and throwing someone else in the way of a spear. Not when the person in question wasn’t trying to hurt me.

I’d be shocked if anyone with the same baseline [Oath] that I had would think differently.

Which brought up some thought-provoking situations. Some impossible situations as well, ones where I’d get backed into a corner because of [Oath] and had no way to escape.

Invisible bystander in the way of my beams? Even if I had no knowledge of them, accidentally murdering someone was still killing them, the ultimate harm. It sucked, but I doubted I’d find anyone willing to stand in front of me, completely invisible, and let themselves get murdered just so someone else would have a chance at killing me.

Much likelier was someone using an invisible hostage, but then again, an invisible hostage was generally worthless. The point of hostages was deterrence after all. If someone knew exactly what my [Oath] was, but somehow didn’t know about my Radiance magic, maybe they’d try it. Seemed unlikely. My Radiance magic was a lot more public than my [Oath].

Good to know that my protections extended to bystanders I didn’t know about. On one hand, it would be a pain to deal with. On the other, it gave me a certain peace of mind. I knew myself. I knew where I stood, what my values were. I had utter confidence in them, in the rock-solid knowledge that I was right.

The whole scenario seemed ridiculously far-fetched though.

Speaking of hostages. I couldn’t laser through them, but if someone else killed the hostages, that wasn’t on me. Like with the pirates. A solid wall of meat shields could cause me grief, but Radiance had strong pinpoint precision. Any spare leg, any trailing arm, any eyes poking over the side were fair game, and I could confidently blast those.

I shot at a pirate, and they slit the throat of a hostage?

Not my fault.

This was probably an area where I was close to the baseline of [Oath], where other people wouldn’t have the same flexibility and leeway. I only took responsibility for my direct actions. I took no responsibility at all for the actions other people took, or the knock-off effects of my actions.

Healed a serial killer? They strike again the next night?

Not my fault. People were responsible for their own actions.

It was unlikely, but given my lifespan, inevitable that one day I’d have a patient, that over the course of me treating them I’d discover they were committing terrible crimes. That would be a tricky day, with my vow to keep patient information confidential clashing with the need and duty to stop them.

I’d figure that one when I came to it. I had some vague ideas, that if I started exploring now I’d never leave this bath.

One situation I’d covered before - someone who wasn’t currently attacking me, but was about to. [Oath] didn’t demand I be stupid. Someone who was clearly about to attack me was fair game.

How did all this jive with "I will only take up my knife to defend my patient or myself"? My current interpretation seemed to be more of a "Punish people attacking me" or "Stop people attacking me" rather than "Do anything needed to protect myself and my patients."

At the same time, I could already take extraordinary measures to protect myself and my patients. The way the current fight had shaken out had demonstrated the edges of those measures. The only thing my ethics and morales barred me from doing, related to life and death fights, was seriously harming other people.

Broken bones and below? Yeah, sorry, girl’s gotta live. I could patch them up after.

Oh sure, there were the parts about not charging people to learn medicine, and keeping a patient’s health information confidential. I seriously doubted that those would ever be important in a fight, and for practical purposes, I was thinking about the harm clause, and the edges of it.

Time for some trickier problems.

What could I do about someone who’d been taken over by a shimagu, but was currently restrained and unable to harm me? Could I heal them to death?

Assuming, of course, that I couldn’t talk the shimagu out of the body, or bluff a threat or something.

My instincts sharply veered towards "no", although I was deeply conflicted on the matter. Like, yes, it could easily be argued that the person who’d been taken prisoner by the shimagu was my patient. The line ‘I will apply all measures that are required to my patients’ demanded that I heal them, that I fix and restore them to full health, necessitating the removal of the shimagu. There was also the line "I will defend the patients under my care from harm and injustice", and yikes, being held in perpetual slavery was one hell of an injustice.

Flipping it on its head for a moment though.

‘I will not discriminate who I heal based on class, sex, race, what gods they pray to, nor by any other means’ strongly pointed towards treating the shimagu as a patient. They were an intelligent race of creatures, and it was a cruel twist of fate that forced them to be a parasite. I didn’t have all the details, but if I was told that shimagu required a host to live, like most parasites? I’d totally believe it. I should follow up on that thought.

Two patients, strongly linked, and healing one would harm the other.

Well, minor correction.

Healing the shimagu would do almost nothing.

Healing the host would kill the shimagu in cold blood.

‘Healing is my art.‘

When I was making my class, I’d firmly rejected the notion of reverse healing, of getting skills that perverted my healing into a force of destruction. Healing an intelligent creature to death screamed like a violation of that ideal. Mostly. I was still fully comfortable healing a shimagu to death when attacked.

Where did I come down on healing shimagu who were just going about their business?

I was no great arbiter of justice, in spite of my job. I was no great heroine, in spite of nearly taking [The Rising Dawn] as a class. I was, fundamentally, a healer. What was the healer’s answer to this problem?

When in doubt, medical ethics had strong guidelines.

Beneficence. I should act in the best interest of the patient. This one was generally easy, extra-so since my skills leaned heavily towards helping, with limited ability to harm. The two patients had conflicting best interests though, and I was trying to properly thread the needle here.

Autonomy. A patient had the right to choose their treatment. This was the principle that I, quite frankly, had the least attachment to, and was the weakest of the lot. My healing aura automatically helped heal people, and I’d often blasted my heal with [Wheel of Sun and Moon] with no regard to who was inside of it, their injuries, or if they wanted healing or not. I’d also heal people if I believed it was for the greater good, like in Perinthus, that old man who didn’t want to be healed. I’d healed him anyways, because the greater good of the community outweighed his wishes.

I paid some lip service to the principle. When the one-eyed gnoll hadn’t wanted healing initially, I hadn’t forced the issue. I’d let him go.

Not exactly a great guideline to what the right decision was.

Justice. Allocating scarce resources to where they would do the most good. Important in Perinthus, important in mass casualty events, but the only real impact it had on my life at this point was deciding where I should go on Sentinel missions. I had enough stats and skills to be able to blow through nearly any healing problem, barring being caught in a war or something. This principle didn’t help decide what the right decision was.

Nonmaleficence. I shouldn’t be the cause of harm. Well, this one was pretty clear. Option one was murder. Option two was having someone continue to be imprisoned.

Chapter 251.3 - Ethical Examinations

As much as I’d like to say death before slavery, as much as I fought being tied down and bound myself, I wasn’t going to pretend that being a slave was worse than death. Not in my books. There was a reason I didn’t try to murder every slave owner in Remus. There was a reason I healed slaves, then didn’t try to break them out of slavery. From some angles, I should. From others?

I was a healer. My fight against slavery was slower, gentler. Less likely to succeed. I pressured people not to have slaves, I refused to use them myself. But if I wanted to fight every slave owner in Remus?

I’d have to start with Kallisto, and probably Julius, Night, and the rest of the Sentinels to start off with. The institution was deeply ingrained in society, and uprooting it was the work of a lifetime.

Many, many, many lifetimes. Good thing I had those, and the ability to slowly make changes that would persist. Unlike so many rebellions that were brutally put down, or even if they had succeeded, there would just be more of the same. No, I’d need wealth and power to influence changes

Focus.

When push came to shove, [Oath] would probably let me heal a random passerby of a shimagu without penalty. It was a sufficiently grey area, but not a super dark one. However, my own ethics pointed strongly that such an action, even if permitted by my [Oath], wasn’t correct. [Oath] and my ethics weren’t totally intertwined. They weren’t always going to align exactly.

Shimagu were people, and I wasn’t in the business of dishing out as much death as I could. I chose life.

It was the harder path.

It galled me to end up at that conclusion. Let me flip it on its head, see if I came to a different conclusion.

What if a shimagu was trying to take me over? Was that enough harm to myself to become self-defense?

Maybe… not…

No wait, yes it was, I was a dumbass. I’d utterly steamrolled the pirates for trying something similar, although the first ones had held a knife at my throat, and then the captain had ordered them to kill me.

Then again, it was a blessedly moot point. No shimagu would ever try to take over a healer that could delete them with a flicker of a thought, and the moment they tried to cause harm to anyone else, I could use that as justification to burn them out of my body.

Right. All in all, I felt safe from my body being invaded, my own will being violated.

With all that being said, as much as I was pontificating about shimagu being allowed to live, I hated their model. Total bodyjacking? Slavery of the worst sort?

No, fuck them with all the rusty knives I could find.

Now, when the host body of a shimagu was badly hurt, and I needed to choose which one would live? Or heck, maybe it was a case of "both could die"?

It wasn’t quite the case of "save the mother or save the baby" - thank goodness modern Earth medicine made that a practically moot question - but there were parallels.

When given a choice who to heal, and I could only pick one, save one? I could use my own judgement, and "terrible body-jacking slaver" ended up near the bottom of my priority list.

With that being said, they were still on my list of "people to heal", because I swore not to discriminate. "I dislike how you’re forced to live" wasn’t on my list of "reasons not to heal someone."

Now, shimagu infesting a monster or beast of some sort? Yeah, go nuts. I wasn’t exactly big on cow’s rights, except perhaps the cow’s right to end up in my stomach. A shimagu wanted to take over a cow, t-rex, bear, shark, or something else?

Please, be my guest. I’d even happily heal them up if they were living like that, with a smile on my face. Unless they tried to eat me.

It was a dragon-eat-dinosaur-eat-human-eat-cow-eat-grass world out there.

There was the added case of "Ok, you’re a shimagu. I’ve got a perfectly good tiger body right here. Leave the person and go to the tiger, or else."

Hopefully the threat would be enough.

I almost wanted to deliberately go around, trying to provoke as many shimagu as I could. "Oooh, look at me! Big scary healer! I’ma get you!"

Now, if they ran away? Not much I could do.

If they took a swing at me?

A flicker of thought, and there’d be one less shimagu in the world.

I recognized that there was some level of cognitive dissonance going on. On one hand, I considered myself a healer, a lifesaver. On the other, I was planning out the best ways to provoke people I disliked into attacking me, so I’d feel justified in killing them. The cognitive dissonance had always been there, but it was getting stronger. Bigger. More obvious.

Ever since I’d been asked to kill that goblin encampment. Ever since I took a job as a Ranger, as a Sentinel, with a healing mindset.

There might be - scratch that, there will be - problems for me down the line because of all this. I… probably wasn’t the most stable and well-adjusted individual. Being away from home and stability for so long hadn’t helped.

With my body count, it’d be frankly alarming if I was.

I was clearly in shimagu territory at this point, and could assume that the bodyjackers lurked around every corner. This made it relatively easy here and now. Flicker a heal at attackers, then if that didn’t work, murder them dead.

What about when I returned home?

I had more than a little Artemis inside of me. I would still probably blast first, and ask questions later. If anyone was stupid enough to attack a level 400+ Sentinel. If I, in full control of my mental facilities, got attacked by a random mugger in Ariminum, and killed them. Then it turned out they were controlled by a shimagu the entire time? I would probably eat one of the milder [Oath] penalties - but it was still a violation. If I had to guess, I’d just lose an[Oath] level and feel sick. No pain, no mass loss of levels, nothing. Still, accidental murder - even legally defensible in most situations - was still the death of a person, and I’d beat myself up viciously over it.

More situations!

What about Hunting? I now knew about Void mages, and the potential danger they represented. Was Hunting an active threat? Was the unknowing, unintentional, random nature of his danger enough to rise to the level where I could do something about it? Or was he, in a nutshell, innocent, and not worthy of being taken down?

That was a little easier - he’d done nothing wrong. Existence wasn’t a crime, but I’d be having a long talk with Night and the rest of the Sentinels about him. Heck, Hunting could join in - knowing what sort of threat he posed, he might be able to find a solution himself! Or just, like, retire to somewhere far away or something.

What about, oh, evil Destruction? Had a ton of power, was overlooking a city, was going to unleash a gigantic skill? By some fluke, I was there, and out of range of the skill entirely. I could kill evil Destruction, and stop the skill, but in no way was I at risk of being harmed by it. There was no self-defense.

Someone else with the same [Oath] might be ok doing it. I’d never considered theoretical or future patients to be patients though. I was extremely close to obeying only the letter of the [Oath] in this case, with no added spirit, so to speak. Otherwise, I’d be stuck in a never-ending loop, running around from place to place in a single city, constantly trying to heal people. Constantly working my magic, just in case. Looking for those new, future patients.

Let’s see, just how badly that logic would’ve screwed me up in the past. I wouldn’t have been able to escape the dwarves, I would’ve died in the guardian fight, I would’ve been trapped on the frontlines the first time I showed up, I would’ve been trapped in Ariminum with its huge population, I would’ve never been able to leave Aquiliea the first time, I would’ve…

Yeah. I would be so fucked if I didn’t have the rule of "People I can see, right here, right now."

Future patients weren’t patients.

Back to the evil Destruction question.

Without him attacking me, without a patient to directly defend, I believed "First, do no harm" would apply.

Now, that might not stop me from trying to kill him. But I’d do so with the full knowledge that the action would cause the worst [Oath] violation possible, one that would make the most recent break seem like child’s play.

After all, the gnoll’s body was trying to murder me. It was still an [Oath] violation, but it was one hell of a mitigation.

Which brought me to another idea - I had "layers" of violations so to speak, from "This is such a tiny, technical violation as to not be worth it" all the way to "This is the worst possible." There was granularity and nuance. Not all violations were the same. Killing a dozen orphans in cold blood wasn’t on the same level as accidentally cutting someone with a knife, and the penalities I faced reflected that.

Another interesting aspect to [Oath] - I had to make the attempt. I had to try to heal people.

I didn’t need to fight particularly hard against being restrained. Something as simple as a hand on my shoulder, stopping me from going? Being picked up and carried away?

I was right on the letter of things, the baseline. "Oh no, I’m trying to heal this person, but I’ve been grabbed and am getting carried away. Oh well."

It’d helped me numerous times with the Rangers in Perinthus, and generally on the road.

At the same time, I’d observed that I’d been half-trapped by the dwarves, and the patient that I knew was there. I’d believed that I needed to try and save the giant during the battle of the guardians.

What were the differences? Where was my line drawn?

Well. The dwarf - and whoever I’d turned my back on in Perinthus were easy. I went for immediate, real patients in front of me, and that extended to "There is someone I know is hurt right past this unlocked door."

That was a fascinating thought. I decided to explore it more. Solid wall? Nope. Locked door? Same problem as a solid wall.

Like, obviously if I could go over the wall, it wasn’t a solid wall. But that’s where my line was drawn. "Accessible" patients, I suppose was the criteria I was using.

What made a patient accessible? Well, I suppose I needed to be able to get to them. In the fight with the guardians, fallen trees and rocks hadn’t stopped me. I’d just gone around or over them. I’d been stopped by Galeru, the Rainbow. At that point, I wasn’t able to go further - and the giant had died shortly after.

Quick side-note - trying, and failing wasn’t penalized. I had to put forth my best foot. Success wasn’t mandatory. I could believe a naïve, new healer might believe otherwise, but they’d quickly change their mind, or be penalized into oblivion by [Oath].

I had a bit of ego regarding my healing prowess. I kept myself humble by reminding myself that I couldn’t heal everyone or fix everything. Lule and the dragonfire was a good example of that.

What did all of the cases of people restraining me, and I thought it was ok, have in common?

Chapter 251.4 - Ethical Examinations

Well. It was almost purely Rangers. I couldn’t think of another person who’d successfully stopped me.

Or rather, I could - the dwarf guard. Crucially, I didn’t consider that a "valid" stop though, and I’d hung around until I knew the patient was better.

Which had a nice side-note. I could delay on healing, as long as I wasn’t abandoning the patient. "Oi, wait a minute" was valid.

Otherwise, like, I would need to stop spars the moment the first cut occurred.

Focus.

Meditating on the people "allowed" to hold me back, that I’d accept? Yeah, it had to be someone I knew and trusted. Random strangers weren’t enough.

Would I accept the elves holding me back?

Awarthril and Kiyaya, yes. Aegion and Cordamo? Not at all.

Serondes? Probably yes.

I allowed small, physical acts of restraint. Being told "No don’t do that." wasn’t enough. It had to be physical.

At the same time, a hand on my shoulder was enough. I didn’t need to struggle and fight against other people to get to my patients. Be a little counter-productive.

At the same time, I couldn’t really ask to be restrained. It had to be organic.

Everything was crystalizing towards a single idea. I’d been feeling around at the edges, and I softly verbalized it, an ideal I was living by.

"I will not harm those who are innocent."

I waited a moment, believing that I’d get some notifications, an update and upgrade to [Oath].

Nothing.

Damn.

I suppose "I will not harm those who are innocent" was simply a subsection of "First, do no harm", which led me down another train of thought.

Although, was that correct? Was that the proper interpretation of how I saw the world?

Yes, but no. A hardened criminal, worst of the worst? I’d leave them be. No, my "innocence" examination had more to do with people who were trying to harm me.

"I will not harm those who are not trying to harm me." Was a better interpretation of how I saw the interplay of those two lines of my Oath. I’d been unconsciously following that principle my entire life. I just had words for it.

In my heart of hearts I knew that someone being body-controlled wasn’t the one trying to kill me. Or, most of the time wasn’t.

What if I was in a war, and one side was objectively the Bad Guys? Ignoring for a moment that war was never that simple, that one side was rarely objectively wrong, and that winners wrote the history, just a fantastical black and white "bad guys VS good guys" fight. Could I heal the bad guys?

That was an easy yes. I healed everyone. Heck, the dwarves had possibly been the bad guys in their war, and I had no compunction about healing them. A person in pain was a person in pain, and everyone deserved health, as a fundamental right.

All of this redoubled my resolve to not let people know that I had the [Oath], although I did still think it was useful, and should be spread. A double-edged sword. The greater good would be served by it spreading, even though it would make my life harder.

Such was the fate of being a healer.

However, thinking about wars made me think of large battles. Upon some self-reflection, my rules did morph and change when it came to large-scale mass battles. If 80,000 people were clashing on a battlefield, with spears stabbing, arrows flying, and uncountable skills being used, I recognized that wading right into the middle of it to try and heal everyone was pointless. I’d just get myself killed, and not be able to heal a fraction of the people I could otherwise.

No, first off, I was most likely neutral in the fight. Off to the side, there, present, trying to get as many people saved with [Cosmic Presence] as I could. Anyone who made it to me? Healed. Anyone who tried to interfere with the healing station I’d set up? Well, that was a clear and obvious violation of my patients. Same with trying to restrict access.

There were probably more nuances and rules to large scale battles and wars. I hadn’t been in enough of them to properly figure them all out.

The cat was entirely out of the bag at this point, regarding [Oath]. I’d written down my [Oath] several times, I’d shared it with multiple healers across cultures, and my books were being copied and spread. Only thing I could do was adopt the Sentinel Dawn persona hard, and hope not too many people remembered that I was Elaine.

Should only take, what, 200 years?

I was almost entirely clean at this point, and I figured I should check on my levels.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 419->420! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Well, ok then. I guess the healing I did while cursed and being murdered was good for something, namely, getting my level back. Yay?

Wait shit. What happened to [The Stars Never Fade]?

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

Oh good. Looked like the minimum level was 1, and losing a level didn’t lose the skill. Still, I wanted to level it up… just in case.

I wonder if any gnolls were willing to have me experiment on them? "Sorry for killing your partner, here’s an extra 15-30 years of life" was one hell of an apology. Plus, it let me see how the skill worked in a way that, well, putting it bluntly, if it went horribly wrong I wouldn’t lose someone close to me. They were somewhat canine-like, and working on them could help bridge the gap between how [The Stars Never Fade] currently worked, and getting it to work on Kiyaya.

Speaking of, what did I think with [The Stars Never Fade], old age, and [Oath]?

That one was easy. Getting old was a natural process, the road nature and the gods had fated we all take. I’d happily heal an old man of every disease and injury they had, but age itself? The inexorable march of time?

Time came for almost all of us. I didn’t feel obligated to stop it. It was a skill for me to dispense how I saw fit, a gift. Not an obligation.

People didn’t need a second life. People didn’t need youth, not in the same way the needed and deserved life and health.

And when Father Time came knocking? I’d done my job perfectly.

Healers didn’t stop death. We simply delayed it.

Death came for us all.

I was lucky in that I knew the manner of my death, just not the time. Screaming, [Oath] having driven me into an impossible situation.

It’d happen one day.

I shook my head, refocusing on my skills.

My capped skills recapped, which was a relief.

[*ding!* [Cosmic Presence] leveled up! 285->287]

Well, I did complain that [Cosmic Presence] was hard to level up. Mortal injuries not healing in a fight was great for it though.

[Sunrise] sadly suffered the loss of level penalty.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 344->345! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Once again my levels yo-yoed on me. I wasn’t going to complain.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] leveled up! 26->44]

Still not complaining. I needed to figure out how to merge [Solar Flare] with [Sun’s Heart]. Probably just… leveling it a bunch, and it’d naturally merge together. Not much I could do there, besides maybe asking Serondes to make Lava pillars for me to burn while we snogged.

Heh.

It’d be hot.

[Scintillating Ascent] was again a victim of the [Oath] penalty, but that brought in an interesting question.

What had happened to the minor metamorphosis that I went through each time I leveled up?

[Pristine Memory]’s to the rescue! I reviewed what had happened grimacing as I replayed the exquisite torture I’d gone through, each agony I’d suffered perfectly preserved and catalogued. That would absolutely be visiting me in my dreams, and I idly plucked at my fingers again. I slapped my hand.

No. Bad Elaine.

No starting bad habits.

I went back to checking if I’d felt any metamorphosis during the [Oath] penalty, annnndd… nothing. No change. I looked down at my hand, using my memories to compare before and after.

No change.

I’d need to double-check the next time I leveled up, but - silver lining? Did I just get a free level of becoming prettier?

[*ding!* [Pristine Memories] leveled up! 217->218]

If reviewing the horrific torture I went through was the requirement for leveling up [Pristine Memories], it was going to stay at a low level.

[*ding!* [Egg Incubation] leveled up! 46->50]

Extra credit for protecting the egg!

[*ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] leveled up! 374->376]

Ok, what?! The only thing I could think of was healing all the gnolls, combined with my thoughts and meditations on the subject had paid off.

[*ding!* [Sentinel’s Superiority] leveled up! 394->396]

Yup, Sentinels were the best.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General skill [Unbearably Smug]. Would you like to replace a skill with it? Y/N]

Look. System. I’ve had a long day. Enough with the sass, please.

[*ding!* [Persistent Casting] leveled up! 290->293]

I hated to say it, but I was getting significantly more experience than usual from this fight. I might’ve been the two against one nature of it, but I had this feeling, born from long experience, that it was whatever curse that had slowed down my healing that was responsible for the experience. Not only was it a harder fight, but it was more drawn out.

With a sigh, I finished the last idle scrub, standing up from the now-brown waters, a wrinkled raisin emerging from the depths of the sea. Kiyaya perked up, the loyal wolf having been with me every moment.

"Good girl." I whispered at her, then started to get dressed.

Time for food.

I was starving.

Chapter 252 - Immortality Investigations

I sniffed experimentally, half-heartedly hoping that Aegion had hunted something down. I was hungry enough to eat a whole centrosaurus!

As long as they didn’t taste like pork. Seriously System, of all the things to torment me with? That one had been a low blow.

I shook my head to clear it, and navigated out of the little overlapping walls Serondes had erected for my privacy.

Best boyfriend ever. At the same time, the image of him punching through me kept flashing through my mind. Intellectually, I understood why he’d done it, but it still bothered me that he was capable of applying what should be lethal force to me at the drop of a pin.

It wasn’t logical, but it was there. We should have a conversation about it.

My stomach rumbled, reminding me that I’d burned through a good amount of mana, and I’d just been in a fight for my life. It was making demands.

Food! Feed me, Elaine! Feed me NOW!

With my body in open rebellion, I hustled out.

The grassy gnolls had bounced back with remarkable efficiency. Their wagons were all packed up, ready to roll out. Those who weren’t flexible or adaptable died.

And -

As much as I hated to say it, those who rebelled and tried to fight back against injustice, those who wanted to fight people significantly stronger than they were, also usually died. Sure, it was possible for someone lower leveled to kill a higher-leveled creature or person, but the reverse was usually true.

"Elaine! You’re back! Here." Aegion thrust two mugs into my hands. I had half a moment of hesitation, before my stomach won out, and I started drinking.

Ok, the stuff he’d made for the troll party? That was good.

This stuff? This was going to ruin me for life. Liquid ambrosia. The nectar of the gods. Divine perfection made liquid. My worries washed away, my minor trembles ceased, and I felt warmth, energy, and a strange feeling I could only describe as goodness radiated through my body, centered on my esophagus.

It filled me right up, instantly squashing hunger. It…

It…

It was...

It was better than…

Better than man-

No.

No, I couldn’t say it. I couldn’t finish the blasphemous thought.

At the same time, I had to face reality. I couldn’t lie to myself.

It was better than mango juice.

"Goddesses!" I swore, taking a moment to collect my thoughts. The other elves were heading over, with Kiyaya still protectively at my side. Blasted wolf was big enough to entirely shield my side and back, with the way she was half-curled around me. "Aegion, where have you been keeping this!?"

"Ooooh, you broke out the Ilan juice! I want a mug." Serondes butted in, then draped an arm over my shoulders. "Hey Elaine, feeling better?"

I snuggled into his arms, appreciative of how he’d stayed with me while I was in agony, how he’d helped. His robes were splattered with mud and blood, a remnant of his diving in to hold me while I was rolling around in the mud, completely incapacitated by pain. I didn’t mind that I was getting dirty all over again.

"Yeah. Aegion’s stuff hit the spot." I murmured.

"No. Absolutely not." Aegion denied Serondes. "You didn’t almost get murdered. You didn’t go through unimaginable agony. Did you hear Elaine at all? You must’ve, you were right there."

He gave a small shudder at that, and I felt a little guilty. Just how bad must it have been to hear my screams?

No.

Wait.

Screw that.

I was the one doing the screaming, no guilt.

Awarthril came over, and Kiyaya bounded over to her, happily letting her know how happy she was to see her again.

I wanted a companion like that, a partner like that. Someone who was always super happy to see me.

Mmmm. He wasn’t super expressive though. Couldn’t have everything, and he’d gotten serious brownie points for how he’d handled stuff.

"Elaine! I’m so glad to see you’re ok! Aegion get you the Ilan juice? Yes? Good. Ok, Thukrur wanted to see you Elaine if you’ve got a moment."

Awarthril’s words were rapid-fire, none of us able to get a word in edgewise.

"Alright, sure, give me a moment." I lifted up my mugs - when had I drained the second one?! - and proceeded to lick the rims of them, getting every last drop. I then took my finger, and started to glide them along the inside of the mug, wanting, needing every little bit I could get.

Awarthril made a huffing noise at me, and Aegion took the mugs away.

"I’m not done!" I whined at him.

"Told ya it was addictive to non-elves." Aegion smugly informed Awarthril.

"It’s not addictive! I can quit anytime! I-"

I realized what I was saying and shut up.

Hmmm.

Right.

No more Ilan juice for me.

Although, one more mug wouldn’t hurt...

"Ok, ok, we should get going." Being wrong made Awarthril grumpy.

"Let’s spend some time later on, just me and you, ok? I want to check you over." Serondes half-whispered in my ear. The tone was neutral, and I couldn’t tell if he was being serious, flirty, or was serious and hoping it’d turn into flirty.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. A return to normal was what I needed. Dwelling over what had happened would reinforce it, make it worse. I needed to keep moving forward, and get back on the horse.

I also thought the elves had the right idea when it came to taking a break after a fight, or other violent activity. I should discuss taking a break for a few days, to help me process.

"Sure!" I tried to be cheerful, but it probably sounded forced. "You do owe me a backrub."

We all followed Awarthril out to where Thukrur was waiting. He was walking along the caravan, followed by an assistant of some sort, checking that everything was in its proper place. The rest of the gnolls were all seated up, the caravan clearly ready to go at Thukrur’s word.

He saw us and bowed deeply, the assistant shooting off on some pre-arranged errand.

"Er-larne." He said, struggling with what was clearly my name. "Many sorries. Take generous gift! Many many sorries!"

He knocked on his eggshells that coated his body in a rapid, practiced way. I couldn’t even begin to guess what was going on with that.

The assistant ran back with a number of wrapped packages in flimsy cloth, the largest one looking suspiciously like a book. I’d know that shape anywhere. Books inside presents had that distinct look, where one side and the top and bottom was flush with the wrapping, and the other three sides were "looser". I’d know a book from a mile off, regardless of how poorly "disguised" it was.

It was like Unlocking Day! Presents, presents everywhere! He handed them off to Thukrur, then ran off. He turned back to me, and with a bow, offered me the set.

On one hand, I wanted to object. On the other, I’d have to live with the System torture forever, permanently engraved in my mind, my skills not letting the memory dull or the sharp ache fade. I took them without reservation.

"Many thank yous." I bowed, trying to keep my language usage simple enough that he’d understand.

"No no…" Thukrur seemed frustrated at the limitations of the language, and started to rapidly growl in his own language. Awarthril seamlessly picked it up.

"The gnolls take great pride in hospitality. Breaking the rules? They feel the need to compensate you, and every gnoll heard what you went through. Every gnoll knows it’s their fault, well, they think that at least." Awarthril was rapidly translating, and adding in her own commentary. "I think Thukrur might be at risk of a mutiny if you’re not made happy, or if the gnolls think the gifts aren’t generous enough. Or…"

She frowned.

"Something. Some nuance is lost in translation, and I don’t know every single gnollish sub-culture and their individual rules."

AKA, life was complicated, extra-so when traveling. However, I saw an opening.

"If I give him a gift back, or payment of some sort, would that mollify them? Show them that I got so much, that I needed to give something back?"

"Maybe. What are you thinking?"

"Well, I have this one skill I’m trying to improve for certain reasons." I patted Kiyaya as I said that, making it clear what I was talking about.

"What?" Aegion made it abundantly clear that, for once, my attempt at being subtle had been waaaaaaaaay too successful.

"Which skill?" Serondes asked, his words like a knife to the chest. Serondes! You were supposed to understand me! We’re supposed to be able to read each other’s minds! The gods know they’ve been physically close enough to each other often enough.

"What do you mean?" Awarthril piled on.

Come on. Really? They had to be yanking my chain at this point.

"I want to practice [The Stars Never Fade]. One of the current weak points is not being able to heal companions. It’s a human-centric skill. By working it on other, er..."

I almost tripped and said "Humanoids", but remembered who I was talking with, and their view on the world.

"Elvenoids, I can start growing and flexing the skill."

"Absolutely not!" Aegion shouted. "You can’t let other people know you’ve got the skill!"

"What, and who, exactly, should I use it on then?" I fired back. "I’ve got a great skill to help people that I want to help, and it needs practice. Or do you have a better idea how to evolve the skill, that somehow involves never using it? "

Aegion looked like I’d slapped him, which I kinda had. Also, kinda weird for the party animal to be so passionate about this.

"What happens when they start telling people? When other people ask? When-"

"Enough." Serondes interrupted. "Elaine wants to do this, she should do this. I think she should always work to become stronger, and improve that skill of hers. Although, I need to know, why Thukrur?"

I could kiss Serondes.

Actually - I could kiss Serondes! And I did.

"Quite frankly I don’t care what happens to Thukrur, and if there’s something incredibly wrong with the skill, I’d rather find out here and now, rather than on someone I love."

Awarthril looked deeply conflicted. In the end she sighed.

"It’s your skill, and your life." Her eyes were involuntarily dragged towards Kiyaya, who licked her.

"Can you tell Thukrur about this? Mention that he might get cursed, that I don’t have a good grasp on just how young he’ll become, and all the details? He should go into this knowing what’s what."

"Sure!" Awarthril was only too happy to facilitate.

A long conversation erupted between the two, Awarthril growing at Thukrur, and Thukrur growling right back. As time went on, and the conversation got longer and longer, more of the gnolls hopped off from their assigned post in the caravan, to see what the heck was going on. The conversation was clearly engaging and engrossing enough that they stayed, low rumbles traded between them. Ears flickered as tails wagged, and soon enough we’d reached critical mass where every member of the caravan was watching the discussion between Awarthril and Thukrur.

Awarthril and Thukrur finally reached some sort of agreement.

"If it works, he insists on giving you another gift by the way. And owe you four favors." Awarthril told me.

I half rolled my eyes.

"Puh. Is that what was taking so long?" I asked. I would be somewhat annoyed if all that talking had been her negotiating on my behalf. She shook her head.

"No, mostly wanted to know what curses entailed, and wanted a brief crash course on Immortality. Couldn’t quite believe what you were offering. Was sure there was a catch somewhere."

That kinda made sense. "Hey random person! Want an extra 200 years of life?"

I’d slam the door shut on anyone who knocked on my door and made that offer to me. Sounded like a scam, or a way to rope me into a cult or something. Next thing I’d know, BOOM! Tied to an altar with people chanting in a circle around me or some nonsense like that.

They’d need to have a fantastic mango-deal for me to join a cult.

Sounded sketchy. Well, I was a generous goddess! You get a body 30 years younger! You get a body 50 years younger!

With how stats - specifically vitality - worked, turning a 70 year old with a 50 year old’s body back to 20 was giving them a lot more than 30 or 50 more years of life. It was giving them more like 100, possibly even 200 or 300 more years of life. Vitality slowed down aging a bit, and the more someone had, the stronger the slow. Sure, as far as I knew it was impossible to completely prevent dying from old age just because of vitality, but my knowledge was limited. A small fry in a large pond.

I had to imagine it didn’t though, otherwise my skill wouldn’t be such a big deal.

"Ok, are we all good to start now?"

Awarthril glanced back at Thukrur, and trilled something at him, r’s rolling like rocks. He gave me a solemn nod back.

"All set." She said, stepping back.

"Good luck!" Serondes wished me. Aegion was a good sport, and gave me a pair of thumbs up. Cordamo waved his body at me, flapping his wings.

I started to walk to Thukrur, and Awarthril whispered to me.

"Want some theatrics?"

Mirage classer. Right.

"No thanks, I’m good." I softly muttered back.

I ended up in a ring with Thukrur, everyone having fallen suddenly silent. Staring unblinkingly at us. The moment was right.

He knelt at my approach, and I let him, recognizing the solemnity of the moment. I ruined it slightly by shifting all of the packages he’d given me under one arm, then carried on.

Step.

Step.

Step.

I ended up in front of him, and reached out, putting my hand on his forehead. I focused, trying to channel [The Stars Never Fade].

Nothing was happening, and I realized - I didn’t have an image. I imagined Thukrur as a young, strapping gnoll, like one of the ones in the ring. Not a kid, a bit into adulthood. Hopefully if I overshot, it wouldn’t be too bad.

I felt the skill take hold, but it didn’t immediately go. No, it was like pressure was building up inside of me, like water was steadily building up against a dam, wanting to break free.

Darkness radiated from me, but it wasn’t an all-consuming dark. No, it was simply a tapestry, a painting for all those watching to behold. It quickly expanded, taking in everyone into its illusion. Quiet murmurs of concern were quickly squashed.

What an illusion it was.

Tiny points of light glimmered in the darkness. White, yellow, red, blue, and orange were the predominant colors. As more and more popped in, they started to cluster together, forming the shapes of galaxies. Spiral, elliptical, lenticular, barred spiral, irregular and everything else, all the different shapes a galaxy could form, dozens, hundreds of them appearing around us. They began to spin around us, a representation of the universe around us.

More celestial objects joined in. Comets drifted through the image, their long tails shedding harmless motes of light on us all. An all-devouring black hole, a white dwarf star, and fantastical creatures made out of stars flew, ran, galloped, and swam through the cosmos.

The whole image spun, faster and faster, stars and planets trading with gas clouds and asteroid belts through the imagery presented. Exploding supernovas one moment, two planets of equal size colliding, stunning rings around gas giants with hundreds of colors, the full spectrum of just, what, exactly was out there was shown to us in a dizzying kaleidoscope of images.

Gigantic whale-like creatures "swam" through space, nibbling at planets, migrating between solar systems. They carried whole ecosystems on their back, the universe supporting life on more than just planets.

Dark images, impossible shapes that we couldn’t look at, writhing knots of space, images that our eyes refused to focus on, that were impossible for our brain to process.

Someone was loudly sick.

Then the spinning stopped, and we were looking at a single star, a dim old red giant. Bloated and expanded, it was still burning, but starting to think about the end of its life. It had consumed half the planets in its system in its expansion, but hadn’t reached the white dwarf stage yet - or gone supernova.

The building magic inside of me exploded out, streaming towards the depicted star. Slowly, it compressed back, red warming back up into yellow as the star heated up, the light brightening until it was blinding us all.

Then with one final flash, a new star - no, the same star, just younger - spun in front of us, sun spots mixing with solar flares showing its vigorous youth.

Then the entire image faded.

[*ding!* [The Stars Never Fade] has leveled up! 1->2]

Chapter 253 - The Never-Fading Star

The images faded, the star slowly becoming more and more transparent, bringing us all back to reality - not that we’d ever left.

Heh. [The Stars Never Fade] was the name of the skill, and what was the first thing that happened? The image faded away. There was some irony in that. Or something.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 420->421! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Thukrur knelt in front of us, blinking the stars out of his eyes. He was young again. His fur had filled in and turned a darker brown from the earlier patchy grey, his jowls were firm and attached to his jaw again, the wrinkles around his eyes were entirely gone. He seemed to have energy again, along with a thousand other subtle signs of youth that I subconsciously knew, but couldn’t quite put words to.

He had his youth back, with all the experience and wisdom of age, not to mention a silly number of levels. I’d place serious money on Thukrur becoming a mover and shaker in the gnoll community, if not the greater world.

Also - I could restore hair with this skill? That had some potential, with how often I needed to cut my hair short, and how I liked it long.

A cooing noise came from my shoulder, the sound of a curious bird. I didn’t feel anything from my shoulder. No weight, no pressure, no claws grasping for support and stability. No wings flapping for support. It was like nothing was there.

A second coo came from my shoulder, and I froze, breaking out in cold sweat. I would’ve instantly soaked my clothes, if Mistweave could absorb sweat. As-is, I felt rivulets of sweat pour down my back and front, pooling on my fingertips and dropping to the ground.

Without moving another muscle, I slowly panned my eyes over.

Yup.

Sitting on my shoulder was the Grim Reaper herself, White Dove.

I need to stop sweating holy gods I’m going to stink and get her feet wet and she’ll get pissed and I need to stop and make her happy and do I bow? No wait, that might dislodge her. Don’t throw her off, that’d just piss her off. Do I do nothing? No, wait, that…

My thoughts were racing, going a thousand miles an hour as I froze in indecision, unsure of the best way to tackle the situation I found myself in.

I decided that I was not the main character of this event, and the best move I could do was shutting up and staying absolutely still. White Dove had chosen my shoulder to perch on, and the less attention I could bring to myself, the better.

I channeled my inner tree, the rock inside of me, and went absolutely still. Probably the first time in my life I wasn’t fidgeting or tapping my foot impatiently or something.

White Dove opened her beak, and the world stilled.

Her voice was impossible to describe. Light? Airy? Angelic? Death incarnate? A pull on my soul with every syllable, promising peace. An endless void.

Words that reverberated with power. Words that echoed through creation. Words that spoke directly to me, that I could comprehend and understand. That everyone and everything present could know. That suppressed every sound, that dampened every noise and demanded the full attention of all creatures, great and small, who could hear it.

The System was magic. White Dove was Magic.

"Thukrur Kerishester, of the Iron Spears Tribe." She Spoke, and the world trembled. "[Eggshell Warrior]. [Trader Along Many Roads]. [Raid Leader of the Iron Spears]."

The named gnoll bowed deep, ending up going to one knee. He had some careful words for the Reaper on my shoulder, a tone most respectful in his native, rolling language.

"You have denied me, and for this sin, I curse you. No more shall you smell.

First, scents are denied to you. A wounded subordinate. Your child’s smell. Your wife’s musk.Second, you shall not emit any odors. Your partners will not know when you are near. You will walk invisible to the noses of the others in the market.Third, no more will you be able to smell out deals. Intuition fails you when it comes to potential opportunities."

White Dove paused, then with one last line, filled with venom and hate, she finished.

"I curse you."

The curses sounded gentle at first. As White Dove started to list all of the impacts though, it sounded worse and worse. It hadn’t been obvious to me, but it sounded like smell was super-duper important to gnollish society. They seemed to base lots off of smell, given how many things White Dove was listing off.

That, and there were counterpoints. Abstract points.

Like, "not being able to sniff out deals" - sounded like a nasty curse for a trader, and an abstraction of "not being able to smell."

I was still keeping my eyes all the way to the side, watching White Dove on my shoulder while keeping my head straight ahead and unmoving. I flinched as she turned towards me.

"You. You have stolen time from me. I know you. We shall talk another day."

My frozen indecision remained, but somehow my body found a way to sweat even harder.

At least Thukrur wouldn’t be able to tell how bad I smelled. Small mercies.

Then White Dove launched herself from my shoulder, flying forwards. In two quick flaps of her wings, like a coin flipping, she morphed from White Dove into Black Crow, before veering off and fading out. On to reap another soul, one unwilling to die.

Awarthril was the first to break the silence, the first one to move.

"Well. That was quite something! Thukrur, are you alright?" She moved over to him, repeating the question in a growl, offering the significantly younger Thukrur a hand.

His nose was twitching furiously, and he accepted the offered hand, pulling himself to his feet. He growled back, pawing at his nose.

My sense of smell wasn’t anything to write home about. All I could imagine was it was like going blind, losing an entire sense.

Still, he had hearing, sight, touch, and the rest, and honestly, I’d gotten by just fine with those senses. He’d be alright.

The rest of the gnolls descended on him, touching him, feeling him, sniffing at him with puzzled looks of bemusement. One tapped the eggshells, and made excited noises.

Four of the gnolls came up to me though, bending over to practically shove themselves in my face.

The gnolls weren’t super tall, but I was short by every non-dwarven metric.

"Me! Me!" One of them yelled in broken Creation.

Another gnoll shoved him.

"No! Me!"

Third gnoll jumped in, invading my personal space.

"Me! Pay lots. Good deal!"

Serondes smoothly moved in to shield me, as Thukrur started barking out orders in his harsh language. The gnolls were hesitant, but he said something else that got most of them to reluctantly part ways, and head back to the wagons. Only two gnolls were sticking by me, Serondes in the way, clearly hoping for similar treatment.

They weren’t exactly old, or even middle-aged. I quickly checked their levels, and yup, low-leveled - for this area.

Thukrur approached, and he was like a new man. He was stretching, shaking out his legs and arms. He looked at his hands with wonder, twisting and flexing them, then taking a few little hops on the way over. He made it to me, grabbed my hands, and tried to shove something inside of them.

"He’s thanking you for the gift of life you’ve given him, and wants you to accept this token." Awarthril translated for me. "It’s nowhere close to what you’ve given him, but he hopes you can keep this token to remember him by."

He said some more words, enthusiastically pumping my hand.

"He’s also hoping that you’ll come visit him in 300 to 400 years, and renew him again, and that he’ll be praying to his patron goddesses to protect you. The ring he’s giving you should help with the protection. Also, feel free to ignore the idiots pestering you to do the same to them."

He growled at the two gnolls, Thukrur’s ears going flat as his voice rumbled out. I wasn’t the target, but I felt intimidated. I was already on edge because of White Dove, and my vision briefly narrowed as I imagined a fight. I could just see Thukrur lunging at me. I’d drop back, Serondes would throw Lava in the way, and I’d try to drill through Thukrur’s eggshell armor from the ground, shooting between Serondes’s legs.

I shook my head, dispelling the vision. I really, really, needed a good long safe break. I was barely keeping it together. I was starting to crack - no, I was mid-cracking, and frantically applying Ooze to the problem to try and keep it together. The only miracle was that it was happening now, and not, like, when I was being chased by the Shluggoth. Curling up into a gibbering wreck would’ve been the end of me.

One of the gnolls scampered off, but the other stubbornly stayed.

"Me! Heal me! All money!" He barked out, practically vibrating with excitement.

I glanced at Awarthril, who shrugged back at me. She growled something at Thukrur, who grumbled back.

"Eh, go for it."

I touched the gnoll’s forehead with a single elegant finger, continuing to palm the ring I’d been given. He went still. I felt dozens of eyes peeking over, wanting to see what happened.

I focused on [The Stars Never Fade], remembering to create an image of a younger gnoll.

Nothing happened.

After a few minutes he cracked his eyes open, looking around in confusion. I felt a hot blush spread up my cheeks.

"Um. Awarthril. Could you, ah, possibly explain that I forgot the skill has a cooldown, and I can’t use it for some time?"

Three elegant elvish hands hit three immaculate elvish foreheads at the same time. Awarthril quickly growled something out, and the gnoll’s face fell hard. He turned, tail between his legs, and slunk back. Thukrur patted him on the back, then faced me and pointed at my hand.

"Ring. Magic. Hide Level."

He patted my hands again, shaking them up and down. He had tears forming fat splotches on his face, and a stupid grin on his gnollish face. The only key that anything was less than perfect in his world was his nose, which kept twitching, looking for scents, for anything at all. With one last shake of my hands, he turned and joined the caravan. He started barking out orders, gnolls running around to re-fix caravan stuff.

I took a moment to finally look at the ring that Thukrur had thrust into my hands, the one that said would protect me. It was a glossy black ring, looking like it was carved out of a single piece of obsidian.

Serondes looked at Thukrur and whistled.

"That’s one heck of a level."

I quickly checked, and wow. Yeah. Higher than the elves by a good chunk. Explained why White Dove had named three classes for him. Also explained how their caravan in the middle of nowhere was doing just fine.

The elves crowded around.

"Oooooh, a Deception Ring! I thought they were just stories!" Awarthril cooed. "I want to give it a try!"

"Don’t get caught with one of those in Tympestshard. The watch will be less than amused." Aegion added in.

"Hang on." Serondes threw an arm over Aegion and Awarthril’s shoulders. "You’re saying they’re just in stories. You’re saying Tympestshard knows them well enough to have rules. Which is it?"

Aegion half-sniffed.

"Well, all the best parties are in Tympestshard.The smarmy city elves know things there, and aren’t just honest, hardworking country bumkins like the three of us."

"Ok, oh knowledgeable one, how do I work this thing?" I poked fun at him.

"Fuck if I know. Just throw some mana into it or something."

With a yell, the gnollish caravan started to move out, centrosaurus pulled the large, savanna-topped wagons down the road. The brittle road snapped and cracked with each move of the mighty dinosaurs, leaving shattered stones in their path.

"Well, there goes the road." Aegion commented as the gnolls moved out.

I slipped the ring onto my right index finger, and focused on it. I felt it "connect", in the same way that Inscriptions did, but totally different at the same time.

Inscriptions felt primitive and small compared to the monstrous complexity I was feeling here. A raging storm on the ocean, compared to a cup of water. The full Senate building, compared to a kid putting rocks on top of each other. It was far more complicated and intricate than anything I’d ever seen or worked with.

Hell, everything I’d ever worked with had just been "on or off". This was a whole new beast, and I didn’t even know where to begin trying to get it to work.

I stopped focusing on it for a minute.

"Hey Awarthril, you said you wanted to look, right?" I took the ring off as I asked.

"Oooh, yeah! I wanted to give you first shot at it though."

"I couldn’t figure it out." I admitted, handing it over. "It’s far more complex than anything I’ve ever dealt with, by leagues."

Awarthril brought the ring up to her face, studying it closely.

"Weird. If I hadn’t gotten told it was a Deception Ring, I’d believe it was totally normal. It even hides its nature."

"I can’t possibly imagine a thieves' tool called a Deception Ring would exactly broadcast its purpose, or that it was magical." Serondes drily pointed out. Aegion chuckled as Awarthril winced.

She then slipped the ring on, and closed her eyes.

Nothing much was happening as she focused, the six of us standing around awkwardly. Except Cordamo, who was hovering. Same difference.

I did notice that, impossibly, the ring had resized itself to beautifully slip onto Awarthril’s fingers, just as it had gone onto mine, and Thukrur’s hands without issue. Some minor resizing magic at play.

I started to tap my foot, then realized I had other outlets for my restless energy. I slipped my hand into Serondes’s, and started squeezing.

I felt kissing might be going too far at this point. No need at this time and place. He squeezed back.

Finally, Awarthril opened her eyes.

"Got it! Check out my level!" She called out, and I started to use [Long-Range Identify] in rapid succession.

The colors I got back went through the entire range of the rainbow. She started at white, went to various familiar shades of pink, then down to the dark reds, morphing into orange, yellow, green, lime-green, teal, blue, indigo, purple, and finally into a dark black, before reversing and heading right back to white.

She was clearly having a lot of fun, changing her level around, moving it around like a yo-yo.

"Oh hey, what does this do?" She asked, and went still again.

I watched her, continuing to spam [Long-Range Identify] on her. I couldn’t see anything obviously occurring.

"The ring!" Aegion pointed, and we all looked. The ring was fading in and out, completely solid one moment, transparent to the point of invisibility the next.

"That’s handy." Serondes commented. "Can I try next?"

"Oh, let me play with it as well!" Aegion jumped in, practically hovering on top of Awarthril.

"Shush you, you’ll get your turn." Awarthril half-swatted him away.

I half-opened my mouth to object, then closed it, thinking it through.

What was the harm in letting them play with it? I’d be using it for a long time anyways. I could afford to be generous - and check out my cool loot!

"Yeah, go nuts. Although, Serondes, want to start setting up a campsite? I’d like to take a few days to decompress after that fight." I was remembering the elven habit of taking some days to rest and relax after a fight, to help fight against long-lasting trauma from setting in. I was feeling pulled and run ragged, and I needed a break.

Serondes whistled, and like a scythe going through wheat, a bunch of the ferns and tall grasses by the side of the road fell. Lava erupted, a campsite forming.

I gratefully sank down into a hard chair at a table, and finally unloaded all three of the packages I’d been holding. I started to open them up.

An elegant salmon-colored dress, with a needle and a spool of thread in the same color. The boring book I’d been reading. A diamond, emerald, and sapphire gem, none of them able to store my skills. Still lovely gems though. All things I’d taken more than a cursory look at.

I eyed the book, an idea forming. I’d need to ask Aegion about it. Also ask him to do some tailoring for me.

I was getting some ideas with the dress and Serondes. Speaking of, I needed to have a long talk with him. Should do it soon. Maybe tomorrow.

Aegion was busy playing with the ring, as Serondes was still setting up camp. Awarthril pitched in to help, moving the Spatial Box.

Ok, I wanted to get the book signed. No way the elves had a skill for it, and I’d asked them about a quill and ink before. They had some, but I wouldn’t gamble on it somehow being a magical pen that could do verified signatures.

"Be right back!" I called out, grabbing the book and shooting after the caravan.

In just a few minutes I caught up with them, laughing as I saw Thukrur engaged in a footrace with some other gnolls by the side.

He utterly crushed them, triumphantly throwing his hands up as the rest looked defeated. Decades of "If I were just twenty years younger I’d show these young whippersnappers what’s what" finally turned into "well, now put your money where your mouth is old man!"

There was just a sheer energy and joy there. I debated rewinding people more often. Not out of obligation, but for the sheer heart-warming moments like these.

Oh man.

I wish I could see what happened when he got home.

"Hey kiddo! Your old man is now younger than you are!"

Heh.

My face quickly fell as I realized an implication.

Thukrur would probably have to bury his own kids. From what I’d heard, there didn’t exist a worse fate for a parent.

On that somber note, I dove down to the caravan, still clutching the book.

"Er-larne." Thukrur bowed again. "Problem?"

I licked my lips, thinking. I needed to use easy words.

"Quill. Writing. Sign. Skill?" I tried to mime what I wanted. Thukrur got it, and barked out some quick orders. A quill was quickly presented to me.

I wasn’t sure they’d gotten the part where I was looking to make a good signature.

"Sign. Skill?" I repeated. I mimed writing with the quill again, repeating myself. "Skill? Skill?" He had to know skill. It was probably one of the most basic words in any language, something that transcended race and language.

It might even be more important than "Money" to non-merchants.

His eyes lit up, and more gnolls went running around. A grumpy gnoll stomped over, mad at getting interrupted. He had ink stains everywhere besides his paws.

[My Hands are Clean] only applied to hands.

A quick exchange, and Thukrur nodded to me. "Good!"

I interpreted that to mean "ready". I put the quill to the cover of the book, and wrote my name.

Elaine.

That’s who I was. Just Elaine. No last name. No titles. I wanted to write the Medical Manuscripts again, and give a copy to the elves. My little way of showing "HA! Look what I can do! Look what this little human can do!"

It’d probably get laughed at. "Look at how little they know!"

At the same time, I felt like I had to try.

I quickly gave Thukrur my thanks, and left after he repeated his thanks again, and offered for me to stay for a meal.

Given the chance, he’d endlessly thank me, and I’d never escape. Not that I’d think they’d break out the chains, just out of sheer social niceties.

Anything to avoid social niceties.

I flew back to where the elves had been working.

Camp got set up. Serondes had his fun with the ring, then handed it over. Awarthril plopped down next to me.

"Ok! The ring’s a bit tricky, but super neat. It’s just like using a shoe fitter! The slider’s a bit hidden - it’s around the pillar like you’d find in a self-lighting flame."

I gave Awarthril a blank look.

"I have no idea what any of those are."

She pursed her lips at me.

"Well. I know you’d mentioned that Remus wasn’t that nice to women, but not letting you use magic objects? At all? That’s just unacceptable. I’m inclined to go over there and give them a piece of my mind. Let’s see them try to stop me!"

I looked down in embarrassment.

"No, um. We don’t have magic objects like that. At all. In Remus. Only things I’ve used are ‘fully activated’ or not. I don’t think we know how to make anything more complex…"

My voice faded away at the end of that. Awarthril looked horrified.

"None!? Oh you poor dear. Alright, this is going to be like teaching you how to somersault before you can walk, but I’m sure we’ll manage it. First…"

Chapter 254 - The Sex Talk I

The elves had agreed to give me a few days to process being nearly murdered again. I was seeing the value in it, given how I was feeling like poorly pieced together pottery at the moment, just a stiff breeze away from shattering.

I wasn’t going to break though. I was stronger than that.

Still, there wasn’t a ton to do currently besides goofing off.

I’d quickly skimmed the book I’d been given, which was about as boring as it’d looked. Then Aegion had helped me carefully scrape the pages, getting the ink cleared off while preserving the vellum underneath.

The Medical Manuscripts were being written again!

I didn’t want to write all day though, my hand got cramped and I could only focus on the task for so long. I wasn’t thinking of what I needed to write anymore, which was how I’d done it before. No, this time around I was just transcribing it from memory.

I loved [Pristine Memories] for stuff like this.

Still, the sun was starting to get low, and I shook yet another cramp out of my hand, putting the quill down. I eyed my spot, and with a sigh, picked it back up, licked the end - ink tasted terrible - and dipped it back into the inkpot. I finished a few more sentences, then leaned back to examine my work.

"How’s it going?" Awarthril hovered over me. "Everything ok? Any issues I can help you with?"

I waved a hand lazily.

"Nah, I’m fine. Thanks! Just finished up this section of the book, going to call it a day."

Awarthril leaned over my shoulder, squinting to read the tiny, cramped text I’d written.

"Well. I don’t quite understand all of that, but Elaine, this is amazing! I can’t wait to see it done. And you’re sure you want to give it to us?"

Awarthril reading over my shoulder out of sheer curiosity was going to get my [Oath] revealed. It was going to end up in the book, but once I wrote it down? The cat would be out of the bag.

I didn’t want the elves to know about it, but there was strong potential for some serious good here. If the elves thought my Medical Manuscripts were good stuff? If they spread it around?

It’d help thousands, if not tens of thousands of people. I didn’t dare dream larger. What was my life balanced against those sorts of scales?

It wasn’t even like my worse-case scenario would leave me dead. Just… detained for a few dozen years.

"Well, yeah. I’ve got a few dozen copies circulating at home, and there I can just pay a blasted scribe to do this for me!"

I glared at the offending implements, like they were personally responsible for my decision to re-write the entire Medical Manuscripts again.

Awarthril coughed, and I reddened.

Right. She’d offered to do the writing for me, but something in her tone when she’d offered had made me bristle and reject her, insisting that I do it all myself.

I blew on the ink one last time and slammed the book shut. Without saying anything else, I extracted myself from the conversation, and cheeks burning, put everything away in the Spatial Box, before heading over to the little hut Serondes had made for us.

I got inside and breathed. In, and out. Just let it go.

Speaking of embarrassment, I wasn’t getting any younger - ok, I could, I had a super-rare skill just for it - and it was time for Serondes and I to have a serious talk.

First, I changed into the nice new dress I’d been given. Why not? I liked the Mistweave well enough, but wearing the same outfit day after day after day was getting real old. I’d done it enough with armor sets.

The material was silky, and the cut in a somewhat daring style. It was nice, but not, like, super special to me. There was none of the emotions or history needed for it to be special.

I poked my head out of the little hut.

"Hey Serondes! Wanna come over?" I called out in my best ‘alluring Elaine’ voice. Irresistible to any person I had my eyes on!

"Give me a few minutes, I’m busy!"

I put my hands on my hips. Fortunately, as I was formulating the right devastating reply, Aegion saved my bacon.

"Serondes, given how nice Elaine is dressed up, maybe you shouldn’t wait a few minutes."

Serondes glanced over at me, then did a double-take. He looked at what he was doing, put it down, and came on over.

"Come here you!" I flirted with him, pulling him into the hut and closing the door.

He swept me into his arms, and we spent some time kissing. He picked me up, and started to lay me down on our bedrolls when I put a hand on his chest.

"Serondes. Let’s have a talk."

He paled.

"Nothing good has ever come from that sentence." He complained as he complied.

"Well, let’s talk about sex." I settled myself down in a comfortable sitting position.

Mostly. There was one bit of the dress that was catching and just not quite there.

Focus.

"Yes. Frequently, epically, twice daily?" Serondes asked the last part as a question.

I half-punched him in the arm. I could see why Awarthril got annoyed with him at times.

"Har har. No, seriously. I want to make sure we’re on the same page with a bunch of things before we go much further."

He sat up straighter.

"I’m listening.""Good! We’ve got a lot to talk about. Sex, consent, boundaries, health, acts, and probably a few more." I ticked the points off my finger one at a time.

He waggled his eyebrows.

"Let’s do acts first!"

"That’s kinda not the order I was hoping to do things in… but sure… wait no. No, gotta hit the other things first." I was kinda babbling, able to feel every heartbeat.

He shrugged.

"Alright, go!"

Start at the start I guess.

"What does consent mean to you?"

"Well, I ask if you want to have sex, you say yes, then we have sex."

I rubbed my eyes. Close, yet so, so far.

"Ok, you’ve got some basic ideas. First off, I can obviously say ‘no’ if I don’t want to have sex."

"Sure."

I should’ve written notes on what to talk about, in what order. I was kinda winging it. Like a butterfly.

"Let’s talk about getting consent. As you said, you - or me - asks, and the other person confirms or denies it. Then we can get started! It’s that easy."

"Asking for consent isn’t sexy. I don’t want to kill the mood. What’s wrong with just slowly going, and seeing what happens or when the other person asks to stop?"

"Well, for the second part, I dunno how often you’ve seen things from a woman’s point of view." My tone was a little dry, but a tiny bit curious. For all I knew there was magic that would let Serondes do something like that. "It’s entirely possible for someone to start taking liberties, and ignoring some non-verbal cues to stop, thinking it’s ‘sexy’ or ‘a game’. Then the woman stops, because she’s scared of getting hurt, or killed, and just lets things happen."

I paused for a moment, letting Serondes soak that in. I breathed in a few times rapidly, and let a fear of mine explode out of me.

"Serondes, push come to shove, you could kill me with a thought. I’d barely be able to resist. I don’t think you realize how scary that is for me, or how incredibly vulnerable I need to make myself to do anything around you. So please. Make me comfortable. Make it clear that you’re not a threat to me, or threatening me."

I swallowed the lump in my throat, watching the gears turn in Serondes’s head as he processed all of that. I felt the back of my dress getting soaked. Finally, he nodded.

"Makes sense. I wouldn’t want to be with a woman who was that much stronger than me, because you’re right. That is scary."

Ok, so… fine, I guess he got the idea. I felt my heart lifting up at that, and gave him my best smirk.

"Also, wanna bet on the asking for consent thing?" I boldly stated. He eyed me.

"Sure."

I leaned closer to him, letting him get a good view as my mouth practically touched his ears.

"I want to go down on you at the end of this. Is that ok?" I tried my best ‘seductive’ voice, and leaned back. From how Serondes’s cheeks flushed and pupils got huge, I’d say I succeeded. I gave him a little wiggle, smirking at him.

"Sexy or not?" I challenged. He held his hands up.

"Sexy, sexy, fine! Asking for consent can be sexy, if done right."

I laughed at that.

"Ok, sure." I put on my best mechanical voice.

"Serondes. Elf. May. I. Place. Food. Receptacle. On. Your. Chatter. Exit?"

He looked somewhat horrified at me. I’d killed the mood somewhat, but eh. I wasn’t here for making a good mood.

"See? All in the way you ask."

He thought about it a moment.

"Can I bend you over later?"

"Yes, but that touches on something else. Be specific! Bending me over is fine. But I don’t think you were talking about just bending me over now were you? You wanted to do more than that."

"Sure, but do I need to be explicit about it?"

"The first time? Yes. Especially if we’re not sure where we are on all the different types of sex and sex acts we want to perform, and that we’re good with."

"Isn’t it self explanatory?"

I shook my head, letting my hair wave around.

"Let’s pretend, for a second, that I had a habit of…" I glanced down significantly, and squeezed my hands together. "Crushing grapes. Making them just go pop. I’m a healer after all, I can fix it. For all you know, I find that lots of fun."

Serdones crossed and recrossed his legs.

"Wouldn’t you want some heads up before I started going pop?"

"Yes, but that’s not the same!"

"How do you know it’s not the same? Maybe something perfectly normal for you is entirely unacceptable to me. That’s why we’re here, now. Talking. So we establish boundaries with each other. So we know what’s ok without asking - like how we kiss all the time - how we know what’s OK with asking, and how we know what’s off-limits, and what shouldn’t even be asked."

I could see Serondes processing all this. He nodded.

"Ok, can I touch your chest?"

"In private, sure! Not in front of everyone though. Don’t need to ask even." I winked at him, and he moved forward, taking the liberty he just asked for.

"How about your butt?"

"Same thing. Can I touch your butt?"

Serondes slipped a hand under my dress, caressing my leg up to my ass, then starting to feel me up with his other hand before he answered.

"Yeah."

I gave the object in question a hefty squeeze over Serondes’s robe.

"Can I stick a finger where the sun don’t shine?" My eyes were twinkling at him.

"Um, no. Heck no." He said as his hands withdrew.

"See? Talking about this tells us where our boundaries are, and what we are and aren’t ok with. Without the talk…"

I glanced down significantly, and squeezed my hands into fists.

"Grapes."

A thought struck me, and I added it in to make sure I wouldn’t forget later."And just because I’ve said yes at some point, doesn’t mean I can’t change my mind later."

"Well…." Serondes kinda trailed off there. "Even if we’re in the middle of doing it?"

"I mean, are you willing to be somewhat adventurous with me?" I asked.

"Sure!" Serondes’s enthusiasm was transparent.

"Well, what if I wanted to try something on you, and you decided in the middle that you really, really, didn’t like it?"

"We’d stop."

"Exactly! See, revocable."

I got a nod from him.

"What about quickly finishing up?"

I gave him a glare, and mentally calmed myself. We were discussing this for a reason, and Serondes was, so far, adjusting and adapting. On one hand, it shouldn’t be my job to teach him this stuff. On the other, he was listening and receptive, and it was stuff he needed to know at some point.

"Then we’d have a Very Serious problem. No. Consent is revokable, and when it’s revoked, it’s immediately revoked. No continuing, no quickly finishing, nothing. Lemme phrase it this way. You’re having sex with a woman who isn’t consenting. What’s that called again?"

"But she consented earlier?"

"That doesn’t matter in the slightest. My earlier definition still applies. Plus, how enthusiastic would I have been in the first place if I’m revoking things in the middle, or how badly have things gone? People don’t revoke consent in the middle just to screw with you."

That seemed to get through to him.

"Alright, alright. I want to talk more about different things we’re willing to do with each other."

"Can we detour for one quick moment? Just want to talk about obtaining consent for a quick second."

"Isn’t that what we’re doing?"

"Yeah, and we’re doing great so far. I just wanted to bring up pressure for a moment."

"I’m feeling pressured by this whole conversation!" Serondes joked.

"Yeah yeah. Look, is consent really consent if you’re threatening someone into it?" I asked what I hoped was a rhetorical question.

"Well, no." Serondes came through for me. I might’ve needed to dump him if he said yes.

"Ok, what about pressure? Like, there’s degrees of pressure. Is blackmail still a threat? Is threatening others? Those should be easy. But then we get into other problems, like power dynamics."

"Tell me more."

I could kiss him. And I did.

And touched his butt, since he’d said earlier it was ok to do.

"It ranges from obvious to less obvious, to subtle and insidious." I said. "By the way, can I take your clothes off?"

"Any time, any place." Serondes suggested. I facepalmed a bit.

Almost.

"At a formal event? In front of kids? In-"

"Point taken, but Elaine, you also have your own good judgement. Forgive me for thinking you’d apply it." Serondes cut back.

Ouch. He was right.

Focus.

Moving on.

"The biggest issues is when sex becomes transactional, and the transactions aren’t tiny." I went back to consent. "Like if a guard’s arrested someone, and offers them freedom for favors. Or someone owns slaves, and makes demands. A master putting sex on the list of duties for an apprentice. Those are the obvious ones. The more subtle ones are withholding affection, making demands, or doing things like constantly waking someone up in the night until they give in. Those are all bad."

I hesitated over the next example, then decided not to talk about prostitution and consent. The subject and ethics were somewhat murky as-is, and my only solid experience with the topic was in Remus, where the lines less blurred and more utterly obliterated when slavery came into play. The topic was complicated and nuanced, and I knew I didn’t have the experience or knowledge to properly go into it.

Bless the Aquiliea guards who’d let my dad keep his job. I’d need to swing by at some point, figure out who’d made the decision, and like, rain money on them or something.

"Would another example be, say, demanding sexual favors to escort someone back to her home?"

I looked him in the eyes.

"Exactly. Even the implication is bad."

"What are tiny transactions?" Serondes asked, reaching back round to fondle me a bit. I snuggled into his grasp.

"Minor things, like ‘hey, can you do the dishes?’ or ‘can you get a bath warming’ and other minor tasks like that. They’re so small, it’s not really pressure, just a tiny favor that we’d be willing to do for each other anyways. The sex isn’t really part of it, it’s just like..."

I struggled a moment for the words.

"Just like combining some minor things anyways." I finished lamely.

"What’s the biggest thing you think is ok to trade for sex?" Serondes asked.

I gave him a kiss, wrapping my hands around him to give him a hug. He was getting it! We were establishing safe, healthy boundaries, talking about stuff, and figuring out how we stood - err, laid - in relationship to each other.

"Probably more sex." I answered seriously.

"Deal!" He shouted out. I rolled my eyes.

"Like reciprocating. Like, an example would be ‘I’ll go down on you if you go down on me.’ Pretend for a moment that we’re only OK with going down on each other, but we love the reverse. We could happily arrange something where I scratch your back, and you scratch mine."

"Well, I sure hope there isn’t a lot of scratching involved. Or backs."

He looked down at my waist significantly. I tried to half-punch him from my poor angle.

"You know exactly what I mean. Leads well into the next idea. GGG."

"GGG?"

Chapter 255 - The Sex Talk II

"Yeah, GGG. Good, Giving, Game." I explained the acronym. "It’s a way of approaching relationships and sex, and unless you’ve got a better idea, it’s how I think we should approach this."

"I’ve got my own ideas, but go on, I’m listening." Serondes’s eyes and hands suggested that he wasn’t listening all that closely, but mmmm. What he was doing was nice.

Plus, he was an elf, and they’d been completely unfair so far. I could easily imagine Serondes being able to do three things at once with his full attention.

"Ok, so. Good. We should each try to be good to each other, and good in bed with each other."

"You’ve got no danger of me being bad on that last one." Serondes quipped. I rolled my eyes.

I don’t think I’d ever met a man who didn’t believe that. Honestly.

"I’m sure you’re an expert." My voice was practically dripping with sarcasm. "But maybe humans have different buttons than the one you’re used to, or maybe my buttons are a little different."

"Like this one? Or this one? Or…" Serondes deftly and expertly poked, prodded, and massaged me, causing me to twitch and arch in his arms.

"Alright, alright! I get it!" I squirmed, trying to stay focused and on-task with the conversation we were having.

"Giving equal time and equal pleasure to each other." I explained the next part, getting an arched eyebrow back from Serondes.

"Well, by my reckoning, there’s been quite a lot in one direction, and less in another." He pointed out.

I bit my lip. He wasn’t wrong. At all. He’d been doing lots for me, and I’d mostly been enjoying and basking in the attention and affection.

"Ok, fine. On your stomach, strip off your shirt." I shifted around to give Serondes space to comply with my orders. Which he did, and I put my hands on his back, leaning in to give them some weight. I started on his shoulders, focusing and working on giving him a relaxing massage.

"It seems foolish to constantly measure and check everything we do for each other." Serondes half-murmured into his arm. "Better to simply try to do our best."

I paused my massage to give a few quick kisses on his back. "Yup!"

"With that being said, I’ve done roughly 17.2 times as much for you. Now 17.1."

I grabbed his ear and twisted it. Even with all my strength, Serondes’s natural elvish toughness and vitality was enough to practically ignore me.

"Now listen here you…" I trailed off as Serondes started laughing. He rolled over in place so fast that I basically stayed on top of him, now straddling his chest.

"Hook, line, and sinker." He grinned at me. I flicked his nose.

"Yeah. Fine. You got me. Last one’s game." I switched the topic. "It’s a little more complicated than the rest. Game’s basically the idea that, if I’m neutral or ambivalent about an act, and you’re really into it and the idea? I should probably give it a shot. Same goes for you! If I’m really into trying something, and you don’t dislike the idea? Humor me."

"Well, how does that tie back into consent?" Serondes asked. "Seems like there’s some problem room. Also, what are some examples?"

"I mean, it’s still up to the person in question what they want. An example, hmmm…" I thought about it a moment.

"I’m not much up for, say, sex outside. But if you really, really wanted to do it? I could maybe be talked into it." I finally decided. "It’s not my favorite idea, but it’s not like I hate it to the point where I would refuse to do it."

"Hmmm. I see." Serondes added. "Anything else before we start having some fun?"

I wanted to roll my eyes at him.

"Yes. Quite a few things. An easy one is sexually transmitted infections. Normally we’d have to worry about them and make sure we didn’t have any, buuuuuuuuuut. I’m a healer! Destroyer of diseases! Vanquisher of infections! Good talk."

Serondes snorted, and went back to lying on his stomach, tapping on his shoulders. I got back to massaging.

"Monogamy. I’m entirely monogamous, and from my understanding, you are as well?" I checked real fast.

"Mmmmmm. Yup." Serondes agreed. I wasn’t a huge fan of his tone, but I shrugged.

"Ok, I think the last thing that we need to tackle before going back to the list of acts we’re willing to do and when is pregnancy and birth control."

"Easy. Elves can’t have kids with non-elves. Boom. Done." Serondes snaked an arm down his side, rubbing my exposed leg.

"And how, exactly, do you know that elves can’t have kids with humans?" I demanded.

"Well, from what I’ve heard, elves and demons can’t have kids, nor can elves and dryads."

"And from what I’ve heard, humans and elves can." I retorted. "Look, there’s a bunch of different types of sex. Let’s just call reproductive sex PIV."

"I mean, it’s not, but sure."

If looks could kill, I’d be violating [Oath] a dozen times over. I took a few deep breaths to center myself, then unloaded on him.

"Look, with PIV, what’s it to you? Just a good, fun time, right?" I plowed on. "It’s a fun, good time for me as well. The issue is the risk. I bear all the risk if something goes wrong. The last thing I need in my life is a kid. I don’t want kids. They’re not part of my plan. My life would get ruined, my body changed forever, and I’d need to spend at least twentyish years raising said kid and helping them out, or even longer if half-elves take longer to mature. Like, no. Also, you’re a dear Serondes, but would I be wrong to call our relationship a fling?"

"Um." I got an awkward pause from Serondes.

"Look, I’m loving what we’re doing and what we have here, but I feel like this relationship has a bit of an expiry date, no? Are you going to follow me back to Remus? Do you plan on sticking around the Academy that you’ve said is ‘boring’ and ‘worthless’? What do you see as our long-term future together?"

Serondes’s face was hilarious. Shock, puckered lips, followed by a furiously twitching nose which he half got up to pinch. He opened and closed his mouth a few times before sneezing.

"Ok, yes, you’re probably right. This is a fling." He sounded a tiny bit hurt at that admission, and I felt just a tiny bit bad. However, it was better to get it out in the air and discussed. Both of us should be on the same page.

"Right. I get pregnant somehow, our fling ends, you leave, and now I’m stuck doing all this by myself. Remus is shit towards women, and an unmarried woman having a kid? I’d be lucky if the Sentinels kept me around, and even then my ability to operate would be hindered. Forget joining the Academy, helping Awarthril, or any number of other things. I’d be stuck, and my life in shambles, all for a few moments of fun. It’s just not worth it for me."

"But elves and humans can’t have kids in the first place. So it’s moot."

I stopped massaging Serondes and knuckled my forehead.

"If we’re not actively using some sort of birth control, we’re trying." I explained to Serondes after a moment. "Now, I don’t know about you, but I didn’t bring any with me." I added in drily.

"Sure, but we’ve got some in the Spatial Box."

"Do they work on humans? Or just elves?" I asked.

"Well, Awarthril might be able to share what she uses, and I’ve got a potion I can take." Serondes added.

Wow. Male birth control. Ok, that was pretty neat. Still had a minor problem though…

"What’s the mechanism of action, and do you know if it still works when you have PIV sex with human women?" I asked.

I wasn’t being fair here. I knew Serondes hadn’t studied biology, and would have no idea what the answer was.

The risk to myself was just too damn big.

I got some grumpy noises from Serondes.

"Can we discuss the rest of this another time? It’s off the table for now… why don’t we discuss all the things we do want to do?" I leaned back into his back, trying to get back in his good graces with the power of backrubs!

"Mmmm. Fine. What is on the table - or bed, as it may be?" Serondes asked, seemingly accepting my limitation.

The more I thought about it, the more annoyed I was getting. I shouldn’t have to explain in great detail why I did or didn’t want to do something! A simple "I don’t want to do X." should’ve been enough for him. Pressuring me and asking me in great detail about it, forcing me to defend my choice again and again wasn’t cool.

At the same time, if it was important to him, or something he was looking forward to a bunch? Talking it out was good. It was a tricky mix. There were few absolutes in the realm of dating and sex.

Why couldn’t it be medicine? That was so much simpler.

Well, time to extend some olive branches.

"How do you feel about hands?" I asked.

"Ehhh. Like, I’m ok with the idea, but I don’t think it’s that satisfying in practice. How about you?"

"Wash your hands and trim your nails first. Also, gotta ask me beforehand."

"That pun was awful. Oral?"

"Well, there are quite a few different ways of doing it…"

We kept talking until my throat was sore, discussing the 101 different ways of having sex that we could think of right here and now. When it was ok. When it wasn’t ok. What our expectations and requirements were.

A strong, healthy sex talk, establishing important boundaries before we did anything. I could feel myself getting turned on the more we described different acts that we’d like to do to each other, and how we envisioned them going down.

We were winding down, when we hit one last snag.

"Drunk sex?"

"No, I can’t consent. Well, not when drunk. Lightly buzzed? Maybe, we’d need to talk about it in advance. It’s like waking someone up with sex. It’s tricky, difficult, and almost always a no."

Serondes flopped back, blowing raspberries.

"Anything else?" He asked with a slightly disgruntled tone.

"Yeah, can you make a pillar of Lava for my egg?"

"Why’s that?"

I caressed him, and answered with mischief in my voice.

"I do seem to recall wanting to do some things with you at this point. Things that require that I’m not managing the egg for some time. Unless you don’t want to anymore?"

I’d never seen clothes disappear so fast.

[*ding!* [Passionate Learning] has leveled up! 378 -> 379]

Not again.

I woke up the next morning, completely naked except for my pendant, and cuddling with Serondes. I threw off the sheets, quickly decided between my two outfits - Mist weave or fancy dress, Mist weave won - and headed out.

"Elaine! Good morning!" Awarthril practically jumped on me, throwing an arm around one shoulder.

"Elaine! Congratulations!" Aegion shoved a mug into my hands.

I sniffed it cautiously.

"What’s all this?" I felt clever asking both about the attention and the mug in a single question.

Awarthril tapped her nose, and I paled.

"No. Nooooooooooooooooooo." I buried my face in my elbow as I remembered her enhanced sense of smell. And all the things White Dove had said when cursing Thukrur, and his sense of smell.

"Hmmm. Aegion?" Awarthril’s tone made it clear what she wanted him to do.

"Hey Cordamo, let’s go exploring!" The brewmaster called out, and I heard him stomping - deliberately loudly - off into the tall grass.

Awarthril gently guided me to the table, and sat me down.

"So! Tell me everything!"

Without thinking, I sipped the brew Aegion gave me, then sprayed it all over Awarthril.

"AEGION!" I shouted, throwing the full mug vaguely in the direction he’d gone. Foul liquid spilled everywhere, and I sat down with a grumpy vengeance.

"Why would he give me the bad beer?" I complained.

"Probably because you got laid and he didn’t?" Awarthril had an amused twist to her mouth.

"Yeah, fine."

"You seem pretty happy, everything went ok?"

"Except for everyone else finding out, yes." I glared murder at her. She laughed and backed up.

"Alright, alright. Leaving tomorrow, does that work for you?"

I could always use more rest time, but I did want to eventually get home.

"Yeah, works for me."

The road - even as broken as it was - sped us up. We were now covering two, three times the distance per day that we’d been able to get before.

A few weeks passed.

"We’re getting close to the Low Experience Zone!" Aegion told me one day, handing over some fried eggs he’d foraged. Extra-large, one was more than enough for me. "Well, relatively speaking. Still need to travel for a few more weeks in that direction-ish. Still! Closer than we were yesterday, and tomorrow we’ll be even nearer!"

I gave him a smile.

"Thanks Aegion!"

I took a cautious bite of the eggs. Tasty!

We camped that night, Serondes and I getting back to magic lessons. I wanted [Butterfly Mystic] to level, damnit! Well, level more. I’d gotten a pair of levels at this point in our travels.

"Sand’s a lot of fun." Serondes explained. I half-rolled my eyes. Yes, I knew that. ‘Serondes and the dozen massaging hands’ was now a regular feature in my life.

"One of the ways I can use Sand is by having thousands of tiny repetitive motions and hits in a short timeframe onto a single target. Like this."

Serdones waved his arm - entirely unnecessary dramatic moves, but cool looking - and a pillar of rapidly hardening Lava erupted from the ground. What looked like a solid bar of Sand was then summoned, and after a few flourishes, practically went straight through the pillar.

Fascinating. I got so much out of that.

I mentally sighed. Serondes was trying, and he always had something new and interesting. The rapidly-pulsing Sand was an interesting idea, and it could apply to Radiance somewhat.

I focused on the pillar, and with a thought and a focus, rapidly flickered a beam of Radiance at it, turning it on and off in quick succession.

It would’ve been blinding if it wasn’t for my [Radiance Resistance], and Serondes was squinting.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 51->52!]

[*ding!* Congratulations! You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Strobe Laser]! Would you like to replace a skill with Strobe Laser? Y/N]

Strobe Laser: Light up the party and your enemies with this rapidly flickering Radiance beam! Increased speed, focus, heat, and destruction per level.

Well.

Shit.

That looked like a solid combat skill. I already used [Radiance Conjuration] to make fine, pin-point beams, but I was gated by my magic power how much "oomph" I had. With a dedicated skill, I’d be able to use both [Radiance Conjuration] and this new skill at the same time, doubling my output, and effectively doubling my power.

Ok, it was more like a 50% increase in damage, since I had [Kaleidoscope]. Still, there was a trade-off between meta-skills, like [Solar Flare] and [Sun’s Heart], and more "point and blast" skills. I felt I was a little too far on the meta and utility end right now, and needed more damage.

I couldn’t take it, I didn’t have the spare slot. I was still working on [Solar Flare].

Maybe later?

I declined it, and that must’ve pushed me over the edge.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 346->347! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

"A level! Wooooo!" I jumped up and down.

"Nice!" Serondes opened his arms, and I happily jumped into them. "Does that mean I’m doing something with you tonight?"

I gave him a quick peck.

"Yes, but no, but yes again. Let’s call it a night."

I had inspiration strike me, and I mentally reached out to the ring of deception, fiddling with the settings.

"Up for some role play?" I asked Serondes, who arched a curious eyebrow at me.

"Sure."

I mentally adjusted the Deception Ring to show me at a low level. Usually I liked putting it at a high level - I liked feeling powerful, after having spent so much of my life powerless, and the ring helped with that. Not tonight though.

"Ack! Alas, I am a poor, low-level human faced with a vicious and," I glanced significantly at his head. "Horny elf. Whatever shall I do?"

Serondes had some ideas.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 415,850/415,850]

[Mana Regen: 277,804 (+361,539)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 94]

[Strength: 957]

[Dexterity: 1,484]

[Vitality: 11,330]

[Speed: 11,330]

[Mana: 41,585]

[Mana Regeneration: 41,676 (+36,154)]

[Magic Power: 18,342 (+342,995)]

[Magic Control: 18,342 (+342995)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 421]]

[Celestial Affinity: 421]

[Cosmic Presence: 287]

[The Stars Never Fade: 2]

[Center of the Universe: 421]

[Dance with the Heavens: 421]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 421]

[Mantle of the Stars: 421]

[Sunrise: 345]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 347]]

[Radiance Affinity: 347]

[Radiance Resistance: 347]

[Radiance Conjuration: 347]

[Solar Flare: 52]

[Nectar: 347]

[Sun's Heart: 347]

[Scintillating Ascent: 314]

[Kaleidoscope: 347]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 220]

[Egg Incubation: 55]

[Bullet Time: 420]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 374]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 394]

[Persistent Casting: 296]

[Passionate Learning: 379]

Chapter 256 - Spinosaurus Surprise

I was woken up in the middle of the night to the sounds of shattering rocks and screaming. Serondes and I bolted awake, and I summoned a strong Radiance glow as he got some Lava ready for lighting.

A sword crashed through one of the walls, the crystal blade sinking into the other side of the room, shaving a few hairs off my nose as I went cross-eyed.

Serondes grabbed the crystal blade, yanking it out of the wall. I recognized it as one of the elven blades, and with the sheer expertise demonstrated by getting it through one wall and not the other, I assumed it was a high-speed delivery.

Then Serondes sprinted out the door, while I followed a moment later, only pausing a moment to check that the egg was still good in its Serondes-created Lava pillar. I didn’t bother to throw anything on. I didn’t have any gear nearby, and what I had that was halfway pretending to be protective took ages to equip. I’d just have to hope mom’s lucky pendant was enough.

I had a half-second to think before I got outside.

FOR ONCE it wasn’t me getting attacked in the middle of the night. THANK GOODNESS.

I got out of the hut and immediately exploded upwards, snapping my [Scintillating Ascent] wings open to gain height, and get myself away from the problem and into a good vantage point.

Goosebumps ran down my arms as [Bullet Time] activated before I could even properly see the threat, but it only took a half-moment to turn my head towards the screaming, and see what was going on.

A dinosaur with a familiar shape was rampaging out, with Aegion caught screaming in its jaws. A long, crocodile-like jaw with jagged teeth, a large sail on its back, hunched over on two feet with grasping claws and a long tail. I’d seen statues of the dinosaur, and the super-sized version in the flesh.

A spinosaurus. Or a relative so close as to practically be one.

The dinosaur was big, but not Etalix-sized. I would be knee-tall on it, compared to the ankle-tall that I would be against the Guardian himself.

Aegion was in the jaws in question, working hard at not turning into an appetizer, the spinosaurus’s serrated teeth trying to saw him in half. Most of the screaming was coming from him, although Kiyaya was barking, Awarthril was yelling, and the spinosaurus was making its own noises.

With a thought I flew up, higher, bathing the field in light so we could all see. My eyes flickered up, noting the clearish sky, and the pair of crescent moons. [Wheel of Sun and Moon] was live. I did try to aim a second high-intensity beam at the spino’s eye, trying to blind it on one side.

It’d attacked at night, I was assuming it didn’t like the bright lights.

Serondes was hovering lower down, spinning balls of Lava forming around him, preparing to attack. Awarthril had her overlarge polearm out, and Kiyaya was next to her, howling. They were keeping a far, cautious distance from the spinosaurus, and as my eyes adjusted, I saw a bit more what was going on.

There was a faint greyish-brown sphere around the spinosaurus, a solid ball of see-through color crackling around him. Grass inside the sphere was slowly crumbling and fading.

Something clicked, and Awarthril’s voice was magnified a dozen times, the force of her words like a hammer against my head as Kiyaya amplified her.

"Erosion aura!" She yelled as she charged forward.

Chains erupted in her path, launching themselves up to the spinosaurus, wrapping around its neck, arms, legs, body, and tail. Awarthril took a hop forward, a pad of Ooze appearing in her path. She sprang off of it like a trampoline, slicing down at the spinosaurus.

Fuck it. I wasn’t doing any good up here, and Aegion needed help. It sucked to think, but he’d be better off sliced in half. Then I could heal him up, and he’d be back in the fight, not trapped.

The angle wasn’t great, and the blade was turned by the sail. Still, Awarthril was flexible, and sticky black Ooze appeared around the spinosaurus, trying to bind it further.

Serondes wasn’t idle, his classic Lava bullets interspersed with the occasional larger crescent blade of burning Lava fired at the spinosaurus.

I continued my dive, feeling my skin prickling as I dove through the Erosion aura, the skill eating away at my flesh and bone, my vitality slowing the process down and my healing reversing any damage that occurred.

Getting so close to the spinosaurus was risky, but when was healing mid-combat anything but?

Serondes’s attacks were a powerful broadside onto the dinosaur. The smaller Lava bullets didn’t do much, but the larger slashes of Lava that caused the air to shimmer and mirage around them were cutting deep.

In a strange twist, the molten rock half-trickled out of the gashes they made, before solidifying into solid rock. Both armor against future attacks, a reduction in flexibility, and a heavy weight to carry. Not that a few dozen or hundred pounds would slow a massive dinosaur of that level much.

Even as I dove, air screaming past me as I let gravity pull me down while "pushing" my flight down, the chains around the spinosaurus slowly degraded, then snapped. First one, then two, then the rest of them went, the spino’s Erosion aura - or skills - breaking through the bindings.

I flashed past Cordamo, who was circling just above Aegion, wind swirling ominously around him. As I shot past him, the wind picked me up and spun me around, causing the ground to spin wildly. I had enough experience flying, even through hostile conditions, that I was able to keep my head and orientation.

I started to summon my [Kaleidoscope] butterflies, launching them in careful waves at the spinosaurus. I didn’t want to risk hurting Aegion more while he was trapped in the literal jaws of the beast. I aimed for the hip, hoping to chain enough explosive Radiance butterflies in a row to take the leg out of action.

Ideally, with that leg gone, it would fall over and be entirely crippled. No way would we be that lucky.

I was careful with how much mana I was using. I wasn’t the offensive powerhouse of this team, I was the healer. Aegion was going to require serious assistance, and there was no telling who else I’d need to fix.

The spino finished breaking free and whirled hard. First he swung Aegion through the hail of Lava bullets that Serondes had launched, peppering the poor elf with friendly fire. He kept spinning, and his tail elongated, extending further and further. Stretching in a way only a skill can cause, cracking like a whip.

Serondes saw it coming, but he was a little too close. A little too sure of the distance that he had on the dinosaur, of his own skills. He flew back, but the tail kept extending, some skill at work. A ball of Sand flashed inside a shell of Lava, but the tail just went straight through it, breaking dozens of Serondes’s bones and sending him flying.

I quickly, clinically analyzed the injuries I’d seen in that brief window of vision I’d gotten. Broken arm, shattered ribs, broken spine, likely dozens of internal injuries, probable broken neck, crushed pelvis, and those were only the injuries I had a vague idea of from this distance. Either way, Serondes was in a world of hurt, and required urgent medical care to stay alive. Blunt trauma was a nasty way to go, and it could go either way. He could survive for hours with those injuries, or if something subtle went wrong, minutes or less. A rib puncturing his heart would kill him quicker than landing on the nest of some creature that took offense. Medicine was an art, and tiny, miniscule differences and changes in what happened to a patient was often the difference between life and death.

As much as I wanted to tend to him, Aegion had triage priority. I was closer, and more importantly, Aegion’s current appointment with Black Crow was ahead of Serondes’s. He was being sawed in half, inside of the Erosion aura, and had just eaten a literal faceful of Lava bullets. Only reason he was still alive was there hadn’t been a slash of Lava in that attack. That, and his innate tenacity.

I finished my dive, starting to pull up to get some distance again. At the bottom of my dive, I was not only in range to use [Wheel of Sun and Moon] on Aegion, but a bit closer than my max range to decrease the penalty. I was probably going to end up needing to heal and re-heal Aegion a bunch, and mana was going to be a concern.

I cut the [Kaleidoscope] cast, watching the swarm of Radiance butterflies fulfill their mission. One after another, in rapid succession, they hit the hip joint, having gone the long way around. A chain of explosions erupted in the area, finally clearing to reveal…

Fuck.

They’d barely managed to blow through the tough scales, burning and scarring some of the muscles underneath. Not nearly enough to slow the spinosaurus down.

I split my attention back to Aegion, focusing on healing him. I didn’t bother with his waist - anything I healed would just get immediately re-opened. Instead I focused on everything above that. Heart. Lungs. Bones and muscle, spending extra attention on blood and blood loss. Naturally, his face got extra attention, healing a half-dozen holes drilled from Serondes’s Lava bullets.

I should totally make a joke about them improving his appearance. Or something.

He looked horrible, but his struggles and my healing working on him made it obvious that he was still alive. I kept working on pulling up, aiming to get up and away from the fight. I needed to fix Serondes up.

I thought I’d given myself enough room, and I was peeling away to save Serondes when the sail of the spinosaurus grew, the edge of it clipping my side.

Due to the angles involved, and my rapid upwards motion, it didn’t do too much to me, just caused me to wobble a bit in-flight and a negligible amount of mana.

Ok, sure, so it also ripped a chunk out of my side, ribs going flying, etc. etc. that instantly got restored. Basically a papercut.

I started to shoot off towards Serondes when Awarthril’s Kiyaya-amplified voice hit me.

"Elaine! Catch!"

I twisted in the air to see what I was supposed to catch, and swore to myself.

Awarthril was mid-leap to the spinosaurus’s jaw, where Aegion was hanging limply, the jaws of the dinosaur having almost entirely closed on him at last. So much for my healing. As she got closer, Ooze sprang out, connecting her to the spinosaurus and drawing her in faster. She reached Aegion, and ripped him out of the teeth of the dinosaur.

Well, for a generous definition of Aegion. She got the important parts. Head, heart, lungs, like a third of his organs. Everything from the belly down was left inside of the dino’s mouth though.

One downside to elvish perfection - I bet monsters thought they tasted delicious.

I immediately reversed direction and started diving back down.

With her bad angle and superelven strength, she heaved, sending Aegion’s upper body spinning towards me.

"You flea-infested idiot!" I cursed Awarthril as I flew on an intercept course for his body.

Skin and bones were important. Among other things, they kept the important bits, like guts, liver, kidneys, gallbladder, spleen, stomach, and everything else inside a person.

All of which were busily exiting Aegion, centripetal force flinging them out of his body with a generous dosing of the rest of his blood. Not the proper way to treat a patient.

I hadn’t gone terribly far, and between Awarthril’s high-speed toss and my own redirection, skin still burning under the terrible Erosion aura of the spinosaurus, Aegion was in range quickly. I blasted him the moment he got to the edge of my healing, my heart seizing for a brief moment before the rest of his body popped back into existence.

He’d live. From the current set of injuries anyways.

I glanced at Awarthril, currently dodging swipes of the spino’s extra-large claws, the fierce talons flickering as they grew longer then shorter, trying to skewer or slash the nimble mage. Kiyaya’s howls had taken on that deep, bone-shaking quality I’d associated with her most powerful skills.

She looked fine, if somewhat battered. Then the claws slashed at empty air, and a spray of blood out of nowhere reminded me of Awarthril’s favorite invisibility trick, having been smelled through by the clever dinosaur.

The injury reflected itself on the illusion, and I made a snap call.

Serondes’s wounds were worse than Awarthril’s, and we’d need his firepower to finish this fight.

I flew off in the direction I saw Serondes last flying, gaining height to better search, fleeing from the lethal threat at my back. I used my Radiance like a gigantic spotlight, throwing illumination all around to better try and find Serondes.

Like a bolt of white lightning, faster than any striking snake, the treacherous couatl struck. He dove down at me, wrapping himself around me, yanking me off-course. He was much lighter than I was, but between the speed he was going at, the entirely unexpected nature of the attack, and the powerful gale winds behind him all worked against me, causing me to be entirely knocked off my flight path, following Cordamo’s new idea of where I should be.

Which, evidently, was directly into the jaws of the dinosaur.

"CORDAMOOOOOOOOOO!" I yelled, frantically processing with the extra time [Bullet Time] gave me. A lifetime of experience and dealing with things trying to kill me gave me clarity, and let me think instead of blindly lashing out.

Apart from the one episode with the owl, Cordamo hadn’t exactly shown me animosity. He’d been relatively friendly, in spite of the fact that my dislike of snakes wasn’t exactly well-hidden. More importantly, I’d just saved his life-long bonded companion twice in the last minute. That wasn’t usually setting the stage for a vicious betrayal, that was usually praise and gratitude. Cordamo was smart enough to know what was going on, and what I’d done.

If he really wanted me dead, trying to strangle and poison me in the middle of the night would be the best method. I doubted any of the elves were dumb enough to buy "well Elaine accidentally died fighting the dinosaur" not when Awarthril and Kiyaya had a great view of the action.

Plus, he was in just as much, if not more, danger from the vicious dinosaur than I would be in.

Contrary to appearances, Cordamo hadn’t wrapped himself around me and was dragging me into the maw of the monster for fun or some misguided suicide mission. I didn’t know what he was up to, but I decided to have some faith. I stopped struggling against him, and started working with him, speeding us up.

Why me? Was it because I was there, because I was a healer, or because I was a mage?

Slim chance that it was because I was there. I can’t imagine more weight and ballast being what Cordamo needed, unless he was planning to use me as a club.

Actually, I could see him using me as a club, the jackass.

Instead of looking at the dinosaur, I looked at the feathered serpent instead.

Feathers were flitting off of his wings, with red streaks appearing on his body. Even as I was quickly looking, another patch of flesh opened up, a hole showing his ribs.

It clicked for me. Cordamo was small, and focused on speed, agility, and his poisons. He wasn’t stacking vitality, and the Erosion aura was doing terrible things to him, to the point where he wasn’t able to survive for long in it. He needed me just to stay alive against the oppressive, all-degrading skill.

I flickered a thought at healing him, and kept it up as we slammed into the dinosaur, landing on its back. Not exactly where I wanted to be, but it’s where Cordamo believed we needed to be.

Or him at least. I was just a handy healing package.

As we were flying in, I got to watch part of the fight. Aegion was moving towards the Spatial Box, probably to arm up. Awarthril was still fighting the spinosaurus, quick shifting claws slashing wildly to try and find the tricky illusionist hiding somewhere in the area.

There were no more Ooze pits or metal chains. The passive Erosion from the spino had chewed through them, and Awarthril was focusing her efforts.

The dinosaur roared, and its tongue shot out of its mouth, aiming for a seemingly empty spot. It split into a half-dozen tongue-like tentacles with nasty spikes on the end, finding the invisible Awarthril and wrapping around her, hooked barbs cruelly digging into her flesh.

The spinosaurus started to whip her around, Kiyaya leaping in to bite onto the tongue. She anchored herself, trying to stop the tongue from retracting

Even as Cordamo and I were landing near the base of the monster’s massive sail, I saw its head going up and down, Awarthril caught in its grip and being slammed into the ground, only to be brought up again and slammed back down.

Like hammering a nail into a piece of wood, driving its spikes deeper into her.

Kiyaya was involved, but frankly, with how everyone else was getting beaten up, she was the least of my worries.

I didn’t bother struggling against Cordamo’s bindings. I was stuck here, and the snake needed help just as much as Awarthril did, if in a less obvious and bouncy fashion.

Cordamo struck, fangs breaking against the incredibly tough, skill-reinforced scales of the dinosaur. He hissed in pain, one fang flying off as it broke.

Just my luck, it spun back and sank into my shoulder. My healing instantly restored his fangs at the same time it purged the traces of poison sent at me, and I ripped out the offending object.

"Careful!" I griped at him, as he drew back, preparing to strike again.

His fangs glistened with poison as his teeth turned green, clearly having some skill relating to how Gale had the concept of sharp behind it. Then, even through the enhanced perception of [Bullet Time], he blurred as he struck, his deadly fangs sinking deep into the spino’s back.

I couldn’t see it, but I could imagine the gallons of poison pumping into the dinosaur, Cordamo’s Poison skills letting him generate near-endless amounts of the lethal liquid.

I hung on the best I could, with the dinosaur throwing Awarthril and Kiyaya around by its tongue causing it to buck and shake harder than any bull.

A thunderous roar and burst of Lightning exploded next to us, Aegion having gotten his hands on his weapons and letting loose. I blinked the stars out of my eyes, my ears popping back as my entire body rattled and shook on the aftereffects of one of his skill-enhanced arrows blowing up practically on top of me.

I never, ever wanted to be on the wrong end of one of those.

Then like a light going out, the mighty beast crashed to the ground, the System sending a notification a moment later.

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Spinosaurus (Forest, 755)]//[Spinosaurus (Erosion, 750)]]

"Cordamo! Serondes! Now!" I yelled at the couatl, trying to take flight. The snake unwrapped himself from around me and took off, giving me a stiff tailwind to help me out.

We shot off together, couatl and human working in tandem. I shined brightly, pushing my [Radiance Conjuration] to the limit. I started to feel myself crashing from the adrenaline wearing off, refreshing myself with [Sunrise].

We searched the area, looking for any signs of Serondes. He’d been launched into a forest, and we weaved between the trees, my high-speed maneuvering along with the light centered on me throwing wild shadows around the woods, disturbing any number of creatures with my high-intensity spotlight.

Cordamo let out a stream of hisses and shot off, the wind changing direction. I veered sharply in his direction, my long study of the winged snake’s movements having a noticeable effect on my agility and maneuverability.

Half-impaled on a tree, bleeding and broken, was Serondes. I pushed [Wheel of Sun and Moon], focusing on healing his shattered bones, fixing his heart and head, and generally healing and restoring him. I had mana to spare, and the fight was over, so I was less concerned with efficiency.

Even as I got in range, nothing was happening, and I screamed, flying full-force into him. Begging the world that he wasn’t dead. That I wouldn’t need to bury another body, engrave another name.

I crashed into him, my healing kicking in. The moons had been hidden by the leafy canopy, but like an angel of mercy, my touch restored him, bringing him back to life.

Of course, my healing also broke the branch that had been impaling him and keeping him up, causing him to plummet to the forest floor, hitting a few branches on the way down before he oriented himself to what the fuck was going on, but eh.

He’d live.

I might need to take a second trip out, but that was unlikely, not with Serondes conscious and in full control of his magic. Worse-case he could make a floating Lava chair or something and get carried out.

I wanted to stick around and make sure everything would be fine, but Awarthril’s visible injuries, and whatever had happened to Kiyaya, was a higher priority than checking on Serondes. I shot back to our campsite, Cordamo giving me a strong assist again.

Kiyaya was ripping at the prehensile tongue of the spinosaurus, all while getting some strong howling in. Benefits of a Sound element. Awarthril was still wrapped in the spinosaurus’s dead appendage, cruel barbs having remained in her flesh even after its death. She was breathing hard and bleeding heavily, blood pooling under her. [Wheel of Sun and Moon] worked perfectly, and it became obvious that some muscles of hers had been entirely severed, as post-healing she was able to shake the tongue off and stand back up with another elven curse.

"PrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrfangardglarbarghMeeeeeeerp!!"

I was starting to think these weren’t elven curses. I dunno, there was just no consistency. I’m pretty sure they were just weird fucking noises that Awarthril made. She looked to be in terrible shape, with her clothes in absolute shambles. Rips, tears, bloodstains, and everything that was still vaguely intact looked faded and thin, like it was made out of poor, low-quality materials hastily put together then moth-eaten.

Kiyaya was a good girl, and got a dose of healing a moment later.

Awarthril immediately went to Kiyaya, patting her over and crying somewhat. She gave Kiyaya a great big hug, scratched her behind her ears, then headed over towards me.

"Elaine! Are you alright? How’s Serondes? And everyone else?"

"Everyone’s ok." I couldn’t keep the exhaustion out of my voice.

"Oh thank goodness! I was so worried."

She gave me a look up and down and patted my shoulders.

"You should rest up. Or at least, put some clothes on! You’ll catch a cold standing out here naked."

I looked down.

Derp. Right.

Hang on.

Completely naked?

Mom’s pendant!

I darted up, acting like a firefly, lighting the area up and cursing that I’d dumped [Lost and Found].

"What’s wrong? Elaine, you ok?" Aegion asked, making a reappearance.

"My pendant! The one I got from my mom! I’ve lost it!" I started to burn search grid marks into the ground, preparing for another long search.

Aegion and Awarthril glanced at each other. Kiyaya padded over, and helpfully put her nose to the ground, sniffing furiously as she tried to track down and find my pendant.

Good girl!

"Were you reinforcing it?" Aegion asked.

"Huh?"

"Did you have a skill protecting it?"

"No, I don’t have anything like that."

Technically I had [Mantle], but I used that to protect myself and throw shields around.

Aegion and Awarthril glanced at each other again.

"What? What is it?" I asked.

"Elaine, I’m so sorry. The Erosion aura probably ate it."

"No. NO! It’s special. It’s got to be ok!" I screamed back.

I looked at Awarthril’s tattered clothes. I remembered what the aura had been doing to me, to Cordamo. How a high-level monster couldn’t even be inside.

"The cord probably just snapped or something, it’s been fraying for ages now."

I wasn’t sure who I was trying to convince.

I thought back through the fight, pinpointing the moment where I’d felt the subtle weight of the necklace breaking, falling off. I thought about what I’d been doing, how I’d been flying and moving.

I rushed over to the area, blasting it with Radiance, making it brighter than the day.

It popped out at me immediately, a different-colored spot among the dead grasses. I flew down to it.

I sobbed as I picked up the rusted, eroded remnants of my lucky pendant. Even that small part crumbled to dust in my fingers, a still breeze scattering the remains.

No!

Not my lucky pendant!

It’d been with me forever, practically speaking. Mom had given it to me on my Unlocking day, and I’d basically never taken it off since. It’d survived the slavers and bandits, Rangers and monsters, plague and Ranger Academy. It’d survived me getting stabbed, sliced, poisoned, decapitated, burned, thrown down a mountain, snuck with me into a dragon’s lair and so many more adventures.

It was the closest thing our family had to a family heirloom, and now? It was just… gone. Destroyed by an aura.

I hadn’t even noticed.

"I’m back." Serondes tried to announce himself, but his voice was shaky. Worried, like his core beliefs of invincibility had been shaken.

I just stood up and walked away, ignoring Serondes.

Ignoring the rest of the elves calling after me, asking if I was ok. Like a zombie, I sleep-walked back to the hut, curled up in a ball, and cried myself to sleep.

I just wanted to go home. Needed to go home. I was insisting we head towards the deadzone tomorrow.

I was woken up in the middle of the night to a voice - no, voices - no, it was one voice, with many voices inside of it, as impossible as it was.

It sang, with mischief and cruelty, with child-like wonder and awe, words in a language that made me want to rip my eyes out and that I could understand every word of, every syllable passing its - their - its lips. A manic giggle, an imposter that was trying to mimic a child, yet clearly having never heard one before and getting it wrong. It sounded like the blowing of a horn, the baying of otherworldly dogs that had no place being in this world. The words had color, all the different shades of autumn. From the leaves of the trees changing color, to the wheat and grains that ripened and were harvested in the season, all the way to the last warm rays of the fading sun. The refreshing breath of cold, misty air, a flickering candle inside a carved pumpkin. My senses were crossed in an impossible way, bright colors bouncing on words.

"Found you."

Chapter 257 - Peer Pressure

My heart was racing at the voice, the words fading out of my ears, yet echoing in my mind, impossibly colored. How words in my mind had color, I’d never know.

"Serondes. Did you hear that?" I asked, shaking him.

He just grunted and rolled over.

Bah.

I debated waking him up, but apart from the weird words, nothing was happening. My hut wasn’t exploding, swords weren’t flying through the walls, and there was no [Bullet Time].

I was awake for the second time in a night, and at this point I was giving up on getting more sleep.

However, creeping paranoia was setting in. I used [Mantle of the Stars] to cloak and shield myself with all the brightly colored stars in the sky, just as a quick added layer of protection.

I got up, and got dressed. Mistweave, ring, and finished it off with the glass-woven sash with the egg. I picked the egg up, needing to do a quick ‘hot hot HOT!’ juggle before getting it into the sash, then turning on the heat with my Radiance.

I’d gotten lucky that no stray shots had gone this way. I’d gotten lucky that Awarthril throwing a weapon to Serondes hadn’t hit the egg. Lucky, lucky, lucky.

An egg didn’t have System access, and no defenses besides natural hardness and shape.

I got outside, seeing Aegion and Cordamo on watch.

Finally.

Finally!

The night attack seemed to have hammered the idea that a watch should be established hard enough that it stuck.

"Aegion! Did you hear a weird voice just now?" I sat down next to him, tentatively accepting some raw piece of meat that he handed me.

Just. Slap. Raw meat right into my bare hands.

"No." His voice was toneless.

"What is this?" I pulled a face.

"It’s heart. For you." He sounded shaken.

"You ok?" I sat down next to him, swatting at Cordamo who was sniffing around. I glared at the couatl.

"Just because you killed the spinosaurus doesn’t mean you get this. Seriously. Just leave it be. Didn’t you already get your share?"

I was remembering that the elves had some bizarre tradition of eating the raw heart of their enemies, and, well, looks like this time nobody had intercepted my share.

I’d eaten so much worse, but with my magic it’d been years since I’d eaten it raw.

Ah well, nothing for it. I popped it into my mouth, and started chewing.

The danger noodle slid off, something in my tone warning him off. He took flight, trying to peer through the darkness for any danger.

The raw heart was, well, raw heart. Exactly as tasty as the label claimed. Aegion wasn’t bothering with pranks or anything. He just didn’t seem to have it in him, like a spark had gone out.

Aegion and I sat in silence for a moment.

"Is this what it’s like for everyone else?" Aegion broke the silence.

"Is what?"

"This… this fear. This worry."

I shrugged.

"I dunno what you’re feeling exactly, but in a sense, yes? We all know the world is dangerous. We live like we could die any time. We take precautions. Like having a watch."

I glanced significantly at Aegion at the last part. I was probably going to be somewhat insufferable.

"I almost died!" He wailed.

My sympathy levels were zero.

"I’ve been stabbed through the heart, had all my limbs broken, been impaled by traps, practically tortured, decapitated once, burned, fought off innumerable illnesses and diseases, gotten blown up, and that’s just the start! The full list would take way too long. I’m lucky to be alive, and I know it. Ripped in half? I’m lucky it’s been so long since the last time that happened. This is what life is like for mortals. I’m just durable enough to be able to tell you, first hand, what all of those things are like. Everyone else gets their name on the wall."

That last part would probably go right over Aegion’s head, but eh. Hopefully he’d get the idea.

I paused for a moment, thinking.

Eh. We were close enough to home.

"Toughen up, go home, or die. Those are basically your options at this point. Now, if you’d like, I can take over watch. The gods and goddesses know I’ve spent enough nights on watch to do it alone."

Aegion stilled, working through all the things I’d said. Finally, like it pained him to say, he spoke.

"Can you teach me how to properly keep guard at night?"

I turned my head to hide a grin. Still slipped into my voice.

"Happily. First… Just leaving a carcass of a huge dinosaur out there will attract predators and scavengers. We don’t want those."

Watch was boring. Talking about watch was almost as boring. I checked on my level-ups from the fight with half an eye while I kept chatting with Aegion. I’d get fidgety and antsy otherwise.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 421->424! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Three levels! I didn’t think my healing had been worth that much, but I guess the combination of the ridiculous levels involved and my ever-growing [Passionate Learning] was paying off.

My capped skills re-capped themselves. Nothing interesting there.

If nothing else, I was going to advocate that Ranger Trainees, and maybe Sentinels, should take trips outside of the Dead Zone to level up. How much stronger could we all get, just spending a few months out here?

Assuming the casualty rate was acceptable.

[*ding!* [Sunrise] has leveled up! 345 -> 347]

Wasn’t going to complain about free levels.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 347->348! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

I resisted the urge to complain about only getting one level. My Radiance contribution hadn’t been stellar.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 52 -> 88]

That was more like it!

[*ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] has leveled up! 314 -> 319]

More levels! I needed to cap the skill at some point. Then find a mirror.

[*ding!* [Bullet Time] has leveled up! 420 -> 424]

[*ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] has leveled up! 374 -> 375]

[*ding!* [Sentinel’s Superiority] has leveled up! 394 -> 396]

[*ding!* [Persistent Casting] has leveled up! 296 -> 299]

No surprises. Levels!

Serondes was the last one awake. Awarthril silently joined us in the middle of the night, listening to what knowledge I had to share about keeping a proper watch in the middle of the night, and how to best have an early warning for attacks. To better avoid issues like being woken up in the jaws of a dinosaur.

Rude awakening, that.

"Did anyone not level?" Awarthril asked. We all shook our heads, and she grinned.

"Levels for everyone! This calls for a celebration!"

I gestured with my gnawed-on spinosaurus sail.

"What more could we possibly need? This seems like party enough."

"Pooh. Don’t be a spoilsport." Awarthril retorted, but when nobody else chimed in support of her, she gracefully let it go.

Aegion was being uncharacteristically silent.

"Where to?" Serondes asked as we were finishing up breakfast. I was regretting some of my life choices, specifically selecting the spino-sail to try and eat.

It was bad.

"Please toss me a leg." I had ambitions, requesting an entire leg that was larger than I was.

I gave my best eyes to Serondes, who conjured up a few mage hands to deliver only part of my request. Only enough food to stuff me, not make me go pop! Fortunately he didn’t try feeding me or anything like that.

We’d discussed it! Hurray for good communication!

I took a few bites, and feeling fortified, made my case.

"I’d like to get back home. As soon as possible." I was taking small nibbles, to better keep talking.

"What’s the rush?" Serondes asked. Couldn’t quite blame him, given that our fling would probably end once I got home.

"I just lost my last memento of home. It’s been way too long for me. Remember, my family’s mortal, and I’ve been gone a year and like, two months at this point. Not sure how that is for elves, but that’s ‘let’s hold a funeral’ in how humans view time."

I wasn’t entirely sure on the timeline. My only strong markers were the solstices and equinoxes, and the elves had a different calendar entirely. Either way, too long. We were near, and I was going to head towards the Low Experience Zone, elves in tow or not.

To my surprise, Aegion was the first to jump in.

"I know we take breaks after big fights. I think I need more than a short break though. Let’s head towards Elaine’s home. I could use a few weeks or months being the scariest thing around."

He nodded at me.

"No offense Elaine, but according to your own stories you’re one of the best, and one of the highest-leveled, scariest things around. I’m much stronger than you are, and if you’re an apex predator, what does that make me? A relaxing vacation, that’s what."

That… was one hell of a non-sequitur, but I wasn’t going to call it out when he was agreeing with me.

We looked at Awarthril, whose decision - along with Kiyaya’s weight - would break the tie.Mostly. If she agreed with Serondes, we’d be split in half.

"Oh Elaine! I hadn’t quite realized that your family would think you were dead! No no, we can’t have that. We’re going to get Elaine home now. As quickly as possible!"

I felt my heart expand three sizes at her pronouncement.

"By the way, Elaine?" She said.

"Yes?"

"Wipe your face. You’ve got something right there."

We packed up, oriented ourselves east, and started to move.

Sadly, the road wasn’t leading in that direction, so we slowed down due to the rugged nature of the terrain. At first.

The latitude suggested we were kind of near Remus. It should’ve been winter at this point, but the weather was still warm. On the occasional strong winds from the north, I could even smell the ocean. Or perhaps a sea, but either way, it generated strong nostalgic pangs, and feelings of homesickness.

We started to cross the occasional road, then they became more frequent, and better maintained. We saw the occasional caravan, but after the last meet-up with one, we decided after a short discussion to not bother stopping for the day - or longer! - to chat.

There wasn’t anything we needed.

I got good with my ring, able to rapidly make it invisible, then visible again, along with changing the level I was displaying. With the elves helping, I was able to properly mark 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, and a few more levels that I thought might be useful, so I could almost instantly change my level to the exact "right" level that I wanted to show.

A nice bonus - the elves had helpfully mapped out every class-up for me! 512, 768, 1024, 1536, 2048, 2560, 3072, and 3584! 4096 was the highest level, but apparently there was something weird about it? The elves themselves didn’t know, the information was restricted, and they were too young, and too low-level.

I kept getting lectures on what it was like to be an Immortal, Immortality, and all sorts of other random factoids that the elves thought were important for me to know.

I finished the Medical Manuscripts, Awarthril giving me a thoughtful look when she saw the [Oath] written in the back. She didn’t say anything, and I wasn’t sure if that made me happy, or scared. Either way, she didn’t tell the others about it, which I appreciated.

I was getting more and more excited by the day, every step increasing my pulse.

Home.

We were getting there. Irrationally, with no basis for it, I could feel it in my bones. Remus was getting nearer.

My best guess for the feeling? A hefty dose of hopefulness, combined with subtle changes in the ocean breeze smell, that I subconsciously associated with home. The smell had gone from occasional, to frequent, to near omni-present.

"There’s a city up ahead." Aegion reported one late afternoon, as we were walking on some nice roads. We’d already dodged three caravans today, and a close city was a good suggestion why we were dodging so many people and why the roads were nice.

He kept his eyes closed as he reported in.

"Tall, thick walls. Guard towers. Well-planned city, large. I’m seeing parks, buildings belching normal smoke, a port, either alchemical buildings or weird multi-colored fires, a fortress in the middle of the city, patrols on the walls."

He paused a moment, thinking.

"Patrols are primarily ogres, although I thought Yugark was to the west of here."

"Mortals move around quite a bit, and the map is 800 years old for this area." Serondes pointed out.

Um.

What?

They were expecting 800 years old and accurate map to go together? I take back all the nice things I’d been thinking about them.

"There’s a second species that’s rarely on patrol, but they’re there." Aegion continued reporting. "Most are in armor, hang on, trying to spot some that aren’t."

We waited a few moments.

"Alright. Elvenoid form, two arms, two legs. No horns, hair just on top. Tend towards tall and muscular, no super distinguishing features. No offense, but they’re as dull as you are Elaine."

Hang on.

Waaaaaaaait a minute.

"How are they different from me?" I asked, not daring to hope.

"Taller, stronger. Mostly seen males so far."

I wanted to half jump for joy, half punch Aegion.

I did both. My fists were as strong as a butterfly’s fart, I was in no danger of causing harm.

"Pretend for just a moment I’m a scrawny, short, under-muscled version of what a human woman looks like, and that the men tend to be taller and burlier. What then!?" My voice was hungry, demanding one answer and one answer only.

"Mmmm. Yeah, probably humans then."

I screamed with joy.

"Humans! Let’s go! GOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" I charged down the road, only for Awarthril’s ever-present [Rubbery Rope] to yoink me back like some bad comedy.

"Whoa there! We’re not even in the Low Experience Zone yet. If we’re unlucky, this is shimagu territory. They shouldn’t be out this far east though."

Bah-what!? Humans!

Although the mere mention of shimagu was enough to put a dampener on the wild unbridled joy running through me.

"Let’s get a campsite ready to discuss what we’re going to do." Serondes suggested. "Regardless of what’s going on, I don’t think we want to find out at night, or potentially sleep in a hostile city."

"Plrbrbrbrbrbrb." Awarthril was rubbing off on me. I blew a raspberry at Serondes, mentally cursing his good sense.

He was right though, we should talk this over.

Briefly.

"Let’s!" Awarthril agreed.

"Yeah sure."

We moved off the road, deep into a small patch of forest. More and more of the land we were going over was farmland of one sort or another, but we tended to ignore the few farmers we saw, and they ignored us entirely. Just another set of travelers. Serondes built a single, low hut out of Lava, half-burying it to reduce visibility. Finally making concessions to visibility, and that they weren’t invincible.

We huddled up, eating a nice dinner of jerky and berries that Aegion had foraged during the afternoon.

"I see two options. We either go through the city, or we go around the city. Any other choices?" Serondes started off the "what do we do now" meeting, after some light dinner chit-chat.

I didn’t see anything else, so I kept my mouth shut. I did mentally chant in the city in the city in the city in the city.

Humans! I wasn’t speciesist or anything, but there was something about familiar faces after far too long.

"We could bulldoze the city then keep going!"

To nobody’s surprise, Aegion had the absolutely absurd idea. Even Cordamo was giving him an "Are you serious?" look.

He chuckled weakly at us, waving a hand.

"Bad joke, bad joke, sorry."

We all spent another half-moment giving him the "what the fuck" look, then moved on.

"Benefits of going around the city?" Serondes asked.

"Avoid any conflict. I don’t see anything else." I quickly threw in. I didn’t want to go around the city. I wanted to see what was going on, find out why there were humans here.

Also, to be fair - I’d only come up with one so far.

"Downsides?" Serondes asked.

"Takes longer, and if we wanted to be undetected, we’d need to take a semi-significant detour. Given how few cities and towns we’ve seen, I doubt there’s another one, but if there is we’d keep circling even further out." I jumped in. Taking longer to get home? Booo. Even if the humans here were great, they weren’t mine.

"Pros of going through the city?" Awarthril asked. "I know we can confirm if it’s a shimagu encampment or not, which is valuable. I know it’s unlikely, but it could be worth checking. We could circle back to it once Elaine’s reached home."

"Can buy someone else’s food. Buy good beer. Get some souvenirs. Get some cheap gems. Buy some Arcanite. Sleep in a real bed. Have someone else make the bath for once. If there’s someone good enough, get our armor fixed. Our weapons repaired. The thousand and one tiny luxuries civilization has to offer, or knowledge that it’s a threat." Serondes looked somewhat haggard at his torrent of words, and thinking over his life story, I was reminded that this was his first real adventure away from home, his first extended trip in the wilderness.

I was also tempted to make a flirty comment about how he liked making baths with me well enough, but went with shutting up to get what I wanted, namely, visiting the city.

Unsaid - I wanted a real bathroom. I had no trouble running around the wilderness, but I didn’t want to replace the bear in the classic joke "Does a bear shit in the woods?"

Leaves were awfully close to becoming my new nemesis.

"I’m not sure about this. I’m still hoping for some peace and quiet, and I think we should detour around the city, even if it takes a month." Aegion flopped back, looking listlessly up at the roof of the Lava hideout.

"Oh don’t be like that! Think about what’s in the city! More arrows. Parties. All the parties! You could make a dozen new friends in a night! Show them how to throw a proper party. They might have some cool herbs to throw in your next beer!" I was blathering. Someone better with people might have a better way of doing it, but eh.

I was a "Throw everything at the wall and see what sticks" sort of girl.

"And rare ingredients! Oooh, and new brews! By the dozen!"

Splat went the Elaine offensive. Time to see what slid off and what stuck.

Aegion was getting a distant look on his face. I wasn’t sure if he’d heard anything I’d said. Kiyaya booped his nose with her paw to bring him back to Pallos.

So much for operation "Pasta fling". If the wall didn’t even have ears…

Ok, apart from "The walls have ears" saying, my analogy was rapidly breaking down. I was too excited, and not exactly a social master at the best of times. I was going to practice the ancient art of shutting up for some time. It seemed like Awarthril and Serondes wanted to go to town anyways.

I’d let them do more of the talking.

"The downside, of course, is if we go through, and they are shimagu, we might be in a bit of a pickle." Awarthril delicately added in.

She spent a few moments carefully thinking, before asking me a slow, thoughtfully worded question.

"Elaine, if a body controlled by a shimagu attacked you, could you heal the person of the shimagu infestation?"

The second reminder of shimagu sobered me up a bit, and my newly found resolve to shut up was thrown out the window in the face of a direct question.

I appreciated her careful phrasing, hinting that she had internalized that I had [Oath], and not giving it away to the other elves. They hadn’t bothered to read the Medical Manuscripts, and while that was fine for Aegion, I was a little hurt that Serondes hadn’t even tried, declaring it dry. Like, yeah, it wasn’t for everyone, but it would’ve been nice if he’d given it half a shot.

"Yes, I can." I’d gone over the ethics of it recently, working out that was possible.

"Ok, the worst-case scenario is that it’s a shimagu-controlled city, and they take offense to Elaine’s presence. Right?" Serondes asked.

"The worst case is worse than that." I muttered unhelpfully. I hated sabotaging my position, but it was best to go in with eyes open.

"What do you think it is?" Awarthril coaxed.

"I have no idea, I just know the worst thing you plan for is never the worst that can happen."

Aegion barked a laugh at that, breaking his melancholy somewhat.

"Here’s the breakdown." I said. "There are two options, and three possibilities. The first is we go around the city, ignoring the minor chance of there being more cities."

"Or a patrol catching us!"

"What do we care if a patrol catches us?" I asked. "We’re just traveling through."

"Ok, fine."

"The second is we go through the city, and everything’s fine. We spend a nice day in the city, then keep going." I said. "I imagine some of us will want to spend more than a day. OH! Aegion, you mentioned ports, right?"

"Yeah, there was a fairly large port."

"They could have a ship to travel to the dead zone! Home!"

"It’d be nice." Awarthril sighed wistfully.

"The last is we try to go through the city, and it’s filled with shimagu. Then we’re in trouble." I finished off.

A penny dropped for me. Well, more like an entire damn anvil, with a full parade behind it.

I was an idiot. An unthinking idiot.

I needed to know if the city was infested by shimagu. I wasn’t just Elaine, happy-go-lucky wanderer. I was Sentinel Dawn, guardian of Remus. Humanity’s last line of defense against threats.

A city full of bodyjackers, taking over humans? Parasites that could easily be burned out by a healer?

Yeah, if that was mentioned in a Sentinel meeting, every head in the room would be turning towards me, and I’d be out the gates before lunch. It was my duty to check it out, especially if we were as close to Remus as the elves seemed to think.

I needed to explore the city, with or without the elves.

"True. But we’d be stopped at the gates." Awarthril pointed out. "It’d be easy enough to just walk away at that point. Heck, if you wanted, I could just Ooze the guards, and we bail."

I didn’t like the idea of casually taking lives.

At the same time, I’d walked into a goblin encampment and provoked the heck out of them. Right now, provoking shimagu seemed to be equally valid. After all, they could run away, and breaking chains on top of everything else I did?

Seemed attractive.

I was glad Serondes had suggested we break for the night and plan. Walking in all excited would’ve gone poorly. Now I was able to sit back. Plan.

Execute.

"Skills?" I asked.

"Shimagu are basically restricted to purely physical skills - and passives at that - unless they’re in a rare cooperating host." Serondes reminded me. "While possible, I doubt a high-quality host that’s cooperating is acting as a gate guard. Since, after all, people who are cooperating with a shimagu have significantly more power than the average shimagu-controlled body, or even a regular individual at that level. Since the shimagu would be augmenting them."

A good reminder. If I only needed to worry about physical attacks, and my healing was at a strong range?

Arrows were still a concern. Otherwise?

"What are the chances that it’s a shimagu city, versus a normal city?" Awarthril asked.

"Oooh, hard to say. Somewhere between 1 in 12 to 2 in 12?" Aegion ‘estimated’, which seemed to just be pulling numbers out of his ass.

"Right. I think we have our options?" Awarthril confirmed. Nods went around the circle.

"Hang on, I’ve got one more thing to add." I said.

"Go on!" Awarthril encouraged me.

"If there are humans in the city, I need to look at it, one way or another. My job as Sentinel demands it. If the rest of you don’t want to go, that’s fine, but I need to investigate it either way."

I held my chin up, daring any of them to contradict me. None of them did.

"Well, that’s quite something! Who wants to go to the city?" Awarthril asked, and I raised my hand. Kiyaya nuzzled up to me, and sat in my lap, practically engulfing me and hiding me from everyone else. She was a big girl, and when I was sitting on the cooled Lava floor?

Gigantic. She seemed to be voting with me.

Good girl. She’d get all the scratches.

I waved two hands around her, making my vote clear.

Awarthril gave a polite laugh.

"I’m going to agree with Elaine here."

There was some hissing as Cordamo, of all people agreed with me.

"Can’t let my honey berry go alone! Plus a real bed? Oooh, the things I can do with a real bed."

I made a gagging noise at Serondes, who waggled his eyebrows suggestively. I threw him an angry finger. I’d told him I didn’t want super suggestive stuff in public!

"Go around the city?"

"I’m clearly outnumbered here, with everyone else wanting to visit, but yeah. I’m not feeling up for even the chance of a conflict."

"Oooh. Hmmm. Is there any way to make this easier on Aegion?" Awarthril fretted, digging through the Spatial Box for…

Honestly, I had no idea what she’d been looking for.

I thought about it for a few minutes, while Serondes and Awarthril tried to extract information from Aegion, trying to work out a compromise to keep everyone happy.

"Wait! I’ve got it!" I exclaimed, fiddling with my ring. "I’ll just show up as the highest level healer I can. That’ll deter just about everyone and everything, right? We’ll still figure out what’s what, but who’d want to attack us? No conflict, and we get what we want, right?"

If I saw something that [Identify]’d as purple walking down the street?

Yeah, I’d be getting out as fast as I could. Have a nice picnic, 3,000 miles away. I didn’t go for black like Lun’Kat, because maybe people would think their ID was on the fritz. There was no question with a deep violet.

"Oh brilliant Elaine! Nobody can know you’re a healer without them [Identify]ing you anyways! Aegion, does that work for you?"

"Eh, sure, I guess."

Awarthril clapped her hands together, happy that we’d all come to a harmonious conclusion. "Now, let’s get some sleep. Kiyaya, first watch?" She asked, and the wolf nodded.

I locked eyes with Serondes. He jerked his head over to his bedroll, in its own little alcove.

I crossed my arms at him. I was still annoyed about the bed comment.

Either way, I wanted a good, full night’s sleep before tomorrow. It was either going to go great, or terribly. There was no in-between.

The next day I geared up, with everything I had. Because if shit hit the fan, the plan was always the first to go.

I put on my Mistweave dress, my ring. My Sentinel badge, as unlikely as it was to be recognized. My sash with the egg, and I retrieved the pieces of my dwarven armor that held my Arcanite, and my few remaining utility gems.

I still had [Reversal], [Water Conjuration], [Shocking Paralysis], [Watery Manacle], [Mana Void], [Cast Scream], [Amplify Voice], and [Curse Breaker].

And almost a dozen empty gems, mementos, reminders. Skills I’d blown on this long adventure, keeping myself alive. The remaining ones were quite frankly weak.

I felt geared and ready to go.

"Let’s go." I said, and stepped outside, into the clear sunny day, without a cloud in the sky.

We turned east, hit the road, and took the first steps towards the city.

Chapter 258 - Municipal Massacre I

We walked down the road together, just about fully geared up. We weren’t looking for trouble, but we were ready for it.

The elves were in their armor, crystal swords at their hips, shields on their back. Helmets that somehow fit over their horns. Cordamo was flying high, while Kiyaya was close by my side.

Which made me nearly blind to everything going on there, but also gave me a huge fluffy shield.

The only thing they didn’t have were the talismans.

Awarthril had [Rubbery Rope] connecting to all of us. I picked at it.

"Is this useful with how close we are to each other?"

Awarthril pursed her lips.

"Well, right now, no." She admitted. "No telling what happens if there’s a fight."

She hefted the Spatial Box, looking like a day laborer if it wasn’t for the gleaming armor.

"I’m not excited by the idea of a fight. What happened to waiting, and cooling off after a battle?" Aegion complained again.

"Oh hush you. You’ve had, what, almost a month to get over the last fight?" Awarthril retorted back.

"We don’t anticipate a fight. We’re just ready for one." Serondes chimed in.

We were going so slowly. Humans! People! I wanted to sprint down the road, screaming with excitement.

Ok, maybe not quite. It wasn’t exactly home, just home-adjacent.

Oooh! Unless Remus had expanded!

That didn’t quite make sense with the population ratios, and the humans working with the ogres. STILL! The elves didn’t seem to know of humans before meeting me, which strongly implied that we were all in Remus. Humans being here implied they came from Remus, so if nothing else, we were damn close to home.

We crested the last hill, and I was slightly disappointed. The architecture was nothing like Remus. I didn’t have the words to describe it well, but there was a look to the walls that Remus cities had, and these walls had a totally different look. It was like, oh, how mangos and apples were similar to each other, but radically different in the details and the nitty gritty.

What Aegion had been saying about "Lots of [Beastmasters]" was made obvious. Pterodactyls were landing and taking off, some without any visible riders. A group circled high up, and the walls had the occasional dinosaur along with the guard patrols.

On the gate before the city were all manner of people trying to get in, an orderly line of farmers, merchants, travelers, and whoever else wanted to get into the city. More beasts were present here, from large, slow herbivores carrying large loads or pulling wagons, to smaller fliers flitting about the line.

A small patrol from the city was moving up and down the line. It was headed by one huge ogre in bright teals and yellows, in armor that was the right mix of practical and fancy to indicate a guard. After all, guards needed to be visible and an easy source to look to in an emergency, while also having practical gear for brawls.

Along with him were three velociraptors, with the same bright teal and yellow combination. They followed closely behind the ogre, the guard some sort of expert [Dinosaur Tamer]. Nobody in line blinked at the existence of raptors supplementing the guard, and one kid even threw a treat to the fierce dinosaur.

The ogre was tall, fat, and muscular, wielding a spiked baton so thick it almost looked like a club. He was fairly liberal with how he pushed, shoved, and menaced anyone who stepped out of line a hair, and I’d never seen such a well-behaved line waiting to enter a city.

"Well! We’re here, nothing for it! Let’s get in line!" Awarthril clapped her hands together, and we moved forward, reaching the end of the line.

I triple-checked my ring, making sure that it was displaying me as a purple [Healer]. It’d be nice if I could change my tag, and go super incognito, but if the ring had the option, I hadn’t found it yet.

"Hmmm. Are you sure about that level Elaine?" Awarthril asked me.

"Ah, yeah, why?"

"Well… do you have any idea how powerful a purple level is?"

I opened my mouth to say "no", then remembered.

I did know how powerful purple was. Galeru, the Rainbow had been purple.

Had gotten trumpeting System notifications to everyone nearby.

Had turned herself into Lightning, and arced across the sky.

Had casually deflected attacks from Lun’Kat, who’d been able to bring the sky down on a country.

I was claiming a similar amount of power.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Purple might not be the best idea.

If I saw someone purple approaching, and I was in charge of a city? Even if their tag was as harmless as possible, I’d probably hit the "Evacuate now" order, forget about it when their tag was "Massively lethal."

Ok, purple was way too strong.

"What do you suggest?"

"Go down, I’ll tell you when." Awarthril cranked her neck, looking at me. Her eyes started to rapidly flicker, reading a notification I couldn’t see.

I mentally reached out, finding the "level" aspect to the ring and starting to move it down.

"Keep going, keep going, keep going, and stop!"

Roughly… level 1300ish? Give or take?

"Much better!"

I grabbed Serondes’s hand, squeezing it briefly. Then I slipped my hand out, being ready.

Prepared.

I was expecting something to happen. Shimagu bursting out of hidden trapdoors or something. A magical volley from the wall. I was primed, in full fight or flight mode, eyes flickering from place to place, ready to move, to react.

Plans and tactics were reviewed, constantly shifting and changing as people moved around.

We were behind a farmer, with a wagon full of grains pulled by a mule, and shortly after a second farmer came behind us, pulling a handcart full of squash.

The farmer behind us, lazily glanced over us, saw me, and clearly checked my level. His mouth opened, the grass he was lazily chewing on tumbling out without a care in the world.

He looked over his shoulder, slowly looked back at me, then took a sharp turn, and started to cut through the fields around the city.

"Where do you think he’s going?" I asked, watching him bulldoze through an area he clearly didn’t belong. Going for some hidden weapons? A subtle alert cue? Awarthril squinted at him.

"I have no idea."

"Going for a different gate." Aegion said. "Decided this one was too dangerous."

He gave me a pointed look. I gave him my best innocent ‘who me?’ face, while continuing to scan around me.

"I mean, wasn’t that the point of her ring? No conflicts?" Serondes was all too happy to score some points on Aegion.

"Yeah…" Aegion agreed.

There was only so much vigilance, so much preparedness for a fight I could have.

As we shuffled through the line, even the ogre guard pretended we didn’t exist. Just stared straight past us as he patrolled along. The boredom, lack of action, and the sheer mundanity of waiting to enter a city, quickly overcame my "fight or flight at any moment". It wasn’t a state that was possible to maintain forever, and nothing was happening now.

Almost literally. Snails moved faster than this line. I went back to holding Serondes’s hand.

Eventually, the line got short enough where some ambitious merchants were willing to get in line behind us, although they kept at a distance.

Awarthril tilted her head, eavesdropping on the conversations everyone else was having in line.

"Not familiar with this language. Aegion?"

He spent a moment listening, shaking his head.

"Nothing."

"I’m not familiar with it either." Serondes added in.

They looked at me.

"What are you looking at me for!? I speak one language!"

Awarthril pursed her lips.

"A deficit which we should’ve worked on correcting. I’m sorry Elaine. I should’ve realized, and focused more on teaching you the five most common languages on the continent, over botany."

She eyed me appraisingly.

"Don’t start now!" I begged her.

I liked learning, but there was a time and a place for everything.

"I’ll figure it out at the gate." Serondes reassured us.

"One way or another." Aegion muttered.

We got to said gate without incident, where we tensed up. Hands went to the hilt of weapons, and the elves subtly moved around to protect me.

This was it. This was the moment where we figured out if they were shimagu, and we were in for trouble, or if everything was going to be fine.

Well, in all likelihood. I suppose there was a slim chance that, for whatever reason, they’d allow a lethally powerful healer into the heart of their city, instead of cutting them off at the gate. I can’t think of why anyone would let a massive threat into the city instead of slamming the gates shut on them, but I guess it was technically possible.

I removed my hand from Serondes’s again. Holding hands was absolutely terrible in a fight. I needed freedom, movement. The ability to dodge and weave, room to maneuver.

The actual guard check was in the arch of the gate itself, a deliberately tight space. I looked up and around, seeing inscriptions along the inside of the gate, up and over the ceiling, each one connected to Arcanite for power.

I could start to see inside the city! The guard checkpoint was a little more distracting though.

More ogre guards, more baton-club mixes, but there were a number of short swords and shields present. And one human guard! I studied him intently, although his eyes seemed to slide right off of me. There wasn’t even a reaction to my Sentinel badge, which generally caused no end of commotion for anyone from Remus.

Although - if he did recognize the Sentinel badge, it’d give away the game that I was faking my level. "Hang on, Sentinels aren’t level 1300!"

Ok, to be fair - the Sentinel badge wasn’t nearly as well-known as the Ranger badge, and while the average human in Remus - bloody citizenship rules meant I couldn’t even talk about the Remus citizens without excluding most of the population - knew what the Ranger badge looked like, the Sentinel one was more confined in its reach and knowledge. Sure, anyone I needed to work with - captain of the guard, mayor, and the like - all knew what it was. People in Ariminum knew what it was.

People like, say, 8 year old me?

Nah. Sentinels were just stories.

Focus. This was the dangerous part! Shame I wasn’t recognized though.

Two bipedal dinosaurs loomed in the shadows of the gate, with strange, almost fur-like short feathers. They were roughly nine meters tall, and looked as heavy as a dinosaur of that size would be. Their front paws had… well, it was hard to tell where the fingers stopped, and the nails started. Either way, insanely long, sharp finger-claws that must’ve been almost a meter, meter and a half long in total. I had no doubts that whoever was in control of the dinosaurs had guided their skills to reinforce the deadly claws.

[Therizinosaurus].

The city took their dinosaurs seriously!

The guards held up their hands and we stopped. They looked at us, one of the guards visibly flinching as he looked at me. They had a quick, rapid discussion with each other, and one went off running.

If this got into a fight, what would I do?

Well, it’d only get into a fight if they were shimagu, or if Serondes said something utterly stupid and offended all the guards.

Or if Aegion tried to "make friends" by giving them beer, then they interpreted it as a bribe or a poisoning attempt. Not that I’d blame them.

Or Cordamo went for a snack, or…

Ok, this was getting to be a disturbingly long list.

I didn’t understand a word of what was going on, but I knew guards. I’d eat my hat if that wasn’t "Oh shit, go get the boss because this person’s WAY outside of our paygrade to handle."

They spoke something to us, entirely unintelligible.

"We don’t know that language, got another one?" Awarthril asked, careful with her tone. It wasn’t the words, so much as the "Yeah, I’m being respectful here, but clearly asking stuff in different languages."

Back to the fight plan. I’d assume shimagu. I was in the shadows here, under the gate. The dinosaurs and guards were powerful. I’d probably try to dive backwards, out of the city. The crowd near the gate would vanish the moment violence started to occur, it’d be clear.

If one of the guards or dinosaurs went directly for me before I got out, either blow out their knees with [Butterfly Mystic], or if they got too close, slap them full of anti-parasitic healing.

Then work it out from there, trusting my training and instincts. No plan would survive any fight longer than those first few moves I’d planned.

I couldn’t follow what happened next, but Awarthril kept repeating a similar phrase in different languages, followed by the guards seemingly switching languages around, both parties looking for a common language.

I started to relax. Attempts to communicate, even after seeing my level and designation, suggested no shimagu.

Serondes suddenly jumped in, yelling triumphantly in a language I didn’t know. The guards looked slightly taken aback, hands going to weapons. The huge therizinosauruses moved forward just a hair, but two of the guards shouted them all down, then turned to Serondes and started speaking rapid-fire.

A language in common! Yaaaaay.

Ok, I needed to work on this language thing. Being left out all the time sucked.

Double suck - Awarthril had started out with Creation, and none of the guards - especially the human - had spoken it. Which implied that there wasn’t robust communication or trade with Remus. Maybe it was just a small enclave of humans that had survived out here.

In the end, some white cloth strips were brought out, and a few Arcanite changed hands, Serondes paying the gate toll. He then gave each of the elves one of the white strips, and explained.

"We’re good to enter. They require us to wrap our swords shut in their scabbards. City’s called Ochi."

Aegion snorted as he wrapped his sword up, his bow untouched on his back, under his shield.

"Like that’ll stop us."

"Oh hush." Awarthril scolded him, making sure hers was tied in a simple, pretty bow. "You know most cities have barely-working security measures. Like Elaine was telling us how they have mages discharge their mana before entering, yet a good mage would have their mana back in minutes! No, you know it’s a simple test, to see if we’re cooperative and willing to follow their rules, or if we’re terrible troublemakers, and they need to throw us out now."

With the toll paid, the guards placated, and no attack by bodysnatchers, we entered the city.

Ochi. Where I was hoping to get some answers about all the humans here.

We entered the city, to a cacophony of noises, and a kaleidoscope of colors.

The streets were wide and unplanned, crookedly going off in all directions and winding around, but wide enough that it didn’t cause too many problems. Craftsmen, merchants, and all manner of other people had rickety booths, crammed into every inch of space clearly marked on the road in red. One stall leg, clearly temporary, was a few inches into the road.

A passing guard corrected it with a casual swing of his baton, taking out half the stall with it.

Nobody gave it a second glance.

Ogres were bellowing, and I saw a few humans shouting their wares, the business of making profit the same the world around. Carts rumbled through the street, pulled by any manner of creature, as pterodactyls soared above, screeching and crying.

Each booth had a different little flag or bright ribbon hanging on it. Some high up, flapping in the breeze, others tied to a pole, made to be as visible as possible. I looked at them, trying to figure them out.

Oh, interesting! They were made out of paper!

If they were using paper, of all things, as a marker? They had to have good books. Time to find a bookstore, or even a library!

I might not know the language now, but we were close to Remus. Add in Immortality, and I could see myself popping over now and then. Not terribly frequently, just two, maybe three times a week.

There was something a bit weird about the place, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. It was probably just a bit of cultural shock, something I was unconsciously used to seeing that I wasn’t.

Ok, creepy city check one. Were there kids around?

Yeah, I saw a pair of human kids huddled in a corner, whispering together and eyeing a stall. Thieves, with utterly shit heist-planning skills. Either way, kids were a good sign.

What else did I see?

There was a beggar, practically hidden in an alley, with his bowl out.

Maybe that was it? Remus took an incredibly harsh approach to beggars and other people trying to live on the streets, and they usually found themselves in slavery sooner rather than later. Usually without following the proper legalities.

There were some unlit paper lanterns strung over the street. Maybe those?

"Ochi! We’re here!" Awarthril happily clapped her hands together. "Do we want to stick together? Do we want to go exploring? Anyone have anything they want to see?"

On one hand, exploring! On the other, I didn’t speak the language.

I could probably get away with it by mimeing.

On the third, more important hand? Rangers had rules about sticking together in cities. Granted, that was usually because we were a target, but I believed the same should apply here.

Although - we’d never truly break into individual groups. Plus, everyone but Cordamo and Awarthril had a signalling skill. Serondes could make eruptions of Lava, Kiyaya had a Sound element and could be just as loud as that implied, Aegion had Lightning arrows, I had my Radiance. I couldn’t imagine Kiyaya leaving Awarthril alone, and vice-versa.

Yeah, we’d be fine if we broke up in pairs. No need to say anything right this second about it.

"Let’s stick together for now, and break apart once we know where we’ll spend the night?" Aegion suggested. There were nods from all of us, and I slipped my hand into Serondes’s, giving him a squeeze.

"Ok! Let’s go!" Awarthril cheerfully plowed into the crowd, the rest of us following. Cordamo joined us a moment later, streaking in from the sky.

One nice thing about the town being full of beasts - nobody batted an eye at Kiyaya.

"Oooh! Food!" I yanked Serondes towards one of my favorites - "I don’t want to know what" on a stick, with several exotic smells.

Well, ok, it was more of a large roast, thick as my thigh, twirling under some warm coals. As people made their orders, the stall owner carefully sliced some off, skewering them on a stick before handing it over. He then threw a half-dozen spices onto the freshly exposed meat, and kept turning.

Serondes huffed, but relented, buying me one. Cordamo nosed in, and before long, he’d bought each of us one.

I took a bite, and pulled a face.

"Ugh!" I thrust it away from me.

"What’s wrong?"

"Tastes a bit like pork." I was pulling the ugliest "this is disgusting" face I could. The spices were good, but the underlying flavor was anathema.

Cordamo snapped his head forward, seizing the moment - and seconds - before anyone else could.

Serondes squeezed my hand.

"We’ll just find you something else."

I leaned into his shoulder.

"You better!" I teased him.

A raptor was behind us, seemingly well-trained enough to wait in line. After we were done, it dropped some hefty plates from his mouth onto the counter, and snatched up the offered sticks.

Amazingly well-trained animals. And with a whole society backing it! There’d never be monsters running around on the streets unsupervised in Remus like this.

Ladies of the night were openly showing their wares on the street, and I wasn’t trying to be offensive. But ogre sensibilities had to be radically different from most other elvenoids.

"BEER!" Aegion yelled, and our whole group lurched to another stand, Aegion practically breathing down Serondes’s neck as he haggled for eight mugs. One for each of us, and two more for Aegion.

"Oooh, I want some hats!" Awarthril had us staggering towards a new vendor, brightly colored flimsy hats.

I got a nice paper flower, tucked behind one ear.

Aegion got a floppy therizinosaurus hat, the paper dinosaur comically bouncing around as he walked around.

Awarthril got a little pinwheel, the paper bending in the light breeze instead of spinning.

Kiyaya got an early precursor to what I could only call a "witch hat", her ears poking through the wide brim.

Cordamo got a little piece of paper wrapped around his head, the ogre running the stall not wanting to get too close to the snake, and not having anything snake-sized.

Smart dude.

And lastly, Serondes, who got a small triangle of paper between his horns, acting like a banner.

The sight of the noble Serondes, elf, mage extraordinaire, first romantic fling, haggling over a few Arcanite chips with some random vendor in a new city?

Priceless. It was going into the treasured, hilarious memory archive.

Like Artemis dancing with Lightning.

Or Autumn teaching me how to make signs to advertise in the market.

I looked around, and it clicked.

That’s what was missing! Merchants were yelling out their wares, screaming about how they had the best deal possible.

But there were no signs.

No flares of magic.

No bright Mirage signs, saying "Discount Shoes! Buy one, get one free!"

I kept looking, and there were no skills being used. Nothing obvious, nor were there many of the telltale signs of skills being used. Just raw stats.

Now, it was possible that there was some sort of ban on skill use in the city. The guards were brutal and rough enough that I could believe enforcement on such a rule would get almost everyone.

Almost.

There’d always be that person trying to use them. The thieves, if nobody else.

Here?

Nothing. Nobody.

Not a skill to be seen.

I came to this realization, paling at the conclusion, as we exited a street into a larger marketplace, crowded with dozens of people and dinosaurs, jostling around, roaring, and in the case of the monsters, being smelly.

Quite a few people had lights dancing around them, lit up like a beacon. We all stopped and stared, my thought briefly knocking out of my head, only to come roaring back with confirmation.

Those lights were special. Sure, they could be mimicked by illusions and Mirages, but everyone knew those lights. They were the "Classing up" lights, indicating that someone was in the world of their soul, picking a new class.

Except these people were up and about, walking and talking, laughing and trading. Haggling and bartering, eating and drinking.

Living.

All the pieces came roaring together, the elves breaking the sashes on their weapons. Awarthril dropped the Spatial Box, and in near-unison, we yelled our conclusion.

"Shimagu."

A guard immediately took a swing at me.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 421,680/421,680]

[Mana Regen: 283,337 (+367,662)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 98]

[Strength: 964]

[Dexterity: 1,500]

[Vitality: 11,472]

[Speed: 11,472]

[Mana: 42,168]

[Mana Regeneration: 42,260 (+36,766)]

[Magic Power: 18,530 (+347,438)]

[Magic Control: 18,530 (+347,438)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 424]]

[Celestial Affinity: 424]

[Cosmic Presence: 287]

[The Stars Never Fade: 2]

[Center of the Universe: 424]

[Dance with the Heavens: 424]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 424]

[Mantle of the Stars: 424]

[Sunrise: 347]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 348]]

[Radiance Affinity: 348]

[Radiance Resistance: 348]

[Radiance Conjuration: 348]

[Solar Flare: 88]

[Nectar: 348]

[Sun's Heart: 348]

[Scintillating Ascent: 314]

[Kaleidoscope: 348]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 220]

[Egg Incubation: 55]

[Bullet Time: 424]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 396]

[Persistent Casting: 299]

[Passionate Learning: 379]

Chapter 259 - Minor Interlude - Yigruk the Ogre

Life was pain.

Life was misery.

Life sucked.

That was Yigruk’s take.

It started when he was young.

Everyone pitched in on the family farm, from his older siblings all the way to his parents and grandparents. They lived in a cramped hut, the ogres all jostling for sleeping space nightly, even as the kids grew larger and the space stayed the same size.

At three, he was taught what a "good" pineapple looked like, and what a "bad" pineapple looked like, then tasked to sort pineapples on the family farm. They were prickly and burny, and his parents had no sympathy for his poor hands, instead viciously cuffing him if he didn’t sort enough of the fruit in a day.

Yigruk grew up fast, and eyed his younger sibling, two years younger than he was. Even at three he could realize two things:

The sibling was competition, eating food that he could be eating instead.

When the sibling grew older, they’d take over the pineapple-sorting job. He was stuck on pineapples until that day.

The second thought won out, but there were a few close days. There were gaps in the ages of the siblings, which Yigruk steadfastly believed was due to disease or injury.

The only bright spot in his days were when the sun went down, and everyone huddled inside. Grandpa had stories to tell, and oh, what stories they were.

"Shimagu! Shimagu! I want a shimagu story!" Yigruk demanded.

"Yeah! Shimagu!" A chorus of other voices chimed in.

"No! I don’t want shimagu! I want Nolirig!" One of the siblings protested.

Three of the siblings near him viciously beat him. The price for speaking out, the price for stepping out of line.

It was part of why Yigruk wanted shimagu stories.

That, and they sounded awesome!

Grandpa chuckled.

"A shimagu story eh? Well… how about Trurub the Strong and Sen the Builder?"

"Yeaaaaaah!" A chorus of voices called out, half of them having never heard the story.

"Well! It all started a long time ago, where there was a big, strong ogre named Trurub. He was soooo strong, that everyone called him Trurub the strong! He had so many points in strength, nobody could count that high! But Trurub wasn’t very smart."

"Sen the builder was a shimagu, and he was a GENIUS! He knew how to build the biggest buildings, he could make the strongest bridges! But alas, Sen had no strength!"

"Could Sen build a better farm?" Yigruk asked. Grandpa chuckled.

"Of course he could! He could build a farm that went further than you can see!"

"Anyways, Trurub had a problem. His village got washed away! He wanted to build a new house for himself, but he didn’t know how! He rolled the biggest stones over, but had no roof! He put another rock on top, but it just rolled over! Trurub was very sad."

"Along came Sen! Sen saw that Trurub was sad, and wanted to build a home. So he said ‘Hey Trurub! Let’s work together! Your strength, and my skill, and we can make you a home. We can make everyone a home!"

"Trurub agreed, and the two worked together! They built him a home, a grand home! It had six rooms!"

"Whoa." The ogre kids all gasped at once. Six rooms for a house!? Impossibly luxurious.

"Then he went and built his neighbor a house! And that neighbor’s neighbor! And before long, the whole village was rebuilt!"

"Then Trurub the strong and Sen the builder went out into the world, and built vast cities! People cheered their name! All because Trurub and Sen worked together!"

The kids cheered. It wasn’t quite as exciting as the stories of shimagu and ogres working together to slay some big monster or another, but it was fun.

"How do I get a shimagu to work with me!" Yigruk yelled, trying to be the loudest. It was the only way for his questions to be answered, and in the story, he saw an out.

A way out of spending his entire life handling pineapples, and the utter shit and misery that was his life. Even at his tender age, he knew he didn’t want to spend his life with his hands poked and burned, fighting other ogres for the meagre space, half-starving in a dirty hut.

More of his siblings wanted to know as well. Grandpa just chuckled.

"Well! You need to become strong! Shimagu like working with strong ogres! When you get a class, get a physical one, like [Laborer], or even [Warrior]! Recruiters come around now and then, and if they like you, you can also get a shimagu friend!"

"Do you have a shimagu friend?"

"Of course!"

Yigruk never doubted the veracity of the statement, although he had never met the supposed shimagu.

As Yigruk grew up, life remained shit. Famine ravaged their crops, and Yigruk was in the lucky phase where he was big enough to fight for some of the remaining food, and small enough to survive on scraps.

The recruiters came by every few years, banging on great silver drums. Yigruk went star-struck the first time he saw them.

It wasn’t the armor, their weapons, or their stories of adventure and the greater world. No, to Yigruk, it was the fact that they looked well-fed, and not utterly coated in shit like everyone on the farm.

Some of his brothers and sisters left with them.

They didn’t come back, but Yigruk couldn’t blame them. Who’d want to come back here?

Time blurred. There was no such thing as education, not on the farm near a small village. There was just work, sleep, the occasional celebration, and best of all, stories of shimagu.

An accident - a falling tree - killed one of Yigruk’s younger siblings, and left Yigruk with a bad arm. He wasn’t going to let that stop him, although it didn’t quite heal right.

The day came where Yigruk thought he was old enough, and the recruiters came along.

"I want to join." Yigruk said, presenting himself in front of them. They glanced at him, reading his System-granted level and designation.

He’d gone for [Warrior], figuring he had a better chance that way. Most of his "warrior" experience came from fighting his siblings, and the class he got reflected that. The leveling was slower, but Yigruk thought the tag would mean more.

He hoped. None of his brothers or sisters had been turned down.

"Right. Welcome to the army." One of the ogres said, patting his back in the bone-shaking way ogres tended to do.

"Will I be able to get a shimagu friend?" Yigruk asked.

The small, not-ogre chuckled, like Yigruk had asked some great joke. "Country bumpkins." He said under his breath, so quietly that Yigruk couldn’t hear it.

The others could.

"Yeah, of course you will! Everyone does!" The back-slapping ogre reassured Yigruk.

He joined a train of other recruits, following the recruiters in a long line as they meandered around the countryside, before arriving at a facility.

Yigruk’s jaw dropped as he looked at it. It had to be a palace. It was bigger than the farm he’d grown up on! And that was just one building!

This had to be where the shimagu lived, in the lap of opulence and wealth. They probably had three meals a day!

Yigruk just hoped he would be found worthy.

No.

Yigruk steeled himself.

He would be found worthy.

"Listen up, recruits! These are the trainee barracks! Here you will eat, sleep, and train until we determine that you are ready! Now get to it!"

Yigruk had no idea what he was supposed to do, but standing out in the crowd was not it.

Not with some of the guard ogres having their clubs ready.

Not with the knowledge that people who stood out were beaten back into line.

Yigruk moved with the surging crowd, noticing that three of the guard ogres had the strange lights that appeared when someone was classing up dancing around him.

Weird.

He ate, slept, and trained with the other recruits. He discovered that the small not-ogres were called "humans."

Life was slightly less shitty. Three bland meals a day. Only beaten when he lost in a fight, and always had a chance to fight back. Significant reduction in the amount of shit he was covered in.

The best years of Yigruk’s life.

He did his best. He got both of his classes to level 128. He listened to his instructors, who strongly pushed him - all of them - to load up on passive skills. They were the best skills. Shimagu liked people with passive skills.

"Why do some people have the lights?" Yigruk asked one day.

"It’s a mark of favor from the shimagu. Only the best are able to get them."

The ones with the lights did have the highest levels.

Yigruk worked hard, but there was no hiding his bad arm. It held him back, threw him down the grand rankings that the instructors posted.

He was down about it, until another ogre was badly injured in a training accident, and went from being near the top of the scoreboard, to near the bottom.

It got vicious from there, as everyone realized they could eliminate the competition.

The instructors seemed to encourage it, and levels never flowed so freely.

The end of Yigruk’s training came soon enough.

"We will announce your name and shape! Line up under the shape in question!" The instructor yelled at all the recruits milling around in the courtyard.

".... Yigruk, Square!"

Yigruk dutifully moved to the "Square" line, which had some additional symbols under it.

He’d never been taught to read, or his letters, so he was entirely unaware that it said "C - Average body."

The lines slowly shuffled through, one ogre at a time passing through a door, into a room.

It was Yigruk’s turn, and heart pounding, he entered a room with eight other trainees, six of them ogres and two of them humans. Yigruk recognized all of them, having spent the last few years together.

This was it. The moment he’d dreamed of since he was a kid. Gaining a shimagu friend.

He’d never seen one before.

"Okuda. Your turn." One of the instructors said in a bored voice to a positively ancient, fat ogre.

Something flickered through his eyes, before pointing at one of the other ogres - Bikur.

"Him."

The ogre in question went and knelt down in front of the fat ogre, who put a hand on his head. The eyes flickered again, and a few minutes later the kneeling ogre stood up.

"Everything’s fine. Process complete." He said, and Yigruk almost did a double-take. Bikur did not speak like that. It was his voice though.

Maybe merging with the shimagu had made him smarter, like all the stories said?

"Right, out to the track with you. Get used to the body."

One after another, a different name was called. The ancient ogre’s eyes would flicker a bunch, and one of the recruits was selected. A new recruit would then enter the room, always keeping the number at nine.

Yigruk was getting nervous. What would happen if his name wasn’t called? If he wasn’t found worthy?

At last, the old ogre grunted, and Yigruk’s heart leapt in his throat as he saw the gnarled claw pointing at him. He rushed over, kneeling down in supplication.

A hand on his head, then a cold, slimy sensation at his neck. He held still as it entered into him, eager and excited.

Then, at last, a voice, echoing in his mind.

"I can’t believe I got this terrible body. A fresh recruit? Me?! This sucks."

Not the most promising of starts, but Yigruk was determined to make it work.

He tried to say hello back, that his name with Yigruk, and that he was excited to meet him.

His throat wouldn’t obey.

He tried swallowing, saying it again.

Instead, his body stood up.

"I’m in. Everything’s fine." Yigruk heard himself say.

But he hadn’t said the words!? What was going on?!

"Right, out to the track with you. Get used to the body."

Yigruk felt his head nod, then his body turned, one step at a time, arms shaking out experimentally.

In that wrong way that angered his bad arm, causing a jolt of pain to run through him.

"Oh great. This body’s broken to boot. Just great. Just what I needed." The voice inside of him complained again.

Yigruk’s body went for a run, every little problem triggering a flood of whining.

Yigruk wasn’t enjoying his first day with his first shimagu friend.

He did eventually figure out how to say hello. He just needed to "think" hard enough at the shimagu.

"Hello! I’m Yigruk! Who are you?"

"Oh not a chatterbox. Please. That’s the last thing I need. I’m Kudo, and the more you shut up, the better off we’ll both be."

Yigruk wasn’t sure what was next in life, but Kudo seemed to have ideas.

Once he was done acclimating to his body, Kudo grabbed a sack, hefted it over one shoulder, and headed out the door.

Yigruk was starting to realize that he was no longer in control of his body. At all.

"Where are we going?"

"Please don’t talk."

"What else am I supposed to do? Are we going on an adventure? Are we going to build something? I got a [Warrior] class! Let’s get a sword, and go find a monster terrorizing a village! It’ll be fun! Your brain, my brawn!"

"No."

"Where are we going?"

"Will you shut up if I tell you?"

Yigruk quickly thought about it.

"Ok."

"Got a new job at the dinosaur farm. Raising raptors."

"Oh cool! Are you some sort of [Beastmaster]? Are you going to order raptors around?"

"I thought you said you’d shut up. By the slime, you talk a lot. More than my last host."

"Last host?"

"Got killed in the war."

Yigruk shut up.

They spent a few days traveling, Kudo seemingly knowing where they were going.

The dinosaur farm was like a huge farm. A gigantic barn, with Arcanite fueling heating inscriptions to keep eggs warm. Pens for small raptors. Pens for medium raptors. Open fields for the adult raptors who survived.

Kudo was in charge of feeding the medium raptors. Not the glorious life Yigruk had imagined. Kudo didn’t seem to be able to go a day without complaining about something.

"The food sucks."

"I’ll never level here."

"The bed is full of bugs."

"The blasted raptor almost took my hand off again."

"This is a dead end job."

"I should’ve taken the raptor body. Why did I go for ogre?"

"I need, like, 50 more levels. Then I’ll have a good job. Yeah. That’s what’s holding me back."

Yigruk wanted to point out that it was his hand, but Kudo didn’t care. Yigruk’s body was Kudo’s body, as far as Kudo was concerned.

Yigruk was starting to learn what Kudo wanted, and liked. Every time he complained about the raptors being lined up, and shimagu choosing which one they wanted, Kudo complained. Yigruk would remind him that Kudo wanted a body with thumbs, that could speak.

Some kids visited one day.

"Are you really friends with a shimagu?" They asked Yigruk.

Yigruk - Kudo really - cracked a huge smile, uncharacteristic of how much he complained on the inside.

"Yeah!"

"What’s it like?"

Yigruk wanted to say it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. That life was shit again. He couldn’t scratch what he wanted. He couldn’t pee when he wanted to. He was forced into a job he didn’t want, and the shimagu never let him take over and stretch his legs.

Instead, his smile stayed plastered on, a perfectly done mask.

"It’s great! It’s so wonderful having a shimagu helping me out! If you’re good, one day you’ll have a friend as well!"

That was Yigruk’s first taste of hatred.

His resistance was slow. Kudo took all the actions, and they weren’t in a war. They weren’t fighting. Yigruk wasn’t getting many levels, and few actions being taken by his body got a skill offered to him by the System.

After all, getting a System-skill required willingness, and a token effort to get the skill. Without the body performing the token effort, the skill wasn’t offered, not for a physical classer like Yigruk.

"We should become a guard." He whispered in Kudo’s ear. Well, more ‘thought-at’. "More fights, more levels."

"That’s so much work." Kudo complained.

"Better pay, more levels."

But a few years later, they’d managed to get a job at one of the nearby cities, famous for being on the outskirts, the edges of shimagu territory.

It was easier to sabotage as a guard.

Chasing a thief? [Sprinting] replaced a passive, the active skill dormant unless Yigruk willed it.

Beating someone stepping out of line? Yigruk never thought he’d take [Beat down] as a skill, but there it was.

He even ripped out the [Affinity] skill, and once his last passive skill had been replaced by an active, he almost shut down, not bothering with the day-to-day actions Kudo was taking.

What was the point? He was a prisoner. He’d done what he could, putting all his skill levels to 1. On rare occasions, he heard of a body resetting their class down to 8, and getting killed for it.

Being a guard meant he occasionally saw the darker side of things. The pools of nutrient goo, filled with swimming shimagu who were waiting for a body. The schools, filled with old men and women, hosting young shimagu to better teach them.

The rare mages, so high in status and power that Kudo could only bow his head as they walked past, a perfect harmony of body and shimagu raising them up to untold heights and power.

Yigruk burned with envy. He’d been raised on stories of those. That was almost him.

Or so he had believed.

He knew better now. Without the education, without the dedicated, demonstrated willingness, without being lucky with the shimagu who’d selected him, he could’ve never gotten there. It was a pretty lie, fed to placate and encourage.

Yigruk was looking forward to hitting level 256. He would class up then, and simply never come back. He’d enjoy the world of his soul, until one day his body stopped functioning, either from old age, or Kudo getting them both killed.

It was the one place that wasn’t filled with shit.

It was the one place that wasn’t misery incarnate.

It was the only place he could escape Kudo’s incessant, never-ending whining and complaining.

It was the only place he could be happy.

Life was shit. Yigruk couldn’t wait for it to be over.

Each day was just like the next. Smack around a few people who got out of line. Demand bribes to look the other way. Strut around like he owned the place, only to cower in fear when encountering the people that did. Occasionally visit a prostitute, because Kudo was so noxious that nobody wanted to settle down with him.

Nobody asked Yigruk his thoughts on the matter. With dim horror, he realized nobody asked the opinions of the escort’s body that Kudo solicited either.

A girl in the market square. A human girl.

"What are the gate guards doing, letting a healer that strong in here!?" Kudo complained. "Damn lazy asses."

Yigruk carefully didn’t mention that Kudo was incredibly lazy himself.

"They probably didn’t want to say no to someone that strong. She could just instantly kill them all. Probably called for one of the Twins instead. Plus, she could be working with a shimagu." Yigruk pointed out.

If he didn’t give Kudo a good reason, Kudo would just keep complaining endlessly.

Yigruk had no idea what level she was. One minor rebellion with an active skill had seen Kudo place a "buff" on Yigruk, making him faster, at the cost of all his mana regeneration. He didn’t have enough to even try to [Identify] the person in question.

"You should kill her." Yigruk whispered into Kudo’s ear, seeing the elven guards surrounding her. "Think of all the levels."

"It’s too hard." Kudo whined, but he’d actually responded. He was listening.

"You’d be famous. Rich. Getting rid of a threat that large? Heck, they might even give you a new body! One of the therizinosaurus even! The gate guards were too cowardly to do anything. You’ll be a hero. They’ll give you everything."

"You’re just trying to get rid of me. You know they’d just replace me with someone else."

"Yes. Please, I can’t take any more complaining." Yigruk begged.

"You’re not wrong though." Kudo mused.

Yigruk knew Kudo inside and out. How could he not, having spent every second of years together? He knew when to speak, and when to shut up.

There was no way Kudo would get through the elven guards, or that large wolf. Yigruk hoped the end would be swift and relatively painless.

"Will you help?" Kudo asked.

"Yes!" Yigruk confirmed. His skills were almost all level 1, and deliberately bad, but anything to escape to the sweet oblivion of death.

With a roar, two minds working as one for radically different purposes, Kudo-Yigruk swung at the healer, trying to startle her and kill her before anyone could react.

Yet, almost before they moved, the elves drew their weapons impossibly fast, shouting the same thing.

The girl looked at Yigruk, and he saw only death in her eyes.

A skill flickered over him, and his bad arm felt whole again. A broken tusk was restored.

The cold, slimy feeling of Kudo, ever-present to the point where Yigruk lost awareness of it, evaporated.

Yigruk half-stumbled, suddenly in control for once. He breathed in, and out.

Tasting the sweet air.

The elves were yelling, the girl was yelling, people were moving around, startled at the guard having taken a swing at the visitors.

Yigruk looked around.

He would’ve yelled "Freedom" if he’d ever learned the word, or knew the concept.

He didn’t though. He just knew he was never going back.

With a deep, primal yell, he buried his club into the head of the nearest shimagu host.

All hell broke loose.

Chapter 260 - Municipal Massacre II

[Bullet Time] didn’t even activate.

Ironically, weak blows that didn’t trigger the skill were almost as dangerous as skills that did, simply due to the dramatically reduced time to react. If I was gunning for me, I’d fire a bunch of weak skills that could slow, blind, or bind me, before going for the finishing blow.

The guard was slow. Unreasonably slow for his level and designation as a [Warrior]. It indicated low quality classes and poor skills.

My first instinct was to just blast his head off. It’d be easy. I was trained to do it that way, I knew the weakest paths of a body to burn through to kill people the fastest.

I caught myself.

Instead, I flickered a weak heal at him, the bright and sunny sky letting [Wheel of Sun and Moon] shine.

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Petty Tyrant (Ooze, 288)]/[Dinosaur Handler (Wood, 190)]]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn-

I turned off non-kill System notifications. Didn’t need the distraction right now.

It was moot.

The ogre halted his swing, as the elves started to swing at him.

"Stop!" I barked out, the tone of unshakeable command halting their blades.

Glad that worked. It’d been ages since I had to order anyone, and I’d never tried on the elves.

The ogre wavered a moment, then turned, slamming his mace down on the head of a human just going about their shopping.

I could’ve stopped it.

I wasn’t obligated to, and I’d just gotten the notification that I’d killed a shimagu. With the hatred shown, I was inclined towards provoking the shimagu. Forcing them to take a swing at me.

I wasn’t barred from provocation, then self-defense. My only obligation was to heal them if they came to me hurt.

I checked my mana usage, mentally whistling.

[Mana: 421,331/421,680]

If that shimagu was representative of what it took? I could kill thousands at once.

Or about one every one to two seconds.

I stepped forward, looking down.

Paste. The ogre had turned the dude’s head into a fine paste, along with half-splitting him open before his club’s momentum had gotten arrested. He then ripped the club out, gore splattering other shoppers.

Strangely, people didn’t panic as hard as I thought they would. Sure, everyone nearby drew back, and there was a tone of shouting that I associated with "call the guard!", but there wasn’t, like, a mass panic and stampede out of the market.

The guard’s casual violence was playing in our favor.

"Why’d we stop?" Serondes asked.

"Hush you. Elaine just destroyed the shimagu. He’d just been freed." Awarthril quickly cut in.

"Well, why didn’t you do that earlier?" Aegion asked. "Actually, why are we just standing here? Kill them all!"

I gritted my teeth.

"I can’t."

Three pairs of eyes looked at me in disbelief. Awarthril sighed.

"Want me to tell them?"

Kiyaya put her head on my shoulder, reminding me how large she was. The ogre went after another person, his strike deflected by a panicked arm thrown in the way. It wasn’t a surprise anymore. Still, the ogre victim got blasted into a stall, canvas and wooden supports collapsing around him. Shielding him from the light of day.

"Yes." I ran forward, having no time to explain. Awarthril seemed to grasp what I was doing, and threw an Ooze rope at the original ogre, restraining him from following up.

Well, new patient. Shattered arm at the least, probably dozens of ribs, well, this broke my "shimagu are people as well" tie nicely. I now needed to decide - did the ogre host live? Or did the shimagu survive?

Yeah. I had no problems answering this question. Awarthril was giving the condensed, mostly guessed-at rules of my [Oath], while Serondes yelled at the original ogre to stand down. To stop attacking.

I found a foot sticking out of the collapsed stall, the merchant running it yelling at the original guard ogre to be more careful. He was snarling back, Ooze wrapping around him.

They still hadn’t gotten it.

They still hadn’t processed what was going on.

I slapped the foot sticking out, focusing on healing the ogre. Completely. Entirely.

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Lazy Overlord (Ooze, 300)]/[Crafty Carpenter (Wood, 299)]]

I turned off kill notifications as well.

The ogre in question exploded from the ruined stall. He snarled at me, snarled at the guard. The guard, the original freed ogre, snarled back.

I swear I saw lightning shoot between their eyes, as they came to an understanding. The merchant overheard their conversation, paled and turned.

The new one grabbed him, while the original guard crushed his neck with a club.

The screaming started. A guard killing one person? Trouble, but not too surprising.

The guard killing a second person? A random passerby helping him?

Trouble, with a capital T. Merchants started to pack up as shoppers bailed.

I felt myself getting pulled back, Awarthril’s [Rubbery Rope] getting abused.

"Protect Elaine." Awarthril curtly ordered.

"And listen to me." I added in, starting to take deep, slow breaths. This was going to end with a lot of bloodshed.

I idly flickered a heal at a not-quite dead human, hoping that he’d be able to explain before getting smashed again. They hesitated, seeing a torn-off limb getting fixed, before getting the idea.

The human yelled something at us, cursing us out.

Well, I couldn’t tell the words, but the tone was there.

"He wants to know why you waited, why you couldn’t do it earlier, and why you’re not helping more people." Serondes quickly translated. "Also, he’s suggesting something anatomically unlikely with pineapples, unless you’ve secretly become a Space mage recently." He drily added.

"Yeah, I’m not telling them the details." I said.

"Awarthril filled us in. Details?" Aegion asked.

"I have to be attacked first, or be restoring a terribly injured host." I gave the super condensed version.

Awarthril lashed out, a mix of Mantle chains and sticky Ooze grabbing one of the people running by. She reeled her in, the poor woman yelling. Awarthril’s crystal sword exploded from her stomach, rapidly skewering her from behind, only to bring it back and drop her at my feet.

"Like that?" She asked. I kicked the woman, healing her up, destroying the shimagu inside.

"Yes, like- oof!"

The woman practically tackled me around the legs, babbling and crying as she held onto me.

"Eternal gratitude, thanks, you’re her savior, etcetera etcetera." Serondes lazily translated.

"Ok, let’s slow down on-" I started to say, but it was too late. Awarthril had grabbed another group with her Ooze, yanked them in, and with a single clean sweep cut off most of their legs.

"Would you stop that!" I yelled at her, as the screaming intensified and the crowd split around us, now considering us more dangerous than the three rampaging ex-shimagu.

"That takes up huge amounts of mana to fix! Just… leave it, ok? Let me run this." The elves method was horribly inefficient.

I spent a few moments with each patient, making sure I had a good image of what was going on before healing them.

Some of them begged, some of them tried to crawl away without their legs, while still being restrained. One of them tried to fight back, a sharp knife going for my throat as I bent closer to heal him.

Without exception, all of them changed how they acted the moment I healed them. Most scrambled away.

Some armed themselves.

"Well, here’s the guard." Aegion’s voice was tight, his hand on his bow.

"Give me first shot at them. Only defend me if it’s a surprise blow, or after I give the signal." I started to run towards the guard squad, who were rushing at the three original freed people.

They scattered and ran through the nearly empty market. Stalls had broken and carts flipped, fruits and cheap goods of all sorts spilling out into the already-disorganized market, turning the entire thing into an obstacle course.

The small, expensive goods had either gotten grabbed by the merchants on their way out, or by opportunists.

One of the guards barked a command, and a half-dozen raptors shot forward, splitting up and chasing the fleeing people.

I leapt forward, snapping my wings open to better navigate through the debris of the marketplace. On the other end of the square, a crush of people were trampling out of the marketplace, the poor organization, narrow exits, and sheer panic turning what could’ve been an orderly escape into utter pandemonium.

I’d need to swing by there next and heal a number of people who got trampled.

I kept my focus on the guards, who pointed and shouted at me, menacing me with their clubs. I landed near them, close, but not too close.

Between them and the freed people.

I just stood there, defiantly staring at them. Daring them. "Come on, take a swing."

I didn’t even flinch as one of Aegion’s thunderously loud arrows roared, someone on the receiving end about to have a really bad day.

The guards were cocksure. Arrogant. Beating people who put a toe out of line, day in, day out. It was their first recourse, not their last.

It was no surprise to me that two of them took the fatal swing. With a flicker of thought, two more shimagu were killed.

I did have to dodge the follow through, one of the ogres either a cooperative host, or just so surprised by his sudden autonomy that he didn’t do anything with it, his body continuing with its most recent command.

They were slow. Like, yes, the club whizzed through the air at my head, but it just felt… slow. Awkward. I didn’t even try to shield the blow, simply bending back to avoid it.

It felt wrong on some level. Like they were toying with me.

I’d been taught to never toy around in fights. Apply my best, most lethal force. Always.

The low-level pests taking out dad’s eye was a fresh, ever-constant reminder that things could punch up.

Still. No [Bullet Time], and barely any effort to dodge? Something was weird here.

The guard that stopped his swing broke and ran, while the easily-dodged guard followed his swing through, turning it into a spin as he whirled on the other guards, trying to land his own attack on them. A short scuffle occurred, which didn’t stop even when I healed everyone of shimagu.

I gave a flash of Radiance behind me, indicating that I’d worked my magic.

Too much to ask that people in a fight magically realize what happened. Nobody was going after me, but I was losing mana keeping everyone alive. I was only healing near-lethal blows, but even then? These ogres were vicious.

"Serondes!" I yelled over my shoulder. I half-jumped when his voice barked out over my shoulder. I twisted to look, seeing nothing there.Kiyaya and Awarthril were up to their tricks.

The ogres, broken and bloodied, stared at each other. Panting and heaving, not quite trusting the mysterious voice. They’d probably been fed a diet of lies their entire life.

I walked through, healing them all one last time. Slaughtering the remaining shimagu. The former hosts scattered.

"Over here!" Awarthril voice whispered in my ear, but I ignored it, taking flight over towards the crowd.

I noticed with some horror that the elves hadn’t been idly waiting for me. They figured they were in the middle of shimagu territory, and were doing what adventurers did best.

A near wholesale slaughter.

I’d never gotten any notions of "honor" or "fair play" - indeed, those ideas could get me killed - but [Oath] bound and restricted me somewhat.

The Rangers had their own code of conduct, which I largely ignored because mine was more restrictive. Artemis was an excellent example of the Rangers themselves selectively ignoring large parts of it when it suited them.

However. No matter how trigger-happy Artemis got, she never turned on civilians wholesale. Not like this.

We didn’t do things like mow down crowds of shoppers and merchants, firing Lava bullets as quickly as I could into their fleeing backs. We didn’t spray fine mists of poison over everyone, watching as they writhed in pain. As flesh melted and bones corroded.

I couldn’t fire thunderous arrows and have colorful spores explode, spreading from person to tightly packed person like a virulent plague.

My approach was just another doom approaching. The bright, colorful butterfly of death approached.

I felt a little sick to be on this side of things. I was a Ranger, a Sentinel. We were the people that stopped these types of behaviors, not perpetuated them.

I landed amidst the trampled, poisoned, spored, shot, and burned people. Heedless of the firepower coming my way, flickering the occasional shield as the wind shifted and Cordamo’s poison tried to douse me, I walked among them. Kneeling, touching.

Healing.

Restoring.

"Here. You’re ok now." I told a boy. He wouldn’t understand my words, but it was about the tone. The actions. The small ogre practically leapt into my arms, crying. Trying to get me to go somewhere.

I gently put him down, and hardened my heart. I moved in a different direction. A direction I believed I could do more good. A direction with a higher density of casualties.

It wasn’t the direction the boy wanted me to go. It was the direction countless other people needed me to go, other family members who’d be grateful for the choice I made.

The cold, evil necessity of triage.

I could try to blow a gigantic heal here. I could wrap everyone in a large radius inside [Wheel of Sun and Moon], and just think "Heal". I’d probably even get everyone to boot.Then I’d be stone cold out of mana. I’d damn everyone not inside my range. I was taking a slower, more careful route. Diagnosing, touching. Being efficient with my mana, because when I had an entire city to deal with, efficiency was the word of the day.

I flitted through the fallen, pushing my speed to its limits. Only glancing at someone to immediately get a fairly comprehensive idea of their injuries and their needs. Brushing them lightly, using the momentum from the motion to move to the next patient, creating a flowing dance of life.

An old ogre, his sagging face melted by poison. A little girl, too young to have unlocked the system yet, screaming in agony and clutching the burnt stubs of her legs. A mother, hugging her teenaged kids, unaware that the spores were spreading from her to them.

I got to them.

I got to the shimagu inside of them.

I didn’t get to the ogre, trampled by a thousand feet. I was too late for a fisherman, prized catch in his arms, too many injuries to determine the cause of death.

The elves were rapidly plummeting in my estimate, although they did have the good grace and the sense not to shoot the people I’d fixed up again.

At the same time, I struggled to pinpoint how they were wrong. They were in the middle of a hostile city, filled with bodysnatchers. Their entire stated mission was to fight shimagu. They knew if they hurt someone badly, that I was free to heal them, and free them from their terrible grip.

Were they right?

Were they wrong?

This wasn’t the time or the place to figure it out. Just to move, to act. To trust in my own ethics and guidelines, to heal and fix the people in front of me.

"Ranger." A human whispered in awe, reaching out to touch me. I froze, and grabbed his hand. Hearing familiar words, from a familiar face.

"You know me? You’re from Remus?" I half-whispered, not daring to believe.

"Yes, I -" He was interrupted, as heavy stone weights appeared around me. My legs were encased in stone, and I half-fell forward as my arms were encased in huge blocks of rocks, the conjured material entirely stopping me. It half-crushed the man I’d just been talking with. A form of how Awarthril summoned chains to bind people, using boulders instead of chains.

I was trapped.

Chapter 261 - Municipal Massacre III

Magic was funny. Directly impacting another person was difficult. Bodies resisted the attempts of magic to directly influence them, when it wasn’t something strictly beneficial like healing. It was part of why my healing couldn’t harm people, not without an extraordinary amount of creativity.

Blowing out the dwarven implants was the closest thing to "harm" I could perform.

If Toxic wanted to poison me, he had two options. The first was the easy one. Summon the poison, stick it on an arrow, and use quiver express to deliver.

The second was to try and summon the poison directly inside of me. Technically possible. However, he’d face an incredibly steep penalty, that only increased as my vitality increased. The penalty ramped up to the point where if Arthur could poison and kill me that way? He’d be so much stronger than me that it just wouldn’t matter. He’d be able to kill me a hundred different ways anyways, and killing me via directly importing matter inside of me would just be a creatively insulting way to do it.

That protection was only skin deep. Well, for me at least - warriors could "extend" that protection with skills to their armor and weapons, and it tended to be wrapped up in other skills they had. Meant Acquisition couldn’t just teleport their armor off of them, or teleport their weapons away. He could teleport my weapons away from me though, which was largely irrelevant since I didn’t rely on swords and spears.

People were creative, and didn’t let the System’s limitations hamper them too much. Awarthril’s build was a great example of that. She couldn’t summon metal inside of someone, so she just summoned shackles and chains right outside of them, instantly handcuffing them. At the level Awarthril was operating at, physical Classers had a solid shot at snapping the chains, although the cuffs could be obnoxious to remove. She’d need to start focusing more on her magic stats to improve the strength of the metal if she wanted to stop physical Classers.

That, or keep doing exactly what she was doing - stacking more restraints on them, then just flat-out killing them with her superior equipment and physical stats.

A weak mage like myself though? Yeah, I’d be trapped.

It wasn’t done more, because that particular trick could only be done at close, close range. It wasn’t a long-range move.

It wasn’t something that could’ve been done if [Mantle] was up.

All the thoughts flashed through my head as I slammed forward, boulders wrapping around my legs. I half-expected the next thing I’d hear to be "let her sleep with the fishes" in some terrible accent.

Rocks wrapped around my hands and arms like the world’s worst boxing gloves, forcing me to bend over from the sheer weight of it all.

An invisible mage.

I flashed Radiance around me, turning myself into a blinding beacon, determined to blow away the illusion.

I expected blinding light to flash around me. Instead… nothing happened. I started to struggle against the blocks, seeing if I could slip out. I checked my mana, seeing that it was draining away. I stopped trying to flash Radiance around me, and the mana drain stopped.

Something was stopping my Radiance magic.

I tried to throw up [Mantle], but it didn’t pop up either. I kept working on it, since it cost no mana to use.

I was making a bold assumption that a shimagu collaborator was the current cause of my problems. Host bodies didn’t use skills, not unless they were working with a shimagu.

I wasn’t sure why shimagu mages inside of normal bodies didn’t seem to be a thing, but the utter lack of skills I’d seen inside the city, along with snippets of conversation with the elves implied it just didn’t happen.

My nerves were rapidly getting frayed. Imprisoned by an invisible enemy, then nothing? The suspense was killing me. An unusual tactic to be sure, but effective.

A bolt of pure energy appeared just a few inches from my face right as [Mantle] snapped into being. Combat reflexes took over as [Bullet Time] kicked in.

I quickly adjusted a tiny hole in [Mantle], towards where the bolt was coming from. I flickered a wide-range [Wheel of Sun and Moon], trying to snipe the hidden shimagu. At the same time, I drilled a thin beam of Radiance through the tiny hole, racing, and beating, the magic bolt.

Things were happening rapidly, even for [Bullet Time]. The illusion dropped, and my Radiance beam punched a hole in the ogre’s arm. I started to mentally readjust, while also working on just how I was going to survive that big, fat Arcanite blast coming for my head.

I couldn’t move. Well, not enough to get my head out of the way, even if I had enough time and speed to get out of the way. The weights forcing me to bend over were restricting my mobility too much.

I was fully confident in surviving anything but a headshot. Even then, I suspected I could survive minor headshots, like if someone shot a needle through my brain.

The Arcanite blast was threatening to entirely obliterate my head, the mage’s level threateningly high. Over level 600.

Fuck.

My [Mantle] broke under the blast. Surprise, surprise.

I frantically went through my options as I redirected my Radiance beam for the ogre’s head, hoping that if I killed him before the bolt landed, that the skill would dissipate.

Fat chance. It’d been fired already.

I struggled against the heavy boulders, my muscles barely getting anything done. Wasn’t going to get out like this.

I skimmed through my options, hitting on one of my utility gems I’d never gotten a chance to try.

I blew the [Reversal] gem I’d been holding since the dwarves, and tried again. The boulders got lighter, but I was moving too slowly. I was going to get killed.

None of my other gems could help.

None of my skills.

I gritted my teeth, staring at the bolt. My only shot was to get into a flat-out stats test, where I’d tried to heal the damage as it happened, and not let the bolt blow my skull apart. I just had to hope that my [Oath]-boosted stats, and remaining mana, combined with my vitality would heal me faster than the skill-boosted shot from the mage.

Chains wrapped around me as sticky Ooze connected with the boulders, Awarthril dropping her invisibility. The elves had seen the mage wrap me in boulders, and he’d paused, giving them time to move in. Kiyaya’s enormous jaws were closing on his head, the massive dire wolf demonstrating what happened to mages when sneaky physical classers got close to them.

Then Awarthril yanked, applying her triple physical Classer stats to me. The chains bit deeply into my flesh, the Ooze stretched and pulled at the boulders as I was forcibly removed from the path of the shot. My joints screamed in protest as they were all caught between immovable rocks and unstoppable forces, but by some miracle I stayed in one piece.

Mostly.

[Bullet Time] dropped, and things returned to their normal pace. The Arcanite shot blurred as it slammed mostly past me, taking out a large chunk of my shoulder, separating my right arm from the rest of me. [Persistent Casting] on [Dance With the Heavens] knitted and restored the flesh, and gave me a new arm.

That would’ve absolutely taken my head off.

There wasn’t even a scream as Kiyaya’s jaws finished closing on the mage’s head, just a shower of blood as the wolf shook her head in the classic canine kill move.

I quickly checked my most recent kill notifications, just to get confirmation.

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Inner Best Friend Forever (Ooze, 672)]/[The Twice-Hidden Illusionist (Mirage, 621)]/Echoes of a Thousand False Footsteps(Sound, 555)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [The Chainer of All (Earth, 606)]/[Annul Augur (Void, 599)]/Arcane Spellweaver (Arcanite, 514)]]

Serondes touched the boulders keeping me imprisoned, dissolving them into Sand.

"Thanks." I gasped out, putting a hand to my chest, trying to stop my racing heart.

"Abolishers." He spat out. "Hate them."

"Oh hush you. They do one thing, and one thing well. You’re just mad because he outstripped you." Awarthril fretted over me.

"Look, just because physical Classers get to ignore Abolishers..." Serondes started to retort, but Awarthril cut in.

"Elaine, are you ok? Everything alright?"

I shuddered. I was alright.

I nodded.

I had to be alright. I didn’t have time to process and review just how close I’d been to death there.

I glanced down. Eggy was still whole and hale. Awarthril must’ve been careful with her chains.

"Oooh, Arcanite!" Aegion had wasted no time looting the body, and triumphantly held up a bag that clinked in a familiar way. "Score!"

I mechanically moved over to where the injured, half-massacred ogres, humans, and shimagu were, and got back to healing. It was practically autopilot at this point. Horribly broken and burned arm. Cure the burns, fix the bones, add in a little extra for the traumatized vascular system. Repeat with a new patient, new injuries.

I was getting all too familiar with exactly what types of wounds the elves generated.

Cancelers. Well, the elves were calling him an Abolisher, but same thing. Someone with a skillset around stopping other skills and abilities from being used. I knew we had, like, three Rangers that could do similar things. I’d never met one, although I suppose technically I did bump into the Rangers with the skillset at the Ranger Convocation.

They were an odd sort. It was magic based, although an even flip if they’d get the [Mage] designation. The skills by themselves didn’t do anything, they just stopped other mages from doing things. A lack of physical stats, and a lack of offensive magics made the class unattractive in and of itself, although teams loved a member with it.

Kind of like healers in a sense. We weren’t the best in fights, but we were some of the best support and utility a team could ask for.

Good Cancelers could selectively cancel out skills, and in retrospect, the mage hadn’t been canceling out Mirage skills - hence staying invisible himself, without stripping Awarthril of her invisibility. It was also why my shield had snapped in place with the bolt being fired, and why Awarthril had been able to use her chains - the Canceler had dropped the skill, hoping to get a quick snipe in before we could react.

Lucky for me, Awarthril was better than he had been.

I kept my head on a swivel as I continued to heal people, some of them running as soon as I was done with them, others moving into a group of other recently-freed people, muttering angrily together, fear on their faces.

It looked exactly like the start of a mob. They were getting together. Getting angry. It was going to get ugly.

"Why are we hanging out here?" Aegion complained. "We need to be moving. We need to get out of here before more of them come. We’ve been lucky so far, but once the entire city comes down on us?"

"Because people are hurt, and need help." I retorted back, turning to give him my best death glare. "Maybe if some random adventurers hadn’t unleashed a massacre into a fleeing population we wouldn’t be here now, would we?"

Aegion got that stubborn look to his jaw that I knew too well.

"What else are we supposed to do?" Serondes’s tone made his position clear. "We came to fight shimagu. How were you expecting us to fight them?"

"Well-" I was cut off by Awarthril.

"Peace. This isn’t the time or the place."

I shot her a thankful look, only to see the man I’d been talking with earlier standing next to her, staring at me and looking nervous.

I beckoned him over, then refocused on my patients, half of whom were running away from me.

My patients fell into two groups at this stage. The "Brink of death" - the name of the group described the group - and the "fleeing for questionable life" group, AKA shimagu who saw the writing on the wall with me walking around, and were bailing, regardless of the host body’s injuries.

I made the snap call to focus on the "Brink of death" patients, trying to wrestle as many lives out of Black Crow’s implacable talons as possible. I wrapped myself in [Mantle], just as an extra precaution against more invisible mages trying the same thing.

"Ranger. You came." The man’s voice was full of reverence as he jogged next to me. He was keeping up with my flowing dance, tapping one patient after another, moving on before they could get up and thank me. Before they could slow me down.

"Sentinel, but close enough." I absent-mindedly corrected him, remembering that not everyone knew what Sentinels were, even in Remus.

"Thank you. Thank you thank you THANK YOU!" He tried to give me a hug, which I nimbly dodged. Nope. None of that. I had patients I needed to work on.

"Are you here to free us? How did you find out? When -"

I cut off his barrage of questions. I had practically nothing for him. We’d come here practically on accident.

"What’s your story?" I needed details.

"Well, I’m Calavius. Grew up with my friends Oppius and Aburius. When we were young, we liked to travel around…"

Calavius could not give a concise story to save his life. Quite literally. He’d put Night to shame in sheer words to information ratio, but annoyingly, he went on massive tangents. I had to keep him focused.

Long, LONG story shortened significantly - he lived in Port Salona, which I remembered was at the very edge of Remus. He and his friends had figured the same thing, and wanted to know what else there was in the world.

Even as he was telling his story, alarm bells started to ring throughout the city. The chaos and destruction we’d unleashed had finally finished working its way through whatever channels this city had, and the alarms were going off.

The elves occasionally interjected themselves into the story, and I wanted to strangle them all. We were in a hostile city, and the longer it took for reinforcements to show up, the worse and more powerful they’d be.

To be fair, the elves did manage to redirect him back to the meat of the story. I couldn’t be too mad.

Adventurers. Adventurers everywhere. They’d be the death of me. Oh sure, he didn’t use that title, but the idea was the same.

He and his friends grabbed a ship, some rations, and went sailing, keeping close to the coast, to avoid deep-sea monsters. They didn’t stay too close to the coast though, due to monsters that could jump into shallow water.Through some skill, and hefty doses of luck, they made it quite a distance before they encountered another ship, filled with humans.Remus was a hard place, and they weren’t too trusting of these new people. First smart thing he’d said all story. It hadn’t mattered, as the other ship overtook their smaller ship, broke out the harpoons, and they were captured and infested.

The group of healed people that were sticking around half broke up, scouting around the devastated marketplace. They picked up poles, armed themselves with canes, and generally kitted themselves out with makeshift weapons.

That was going to end with trouble.

He’d been an unwilling slave ever since. His story was horrific on a dozen levels.

"... and then the shimagu who’d taken Oppius over made him stand perfectly still. See, they were mighty mad about his broken leg, and said they couldn’t do a thing about it. Seemed silly to me, just pop on over to a healer quick-like. Didn’t know then that they had no healers. How silly is that?"

"Oppius?" Aegion butted in, redirecting and keeping Calavius on track.

"Right! Oppius! They had Oppius stand perfectly still, and slowly peeled the flesh off him. Never seen him so brave! Well, I guess it wasn’t him now. They peeled the flesh off him, laughing and betting how long until he’d die. Turned him into chum, right there. Then they went fishing."

Calavius was bawling at the end.

I finished healing the last person, and I was seeing red.

The difference between the theory of the shimagu, and the belief that all life was sacred, and having their cruel realities rubbed in my face.

I was wavering. On the brink.

What would I become if I abandoned my morals and beliefs?

This was a poor time to be considering a revisit of my ethical framework. I had some ideas though.

"Serondes." My voice was tight as I fought back rage and tears. "Translate for me."

"Kiyaya. Amplify Serondes."

I was shit at speeches. I wasn’t going to try anything fancy.

"Hey you lot! You’re looking to even the score, right? Hit the shimagu? Follow me. I have a plan."

I mentally gave myself a C- on "Inspirational speech designed to get the angry mob to follow me", but after looking at each other, in their day clothes and holding clubs that used to be table legs, and seeing the elves standing next to me in their gleaming armor, holding onto powerful weapons, they came over, angrily muttering and talking amongst each other.

My Mistweave clothing dramatically flared as I spun on my heels and started to stride out of the market square, the elves flanking me, and the angry, armed mob behind me.

"Awarthril." I bit out, trying to keep my voice in "steady Sentinel in charge of the situation" and not "screaming in rage" mode.

"Elaine." She didn’t have the same tightness to her voice, just a wary grace, tightly wound and ready for problems.

I took my Sentinel badge off and flashed it at her.

"Can you project this in the sky? Large and facing down on the town?"

Bless her. Without another word, without any of the other elves butting in, she did it.

The Eagle of Remus appeared in the sky, the standard held on every banner the Remus legions carried. The golden circle appeared around it, the Ranger’s mark, and finally, the sunburst of the Sentinels exploded around it.

A burning declaration in the sky. A warning, to the shimagu. A message, a signal of hope for any of my countrymen stuck in the city, trapped in their own bodies.

A declaration.

Sentinel Dawn was here.

Chapter 262 - Municipal Massacre IV

The symbol of the Sentinels blazed in the air above us, just barely clearing the buildings. It wasn’t particularly large, but it was bright. Easy to see for a moderate distance.

Awarthril was fancy with it. Twisting it, turning it, making it so that no matter what angle the symbol was seen from, a watcher would get a good view.

At which point, I’d hope the shimagu were vaguely normal - the city and marketplace implied, yes, they were - and people would gossip. Spread the word. After all, the shimagu might not know what it was.

The hosts would. Some of them, at least. Those from Remus. They were the ones I was trying to reach.

"Did you see that eagle?!"

Anyone from Remus would be able to guess what that was.

I’d never been amazing at leadership class.

I took the class. I learned. I tried to apply the lessons. I’d been given practical experience managing a squad in fights and survival situations.

I was solid with those parts. Give me a team of Rangers and a problem, and I knew how to use one to make the other disappear. Generally, the problem disappeared, but it was entirely possible for the Ranger team to be the ones vanishing.

Inspiring people? Big speeches? Large-scale organization?

The only part I’d managed to successfully learn was "delegate the hell out of it." My greatest leadership accomplishment, bar none, was getting Kallisto to join me on my Sentinel missions, to handle large portions of diplomacy and wrangling.

I had nobody to delegate to here. If I considered things to be just me and the elves, I was fine. They were moderately competent, and we were a small, solid team.

Add in the angry mob that I couldn’t even speak the same language as?

With an emphasis on the angry mob part of it? Vicious, uncontrollable beasts in the first place?

"Follow me" was the start, middle, end, and epilogue of ideas I had. It wasn’t even my best idea, which was "get far away from the angry mob that might decide to turn on you for some unknown reason."

There were a number of other factors that I should be considering if I wanted to call myself the "leader" of this group. Logistics sprang to mind first, because it was easy for me. Morale? Goals? Building consensus?

I’d rather the shimagu just kill me now.

I put all those out of my mind, figuring that it’d be a future Elaine problem. She’d hate me and curse my name out.

Oh well.

I felt a grin crack my face. She wouldn’t be able to reach me.

I ditched every problem except "How do I stay alive for the next hour" out of my mind.

First, resources.

Still had my gems, although the skills left were mediocre. They revolved around capturing a single target, or making a large announcement. I was in "kill, don’t capture" mode, and Kiyaya was a bigger sub-woofer than I could manage.

I had about half my mana left.

I had my skills and training.

I had a few little trinkets. I mentally adjusted the Deception Ring to show me as a level 128. I wanted people to think I was weak, and take a swing at me. It’d make my job that much easier. It wouldn’t flag me as the city-ending apocalyptic threat, and powerful first strikes were more likely to be aimed at one of the elves. I had no issue with that.

It’d have to be enough.

I left the market, not looking back as the warning bells continued to toll. I could feel the mob behind me, like a pulsing beacon of anger. I could see the elves out of the corner of my eye.

We turned onto a mainstreet, only to find a solid mass of guards and soldiers on the other end. They’d broken out wooden circular shields and long, wicked spears that looked like they wanted to pull and tear instead of stab and… well, more stab.

The street had been cleared of people, but I spent no time looking or focusing on that. On thinking what everyone else would do. While the elves hesitated, my training took over, I knew what to do. I simply ran.

[Running] had been one of my earliest skills, and I still loved the movement. The wind through my hair, the breeze kissing my face. It’d evolved over time, to [Rapidash], then [Talaria], and now [Scintillating Ascent].

The soldiers yelled something, and a whole mass of bows came up. Half seemed to be "going high", aiming for the unruly mob behind me, while the rest were "going straight".

An unreasonable number were aimed at me, and I moved.

I couldn’t dodge arrows. Even when unskilled, there was significant strength in the ogre’s arms, and I’d eat my boots if the bows and arrows were made out of mundane or poor materials. I just wasn’t fast enough, in spite of what [Bullet Time] implied I could do.

Almost nobody was.

No, the key to "dodging arrows" was to dodge the archer. I planted a foot, pushing myself one way, watching the bows track me. I landed, and with my other foot, pushed the other way.

Training the ogres how I dodged.

Aegion’s arrow roared past me, a stiff tailwind boosting my speed, the arrow, and everyone else.

They couldn’t hold the arrows long, and wouldn’t. Not when me getting too close would spell certain death for the shimagu. I leapt into the air, letting the wind caress and take me as my wings unfurled, shooting me into the sky.

I timed it well. I’d gone up right as the archers loosed.

My focus lasered in, the entire world becoming just me, and the arrows trying to pincushion me.

[Bullet Time], and a wealth of experience, let me pick out exactly which arrows would hit me, and which ones would miss. It let me see which arrows were flying significantly faster than they had any right to, which ones were bending in the air, a sure-fire mark of powerful skills supporting their travel. The most dangerous arrows in the lot. With pinpoint precision, I burned the feathers of a half-dozen arrows heading towards my head and chest, Radiance rapidly flickering in and out of existence. A second set of Radiance beams sniped a few of the more dangerous arrows that I could spot. I threw up a small [Mantle] around my critical areas as I curled up a bit, reducing the area that could get hit.

Wrapping my arms around the egg, giving it a second, fleshy layer of protection.

It was like going through a hailstorm of sharp metal and long wood, arrows whizzing past me like a swarm of angry bees. I was nicked dozens of times by near-misses, arrows that I’d properly judged wouldn’t land on me.

My legs ate five arrows, but that was nothing.

Then the storm was over, the volley passed. I flew in at top speed as the archers reloaded and started firing as quickly as they could, any massed fire discipline going out the window. Panic setting in as death approached on bright and colorful wings.

An enormous crest of Lava washed under me, slamming into the soldiers. The lucky ones just got searing specks of Lava on them, lighting their clothes on fire. The unlucky ones died.

The extra-unlucky ones lived, screaming as they were coated in burning Lava, their bodies cooking under them.

I mentally cursed Serondes out. My job was going to be that much harder.

It was one hell of a distraction though. Some of the soldiers broke and ran - I was judging them harshly, that was nothing compared to what regular Remus legionnaires went through, let alone Rangers - while more were busy not dying. The amount of incoming fire dramatically decreased.

There were only three more arrows, which I burned, deflected, and ignored my hip getting punctured, then I judged I was close enough.

The day was bright and sunny, and nearly all of them were in range, and nearly all of them were out of the shadows. They were unquestionably hostile.

My quickstep through the sky ended with a [Dance With the Heavens]. Celestial power blasted out of me, washing over the combined ogre-human soldiers. I quickly flickered my eyes through my notifications, noting dozens and dozens of shimagu kill notifications.

At the same time, Serondes’s Lava crest utterly ruined my short-term plans. Between the marathon session I’d just ran, and the sheer number of badly hurt people, with the non-human penalty, distance, and severity, I’d almost zeroed myself out on mana.

By "Almost zero" I was talking about 20,000 points or so, out of my 421,000 points total. Enough for most serious injuries, barring decapitation.

Hell, I could probably manage decapitation as well, as long as I focused on just the important parts.

I shelved the thought, and the implications off to the side.

Most of the soldiers froze, regaining control of the bodies for the first time in years. Or decades.They were a raw pile of dried tinder, and it only took one spark. None of the hosts knew that the rest of them had been freed. One human drew his knife, stabbing the ogre in front of him in the back.

Absolute pandemonium broke out, the ogre turning his club on a different soldier, who fought back. Guards whirled with their clubs on soldiers, who wildly swung their polearms around. Archers staggered, and those with nocked arrows loosed them point-blank into the people standing next to them. Some ran away, and one enterprising individual found a torch, and started to work on getting [Arsonist] as his next class evolution.

I wanted to facepalm. I’d just purged nearly all of the soldiers of shimagu, but they didn’t know that. To them, they were now free, trapped in a sea of slavers. Slavers who "seemed to know" what had happened, and were busying trying to kill them, so they were lashing back out and-

It was a damn mess.

[Cosmic Presence] started to work overtime. Vicious cuts clotted up and closed, cut muscles were quickly replaced by scar tissue. Serondes’s Lava was still searing the poor people it’d engulfed. I’d healed them entirely when I flashed my skill, but that didn’t magically cool off the Lava. They were just re-burning, their bodies going through the "heal burns" cycle at an incredible pace. Blisters formed and popped, boiling under the heat, only to immediately reform.

It was gross. Even by my hardened-by-wading-through-gore standards.

The elves ran up.

"Awarthril. Start pulling critically injured people out." I ordered, absent-mindedly yanking barbed arrows out of my body. Annoying things. I wasn’t going to jump into the fray - [Oath] didn’t demand it, and I wasn’t going to be a complete dumbass, but I did need to stick around and heal the people I could. I needed this fight to be over now so I could get a move on. Before the shimagu managed a larger response than a few guard squads.

Awarthril snapped out a sticky tar-like whip into the crowd, grabbing an ogre that had fallen and was being trampled and stabbed in the confusion, then yoinked him out.

Causing a half-dozen injuries in the process. I refrained from sighing.

"Serondes. Please tell them that they’re all free, and to stop fighting. Then can you remove your Lava? It’s fucking with my healing."

He started speaking, Kiyaya amplifying him without me saying a thing.

As he was speaking, the first mob, the original mob, caught up with us. They were angry. The nuances of who’d been freed, who wasn’t a shimagu and who was controlled were entirely lost on them. It was an angry mob. Reason and logic no longer applied.They just saw the guards and soldiers, still in their uniforms and weapons, the clear symbols of oppression and the shimagu reign clear. The very same people that had just volleyed arrows into them. Them fighting each other wasn’t a hint to not fight, no. To the mob, it was like the matador’s bright red flag, shortcutting straight to the fight or flight response.

Any member of the mob inclined to pick "flight" had already left.

With a primal roar, disregarding weapons and injuries, levels, bodies, and numbers, they crashed into the former guards, wielding their makeshift weapons. They picked up half-snapped arrows and shoved them in eyes, wrestled shields off of people only to bash a third person’s head in.

Complete pandemonium.

"Aegion! Once I heal someone, shove them somewhere else!"

"Trying to keep an eye on everything else around us!" He barked back.

Shit, he was right. That would explain where Cordamo was. At least I didn’t need to detoxify everyone on top of the rest of this mess.

"Serondes then. Forget trying to disperse this normally."

I got grumbling from him, but as Awarthril pulled the next person out, he did what I asked.

My mana was getting dangerously low. I made a judgement call.

I could perfectly heal ten people, or barely stabilize and fix everyone. I went with the second one. It was imperfect, but when had the world ever been good or fair? By stabilizing people, [Cosmic Presence] would get a chance to act, reducing the totally amount of mana I’d need to fix everyone back up. More lives saved, in a shorter time frame.

"Hiding us." Awarthril tersely bit out, and vanished. Copies of us shimmered into existence between us and the mob, and she kept fishing people out.

I felt her [Rubbery Rope] reattach itself to me. Her illusions were clever. As she pulled people towards us, she made it look like they were heading towards our fake copies, then flickered invisibility over them as they reached "us", and kept pulling.

My mana was continuing to drop, even though I was only touching up the worse injuries. I had to operate off of memory, since the patients were being delivered to me invisibly. Had to try and remember what glimpses I’d seen with [Pristine Memories]. Awarthril was grabbing people faster than Serondes could convince them to leave.

They seemed to have some prejudice against invisible disembodied voices. I wonder why. We were also getting a bit of a crowd, invisible people bumping into each other, tripping over each other.

This was a mess.

"MOVE!" Aegion roared as loudly as he could.

Even before he was done speaking I was on the move, jumping back to avoid whatever it was that spooked Aegion. My head snapped forward and my whole body started to spin as Awarthril demonstrated her superior physical prowess, pulling us all.

At least, I assumed that’s what was going on. The invisibility wasn’t helping.

I didn’t even hear it coming. One moment I was looking at the brawl, the writhing mess of flesh and blood, anger and hatred, intent on tearing each other apart. The next, a massive pillar crashed through where Awarthril’s illusions of us were, stone and dirt exploding in a powerful wave over us.

Only once the pillar landed, and the rocks got thrown out in all directions at high speeds, did [Bullet Time] kick in again.

The rocks were significantly scarier than the arrows had been, in spite of the directed versus undirected nature of them. The rocks had significantly more force behind them, and there were more of them. I couldn’t carefully snipe rocks out of the air, and my mana was on the low end.

The metal pillar was wider than I was, and was red-hot. Little sparks played along it, although I was more focused on the shrapnel spray heading our way.

I snapped [Mantle] into place, knowing it wasn’t going to be nearly enough. Knowing that I didn’t have enough mana to heal through the rocks that were about to turn me into swiss cheese. I spared a quick thought to everyone who’d been on the other side of the pillar, who’d been much closer to the ground zero of the attack. I kind of wanted to go back and help them out, but I wouldn’t deny that I thought Awarthril physically pulling me out was good for my health. I breathed a sigh of relief as Serondes summoned a half-dome of Lava to shield us.

I could hear the rocks impact on the shield, sounding like a giant with a pair of stone drumsticks performing a solo.

"Bwooooooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuarplh!" Awarthril… well, not said. Those definitely weren’t words coming out of her mouth. "What was that!?"

"That was it doesn’t matter we need to keep running!" I was already moving, Ranger training kicking in. Movement was life. Stillness was death.

I’d been trained how to instantly assess, react, and move. The elves had better skills, more levels, and higher stats.

I had better training.

"The Lava shield told them exactly where we are!"

Chapter 263 - Municipal Massacre V

The moment my feet touched the ground, I was pivoting, exploding forward in a sprint.

"Into the house! Move move move!" I yelled, not checking what the elves were doing behind me. Kinda hard, with the rolling clouds of dust that got kicked up, stone getting pulverized into concealment.

Only a weak concealment. Currents and eddies marked where we were running to and moving, but it marked everyone, no person being more obvious than the next.

We needed to be out of sight of whatever Classer was dropping large metal pillars on us. I could just imagine the build now. Something to fly, something to see, the ability to conjure up lots of Metal, and a dozen abilities to accelerate the rod. Easy airstrikes, practically bordering on orbital strikes. I had no way of stopping one of those attacks, and I doubted I could survive my head being pulverized.

Heck, even if my head wasn’t a weak spot, the metal pillars would pulverize me. The mangled remains of my body would be in an infinitesimal fraction of space between a rock and a hard place, and there’d be no place to regenerate to.

I’d die. No question about it.

There were two bright points.

The first was the attack had to be expensive. Either conjuring up that much metal, or carrying around that sort of weight wasn’t easy. From how uniform the pillar looked, I’d bet conjured.

Conjured material cost scaled roughly with weight. It took me roughly 45,000 mana to regenerate my entire body. I’d believe the summoned pillars were at least ten times as heavy as I was, which implied 450,000 plus mana just to conjure the metal, let alone aim and unleash it.

And metal was heavy. I was probably dramatically off in my estimate.

Either way - we weren’t at risk of a hail of these coming down on us. However, I wasn’t going to bet that it was a one and done attack.

The second was whoever was attacking needed to see us. It was a precision strike. Dodging was the answer, and since the attack was too fast to dodge?

Pre-emptive dodging, AKA zig-zagging and hiding was the order of the day.

There were too many unknowns to come up with a strong plan. All I had left were my fundamentals. Movement was life. Don’t be seen, hide and strike first. Elevation gave a tactical advantage.

The houses were more like apartments. Closely packed against each other, multi-storied buildings that had the vaguely run-down look of a well-loved structure without a lot of money to love it with. The radically different decorations on each of the windows pointed towards an apartment complex, and they were squeezed together like sausages on the side of the road.

I didn’t aim for a door or anything.

Nor did I slow down as the wall rushed at me.

Radiance exploded out of me, aiming for the wooden window slats, or more specifically, their hinges. I leapt forward as I got near, [Scintillating Ascent] giving me a small assist as I exploded head-first through the window, somersaulting into the apartment.

I quickly took stock of the room, without [Bullet Time] giving me an assist. Three ogres sitting around a table, looking vaguely in shock at me.

Portals of entry. Door in front, window behind.

Weapons. Knives on the table, their physical bodies, potential skill use.

No. Potential skills were always in play in Remus, where I’d trained. Skills were significantly restricted here. Made clearing buildings here much easier than at Ranger Academy, although this was for real.

I made a flash plan.

As I tumbled through the air, I blasted them all with bright Radiance beams, aiming to blind, not kill. Disorient them. All flash, no bang.

I rolled to the floor, and changed my momentum from a roll to a slide. My knees screamed at me as I glided under the table. The ogres, either in shocked reflex, or in a deliberate attempt, kicked at me.

It wasn’t trivial to dodge their kicks, not in the high-speed cramped confines under the table, but it was manageable. Also, kicks were clearly indicating that they were hostile, so I slapped the shocked ogre’s legs.

Healing them.

Killing shimagu.

As I exited from the table, I flexed my legs, moving back up to my feet. I didn’t look back, blazing through the door, bouncing off the wall, then continuing on down the hallway.

It didn’t matter where I was going, so much that I was moving fast, and moving somewhat unpredictably.

Sure, whoever was dropping anvils on us might have absolutely perfect knowledge of the layout of every building in this city, seen what window I went through, and guess that I’d follow the hallway. If all those events occurred, yeah, I’d be screwed.

Or she could just make a lucky guess.

There was a door at the end of the hallway, and as I pounded towards it, I heard the snapping and breaking of wood. Like an elf with extra-large horns had just plowed through a wall.

Honestly. The elves were high level and powerful, but their lack of experience and training in urban settings, and fighting against other intelligent creatures was showing. They were physically faster and better coordinated than I was, but I was ahead of them because I assessed the situation and made decisions quicker than they were.

I was proactive. The elves were reactive. A difference in training, experience, and mentality.

I flash-burned some helpful arrows into the wooden panels of the apartment’s hallway, letting them know which direction I’d gone.

I didn’t stop to open the door. I just burned through the doorknob and hinges, then leaned my shoulder forward, praying that it’d be enough. That there wouldn’t be some weird quirk, or someone standing on the other side of the door.

Actually - I knew there was nobody standing on the other side of the door. My Radiance would’ve gone right through them, and [Oath] would’ve been peeved.

Yay for impromptu scouting!

The door blew out under my tender ministrations as I rammed it. It only half-fell out into the main hall, the narrow passageway foiling my plans.

I spotted a rickety staircase, and started to run for it. I glanced down, checking on the egg. Yup, still there, still intact.

Four steps towards the stairs, and I heard the distinct sound of a wooden board, formerly a door, getting snapped in half by irate elves.

"There!" Awarthril shouted, and by the cursing and double-thuds that followed, I guessed that Aegion and Serondes were being unceremoniously yanked along by her [Rubbery Rope].

"Up the stairs!" I pointed, kinda pointlessly. There was something to be said for clear communication though.

A nice thing about all this running around without fighting - my mana was regenerating at a crazy rate. Roughly 180 points of mana a second.

Part of me whispered that whatever Classer was dropping anvils on us had a higher regeneration rate.

"Duck!"

Without a moment’s hesitation I threw myself to the ground, wrapping myself up in [Mantle].

One moment.

A second moment.

No [Bullet Time].

Awarthril jumped over me like a gazelle, all grace, elegance, speed, and large pointy horns. A [Rubbery Rope] snapped out to connect to me, and it didn’t even take me a second to realize what was about to happen.

"No-!"

My cry of despair was cut off as I was yoinked, limbs flailing, into the mess of Serondes and Aegion also getting tumble-dried in Awarthril’s wake.

"Up over up and up!" I shouted, bracing myself.

It was like holding onto a rope. A rope being pulled along by an enthusiastic, if somewhat unwitting bear. Awarthril bounded up the stairs, without a single care or concern about the three of us getting yanked along.

She also had a standard-length [Rubbery Rope] that we were all attached to.

The end result?

As Awarthril turned the corner on the staircase, I went splat on the wall. In my panic, I threw a [Mantle] over the egg. Aegion rammed into me, the pointy edges of his shield, hard armor and all. The air exploded out of my lungs, which gave me nothing to do as Serondes acted as a hammer to Aegion’s nail.

Then all of our ropes went taut as Awarthril kept running, and we were unceremoniously tugged along.

I did get to see the Elaine-shaped impression in the wall behind me.

Kiyaya was behind us, and I swear she gave us a pitying look.

"Through! Through!" I yelled, but Awarthril kept going up.

This wasn’t working.

"Stoooooooooooop!" I ordered in my best ‘command voice’.

Awarthril stopped. Serondes was loudly sick.

"Are you ok Elaine? Is everything alright? It’s a bit dangerous out there right now…"

I gave her a flat look. My best "no shit." look.

"Awarthril. I’ve got more experience than all of you combined in this. Follow my directions." I didn’t give her, or the other elves, time to argue. We didn’t have time. We’d stayed too still for too long already. We hadn’t moved far enough. I pointed at a wall, one that I’d been half-tracking and knew led to another apartment building.

"Through that wall. Now."

Awarthril half-frowned, but Serondes was on point. He gave a few sharp whistles, and with a stiff breeze blowing my hair around, a number of deep cuts appeared on the wall.

I wasn’t going to wait for Awarthril to work through everything. I moved.

This wall was more cooperative than the door was, and the elves followed behind me.

We ended up in another apartment hall. Dingy brown wood, placed years ago and barely maintained. Wouldn’t want to live here.

There was a great roar and a cacophony of sounds that was hard to properly parse.

All I knew was the Classer dropping pillars from the heavens guessed, and guessed wrong.

The elves paused, glancing back. I didn’t.

"Keep going!"

A number of doors opened. The ogres and humans - really, the shimagu - poked their heads outside. Saw a number of heavily armed warriors stampeding through.

Closed their doors.

There was a deep, primal instinct that screamed to take cover when disasters were occurring, and no matter how irrational it was, home was the safest place. True for humans. Apparently true for shimagu.

We kept running, fleeing through the interconnected buildings.

One ogre was trying to escape as we stumbled upon him. I tripped him with [Mantle], then sprang over his falling form. He was obviously running away, and I just let him be.

"Awarthril! Invisibility!" I shouted when I spotted a window. There was no glass here, just slates letting air in or not.

I faded out of existence, feeling a strong breeze as someone - Awarthril I assumed - blasted past me. With no visible hand, the windows opened, and without hesitation, I threw myself out the window.

Couldn’t fly, it’d break the illusion.

I mentally cursed every god and goddess on Pallos as I saw what awaited me on the street.

The roiling dust hadn’t settled. My perception of time was skewed, the superhuman abilities the System gave me messed with my perception of how long, exactly, it took me to do things. Dust, when it wasn’t being controlled by a Classer, followed normal rules of the world.

I couldn’t see how high up I was.

Wish I could see Kiyaya jumping out the window though. Sight would’ve been priceless.

The dust cloud rushed up at me. Shame I couldn’t see the ground. The act of throwing myself off of a tall building was giving me a random sense of nostalgia. I had a half-flashback to when Artemis was training me, one of my earliest practical Ranger lessons. My solution at the time had been to jump off the wall, and I’d thought when I’d gotten the ability to fly this would no longer happen.

Welp. So much for that.

The big difference this time though? [Mantle] flashed at exactly the right moment, stopping me -

Nope!

I miscalculated how fast I was going, and crashed right through it.

One day.

The move arrested my speed such that I barely noticed my mana flicker as I landed, bending at the knees and rolling to absorb the impact. I did notice the mana loss from breaking straight through my shield though.

Then I was off, trusting elven hearing to make out my footsteps, elvish eyes to see the swirling dust, and work out where I was going next.

Thinking about it, going invisible might’ve not been the most effective idea. Ah well, hopefully we looked just like anyone else moving through the dust from above.

Goddesses know I had to dodge enough ogres running through the dust in a blind panic.

In no time at all, the steep walls of another building showed up, and I made my own entrance, the elves following shortly after.

I briefly toyed with the idea of Awarthril sending illusionary attackers at the Classer to keep them busy, but ditched it. She’d need to be relatively close to the illusion, unless she had some trick up her sleeve that she’d never shown yet, and that’d give our position away.

Three times we changed buildings.

Eight times enormous steel obelisks came crashing down. Some crashed off into the distance. Most were alarmingly close.

I was both the slowest, and the fastest person. Pure stats? I was the slowpoke, and stopping the elves from reaching their full potential.

But I didn’t dither. I didn't wonder what to do next. Oh sure, if we spent five minutes on each decision we’d make better ones. Making a mediocre decision right now was better than a perfect one minutes from now, especially when five seconds was too long.

After the first time Awarthril ran me over while invisible, she dropped the cloak while we were inside.

All this running around was great for my mana though, and I’d restored more than half my mana pool.

"Stop!" Aegion shouted. I skidded to a halt, looking back at Aegion. Aegion’s eyes were steely, and he’d unslung his bow.

He’d given advanced warning earlier, and I didn’t see Cordamo. He nocked and drew an arrow, aiming at the ceiling.

"We’re going to have to run after this." His eyes were faraway, the words absent-minded.

"Awarthril, [Rubbery Rope]. How far can you stretch it?" I asked, already getting clear of Aegion.

She glanced at me, divining my intention immediately.

"Is he close enough for me?" Serondes asked.

Still staring at the ceiling, Aegion gave a tiny, curt shake of his head.

Awarthril connected the rope, and we ran down the hallway, down to another window as Aegion fully drew his bow. Winds gusted around him and Lightning crackled as he made minute changes to his stance.

With the barest relaxing of muscles, he released the arrow, causing an explosion of Lightning and a solid Gale wall of air to barrel down the hall, causing all manner of minor destruction. The arrow itself went through the ceiling, blowing out a large hole.

In one fluid motion, Aegion grabbed another arrow and sent it chasing the first one. Four more arrows were rapidly launched before he paused.

"Go!" I didn’t wait to see what happened next, instead electing to take my chances with the window and the ground.

I threw myself into daylight, briefly enjoying the kiss of the warm sun on my cheeks.

Then [Bullet Time] kicked in for the first time this whole fight. I snapped my wings open and shot forward, while placing a shield behind me.

The building was there one moment and entirely gone the next, turned into a whirling maelstrom of wooden splinters, with some bone shards and viscera mixed in for flavoring.

[Mantle] managed to stop the first wave of splinters, but a particularly sturdy beam broke it, braining me, before spinning off like the world’s largest throwing stick.

I felt my head crack, and hot fear flashed through me. I’d fractured my skull in a dozen places. I’d never taken such a bad blow to the head, my brain getting rattled around like dice in an unlucky gambler’s cup.

My healing instantly restored the broken bones of course.

I was still unsure on exactly how my healing worked on traumatic brain injuries. Needed to look out for a concussion. Needed to look out for…

The rest of my worries were rendered moot as the rest of the exploding building caught up with me, turning me into the first human-oak hybrid porcupine.

Then the wave was over, although there was a new dust cloud, choking me and causing every breath to come up short. I was spending more time hacking and coughing than picking splinters out of my arms and legs.

A brief flash of Radiance, combined with the innate properties of [Dance with the Heavens] got most of the problems in my back.

I grabbed one yellowish object stuck in my arm, and wrenched it out.

Ewww. Someone’s tooth.

I landed.

"Serondes! Awarthril! Aegion! Where are you!" I cried out, fighting my way through the thick haze of obliterated hopes and dreams.

A human staggered out of the cloud, bleeding heavily. I deftly darted in, tagged him for a full heal with a mediocre image, then continued on, fading into the darkness before he could slow me down with his thanks or his story.

I plowed through a half-dozen other people, healing as I went, continuing to call out for the elves before running face-first into Kiyaya.

"Kiyaya! Where’s everyone else?" I asked.

"We’re here!" Serondes called out, as Kiyaya moved her massive bulk over.

They were annoyingly fine.

"How?!" I demanded.

Serondes gave me his best shit-eating grin.

"Well, some of us stuck together, and Awarthril and I overlapped our protections."

He glanced significantly at my blood-stained body. My healing was great, but it didn’t have an auto-clean feature.

I gave him a finger back.

"I got him." Aegion interrupted. "Now what?"

"Where’s the Spatial Box?" I asked, to awkward silence.

"I left it back at the square." Awarthril eventually admitted.

I facepalmed.

"Whyyyyyyy." Serondes complained.

"Oh come on." Aegion grumbled.

"Right. Find our way back to the square, grab the box, and get out of the city. Any objections?"

I didn’t wait for them. I shot up into the air, trying to find where the now-former market was located.

Pillars of smoke came off of numerous fires that had started throughout the city. One was violently out of control, ferociously burning and consuming. People moved like currents, towards the fires, away from them, visible as eddies in the dust. Gleaming metal pillars stood tall and defiant, the recently deceased Classer having not given a care for where he was blasting.

Pterodactyls were circling, screeching. Dinosaurs, controlled by shimagu.

More ethical than taking over another sapient being.

I turned towards a flash of white in the corner of my eye, seeing Cordamo strike past one of the pterodactyls. The wings fell off the bird, and I didn’t watch the shrieking spiral of the rest of the body plummet down to Pallos.

A glimpse of red, and I turned again.

A figure was flying through the air. Elvenoid. Bright red, bat-like wings.

Crimson skin, with finely-printed words twisting and snarling carved into every inch, a nauseating shade of yellow against the crimson flesh.

Powerfully muscular body. Ash left in its wake, slowly trailing down towards the city, some embers still burning.

I’d previously wondered about demons, but there’d been a second possibility I’d never considered, one that was rubbing itself in my face. Rubbing so hard that there was no denying what I was seeing, that it wasn’t a demon.

A Devil.

One was powering towards me.

Chapter 264 - Municipal Massacre VI

I glanced up at the sky, quickly throwing together a simple plan as the devil flew towards me.

I flew away from the devil, but slowly. Roughly a quarter of the speed I could manage.

I’d like to have shot up into the sky, but that might’ve given away the game.

I checked over my shoulder. Good, he was chasing, and getting closer. I flapped my wings faster, while barely increasing my speed, trying to show myself "panicking" at the approaching devil.

Being chased by a high-level [Mage] in a warzone was enough for me to assume he - they - were hostile.

As he got close enough, I reversed, g-forces pulling at my face and making my innards flip around. Studying Cordamo helped with this maneuver, [Scintillating Ascent] now able to turn on a coin while keeping my speed.

I accelerated towards the devil, blasting out [Dance with the Heavens] as far as I could. I wasn’t going to try killing the devil, but the shimagu could be an easy target to pick off. Ideally, the devil was being controlled, and once freed, would turn on the shimagu.

Given the [Mage] tag, I seriously doubted that, but sniping the shimagu would be a serious blow regardless.

Plan part 1: Kill the shimagu. Everything was up in the air from there.

The devil - shimagu? - himself had different plans, and wasn’t going to just let me kill him. Three different colors of clouds erupted from him. A shockingly bright orange, a wispy grey, and deep, dark ashes, with glowing embers deep inside. The three clouds mixed as they expanded.

I wrapped myself in a skin-tight [Mantle], Ash, Miasma, and… Miasma again? Steam? Straight Wind? Acid? I wasn’t sure about the third element. Either way, the three elements weren’t well-known for their burst or puncturing power, and I just might be able to keep myself well-protected with my flexible [Mantle of the Stars].

The last thing I saw before I charged into the cloud was the devil wrapping himself in the same mixture.

One small angry part of me was screaming that he knew how [Wheel of Sun and Moon] worked, and he was deliberately shielding himself from the skill by wrapping himself in dark clouds.

The larger, more reasonable and experienced part of me was calmly explaining that, no, he probably just had skills relating to his other skills - surely, a devastating surprise - and wrapping himself up was one of the criteria.

Or he believed in being hidden, just like I did.

My vision went nearly entirely black. The only things I could see were the sun, a pale, tiny, distant dot, and the burning embers swirling through the mix.

The devil was somewhere inside with me, and I cast [Dance with the Heavens], focusing on maintaining it while keeping an eye on my mana. The plan at this point was to try and get the devil to physically punch me, and try to kill me that way. The moment he made contact, I’d burn the shimagu out.

Given how many elements I’d seen, I wasn’t holding out hope. I stopped flying, and let gravity take over. Either I’d escape from his elements, his domain, or I’d lure him closer as I bailed - this time for real.

I didn’t bother trying my Radiance at all. Too much crap in the way. I’d call it a weakness of Radiance if it wasn’t for the fact that nearly every element would struggle in this mess.

I dropped, picking up speed. The devil obviously knew what was going on in his domain, and acted.

Like a vice clamping down on me, the swirling maelstrom of elements tightened on me, starting to overwhelm my shield.

My shield was about to pop. Instead of wasting more mana on it, I shrunk it. It was no longer covering me like a second skin, instead wrapping around the precious egg, keeping it safe. I wrapped my arms around it, giving it extra protection.

The noxious roiling mess hit me like a punch to the gut. It burned, in a dozen different ways. Sticking my body into a roaring bonfire would’ve been colder. The air was thick and cloying, and while I held my breath it didn’t stop the embers from invading my nose, the gas from burning my sinus.

Hot embers burned against my skin, briefly branding me before flying off, letting my skin reknit. Tiny sharp blades sliced across my arms, chest, and face, spurts of blood flashing before me, then whisked away into the mixture.

I briefly missed and regretted not being in full armor, the stuff designed to stop exactly this sort of attack and problem. Then my vambrace melted, fusing into my flesh and arm, and those regrets vanished.

Metal. A fourth element. There had to be a shimagu involved, and the devil and shimagu were cooperating.

My mana was dropping faster than I’d expect. The heat was trying to cook me alive, my healing acting as a radiator and cooling myself just as quickly as the burning tried to denature my flesh.

My lungs burned as I held my breath, my throat staying closed even as hot ash poured into my mouth from my nose. My cheeks inflated like a squirrel, the ash having nowhere else to go.

I gave up the fight and opened my mouth.

A sharp Metal shard embedded itself in my eyeball.

I gritted my teeth, stopping myself from swearing.

I was still falling.

How long had I fallen for? How far had I gotten? I couldn’t see the ground, but I could feel how fast I was going. I reoriented myself to land feet-first, giving myself enough "crumple time" to minimize injuries.

At this pace, I was going to hit the ground before finding air.

The demands of my lungs increased, and finally I couldn’t resist. I slowly breathed out, only for the gases to viciously invade.

I started clawing at my throat. Ripping at it, tearing at it, trying anything to get air.

I briefly considered [Mantle] as a mask, but discarded the idea. It’d keep as much crud in as it kept out.

I burst out of the cloud, flaring my wings open as I performed an emergency aerial twist to avoid getting splattered by Serondes, surfing on a crest of Lava, with Awarthril grimly hanging onto him.

We flashed past each other, the wind snatching any words that might’ve been said.

A few bright arrows appeared in front of me, pointing to a spot on the ground. Coughing, hacking, wheezing, and generally trying to get my lungs full of air and not nonsense, I traced out the arrow’s path.

Right to Aegion and Kiyaya. Awarthril’s illusions coming in handy!

My landing was rough, which was to say I smashed my feet and knees in a way that would’ve crippled anyone else.

For me?

I regained more mana that second than I spent fixing myself up.

Aegion said something, but I missed it entirely. I was a little busy, on my hands and knees, trying to get air, to get life back inside of me.

The bigger problem was my lungs. I could barely breathe, each gasping wheeze sending agony through my body.

Bloody fucking healing skills not accounting for shit in my lungs. For WHATEVER System-forsaken reason that wasn’t part of me, and was "external". That, or it’d get fixed whenever [Dance with the Heavens] got evolved to handle suffocation.

Every exhalation brought with it another cloud of cooled ashes, with the occasional retch, bringing up a dribble of water.

"Elaine!" Aegion yelled.

"What?"

"You ok?"

"Do I look ok?"

"Well, you look better than when you weren’t answering me."

I crawled up to my feet, then bent over, hands on my knees, still coughing. Most of the dust had settled by now, but my landing and movements had kicked some of it up, making life miserable for me. I reached up, and with my fingers, found the metal shard that was embedded in my eye. Once I had a good grip on it, I extracted it from my eyeball.

Euachk.

My head felt a bit weird, and I rubbed my hand over my forehead, going back and back and back, until I was forced to admit - the devil had burned off all my hair.

Bloody hell.

I steeled myself and looked up.

Serondes and Awarthril were clearly inside the cloud themselves, the Ash glowing with a bright spot in the middle - obviously Serondes’s Lava.

The ball of embers was rapidly moving north, towards the ships and the ports of the city.

"Any idea what’s going on?" I asked Aegion. He had Cordamo, and being a sniper, had vastly superior eyesight.

Also, somehow, somewhere, the elves had gotten their Spatial Box back. Why’d I even bothered to scout for it?

"Yeah, Awarthril’s finally gotten the devil." Aegion said, and I finally had the word for the creature. "Going to throw him into the ocean."

"Why’s that?" I asked, checking around us. The street was starting to fill with people, humans and ogres trying to pick up the pieces of their life that had just come crashing around them. We were given a wide berth, but with our current non-hostilities? Life was going on.

Until the next idiot took a swing at me, and the whole fighting-riot-mob snowball started again. It was only a matter of time, but I was grateful for the breather.

No idea if it was Aegion in his gleaming armor, me with my healer tag, or Kiyaya. The dire wolf was big.

"Devils can’t swim. Their curse is something like complete paralysis when submerged in water. Put one in water, and it’ll sink and drown."

Aegion’s words were like a prophecy, as the Ash ball took a sharp dive down, vanishing behind some houses. The smoke was near-omnipresent, but it wasn’t thick enough to hide the column of water.

"Incoming." I called out, seeing a torrent of velociraptors turn the corner of the street, focusing on us. Spreading out in classic pack tactics. The shimagu saw a squad of enforcer dinosaurs and made themselves scarce.

There were a lot of the dinosaurs. They just kept coming, and coming, filling the entire street up with them. At least they weren’t super high level. Just in the 200-350 range each.

My point of view was getting skewed, when raptors stronger than most Rangers weren’t "super high level."

Aegion rolled his shoulders in the classic "warming up" move, trading out his bow for his sword and shield.

"Can you pull the same trick that you’ve done so far?" He asked.

"Which one?"

"The one where you get near them and they all start fighting each other."

I guess that’s how it looked from his point of view.

"Not sure if the velociraptors will start fighting each other, but yeah. I can purge them of shimagu and take it from there."

I spat out some more blood. I had some Metal shards stuck in my lungs, and they were cutting me back open as quickly as I was healing.

The right move would be to turn off my [Persistent Casting], then manually heal the area, focusing on generating scar tissue around the affected area, then re-cast with a strong image, deliberately allowing the lung scar tissue to remain.

The entire plan fell apart at "Turn off [Persistent Casting] in a war zone" though.

As it was, as each fleck of metal bit into me, my upgrades on [Dance with the Heavens] kicked in, eroding the metal a little bit further. One agonizing cut at a time, my lungs were getting cleaned.

I darted forward, hopping up and taking flight down the street.

I wasn’t thrilled with my current mana. Oh sure, I could probably survive three decapitations, but I wasn’t happy with it.

No sense in taking risks though. I flew over the raptors, blasting a heal through all of them.

They kept charging down the street in perfect formation.

"Aegion! It didn’t work!" I yelled back, dive-bombing the dinosaurs.

It got messy.

Kiyaya was a monster in her own right, bowling over the smaller raptors. Her mighty jaws effortlessly bit raptors in half, while powerful kicks from her hind legs broke any raptor that tried to flank her. She roared and snarled, her voice doing almost as much damage as her fangs and claws.

The raptors got a few blows in, but Kiyaya had a few hundred levels on the dinosaurs. The only way she’d die was "death by a thousand cuts."Or if one of the raptors had a powerful poison.

Or if there was some particularly nasty skill.

Or…

Aegion was fighting conservatively, guarding Kiyaya’s flank. His shield caught dinosaurs trying to dash past him - or into him - followed by a quick dispatch with his sword.

He was no [Swordfighter], but a physical Classer was a physical Classer. Strength and Dexterity applied to swords just as well as spears, bows, rowing, lifting heavy crates, and so much more. Aegion also had hundreds of levels on the monsters.

I was busy strafing the dinosaurs. I flew low and fast over their heads, throwing pinpoint Radiance beams through eyes and heads.

One of the monsters jumped up as I passed over, his jaws closing on my leg. It wasn’t a problem - how jaded was I that a dinosaur trying to rip my leg off wasn’t a problem!? - but the issue was the surprise weight.

He slowed me down just a bit.

Pulled me down just a bit.

Worst of all, gave the other raptors ideas.

Leaping and snarling, more raptors latched onto me as I exploded with Radiance, summoning [Kaleidoscope] butterflies in all directions. Explosions chained around me as I was pulled into the pack, the beasts intent on ripping me to pieces. Quite literally eating me alive.

I wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

I refocused, hitting the velociraptor on my right arm with a Radiance beam through the head, while my explosive butterflies handled the one on my left. They fell dead, but wholly intact, forming a fleshy shield for a quarter of my body.

I basically gave my legs up, letting the dinosaurs chow down on them. Sure, the road was getting slick with blood, but I could restore it. While they were ripping my legs, they weren’t letting anything else get close.

Raptors eating my sides were next, and one by one, I worked my way in a circle, intent on burying myself in dead dinos to shield and protect myself. I kept an eye on my mana, but I was going to make it.

I was going to survive literally being pulled into a pack of carnivores.

As my heart surged in triumph, Kiyaya bowled over the monsters, standing protectively over me.

"Good girl." I patted her belly, not caring that it was more blood than fur.

I carefully rolled over and extracted myself. I checked on the egg.

Still good.

I got out just in time to see Kiyaya’s jaws closing like a steel trap on the last raptor. With a flicker of thought, I healed Aegion and Kiyaya.

"Well." Aegion gave his wrist an expert flick, clearing the crystal blade of blood. "Why didn’t your trick work?"

I quickly glanced through my System notifications, frowning.

"No shimagu kills. Either they had a skill to protect themselves, or there were no shimagu."

We spent a heartbeat in thoughtful silence.

"With the number of dinosaurs here, it’d make sense if there were some [Beastmaster]’s around." Aegion commented.

"Yeah. I didn’t see the kill notification on the devil either."

Aegion’s eyes started to rapidly flicker, reading notifications only he could see.

"Shattered gems." He swore. "What should we do?"

It only took a moment to come up with a plan.

"We’re leaving." I announced. "You and Cordamo can signal Awarthril and Serondes where we are. We can’t fight an entire city."

I quickly debated flying out on my own, but no. Leaving Aegion and Kiyaya mostly alone was a bad idea.

I started to stride through the street, walking around dead raptors and stepping over fallen beams, kicking up a cloud of fine dust in my wake. With the violence over, people were starting to emerge again.

Anyone who saw me quickly turned and ran away, or hid back in their building.

There would be another wave of attacks, I just knew it. The shimagu were getting smarter, sending creatures that I couldn’t just snap my fingers to kill.

We hurried along, moving quickly. Kiyaya erased any sounds we made, and we surprised quite a few people as we ran around.

I ignored the ones who ran. I purged the ogres and dinosaurs who took a swing, the shimagu culture having a bizarrely high level of innate violence.

About a quarter of the time, after killing the shimagu, the former host went on a rampage. After the third time it happened, after the third time Aegion and I got embroiled in an ugly mess, we started restraining the freed hosts.

We just didn’t have the time to constantly get stuck in quagmires.

We mimed being quiet and sneaking out, and fortunately the hosts got it. There was no way to tell that they’d been healed, that there was no longer a shimagu at the helm.

Once we weren’t getting into fights every five minutes, my mana started to refill nicely. The alarm bells continued to ring, a never-ending backstop to the chaos, and occasionally crews hustled by, carrying lumber, water buckets, sand, and more.

We turned another corner, another street, and came face to face with a horrifying scene.

An old human was lying down on a table, cheerfully extending his three remaining limbs out. A raptor was collared next to the table. An ogre slammed a cleaver down, taking the last arm off and slapping it down onto a grill. They both ignored the blood pouring out of the arm, repeating the process on his legs. The rest of the people wandering through the street were completely ignoring what was going on.

Well, except for two people standing in line next to the grill.

Then the ogre grunted, and the man started to scream. It wasn’t in any language I knew, but the pain. The sheer anguish.

I started to sprint down the street, but I was too slow. Too far. Frankly, too shocked at the casual, consensual dismemberment occurring in the middle of the street without a single person batting an eye at it. The ogre’s cleaver came down on his head, a quick mercy.

The raptor shook himself, then turned to the ogre, who handed over some thick slabs used as coins, then half of one of the legs to the raptor.

The raptor half-bowed, then trotted off.

Wait.

The grill.

The grill with meat on it.

The pork-flavored grill with meat on it.

I bent over and vomited.

"You ok?" Aegion asked. I didn’t have time to shake my head before I spewed again.

Which was an answer of sorts.

I heaved and retched until I was dry, until nothing but bile was coming up.

I’d turned off System notifications, but I quickly checked for skills, getting cursed confirmation.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Cannibalism]! Would you like to replace a skill with it? Y/N]

Something inside of me snapped.

Chapter 265 - From Dawn till Dusk

First, do no harm.

It was the first line of my [Oath]. The central, guiding principle with which I’d led my life.

The [Oath] in question had a baseline, the letter of the law. It also had the spirit of the law, and with how restriction skills worked, I needed to follow both letter and spirit.

On top of that, I had my own personal ethics, areas where I went above and beyond a single skill. Like, "Don’t steal stuff" wasn’t part of my [Oath], but barring exceptional circumstances, I wasn’t about to start plundering and looting. As tempting as it was at times.

One belief I had was in non-malfeasance. My healing shouldn’t be the cause of harm - at least, when I wasn’t actively defending myself. A practical application was with the shimagu. They were intelligent creatures. Everyone deserved life. Preserving that was my life’s mission. Simply killing them out of hand, when I wasn’t defending myself, wasn’t ok. Granted, I’d been using the most generous definition of self-defense while in the city.

This wasn’t part of [Oath], not when a shimagu was controlling another intelligent creature. It did apply when a shimagu was controlling a dinosaur, or non-intelligent creature.

As I realized what I’d eaten, as yet another casual atrocity was revealed to me, that belief crumbled to dust.

I was a healer. I had ethics, principles, beliefs. I’d like to think they were noble.

I’d wanted to believe that I’d stick to them, no matter what was presented to me. That principles only mattered when tested, when sticking to them was hard. That’s why they were principles. Otherwise, what was the point?

But this?

This was the natural conclusion of my ethics in action? This is what I had to allow, to keep my principles?

I’d been gone too long. I’d been in too many shit situations. Formorians, barren lands, dwarves, gods, dragons, guardians, mines, orcs, traps, decapitation, capture, escape, horrors, months trapped underground, dragons and dryads, elves and centaurs, trolls and hydras, White Dove, gnolls, raptors, dinosaurs, and now shimagu.

Shimagu casually butchering humans in the street, and selling them as a delicacy, with salt and pepper.

I felt myself break inside.

I felt my beliefs take a haircut.

[Oath] did not bar me from healing a person controlled by a shimagu, unconditionally.

I was seeing red. Hot fury coursed through me. Rage and wrath clouded my judgement, narrowed my focus. Nothing else mattered but this one problem, this one massive injustice in this part of the world.

I clenched and ground my teeth, while balling my hands into fists. A primal snarl was etching itself on my face.

For once, I had the power to make changes. I had the power to right the injustice.

That’s just what I did.

My scream of outrage went with a full-area blast of my healing. A dozen people around me froze, but I didn’t bother waiting to see what happened. What they’d do.

I launched myself up, taking flight just above the average head height, and blasted down the street, keeping my healing up. I didn’t look to see if Aegion or Kiyaya were following.

I didn’t care.

I swept street after street, always choosing the larger road. Aiming for the largest crowds.

The city was big. There was only so much I could cover.

Each part I did cover though? Freedom. Escape.

Chaos.

While I was flitting around the fortress in the middle of the city, I saw a rapidly-expanding cloud of Ash coming from the port, followed by an eruption of Lava.

Serondes and the devil were still going at it. Presumably Awarthril was around, just less flashy.

They could use some help and backup. If nothing else, after the fight they’d probably have a number of burns, sharp metal pieces, and other problems.

I started heading that way, zig-zagging through the roads, dropping shimagu by the dozen.

By the hundreds.

Thousands.

The shimagu didn’t take my assault lying down. Given my speed, given the size of the streets, they only had seconds to react and try something. Anything.

The smart ones fled, hiding in buildings. I didn’t bother chasing them down, not with larger crowds to handle, not with the shade forcing me to touch them. It’d take like eight seconds to track one down and manually heal them, versus getting a few dozen other shimagu in the same timeframe.

The stupid ones braced themselves, arming themselves with a makeshift weapon. Table legs and clubs, metal poles and, in one memorable case, an entire cart. They lined themselves up in my path, ready to take a powerful swing as I passed.

Idiots.

My healing was ranged, and any shimagu was purged before I got close enough for them to attack.

The desperate ones threw whatever was at hand at me. Sticks, bags, pottery, coins, charcoal, fruits - whatever was in their hands. Whatever they could just grab in the moment.

I flickered [Mantle] to stop particularly noxious items hitting my face or the egg, not wanting to impede my vision. Otherwise, I blazed on, wobbling a bit as a particularly heavy jar clipped my shoulder.

I was wrath incarnate, the great harbinger of Black Crow. I was furious, seeing red and Black.

I kept enough self-control to not hit dinosaurs, or other creatures that shimagu might’ve taken over. I wasn’t so far gone to start openly violating [Oath] in that way. However, I maintained situational awareness. A dinosaur that didn’t run? A therizinosaurus that looked like it was going to take a swipe?

Self-defense.

I blasted them.

With all that said, when I ran into a squad of guards that had bows at the ready? I didn’t assume I was suddenly invincible. I fell back on my training, blinding them before dodging, swerving, or diving into the recently freed and confused crowd, rolling, sliding, dodging, and generally making myself hard to hit.

I’d occasionally fly over a block of buildings, making myself unpredictable. Making it hard to track where I was, where I was going, where I’d be next. Taking my time, letting my mana regenerate to kill even more.

I briefly turned my notifications on, checking half a second of notifications.

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Lord of One (Ooze, 321)]//[Heavy Lumberjack (Metal, 222)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Regent of Bone (Ooze, 345)]//[Wool Tailor (Wind, 189)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Mate for Life (Ooze, 168)]//[Bricklayer (Lava, 138)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Tyrannical Overlord (Ooze, 194)]//[Light Armor Smith (Metal, 217)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Lazy Boss (Ooze, 184)]//[Street Sweeper (Pyronox, 224)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Best Buddy (Ooze, 157)]//[Smith’s Apprentice (Metal, 31)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Merciless Tyrant (Ooze, 326)]//[Pearl Diver (Ocean, 201)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Master of the Body (Ooze, 151)]//[Fisherooze (Water, 169)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Comfortable Comrade (Ooze, 320)]//[Cunning Trader (Sound, 188)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Sovereign (Ooze, 270)]//[Fruit Farmer (Verdant, 60)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Diabolical Puppetmaster (Ooze, 338)]//[Best Gossip in Town (Wind, 325)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Inner Confidant (Ooze, 235)]//[Town Crier (Wind, 66)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Personal Monarch (Ooze, 256)]//[Fine Textile Weaver (Forest, 260)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Despicable Dictator (Ooze, 282)]//[Socialite (Mirror, 102)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Despot (Ooze, 205)]//[Accountant (Water, 92)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Cozy Companion (Ooze, 318)]//[Tax Collector (Metal, 269)]]

I stopped checking after the [Tax Collector]. A lifelong fantasy come true.

I closed my ears. I only looked forward, navigating through the city, not looking down. Not looking behind me.

My mana was going down, and a little voice in my head was telling me to slow down, that I needed to conserve mana. My little breaks here and there weren’t enough.

I didn’t want to conserve mana.

I wanted to punish shimagu.

I wanted them to hurt.

I pulled myself short at that thought. It was like a bucket of ice-cold water washing over me.

I wanted the shimagu to suffer? That wasn’t me.

Or rather, since it was my thought, it was me. It just wasn’t who I wanted to be. My anger was cooling.

I was already walking a razor-thin line. I was going down a nasty way.

I needed to stop. To take a break.

I looked at my mana, dangerously low. Less than 10,000 points of mana left, and it was only because my regeneration had spiked so high with all the levels I’d gotten that I had anything at all.

Unceremoniously crashing to the ground would be a poor move.

I flew up. Up, away from the shimagu. Up, away from the freed hosts. Up, into the smoky sky.

The pterodactyls had gotten a good view of what I’d been up to. They stayed well clear.

Up and up I went, higher and higher. I’d never gone so high, Sky’s warning about not flying too high having kept me at lower altitudes. I ascended until I was panting in the thin air, too high to see anyone, then I looked down.

Smoke covered the city, spewing from dozens of fires. Rows of neat buildings were rudely interrupted with gaping holes of destruction, from where the shimagu mage had sent giant metal pillars after us. Dust coated a third of the city, while Ash covered half the city, from the port to the fortress dominating the center of the city.

The fight and the mess had taken the entire day. We’d started at sunrise, and now the sun was setting, throwing shadows that the fires were vigorously fighting against.

The Ash and large area of effect skills had ceased, and I carefully filtered my notifications for high-level kills.

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Driven Taskmaster (Ooze, 588)]//[The Hammer (Mithril, 560)//[The Anvil(Mithril, 345]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Contracted in Triplicate (Ooze, 672)]/[Wave Rider (Water, 621)]/(Herald of Thousand Spinning Shards (Metal, 555)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Obscurer of the Sun and Skies (Ash, 666)]/[The Scalding Squall (Steam, 635)]/ The Last Gasp (Miasma, 450)]]

[*ding!* Your party has slain an [Captain of Wood and Flesh (Ooze, 621)]//[Endless Shipwright (Forest, 485)]//[Master of the Storm (Storm, 284)]]

The Ash non-shimagu combined with the Metal shimagu at practically the same time implied that Awarthril and Serondes had managed to kill the devil.

I oriented myself - easy, when north was where the ocean was - and spotted a hill to the east. Flashing bright Radiance down towards the city, trying, hoping to maybe signal the elves where I was going, I headed out.

I was done with the city.

I sent another flash of light at Cordamo as I passed near him, before sitting down on the hill, back resting against a tree.

I forced myself to look at the city. To look at what I’d done.

The city had been peaceful yesterday. It’d been at ease this morning.

Then I came along, and now what? Thousands, if not tens of thousands dead. A city in flames. More would die in the aftermath.

Because of me.

Who’d sworn to do no harm.

The guilt crashed into me like a wave.

I wasn’t being penalized by [Oath]. What I’d done was too abstract. I’d freed someone from his chains, and he went around lighting fires. I wasn’t responsible for that, from [Oath]’s perspective. I’d been a hostile in a city, and indiscriminate force had been unleashed to put a stop to me. Again, I was responsible, but not responsible, so [Oath] was silent.

Damn it.

I almost wish it wasn’t.

How many had I personally killed? I was about to look at my notifications, when I checked myself.

I was going to have a ton. I mentally fiddled with the notifications, compressing them. I couldn’t figure out how to get the species instead of anything else, but otherwise, it mostly worked for kill notifications from the last day.

[*ding!* Your party has slain 8,096 Ooze-Element creatures!]

How many people total was I responsible for today? How many humans and ogres had died?

I added in the dinosaurs, just because filtering them out was hard.

[*ding!* Your party has slain 10,559 creatures!]

Even as I watched, the number ticked up. It was possible that I was getting credit for "knock-off" kills. How would I know? "Practically burned a city to the ground, incited massive riots, and killed thousands" wasn’t a well-studied System phenomena. Generally, when similar events happened in Remus, we didn’t send scholars to interview the perpetrators. We didn’t gather and collate data. No, Rangers and Sentinels were sent in to deal with the problem.

I checked the rest of my levels.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 424->511! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

DOVE CURSE THEM ALL! Level 511?! 511!?!!?! Ooooh, I should go right back there, and give them a piece of my mind until I hit 512.

Oh gods, what was I thinking? Over ten thousand lives, reduced to almost a hundred levels, and I wanted to go back for more?

I felt disgust welling up inside of me, and I let it out, retching.

No.

That was also an utterly stupid number of levels. It was on par with Destruction unleashing the earthquake on the Formorian queens, and annihilating huge portions of the swarms. On the plus side, freeing enslaved Remus citizens (Or… well, not citizens because Remus was a huge pain about citizenship, but WHATEVER) was a super-Sentinelish thing to do. I had [Passionate Learning]. I was out of the dead zone. I’d used the class in a direct, offensive manner, which was new. I’d investigated a major threat on Remus’s borders.

On the downside, the healing I’d done would’ve been worth a ton less if the shimagu didn’t have their own classes. Their own intelligence.

A strong sonder came over me, the crushing weight of how many hopes, dreams, and ambitions I’d just casually snuffed out washing over me once again. My heart plummeted into my feet, my stomach dropping out as once again I’d realize just what I’d done.

I was not cut out for mass-murder. No matter how justified.

[*ding!* [Celestial Affinity] has leveled up! 424 -> 471]

For the first time in forever, my affinity skill wasn’t capped. Weird. Guess it was because of how fast I’d leveled or something?

[*ding!* [Cosmic Presence] has leveled up! 287 -> 300]

Seemed like a lot.

[*ding!* [Center of the Universe] has leveled up! 424 -> 450]

All of these skills uncapping were going to be a huge pain to re-cap.

Also, I wasn’t looking forward to what torment I’d have to go through to cap my anti-pain skill.

[*ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] has leveled up! 424 -> 511]

I wasn’t surprised in the slightest.

[*ding!* [Wheel of Sun and Moon] has leveled up! 424 -> 511]

I was probably capped here for ages.

[*ding!* [Mantle of the Stars] has leveled up! 424 -> 469]

Permanent shielding for the win! It was a nice number.

I slightly regretted not using [Sunrise] at all. Ah well!

512 was around the corner. I should start doing some serious planning on my third class… and how long I was going to wait before taking it.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 348->357! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Practically nothing compared to my [The Dawn Sentinel] levels. Wasn’t going to complain, especially since the levels were "justified" - I had no issues lasering velociraptors that were trying to tear me apart.

I had issues with the shimagu because…

The shimagu were different because…

… I had no good words why.

The capped [Butterfly Mystic] skills stayed capped.

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] has leveled up! 88 -> 130]

Merge already!

[*ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] has leveled up! 314 -> 333]

Solid levels!

[*ding!* [Long-Range Identify] has leveled up! 370 -> 375]

[*ding!* [Pristine Memories] has leveled up! 220 -> 221]

[*ding!* [Egg Incubation] has leveled up! 55 -> 94]

Egg protection duty! Woo!

I looked down at the egg, still safe. Still attached. Still warm, in the [Mantle] and sash Serondes made.

Good.

Wonder when it’ll hatch?

I squinted at it. Did it just rock a hair? Or was it my imagination?

[*ding!* [Bullet Time] has leveled up! 424 -> 511]

[*ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] has leveled up! 375 -> 376]

Oooof. If nothing else, [Oath] only moving a single level, in spite of all the "healing" I’d done, was a damning indictment of my actions.

[*ding!* [Sentinel’s Superiority] has leveled up! 396 -> 511]

I’d just been the most Sentinely Sentinel who ever Sentineled.

[*ding!* [Persistent Casting] has leveled up! 299 -> 315]

Awww, no upgrade at 300. I was disappointed.

[*ding!* [Passionate Learning] has leveled up! 379 -> 380]

With no small amount of dread, I checked when, exactly, in my log that I’d gotten that level of [Passionate Learning].

My stomach rebelled at the answer.

It also reminded me why I’d done it. Why I’d zipped around at high speeds, healing as many people as possible. Yes, the city had been safe. The city had been peaceful. It was a lie. An illusion, built on the backs of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of enslaved people. People, who the moment they were freed, immediately and violently turned on their oppressors. People who’d chosen to go down fighting, to go down swinging, rather than go back to the worst kind of slavery.

They were free.

Many had died, would die, but nearly all of them had made the choice to fight back. They didn’t need to.

There was a deep train of thought there, ideas and concepts to explore, especially as it related to Remus.

Importantly, it reaffirmed my decision to be a Sentinel. Of the importance of the Rangers. I’d effectively been a single powerful, violent, high-level Classer inside a city, hellbent on killing as many people as possible. And look at how well I’d succeeded.

I wasn’t the first to have such ambitions.

I wasn’t going to be the last.

Heck, I’d basically done a Hesoid, playing "how many people can I kill?"

The thought disgusted me. Made me want to punch myself.

But - I hadn’t been wrong. Had I?

I shook my head to refocus.

The shimagu had sent their own Classers against me. They’d failed.

We needed Rangers, Sentinels, and the rest to help keep the peace. To be able to deal with people who woke up one day, and chose violence.

There was something to be said for tackling the problem at its root. For solving the underlying problems that caused the behavior.

I lacked the proper social skills and know-how to even identify the problem, let alone how to fix it. I was Immortal though. I had time to work on it. Worse-case, I’d just get fabulously rich then hire a bunch of people to figure it out for me.

Until then? I was needed as a Sentinel.

My stomach rumbled again, violently, reminding me of a few important facts.

I’d vomited everything I’d eaten so far today.

I’d burned a huge amount of mana, and regenerated just as much. It was ravenous work, and I needed food.

For the first time in ages, I didn’t know where my next meal was coming from. No elves, no spiders, no dwarves, and the local wildlife was at a minimum due to all the farms. Guess if I got hungry enough I could raid a farm for food, but stealing from a farmer, after what I’d just done? It just felt wrong.

I’d probably need to kill more shimagu.

I was conflicted about the actions I’d taken.

I wasn’t conflicted about the fact that I was tired of killing. Tired of taking lives. I needed a break.

Soon. Remus was close enough that humans were occasionally wandering over here.

A grey smear in the sky caught my eye. It looked like Cordamo, and without getting up, without moving, I flashed Radiance at him, signaling where I was.

I’d been ruminating, running from one thought to the next, but now I finally had time to wonder about the elves, and where they’d been. How they’d fared.

Cordamo clearly saw me, and dove down towards me.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 576,750/576,750]

[Mana Regen: 432,699 (+515,651)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 194]

[Strength: 1,003]

[Dexterity: 1,823]

[Vitality: 14,190]

[Speed: 14,190]

[Mana: 57,675]

[Mana Regeneration: 57,776 (+51,565)]

[Magic Power: 22,735 (+427,418)]

[Magic Control: 22,735 (+427,418)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 511]]

[Celestial Affinity: 471]

[Cosmic Presence: 300]

[The Stars Never Fade: 2]

[Center of the Universe: 450]

[Dance with the Heavens: 511]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 511]

[Mantle of the Stars: 469]

[Sunrise: 347]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 357]]

[Radiance Affinity: 357]

[Radiance Resistance: 357]

[Radiance Conjuration: 357]

[Solar Flare: 130]

[Nectar: 357]

[Sun's Heart: 357]

[Scintillating Ascent: 333]

[Kaleidoscope: 357]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 375]

[Pristine Memories: 221]

[Egg Incubation: 94]

[Bullet Time: 511]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 376]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 511]

[Persistent Casting: 315]

[Passionate Learning: 380]

Chapter 266 - Return to Remus

Cordamo snaked through the air, the usually pristine white skin marred into a dark grey by the ash, Ash, and smoke permeating the air.

He landed heavily next to me, without his usual grace. With a thought, I healed the couatl up. I wasn’t sure if my mana flickered or not, my regeneration was that high.

Over 250 points of mana a second. I was mentally exhausted. I didn’t have the bandwidth to calculate exactly how much I had.

Wait. I could just get the System to do it for me.

263 points of mana a second.

I looked over at Cordamo. Poor snake looked exhausted. I extended an arm out to him, touching a feathery wing with a finger.

[Sunrise] failed to activate. I’d never expected to need to energize creatures that were so far from human, and the human template.

Heck, I’d expected [Sunrise] to be a temporary skill, until [The Stars Never Fade] kicked in. I hadn’t expected [Solar Infusion] to be such a dud.

"You ok?" I asked Cordamo, figuring conversation was better than wallowing in the funk I’d found myself in.

I got an exhausted hiss and a nod back.

"Aegion’s alright?"

"Shaaaaaaaaaa!" The snake reassured me.

"Heading this way?"

His head bobbed up and down.

Alrighty then.

Cordamo wasn’t the best conversationalist. Something about a lack of vocal cords. I just sat and waited for the rest of the elves.

Sometimes, doing nothing was the right thing to do.

I wasn’t sure it was the right thing here, but I was emotionally drained. Boundless energy and mana, sure. The will to apply it?

After what I’d done?

I got some thinking in.

I had two separate mindsets, which went with the ‘personas’ I used. Healer Elaine, and Sentinel Dawn.

They were remarkably similar in many ways. Both healers. Both members of Remus. Both had a family, both were me. It was a handy fiction that I flipped between, depending on what I needed or wanted to do.

I was on a Sentinel mission? I was doing something for the Rangers? Sentinel Dawn the whole way.

I wanted a quiet, relaxing afternoon? I wanted to travel from place to place without a huge fuss? Healer Elaine.

I was in no danger of dissociating or anything like that. My cognitive dissonance had finally caught up with me, and I was paying the price.

My Sentinel Dawn mindset saw what was going on in Ochi, and had no tolerance for it.

Healer Elaine saw the lives snuffed out, the damage and the loss, and was horrified. Intelligent creatures were intelligent creatures, and everyone deserved life. Sure, the shimagu were weird, but they hadn’t been asked to be born that way. They didn’t ask to need a host body to do anything. They were simply living as biology dictated they lived.

I reassured myself that at least I recognized the cognitive dissonance, and let the ideas clash, instead of trying to bury, hide, or justify what I’d done.

I kept wrestling with my actions.

I’d done the right thing.

I’d done the wrong thing.

Had there been a better option? Once in the position, was there anything else I could’ve done?

Just leaving would’ve been anathema to my Sentinel Dawn mindset.

Same with doing nothing.

Going about it half-heartedly would’ve been wrong to both mindsets, and could’ve easily gotten me killed.

I was entirely in agreement with myself that getting myself killed was wrong.

I kept wrestling with the problem.

What would Night do? Artemis?

Any other Sentinel?

Well, they’d just kill them all, host and all. Not exactly the most inspiring of examples. I was at least reassured that I’d saved the host bodies.

But… there’d be nobody dead without me.

Nobody free without me. There’d be significantly fewer people dragged to the butcher’s table and chopped up after my actions.

I was not reaching a decision or a conclusion, simply spiraling deeper and deeper into a funk. I decided to do some math instead. I realized I’d hit a milestone.

I had more than a million stat points when [Oath]’s boost was factored in. 850,000ish stat points were from [Oath]-boosted stats alone.

I was a monster.

I watched the pillars of smoke getting larger, flames starting to appear above the walls.

I was a monster.

No, I was a savior.

Well.

The two didn’t need to contradict each other. I could be both.

I brooded unhappily until the elves made it back. The three of them staggered back, arms over shoulders, supporting each other like a trio of drunks, where their unsteady gaits canceled each other out, allowing them to walk somewhat straight.

Kiyaya walked by them, dragging the Spatial Box along by a cord.

I healed them all the moment they entered the range of [Wheel of Sun and Moon].

"That was bad." Awarthril broke the silence. I forced myself to get up, and touch her, energizing her with [Sunrise].

"Whoa! That’s the stuff! Thank you!"

Aegion threw me puppy-dog eyes, and I rolled mine. I tapped him for energy, and did the same with Serondes.

"That was exactly what I wanted to avoid." Aegion complained, throwing himself to the ground.

"Can you shift please? I need some space." Serondes said.

Aegion rolled over.

"I need more space."

Cordamo angrily hissed at Serondes, who shot him a nasty look back. A wide perimeter of Lava crept around the top of the hill.

"I need this area."

"Well-" Aegion argued back, only for Awarthril to interrupt him.

"Peace. Serondes, can’t you do half the floor now, then half later when we move over?"

Without a word, more Lava appeared, and Serondes went back to building another fort.

"What happened with the devil?" I asked.

Awarthril frowned.

"Threw him into the ocean, but we didn’t expect he’d be able to fish himself out. Devils just can’t. It was weird."

"I mean, there was the shimagu."

Awarthril had the good grace to look embarrassed. I glanced at Serondes, but his back was to us.

"I realize that now. What happened with you? Aegion mentioned you’d met up with him, then suddenly flew off. Everything alright?"

I thought about it.

Everything was not alright.

But I didn’t want to talk about it right now. Not with Awarthril and the rest.

Hated directly lying though.

"I went around, healing people. Which killed shimagu as a side effect. Ended up killing a few thousand. Why are we building a fortress here? Shouldn’t we be getting further away?"

Awarthril and Kiyaya both turned to Aegion. He shaded his eyes, looking at the city.

"No, as much as I wanted to avoid a fight, this is a good distance."

I was slowly getting what the elves were saying. I didn’t believe it.

"Good distance for what?"

"Well, sniping at them. Spore’s great for this sort of thing, and Cordamo can see over the walls. The pterodactyls are a twist, but Serondes and Awarthril can cover me. Fortress should blunt a frontal assault."

"We got their high-level combat mages." Serondes chimed in. "Going directly in the city was a boon in that respect."

With horror, I realized they meant to continue. From Aegion’s description, he was going to set up a tower here, then bombard the city with deadly, Spore-bearing arrows.

"Why?" I whispered.

Like a hypocrite. I was in no position to criticize.

Awarthril shot me a sympathetic look.

"Elaine, we came looking for shimagu. What did you think that meant? What did you think we’d do once we found them?"

I just stared at her, mouth opening and closing with words that would never come.

I had nothing.

They’d been entirely upfront that they were after shimagu. They’d explained what shimagu were.

Back then, they’d been a nebulous, unknown concept. "Bodyjackers". Sounded terrible. I’d been all for it. I’d had no problem supporting their mission.

Now it was here. It was in front of me. What did "fighting shimagu" mean?

Well, to the elves, it meant killing every last one of them. Host included.

They didn’t have a way to separate the shimagu from the host, so they were going to kill both. What else could they do? How else could they fight the shimagu?

"Speaking of, good work!" Serondes shot me a thumbs-up. "I was able to observe the aftermath. The amount of chaos and destruction you unleashed is going to make our job that much easier!"

"You’re staying here then?" I asked the elves.

"Yes. I know we said we’d help you home, but this is too important." Awarthril started to loot the Spatial Box, taking out bedrolls, tables, and the rest.

"I can’t stay."

"What?" Serondes stopped, turning to look at me.

"I need to get home."

I didn’t say I was sorry I couldn’t stay and help. I wasn’t. I was still conflicted, but it was easy to turn down "kill everyone".

"I understand." Awarthril’s words were made worse by her tone. Entirely sympathetic. Entirely understanding. Caring.

"You have so much empathy, Awarthril. You’re caring. How can you…"

I didn’t say it, just gestured broadly.

Awarthril gave me a sad smile.

"Do you think they want this? Do you think, given the choice, they’d be here?"

I knew we weren’t talking about the shimagu, but the hosts.

"Well, no… but what about all the people I just freed? Won’t they get caught in the crossfire?"

Awathril hesitated, an awkward look crossing her face.

Her face went though a number of looks, before settling on ‘surprised realization.’

"I’ve got it! Most of the freed hosts are going to want to escape the city. We’re making a fortress here. A beacon. Aegion’s arrows will show that we’re hostile, and anyone hostile to the shimagu is a friend of theirs. They’ll come here, and we can protect them. No chance you’ll stick around, and make sure no shimagu infiltrate…?" Awarthril asked, then snapped her fingers.

"No! Your Medical Manuscript! I bet they’ll be eager to learn healing skills and take healing classes if possible, and the Medical Manuscript gives them the knowledge needed to get the right classes and skills!"

"That should work." Aegion thoughtfully added. "Friend of mine, Lumornor, might be interested in those Medical Manuscripts if they’re as good as Awarthril thinks they are. He dabbles with that sort of stuff."

"Just how much larger do you want me to make this thing?" Serondes grumbled, already conjuring up lines on the ground that would mark the foundations of the expanded zone.

I still didn’t like it. I wasn’t going to stay.

I was left with an awkward situation though.

How did I leave?

I wasn’t concerned about the elves, but my old nemesis had reared its head.

Social Skills.

I’d run away from home. I’d escape bandits and kidnappers. I’d left the Rangers on good terms to go to Ranger Academy, with a big celebration and a party. I’d left home on a mission, left Hunting under dwarven duress, then escaped from dragons and dwarves.

I’d never just been like… "bye".

Well.

Might as well?

"Ok, well, bye I guess?"

Even as the words left my mouth I felt awkward.

Awarthril’s face fell.

"Any way to convince you to stay?"

I thought about it. Really thought about it. Serondes wandered back over.

"No."

"Not even for me?" Serondes waggled his eyebrows suggestively, which was a lot less appealing when covered in soot. He would’ve needed a bath even before suggesting anything under normal conditions.

"No, sorry."

"Well, what does that mean for us?" He asked.

I frowned.

"We always knew this was a fling with an expiry date, and it looks like now’s the time."

"Not even one last romp?"

We all gave him a death glare that let him know where he could stick that suggestion. Even Cordamo hissed disapprovingly.

"How will we meet up again? I still have hopes with you and Kiyaya." Awathril asked.

I thought about it. I still wanted to help Awarthril. In spite of recent events, I still counted her - all the elves - as friends.

"Why don’t you come to Remus once you’re done? I live in Ariminum. It’s the capital. If that doesn’t work, is there some place I can head towards in the elven lands?"

Awarthril looked thoughtful.

"That should work. Give me, say, 200 years to show up before you stop looking for me? Also, you’d be welcome at the Academy. Come on over!"

I blinked at that.

Right.

Immortals.

Completely different concept of time.

"Sure. How will I find the Academy?"

"Just follow the stars. When Fire is between the moons on the spring equinox, you’re in the right place."

I had no idea how to even begin to interpret those directions.

"Ok, yeah, you’ll find me. This is goodbye I guess?"

"Won’t you stay for lunch?" Aegion asked.

My stomach rumbled, reminding me that breakfast had been ages ago, and I’d just done incredibly heavy lifting, and required a boatload of food.

"I want to, but I’m afraid of getting bogged down. I’ll take something for the road though?"

Aegion grabbed one of his barrels, and filled a set of mugs. He passed them out to each of us, then busted out some poetry.

"At least have a toast with us! To friendship! We’ve been great friends, it’s a shame to see you go, yet the days are endless and Pallos is small, we shall meet again!"

Aegion somehow managed to lift all our spirits, and turn the awkward, somewhat sad mood into a festive one. A powerful reminder that we were Immortal, and there was no way we wouldn’t see each other again. With great cheer, we crashed our mugs together, and threw back the mugs.

One swallow in, and I realized I’d made a terrible mistake. Aegion had given us one of his "specials".

I sprayed - I hesitated to call it beer, not with how awful it was - liquid out of my mouth, aiming for Aegion. Awarthril and Serondes joined me.

"WHY!?" Awarthril screamed at him, throwing the mug at point-blank range at his curly horns. "This was supposed to be a moment. Why ruin it!?"

"I - but - I -"

I tuned Aegion out as Serondes and Awarthril lay into him, instead going over to the Spatial Box.

I grabbed the few things of mine that were still in the box, mostly the presents the gnollish chief had given me. Spare dress, neatly folded with some fun memories. A few gemstones. I was leaving the book behind.

I wasn’t going to drag the ruined remains of the dwarven armor around. I didn’t see a reason for it.

I still had the rest of the gear I’d entered the city with. I checked on my three - no, two now - most valuable items.

Still had my Sentinel badge. Still had the egg.

My hand wandered up to my neck. I was missing mom’s pendant. It felt weird without it around my neck.

I’d be seeing her soon, with any luck.

I was missing my hair, although that’d be easy to fix. First town I found, I was going to turn it upside down until I found a hairdresser.

Cordamo and Kiyaya came over. I gave Kiyaya a hug, burying my face in her short fur.

"You’re a good girl, you know that?" My voice was muffled, but she understood me. "I’m going to work hard on figuring out how to keep you around FOREVER. Ok?"

She nuzzled me with her gigantic snout. She was gentle, but I could feel the power.

Cordamo hissed at me next.

"Eh, you’re alright in the end."

He looked vaguely offended, and poked at my egg, looking at me pleadingly.

"No."

I looked over at the elves. Awarthril and Serondes had successfully dunked Aegion into his own barrel. All I saw was a pair of thrashing legs, and way too much poison-beer being splashed around.

Yeah I was going to stay far away from that.

I looted the Spatial Box for additional rations, and since I didn’t have a good way of carrying them, I started chowing down furiously. Washed away the bad taste in my mouth.

The elves eventually stopped goofing off, and I said a final round of goodbyes.

"Awarthril. Aegion. Serondes. It’s been wonderful. I can’t wait to see you again."

The more I thought about it, the more I liked Aegion’s words.

"We’ve been great friends, it’s a shame to see you go, yet the days are endless and Pallos is small, we shall meet again!"

Awarthril had tears in her eyes as she gave me a hug.

"Goodbye for now, Elaine."

"Awarthril, you’ve been wonderful. I’m going to miss you." I successfully didn’t cry.

Serondes and I did a little awkward ‘we just broke up but want to hug each other oh gods how do we do this without it being awful’ dance. We had a brief, chaste, SO AWKWARD hug, then broke apart.

"Thanks Serondes. It’s been… fun?"

Serondes winced at that, and I mentally cursed myself.

If I could see Serondes like… 2000 years after everyone else… yeah maybe it’d stop being awkward then.

"I enjoyed myself." He eventually settled on.

Aegion came up to me, arms open for a hug. I backpedaled.

"Oh no no no. Not with you coated in that. I’ve got a long ways to go, and I am not getting coated in sticky terrible beer before I go. Noooooooooo way."

He looked crestfallen.

"You did yourself in." I remained firm, then softened. "Hey, save me a cup of good stuff for next time."

He brightened up at that.

"Yeah!"

I had nothing else to say. I gathered everything up in my arms, made sure the egg was safe and warm, and took off.

"Goodbye!" I called back.

"Goodbye!"

I took off, flying into the sky, following the coast eastwards. Behind me, I heard the crackling boom of Aegion’s arrows launching.

The elves wasted no time starting their siege.

A shadow passed over the sun, and I reflexively looked up. I saw the sight that nearly every being on Pallos dreaded.

A swarm of ravenous dinosaurs in the sky. Pterodactyls this time.

They were flying in tight formation, in a way no dinosaur flew.

Shimagu.

I craned my neck, continuing to fly forwards but wanting to see what happened.

A spiked dome of Lava was covering part of the fortress, Serondes having reacted well. Arrows flew out of the dome, flying impossible distances before striking down the birds.

The elves were doing just fine.

I kept flying, keeping low to the ground, hoping that I’d escape the notice of the shimagu. One radiant butterfly, running away, or multiple hostile elves setting up camp?

They left me alone. I kept flying.

Flying over farms of grain.

I flew, keeping the ocean ever to my left. I was afraid of getting lost if I tried to cut inland. I was afraid of missing Remus civilization entirely.

Port Salona was on the ocean coast, and the person from Ochi had mentioned that he’d lived there.

I flew as farms abruptly turned to jungle, practically a solid line across the landscape.

I flew as I crossed the line, feeling sick and miserable as I did so. I’d officially entered the deadzone.

I kept flying as day turned to night, slowly adjusting to eat my travel rations.

I flew as the moons rose, bright and large, a pair of crimson eyes watching my journey.

I flew and I flew, through a howling storm that soaked me through, that tried to blow me off-course during the night. I fought back, pushing through the warm rain and buffeting winds, opening my mouth to grab a quick drink.

I flew as the moons set, as the storm broke, the sun ending the long night.

It felt terrible.

It felt like home.

I flew through the hot rays of the tropical sun beating down on me.

[Sunrise] kept me energized, while [Scintillating Ascent] kept me going.

I didn’t fly too high, or too low. I didn’t fly over the deeper waters, nor did I tempt whatever monsters lived in the jungle, who’d pushed back civilization from encroaching upon them so far.

I flew.

I flew as I spotted rugged farms carving out a patch of the jungle for themselves.

I flew as I spotted little villages.

I flew as I saw our fabulous roads.

I flew as I saw people. Humans.

Then, rising over the horizon, framed by the setting sun, I saw walls. Blessed, glorious Remus-style walls.

I’d never been to Port Salona before, but everything matched.

I was tired. On dozens of levels.

I didn’t bother waiting in line at the gates. I didn’t bother introducing myself.

I just flew over the walls, ignoring the cries of the guard for me to stop, halt, and identify myself.

Nah. I didn’t need to, and I didn’t want to.

I circled the city, smiling as kids tugged on each other’s arm and pointed at me. The glorious, radiant, colorful butterfly making a show. I did spin a bit for them, delighting in their pure joy, endlessly happy that I was making their day.

Making the day of human kids in my home.

I looked around, and saw the best thing ever.

The Ranger’s sign. There was a team in town. One bored Ranger at a desk, the classic wagon behind him.

I dove, pushing my speed to the max, grabbing my badge.

I flashed past the poor Ranger, trying to get a dozen words out in the quarter of a second we were near each other.

"SentinelDawn!I’mFinallyBackOhGodsINeedARest!"

I expertly flicked my badge at him as I blazed into the wagon. They had the same set up we’d had way back when. The same arrangement all Ranger teams did.

Home.

HOME!

I grabbed three different piles of bedrolls and sleeping supplies, threw them all into a pile, then collapsed into it, instantly falling into the deep sleep of peace. Of safety.

A deep sleep I hadn’t experienced in almost a year and a half.

The sleep of home.

Chapter 267 - Homecoming

My eyes cracked open as I heard a soft clink next to me. I saw a hand retreating, leaving my badge with me.

From how terrible I felt, and how dark it was, it was obviously still night.

I closed my eyes and went back to sleep.

"Good morning Rangers! Up and at ‘em! Let’s go go GO! Last one out does one extra lap!"

Rude shouting, exactly like the drill instructors at Ranger Academy, woke me up like a bolt of electricity. I was scrambling out from my gigantic pile of blankets before my mind caught up with what was going on.

It was almost entirely pitch-black in the wagon. Only my increased vitality, along with my eyes being adjusted to the dark, let me see the shapes and outlines of people moving about.

Around me the rest of the Ranger team was already moving, bolting out of every exit the wagon had. Clever, since if two of them went for the same exit, they’d block each other and end up doing an extra lap.

"Ah, pardon Sentinel Dawn." The original voice called into the wagon. "Didn’t mean to wake you. Team 11 does morning exercises, and I believed maintaining that was important. We have no issues at this time."

"It’s fine." My voice had that croaking ‘dear gods why am I awake’ quality, and I fixed myself up with [Sunrise].

Whoa! Yeah! That hit the spot!

The last Ranger finished exiting. I bent over, grabbed my badge, and straightened back up. My head felt weird. Not having hair was strange. Something to fix today.

I walked out the door, taking a look around.

It was sunrise.

Scratch that.

It wasn’t even dawn yet. The barest hints of light were lightening up the sky, but it’d be a stretch and a half to call it sunrise.

In front of me five Rangers in various different ideas of nightclothes were in front of a sixth, stern-looking Ranger. I suppose I couldn’t complain too much, given that my idea of night clothing was the same Mistweave dress I’d been living in.

And the most welcome sight for sore eyes - a pair of familiar wolves! Moonmoon! Which meant Wolfy was here!

I had to catch up. In a few minutes.

Or longer, depending on the leader’s plans.

"Ranger Decimus! By my reckoning you were the last one out! As such, you will be running an additional lap!"

One of the Rangers - I’d bet all my money it was Decimus, and while he was slightly familiar, I wasn’t quite able to place him this early in the morning - groaned, while everyone else ribbed him.

"We begin with a 64-count of jumping jacks! Ready? Begin!"

The Rangers all started to count in unison, performing the exercise in question. The leader was no exception, jumping in unison with the rest.

"One, two, three, ONE! One, two, three, TWO! One, two, three, THREE!"

I rolled my shoulders, stretched, and figured that while I was in so-so shape, I wasn’t in the best, post-Ranger Academy shape of my life. Julius had never done morning exercises, but whoever was the boss here wasn’t Julius.

Also, I’d just gained a stupid number of levels. Usually, the benefit from one or two levels was barely noticeable, but I’d just gotten something like a 30%-40% increase to my speed by the numbers.

I secured the egg, making sure it was at a nice, optimal temperature, then adjusted the harness some so it wouldn’t flop all over.

I got in line next to one of the Rangers, and joined in on the jumping jacks. I got a funny look from the Ranger leader, but he said nothing, continuing to call the jumping jacks.

We wrapped up in no time at all, and he paused.

"Sentinel Dawn. Do you require our services for anything?"

He was tense. An amused smile flitted across my face, as the memory of traveling with Julius and the rest when we bumped into Hunting crossed my mind. How worried we’d all been, and how nervous we were.

The Ranger Leader had a great poker face. I schooled my expression, reminding myself that here and now I was the absolute boss, and it wasn’t in good taste or leadership to poke fun at his expense. Even my happy grins were probably making him sweat buckets.

I weighed my words carefully as the rest of the Rangers were carefully not looking at me.

"Yes and no. I’ve been away from Remus for a year and a half. Found my way back yesterday. I’m in dire need of resupply and human contact. Apart from that, I suspect I’ve slipped on my physical exercise, and my physical stats have recently improved to the point where I need to re-drill everything from the ground up again."

I thought about it a moment more.

"I’d like to join in on the exercises if it’s not too much trouble."

He - I was going to call him Bossman, nobody could stop me - saluted back, familiar hand over heart.

"Anything you need, Sentinel. Although, I do believe you should lead…?"

I flapped a hand at him.

"You know what you’re doing and what your team’s doing. I don’t want to interfere, simply participate."

Bossman took everything in stride. If he was a poor enough Ranger to get thrown by a Sentinel showing up wanting to get told to do push-ups, he would’ve never made it as a Ranger.

"Right! Next exercise is 64 squats! Ready, begin!"

We kept up the workout until the running portion.

"Eight laps around the city walls! Ranger Decimus! You will be running a ninth lap!" Bossman roared out.

I swear he must’ve spent a long stint as one of the Ranger Academy drill instructors, then got promoted back to field work.

"With all due respect Ranger, I believe I was the last one to morning practice." I chimed in.

Bossman’s face puckered up.

I was kinda botching it a hair here. I was the Sentinel, I should be in charge. By having Bossman give orders, it was undermining… a crapton.

Before he could say anything, I saved him.

"Right! Ranger Decimus! You will be running the normal number of laps. Same as everyone else. Bossman, are you joining us?"

Bossman looked confused for a moment, and I heard an awkward cough beside me, and a familiar voice.

"That’d be you, Tiberius." Wolfy’s voice was almost the same. A little more tired. A little rougher. Same Wolfy. "Ela- err - Sentinel Dawn has a habit of giving people nicknames."

"Yeah, you’re lucky you got Bossman. I got Artillery C." A second familiar voice added in.

"That’s Artillery Mage C." I corrected him, and I heard some snickering. I cracked my own grin.

Bossman looked like he was eating a lemon. I was fairly certain I hadn’t taken the skill, but [A Single Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings] was in full force here.

Time to take control.

"Bossman. In your estimation, is a Ranger needed to stand by and be prepared to receive complaints?"

He thought about it a moment, then shook his head.

"No, Sentinel."

Alrighty then. Just had one more question before I got started. Proper information was key for planning, and Port Salona had an interesting twist to it.

Namely, that it was a port.

"When running around the city walls here, do we typically go all the way around, or bounce back?"

"Sentinel. We go all the way around, climbing over the walls where the city meets the sea. It adds an extra obstacle, and attempting to avoid the guard’s notice is an additional exercise."

I nodded at him.

"Ranger Team 11! On Bossman, who will navigate us out of the city, so we may begin our morning run."

I wasn’t about to try and lead us out of the city when I’d just flown over. I didn’t exactly know the streets of the area, and getting everyone lost was not a good look.

Image management. I didn’t miss it, but it was strangely nostalgic.

Bossman took the lead and we jogged out of the city, Moonmoon following us. The port was starting to come to life. The smell of fresh baking bread as we passed a bakery, the warm glow of forges coming to life near the silversmith. The guards weren’t happy to open the gates to us, especially since nobody was in their Ranger gear. We looked like a bunch of misfits, but Bossman had a few quick words with them.

Moonmoon probably helped.

We got out and paused.

"Race, or pace?" I asked.

"Whatever you want, Sentinel Dawn." Bossman replied. Wolfy mouthed "race" at me, and I got a chance to look at everyone.

Wolfy and Artillery Mage C were both known to me. Bossman was clearly the leader, and a second experienced Ranger was with him. He was notable for his high level - a [Warrior] over 320 - and his age. He looked over 60, had completely white hair and with his level, his vitality had to be slowing his aging down significantly. If he said he was over 100, I’d believe him.

"You’re Greybeard." I pointed to him.

He saluted, in spite of neither having a beard, nor his hair being grey.

The remaining two Rangers were familiar as well, although I’d never gotten a name. They’d been recruits at Ranger Academy, two candidates I’d taught in my classes. They hadn’t stood out in a good or a bad way, and had clearly done well enough to not only graduate, but survive until now.

I was all too aware that the squad of eight was a squad of six. Unless doctrine had changed, Moonmoon wasn’t counted. Had to make it cramped when they all needed to cram into the wagon.

Less cramped now.

"And Newbie Ranger and Newbie Mage." I pointed to the last two, calling out their respective displayed classes.

They weren’t too pleased, but eh. They weren’t standing out, and their level was only 210ish.

"The race is nine laps for me, eight laps for the rest of you." I burned a line in the dirt with a quick flash of Radiance. I couldn’t think of a reward or a penalty, so I did what I loved doing in situations like these - I delegated.

"Bossman will think of a reward for the winner, and a punishment for the loser."

Newbie Mage groaned, then gave me a challenging look.

Oh no he doesn’t. I could practically read his mind.

"She’s a Healer. She’s young. She’s a girl. She’s got an extra lap. I can beat her."

"Go!" I called out, and took off.

I didn’t start off in a flat-out sprint, oh no. I wanted to work my way up to it. I wanted to see everyone do a full lap.

I wanted everyone to watch me keep up with the fastest members of the team, then beat them.

Honestly, my only concerns were Bossman and Greybeard. If either one was a speedster, I’d be screwed. They’d be able to beat me.

Eh. If it happened I’d pull out the "I’m a healer-mage relying on raw stats on my third-lowest stat while running an extra lap." card.

It seemed like Greybeard and Bossman had similar ideas.

To my minor surprise, Moonmoon was keeping up with us, the two wolves loping along at a casual pace. Thinking about it though, wolves were baseline much faster than humans were, so it made sense.

With competitive glances, we sped up, leaving Wolfy, Artillery Mage C, and the two Newbies in the dust.

Faster and faster we ran around the city, and rounding yet another corner, I saw the view of the ocean, sunrise skipping over the waves to turn the whole thing golden.

I slowed down a hair, letting the others overtake me.

I had no idea where on the wall the "we climb over here" section was, and I wasn’t about to start making new rules and new spots to go over.

Turned out, it was right where the ocean met the walls. The walls didn’t stop at the ocean though, they kept going some distance out, until a stout guard tower anchored the end in the harbor. Moonmoon sprinted ahead, the pair of wolves leaping into the warm waters, starting to paddle around.

"Honestly, it’s a good thing high level wolves can’t jump the city walls." I wryly observed. Bossman gave an amused snort, then leapt onto the walls.

Somehow finding narrow cracks in the wall, places where stones weren’t perfectly aligned. Like a spider, he scuttled up the wall.

Greybeard found his own spot, and mirrored the trick, the old man betraying a surprisingly nimble streak. Decades of experience on top of sizable dexterity.

I just flew over. I wasn’t going to fly the whole way, but an obstacle was an obstacle, to be defeated by any means.

Well.

Almost any.

At Ranger Academy flat-out demolishing an obstacle was frowned on, because then the instructors would need to rebuild it, and everyone else would lose the training and opportunity provided. Here?

Yeah, if Rangers started putting holes in city walls for a morning run, we’d quickly find ourselves unwelcome. The governor couldn’t kick us out, but the guard - and half the citizens - would instantly become unhelpful.

I was probably losing points for "get over discreetly", but eh. It was a race. At this point in my career, I didn’t consider dodging or moving around discreetly to be a high priority.

I gracefully landed on the other side, and waited with an impish smile for the two warriors to make it over. Bossman gave me an unhappy look, displeased with my sandbagging.

They didn’t say a word. They didn’t need to. The challenge was loud and clear. They landed, nearly at the same time, and took off, running through the dirty streets by the ports.

I followed them, deftly stepping over coiled rope, dodging drunken sailors, clearing out of the way of fishermen out to catch their breakfast, and getting increasingly irritated at the wolf whistles that followed behind me.

My Mistweave was great.

In Remus, it was also exotic, and I… probably looked like one of the ladies whose services were for sale.

A new tunic jumped up my to-do list. Like, third thing to-do.

Also hair.

Bossman was now outstripping Greybeard by a solid chunk, and I tapped Greybeard as I passed him, subtly hitting him with [Dance with the Heavens].

Just a quick top-up. No idea what issues he was having as he advanced in the years, or what injuries he’d gotten so far this round that didn’t have a proper healer to look at, but a quick panacea would fix them all.

The fact that he wasn’t able to keep up with Bossman told me that he was likely a spellspear, while Bossman was a double physical Classer.

I kept up with him.

He pushed himself harder, and the only reason I fell behind was dodging the occasional drunken sailor’s grubby grasp.

Ah Remus. I did not miss the harassment.

Bless Mistweave for its intangibility properties.

We made it to the next wall, where Bossman was pounding up the stairs. I could just fly over them. However, I’d then need to admit that stairs were an obstacle, and that wasn’t going to happen.

We both ignored the shouting guards, and dropped down to the ground on the other side of the wall.

"Well, I’ve got nine laps to do while you’ve got eight. Gotta go!" I leaned into it, moving from a jog, to a run, to a flat-out sprint, pushing myself as hard as I could go.

I ran and ran, reveling in the feeling. How long had it been since I just ran for the fun of it? The glorious golden run from my "escape" from Aquiliea was a treasured memory, the sheer joy and energy and excitement of movement, of freedom.

I wasn’t a young teenager anymore. Emotions didn’t have that raw, jagged edge that made them so painful and so glorious anymore. It was a different type of enjoyment, a more muted and mature pleasure in simply moving as fast as I could, running around the walls.

I managed to lap everyone except Bossman, coming in second. It might’ve been overly ambitious to think I could lap a double physical Classer.

We had some time to chat, while the rest of the Rangers ran past us, or slowed to a stop as they finished their own run.

"I thought you were a healer-mage?" The friendly competition seemed to have loosened Bossman up a bit. That, or the morning drill instructor aspect was now done, letting him be more personable.

I grinned.

"I am! Speed’s my third lowest stat."

Bossman was likely a former drill instructor, and knew how to school his face. Still, I managed to catch raw, unfiltered surprise flash over his face before he regained control.

"Any movement skills?"

"Eeeh. Yes and no. Flight, as you saw, and an energy skill. Apart from that, raw stats."

He gave me a disbelieving look, before his eyes widened in realization.

"You’ve got a level disguise skill!"

Oh shit. I was still wearing the Deception Ring, and I’d never changed it from 128.

Hm.

Hmmmm.

Nah, I wasn’t going to tell him.

"I promise you, I don’t have a skill to hide my level."

He looked flabbergasted as Greybeard caught up to us.

I had some mercy on the poor Bossman, who clearly wasn’t believing me. Having him walk away thinking that Sentinels casually lied about dumb stuff wasn’t a good look.

Ah well. I had to give him the short version.

"I have a powerful Inscription that’s doing it for me." Bossman nodded knowingly.

Trying to explain the Deception Ring, how I got it, and everything it did was a bit complicated. I was going to leave it at that. Sentinels were expected to have ridiculous gear. Just look at the Pegasus. Or Magic’s gem-encrusted sash. Or Ocean’s boat made of magic wood. Or Nature’s…

Needless to say. Sentinels were practically expected to have silly gear. Thinking about Magic made me sad. I did wonder what happened to the large fortune of gems that Magic was wearing though.

"Sentinel Dawn. You are a credit to the Sentinel title."

I was not immune to flattery.

He pursed his lips briefly, then seemed to come to a decision.

"With my apologies, Sentinel Dawn." He said, turning to Bossman.

"Ranger Tiberius. Ranger Team 11 is yours to command as you see fit. However, I hope you go easy on…" His eyes flickered to me. "Newbie Mage. The entire contest is practically designed to cause him problems, and while I applaud your habit of morning exercise, the penalty invariably lands on his shoulders. His understanding is turning into resentment."

Bossman got a pained look.

"I know. I see it too. But he’s the slowest one. The least fit. We are forced to go at his pace on operations, and it could - has - gotten a number of us killed. I don’t blame him for the losses, but what else am I supposed to do?"

Greybeard gave a curt nod.

"I understand your dilemma. The responsibilities of leadership. Perhaps… more creative non-punishments?"

"Any ideas?"

He jerked his head towards me.

"Well, if the idea is acceptable to Sentinel Dawn, perhaps he can spend the day assisting her, instead of any other duties?"

"I don’t need any help." I grumped.

Greybeard got a canny, knowing grin.

"I know that. You know that. Everyone else doesn’t."

Ah. AH!

"Yeah, that should work. Just checking, does he have the keys to the coin chest?"

Bossman was real good at the sour lemon look. I rolled my eyes.

"Please, I’ve been a Ranger. I know you need the coins for the entire round. Just need a new tunic, some good Remus food, and about a week in the baths."

Wolfy joined us, followed by Moonmoon.

"Sentinel Dawn. Naturally, our resources are at your disposal."

"What’s going on?" Wolfy asked. I gave him a roguish grin.

"I’m looting you for all you’ve got!"

Chapter 268 - Mango Mania

We kept hanging out until Newbie Mage finished his laps. I wanted to chat with Wolfy and Artillery Mage C, and catch up with them. See what they’d been up to.

They’d survived their first round as Rangers, and were now experienced Rangers. Oh the stories they had! The adventures!

This wasn’t the time or the place, and I had more pressing needs. Like a bath.

And mangos.

I was going to turn the city upside down for some of those sweet, sweet fruits. Honestly, they should be part of the food pyramid, in their own section.

"Critical to life: Mangos."

How’d I manage to go a whole year and change without eating one? I had to be severely nutritionally deprived. I was in dire need of some vitamin M.

"Ranger Decimus! As the last one, you will be facilitating Sentinel Dawn’s stay with us! You are relieved of all other duties until Sentinel Dawn is no longer with us!"

Newbie Mage saluted.

"Dismissed!" Bossman called out, and we all started to work our way back to town.

The guards were slightly happier to see us this time, given that it was a sane hour and the gates were open.

The sun was up, and as we walked through the streets, I subtly let loose.

In the largest radius the skill could manage, I blasted [Dance with the Heavens] and [Wheel of Sun and Moon], actively healing every person I passed.

[Cosmic Presence] passively did the same thing with every step I took, but as I was walking, people didn’t get to spend a ton of time under its influence. It did help in larger fights and brawls, like in Ochi. It just wasn’t flashy.

This wasn’t the first time I’d pulled this trick. I’d done it regularly back in Ariminum, before the Formorian invasion.

The "before times".

At the same time, I wasn’t being entirely benevolent. I was keeping a close eye out for shimagu kill notifications. I wasn’t sure where I was in relationship to shimagu anymore, but I did know any infiltrators in the city were fair game. It did nicely clear the entire Ranger team, and I didn’t get any notifications.

I did see the occasional knot of excited people, taking deep excited breaths, a persistent cough cleared. A dull ache gone. That warmed my heart.

I also knew I was clearing out dozens, if not hundreds, of smaller problems before people knew they were problems. Early stages of cancer. Brewing infections. Fixing up an aneurysm before it could rupture.

I decided to play the "silent secret benefactor" this time. It was more fun in a way.

I did feel guilty when one veteran felt at his face, looking for a scar that wasn’t there anymore.

Most of the Rangers peeled off before we made it back to the wagon. Just Bossman, Greybeard, and Newbie Mage followed me back to our base of operations.

Bossman promptly sat down at the "Rangers get complaints" table, and sighed. I had to respect any leader who jumped on the shit jobs themselves, and first shift on the complaint table was no fun. I’d done it often enough.

"Hey Greybeard!" I called out to the old man.

"Sentinel. May I assist?" He politely asked.

"Maybe. I need to rework my physical sparring from the ground up, and politely, you look like you’ve got the experience needed to help me work out a new fighting style."

He inclined his head a hair.

"I wouldn’t presume to teach a Sentinel how to fight."

I tapped my foot impatiently, crossing my arms.

"I got roughly a hundred levels two days ago. My stats have gone entirely haywire, and I’d bet every coin I’ve got that you know an appropriate fighting style."

"Wait, what level are you?" Newbie Mage butted in, having missed the earlier conversation.

"Ranger Decimus!" Bossman barked at him. I held my hand up.

"Peace, I don’t mind sharing." I did look around, and lowered my voice to a whisper though.

"511. One short of unlocking my third class." Newbie Mage looked shocked. I winked at him. "What, did you think I’d propose a race where I thought I’d lose?"

"She’s got you there." Bossman threw in.

"How’d you get a hundred levels in a day?" Greybeard asked.

Awww. No surprise at the third class. I guess the other Sentinels must’ve spread the word at the last Ranger Convocation.

Drat.

I looked Greybeard in the eye.

"The only way anybody gains a hundred levels in a day. I don’t want to talk about it."

He saluted.

"I would be honored to assist you. Would you like to begin now?"

I grimaced.

"Ok, well, I should start now. But I need a bath. Desperately. Year and a half in the field. Tonight?"

He saluted, and started doing… whatever Greybeard did when he was on break in a town.

"Ranger Decimus." I called out to Newbie Mage, showing a shred of professionalism when giving orders.

"Sentinel."

"I need a sack, seven rods, enough food from our stores to feed six people, and a map to the best bathhouse in town."

He paused, waiting for any other instructions from me.

"No, seriously, that’s it. Dismissed." I shooed him away. I could get away with some minor unprofessionalism.

I settled in next to Bossman.

"I’ll probably have change, don’t worry. I know you need the funds for the round. I’ve been gone a long time. Has there been any, ah, interesting political changes recently?"

He gave me a flat look, then his eyes widened in realization. He smacked his forehead with his palm.

"Gods. A year and a half. With no news. Of course. Of course…" He muttered to himself, then shook his head.

"Long version, or short version?"

"Short version please. I have no stomach for politics, and the less I’m involved, the better."

I got a Look from Bossman, suggesting that he thought I knew a lot more than I was letting on if I was asking for political updates first thing upon returning home, while claiming a complete disinterest in politics.

"Short version. General Augustus, after his glorious victory against the Formorians-"

I gave a loud, derisive snort at that.

"Bullshit."

Bossman held up his hands.

"Peace, Sentinel. Simply trying to give the popular version of events, as most people know them. To my understanding, Sentinel Night and the Ranger Command didn’t see fit to fight him on the credit or the glory. There may have been some backroom dealing on the matter."

"What about Destruction’s earthquake? Demos’s sacrifice? Katastrofi!?"

"All known. Quite a few songs to boot. General Augustus was ultimately responsible for the defenses, and the credit for the victory landed at his feet."

I snorted in disbelief. I did not like General Augustus.

"He formed a triumvirate with General Numerius and General Titus, and they marched back to Ariminum, at the head of their - pardon, the Senate’s - army. The Senate welcomed them with open arms, and happily declared General Augustus dictator for life."

The last sentence was dripping with heavy sarcasm.

"Long live Emperor Augustus." Bossman ended with a flat note.

"Huzzah. Long live." I mimicked his tone.

However, the whole thing sounded remarkably peaceful. Gave me high hopes that everyone I knew made it through alright.

"Any mention of casualties? People dying?"

"The stories report it was entirely bloodless. However, twelve legions descending upon a city, with their blood up and pockets full of pay? The guard needed to call in Ranger Team 0, who needed to call in the Sentinels to assist. Nothing too major from what they told me, it was more of a manpower issue than anything else."

"Do you know Ranger Kallisto? He’s on Team 0. Former teammate of mine." I hoped he was alright. Sounded like he’d gotten the worst of it.

Bossman gave me a look like ‘yeah, I’m suuuuuuuuuuuuuure he’s a former teammate.’

Given Kallisto’s reputation, I didn’t blame him.

"Ranger Kallisto was the one who told me most of this! Fantastic Ranger."

I doubted I’d get news of anyone else. Newbie Mage showed up, with the items I asked for.

"Sentinel." He respectfully placed the items on the table. I swept the coins into the sack, and started to look at the map while chowing down..

"Thank you, Ranger. That’ll be all. Have fun!" That’s what I tried to say at least. I was mid-squirrel impression, and it came out garbled. I shooed him with one hand to make the message clear.

"Well, if you need-"

"What I need is a long bath and some good food, and you’ve fixed one and the map to the other. Now shoo. I know what vacation time means to you. Go. Git. Have fun."

I heard Newbie Mage salute, then scamper off before I could get new ideas for him.

Food. FOOD!

I was starving. I’d been ignoring the signal until now, but I needed a serious chow session. Even if I found mangos now, I’d be too hungry to properly appreciate them.

Speed, strength, and dexterity were good for more than running quickly and lifting heavy objects. High-speed eating was also on the menu.

Pun intended.

"I’m off. Bossman, signal if you need anything. Actually, what are your team signals?"

"Newbie Mage uses a Gale and Mantle combination. If the wind picks up, look up. If you see an exploding ball of metal, that’s him. Greybeard uses Pyronox. Everyone else works in pairs, although technically the Ranger you call Wolfy and his wolves have their own signal - howling."

I appreciated him using my nicknames. Made life easier for me.

"Sounds good. Doubt I’ll run into any trouble I can’t handle, but you can’t miss my signal. Look for the blinding light… or don’t."

I chuckled weakly at my own joke. Bossman wasn’t amused.

The privilege of rank - Bossman wasn’t going to call me out on my terrible jokes. He wasn’t going to laugh at them - he had more self respect than that - but he wasn’t going to call me out.

"Right, I’m off!"

I double-checked that the egg was secure and warm, hefted my loot-sack over one shoulder, and triple-checking the map, set off.

I’d thought about it some.

The first order of business was a nice, long, hot bath. There was no sense in buying a tunic when I’d just make it dirty, and no self-respecting [Hairdresser] or [Beautician] would let me in their store smelling the way I did. I’d gotten caked in blood, guts, gore, and other viscera two days ago, and in spite of my best efforts to scrape some of it off, the rest had hardened and baked in.

The Rangers probably hadn’t said anything, because who was going to tell their boss that they stunk? Thinking about it, I should get something to make the wagon smell nice. And get Newbie Mage to hire someone to wash the blankets I’d befouled.

Mmmm. Yes. I might be a bit of a menace to the poor Team 11.

I practically skated down the streets, gracefully weaving my way through the crowds at high speed on the white roads. No more grey zone for me! Too many stats. If I hit a kid at the speed I was going?

… Well, shoot. I couldn’t even say they’d go splat, because my healing was just that good these days. Nor would I lose that much mana.

Still, it was good to be back in Remus. Jostling through crowds, seeing familiar stalls and stands, vendors, merchants, and apprentices shouting their wares.

I was on a mission, making a beeline for the baths, when an all-too-familiar fruit caught my eye.

The merchant had mangos.

Well, it was a bit early, but I wasn’t going to say no. I darted up to the stall, ignoring the woman he was haggling with.

"Mango me!" I shouted, dumping three rods worth of coins on the table. I didn’t bother haggling, negotiating, or waiting for his response - I just grabbed two dozen mangos, stuffed them in my sack, and was off before the outraged merchant even got two words out of his mouth.

Eight coins for a mango was more than fair. Best deal he’d make all day. I dunno what he was complaining about.

I escaped back into the crowd as I contemplated the mango in front of me, working out how to best gain access to its succulent interior.

I needed a knife. It’d make life easier as I traveled back home. Didn’t think I had enough coins for a good knife right now, not with everything else I wanted to buy.

Eh. I’d done well enough so far.

I could just burn the skin off, using Radiance to carefully slice through the skin of the mango. Issue was what was behind my Radiance beams. I was in a crowd, and I knew my magic had enough oomph to leave scorch marks in the road. Firing beams into the air would look like the "help" signal, and there was no way I was sending the help signal out for "I’m too powerful to peel a mango."

I did what any reasonable person would do in my sandals. I bit in, skin and all.

The sweet release of mango in my mouth. The succulent textures. The sugary notes, the leathery flesh. Every bite sent waves of orgasmic bliss through me, and I found myself comparing the sensation to Serondes, and finding him wanting.

Each careful bite was filled with new, familiar sensations. My teeth sank into the tender flesh, then I twisted, ripping it away. It slid over my tongue, giving a wonderful tingling sensation. Then my molars got to it, teasing out the delicious sweetness, before it went down the hatch, only for the process to repeat again.

Mangos. Sheer divine bliss.

I tried chewing on the seed with my newfound strength, and, well, mango pits continued to be perfection in their ability to act as a projectile. Only people I knew well enough to try and brain were Wolfy and Artillery Mage C, and, well.

I was the boss.

I couldn’t just go around flinging mango pits at people.

Bah.

Sometimes this Sentinel thing was no fun.

I paced myself. I didn’t just inhale the mangos all at once. No. I savored them, drawing out every bite, making sure every ounce of tasty goodness was mine.

The buildings got nicer as I continued down the street, ending up in the wealthy part of town. My ears pricked as I heard a magical, skill-enhanced bard, and I nearly did a spit-take as I heard what he was singing.

Beloved of Julius, Artemis! Would’st thou knowWhy angry Phoebus bends his fatal bow?

First give thy faith, and plight a senator’s word

Of sure protection, by thy power and sword;

What.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAT!?

I stood some time in the crowd the bard had gathered, just listening with open-mouthed shock.

That had to be Arthur’s doing. He’d always been obsessed with bards and The Illiad, and the changed names? The senator instead of a prince? Yeah, it had his greasy fingerprints all over the modified song.

I spent a minute listening to the song, noting where Arthur had made some minor changes. It was well done, but my mood and fun were utterly destroyed by some jerk who decided my ass was fair game for his hand.

For a moment there I wasn’t in Remus anymore. I was back in Ochi, people grabbing at me. Velociraptors tearing into me. My adrenaline spiked, and I went into full fight or flight mode.

I didn’t have eyes in the back of my head. I couldn’t see behind me, although I had situational awareness that people were behind me in a crowd. [Bullet Time] wouldn’t activate for something that wasn’t even close to a threat on my life, no matter how I squinted.

A threat on the molestor’s life, sure.

I whirled around, instantly breaking the contact, ready to fight. Ready to kill. My Radiance was primed and ready, and I was already calculating what angles, and from what parts of my body, would be optimal for blasting this latest threat, without incurring added casualties in the crowd.

I was high, high level, so any strike of mine would be enough to be lethal. The only consideration I had was for collateral damage.

I was going to either swing my hand low, or kick my foot out, and beam Radiance from there, up through the torso and head, and let the punch-through hit the sky. Not ideal, but from my short stature, I couldn’t blast down. I wouldn’t hit anything vital enough.

I finished turning around, coming face to face with a leering face. Some young, rich by his purple-trimmed clothes, jackass.

An [Artisan]. Low level at that, only 135 or so.

I slammed the brakes on my combat reflexes. I removed all thoughts of murder and Radiance trajectories. This was not a threat to my life, just my dignity.

Now, if he tried to push and go further? Yeah, break out the lasers. I wasn’t going to summarily execute him for what he’d done though, as much as I’d like to.

I half-shuddered as I realized that I’d get away with it legally to boot. The absolute worst-case was I’d need to pay a nominal fine. How screwy was that?

I wasn’t going to let him off scot-free though.

I was fast. Far faster than some random young civilian. I slapped him, making absolutely certain to keep my strength to a bare minimum.

I didn’t want to flat-out murder him, and with my strength and his presumed lack of vitality, it was a risk.

My hand connected with a satisfying smack, and his neck snapped to the side with the force of my blow, leaving a nice, crisp handprint on his cheek.

"What the fuck." I yelled at him, making no effort to be quiet. "Don’t grope me. Don’t grope women. Did your parents teach you nothing?"

His face uncrinked back, and people shuffled away from us.

"Relax girl! It was just a joke, why take it so seriously? You should be flattered that I-"

I stabbed him in the chest with a finger, poking him a few times. He tried to catch my hand, but I was too fast for him.

"Do. Not. Fondle. Women. In. The. Street." I emphasized each word with another poke to his chest.

"Hush girl. You’re being hysterical, and ruining the show." Another man butted in. "If you can’t tolerate a compliment, you shouldn’t be out and about. What would your husband say?"

He looked me up and down, frowning.

"Dressed like that, she probably doesn’t have one." A third man butted in, his tone making it clear what, exactly, he thought my career without one was.

"Mmmm. Either way, stop disrupting the show."

The jackass smirked at me, and emboldened, reached out to grab me again.

It was entirely possible to defend myself with non-lethal means, and frankly, I’d seen far too many people die recently. I didn’t want to kill if I could help it, and the paperwork would be epic if I did.

Plus, I had that pesky [Oath] stopping me from just flat-out murdering him in the street.

I swept my foot out, tripping him. He landed hard on the street, and I pinned him there with [Mantle of the Stars]. He wouldn’t move unless I willed it.

I didn’t.

I left him trapped there, and ducking low, abusing my short stature, slipped through the crowd and back to the streets, where I stomped my way to the bathhouse.

Sure, [Mantle] probably dissipated a dozen seconds or so later, as I got too far away to maintain it, but the message was hopefully clear.

My good day had been utterly ruined by him though. I was giving him way too much mental space, but argh! Why! I didn’t even want to eat a mango anymore, I was in such a shit mood!

I did keep up my healing though. Might as well do something productive. I’d eventually get my mind off things.

Grumble grumble grumble.

I made it to the bathhouse, and after paying an obscene amount - seriously, half a rod for an entrance fee? - entered. I undressed, folded my clothes neatly, then resecured the egg. I did bring my sack full of mangos though, planning on munching a few of them while in the bath.

I paused for a moment as the egg rocked. Did I hear tapping noises? Cracking noises?

How close was it to hatching?

After a few minutes of standing around in the changing room like an idiot, not moving at all as people came in and out, I came to the conclusion that nothing else was going to happen. I gratefully slipped into the bath, and started to scrub.

As I scrubbed, I let all the negative emotions filling me slowly get washed away. The action wasn’t entirely cathartic, but it did let me slowly get my mind off of things.

I wasn’t going to let him ruin my entire day. I focused on my enjoyment of where I was.

Ooooh, blessed baths. Serondes had turned numerous bodies of water into baths while we traveled, although I was still filthy. Just not "evacuate the entire building Elaine stinks" dirty.

Awarthril needing to throw me into the pond was easily in my top three most embarrassing memories.

There was something different about the Remus baths. There was a sense of nostalgia, of homeliness to them that was entirely absent in the wilderness. I’d grown up visiting the baths, and they were one of the places I found myself constantly gravitating towards. That, and libraries.

Thinking about it, I should avoid going to the local library. I’d start reading, and it’d take divine intervention to get me back out, and heading home.

I let myself luxuriate in the warm waters. I let the heat soak into me, loosening and relaxing my muscles. I let the bath cradle me, wrapping me in its warm embrace. I let the minor current, a skill from the bath’s owner - or employee - wash away my worries and fears, my anger and guilt, my accumulated dirt and baggage. I let the steam hide me from the world.

For a time, I found peace. Just floating there, head on the edge, legs trailing out.

Calmness.

Serenity.

After turning myself into a prune, I finished scrubbing, the last of the gore coating me flecking away effortlessly. There was possibly a skill at work there, and I’d need to tip whoever was running the place.

I noticed that the water around me was nice and toasty warm, and at a strong boil. Vitality for the win. However, it was hotter than what the baths were normally at. I stood up, somewhat concerned, only for the boil to subside.

I cocked my head, and sat back down.

Boiling.

Stand.

Calm.

It only took me a moment to figure out what was going on, and I rapped the egg with my knuckles.

"You knock that off! People are trying to bathe here! If you boil everything, they can’t enjoy themselves!" I scolded the egg in a harsh whisper.

Ah well.

I had some fun, half-swimming around with just my eyes above the water, blowing little bubbles, watching them rise all around me.

Bubble. Bubble. Spinosaurus Elaine is hunting through the tropical Remus baths, searching for her prey. She spots it on the edge of the bath, erupting out of the water, jaws snatching a mango! Oh the humanity! Another mango has met its ultimate destiny, to be eaten by me!

Why did they sell mangos to other people anyways?

Putting aside merchants’ strange proclivities for wanting to make a profit and selling mangos to not-me, things were looking up. Nice bath. A dozen mangos left.

Spending a few hours here, relaxing and enjoying myself, was just what my mental health needed.

Chapter 269 - Grouchy Guards, Corrupt Constables

After spending so long in the baths that the slowly-eaten mangos were but a distant memory, and I was in serious risk of transforming into a raisin - the next stage in bath-wrinklyness after prune - I decided to get out. I had shopping to do! Hair, tunic, sandals, a knife, and whatever other odds and ends I could think of while out and about.

I got up, made it back to the changing room, got dressed, and left the building.

There was a full squad of guards right outside the bathhouse, talking with an employee.

"Yeah, her!" The employee pointed to me, and I stopped. The guards hustled over, surrounding me.

"Can I help you?"

The guards were looking grouchy.

"Who’s your husband?" The squad leader asked.

"Don’t have one."

"Father?"

"Elainus."

The guards quickly traded looks. One of them muttered "I don’t know an Elainus."

"Does he live here?"

"No, Ariminum."

"Right. You’re under arrest."

"For what?"

"Seven counts of breaking into the city, seven counts of evading the city toll, three counts of solicitation on the docks without a permit, two counts of theft, one count of menacing and intimidation, three counts of assault against a citizen, and forty-four counts of disturbing the peace."

Well. When the guards put it that way. I suppose I hadn’t exactly been the model of a law-abiding citizen. I liked guards. I generally got along with them… except for right now.

Oh no.

OH NO.

I’d been acting like an adventurer! Blazing through the town in weird clothes, ignoring all the rules, and provoking the guard’s ire!

Still, I knew how to talk with them. I was confident that I could just explain myself, and it’d be alright. I wasn’t going to keep acting like a two-bit adventurer.

"Alrighty! Lead the way!" I cheerfully told the squad, who looked somewhat taken aback at my happy cooperation. Not exactly the usual response to being arrested for a dozen crimes.

From the sound of it, I was known to the guards. Just talking with the leader of a squad wouldn’t be good enough to get my name cleared. I’d need to talk with the captain at least, and that wasn’t going to happen here.

No, better to be cooperative. It’d make clearing everything up that much easier. Get to the main guardhouse, show the captain my Sentinel badge in my pocket, apologize, and make amends.

Except for the "assault on a citizen" business. Ooooh, that one boiled my blood. Defending myself from harassment was "assault on a citizen"??

Well. The dude had clearly complained to the guard. Maybe I could get the guards to go harass him instead. It was abusing my power just a hair… but it wasn’t invalid.

The guards surrounded me, and one of them - younger looking, with lower levels - put his hand on my shoulder. I rolled my eyes as he put one hand on my shoulder, and tried to stop my mana regeneration using [Guardsman Buff] or something similar.

Yeah. Good luck guard. You’ll probably get some decent experience for the skill trying to use it on me, although with how cooperative I was? It wasn’t going to be a lot.

"I think my skill’s on the fritz." The guard reported.

"Guardsman. Explain."

"It keeps finding purchase. I thought after three applications it didn’t work anymore?"

The squad leader frowned, and put a hand on my shoulder.

I kept a poker face. I was sitting on close to a million points of mana regeneration an hour. I wasn’t sure if the entire town’s guard working in concert could turn it off.

Well. I was being cooperative. It didn’t mean I couldn’t mess with them a little. I gave them my best wide-eyed stare, and channeling Brawling a bit, asked them a ‘naïve’ question.

"Is something the matter? I’m doing my best to cooperate."

I got a withering look that suggested my tone hadn’t exactly been ‘totally innocent’. I was reminded why I didn’t play extended sessions of cards or dice.

I was briskly marched over to the guardhouse, then marched to one of their small rooms. They took my sack, coins, mango pits, spare dress, gems and all. I was still holding onto my badge though - that I wouldn’t give up. One of the guards reached for my egg.

Just like my badge, I wasn’t going to let anyone take eggy, but at the same time, it’d be easier if I let them find out for themselves. I had faith in my reflexes and my shield being able to protect eggy from any harm one guard could perform.

Plus, the usual reaction to touching something hot was to let go, not break it.

"I wouldn’t do that!" I warned the guard. If looks could kill, I’d be flying with Black Crow right now.

"Prisoner. You don’t tell me what to do." He sneered at me, touching the egg with his hand.

The guardroom smelled like a barbeque, and I was getting flashbacks to Ochi and the shimagu, the memories raw and fresh. He screamed and jerked his hand away.

"What is that!?"

"Hot." I deadpanned back, darting my hand out to tap him and heal him of his burn.

The squad leader didn’t look too happy with me.

"Right. Going to add one count of importing dangerous objects, and one count of assaulting a guard to your charges."

I sat down at the small table in the room and knuckled my forehead. Yikes.

I took my Sentinel Badge out of my pocket, and put it on the desk.

"Could I please see the guard captain?" I asked.

"And one count of impersonating a Ranger. Poorly. That’s not what the Ranger badge looks like, and the squad’s currently in town. I know all of them, and you’re not one of them."

"It’s the Sentinel badge!"

"Annnnnnnd one count of lying to a guard. I’m not sure what you’re doing. Are you trying to get the longest, harshest sentence possible? Do you have some sort of bet with a friend, trying to see how many charges you can get in a day? I promise you, it’s not funny. This isn’t a game, miss."

Welp. This was going from bad to worse. Still wasn’t in any danger, and I did want to clear this up peacefully. I’d been reaching towards violence as the answer far too often, but it wasn’t called for in this situation. These were guards! My people!

I just crossed my arms.

"Let me guess. You wouldn’t want to bother the Ranger team with an imposter either." My voice was heavy with sarcasm.

"Exactly. I’m glad you’re starting to understand how serious this all is. I’m doing you a favor."

Favor my ass.

"Fine. I guess I’ll just wait here until the Praetor, magistrate, or captain shows up then?"

"Yes."

The guards filed out of the room, and he slammed the door shut. I settled into the chair, and waited.

And waited.

The egg moved again, and I looked at it in anticipation. Was it time?

A tapping noise seemed to affirm that, yes, it was time.

Then nothing happened. Boo. That’ll teach me to arbitrarily give meaning to stuff.

And waited.

Port Salona was far enough north to be tropical, and the temperature was sweltering, even at this time of year. The guardhouse was built out of stone, and this room had no windows or anything.

The heat wasn’t the problem. The sweat was.

I was basically cooking in my own sweat. After I’d had a bath and everything.

It was less about the heat, and more about the sticky sweat getting everywhere, and ruining all of my efforts. I’d need another bath, and screw anyone calling me soft for taking two baths in a day.

They were taking their sweet time, although with nothing to mark the passage of time, I had no idea how long it was.

I realized part of the issue was my Deception Ring. They would’ve taken me a lot more seriously if I was showing up as deep red, and not like a little 128 healer. I’d kept it that low from Ochi, and I’d had a quick thought earlier that I wanted things to be somewhat "normal".

Well, that was all out the window now. I set my level back to my real level.

Finally, the squad leader and a few other guards came back, along with the jackass from earlier.

"Elaine,"

How did they know my name? Right. They’d asked for my dad’s name, and it was simply impossible that I would’ve been named for anything besides my dad. Made me want to roll my eyes.

"You’ve been found guilty of a frankly staggering array of crimes. Citizen Spurius here has purchased the debt you’ve accumulated, and has ownership of you for the next thirty years. Please do not resist."

Ok. Wow. This went from "clear up a misunderstanding" to "something is terribly wrong" in no time at all.

Bloody freakin’ entitled citizens. Today was supposed to be a day off! I didn’t want to work!

"What happened to having a trial?" I asked. The squad leader looked smug, pulling out a scroll.

"If you look here, you’ll see that you did have a trial with magistrate Gnaeus, where you admitted your guilt. Well. You would see if you could read."

My eyebrows would’ve climbed into my hairline, if I had one.

"Being able to buy off my own debt?"

Another guard laughed at me.

"With the amount assessed? Impossible!"

"And my belongings?"

"What belongings? You just came here like that, right?" A third guard asked, to noises of agreement from everyone else. Spurius started to stomp over, and I flickered [Mantle], dividing the room in half.

"These are fairly major violations of the Sixteen Tablets." I pointed out.

Spurius snorted at me.

"Yeah, whatever. Get over here, I’m going to make you scream before the sun sets. Humiliating me in front of everyone like that. I’ll show you. You’ll regret the day-"

I interrupted him.

"Right, thank you everyone. That’ll be all."

Rangers. We did a lot. Fought monsters. Investigated plagues.

On our endless list of duties?

Internal affairs. Usually for the army, but we were also empowered to act upon the town’s guard when the situation called for it. Assuming they weren’t operating with the governor’s blessing.

The governor in a town basically owned the guards. They reported to him, he hired them and paid them. If they were running loose, and the governor approved? Then, and only then, was it no longer a Ranger matter, but an issue for the Senate. The approved process was to go to Ranger Command, report the issue, and have the Senators on Ranger Command report back to the Senate, who would potentially strip the governor of his governorship.

It happened every 300 years or so. Often enough that governors were leery of abusing their powers too hard.

Mundane corruption? That was more common.

Wish I could ask them if the governor was in on this. It’d make life that much easier, but alas, things were moving too fast now.

Spurius bounced off my shield, and the guards were looking angry. I didn’t think my shield could withstand constant hitting from all of them, so I followed it up with [Kaleidoscope], a field of butterflies hovering in the air between us.

"Don’t touch them. They’re explosive." I cautioned them, before dropping [Mantle].

The guardhouse was single story, and I looked up, finding a promising spot.

"What are you-" The squad leader started to yell at me, but I ignored him. I unleashed a beam of Radiance, as thick around as my wrist, at the ceiling.

Light exploded throughout the room, the side effect of my powerful magic enough to get the guards to clutch at their eyes. Spurius was screaming that I’d blinded him.

Serondes had made me aware that I could melt stone now, and between my new and improved levels, [Solar Flare] leveling up, and gravity dripping the melted stone out of the way, I was strong enough to punch through the ceiling. My Radiance burned and melted the rock, filling the air with toxic fumes, before exploding out into the city.

I then focused on making the light bright, and rapidly flickered it on and off into the sky.

I hadn’t planned on getting the Rangers involved initially, but I’d managed to stumble upon a Ranger-centric problem. I wasn’t about to do their job for them, for so many, many different reasons.

For one, I wanted a damn break.

For two, a corrupt guard investigation was a full-team affair. Interestingly, it was one area I don’t think Sentinels were ever called in on. The work of separating and interviewing people, and investigating logs was a team effort. Also, a massive waste of a highly specialized Sentinel’s time. There was no Sentinel Investigations.

Well, not currently.

Spurius just didn’t know when to quit. In spite of being blinded, regardless of the deadly butterflies glowing in front of him - ok, to be fair, he couldn’t see them - he still tried to charge at me.

I tripped him with [Mantle]. Even if it was only by proximity, he was involved, and I doubted his involvement was simple proximity.

At the rate he was going, a number of charges were going to be laid against him. I considered myself to be kind and compassionate - ignoring the little voice whispering in the back of my head, telling me exactly how many people I’d killed two days ago - but I had limits. Involved with corrupting my beloved guards? Molesting me? Nah, I wasn’t going to turn the other cheek. I believed he should face the justice system - the real, untainted justice system. The penalty for every crime in Remus was a fine, the size differing on the crime and the judge. If he was unable to pay the fine? He’d be sold into slavery to pay off his debt.

I was deeply conflicted about it all.

On one hand, I hated the dude. Not a deep, burning hatred - I hadn’t gotten the time for a proper grudge to develop - but hatred none the less. I wanted to see him suffer, and the current justice system would do just that. He’d tried to make me a slave, and he’d promised all sorts of torment and humiliation before I turned the tables on him, so there was poetic justice there. Port Salona didn’t have lead mines, but some large fishing boats used slaves… I seemed to remember them having one of the worst qualities of life, and keeping him in Port Salona where everyone he knew would see him and know he was a slave?

He did seem to be particularly mad about getting humiliated. Hit him where it hurts extra-hard.

On the other, I hated slavery. I hated the institution. I hated how close I’d often come to it myself. It was a miserable thing, regardless of the relatively gentle implementation compared to harsher examples I knew of from history. I wanted it to end. I didn’t have the tools or the means to fight against it though, nor did I have a practical solution for what else could be done with Spurius. The only jails were short-term holding cells while the details of the crime and punishment were hashed out. Kinda weird that they hadn’t stuck me in one, but I wasn’t going to look too closely at it.

Focus.

Slavery let the government essentially outsource prisons. Instead of the government needing to build and fund prisons, they got paid on a per-criminal basis. A chunk of the money was, in theory, supposed to go to the harmed party, but the governor took a cut. It wouldn’t surprise me if that was the motive here - railroad people who couldn’t properly protest their treatment, pocket the significant funds. There was, quite frankly, no other alternative punishment for Spurius. The death penalty was exceedingly rare, and I did rate life in slavery as better than death.

The other benefit to Spurius ending up as a slave was I knew where he’d be. I wasn’t going to have a Kerberos repeat, with stray loose ends running around to pop up again one day.

… Artemis was rubbing off on me more than I thought. I was now making sure I didn’t leave threats behind.

Guards tried to get into the room, but the light made it so they couldn’t see. It turned into a clusterfuck, as a guard tried to rush in, tripped over another guard, then turned into a stumbling block for the third guard, who lashed out and hit the fourth…

They stopped trying after six, figuring that I couldn’t keep the light up forever, and they’d deal with whatever Classer was giving them trouble after she was out of mana.

Ha.

If nothing else, I was going to be able to get a nice talk with the guard captain. Should’ve just started with this, honestly.

Then again, if I had, I wouldn’t have stumbled into corruption. Annoying day for me, but gods. How many poor people had they railroaded? How many ‘trials’ never took place? Did they pick me because I didn’t have protection? No family in town to speak up for me?

[*ding!* [Solar Flare] Leveled up! 130 -> 131]

In almost no time at all - Rangers tended to set up near the guardhouse after all - I heard Bossman roaring and shouting orders. Some of the guards started to clear off, and I dimmed the lights.

"Bossman!" I happily waved to him as he entered the room, weapon bared and ready for a fight.

"Sentinel Dawn. Emergency?" He asked, as the rest of the Rangers filed in.

"Mmmm. Kinda. It was going to get ugly. Got a case of corruption here, not sure how bad it is. Going to need a full investigation."

Bossman nodded seriously, and Greybeard was frowning. Wolfy just looked excited, while Newbie Ranger punched Newbie Mage in the arm.

"Weren’t you supposed to stick with her and prevent this sort of mess?!"

Chapter 270 - Thundamoo Troubles

The fallout from me calling in the Rangers was messy, like a tornado hitting a warehouse stuffed with fish. After I debriefed Bossman, filling him in on all the details, and confirming that I wasn’t needed for anything else, I skipped out on the rest.

I was alright at this sort of work, but it needed to be Bossman running the show. He knew his team better than I did, and he had the needed experience to make it all work. In theory, I could jump in to help, but it’d cause all sorts of problems if I acted as a minion to Bossman, and taking over the leadership role of the investigation wouldn’t be efficient. It’d just be Bossman reporting what they’d found to me, making his own recommendation for what to do next, and me agreeing with it. Not exactly a great use of everyone’s time.

Like, yes, I was trained on how to run investigations. Most of my knowledge was theoretical. Running a large-scale investigation like this? Better left to the field officers who had experience with it.

Plus, I was still conscious that I was Sentinel. Breathing down over everyone’s shoulder was going to make them nervous, and nervous people make mistakes.

I only stayed long enough for the Rangers to find my bag of stuff, tucked away in one of the guard’s own bags. Damning evidence.

Wolfy entered the room where I was staying with my bag, bursting into laughter as the door closed.

"Elaine! Elaine! Gods, you should’ve seen the look on his face!"

"With what?" Wolfy’s good mood was infectious, and I felt myself grinning.

"The guard who took your stuff!" He plonked my bag onto the table I was sitting at.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, so, of course he tried to claim it was his."

"Naturally, I wouldn’t expect anything else."

"And he knew what was in it."

"Makes sense. Gotta check what he’s looting after all."

"Yeah, but then we asked him what the seeds were, and what he was planning with them."

"Oh?"

"The look on his face!" Wolfy tried to mime a surprised face, but burst into laughter again halfway through.

I cracked a grin at him.

"I kinda wish I’d been there."

Wolfy waved a hand at me.

"No, no, it’s fine. Can’t imagine what would’ve happened if it wasn’t you."

I paused a moment, debating, then decided to go for it.

"I mean. You can." I softly half-whispered to him. Wolfy looked uncomfortable.

"Well, gotta get back to it." He exited the room.

With a half-sigh I grabbed my bag, and headed out.

"Sentinel! Can I bend your ear for a moment regarding the investigation?" An official-looking guard, with a pair of guards himself, called out to me. I suppressed a groan. The captain of the guard. I didn’t want to talk with him - or any guards - right now. Especially not about the investigation. I could just see the captain wanting something, and even a talk could go badly.How? I wasn’t sure. Someone with better political know-how could say exactly.

"Pardon, busy. Please talk with Bossman about the investigation." I said, nimbly dodging out of the way and finding my way out.

Normally, I’d be lost as heck in town. I still had no idea where most things were. Fortunately, the Rangers were in the habit of setting up their wagon near the guardhouse. I hadn’t seen it - or the Ranger on duty - on the way in, since we’d entered from a different entrance, but getting back to the wagon was easy.

I upped my coin supply, threw away the mango pits - I was in no mood to be chucking them around - and got back to rehumanizing myself after my wilderness adventures.

First order of business was a bath. Again. The heat hadn’t been an issue, all the sweating I’d done was. I didn’t go for a long, luxuriating bath this time - especially after having been made aware that eggy was causing problems for other people in the bath.

Then it was off to find a hairdresser. A few quick questions, and I was pointed the right way.

"Hi! Heard you do hair?" I asked the man in the small store with a comb and a belladonna leaf. The man was busy fussing over a well-to-do lady.

"Yes, but it’ll be some time." He said without even glancing towards me.

Fair enough. I wasn’t going to kick someone out of their session. I was in no rush, and there was something nice about the sheer mundanity of waiting in line.

I’m not sure when I’d last waited in line for something. The experience was refreshing, a sure sign that I was back in civilization, and unlikely to get stabbed in the back, or have a dinosaur burst out of the bushes, looking for lunch. Practically a novelty.

I’d spent half the day waiting for the guards, but this was different. Eventually, before my patience ran out, the dude was done with the lady, who swept out.

"Can I help you?" He asked. I gave him a look and pointed to my hair.

"Hair?" I asked.

He eyed the small patch of fuzz I had. He hesitated.

"Yes, but-"

I drew myself up to my full stature - admittedly not much, I was still shorter than the dude sitting down - crossed my arms, and gave him my best death glare.

"But what?" I asked.

His mouth opened and closed a few times, before his eyes widened.

Yeah. That’s right. Read my level and weep. Full 511. Unless he’d bumped into one of the other Sentinels recently - and honestly, Ocean was the one most likely to get called out here, and given the guard’s ignorance on the Sentinel badge, I doubted it - I was the highest level human he’d ever seen. Almost by a factor of two.

"But nothing. That’ll be…"

His mouth moved a few times, trying to calculate what he should do with his normal price - up or down, up or down.

"How’s 15 coins sound?" It was more than fair for a few minutes of work. It was a full day’s wages and then some for most.

"Deal." He instantly agreed. "Hair! How long?"

I thought about it for a brief moment.

"Lower back please! Do you sell combs, brushes, or other stuff?"

He cracked a grin, smelling money.

"Oh of course! Now, let me see here."

With a few dramatic flourishes - entirely unnecessary to work magic, but I was in a slightly higher-end shop, and the show was part of the experience - I had hair again.

And not the short hair I used when I was out on a mission or adventuring! It was impractically long, easy to grab in a fight, and difficult to maintain.

I loved it. Civilization! Peace! Prosperity! People to supply me with mangos!

The dude’s eyes flickered in the characteristic way of "I just got some levels, hurray!" For whatever reason, he didn’t share the good news with me, although I suspected there’d be some celebrating at home later.

I cried a little as I hugged the dude.

"Thank you. Thank you." I didn’t have more to say, and he patted me on the back.

My gratitude wanted me to shower him with money, but I had to remind myself that it was the Ranger’s money, not mine, and they’d need it down the line. I spent a modest amount of money on supplies.

Into the bag it went!

"Can I know what dress that is?" He asked, looking at my outfit.

"Mistweave! Can’t be damaged, watch." I tried to rip one of the sleeves, the material turning insubstantial and moving right through.

"Wow." His look of envy was making things awkward, and I made some polite noises and left.

Tunic and sandals were easy enough, and I splurged just a tiny bit. Green trims on my tunic, like I’d gotten as a kid. A welcome to the System, a welcome to home once again. I changed into the clothing, no longer sticking out like a sore thumb.

Except for my level. I got some strange looks. After the eighth weird look, I readjusted my level to 128.

Totally anonymous! Healer Elaine was back in action!

Then it was time to get my game face on again. I changed into my new tunic - men’s tunic, the women’s cut was too difficult to move around in - put on my Sentinel badge, my serious face, and made my way over to the courier’s guild.

This time, I skipped the line, heading right to the front.

"Excuse me, urgent Ranger business." I barged past a merchant, talking with one of the receptionists. His noise of outrage quickly became strangled as he saw my badge.

At least someone here had some common sense.

I pointed to my badge.

"Sentinel Dawn. Urgent dispatch to Ariminum, and the Rangers. Need the runner who’ll get there the fastest."

The young man at the counter took one look at my badge, how brazenly I’d muscled in, and swallowed nervously.

"One moment Ranger - err - Sentinel." He excused himself, heading to the back. He returned a moment later with a middle-aged man, sharp and lean.

"Guildmaster Eudoxia. Come on back?" He asked, and we made our way to a private room.

"Sentinel. What can we do for you?"

"I’ve got an urgent letter for the capital. I need a blank scroll, writing utensils, and your best courier."

He gave a deep sigh.

"Courier Zephyr is the fastest one here, but he’s half-retired. However, for a Sentinel? I think I can get him to make the run."

I inclined my head in thanks.

"To be clear. I’m not looking for the fastest. I’m looking for the one who’ll get there the soonest."

Eudoxia chuckled.

"Right, right. That’s still Zephyr. I shouldn’t be surprised that a Sentinel knows the proper way how things work. Too many merchants and citizens with leaves stuffed in their head just think ‘fastest is what’s needed’."

He tapped the side of his nose knowingly.

"And, since you’re in the field, I’ll even charge the Rangers on the other end for the letter."

I gave a weak chuckle at that.

"You just know they’ll pay more."

A few sharp whistles and a quick conversation later, and I had a high quality, blank scroll and some charcoal.

I did not miss Remus’s poor writing implements.

I spent some time flagging the outside of the letter as "high priority", not quite finding myself able to justify "highest priority".

To Sentinel Night, or any other Sentinel, or Ranger Command;

Please open in the presence of three or more Sentinels, Commanders, and/or members of Ranger Team 0.

Sentinel Dawn here. I’m alive, well, and in Port Salona.

Long story.

Critical information:

There is a species of bodyjackers called "shimagu". They operate by invading a host body, and taking over. The host is physically unable to move, but can still use skills. Shimagu seem focused on suppressing said skills.

I discovered a city of them a distance away from Port Salona. It was along the coast, roughly a full day of non-stop flying for me. I am unsure what distance that translates to. There were a number of humans in the city, with a fraction of them having been captured from Remus by the shimagu.

I took care of the city with some friends of mine.

However, the shimagu are a threat. It’s difficult to prove if a person’s been taken over. One method is to apply a healer to the problem. Shimagu are vulnerable to being ‘healed to death’, as most skills recognize them as a parasite and handle them accordingly. Shimagu are unable to use the host’s own skills, and asking someone to display their obvious skills that are known can also confirm an individual is free of shimagu influence.

I’ve been poking around Port Salona, and have found no shimagu here as of right now. We live in something called the Dead Zone - more on that when I report home - and the shimagu might simply find it too unpleasant to live here.

Please let my family know I’m alive.

The local Ranger team has run into a minor spot of trouble. I’m going to give them a hand for a few days, then I will be returning.

Sentinel Dawn.

I ended the letter by putting my Sentinel badge over the bottom, then flash-burning an imprint of it with my Radiance. A tricky move to not set the parchment on fire, but I managed it.

I had to be economical with my words - I wanted it all in one scroll, to let Zephyr move faster. I did think the shimagu threat was significant enough to alert Night and the rest about it now.

I wanted to send more letters, but no. I’d hopefully get there as quickly as possible, and I was, frankly, a bit of a loner. Night and the rest would tell my family, who’d know to tell everyone else I knew that I was alright. The list was depressingly short.

I’d be home soon enough.

If things went really well, I might actually beat the courier home, which was a weird thought. The letter hedged my bets.

Some helpers had gotten supplies in the room, and a moderately high level - 280 or so - courier showed up, a breeze constantly at his back.

Which was irritating to try to write with, when the wind decided to blow around indoors.

"Courier Zephyr. This is urgent. Straight to Ranger Headquarters, they’ve got a mail room there." I sealed up the letter, and handed it to the man.

With a Gale blast, he blew out of the room, leaving a bunch of moisture in his wake.

"Oh for crying out loud." The guildmaster complained. "He can’t wait to get out of the building before showing off and making a mess."

The water condensed and slowly fell, making a mess of the floor. I raised an eyebrow.

"Mist runner? I’ve never heard of that."

"No, Steam. Slowly builds up over time, and lets him go faster and faster, while also providing endurance."

"And his Gale gives him a flat speed, and a tailwind?" I guessed.

"Among other things."

I stood up and shook the guildmaster’s hand.

"Thank you for your time." I said.

"Sure. Am I going to need to evacuate the city?"

I gave a nervous laugh. Eudoxia paled.

"That was supposed to be a joke."

"He. Yeah. Ummmmmmmmmmm. Bye!"

I didn’t exactly have reassuring words. Dude sounded like he’d been around a few times. He should know that a Sentinel sending a high priority message was generally bad news.

I made my way back to the Ranger wagon as the sun set, timing it well. Dinner was served just as I arrived.

Yessss. I still had the skill [Show Up When Dinner is Ready and Not a Second Before].

"Sentinel."

"Sentinel Dawn."

"Sentinel. Nice outfit! That hair’s going to be totally impractical."

"You know what else is impractical? Your face."

"Sentinel Dawn."

The Rangers greeted me as I sat down for dinner with them, but I waved them off. They started talking about the corruption case over the meal, and I shut up, and stayed out of it. I was all too aware that a word from me would have an oversized impact on the case, and how they handled it.

Heck, I already had an oversized impact. I’d bet coins - and nobody would take me up on it - that they’d spend extra-effort on this case, because I’d been the ‘victim’. Too much time would be spent investigating it, because technically I was their boss, and they wanted to look good to their boss.

At the same time, if I told them to chill, they’d chill too hard.

There was some magic alchemy of words that would get them to tackle the case properly, that would get them to yo-yo to exactly the right place I wanted them to be.

I didn’t know what those words were. I did know that silence was wrong, but speaking up was probably more wrong.

Silence it was.

At the end, we broke and cleaned up.

"Ranger Team 11!" Bossman called out at the end. The team stiffened to attention.

Evening exercise? On a full stomach?

"At ease." They all relaxed.

Just a stand-up drill?

"Got one complaint today worth investigating." Bossman cleared the center of the wagon, and gave a short nod to Artillery Mage C.

"Local farmer had the brilliant idea of training and raising caster monsters. Specifically, cows."

"Why?! That’s just asking for trouble!" Newbie Ranger looked particularly aghast at the idea.

"To, and I quote, ‘deel wif da varmits’."

That was one heck of an accent, in a place that rarely had them. Just how long had that family been farming, with minimal contact?

"Anyways. As anyone could guess, it went wrong, and one of his herd’s gone rogue. He’s tried to put the cow down a few times now, but the cow’s blasted him for his troubles. He might’ve said something about the cow becoming canny to his tricks? At least, I think that’s what he said. That, or the cow’s fanny to his dicks, and while we all know the jokes, I hope that’s not what’s going on."

An amused chuckle went around the circle.

"If it was the second one, he wouldn’t be asking us for help." I deadpanned, completely derailing the conversation for a minute.

Bossman let the merriment continue for a moment, then snapped the Rangers to order.

"Cow’s got Lightning as its element, and is fortunately a single-element caster. Ideas?"

"Long-range rock hit." Artillery Mage C instantly answered.

"It’s always a long-range rock hit with you!" Newbie Ranger complained.

"The tactic is effective." Greybeard gently rebuked. "I wouldn’t discount having an excellent trick up your sleeve. The legions train Earth mages by the dozen for that very reason. However. It is worth considering other plans of action, to practice problem solving. Especially given the relatively benign nature of the threat."

Everyone waited in silence for Greybeard to finish, and even after he was done we kept watching him, waiting for the font of knowledge to dispense information to us.

Heck. He’d probably forgotten more than I knew about being a Ranger, and I’d bet he was ‘in’ on all the secrets. Probably even more than I was.

"Let us try to come up with a half-dozen methods of dealing with this Lightning cow, mmm?" Greybeard proposed. "One for each of us."

Artillery Mage C had already gone. Bossman suggested bows. Newbie Ranger wanted to make a deadfall. Newbie Mage wanted to use his magic to make something that sounded like a minefield. Wolfy thought that Moonmoon could scare the cow, and drive it into the jungle, then let the jungle take care of it.

That sounded weak, even to me.

For each plan, the team discussed the pros and the cons of each, teasing out what conditions would make one plan better or worse than another. It was a different way of doing things than Julius had done, but I had to admit - it looked effective, not only for hammering out the current issue, but getting practice dealing with other issues in the future.

My serious game-time planning of monster hunting experience was shockingly low. This meeting might’ve seriously doubled it, if every plan was considered a new experience.

"Sentinel Dawn. Would you like to participate?" Greybeard carefully invited me in. I’d been staying silent so far, not wanting to disrupt their planning. I didn’t know their team, or their capabilities, and the exercise seemed to be a good one. I didn’t want to mess with it.

"Sure. This problem’s easy. Send in a Sentinel." I cracked a grin at my own joke, and got weak laughs.

Greybeard cocked his head at me.

"Being the Sentinel present, how would you handle it?"

"Walk right up to it, Radiance beam through the head. Boom. Dead. That simple."

"The Lightning? Its spells?"

"I’m Sentinel Dawn. I’m durable. Unless the cow’s somehow level 600, I should be able to heal through literally everything it sends at me. My mana pool should be larger, and that’s before the applied power problem."

I paused a moment.

"It’s not level 600, right?"

Bossman shook his head.

"Negative. Mid 200’s."

"Yeah. Walk up to it. Kill it. Walk back."

I thought about it a moment, then shook my head.

"No no, first drive it to an area where I have to do less work once it’s dead, then kill it."

"The plan seems viable. My only quibble is the lack of learning opportunities in both the plan, and the execution." Greybeard said.

"How would you do it?" I asked Greybeard, wanting to know how the font of knowledge would handle things.

"Poison the feed. Get the local alchemist to brew up something potent, unscented, and tasteless, after convincing them that, yes, I know they know how to do it, and no, I’m not going to arrest them for knowing how." Greybeard rolled his eyes at that, and went on a bit of a tangent.

"Honestly, never known an alchemist without their own super-poison they’ve got hidden in their tunic, yet is convinced they’ll be arrested for knowing how."

"Poison the feed, scatter it around, and back off. It isn’t heroic, but it should work on a cow."

I was getting serious Arthur vibes from him. The plan was sound though.

Bossman looked conflicted while all the plans were revised. After settling on, surprise surprise, Artillery Mage C’s plan of "Throw rocks from far away" was selected as the Ranger’s plan of attack, and they started to prepare for a full-on assault, with contingencies and back-up plans being laid. Wolfy started to check over everyone’s gear, and after a moment, after far too long, I twigged to Bossman’s issue.

A cow was easy mode. The biggest ethical problem was "how many ribs am I allowed to take for dinner?" The Rangers already had one problem, and a full day spent traveling out to a remote-ish farm, dealing with a problematic animal, then traveling back, all while the corrupt guards had time to get their stories straight?

Lightning could be nasty. There was a reason Artemis used it. Instant speed, and it could randomly "punch up" by frying a nervous system, or stopping a heart, or frying a brain, or… there were multiple ways Lightning could just end someone.

However. I didn’t care about that. In the slightest. Not with [Persistent Casting].

Bossman didn’t - couldn’t - ask me to take this job on. Not with the level, and the relatively low threat nature of the beast. However, I could ask.

"Why don’t I take this one?" I volunteered. "It’s easy enough for me, and you’ve got the guard investigation to handle. That seems like a higher priority to me, and I’m no use on that problem. Right now, I’m not doing anything else."

A wave of relief went over Bossman’s face.

"Sentinel Dawn. Many thanks." He saluted me. "Anyone else have anything?"

I caught Greybeards eye, remembering about sparring lessons. He gave me a tiny shake of his head.

Yeah, made sense. We both had missions tomorrow, and it was late. All the talking and planning had gotten us far into the night.

"I’ve got nothing." I set the tone with that, nobody else having anything either.

We went to sleep, although the Rangers set a watch and battened down the hatches like we were in the wilderness.

It’d be unlikely for the guards to try and kill us in our sleep, but it wasn’t impossible. A watch it was, and I didn’t volunteer myself to take one.

I wanted some damn sleep, and I got it.

In the morning I changed into my Mistweave, deputized Greybeard with keeping the egg warm while I was on the trip - Pyronox could get just as hot as Radiance, and [Egg Incubation] helped us determine how hot he needed to make it - and generally geared up. And by that I meant, I put on less gear than normal, since Lightning could fry just about anything but my Mistweave. Then Bossman and I went and met the farmer, Bossman made introductions, and we quickly hit it off as we traveled to his farm.

His accent was atrocious. Along with mauling the language beyond recognition.

"Aye, da thundamoo’s a beautbeet. Runna da grawblow, dan BOOM! Iz…"

I got maybe one word in fifty.

We made it to his farm, where the occasional boom from one of the fields indicated the problem.

"Ya, da grawblow dar’s thundamoo." He pointed, like it wasn’t obvious.

I flew on over, leaving the farmer behind, eyeing up the rest of his herds.

They all spelled trouble. Six in ten were showing obvious signs of being caster animals, and Rangers would need to be here again. The Lightning cow - or thundamoo as the farmer called it - was just the first.

What would be next? The sizzlemoo? The gurgdamoo?

I flew over to the cow, flinching a little as a bolt of Lightning struck me. It was loud, and I don’t think I’d ever get used to being struck by Lightning, mundane or not.

I really, really didn’t want to get used to being struck by Lightning.

At the same time, my healing just shrugged it off like nothing happened. The damage Lightning did was on the smaller side - relatively speaking - even though the damage inside that small area was horrific.

My mana barely flickered.

I took two more bolts, got in range, and dropped the poor cow with a merciful beam of Radiance through its eye.

Too easy.

Chapter 271 - Hatching Hazards

I only spent a few minutes accepting the farmer’s thanks for dealing with his Lightning cow.

"You should cull the rest." I told him. "This was the first one, but not the last."

"Ah, da moos ah foin. Dar…"

Holy incomprehensible language. Oi - I - gods he was rubbing off on me already - swear he was halfway towards pioneering his own tongue.

I flew back to town, feeling my hair doing strange things. I felt it as I flew.

Oh for fucks sake.

Lightning strikes did not mix with long hair. I was rocking burns throughout, clumps of hair having gotten charred and ruined, others sticking out at bizarre angles.

I hated the smell of burning hair.

Ok, fine. Hate was too strong of a word, especially so close after the shimagu. I strongly disliked the smell of burning hair.

I flew over the walls, quietly chuckling to myself as the guards studiously ignored me. Word had gotten round. Do not mess with the crazy Sentinel. Ignore the brightly colored butterfly wings.

It sucked that we couldn’t lock down all the guards while conducting our investigation, but practically speaking, how would that work? Did we just throw open the gates and let everyone in and out? Did we stop manning the towers that watched for threats? Did we stop enforcing the rules? Did we remove the guard presence from the streets entirely?

It was a mess.

I made it back to the Ranger wagon, where I changed back to my tunic, thankful that I’d chosen to wear the Mistweave. I didn’t want to call it invincible - that was just asking for trouble - but it sure could take a beating.

I slipped my Deception Ring back on, set it to level 200, and went to find Greybeard and my egg.

Took some wandering around the guardhouse to spot him, but I eventually did.

He was conducting an interview, and I just quietly slipped into the room, grabbed the egg, shot him a quick message in Ranger hand code - "Success" - and left.

I stopped by Bossman’s room once I found him, and flashed him the same code, then left the room.

There wasn’t much left for me to do in Port Salona. The entirety of my checklist was "get traveling supplies" and "get going".

Given that it was almost lunch, and that proper prior planning prevented piss poor performance, I figured I’d spend the afternoon gathering supplies, then leave second thing in the morning, after the Ranger’s morning exercise.

Shame about Greybeard, training, and drills, but eh. I’d just ask Night if he could spare some time for me. I know I had the spare time, but Night kept himself crazy busy.

I looted the Ranger’s cash stores again - only two rods - and headed back into town.

First things first - hair. AGAIN. I made my way to the same hairdresser as yesterday, who gave me more than a bit of a funny look.

I suppose people didn’t often utterly ruin their nice do as quickly as I had.

"Heya! Up for another round?" I pointed to my frizzy hair.

He did not look happy.

"Sorry that I ruined it already. You know how it is."

"That’ll be 20 coins." He was gruff, and I paid without complaint, getting luxurious hair once more.

Like, yeah, I probably could’ve waited three or four days for Albina to get it done for me, but it was the principle and the feeling of it. I was home. I was safe. My hair symbolized that for me like nothing else did. I’d gone a year with short, matted, blood-encrusted, I-don’t-want-to-know-what mess in my hair.

"Two levels in two days." The hairdresser commented. "Guess I’ve got you to thank."

"You’re welcome! Any chance of a discount?"

His snort of disbelief let me know the odds of that happening.

I spent the afternoon half playing tourist, half getting supplies. A knife, some rope, a solid backpack, a waterbottle, and - most importantly - a map.

I was planning on following the roads back home. It kinda sucked, but I didn’t trust myself to try and cross the Nostrum sea directly. It was three parts paranoia about getting lost, and eight parts concern about whatever plant Night and Ocean had talked about that lived in the sea, that prevented ships from doing anything other than cruising along the shoreline.

Plus, while I knew Ariminum was to the south-east, I didn’t have precise directions. Sure, I could cut through the wilderness until I hit another road, but then I’d just be following the road until I hit another city, where I’d need to reorient myself anyways. Probably talk with the guards again, need to explain myself again, and yeah. I was convinced getting a map, charting my course, then just flying as fast as I could over the roads would get me home fastest.

I spent way too much on a map. High-quality maps of the entire Republic - or wait, with an emperor now, were we an empire? How did that work? - were rare, and expensive. Most people were locals and knew the area, and only needed information about the local area.

The rest of the day went well, the only interesting thing was the egg making some more noise. Once my shopping and proper prior planning was done, I spent the rest of the day at the beach!

Carefully curated, lovely sand. Tropical breezes, nice waves - a little slice of paradise. Some families had their kids in tow, but nearly every day was a work day, and who could afford to just… not work and go to the beach?

Not a ton of people. Mothers with their kids in tow was primary, but there were more options than just the beach at Port Salona, and the beach being outside of the walls made it a less-attractive place to take small children.

Not that I minded. I just enjoyed myself, letting the warm sand wrap around me, the sun beat down on me, and hearing the soothing waves.

I stayed quiet during dinner again, although afterwards I took the chance to catch up with Wolfy, Moonmoon, and Artillery Mage C, hearing about their adventures. I gave them the short, short version of events that I’d been through, and they were fascinated by the fact that I’d been outside of Remus. It was like they’d never considered that there was a world outside of our borders. To them, it was just endless wilderness, and I blew their minds with stories about elves, dwarves, trolls, and all manner of other creatures and civilizations out there.

Moonmoon was fascinated by Kiyaya, and wanted to know everything about her. I obliged.

I went to sleep in the wagon, Moonmoon on either side of me.

"Good morning Rangers! Up and at ‘em! Let’s go go GO! Last one out owes sixteen pushups!" Bossman’s voice roared through the wagon.

I was the last one out. I was significantly faster than Newbie Mage - than all of them - but they’d had months of practice with Bossman waking them up, and them scrambling out of the wagon. Also, I didn’t particularly care about being the last one out, and this way I could give Newbie Mage a break from always being the slowest one.

It was a nice drill as well, and I cheerfully did my pushups at high speed while everyone else watched.

Sentinels were above Rangers, but even Sentinels bowed to the rules. At least, that was the message I hoped I was sending.

After a light set of exercises, we went on our run, this time jogging together as a team. Making sure the pace was one even Newbie Mage could run at.

We were running around the walls when the world slowed in its characteristic way when I was in danger.

I wasn’t the only one with similar skills.

"Down!" Roared Greybeard, while I yelled "Shields!".

I was a fan of practicing what I preached, wrapping myself and the egg in [Mantle of the Stars], leaving a tiny hole at the top to blast all the Rangers with [Wheel of Sun and Moon].

My abdomen was getting warm, hot, hotter. I glanced down, only to see the egg glowing, smoke coming off my tunic.

Oh sh-

The world turned to flames. I was in the middle of a blazing inferno, a raging bonfire of a dozen different colors of flame. There was no air, no light, no earth or ground.

Just pure flames, trying to consume me, to devour me alive into their rapacious, all-consuming maw.

I was familiar with fire. I’d dove into multiple burning buildings, I’d spent years as a Fire mage, I’d nearly gotten killed by a dragon’s Pyronox skill, heck, I’d even gotten roasted over a fire once!

This was different, yet the same.

I burned, going up in flames like a candlewick, my flesh turning into fuel for the flames, only to be restored just as quickly. There was no part of my body spared the searing agony.

I swear I was floating, the flames levitating me.

It was just me and the fire. Nothing else existed in the world.

It felt like the flames wanted to replace me, to subsume me and transform me into a living, breathing avatar of fire, turning me into an inferno elemental.

Then like a switch was flipped, the flames stopped entirely.

Well, not quite - there were still numerous secondary fires that had been started around me, the smell of burning hair in the air.

Damnit. I’d just gotten my hair fixed!

The Rangers were scattered around, in various combat stances. Even now they were quickly forming up, putting their backs together, scanning for threats and ignoring their lack of clothing.

Their defensive skills, my shield - broken of course - and healing combined had held. They’d all lived.

Bossman was barking orders.

"Send the wolves out! Get a firing platform set. I want Earth walls, tall and thick. Open-aired! Whatever hit us is going to try again! Heli! Split from us, get another vantage. Mintus! -"

"Belay that." I ordered, looking down and smiling.

I got Looks from all the Rangers, and oh I was going to murder Wolfy as he was giving me an entirely different look. We were all Rangers damnit!

"That, um, might’ve been me." I sheepishly confessed, continuing to look down at the tiny hatchling cradled in my arms, a few pieces of cooling eggshell giving it some protection.

It was tiny, far smaller than the egg would suggest. It was a mottled grey all over, and cheeping with its mouth to the sky in the pitiful way baby birds did.

"Brpt! Brpt! Brpt!"

It wanted something, probably food.

The Rangers crowded around me, looking down, I assumed at the bird. They better be looking at the bird.

"What is it?" Artillery Mage C eventually asked, poking a finger at her. I swatted it away.

"Don’t touch! I’m not sure." I [Identify]’d it.

[Fledgling] it came back, pure white. The only thing that told me was that it was intelligent.

"Still no idea."

"Where’d you get it?" Newbie Mage asked.

"Uhhhhh… that’s classified." I answered. Bossman gave me a quirked eyebrow.

"Can I touch it?" Wolfy asked, as the hatchling’s insistent brpts! became louder and louder.

"It looks kinda fragile? But you’d know better than I would." He did have Moonmoon after all. I was more inclined to let Moonmoon touch carefully, versus Artillery Mage C’s clumsy prodding.

The mage in question made a strangled noise of complaint, my blatant favoritism showing.

"Ah - going for a companion?" He asked.

"Yup."

Wolfy turned to Bossman.

"Sir! Requesting permission to end the exercise, and obtain food for Sentinel Dawn. Early hours - minutes - are critical for this."

Bossman looked around and snorted.

"What, you think I was going to have you all keep running naked, after we almost died? Please. You’re dismissed. Artillery Mage C, Greybeard, fire control. Sentinel, can I have a quick word?"

The newbie Rangers bailed while the rest got on with their respective tasks. Bossman studiously kept his eyes on mine.

"Sentinel. It’s your call, but with all due respect - simply hatching nearly took out an entire Ranger squad. I shudder to think what would’ve happened if that had happened in town. You claim you don’t know what it is. With all due respect. Please don’t bring him into town."

"Her." I absent-mindedly corrected. [Egg Incubation] had given up the game when I first got the skill. "And yes, I can camp out here for some time. Can I borrow Wolfy for the foreseeable future?"

Bossman saluted.

"Sentinel. Naturally. I anticipate we will be spending significant amounts of time in town, working on the investigation."

He turned and left, and I looked down at the tiny, helpless, loud little bird. She was insisting, with surprising volume, that she get taken care of right now.

"BRRPT! BRRPT! BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPRRRTTTTTT!!!!"

"What do I call you?" I gently extended a finger out, stroking the tiny bird’s head.

She was so small. So vulnerable. So helpless and fragile. She had nobody in the world but me. I didn’t even know what she was, let alone where her parents were.

[*ding!* Your skill [Egg Incubation] has evolved into [Hatchling Rearing]!]

Hatchling Rearing: By some divine miracle, you’ve kept the egg alive until she hatched! Be careful, she’s a feisty one! Now, feed her, raise her, and protect her until she unlocks her own System to defend herself with! Increased knowledge and connection per level.

"BRRRPTT! BBRRRRPPPPT!!"

I’d keep her safe. Protect her from the vicious Cordamo’s of the world, until she’d grown up.

A potential bond, a possible life-long companionship was starting today.

She needed a name.

The Remus tradition was to name girls after their father. I was happily single and unmarried, and I had thoughts where that tradition could go stick itself. I didn’t know who her father was, where he was, or what his name was, nor if they had their own set of traditions.

"BRRRPTT! BBRRRRPPPPT!!"

Another tradition that could go stick itself somewhere unpleasant was "girls get one name". No. She was getting a full, proper name. Family Called Fancy. Or, in Earth terms, Last First Middle.

Kinda weird thinking of it like that.

I wasn’t going to name her after me. That was just weird.

Was there anyone in my life I’d name her after?

Artemis. Artemis was on the shortlist for a middle name. However, I’d want to check with her first, see if she was OK with it, and go from there.

Hmmm.

Hmmmmmmm.

"Artemis Fowl" was kinda funny, but after coming up with the name, I ditched it.

"BRRRPTT! BBRRRRPPPPT!!" She was loudly demanding something - probably food.

I did some thinking, pulling names and inspiration from my memories, from all sorts of places. I wanted her to have her own family name, unique from mine. Her own middle. Everything.

In Remus, middle names were usually granted after an achievement of sorts. The hatchling hadn’t exactly had a long life, but she did have one aspect of note already.

Her continued high-volume demands, along with recently hearing The Iliad the other day settled her middle name - Stentor. The loud herald of the Greeks.

I’d had a beloved pet, once upon a time on another planet entirely. Aoife.

The last name I liked, a diminutive of Aurora. I thought it’d fit. A name that reflected when she was born - at the rising of the sun. I was Dawn, and the symmetry wasn’t lost on me. I wasn’t going to name her after my title though.

The name also reflected fire, the flames of the sun, and her birth, her baptism in fire, was all too appropriate for it.

"Auri." I settled on. "Your name is Aoife Auri Stentor."

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 576,750/576,750]

[Mana Regen: 432,699 (+515,651)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 194]

[Strength: 1,003]

[Dexterity: 1,823]

[Vitality: 14,190]

[Speed: 14,190]

[Mana: 57,675]

[Mana Regeneration: 57,776 (+51,565)]

[Magic Power: 22,735 (+427,418)]

[Magic Control: 22,735 (+427,418)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 511]]

[Celestial Affinity: 471]

[Cosmic Presence: 300]

[The Stars Never Fade: 2]

[Center of the Universe: 450]

[Dance with the Heavens: 511]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 511]

[Mantle of the Stars: 469]

[Sunrise: 347]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 357]]

[Radiance Affinity: 357]

[Radiance Resistance: 357]

[Radiance Conjuration: 357]

[Solar Flare: 131]

[Nectar: 357]

[Sun's Heart: 357]

[Scintillating Ascent: 333]

[Kaleidoscope: 357]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 375]

[Pristine Memories: 221]

[Hatchling Rearing: 88]

[Bullet Time: 511]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 376]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 511]

[Persistent Casting: 315]

[Passionate Learning: 380]

Chapter 272 - Major Interlude - Iona - Sigrun I

Iona looked up at the Immortal healer, and felt sick.

She’d tracked rumors of the healer to The Great Tang, aiming to put a stop to her before the war got too out of control.

The ability to grant Immortality was absurd. The exact flavors differed. The most common, by leaps and bounds, vampires. They jealously guarded their innate racial ability, demanded huge prices, concessions, and most of all - loyalty to the Exterri Empire. On rare occasion, a vampire would be coerced into granting Immortality. The rest of the vampires came down hard on such instances, knowing that if one of them was allowed to be blackmailed and threatened into giving up their power, they all were vulnerable. A single monolithic block, working in tandem.

After that, came the numerous mortals who’d somehow seized Immortality for themselves, and not only for themselves, but for anyone their skill allowed. A painting that wilted and faded instead of the subject. Golden apples, halting the march of time. Water, granting eternal youth. The cultivation methods of the Auspicious Mountain Sect. Dozens, hundreds of variants, each one as different and as unique as the wielder in question, as many differences as there were different skills in the System.

As many stars as there were in the sky.

That was before the "natural" methods of gaining Immortality came into play. Consuming the flesh of a mermaid was one. Requesting a boon from a deity, or finding one of their divine treasures was another. Finding the genie, and making a wish was a third, and countless more were scattered and hidden all over the world.

White Dove cursed them all. They didn’t care how Immortality was obtained, simply that it was. Cruel, capricious, bizarre. Sometimes her curses would be on-point, directly targeting and striking at the heart of the poor fool who dared defy her. Other times, they were stranger, weirder, seemingly having no connection with the new Immortal. Rarely, the curse was hardly a curse at all, more of a minor inconvenience. There was no rhythm nor reason to her curses, no pattern that [Scholars] could discern.

Each element could seize - and grant - Immortality.

Healers, ever fighting against Black Crow, had the option of seizing Immortality, and granting it to others, on average over a thousand levels before other classes and methods could. They were watched more closely than other Classers were, as healers could reasonably get to the levels needed to seize Immortality before their mortal lifespan wore out, unlike other Classers. Part of why nearly every mortal nation restricted healers from surpassing 256 - in public.

Any mortal that seized Immortality, and who could grant it to others, was on their own. Vulnerable to coercion, threats, blackmail, bribery, and more. There were no monolithic groups protecting them. The only friends and allies they had were those obtained in their short, fleeting, mortal lifespan before the moment they obtained it. They were exposed, and the world knew it.

For some reason, the ability to grant Immortality was never granted to Immortals. Perhaps it was simply the System recognizing the inherent Immortality of said Immortals, and denying "useless" skills to them.

The end result was the same. Powerhouses. People who ended up at levels far, far above everyone else, who could single-handedly turn the course of a war.

Who could - would - single-handedly start a war.

Old age eventually took mortals. There was only so much wealth and power a single mortal could get, before Black Crow came for them in their old age. Immortals had no such restrictions. Their wealth and power would - barring accident, sabotage, or plain incompetence - simply grow and grow, until their interests collided irreverably against someone else’s.

Diplomacy would be tried at first, and sometimes it’d succeed. But inevitably, there’d be another clash, and eventually one wouldn’t be resolvable with peaceful means.

Then there’d be a war.

It was the rare Immortal who managed to restrain themselves, who contented themselves to live a simple life. Many said they would keep things simple for themselves. They wouldn’t be like the other Immortals.

The lure of safety and preservation was usually their downfall. A few extra coins, in case of an unexpected expense. A spare barn, to hold food through lean times. Rebuilding the wooden home with stone, so it’d better survive the seasons and passage of time. Owning the land they were on outright - who wanted to pay rent for eternity?

Small things. Forward thinking things.

Then the Immortal woke up one day, practically a small lord in their own right. The fear of losing what they had tended to set in next, and, well…

The rest was history.

Naturally, the mortals who managed to seize Immortality always claimed they weren’t Immortal. Immortals living in mortal lands violated any number of treaties and agreements, the biggest one being the Treaty of Kyowa.

Ironically, due to survivorship bias, the rare Immortal that managed to restrain themselves were in the majority in mortal lands. They tended not to flaunt their existence, staying low-key. Out of the way.

But they were there. Old monsters, a king’s uncle thirty generations ago living in a little cabin, a favored knight who’d never want for anything, with levels no mortal could easily stand up against.

Even Sigrun, as ridiculously powerful as the Valkyrie leader was, would be crushed by such an existence, if she provoked them into coming out and taking the field.

They rarely did. An Immortal openly using their power ended with far, far too many eyes on them. As such, only when a country was on the brink of extinction, when total war was declared, did such figures emerge from their hidey-holes.

It was why the nations that existed had existed for hundreds of years, and would likely exist for hundreds, if not thousands, more.

It was part of why Nime was so aggressive with Forbidden Four Classers, in defiance of the Treaty of Kyowa. They were a new country, as these things went. The belief was they didn’t have any Immortals, and were resorting to more desperate means.

A kingdom would empty their coffers just to make one new Immortal guardian.

The ability to make dozens?

Nations were going to war over the chance, both to have their own, and deny the chance to their enemies.

Some were aiming to capture the healer, and force her to turn as many loyal retainers Immortal as possible. Rarely did the king, elder, prime minister - or whoever the leader of a nation was - get turned themselves. No, it was too obvious when such a thing happened. The power behind the thrones, the quiet movers and shakers, were usually the recipients of such a blessing. Them, and anyone proven loyal enough to the country.

Others were more pragmatic. Capturing the healer gave others a chance to capture her in turn. Simply killing her ended the entire ordeal.

Yet more saw it as an excuse to move their armies. Nothing quite granted riches like quick plunder in a justified war, like ransoming a noble back to their family. Nothing granted levels quite like battles and bloodshed. One perfect engagement could turn a mediocre army into a hardened core of elites.

Like the Valkyries. They were already elite units to begin with, but they’d been distilled, honed, tempered. Each surviving Valkyrie was a force of nature in and of herself.

Sadly, they didn’t have a fresh batch of recruits to fill in the holes left by the fallen, unlike a lord who seemingly always had a fresh batch of serfs to pull from, and plug the gaps.

Naturally, there was a fourth party. The Immortal healer herself, and the people who rallied to her. Those who didn’t quite fit in the current world order. Disgruntled lords, too low in the peerage to ever be granted Immortality, given the chance to throw their lot in with the healer and have the clock turned back for them. Adventurers, fresh off delving some deep and ancient ruin, flush with riches and wanting to be preserved in the moment for all eternity. Mercenaries, who could be granted the boon and sell it again, commanding a price that would allow them to retire in luxury for the rest of their life.

The end result was the same. An Immortal healer showed up, and let her skills be known. She was a foci, a pivot, pulling the world around her.

Nobody should have that much power.

Nobody should be able to cause that much death.

And yet.

Iona was late to the party. It was over.

Iona stared at the body, hoisted high by a spike impaling her. Her head had been cut off, replaced by a tiger’s - presumably her companion.

The healer’s head was on a second spike next to her body.

They’d horrifically tortured the poor woman, and Iona sent a long prayer to her patrons, asking that they help guide her soul to the afterlife. Even with Iona’s long experience, with all the carnage she’d seen and dealt, the sight of what had been done to the poor healer turned her stomach.

Even in death, she was afforded no dignity.

Various fluids covered her, and a passerby threw a rotten tomato at her, the fruit adding its noxious juices to the mix, then falling down onto the rest of the vegetables.

Abstractly, Iona had wanted the healer dead. One life, one person, who knew exactly what they were doing and what chaos they’d cause, weighed against the millions of lives unended and ruined as a result of her actions.

Seeing the end result though? Iona wasn’t a cold, heartless killing machine. She could empathize. She could imagine the torture and agony the poor woman had gone through.

They’d clearly drawn it out, and made it last.

With one last shake of her head, Iona turned and left.

Next on her list - Return to the pirate hideout. Loot every last scrap. Report back to the Valkyries, and see what the next hotspot was.

Iona shouldered her way through the crowds, people and races of all sorts having congregated in Xi’an. Most wore the robes of various sects, long flowing things that should be impractical in a fight, yet they somehow managed to pull it off.

To nobody’s surprise, the sect with the largest representation by far was the Tang sect, who ruled the country named after them.

Iona warily eyed a group of people loitering around, wearing yellow jacks with black stripes on them. The Hornet’s gang. Well-known across mortal lands for being [Hired Thugs]. If a merchant wanted to put a rival out of business? Hiring the Hornets to torch their warehouse and storefront, mug them in an alley, or just plain old extort "protection money."

Once hired though, they stayed vaguely loyal, in a criminal sort of way. This group was loitering in front of a major branch of the World Bank. The local [Beancounters] had done their own strange brand of math, and determined that hiring additional muscle on top of their guards with the level of unrest and risks was worth it.

Since they were somewhat legitimately employed, Iona let them be. There was a time and a place to fight with one of Pallos’s three major gangs, and this was not it.

Iona was near the exit of the city when the crowds started to part. Iona let herself go with the flow. This wasn’t her place or her territory, why make a fuss?

Her stomach clenched in a cold knot as she saw who the crowd was parting for.

A pair of Wardens were entering the city, their pointy elven ears and curled horns sticking out from behind their faceless silver masks. The Immortal enforcers had left their domain, presumably for the deceased healer.

Wardens were the reason Immortals didn’t rampage freely across mortals lands - well, not for long. Iona was forced to admit that the Immortals races did have their own set of rules - however esoteric - abided by them. Didn’t mean she liked them much.

Iona took a quick peek at their stats and levels, her divine blessing bypassing any resistances or protections they might have to mask themselves.

Level 2885.

Level 3381.

Either one of them could level the city with a thought. Iona would be helpless before them, [Vow]-boosted stats or not.

Interestingly, they were bonded to each other. A pair of companions, likely lovers, working as Wardens. It explained why there wasn’t a pair of creatures working with them

There was something about the weapon the higher-leveled one carried. Somehow, power, with a whiff of divinity, was emanating from it. Objects just didn’t do that. Not unless…

"The Woundspear." The moon goddess Selene whispered into Iona’s mind.

"If you could get it for us…" Lunaris, the other moon goddess breathed in anticipation and desire.

Iona would’ve given them an incredulous look if she could’ve. Sadly, they were in the divine realm, and Iona was forced to stick to witty remarks.

"Yes, let me commit elaborate suicide by Warden. I didn’t realize you were so eager to meet me again in person." Iona quipped, then got a hair more serious.

"I’m not going to wrest away a divinely granted weapon from elves with thousands of levels on me. Alone." Iona frankly replied.

"Ahh, but just imagine…" Selene said.

"Yes, I’m imagining. Me. Dead, in a shallow grave. Assuming more than a matchbox’s worth of me is left."

"We’ll make you an angel!" Lunaris seemed positively cheerful at the idea, which included Iona’s untimely demise.

"You’re going to make me an angel anyways! Right!?"

The two goddesses of the moon laughed at Iona’s outraged remarks and expression, and she felt their light touch leave her.

Crowds parted before them, and they passed, entirely inscrutable beneath their masks.

Iona forced herself to move once they’d left, noting a maple leaf over a house. They were going to be extra-busy.

She traveled back across The Great Tang, her heart breaking at every trampled field, at every burned farmhouse. She shared her food when she could with people who’d been displaced by the war, who were already starving even before winter hit.

The Great Tang wasn’t particularly far north, and the [Weather Witch]es were predicting a harsh winter. The unknown healer was dead, but her legacy was going to kill millions in a famine.

Iona mentally corrected herself. It wasn’t just the healer. She was the spark, the excuse, but every count, every sect leader, every great general and clan leader was also to blame. They’d mobilized armies and moved out, when they could’ve sat home, focusing on peace and securing their own borders.

Iona missed the hypocrisy entirely. She was a Valkyrie, and could’ve been spending the time fighting monsters and raiders, instead of making the trip down to The Great Tang.

It took some hiking, and some prodding around the Wakacola sea, but Iona found the pirate’s hideout again. She dove down to the wreck, and spent a relatively relaxing day looting the pirate ship of all the Arcanite it used to hold, along with picking up as much silver, gold, and other precious metals, gems, and general valuables as she could find.

There was something magical about getting richer every minute, getting heavily rewarded with each motion.

With her sack filled to the brim with Arcanite, and two entire treasure chests stuffed with more of the stuff, along with a cache of gemstones she’d found, Iona felt positively piratical. Shame that she’d lost her tricorn hat.

She did enjoy a few nights with fellow travelers she met on the road, occasionally with a local resident in a place she stayed. It was the rare night that Iona wanted companionship and didn’t get it.

A [Highrise Burglar] tried to rob Iona one night.

She put him through the wall, then handed the dazed and confused would-be thief over to the local guards, along with detailing to them exactly what his classes and skills were, and what they did.

The guards were beyond delighted to get the information. He’d been a real nuisance, and now they knew exactly how he worked, and how to properly deal with him.

Without further ado, Iona arrived at Castle Valkyrie, her mood steadily getting more and more dour with each step she took towards her "home".

It was too… quiet. Too… empty.

Too cold. It was a lifeless husk, not the thriving training ground of squires.

"Ho Iona!" One of the staff members hailed her as she arrived at the drawbridge. One staff member, and not four squires.

"Jens!" Iona called back with false cheer. "Glad to see you again!"

The practice yard, built for a thousand, had a single Valkyrie and her squire sparring, the older woman trying to teach the girl without a proper practice partner. Gone were the days where Iona trained with nearly 200 of her fellow squires in the grounds.

Each echoing step through the castle, each hallway without another Valkyrie to greet hammered home their lack, their fall.

"Goblin’s Death" the bards called it.

"Valkyrie’s End" would be just as appropriate. Except, instead of a clean death, the Valkyries had a lethal gut wound, and were slowly limping along as they bled out, stomach acid eating through their flesh, agonizingly prolonging their end.

Iona made it to the [Quartermaster], and dropped the chests and the sack down.

"Special delivery!" Iona put some real cheer in her voice. [Knightly Accountant] Sophie had been there when Iona was growing up, and she was still alive, well, and grumpy. A thread to the past, a reminder that they were not dead.

Yet.

Iona gave one of the chests a calculated kick, and it burst open, the crystal Arcanite tumbling to the floor.

"Oooh, you shouldn’t have!" Sophie cooed over the overflowing piles of Arcanite, the diamonds, rubies and other gems glinting underneath. Iona grinned. The only time Sophie was happy was when she was getting lots and lots of money. The moment she needed to part with any of it?

Grumpiness.

Iona just grinned at Sophie as she started to sort the gems by size.

"Oh this is like yuletide come early! This isn’t a town’s payment, and you’re just messing with me, right? No, of course it isn’t. They pay in proper coins, not pure crystal."

Sophie froze.

"You didn’t rob a [Tax Collector] did you?"

"Ummm." Iona scratched her head, thinking about it.

"No. I don’t like the sound of that. No." Sophie started to pile the Arcanite back in the chests.

"Indirectly at worst?" Iona finally hedged. "Took it off a pirate."

"Hmmm." Sophie gave the chests a measuring look, before shrugging and opening them back up. "Well, more for me!"

"Us."

"Yes, yes, that’s what I said, now shoo. Close the door on your way out."

Iona left. Sophie hadn’t said it, but from her questions it was all too clear. Towns had stopped paying the Valkyries for their protection. Their sphere of influence, area of protection, and just sheer clout and numbers were on the downswing.

Unburdened, she made her way to the chapel, where she knelt in prayer.

Selene. Lunaris.

I need help. I don’t know what to do. There are fewer and fewer Valkyries. I’m doing everything I can, but it’s not enough. How do I fix this? How do I solve this? I need your guidance.

There was only silence at Iona’s prayer, but the silence was answer enough.

Instead of Iona trying to take all the problems on her shoulders and do it herself, she was going to visit Sigrun, the Valkyrie’s Grandmaster, who was in charge of fixing the Valkyrie’s problems.

Iona knocked sharply on Sigrun’s door.

"Enter." Sigrun’s clipped voice came from the door.

Iona entered and saluted, standing ram-rod straight. She held her salute for a few minutes, while Sigrun finished penning a letter.

There were four smaller desks in the room, for four [Secretaries] or [Assistants] or whatever was needed.

Only one desk was in use, and the man wasn’t exactly drowning in paper.

Finishing up, she quickly read over it, nodded to herself, rolled it up, and sealed it. The seal had some fancy enchantments on it, proving that this seal in particular had come from that die.

They weren’t impossible to forge. Just difficult.

"Iona. The Dusk Valkyrie." Sigrun slumped in her chair, some weight leaving her. She waved to her assistant, who got up and left for another room.

"Relax. How are you?" Sigrun asked, and Iona let go of the carefully-held salute.

"Fine. Took out the pirates on the Wakacola sea. Managed to loot the wreck, Sophie’s got it now. The Immortal healer’s dead. Cleared out a few bandit nests around Burnsley and Wolfden. Skinwalker near Monchester. Killed a giganotosaurus roaming near Northon."

"A giganotosaurus? Near Northon? That had to have an intelligence behind it, did you find who was responsible?" Sigrun asked, as the assistant came back with a thick folder. He quietly placed it on Sigrun’s desk, then headed back to his own work.

Iona shook her head.

"Vorlers were nearby."

Sigrun gave a curt nod of understanding. Vorlers were one of the biggest threats, worth dropping nearly everything for. Between the goblin invasion, and a mature nest of Vorlers, the Valkyries would’ve gone for the Vorlers.

A small nest? Three Valkyries were enough. One to exterminate the nest, and two to prevent accidents, and make sure the job was done thoroughly.

"Any Pekari?" Sigrun asked after the strange subterranean metal golems.

"One village got abducted, but the Order of the Red Lion got to them before I did."

Sigrun thumped a fist onto her desk, half-snarling as she spoke.

"Those rat-faced thieving bastards encroaching on our territory. Let me guess. They insist that we’re unable to properly look after the area, and it’s now under their protection."

Iona gave a curt nod.

"The villagers are understandably scared after getting abducted, and there’s nothing quite like a band of knights freeing them all to make them grateful."

Sigrun pounded on her desk twice, making her displeasure known.

"If the Pekari weren’t endemic to the rest of the world, I would’ve sworn that was a setup by the Red Lions. What else?"

Sigrun continued to debrief Iona, getting the full breadth of adventures and questing she’d been up to since the Dusk Valkyrie had last been at home base.

Sigrun flipped it open, and started scanning.

"That’s right, divinely blessed. Your track record is impressive. It’s like you’ve been a full Valkyrie for twenty years, not four." Having gotten what she needed, Sigrun snapped the folder shut.

"To serve and protect is my calling." Iona modestly accepted the compliment, not sure where Sigrun was going with this.

"When was the last time you took a break?" Sigrun leaned back in her chair, giving Iona a pointed look.

"Last night? I slept?" Iona wasn’t used to this line of questioning.

"No, I mean relaxed. Had time off. Did something for yourself. Talked with a mind-healer."

"Last night? It was, uh, relaxing?"

Iona wanted to cringe at Sigrun’s look, but she was more professional than that.

"Who’s your closest friend?"

"Julie." Iona snapped back without thinking.

"The same Julie for whom I’m holding a letter of complaint from the convent dedicated to Ness? The same Julie who’s now a nun, and not easy to talk with?" Sigrun gave Iona a piercing glare.

"Yes?"

Sigrun gave a disappointed sigh.

"Iona. You’re not the first to push yourself so hard, nor will you be the last. However, I’m not losing one of my Valkyries to overwork. You are taking a break. You are getting some friends, and if I have any say in it, a companion."

Iona saluted.

"Grandmaster. What would you have me do?"

Sigrun pulled out a fancy letter from Iona’s file. It was written on pristine, white paper, with a number of fancy flourishes and seals.

"We’re not doing well." Sigrun seemingly changed the conversation. "Under my leadership, the Valkyries have declined."

"It’s not your fault!" Iona protested. "The goblins-"

Sigrun held up her hand, and Iona closed her mouth.

"It’s not my fault. It is my responsibility. Such is the price of leadership. Speaking of leadership." Sigrun gave Iona one last measuring look.

"You’re going to be one of the officers." Sigrun told Iona. "You’ve worked hard enough, shown admirable dedication to the order, but most importantly, you’ve solved numerous issues with tact and diplomacy, rather than simply resorting to cracking the responsible party’s skull. You work well with people, and with a bit of training up, I believe you’ll make a fine officer."

Iona remained silent, one part feeling chastised, seven parts not knowing what to say. Sigrun was showing a shocking amount of trust and faith in Iona, and it took her by surprise.

"My plan for you is simple. You’re going to find a companion. You’ll then head off to the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft, to learn everything you can about leadership and administration, along with the whole host of other skills you’ll need to properly be an officer. Your companion will have a chance to grow up safely, and you can learn more about him or her. You’ll get a chance to make new friends, and establish proper networking. Meet the up and coming movers and shakers. Have people you know around the world."

Iona bowed her head.

"How can we afford it? Doesn’t the school practically charge a barony for admission?"

Sigrun got a smug look on her face.

"Yes. I’ve been talking with them though, and they’re interested in you. Very interested. You’ve been offered admission with no examination, and all expenses paid to attend."

Sigrun continued to look like a cat with cream, as Iona tried to parse how, or why, the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft would be interested in her.

Sigrun let her struggle for a bit, then showed some mercy. Mostly out of a desire to get the meeting over with, and get on with the rest of her work.

"It’s your blessing. Your ability to speak and know every language. The linguistics department wants you to work for them, helping them translate old texts, and correct any misunderstandings in words they have. They think having you for five years will be the same as less-blessed researchers working five hundred years."

Iona frowned.

"The linguistics department? With all due respect, I’m not sure how much I’d learn at the linguistics department, even at the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft. Wouldn’t Calador be better? You went there, right?"

"Just because the linguistics department wants you, doesn’t mean you can’t attend the rest of the School." Sigrun pointed out like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Plus, I doubt they’d let you take the Linguistic Track, or any other language Track. As for Calador, it knows war, administering armies, and not much else." Sigrun gestured broadly at the room, the three empty desks hammering home their situation once more. "Look where we are now. Look where that’s brought us. Also, I hate to say it, but the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft gives a better education than Calador. We never managed to beat them while I was there. Lastly, nearly every officer ends up at Calador. We’re trying something new with you."

Sigrun drummed her fingers for a moment.

"There’s also the matter of your third class, which I don’t doubt you’ll unlock. I personally think you should look into a Mallium [Warrior] class. You’ve got a full set of the metal, and the amount you’ve been using it should offer you a strong class in that direction. At the same time, the professors at the School can guide you better than I ever could. They have tricks to help unlock powerful classes, and attending will be a boon."

Sigrun’s eyes flickered to a timepiece, and the pace of her speech picked up.

"The School will be passing by Lyon in the fall. Be there. For the next nine months, you are on companion acquiring duty, and taking a break."

Iona bit her lip to keep her protest unvoiced. Sigrun gave her a knowing glare.

"Companions take time. You can’t just snap your fingers and acquire one. We have no stock, the goblins saw to that. You can ask the local branch of Florence’s Friends if they have anything, but the latest report I have from them isn’t promising." Sigrun paused to collect her thoughts.

"While I won’t gainsay you if fate intervenes, and you bond with a golden eagle or something, I’ll remind you that companions will end up being a significant part of your personal power. A friend to lean on. A mount. Transportation. An ear for your troubles. Someone who can stand by you, through thick and thin. I’m not knocking the majestic eagle, but when push comes to shove, would you rather a spinosaurus or an eagle at your back? I suggest you ponder the question while you winter here. You’ll most likely be heading to the Dairalt Republic in the spring. Dismissed."

Iona saluted, turned on her feet, and left.

Iona pondered her new… mission? Find a companion. Take a break.

She had mixed feelings about wintering at Castle Valkyrie. On one hand, she wouldn’t need to be riding through snow and freezing mud, always a plus. On the other, being cooped up in the nearly empty castle for a season?

Well, more Valkyries would find their way home as the winter storms rolled in. Iona reassured herself that there’d be more people around.

Iona made it back to her spartan room, her home in a sense. There she added her sketchbooks onto the piles of other sketchbooks she’d filled while traveling around.

She paused a moment, then reached out to grab the one she’d just added in. She idly opened it, and flipped through some of her drawings.

She smiled, memories washing over her as she looked through the pictures. Bird’s Eye in the crow’s nest. The ruin of The Black Shark.

She frowned as she flipped to the sketch she made of the healer, her head on a pike. It was worth drawing and remembering the bad with the good.

She flipped to Julie, and smiled a sad, bitter smile as tears welled up in her eyes.

There was a good chance that picture was the last she’d ever see of her.

Iona closed the book with a snap, and tossed it back onto the pile with the rest. She got up, stretched, and left her room, looking to see who else was around.

The silver lining in the whole mess that was Goblin’s Death - there’d been one Valkyrie casualty in the last four years. Each survivor was a powerhouse in and of themselves, and there were still the large numbers of Valkyries who hadn’t been nearby when the call came out. Not all was lost.

The vast majority of the squires, the future of the order, were gone.

Iona didn’t want to spend all her time stuck inside though. She spent one ridiculously memorable night with Randall, the idiot werewolf forgetting what phase the moons were in and turning what should’ve been a fun night into a near life-or-death scrap, Iona’s [Vow] not kicking in when it was pure self-defense, and the starting angle being terrible.

She didn’t see Randall again. Not after that magnitude of mistake.

Iona did respect the rule on no fraternization among Valkyries, and her winter was miserable as a result. She spent some of her time playing games and telling stories with the other Valkyries who’d made it back for the winter, along with training the three poor squires who had the undivided attention of half the order.

Many days would find Iona in the chapel, kneeling in prayer. Communing with her patron goddesses. They’d talk back, the three of them having the most wonderful conversations.

Iona prayed for peace and guidance. She prayed just to talk. She made reasonable requests and outrageous jokes.

She prayed for her dead friends to come back. The squires and Valkyries who’d died in Goblin’s Death. She prayed for Lux to come back. Impossible prayers, but she made them nonetheless, Lunaris and Selene never tiring of her.

Iona also brushed up on her combat fundamentals, and started a refresher course on mounted combat. Lances were the undisputed king of mounted combat, the only differences being varying schools of thought of which types were better. Many one-and-done lances, mundane lances, enchanted lances, skill-reinforced lances, there was a dizzying array of options.

Iona also took the time to practice and learn a number of esoteric weapons, weapons that hadn’t been covered when she was a squire learning from Alruna because, quite frankly, they were rare, hard to obtain, and not in common usage for a reason.

Mallium made obtaining the weapons trivial, and to Iona’s surprise, she discovered that she had a real affinity for glaives, the elegant weapons fitting well with her.

At the same time, rattling around in the empty hallways - especially without Alruna, who was off doing something - was driving Iona nuts, and the moment spring started to hint at showing up, she was off.

Chapter 273 - Major Interlude - Iona - Sigrun II

Countries only vaguely had notions of "borders", and which countries started where, and where they ended. Much more important was who protected a town, and what the culture of a city was.

The Valkyries tended to protect towns, cities, and settlements that tended towards castles, keeps, knights, and serfs, all of whom vaguely identified themselves as being part of Rolland. More important was their identity towards the Valkyries, who in turn paid taxes to Rolland, and vaguely listened to their king and nobility.

It didn’t stop them from roaming all over, acting as [Knight Errants] for portions of the continent. However, their density increased the closer they got to Castle Valkyrie, and their obligations lay around the same area.

Crossing into The Great Tang was easy. There was no such thing as a border patrol. Rolland serfs simply made way for Tang nong, rice paddies replaced wheat fields, and cultivators roamed the land, turning their nose up at the nong and cultivating in their sects, instead of knights galloping across the countryside, turning their nose up at the serf and training in their castles.

It didn’t work exactly like that, but it looked that way to Iona.

The Great Tang wasn’t just a fancy name for the country, a proud boast. The Tang sect had many reasons as to why they were "Great", but the simple truth of the matter was the country was huge. It stretched nearly two thousand miles, but Iona was lucky that Rolland - and the Valkyrie’s headquarters - were sort of center-north of the Great Tang. The country touched eight other countries - all mortal - including Rolland, Nime, and Iona’s destination, Dairalt.

The Great Tang was also great in the diversity of species that lived there. Iona was no stranger to dinosaur-crested saurians or metal-wrapped dullahans, but humans were the predominant race in Rolland. The average village was filled with humans, and humans were the majority in most towns and cities.

The Great Tang welcomed all mortals, and was a veritable melting pot of species. Individual sects and clans tended towards a single race, but no one race was in abundance over the rest.

As Iona traveled across the width of the country, moving impossibly fast with her absurd stats, she got into a few spots of trouble. Her [Vow] wasn’t just for when it was convenient - she was mandated to protect the weak. To face injustice. To right wrongs.

Iona at full speed could probably make the trip in a week. It took her three months, and her exploits in the time would be the stuff that’d keep bards busy for a year.

Sigrun would pitch a small fit if she knew what Iona was getting up to. Her intention was for Iona to take a break, and not burnout, yet Iona was running around, busy as ever.

For Iona, it was simply another spring. Another season. Another sketchbook filled with people and places, to add to the others when she got back to Castle Valkyrie. A diary, of sorts.

The summer solstice that year fell on the night of two full moons. A sacred day, made doubly sacred by the event. Iona found the local church of the Tabernacle, and spent the day in prayer.

Selene. Lunaris.

Hey! Hope you’re having a good day. An excellent night. Can’t wait to look at the moons tonight! They’re going to look gorgeous, I know it.

An amused divine voice answered back.

Why Iona! Are you saying that the moons don’t look gorgeous at times?

A second voice chimed in.

Oh dear. How little faith she has!

The two voices laughed, poking fun at Iona. She blew a raspberry at them, getting some looks from some of the [Priests] and other worshippers in the building. Iona carried on, undisturbed.

Please protect my sister Valkyries.

I hope Su Na manages to get a good harvest this year.

I know you said it wasn’t possible, but could you bring Lux back?

Iona got warm feelings back from the goddesses. They’d heard her. It was no guarantee of intervention, but they’d heard her.

Enough about me! How are you doing? Anything interesting going on? For me, I ended up in a small spot of bother with the Iron Sword Sect. I forced one of their disciples to stop beating a traveler, and he turned on me in a rage, trying to kill me. I killed him instead. Then his master showed up, and wouldn’t stop, so I had to kill him. For whatever reason, the sect leader then came after me, and I tried to talk it out.

Yeah, I ended up killing him as well.

Then a bunch of elders popped up out of nowhere, and honestly, do all cultivators have a few screws loose?

In our experience, yes. They do. Selene said.

Well, most of them. The screwy ones die. The sane ones stick around. Lunaris chimed in.

Well, then…

Iona continued to spend the day in prayer, talking with the goddesses, and them talking back. Then as night fell - she had a particular affinity for that time of day, after her moniker - she made her way to the rooftop.

On this day, the moons rose at exactly the same time the sun set, perfectly balanced and symmetrical. At the moment the sun touched the horizon, at the exact instant that the moons peeked over the edge of the planet, a pair of thunderous, divine voices hammered Iona with such force that she was forced to her knees, hands clutching her ears to try and quiet the voices.

Selene and Lunaris were Speaking.

"Well, since the two of you asked so nicely."

Iona spent hours curled up in pain, her pleas to her patrons to explain what happened getting no response or answer.

She remained that way until one of the priests found her, and tended to her.

Iona took a short detour to visit the Five Flames. Nobody was quite sure of their origins. Scholars argued if the site was magical, divine, the result of an inscrutable enchantment from an ancient civilization, some Immortal pulling a prank, or just a huge scam by the sect running the place.

Iona didn’t think it was all that impressive. And that the name was something of a misnomer. There were only two eternally burning flames, a solid pillar of black Pyronox flames, and one of Fire. The Inferno, Ash, and Radiance ‘flames’ had been extinguished long ago.

Or so the guide who Iona had to pay too much money to claimed. So much for being "eternal". Some empty spots suggested some truth to the matter, but Iona left the place feeling vaguely disappointed. Not before sketching the scene in her book.

The terrain started to change, fewer and fewer farms turning into a more interesting mix as the temperature cooled. At first glance, it was all wild and untamed grasslands, but an experienced [Ecologist] - or anyone with passing knowledge of how the Republic of Dairalt worked - would know the truth. The grasslands were carefully cultivated by each gnoll tribe that lived in the area, giving an optimal grazing experience to the creatures they raised.

Iona met briefly with the Kokaar tribe, fascinated by their herds of ankylosauruses. Nearly every member of the tribe had one as a companion, and they had a new stock they were preparing to sell.

Or cull. Nearly everything they used came from the ankylosauruses. Their pots were hollowed-out tails, their needles carved from their bones. Their shields were overlapping scales, while their yurts were made from the soft belly leather. Eggs and meat were a staple, taken from the dinosaurs as the dinosaurs took from the carefully managed grasslands the tribe controlled.

The tribe instantly liked Iona, her mastery of the tribe’s own tongue - nevermind speaking Trader Talk or Sythria, the communal language of Dairalt - instantly cemented her as an honored guest.

When they found out she had come to Dairalt in search of a companion, they tried to convince Iona that an ankylosaurus would be ideal.

For a hefty price.

"Fantastic armor, like you Valkyrie!" Yotrr said. "Powerful spikes, looks harmless until WHAM! Tail to the face! A land creature, like yourself. And ah, what wonderful bodies they have!"

He gave Iona an appraising look.

"Like you!"

They were decent salesgnolls, but Iona wasn’t convinced. The dinosaurs were slow, and they weren’t exactly rare. It wasn’t about rarity for Iona - she’d take a common bear if it suited her well - but the lack of scarcity implied that Florence’s Friends would have a number.

"Ah, but look at them! Majestic animals, I’d hate to tear one from the herd. It just wouldn’t be right! I couldn’t hope to bear upon your hospitality while working from an egg up, it would be far too much." Iona figured out how to gracefully decline, while making the gnolls feel good about themselves.

A few sketches of the gnolls with their particular companions helped mollify them. They’d seen themselves with the Mirror element before, but a sketch was a rare thing. Easy enough for Iona to [Draw], and worth more goodwill.

She kept a few sketches for herself. Memories, a log of the places she’d been and the people she’d met.

She got directions to Maral from them, the only true city in Dairalt. Headquarters of Florence’s Friends.

Dairalt was not a wealthy country. The gnolls tended to be happy in their tribes, bonded with their companions, living their best life. The climate was cold, and the land not terribly wealthy. Would-be invaders were faced with harsh winters as well as powerful dinosaurs and beasts, backed by skills.

It wasn’t worth it.

Dairalt didn’t have much to offer the rest of the world, not until Florence’s Friends. A group of gnolls from different tribes came together, based on their great love for animals. At the same time, they were a practical sort who knew that not every animal was most at home in the plains. That some animals would be happier in the wider world.

They knew money and outside funding was needed.

Such was the birth of Florence’s Friends.

They were stationary, and they expanded as external money flowed to them. They required infrastructure, and the city of Maral was born. Being a place most of the tribes had contact with, a place for resolving inter-tribe disputes emerged, and later, something resembling a government was formed.

Iona smelled the place a full day before she got to the outskirts. Lumbering titanosauruses had thick blankets, larger than most houses, to protect them against the cold. A few [Massive Tenders] kept a wary eye on the eight of them, protecting them against the elements and poachers, and keeping people on the road safe.

Iona craned her neck as she passed, watching the majestic beasts. They were like the brontosaurus the Valkyries used to have, before it died at Goblin’s Death, but even larger. There were also a number of rock-like protrusions from its back, looking like natural armor. If there was a category after "massive", the sauropods would belong in it.

Creatures needed space and land commensurate with their size. The titanosauruses required massive fields dedicated just to them, and it was nearly half a day before Iona saw diplodocus, the smaller sauropods having their own land.

As Iona traveled along the road, the dinosaurs got smaller, more numerous, and closer together. Feed shacks popped up here and there, and the density of gnolls increased.

Dinosaurs turned to other, more fantastical beasts as Iona continued along the road. Lion-headed, scorpion-tailed manticores were next to the pegasus, and the kelpies had a large pond to keep them happy.

Before long, Iona was staring up at the headquarters of Florence’s Friends. All manner of happy shrieks and cries came from the animals inside. The building itself was made out of polished bone, the remains of many titans artfully and expertly worked together to create a glorious-multilayered structure.

The world’s largest pet store. Building 01.

The doors were wide open, and people were moving in and out. A city dweller buying cat food, a burly, way-too-hairy-to-be-fully human walking out with a hulking wolf nearly as large as he was. A full squad of dullahan warriors wrestled a stone egg onto a wagon, where it was swiftly chained down and thick canvas was thrown over it.

Iona eyed their armor-skin, noting areas of grey paint over where standards and seals were normally kept. Someone was going through a large amount of effort to remain anonymous for whatever was in that egg.

It wasn’t hurting anyone, and it wasn’t her business. Iona ignored them, and entered the store.

Signs were plastered all over, in all of the common languages and nearly every uncommon one.

"Bonding with a companion not guaranteed."

It was a sobering reminder that finding a creature to use as a companion was the easy part. The connection was the hard part.

Iona entered the store and looked around.

Cats played on towers designed for them, while dogs raced and played with small dinosaurs. Some rabbits were in a heavily-warded enclosure, and Iona saw why as one of them hopped, then blinked forward.

Scorpions were next to spiders. A gorgon, with her head covered, was examining a variety of snakes. All of them, from the common garden snake, to the deadly cobras and asps, all the way to the crested vipers and white snakes were interested in her, raised up and following her every motion.

Was that a devil negotiating in good earnest with some poor [Florence’s Friend’s Floor Manager]? The manager had the advantage of a home turf and a narrow, specialized class for handling situations like this, while the devil, well.

Had an eternity of negotiating and writing contracts. An eternity of reveling in the act of negotiation and contract-writing.

Iona stared, having never seen an Immortal casually roaming around in mortal lands before. The Wardens didn’t count - there’d been nothing casual about their actions and motives. The demon she fought hadn’t counted either. It was a pirate, and there was nothing casual about a life and death fight.

The devil was shopping.

Iona eventually tore her eyes away, and kept going. She needed to remind herself that Dairalt was on the edge of mortal lands, and bordered both Modu and Jurcor. Florence’s Friends catered to more than just mortals, and by the Treaty of Kyowa, they were allowed. She carried on.

Parrots were cawing next to sleeping owls, Oozlums flitted next to microraptors. Peacocks showed off their plumage, which offended a swan. The bird in question flashed back intricate colors, showing off her Mirage element.

Iona continued to wander around, each creature and display more overwhelming than the next. A dozen [Handlers] ran around, feeding the animals, keeping them happy, and breaking up arguments.

The second floor had endless rows of feed, from mundane hay, to live crickets and mice, all the way to rare slabs of meat, sold by the half-ton.

The third floor had eggs, neatly labeled and organized in rows. Half were under heater lamps, while more were in stasis fields, keeping them well-preserved.

Creatures that were harder to contain were here. Basilisks and Xuan’wu, tyrannosaurus rex and thunderbirds, the rarest and most difficult creatures to keep only had a few eggs.

There were a few gaps where powerful creatures had been purchased, and Florence’s Friends hadn’t been able to stock more quite yet.

The floor had significant security, with most shoppers unable to wander among the eggs. Iona spent some time looking at the unhatched monsters, while reading a sign that indicated what they had. Before long, a member of the store approached her.

"Hi! Can I help you!" A cheerful rabbitkin greeted Iona. It was clear to Iona that she was using one of the more subtle social skills - [Personable], a quick peek of her skills revealed.

It also revealed her name, but people got weirded out when Iona called out their name before they introduced themselves.

Iona didn’t mind that Celery was using a social skill. They greased the world, and made things go smoothly. She had her own [Magnetic Charm] skill.

With a flex of thought, Iona rearranged the Mallium that was omnipresent on her body, quickly creating the detailed wings by her ears that was the hallmark of the Valkyries.

"Iona. Pleased to meet you." She extended her hand, shaking the rabbitkin’s.

"Oooh! A Valkyrie! I’ve never seen one before! Can I touch?" She asked, reaching up to Iona’s ears. Iona bent over some, letting the rabbitkin touch.

"Wooooooooow. Oh! Where are my manners?! I’m Celery!" The rabbitkin was energetic, constantly moving even though the two were just talking. "Are you looking for a steed?"

"Yeah. Hopefully a companion?" Iona trailed off, not sure what terminology Florence’s Friends used, and if "steeds" were the same as "companions" for them.

"Oooh, right! Ok! You came to the right place! Florence’s Friends is here for you!" Celery said. "Now! Steeds aren’t quite the same as companions. You ride on steeds, and anything big enough can work as a steed. A companion’s different! You need to be BEST FRIENDS with your companion, and you need to have the same temperament!"

"Temperament?"

"Yeah! Like, you’re a great, big, fierce fighter, right? Strong Valkyrie, slaying goblins left and right? Pow! Pow!" Celery mimed swinging a greatsword around at the end.

Iona clenched her jaw briefly, then relaxed it. Celery hadn’t been there. Hadn’t known. Didn’t smell burning goblins in her sleep. To her, it was just a famous story.

"Sure." Iona agreed, keeping her words curt to keep her emotions under a lid.

"Well, something like a bunny isn’t going to work." Celery said. "They’re flighty prey animals. They’re not big fighters. Snakes might not work either. You probably want a carnivore! Or a large herbivore. Moose can be mean."

Celery was clearly making assumptions about Iona, but they weren’t exactly wrong.

"Something sneaky and clever like a fox might not work, but something big and strong like an anteosaurus could work! They just get right up in your face, and RAWR! Not even Lumornor can save you!"

Iona had successfully come to Florence’s Friends with a mostly open mind. She’d gotten exposed to dozens of different animals over the years, but was willing to listen to the experts. She mentally shuffled her list around.

"Is there anything you don’t have here?" Iona asked. Celery sighed, a saleswoman having heard the same question a dozen times, and pointed to the board.

"Out on those." She said, then frowned.

"Hang on, we just sold our last cockatrice. Lemme fix that real fast."

She made some lightning quick adjustments.

"Ok! Sorry about that! We have everything else!"

Iona scanned the board, noting a particularly powerful monster was missing from the "not in stock" list. One that, on first glance, would fit with her temperamentally, would work as a steed, and, important to Iona, was unlikely to die in a fight, or anytime soon.

Iona also had experience with them.

The only issue might be the price. The Valkyries had sent Iona with a ransom’s worth of coin, anticipating sky-high prices for a proper companion. Iona had carefully guarded the coin, but even then, some of the prices she’d seen already were out of reach.

That was before upkeep and maintenance came into play. Feeding a creature was expensive, and the larger they got, the higher the price. Iona had spent too many years mucking out stables and throwing dinosaurs their dinner. She knew how much money it cost.

"What’s the temperament of a hydra like?" She asked. The Valkyries had one, and she had some idea of what hydras were like, but at the same time, that might’ve just been that one hydra. Outliers were everywhere.

"It depends on the hydra! They’re cunning, vicious creatures, powerful lords of their domain! I hope I can meet one someday! They’re soooo cool. It probably wouldn’t want to be my friend."

Celery’s ears drooped, then perked back up.

"Oh! But we don’t carry hydras! They’re too smart. It’d be wrong. Could you imagine if we sold humans here? We’re not Urwa." Celery gave Iona the evil eye, which on the rabbitkin just looked adorable. Iona wanted to pinch her cheeks - or do more - but kept on track.

"I’m a great, big, fierce warrior, like you said. I’m straightforward, and I’m a physical fighter and archer. What would you suggest for me?"

Celery grabbed a carrot from a belt pouch, and started chewing.

"Hmmmm." She thoughtfully munched around the vegetable. "Your primary element is Celestial, and that’s just sooo rare. Usually only variants get Celestial. What’s your other element?"

Iona hesitated a moment, then figured it couldn’t hurt that much. Not when dealing with something this important, and Celery seemed to genuinely want to help her.

A paranoid part of Iona mentioned that nobody gave out information to untrustworthy people, but at the same time, Iona had used Ice arrows often enough that anyone paying attention would know her secondary element.

"Ice." Iona said.

"Oh! That’s great! We’re next to the pole, and we’ve got a ton of Ice creatures! For you, the great big brawny fighter? A polar bear would be perfect!"

Celery’s ears drooped again.

"But they have their cubs in the winter, and the only cub we have left is a runt. That, and it’s been a few months. It’s easiest to start working with a creature from the time they’re born if you want a companion."

Her ears perked up again.

"But don’t take the baby away from mom! They need their mom! It’s cruel otherwise."

Iona was finally forced to sidetrack a bit.

"You care a lot about the animals. Yet you’re ok selling them?"

"Yup!" Celery cheerfully agreed. "Not every animal wants to be here." She leaned closer, and whispered conspiratorially to Iona. "Some of the cages are a bit too small."

Iona quirked an eyebrow at that. She’d seen some of the cages, and they’d looked plenty roomy to her. Heck, the dogs had more square feet than the squire’s rooms!

"Either way, lots of these animals want to go out! See the world! They want to have a best friend as well! I help them do that, then everyone is happy! Plus, I get to spend my days surrounded by the most awesome creatures! It’s a great job!"

"Well, let’s see the polar bear then!" Iona let Celery’s infectious happiness get to her.

The store was like an endless labyrinth. Celery guided Iona around, revealing endless rooms and hallways that Iona had somehow entirely missed the first time around - then exited the building, only to enter a different building.

The second building was hot. The air was practically thick enough to drink, and murky, fenced-off ponds and soaring tropical trees was the order of the day. Nevermind that Dairalt was about as far south as possible, and chilly even in the summer. Florence’s Friends spared no expense on nice habitats for their animals.

They left that building, and kept going, navigating through numerous buildings and environments, creatures that didn’t easily graze in the grasslands.

Finally, they got to the polar bears. Iona took one look at the runt, and had serious doubts.

"He’s… kinda runty." Iona observed. She’d never seen a polar bear before, but even to her untrained eye, the bear was less than impressive.

Her blessing to look at System-granted stats and skills was equally disappointing.

"I know, poor thing." Celery looked from Iona to the runt, and back.

"Actually… I’m not sure if your temperaments would work well. Or if he’d be a good steed." She frankly admitted.

"Well, what else do you have? Any Ice or Celestial casters?"

Celery laughed.

"A Celestial caster! Oh, I wish! No, but we’ve got some Ice casters. Want to see?"

"Sure! Lead the way!"

The first candidate was a scorpion, encased entirely in Ice armor, cold enough that Iona felt a chill. Iona and Celery both agreed it was unlikely to be a good fit, although Iona was more than impressed when she peeked at what skills it had, and just how many stats it was running. The second was a crafty fox, happily munching on rabbits, snowflakes dancing around its pure white fur. It was close, and Iona and Celery agreed that it was a strong candidate, even if the temperament might not be exactly there. A quick, nimble carnivore that had no issues attacking? Quite a few marks in the "yes" column.

Almost all of the fox’s skills were strong, or had the potential to become powerful.

[Heart Hearts] was a weird skill though. Something about finding the tastiest hearts to eat, and making them all the more delicious?

However, it didn’t punch up, and it liked using tricks and cleverness to get what it wanted - namely, more rabbits. Iona mentally quibbled a bit - she thought the fox knew exactly what it wanted from life and worked hard to get it, just like she did.

It went into the "maybe" column.

Iona spent some time imagining working with the fox. It could easily wrap around her neck, or balance on her broad shoulders. It could hunt with her, play with her, and Iona could easily imagine lazy hours spent drawing, while the fox gnawed on a favorite… heart?

Foxy got upgraded to the "probably" column.

A fat caterpillar that lazed around and ate was instantly rejected by both Iona and Celery, and the poor rabbitkin berated herself for even suggesting it.

"Oh! We’ve got a mammoth!" Celery eagerly bounded through the store, Iona following until they left the building. A dozen fields navigated later, and Iona was looking at a small herd of mammoths.

"That one! There!" Celery pointed to one of the baby mammoths. To Iona’s untrained eye, he looked just like the rest of them. However, looking through their statuses showed the truth - the mammoth in question was a full-blown [Mage].

"They’re not super aggressive, but once they get in a fight, watch out! Boom! Pam! Wham! Those tusks are nasty, and they’ve got a powerful charge! Their snouts are clever and nimble! And look at how heavy they are! They can smush anything, and their fur is like armor!"

Celery was a canny [Salesrabbit]. She knew how to make a deal, without coming off greasy or pressuring, which improved her chances of success.

Iona looked at the mammoth, and tried to imagine riding one.

It was easy. She could sit behind the head, and use a lance or bow easily, from a dominant position high above everyone else. On the ground, she could cover the mammoth’s weaknesses, and the mammoth could cover hers. Her biggest concern would be overheating the poor animal. Armor was hot and heavy, and that was before the animal’s massive fur coat was taken into account.

Yet, a caster - an Ice caster - should be able to keep themselves cool.

"How much?" Iona asked, and Celery named a price. Iona felt her heart plunge into her boots.

She didn’t have that much.

She didn’t have nearly that much.

"Too much?" Celery asked.

"A bit. Are all mammoths that much?"

Celery shook her head.

"No, casters tend to cost ten to fifty times as much. This one’s twenty times, given how strong its class appears to be."

Iona winced at the price.

She hadn’t known.

"If I wanted a caster companion, what would you suggest?" Iona had an idea in her mind, and she wanted to chase it down to its logical conclusion. She wasn’t going to let a little bit of adversity get in her way.

If it failed though? She had no problems changing track, and getting a more physically-inclined creature to work with. Her blessing was a little unfair in that respect. She could see exactly how powerful a creature was, and what skills they had, and pick the best of the lot.

Celery chewed thoughtfully on another carrot.

"Well… What’s your budget?"

Iona gave the top end of what she had.

"Mmmm. The fox isn’t in that range. She’s more expensive than the mammoth."

"Why’s that?"

"Adorable Ice fox? Some noble is going to pay waaaaaaaaaaaaay too much money to get her for his daughter. We’ll probably need to send someone to make sure it all goes well."

Celery frowned and kicked a rock.

"Nobles keep us in business, but have the woooooooooooorst track records. At least with you, I know you’ll keep the animal doing what it loves, even if it’s risking its life."

Celery thought for a moment more.

"Well, there’s always the wilderness."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, if you want an Ice caster, Modu’s right next to us, frozen pole and all! The conditions are terribly harsh! Unfit for beastkin or human! The animals love it though. It’s where we send our hunting teams for Ice and snow creatures."

Celery nodded absent-mindedly.

"Yup, yup. They’re so happy down there where it’s cold. Oh! You could also poke around the tribes, and see if any of their creatures are casters. They usually bring them here though. Too hard to sell out there."

Iona thought about it.

It sounded like her options were a non-caster creature of some sort, or visit the frozen wastes and give hunting a caster down a shot.

Florence’s Friends weren’t going anywhere. If seeking out an animal in the wilderness didn’t work out, she could just head back and pick up an animal. It’d take some time, but Iona had time - and orders to take it easy.

A few weeks in the wilderness sounded like a "break" - one that Sigrun would approve of - while keeping Iona busy and on the move. Staying still wasn’t in her nature.

Plus, they were currently out of polar bears, and the idea of one appealed to Iona. They seemed to be an exact match for her, and were large enough to be a steed, while powerful warriors in their own right.

"If I wanted to try my luck in the wilderness, how would I go about it?" Iona asked. "Also, are there special rules for entering Modu?"

The ice giants ruled Modu, but Iona knew the rules for entering the country were lax, in spite of it being on the mortal-Immortal border. The Tabernacle’s primary place of worship was located inside Modu, and Iona knew pilgrims had no issues visiting the place.

Visiting the Tabernacle’s primary temple was on Iona’s lifetime bucket list. She’d love to be able to pray to Selene and Lunaris from there.

"If you’re going to the arctic? Don’t wreck their stuff." Celery shrugged. "That’s what the hunters have said. For making a friend? It’s like making a friend anywhere! Play with them! Hang out with them! Talk with them! If they like you, they’ll hang out, and if they don’t, they’ll maul you to death! Careful though, their roughhousing and ‘shred to pieces’ look really similar!"

Iona chatted with Celery for a while. Celery didn’t seem to care at all that Iona wasn’t buying anything today from Florence’s Friends, simply happy to guide Iona towards TRUE FRIENDSHIP!!!!

With four exclamation points.

"Oh! One last thing!" Celery said as they were wrapping up. "Once you get your new BEST FRIEND FOREVER come back and see us! We can help you get the basics down!"

Unsaid - for a modest fee. Iona didn’t mind though, it’d be worth it dozens of times over.

"Of course I will!"

Their business mostly concluded, Iona moved on, and gave Celery her best [Charming] smile.

"Would you be interested in spending the night together?"

Celery’s ears perked up briefly, then went flat.

"Oh. OH! Um. No thank you."

Iona shrugged.

"Alright, no worries! Thank you again!"

Iona found an inn, and spent the night drawing all manner of fantastical creatures she’d seen that day. It took up dozens of pages in her notebook, nearly filling it entirely.

At the end, she drew Celery, then went to sleep, preparing to visit Immortal lands for the first time in her life.

The arctic wastes of Modu.

Chapter 274 - Major Interlude - Iona - Sigrun III

It took Iona ten days, moving at high speed, to get from Maral down to the frozen arctic wastes of Modu.

Iona passed numerous tribes as she traveled, sharing a quick meal with some, spending the night with others, and being mistrustfully thrown out of more. The gnolls in those tribes were convinced that Iona was there to steal from them, either their food or their companions.

Iona had basic wilderness survival knowledge, but took every chance to learn from the local gnolls how to best survive the harsh, cold conditions.

In spite of it being the height of summer, snow covered the ground as Iona moved into the tundra, then finally into the permafrost. She got in the habit of wearing her full armor at all times, which had the interesting effect of slowing her down.

Armor was hot and heavy, and between all the layers Iona had and the Mallium covering her, exerting herself too hard risked overheating if she kept going at high intensity for too long.

Iona paused when her feet hit ice for the first time, with the ground disappearing into endless white in front of her.

The frost giants claimed all that which was covered by ice. Iona still wasn’t a fan of Immortals, although she supposed the Treaty of Kyowa disallowed most Immortals in mortal lands - not the reverse. Mortals were tolerated in Immortal lands, as long as they didn’t screw up some Immortal's thousand-year plan.

Or accidentally chop down some tree that was being groomed for its descendent to have the exact right shade of wood for a sculptor, or some other crazy Immortal scheme.

A number of Immortals even liked having a mortal workforce around, although none would ever reach a position of power. Immortals were also known to visit the Maple Orphanages now and then, and recruit a hundred kids for some task or another.

Training up a smith to have a very specific skill was a bit hit or miss. Training a hundred smiths wasn’t that much more expensive, and made the odds of success significantly higher. Orphans needed a place to go, and all in all it was a mutually beneficial arrangement. Mostly.

Iona had severe doubts that it was all that benevolent, although Maples was well-funded from former kids who’d made their way in the world.

She chewed on her lip, refusing to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, Immortals could do some good. Sometimes. Even if by accident.

Figuring there was nothing to be gained by just standing in an open field, Iona took the first step into Modu.

It was anticlimactic. Just a soft crunch as Iona’s weight crashed through the thin ice. She put one step in front of the next, slowly ascending the polar cap of ice. Applying her will to the Mallium, Iona changed her boots, adding spikes to keep her stable on the ice.

Life rapidly withered away, choked under the smothering layers of frozen water. Iona was unsure how anything could survive out here.

Yet, as time passed and Iona’s rations dwindled, signs of life she saw indeed. Snowgrass thrived in the environment, the plant having figured out how to survive the harsh conditions when nothing else could. The pet project of an Immortal [Botanist] thousands of years ago, still thriving to this day.

It formed the foundation of the grand food web that gave life to the inhospitable environment. Elk, mice, rabbits, and more grazed on the grasses, foxes and ice wyrms preyed on them, and the circle of life continued.

Iona stayed well clear of any signs of civilization. The ice giants liked their castles made of ice, built large enough to accommodate them while throwing blinding light all over. Iona even saw a few in the distance, deep blue flesh glancing out from white furs as the giants went about their daily lives.

Iona carefully avoided killing anything, instead acting more like a scavenger, or a vulture. When a pack of wolves brought down an elk, Iona brazenly waltzed over. The wolves growled at her, and she growled back.

One of them lunged for her, and she casually backhanded it. She put enough force in the blow to show that she was serious, but not so much as to harm the wolf. It would’ve defeated the purpose of avoiding killing.

After all, if the elk was some prized specimen of a frost giant, it wasn’t Iona who had killed it. It was the wolves, nature itself.

Most of the pack circled her, investigating this strange, bipedal, metal-clad monster that had intruded upon them. Iona stood up tall, showing off her size and attempting to assert dominance, then slowly walked towards the carcass.

Two stragglers were busy chowing down on the elk, determined to get their fill before the rest of the pack made a decision.

The wolves snapped and barked at her, but were unwilling to engage in a life-or-death fight. The two gluttons scattered away from the elk’s body as Iona arrived. She grabbed her trusty axe, and with three sharp swings, liberated half the ribs.

Iona took her prize and left, the wolves descending upon the remains like… well, wolves.

Iona spent time traveling. Following the elk, seeing the southern lights. Encountering rare and fantastical plants.

Seeing the Reverse Glacier. A gigantic block of slowly moving ice, that reflected the reverse.

A beautiful field of summer flowers, with the moons up in the night sky reflected in the glacier. Iona was reflected as an elf, wearing cotton robes with dark hair. Her axe turned into a quill, and her fingers were stained with ink. A gaggle of children surrounded her.

A strange, magical place. The value of seeing what one magical object thought was the opposite?

Questionable. Not exactly worth a full journey on its own, but if it was on the way, well…

A few days later, she encountered the great lake. Somehow, the vast expanse of water wasn’t frozen, in spite of being on a bed of ice a mile thick, and was the second source of life in the arctic.

Iona had only learned of most of the animals recently because of Florence’s Friends. Seals and walruses lounged on the shores of the lake, while penguins waddled in herds.

If Iona was going to find a polar bear, this would be the place.

First was shelter. While the summer wasn’t supposed to have the vicious storms that plagued the area the rest of the year, it never hurt to have a bolt-hole. Reshaping her Mallium, Iona created a crude ice pick and shovel, and got to work.

After securing her shelter - and stocking it with the well-preserved body of a walrus, who’d died to injuries sustained in a fight for dominance - Iona went wandering.

She tracked penguins up until the point they dove into the water. She watched the seals play, their energy infectious. Wolverines slunk around, hunting hares, and lean big cats hunted, keeping herds healthy by preying on the slow, the weak, and the sick.

Iona was warm in her armor, but she knew if she got wet, if she fell into the water, she’d be in serious trouble. Not only would the water steal her heat, not only were there creatures in the water that occasionally caused mass exoduses, but there was a risk of everything just freezing.

Iona was strong.

She wasn’t stronger than Gaia, than Mother Nature herself, and refused to pit herself against the elements that way.

There was no night, not during the summer. Iona was sensitive to the needs of her body - all the better to ignore them in a fight - and slept in her little hidey hole when she thought it was appropriate. She could go for days on end without rest, thanks to her training, stats, and most importantly [Strength from the Stars], but why marathon needlessly?

Iona spent far too long getting breakfast together. The walrus was frozen solid, which perfectly preserved it and made it safe to eat, even if Iona had no vitality. However, it was frozen solid, and Iona didn’t have an easy way to thaw it.

She did it the hard way. Cutting off a piece, and chewing on it until that bite thawed, then moving on.

Iona had her fill, then carefully exited.

There was a new crowd in the area, a herd of wooly rhinos. Iona climbed to the top of a small hill, to better see and not be in the way of the creatures.

Iona was all too aware that they were wild beasts. They could turn on her in a second.

Not an exact temperament fit, but Alruna had bonded with a triceratops. It wasn’t like temperament was the end all be all. The idea of a wooly rhino was tugging on Iona’s heartstrings. She’d spent years around Alruna’s triceratops, and her death at Valkyrie’s End was a harsh blow to her mentor, and Iona. A wooly rhino was close in some respects, and far away enough in others. Both had strong natural armor that the Valkyries could augment. Both were herbivorous quadrupeds, with a business front.

Iona had gotten the vast majority of her training on Trikey, and most of it would transfer over.

Yeah, a wooly rhino would work well. Iona thought she might even go for one of the rhinos here and now, her divine blessing giving her a perfect look at the creature’s stats and skills, and letting her easily determine which creatures were the cream of the crop.

The beasts didn’t look like they were going anywhere in a hurry.

She darted back to her hidey-hole, grabbed her notebook, and headed back to her outpost. She went back to scanning the wooly rhinos, taking extensive notes.

Iona already had two candidates among the younger rhinos. One caster, and the second had unusually high stats for its level, indicating high-quality classes.

Iona was writing down the details of what she’d seen. A shadow crossed the sun, and Iona looked up after finishing the word she was writing.

Too late.

With a deafening cry that scattered the animals present, a wyvern landed with enough force to crack the mile-thick ice, partially landing on Iona.

Iona jumped out of the way at the last moment, but didn’t quite make it. The wyvern’s hindlegs slammed down on Iona’s lower left leg, utterly crushing and pulverizing it.

Her head slammed into the powdery snow, almost instantly cracking itself on the ice underneath and dazing her.

The wyvern blasted the wooly rhinos with a frost beam, hitting an arbitrary member of the herd and freezing it solid as the rest of the beasts scattered. The wyvern’s claws closed around Iona, cracking bones and cutting Iona open as it sheared through her armor like it wasn’t there. The wyvern hopped forward, grabbing the frozen beast with its other foot, then taking off once again.

Iona was only still alive thanks to her ever-present armor, reinforced by [Celestial Armaments], and her [Stellar Body]-boosted vitality. Otherwise, instead of being dazed and concussed, Iona’s head would’ve split open like a watermelon.

Iona rapidly got her bearings back, but they were already in the air, the wyvern flying back to her nest.

Iona liked her chances dropping from the absurd heights the wyvern flew at. The alternative was getting to the monster’s nest. Her arms were pinned against her side, but with a clever flick, she dislodged her axe from where it rested on her hip, the enchantments on the weapon snapping it to her hand.

She didn’t immediately attack the wyvern, no. She peeked at its levels, stats, and skills, looking for weaknesses to exploit, or conditional skills to avoid.

A weaker woman would’ve given up then.

Level 1045.

Ice. Mirror. Dark. All three elements were leaning towards magic and mage skills, the wyvern trusting in its own innate body and power to handle physical problems, and skills and magic to cover everything else.

The Ice let the ice wyvern live in the harsh climate, gave her a powerful breath attack, and let it half-merge into snowstorms. The Mirror protected her, reinforcing her scales against harm and reflecting attacks back, along with granting small empowerments. [You are what you eat] looked to be an absurd skill. Her Dark element both gave her some small measure of disguise, along with empowering her teeth and claws, and cutting through wind and air to fly faster.

The only odd skill was [Titanic Appetite], at only level 40.

Titanic Appetite: You greedy wanna-be dragon you! Devouring all that you see, from the moment you hatched until now, nothing can stop or sate you. You’ve got a bad habit of eating your prey as quickly as possible, and sometimes, they fight back! Take this skill, and turn your stomach into an inescapable cage, making any damage dealt to you appear on your still-struggling food instead. Increased activation time after eating per level.

Iona was doomed.

There was no point in struggling. The wyvern was too strong.

There was no point in not struggling. It wasn’t like the wyvern wouldn’t kill and eat Iona.

Wrapped in the monster’s claws, Iona tried to hack at the talons holding her. The angle was bad, and it was the wyvern’s claws. Innately powerful and tough, before skills and stats reinforced them.

Iona tried to use [Moon’s Descent], flickering the skill on and off to change her weight, hoping to destabilize the monster and fall out.

She liked her chances in surviving from a fall, versus single combat against the wyvern.

The wyvern didn’t even notice her attempts. It was casually carrying an entire wooly rhino next to her. Iona’s weight, even amplified, didn’t come close.

Iona was still in her armor. After looking at how she was being held, she tried to get her armor to "push" her out, leaving the armor behind as she tried to "slide" out of the wyvern’s grasp.

The wyvern noticed that, and flexed its claws a little tighter.

From her point of view.

From Iona’s? The air exploded out of her lungs as she was ruthlessly crushed, a talon casually piercing her skill-reinforced armor and digging deep into her hip.

A trail of blood trickled out of Iona, falling and freezing on its way to the ground. Bloody hail, marking her path.

Iona struggled to breathe, but got nowhere against the wyvern. Darkness encroached on her vision, the world turning to a single point.

Then Iona was falling, gasping for air, but with still enough presence of mind to activate [Snowflake Drift] and [Celestial Armaments].

She hit the ground, instinctively trying to roll to bleed the speed. Her leg, crushed by the wyvern landing then mauled by its claws, failed Iona entirely and she collapsed on the ice.

Reforming her Mallium armor to work as a brace, Iona scrambled back to her feet. As she formed a shield to go with her axe, she saw that she was in the wyvern’s nest, high upon a mountain. Frozen bones were scattered about, and a number of eggs were covered in a light layer of snow.

The wyvern landed heavily in front of Iona.

She screamed defiance at the beast, raising her axe for one last mortal battle. Determined to go down fighting. Determined to get in at least one solid blow on the wyvern.

The wyvern eyed Iona, and in one sharp snap of her toothy mouth, ate Iona whole.

For Iona, the world went from the too-bright sun reflecting unhindered off of snow, to the dark, warm mass of the wyvern’s mouth. The wyvern bit down, and all the parts of Iona that were outside of her jaws - everything from the knees down, and her left hand - got chomped off as the wyvern swallowed, compressing Iona as she went down the hatch.

She held onto her trusty axe, trying to dig it into the wyvern, trying to use it as an ice pick to stop her descent down the esophagus.

The blade bounced off the powerful muscles that were squeezing Iona, forcing her down, instead a long, bloody, vertical gash appeared on Iona’s neck.

With a splash, Iona was launched head-first in pitch darkness into a burning pool, the Valkyrie getting an intimate look at how wyvern digestion worked.

The acid burned, getting through the small cracks and chinks in Iona’s armor. Fortunately, it was "merely" concentrated, natural digestive acids, and not something deadlier.

Iona managed to hold what little breath she had left though.

Iona flipped herself around in the pool, then pushed off the bottom. Her stumps screamed in protest, and Iona found that the stomach acid formed a deeper pool than what she could "stand" in.

It was a moot point. There wasn’t any air to breathe in the stomach anyways, and suffocation would get Iona before the stomach acid dissolved her.

The wyvern’s belly was home to total darkness. There wasn’t the smallest mote of light that a skill or vitality could amplify, letting Iona see what was going on. She had to rely purely on touch, and that particular sense was currently going "AHHHH I'M BEING MELTED ALIVE!!!"

Iona was reminded of the [Titanic Appetite] skill that she’d seen. If she tried lashing out, she’d simply harm herself, instead of doing anything to the wyvern. Her throat was a reminder of that.

No, Iona needed to find another way out. She used her axe to feel along the edges of the stomach, both below the acid dissolving her flesh and above.

She was surrounded by powerful walls of flesh. A tight ring of muscles was at the bottom of the stomach, the esophagus was closed above her, and there was a deep, barely-scabbed over wound along one wall. The same injury, Iona speculated, that got the wyvern the [Titanic Appetite] skill.

Up was impossible, and Iona would die of suffocation before getting digested and pooped out, even if she could somehow get to the next part.

Iona stayed calm, even as a primal part of her was starting to panic. She came to a realization.

[Titanic Appetite] was a low-level skill. It acted on a time basis.

She must’ve been down long enough by now, right? Iona didn’t have the time to make small, careful, experimental cuts.

She took a mighty swing at the already-existing injury, blanching as a deep cut opened along her own belly, acid finding a new injury to pour into and burn her from the inside.

Iona tried to have patience, but the urgency of the situation had her swinging again.

Not quite as powerful. Iona’s efforts were rewarded with a shallow slice across her stomach.

She spent a moment sending a quick prayer off to her goddesses, finding the activity soothing and relaxing, along with taking up time.

Just what she needed.

Selene. Lunaris.

I’m dead. See you soon.

The goddesses finally spoke back, after the long silence since the solstice. Their voices were weak and far-off, like they’d run a marathon and were exhausted.

You got this.

Fight!

Iona felt strength fill her. Not from the goddesses, nothing so divine. Just in the sheer belief and support from someone close to her.

Iona was missing her left hand, but she used Mallium to make a crude substitute, letting her wield her axe in a two-handed grip.

Her lungs were burning, screaming for air. Iona exhaled a hair, to relieve the pain, but didn’t dare inhale. It’d just make it worse.

She sank down to the bottom of the stomach, acid closing over her head, then once she hit the bottom she flexed her hip. Iona erupted up out of the acid, like some ambush predator.

A third time her axe came down on the barely-healed injury, this time breaking through and opening it up.

Iona went into a mad frenzy, chopping and hacking against the tough, powerful muscles, breaking open arteries and hacking through connective tissue. She pushed herself forward, letting the flesh close around her as acid trickled in behind her. It ate the wyvern’s flesh just as readily as Iona’s.

She could tell the wyvern was in discomfort and pain, and that she was making headway. The entire world flipped and spun around Iona as she continued hacking away.

In five hacks she was at the heart - not that Iona could see it. She just knew whatever she was slicing at next was moving furiously.

She hit it with her axe until it stopped moving. She kept going, pushing through flesh and hacking anything she could reach as her empty lungs screamed for something, anything.

The feedback she got from her axe changed, Iona clearly cutting through something else as black spots impossibly swam in her sightless eyes.

[*ding!* Congratulations! You’ve slain a [Frost Wyvern (Ice,1045)]//[Frost Wyvern (Dark, 893)]//[Frost Wyvern (Mirror, 832 )]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dusk Valkyrie] has leveled up to level 435->520! +20 Free Stats, +100 Strength, +100 Dexterity, +100 Speed, +180 Vitality, +20 Mana, +110 Mana Regen, +10 Magic power, +10 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*ding!* Congratulations! For reaching level 512, you’ve unlocked your third class!]

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked [Adult of Pallos - Earth]!]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Adult of Pallos] has leveled up to level 1->8!]

Iona ignored the rest of her notifications, including her Ice class level ups. Normally she’d be thrilled that she’d reached level 512, and gotten her third class. It was the great dividing line that marked her as an elite.

Iona was a bit busy staying alive.

The wyvern was dead. The fleshy cavern Iona was in was just that - pure flesh. As the wyvern died, all of its vitality passively boosting it, all of its strength vanished. Iona tore through the body like tissue paper, gasping in relief as she burst through its lungs, and got a breath of air.

Stale air, but air.

From there, Iona tried to hack her way out. It was simple enough until she reached the ribcage. The monster’s sturdy bones resisted all of Iona’s efforts to break them, and she was reminded that wyvern bones were some of the strongest materials in existence. She’d only managed to get through the scales because Iona was taking them apart from the inside. She managed to slice a hole to outside, breathing her fill of the crisp cold air.

It took some time to hack herself out. Finally, coated in blood and gore, great billows of steam from the heat meeting the cold, Iona emerged from the carcass.

Iona collapsed. Exhaustion threatened to overcome her and make her pass out and sleep. She resisted the pull, knowing that if she slept coated in liquid in the freezing environment, that she’d never wake up again.

She dragged herself to her - well, not her feet - the stubs where her legs ended, and drank the blood pouring out of the wyvern. It was pooling in a small depression. She sliced a piece off for herself, and ate it, feeling the unnatural warmth spread through her.

The frost wyvern, for all it lived in a freezing environment with Ice classes, had run hot. Its blood was near boiling, and enough of it poured out to form a proper liquid pool, briefly mimicking a hot pool.

Iona was freezing "standing up", the harsh winds on the mountain peak stealing away all her heat. She sank into the literal bloodbath, figuring the problem of "how to get out of here" and "how to dry myself" would be better handled while warm.

She was already soaked. Getting soaked again wouldn’t change a thing.

Dragons were the god’s greatest creation, bar none. The gods had experimented many, many times, trying all manner of different creatures, iterating on their designs before hitting the perfect formula for the grandest of all monsters.

Wyverns were a half-step below dragons. They were almost there. Not quite. They shared quite a few properties though.

Like, for example, their blood. Bathing in wyvern’s blood wasn’t the same as bathing in dragon’s blood, and it was a horrendous waste of precious material. [Merchants], [Traders], and [Hunters] would have conniptions if they saw how the blood was being used, let alone the rest of the body being left there.

Bathing in wyvern’s blood made the body innately tougher. It didn’t touch the System, it didn’t grant vitality or anything. It just made the body more.

It was a waste, considering what else wyvern’s blood could be used for. Crystalized, it made for weak mana storage, like Arcanite. It couldn’t hold mana in the same space to mana ratio, but it was possible to get more wyvern’s blood, as opposed to Arcanite. Used as ink, inscriptions and enchantments would take millennium to wear away, even without self-repair portions included. That was before the hundreds of potions and elixirs that called for it as an ingredient, or the weapons improved by quenching them in the precious substance during their forging.

Sadly, [Princess]-detection was reserved solely for dragon’s blood.

The other thing wyvern’s blood did when bathed in was help slightly with the recipient’s connection to the wyvern’s own elements. Luckily, the creature Iona had slain was Ice-aligned, promising her future class-ups with the element would be just a tad stronger.

A single scale flaked off of the frost wyvern’s body, landing right over Iona’s heart. Covering that spot so no more blood reached it.

Iona considered leaving it there. She didn’t know about wyvern’s blood, and she was exhausted. To her, it was simply a warm place to briefly recuperate and think.

The scale offended her sensibilities though, and she absent-mindedly picked it off.

Iona was dying. She had no legs. She had one hand. She had dozens of broken bones, countless strains and tears, her body was one gigantic bruise, and that was before the deep lacerations that criss-crossed her body, or the repeated dunking in acid she’d just undergone.

Slowly, but Black Crow was watching her, taking one hop at a time closer to her. Ready for when she inevitably succumbed to the combination of the environment and her injuries.

Iona needed every last edge she could manage. Any little bit that could help her survive. She allocated every single free stat she had.

She wasn’t at a temple, but the place would have to do. She leaned her head back on the edge of the blood pool, changing her armor around to act as additional supports for herself.

She closed her eyes, and entered into the world of her soul.

"Fast. Best class for me?" Iona asked her guide the moment she arrived. She expected a weak, weak healer class - she’d get in all sorts of trouble long term for it, but she’d be alive enough to GET in trouble - or some sort of wilderness survival class. Something like [Wounded Warrior of the Modu Wastes].

Her guide was her, and knew everything that was going on. Iona had complete faith in her guide’s ability to pick the right class for her. With a snap of her fingers, they arrived at an altar.

"Here." She gestured.

Iona didn’t waste a moment, getting down on her knees to pray. Still, she noted a dozen details, even as she started her class selection.

The braziers were burning blue. The moons were etched into the relief above the altar, and a pair of familiar statues flanked the place of worship.

Iona opened her eyes to a string of notifications.

[*ding!* Congratulations! You’ve upgraded your third class - [Paladin of the Moons] - Gravity]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Paladin of the Moons] has leveled up to level 8->30! +50 Strength, +50 Dexterity, +50 Speed, +80 Vitality, +40 Mana, +40 Mana Regen, +100 Magic power, +100 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Vitality from your Element per level!]

She couldn’t believe it. The goddesses had chosen her to be their [Paladin].

At the same time, she could. Rare was the individual who’d been blessed by their gods, who didn’t get offered a class related to it.

Iona closed her eyes, sending off a quick prayer of thanks.

Lunaris. Selene.

Thank you. I will repay your trust.

She didn’t have much more to say, simply sending warm feelings their way.

She spent half a second looking at her new class. Gravity element, and it looked to be a spellsword. She’d need to use her magic just as much as her physical prowess.

There was another notification waiting for her, obtained while she was in the world of her soul.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Ice Affinity] has upgraded to [Ice Authority]!]

Iona lifted her head up, intending to get out of the pool. She was rudely jerked back down, as her blood-soaked hair had frozen solid to the cold ice below.

In the moment she’d rested her head against the ice, her blood-drenched hair had frozen solid to the ice. With a roar, Iona ripped herself from the ice. She then twisted around, and crawling, using her arms to move the rest of her body, dragging her stumps behind her, she hauled herself out of the pool.

Or tried to at least. Blood on ice was one of the slipperiest combinations possible, and Iona was hurt. She didn’t have a good grip, or good leverage. With a splash, she slid back into the bloodbath.

The most valuable skill Iona had immediately unlocked was [Telekinesis]. The ability to use her meager magic power and mana to move objects around.

Well, meager for her level. Significant for the tasks she needed to perform.

Iona reformed her Mallium to act as a claw-ice pick combo, and with a scream, slammed it into the bloody ice. Using [Telekinesis] on the rest of her armor, she gave herself a minor lift, negating gravity’s pull on her just a bit. Roughly a quarter of her weight.

It was enough. She was able to drag herself out of the blood as her mana pool rapidly drained. She accepted the notification that was presented to her.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Snowflake Drift] has moved from [Traveling Archer] to [Paladin of the Moons] and turned into [Flight of the Valkyries]!]

Iona got to work.

The wyvern’s body represented a large fortune. Iona couldn’t carry out even a fraction, and was more concerned with survival. Her legs still ended at her knees, and she was still one-handed.

With some effort, she got her Mallium to rearrange itself, making crude prosthetics. They didn’t work well, and they cooled rapidly, transmitting the cold directly to Iona’s bones. Every step, every move with them sent pain lancing through her, [Chilled Mind] taking the edge off.

They also thinned her armor to the point where it was nearly worthless, and forget about forming a shield. The only value Iona’s armor had at this point was to be a basis for [Celestial Armaments], which could reinforce it.

Iona was forced to move slowly. Her collection of injuries was impressive, and she found herself using her newfound Gravity skills more and more to make simple, mundane things happen.

Shelter was the first task. She used the wyvern’s body, where it lay, along with the natural formation of the nest as the start of a shelter. Hacking off one of the wyvern’s wings let Iona encase the area entirely, keeping the elements off her.

It also kept the heat in, roiling waves of heat coming off of the wyvern’s spilled blood. The arctic conditions were trying to freeze it, but for now it was a source of warmth.

However, it wouldn’t be able to warm Iona forever. Nor would the flesh that she cut off and ate raw stay warm the entire way back home, even if she could, by some divine miracle, carry it all.

No, she’d need her armor to keep her warm, and she didn’t have enough of it. Not enough to walk on prosthetics and keep the heat in.

Iona improvised.

Using her hands and [Telekinesis], she ripped scales off the wyvern’s body, then carefully placed it on her armor. She reformed her Mallium around each piece, the wyvern scales giving bulk to the armor, along with being fantastic protection and insulation themselves.

Piece by piece Iona reformed her protection. With the basics secured - food, shelter, water from melting ice and a plan to not immediately freeze to death, Iona took a much-needed rest.

She was woken up by the sound of breaking eggs. She got up with a start, and moved as quickly as she could over.

Her hundreds of injuries were slowing her down. She moved too quickly, and the gashes on her stomach opened up, Iona’s bright red blood mixing with the wyvern’s blue. Every inch of her skin screamed, protesting any movements after having been bathed in acid, after having been digested and corroded away. Her hip didn’t work properly, and that was before her crude prosthetics were causing problems.

The eggs were hatching.

The first snout broke through the egg, but Iona had no mercy. She wasn’t going to pit herself against more wyverns. She wasn’t going to let the monsters grow up to become larger threats one day.

She wasn’t going to let them all hatch, then outnumber her thirteen to one. She was too weak.

Wyverns were, fundamentally, beasts. Animals. Her [Vow] didn’t apply when it came to extermination missions.

At least, that’s how Iona saw things.

The first and last thing the baby wyvern saw was Iona’s axe descending upon its head.

One by one Iona smashed the eggs, smothering the wyverns before they even had a chance.

Iona got to the last egg right as the baby finished fully hatching. She raised her axe up high, then hesitated. Seeing something in the baby’s eyes.

Her heart wavered, then softened, a plan rapidly forming.

One baby wyvern was manageable. She didn’t think it’d successfully kill her, not with Iona’s stats and levels.

Iona was also a dead woman walking. She was deep in the frozen wastes of Modu, on top of a mountain. A mountain that a wyvern lived on, one among many. She had an entire mountain range to traverse, then she needed to cross the entire frozen wasteland of Modu while crippled, hoping that one injury or another of hers didn’t finish her off, or attract predators that sensed weakness.

With no food. She could only carry so much of the wyvern’s meat, and that was on top of needing to climb and scale cliffs one handed, no-footed, while carrying the food.

In other words. A dead woman who hadn’t stopped moving yet.

The wyvern was looking around, already demonstrating signs of unusual intelligence.

Iona saw hope and promise in the wyvern’s eyes.

She could bond with it.

Protect it.

There was a difference in perspective with her [Vow]. A beast, that was potentially a threat to her? Fair game.

A helpless baby that Iona had chosen to protect and defend?

Well. That was a different story. A trick of perspective.

It would let Iona’s [Vow] kick in, giving her a gigantic edge against the threats that roamed, while having a partner that radiated threat, who could sense other creatures in the wilderness. Whose very nature could drive off problems.

Iona quickly hacked off a piece of the infant wyvern she’d just killed, then extended it to the newly hatched one. The last remaining wyvern.

It sniffed at Iona’s hand, then snapped, devouring its sibling without a shred of remorse. Iona hacked a piece of leg off of the dead wyvern who’d almost killed her. The mother of all the eggs here.

The baby wyvern ate the meat without a shred of complaint, looking at Iona with measuring, hungry eyes. Recognizing Iona as a source, a giver, of food. Wanting more.

"Fenrir." Iona whispered, petting the wyvern. "Your name shall be Fenrir."

[Name: Iona]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 22]

[Mana: 96,753/129,880]

[Mana Regen: 99,066]

Stats

[Free Stats: 0]

[Strength: 33,220 +(403,623)]

[Dexterity: 33,220 +(403,623)]

[Vitality: 61,732 +(160,503)]

[Speed: 36,655 +(445,358)]

[Mana: 12,988]

[Mana Regeneration: 39,464]

[Magic Power: 10,451]

[Magic Control: 10,451]

[Class 1: [The Dusk Valkyrie - Celestial: Lv 520]]

[Celestial Affinity: 508]

[New Moon's Dance: 488]

[Weapon Mastery: 475]

[Strength from the Stars: 520]

[Celestial Armaments: 520]

[: ]

[Stellar Body: 520]

[Gaze of the Galaxy: 420]

[Class 2: [Traveling Archer - Ice: Lv 370]]

[Ice Authority: 370]

[Shortbow Skills: 365]

[Blizzard Shot: 360]

[Chilled Mind: 370]

[Trick Shot: 357]

[Ice Arrow Conjuration: 358]

[Glacial Slow: 370]

[: ]

[Class 3: Paladin of the Moons - Gravity: Lv 30]]

[Gravity Affinity: 15]

[Telekinesis: 18]

[Lunaris's Gaze: 2]

[Lunar Mass: 30]

[Flight of the Valkyries: 30]

[Eclipse Strike: 1]

[Selene's Grace: 1]

[Harmony of the Spheres: 1]

General Skills

[Drawing: 190]

[Valkyries Valor: 520]

[Adaptable: 366]

[Tracking: 244]

[Vow of Iona to Lux: 405]

[Magnetic Charm: 190]

[Comprehensive Education: 282]

[Dinosaur Husbandry: 290]

Other

Blessing of Selene and Lunaris

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