"Rough night, huh?" Haug asked.

"You can say that." Lith sighed, looking at his Council amulet and the many notifications that Faluel sent him about his family and the Kingdom.

Even the usually cheerful bartender gasped at the news that Belius had almost fallen and was eager to read the chronicles of the three battles on the Kingdom's interlink.

"Do you still have some of that Crimson Garuda?"

"Depends. Are you going to steal another keg?" Haug replied.

"No."

"Then I do have some more." The bartender offered Lith a beer mug filled with the red ale, being careful to never show him the source, just to be safe.

"Thanks. You won't believe what happened to me tonight." Lith gave him a report about the latest events and the progress they had made in tracking the missing children.

Haug was his contractor so Lith felt obligated to keep him posted. Between a snack and a drink, Lith managed to relax. He also told Haug about the quarrel between Baba Yaga and the Master without revealing the latter's identity.

Lith had no idea of the Professor's plans nor of how much Vastor's role as the Master had affected his life so he preferred to keep the secret for himself.

The only things Lith knew about Vastor's alias was that the Abomination hybrids worked for him, and so did the Rock Worm and the Empowered Abomination who had come to retrieve the Orc's violet crystal.

The first point was irrelevant to Lith, and the other two he could understand. Gremus, the Rock Worm, had only done his job while trying to protect the crystal while the Abomination had attacked Lith without the Master's permission.

'If Vastor wanted me dead, he would have sent Xenagrosh, Tezka, or any of the hybrids since I'm no match for them yet.' He thought.

"Great Mother almighty!" Haug whistled in surprise. "And here I thought my life was fucked up. I heard about the children of divorced parents having four parents, but you basically have six.

"Each one of the sides of your life force has a lovely couple worried for you." He chuckled.

Elina and Raaz for the human side, Salaark and Leegaain for the beast side, and now the Master and Baba Yaga for the Abomination side.

"Yeah, except that those kids receive lots of gifts from their parents in the attempt to buy their affection whereas I just have a bunch of meddling assholes who claim to know what's best for me." Lith said with a scoff.

"Aside from my human parents and Salaark, I've got only troubles from the others."

"That's what parents normally do to their children. You must consider yourself lucky just because they didn't inflict permanent emotional scars on you, unlike it happened to Dryna." Haugh pointed with the glass he was cleaning at one of his barmaids.

She looked like a pretty young woman in her early twenties, about 1.78 meters (5'10") tall with blonde hair and red eyes. She had a small set of golden wings on her back, horns on her head, and a knee-length golden tail coming out of her spine.

'Either she is a god-tier cosplayer or some kind of hybrid.' Lith thought.

"Is she-"

"A Wyvern? Yes." Haug misunderstood his question and cut him short. "She's still got trouble with shapeshifting, but customers find her cuter for that. That asshole of Xedros kicked her out without Awakening her after Dryna befriended a human.

"Not knowing how to shapeshift and Xedros being Xedros, bad things happened."

"Let me guess, Xedros killed the human and you picked her up like a stray, giving her a safe place from her father." Lith said.

"No. They ran inside my bar in search of shelter and I Warped the Tavern away. Her human girlfriend works in the kitchen and Dryna serves at the tables in exchange for lessons about magic." Haug shrugged.

"Does everyone here have a story?" Lith asked.

"Yes. Pick that guy in the corner for example. He-"

"Save it for someone who actually cares." Lith snarled at the chatterbox bartender.

"I just came here to tell you that as soon as the sun sets, Scarlett, Vladion, and I are going to find out what happened to the kidnapped undead. Don't get your hopes up. If the Master is right, they are already dead or soon to be."

"That's not the reason I hired you. I wanted you to save them. Why are you still here instead of looking for them?" Haug clenched the glass that he was cleaning so hard that it cracked, forcing the spells imbued in the tavern to fix it.

"No, you hired me to find out the truth and that's what I'm doing. Vladion can't leave his city exposed and Scarlett would never leave Nyka unprotected." Lith said while asking for seconds.

"If we find someone still alive when we get there, you have my word that I'll try to bring them back alive. If they don't compromise my safety, of course."

"Lith Verhen, you're such a piece of work that I would love you had a middle name. I wonder how you managed to get a single woman to love you with such a shitty attitude." Haug snarled, but served him anyway out of habit.

"I've never claimed to be nothing but a bad person, but I'm really good at it." Lith said with a grin.

Then, another update appeared on his amulet, making his face turn pale and his glass be consumed by Chaos beyond what any spell could repair.

***

Griffon Kingdom, Distar Marquisate, Distar Household, an hour back.

After the few minutes she needed to stop puking and let the tonic and nutrients potions stored in her tattoo take effect, Mirim Distar, Lord Commander of the Queen's Corpse had returned home.

After stepping through the Gate of her Household, she shapeshifted her Featherwalker armor into a sky-blue day dress and sat heavily on her favorite armchair.

"Good gods. The sun has barely risen and I'm already dead tired." She mumbled to herself while browsing the good, the bad, and the horrible news on her army amulet.

The Mother Earth potion had ceased its effect after returning Mirim to her peak condition, but due to the overuse of Tyris's breathing technique, it had barely had any effect left.

"What the heck?" She was so shocked that if not for the exhaustion plaguing her body she would have jumped up. "Has Mogar turned upside down? Vastor finished first, then the Corpse, and Manohar ended up last?

"This order is exactly what I predicted, but in a reversed order."

"It's a crazy world, huh?" A male voice said while a dart of pure energy struck Mirim in the chest with enough force to crack her Featherwalker armor and make her cough out a mouthful of blood.

She had been so tired that she had failed to notice either the figure hiding in the dark corner of the room and the fact that the array in the room had been turned off.

"You!" She got back to her feet with a kip-up while infusing herself with all elements.

Seeing the deep blue Archmage robe he wore and what lay under it answered all the questions that she had ever since Lark's death.

"Me." Five rays of different colors came out from the fingers of his right hand, each one infused with a different element.