Randidly opened his mouth to tell her no. Seeing Helen like this would just cause her pain. But then he managed to stop himself. He closed his mouth and looked more seriously at Islinda. This woman is the one who raised Helen. Even if Helen didn’t agree with her mother… she couldn’t avoid being impacted by her. If I was to bluntly tell Helen no in a situation like this…

Randidly cleared his throat. “...alright. If that’s what you want.”

As he expected, Islinda’s face instantly erupted in a bitter grimace. “Hmph. You would truly allow me to look at my daughter, who has been slaughtered like livestock? Since you kept the casket closed, I know that her situation must be pretty grim. If its grim now, after you prettied her up… pah. I can only imagine what horrors my only daughter was forced to endure…!”

Randidly kept his mouth shut even as Islinda continued to glare at him. Charlotte looked confused but didn’t speak up. Eventually, Islinda sighed and shook her head. “Shit. You are no fun.”

“Today’s not a fun day,” Randidly said gently. His head throbbed from this woman’s petty games, but he knew this was just her way of grieving. But immediately after he said those words, he realized how thoughtless they sounded.

“How dare you say that to me,” Islinda seethed. For the first time, the woman lost control of that tight seal she kept over herself and showed genuine fury through the lens of her eyes. Her suppressed emotions emerged with a horrible, discordant resonance that set Randidly’s teeth on edge.

There was no shape to the emotion laid bare. Yet that formless intensity fixated at on Randidly-

Just as quickly as the bare truth of Islinda’s heart was revealed, the tight lock snapped back into place and her gaze was mild. She twisted her mouth. “You did that on purpose. So it would be more ‘fun’ for me. Thank you, I suppose. Now take me home. And you, girl. You will be coming with me so we can look at more of your drawings.”

Randidly bowed slightly and used the Philosopher’s Key to open up a portal back to Tellus. Now that everything was within the Alpha Cosmos, it was much quicker to open up portals to exact positions; he didn’t have to search at all. They called Bertram and Ikaas back down and all four of them crossed over to Tellus.

Islinda looked back over her shoulder once as he was closing the portal. She was finally crying.

Not knowing what else to do, Randidly finished closing the portal on her and stood alone in the dark cavern. But eventually, he shook himself back to action

Randidly made a mental note to check back in on Charlotte Wick soon, lest her sudden disappearance be noted and the Commandant learn of the news. But the more Randidly thought about it, the more savage his expression became.

He stood in the deepening pool of shadow and Nether and allowed the Stillborn Phoenix to hum. The impulse toward ferocity and violence tensed his muscles. His realization drove him more fully into the role as the horrifying monster that lurked in the depths. Honestly… The Commandant won’t even care if I had stolen Charlotte as part of some petty revenge plan. He would probably believe it immature, but a sign that I was learning my fucking place in the Nexus.

Randidly briefly lost control of his emotions. He was violence in the shape of a beast, all need and instinct. The physical edges of him stretched and began to tear. The air seemed to spark and suddenly the interior of this shadowy place was filled with spectral flames. His Nether Weight squeezed the air with enough force that his ears popped. I swear to god, Commandant Wick. I will make you pay for this.

Then Randidly gathered himself back together. He relaxed the Stillborn Phoenix. The ghastly flames vanished like they were simply a mirage. He sent an apologetic glance over toward Heiffal and his shaken subordinates. “Sorry about that.”

Heiffal rubbed tears from the corner of his eyes and then shook his head. “No problem, Mister Ghosthound. We, of all people, understand your pain.”

Randidly reached up and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Having finished the ceremony was a relief, but the aftermath left him so emotionally exhausted that he wanted to sink into a coma for two days. Of course, there were so many other things still to do. The first of those things needed to happen here, now.

Randidly slowly walked toward the coffin. As he did so, his Dreamcatcher of the Long Night began to rumble with all the bass of thunder booming directly overhead. But Randidly kept his eyes forward. Some day… but not today. I’m not ready to face that quite yet.

Instead, he walked up and rapped his knuckles against the surface of the coffin. Then he flexed his hand and Acri obligingly unwrapped itself from his waist and straightened into its streamlined, glave form. “One last spar. At least for now. Until I’m strong enough to face you without crying.”

He brought his weapon sharply upward and diagonally, so the tip of Acri hit off the tip of Helen’s training spear that leaned up against her coffin.

Tinnnggggg!

Instantly, Randidly felt the shift. The noise unleashed an electric charge through the spacious area. It rippled across the tiered slabs of stone and energized the thick layer of Nether that had been seeping into this place for the last few hours. Instantly, the energy of memory rearranged itself and took on a very rigid structure. Although Randidly’s sense could follow the shift, the mechanism of the arrangement left him bewildered.

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 351!

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 352!

Just as soon it started, the transformation was over; the Nether in the surrounding area rapidly solidified into a crystalline form of energy. Randidly stiffened; somehow, the energy became substance and dug into the physical space of the cavern.

However, there was no actual change. Rather, an insubstantial film had settled over everything.

Randidly released a breath and glanced around warily. He flexed his right hand and felt the delicate sensation of the Nether here adjusting. Others might not be able to sense what had happened, but his Nether Core deepened every moment. Somehow, the Nether he released and the memories from the attendees that lingered in the air had been permanently installed in this place. Even just standing here, Randidly felt his Dreamcatcher of the Long Night resonating with… whatever it was that he had created.

When Randidly had thoroughly investigated and determined that the film was inert, he snorted and returned to his task. He used Acri to cut several gouges into the stone ground. Then he used Hallucination of the Bloodless Heart to forcefully crack and lift the stone to create a perfect opening in the ground. Sighing at the blunt method, Randidly seized the edge of the coffin and lifted. With his powerful body, the precious cargo was incredibly light.

Alone in this strange Nether space that Randidly didn’t understand, he lowered the coffin into the stone hole. Without the revealing influence of light, the shadows made the hole seem infinitely deep. Randidly closed his eyes when he lowered the coffin to maintain that sensation. The place of death in the Nexus… I hope its more peaceful than here.

Then he gently placed Helen’s training spear on top of the coffin. Hallucination of the Bloodless Heart activated again to crush the removed stone into smaller pieces of gravel, which he then used to fill up the hole. Randidly felt more tears coming as he looked down at his work. Helen lay before him, completely buried-

-but as soon as Randidly turned away, movement in the strange Nether edifice forced him to stop. He frowned and glanced around, watching as sluggish flows began to naturally form through the thin Nether film. These currents of connection swirled around the outside before flowing into the middle and creating a cyclical rotation of energy.

Randidly soon recognized what he was seeing, even though it had been a long time since he last witnessed this inward-facing energy flow. He licked his lips and inhaled rapidly. Then he looked around again, trying to figure out why this had happened. Eventually, his gaze came back to rest on the coffin at the bottom of the gravel-filled hole. “It will take a while… but this… someday… Helen, are you going to become a Nether Prince…?”

The seed of energy at the core of the coffin had already formed. It didn’t bother to reply to Randidly’s speculation. Two emotions smashed into each other, both drawing power from the weeks of grief that had left him tortured and exhausted. He was trembling. On the one hand, Randidly felt relief that Helen wasn’t truly gone. From his understanding of Nether Princes, they could eventually evolve into sentience. But on the other hand… imagining someone from the Nexus discovering Helen and using her to empower some spoiled brat’s image-

“Fuck.” Randidly spat out the word, unable to reconcile the two emotions. Then he shook himself. “Well, I planned on protecting this place anyway. This just makes it that much more of a priority…”

For another fifteen minutes, Randidly stood and watched the energy flows. He wondered if he was just jumping to conclusions; the current energy flows somewhat resembled a Nether Prince, but right now it was just connections forming within this Nether film. Then he wracked his brain, going over the steps he had taken to trigger the change. Even with all his experience with Nether, he couldn’t figure it out.

Eventually, Randidly produced his Philosopher’s Key and tunneled through space to Neveah’s cottage. When he stepped out through the portal, Randidly was greeted with a face full of slanting sleet. He spat out a mouthful of the chilly precipitation and rolled his shoulders with vigor. As his heartbeat quickened, his skin soon heated beyond the limits of what a human body could produce. Soon, his body released so much heat that as soon as the icy rain hit him, it began to evaporate.

Feeling much more pleasant, Randidly walked forward across the field to Claudette, who was meditating and definitely intensifying the frigidity of the clouds above Neveah’s house. Likely sensing his presence, Claudette’s eyes snapped open as he approached. She offered him a sympathetic glance. “Randidly… I’m so sorry about what happened to Helen. If you need some more time before we work on my image-”

“No,” Randidly said, surprised with how calm his voice sounded. It still sucked to be told that someone was sorry for his loss; each time he heard it, it felt like the speaker was slapping him with the news all over again. But after honestly expressing himself and feeling the confusing shift in Nether, Randidly felt like he could cope somewhat. “No, we don’t need to postpone the project. There are just a few more details to work out. I want to speak with Neveah and then rest, so… four days from now, we should begin.”

“...if you think you are ready.” Claudette offered him a warm smile.

Due to Neveah’s casual talk about Claudette’s mental state, Randidly studied the smile longer than he normally would have. As he did so, he could see the cracks in her tranquil facade. If she was really so upset that even he could tell… Randidly coughed lightly and gestured around. “How about you? How has your training been going? Are you prepared?”

“Yes,” Claudette responded quickly. This time, Randidly flashed her a pained expression and she snorted. “Alright, well. Perhaps I’m just a bit… nervous. If we fail here, at my father’s party-”

“We won’t fail,” Randidly said softly. His eyes were sharp and determined.

Claudette stubbornly shook her head. “Denying reality gets you nowhere; this is a gamble. And if we don’t manage to improve my image by a colossal amount-”

“We,” Randidly hissed through his teeth and loosened some of the controls he kept over his mental state. He was exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster of the last few hours, but those emotional embers around his heart almost immediately flared to life. He could still see Helen, smell the blood oozing out of her shattered joints. His emotion spun together with the significance of her death in his life slammed against the storm above. “Won’t. Fail. This isn’t about denying reality… its about fighting to change it.

“Helen told you, right? We fight not because we think there is a reasonable chance at victory… but because flinching from any desperate struggle means we will definitely die.” Randidly grunted and walked past Claudette. Then he paused and spoke over his shoulder. “That’s all there is to it. Be prepared. Four days from now.”

Then Randidly proceeded forward into Neveah’s cottage.