Robin’s stomach gurgled as he watched Eli carefully pry the top of the bladebeak egg off with a sharp shard of flint. They were in a small room of the tower that amounted to the kitchen or mess. That meant there were places to sit and tables to work at.

Eli’s bag sat on the other side of the cleric from Robin. Packets and satchels and chunky minerals were heaped in it, some spilling out across the table. Those would provide the pigments. In fact some already had. There were scavenged containers with various plants steeping to release the colours Eli was after.

Closer to Robin were two stones. One was smaller and rounded at the end, the other large with a shallow depression in it. It was a far cry from a proper mortar and pestle, but the arrangement would do for some basic grinding.

Eli had walked Robin through the process a couple of times, and now the cleric was dipping out egg white and mixing it with dried and powdered bedstraw root: a practical demonstration.

‘If the root is fully dry, then the paint sticks better, but if it’s still a bit wet, the colour is richer,’ Eli explained as he worked, ‘though if you do it that way, your paint will flake off faster.’

The mixture in the small bowl Eli was working with definitely looked like paint to Robin, though perhaps not the glossy acrylic he was used to from art class.

‘It’s a nice red,’ he said, more to take part in the conversation than out of an inherent admiration for the shade.

‘Can’t have an offering to Beauty without something red,’ Eli replied. ‘Right, I need to apply this fast or it will clump and that would definitely ruin my chances with Vané. I will be back in a few minutes.’

The priest hopped to his feet and swept out of the room.

Robin didn’t follow. Eli had forbidden him from seeing the masterpiece before it was finished. Something about not risking drawing the Deity’s attention to it too soon.

Fortunately, Robin had something else to busy himself with, now that Eli had finished his demonstration. His quest completion had finally pinged.

Quest Complete! [Painting the Forest Red]

You have successfully aided Eli in gathering the ingredients he needs to complete his artistic work (and learned a couple of things in the process)!

Reward(s): +1 Crafting rank, +1 rank in Stealth or Survival

Unable to apply reward. Processing. Awarding closest equivalent. Expression has been raised to 5!

Huh. Well, that was interesting. Something about the system or interface definitely worked off of his actual, lived experiences. What he did and what he learned factored into his gains. Experience points weren’t completely divorced from his stats, though he could apply them that way.

It was almost less efficient to do it that way, for whatever reason. An argument in favour of the interface simply interpreting the world for him, rather than being a controlling force within it. But at the same time, he could force himself to increase skills—proficiencies—he hadn’t learned properly. So something else was going on. The interface or system didn’t just give him information about the world. It also had some influence on it.

How much, though, that was the question. One of many that would be worth answering. Questions that would have to wait.

Robin assigned his other reward to Stealth. It took the rank to 5 and was far more efficient in terms of experience points than the alternative. Plus, sneaking around was useful. He had violent dryads and mischievous pixies to evade.

Speaking of, as there was no knowing how long Eli was going to be, no sense in wasting the time. Robin pushed himself to his feet and padded to the central chamber. He shivered as he went, the stone too cold now. Or his skin too hot. Infection was definitely setting in. Another reason to hope Eli would be finished with his project soon.

And that Vané approved.

Robin quickly pulled up the scrying interface and checked on Cherry and the pixies. When he established that they weren’t any immediate threat, he checked in on the Sisters Sharp. They were still slowly scouting the perimeter of the Keep. Likely looking for a way to bypass it altogether. At least they were on this side of the mountains and hadn’t yet moved on. He still had a chance to catch up to them and guilt them into taking him to Noviel.

The city-state seemed like the smartest move. Most importantly, he had an in: a set of guides. It also seemed the most reasonable option to deal with (though let’s be honest, they were likely to be a nightmare all the same, with Robin’s luck).

It was too bad the interface didn’t have more information, but between the age of this place and the lack of any kind of search function, it was hardly surprising it wasn’t much help to Robin. No reason to focus on the flaws, however. It was still an amazing resource, and one he needed to capitalise on as much as he could, while he could.

Robin shifted over the the Greater and Lesser Arcana station. It just seemed to have the most potential. Even if he didn’t rediscover mighty spells of vast and forgotten power, at least he could familiarise himself with options he might be able to take, and maybe even teach himself a new cantrip. After all, how hard could they be? Cantrips were meant to be minor magics, training exercises even.

He’d already found several illusion spells that had his mouth watering. The Tier 3 version of his illusion spell chain, [Major Phantasm] looked to solve several of the weaknesses of the illusions he’d already mastered, for example. And in studying the illusion materials so closely he’d also uncovered several abilities that sounded suspiciously like Peculiarities to him. There was one which increased the effectiveness of his illusion spells by a whole tier, and one which seemed to enhance the potency of illusions blended with shadow magic (the language was very similar to that of his mask, which sounded very promising). And there was still so much more to discover.

So Robin buckled down and got to it.

***

The first problem was there wasn’t any red cloth or thread in the outpost. Almost all of it was uncoloured. Brown, beige, pale green, off-white, but no red. Nor was there any wood Robin could confidently identify as rowan, and he knew no spell that would help him identify it.

Not insurmountable problems, however. Robin had already scried out a sky rowan to harvest the wood from, and they had plenty of thread. A bit of dye and it would be red as anything. Gathering the ingredients would be a bit dangerous because Cherry and her allies would be on the lookout for them, but gathering some rowan wood and dye ingredients from the forest wasn’t inherently hazardous. Not like stealing eggs from a bladebeak was.

There was also the infection. Robin felt hot constantly, his head swimming. It was difficult to concentrate. Hopefully the problem would be solved soon.

That was why he was here, now, in the room Eli had been using as an art studio. The scent of wood shavings and paint was strong. It made Robin’s nose itch, but it was also kind of nice. It was different, and reminded him of home for some reason.

In the centre of the room was a large…something…covered in several spare sheets roughly knotted together to make a shroud or drop cloth. Of course the masterpiece had to have a reveal. Robin suspected part of the effectiveness of the offering was going to be in the reception of the piece. He was mentally preparing himself to be as impressed as possible, and had mentally practiced several different ways of praising the beauty of whatever was under that sheet.

Deities of Beauty in myth and literature were almost always notoriously vain and often could be flattered into dispensing boons. Robin had no intention of leaving the reaction to chance. He needed some healing and, for that, Eli needed his powers back.

‘Ready?’ Eli asked, raising a hand to the sheet with a flourish.

‘Ready,’ Robin confirmed. ‘Unveil away!’

Eli grabbed the edges of the sheeting and almost snapped it, sending a sharp wave flowing through the fabric so he could haul it off of his creation without anything catching. The off-white fabric billowed in the air for a moment before cascading away to reveal a brightly-painted wooden statue.

The statue depicted an androgynous but stunning figure in a cloth wrap not unlike a toga. The figure was painted with somewhat lifelike colours, though the shades were unnaturally bright, like technicolour-made-flesh. They were sitting triumphantly on a prone, muscular male body. The prone figure wore something similar to a Greek helmet and had a spear cradle in lightly curled fingers, but was otherwise entirely nude. His toes were curling, Robin noted.

Eli took his silence as appreciation. The priest beamed, circling the work. It was a beautiful piece of art, certainly, but it seemed faintly disrespectful to Robin. Of course, who was he to say what would and would not appeal to Vané?

‘It’s good, right?’ It was clear that Eli certainly thought so.

‘What’s it called?’ Robin finally asked, not quite trusting himself to say anything else.

‘Beauty Triumphs Over War,’ Eli answered with a smile.

‘It’s stunning.’ Robin said. What he really wanted to know was whether or not it had worked, but he didn’t want to say the words aloud in case it might offend Vané in some unexpected way.

Eli could clearly see his curiosity, however. The priest smiled and reached out to place his hand on Robin’s chest.

‘[Purge Impurities],’ he said.

Robin felt nothing at first, then it seemed as if his blood began to bubble. It felt like fizzing in his veins. The agitation spread to all of his limbs, like pins and needles in reverse. The sensation grew more and more intense until he couldn’t help himself and he opened his mouth and began to laugh.

‘Well, that’s a beautiful sound,’ Eli said, smiling. ‘You should be free of infection and disease now, as well as any small muscle pains or indigestion or things of that nature.’

‘What tier was that?’ Robin asked when the fit of laughter (and the impurities it carried away from him) had passed. They said laughter was the best medicine, but this was taking things a bit far.

‘Tier two,’ the priest said dismissively. ‘It’s a relatively simply blessing. Obviously, the Church of Vané is better about the more elegant expressions of magic, so it’s more effective than many similar spells you might receive from more prosaic members of the various clergies that populate this land.’

‘I’ll keep that in mind,’ Robin said, absently rubbing his chest where the healing magic had begun its work. ‘And since you clearly have your powers back, what do you say we work on getting out of this forest?’

‘I’m all ears,’ Eli said, wiggling the pointed tips of the appendages in question.

Robin laughed.

***

Robin had scried out the safest pathways between the tower and the sky-rowan he planned to harvest. They wouldn’t need much. Even a fallen branch would do. How hard could it be?

He should have scried the area more carefully. Yes, the sky-rowan was present, growing out of the large outcropping of rock that rose up from the forest ground in a small clearing. However, there were no fallen branches to gather, and the outcropping of rock was mostly sheer face with few ledges or handholds.

If anything, the several hours of hiking through the wood to get here had been easier. There had been no sign of Cherry, her pixies, or even any sentient trees.

Robin stared at the rock, silently cursing the fact that he didn’t have access to [Mask of Myriad Faces] yet. Even if it didn’t allow him to fly, he was sure it would have helped him climb up that rock with relative ease.

Eli looked from him, to the tree, and back.

‘So, what’s the plan for getting up there?’