After receiving the garbled system message about the Redspine High, Vance saw two rainbow-colored frogs dancing in front of him on the stone table, and the peculiar sight filled him with boundless ecstasy. He scoffed and laughed and pointed at the frogs and their funny hats. His mind went blank as he watched the tangos and waltzes. A voice talked from afar about murderous churches and monsters—“Would you like to listen to my ruminations?” Theory this, theory that. Blah, blah, blah—but nothing made sense anymore; nothing mattered, except that ludicrous dance show.

One frog jumped high and stretched its legs. The other caught its partner, one arm under each leg, and spun around with elegance. And Vance started to clap as if he had witnessed an aesthetic miracle. When the tabletop show ended, the frogs rushed to the chamfer and bowed to him, and he clapped even more. It seemed as if a curtain would fall at any moment, as if the music would die away soon; but then the froggy dancers spoke with human words and said that the fun needn’t end now. They leaped off the table and gestured for their adoring audience to follow them.

“Middlerift is too dark and scary! It’s time to leave it behind!”

“We will take you to a faraway wonderland!”

Vance got up, and with every pied footprint he left on the ground, the world completed one of its own steps in a psychedelic transformation. The boisterous House of Turncoats faded away, as if with a pretentious click of the fingers, and what replaced it was a tranquil riverbank scenery. The sky was solid green; the water purple; the grass pink. A yellow moon shone near the horizon: it was made of cheese, and a thousand blue mice and rats were sitting on the riverside and watching the sky with hungry eyes. One day the moon would fall; almost everyone would die a gruesome death, but the rodents alone would satisfy the appetite of a thousand years—gute besserung, bon appétit!

Lured by the frogs toward the river, Vance spied a red and white checkered picnic blanket. It was placed on the grass two meters from the water—the ideal spot to watch the kaleidoscopic ducks and swans—and a naked woman was lying there, with her short but well-proportioned legs stretched in front of her, with her haunches pressed against the fabric, with two prominent pinpoints crowning her curvaceous mounds, and with her delicate arms forming two backward pillars that supported her lissome spine. She looked up at the sky. What thoughts filled her head as she stared into the endless space above? How did she feel as the sole occupant of this restful world?

Vance sat next to her, and the frogs danced in front of them.

“Are you free now?” she said.

“Yeah,” he answered.

She had neck-length brown hair, with a middle part that revealed a line of snowy scalp, and her eyes seemed to draw a low-angle shot of a forest—the dominant green as the canopy, the brownish furrows as the vanishing trunks. Surrounding the two sylvan views were a delicate nose, thin brows, and rosy cheeks. And her round face as a whole, as a unit examined without arbitrary division, had a mesmerizing quality that reassured people of her innocence and good nature. Seeing her face, the priestesses would say that she was blessed, and the nuns would urge her to join a convent. But there she was, shocking the prudish world with her unembarrassed nudity.

“I’m sorry … about what happened earlier.”

“Nothing happened earlier,” Vance smiled, and his nude reflection in her eyes smiled back at him—well-toned muscles, tall stature, thin waist, hairless chest, even shoulders. “Let bygones be bygones. How can anyone worry about something that trivial?”

“The things Hollie said were really offensive … and unforgivable.”

“Yes, the things the holy said.”

“But I hope you can forget about them.”

“Forgotten,” Vance said.

“Thank you. You make me really happy.”

“Don’t thank me. Thank Maven.”

“Who’s Maven?”

Vance laughed.

“Was this … a joke?”

“Yes,” Vance said. “It was the best joke of my life.”

She laughed with honest amusement.

“You have a cute laugh.”

“Uh … Um … Thank you, I guess.” She looked down, hiding her face behind a curtain of hair. “I thought you’d stay angry at us, but I’m glad it’s all in the past.” She brushed her locks behind her left ear. “I’m Shannon … But I guess you know that already. You can call me Shyny … with two y’s. Hollie came up with that one … because of the scales on my dress … and because I’m too shy sometimes … To be honest, I don’t like it that much. On second thought, let’s just keep it plain and simple Shannon.”

“I’m Vance. But my friends call me … Oh, wait, I don’t have any.”

Shannon laughed and said, “I don’t have any either. I just met Hollie today.”

“It’s a strange world.”

“But we can do something about it.”

“Yeah, we can kidnap someone. Kidnapping starts lots of friendships.”

“Stop it. I meant … we can become friends … the two of us,” Shannon said, pulling on her Tectonic Medallion. “You’re the only other person here who’s from Engelsburg. That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”

“You want us to be friends?” Vance chuckled.

“I know Turncoats are really secretive about their identities, but I don’t feel I can make it on my own.” Shannon let go of her medallion. “I’m sorry. You must think I’m really weird. Forget I said—”

“It’s nice to have friends … until it’s no longer nice to have them.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean exactly what I said,” Vance smiled.

“Are you afraid I’d turn against you?” Shannon said.

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

“You don’t need to be. It’s my First Death too. We’re the same level, and we’re from the same city, so we must be similar in many ways. I think we can help each other out. Aren’t you sick of being alone?”

“I don’t mind being alone, but I do hate loneliness.”

“I feel the same way,” Shannon said. “It’s a really hard life we’re leading. We can’t trust anyone right away. We always need to keep our distance and pretend. I miss the days I used to go out with my friends to the taverns. We weren’t the wildest bunch, but we spent good times together. I could be my real self around them. Everything was just so … authentic.”

“All right, I’m sold,” Vance said, pounding the ground with both fists. “Let’s become friends, Geomancer.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Happy times are ahead of us.”

“I can’t believe it … You agreed.”

“Why wouldn’t I? Everything you said was convincing. We’ll set some rules, and then we’ll spend happy times together.”

“Rules? I … I don’t like rules.”

“Fine. Let’s keep things simple, then,” Vance said. “I’m in charge. You follow me wherever I go and do everything I say. How’s that?”

“Much better,” Shannon said, with a hypnotized smile.

***

Having become friends, Vance and Shannon set out on a long journey of epic proportions. It started at the same calm riverside, where they encountered a muscular mermaid and challenged her to a contest of strength. Vance exerted himself and tried his best to defeat his mermaiden foe, but his efforts ended in a tantalizing defeat. He concluded that humanity could never defeat merfolk. He laughed and congratulated his foe, but Shannon stopped him mid-laughter and told him not to give up so soon. He should seek the sage who lived high in the mountains. The sage would train him, and he would challenge the mermaid again, and she would lose this time.

“Of course,” Vance agreed.

But after a few minutes, the two friends had forgotten about the hermit sage and the arduous training and the subsequent challenge. They found themselves among solar elves, and it felt only natural for Vance to reinstate Kaz of Nekhen as their rightful king. Shannon agreed that it was the right thing to do. The old kings were the future. The world should rotate backward not forward. And the two friends orchestrated a revolution and crowned Kaz as the true king. So delighted were the elves with their restored ruler that they granted Vance and Shannon the prestigious title of honorary elf. A large estate and a court position came with it, but the two friends refused to become part of the bureaucracy and embarked for the next link in the chained odyssey.

They searched far and wide until they found the master of Castle Somnus. A calm demon it was—animalistic in appearance, humane in manner. No conflict followed, because the god-hearted demon recognized the two friends and chose to grant their solemn request. They became the new owners of Castle Somnus. It became their shared home, and they became its unchallenged masters. What bohemian destiny it was that brought them here. And what incomprehensible surprises still awaited them. Lo and behold, seconds after they acquired this castle, they discovered that the purple river—the same soothing landscape where their friendship had begun—ran through the main hall, and a boat was beckoning to them from the ceramic shore.

“Let’s go,” Vance said.

“All right,” Shannon smiled.

Shannon lay on her back in the boat and looked up at the ceiling of Castle Somnus, while Vance grabbed the oars and started to row, thrusting his hips forward to give more power to the opposite motion of his arms. In the water, colorful flowers and fruits were floating—pink roses, melanocytic melons, and carnation peaches. The river flowed lethargically, and Vance rowed through the roses and the melons and the peaches. Whenever he felt too tired to propel the boat, he would pause to rest, and in these brief intermissions, he would put his hand in the water and grab the fruits and taste their luscious juices.

“Ah! I feel so good,” Shannon smiled up.

“Me too,” Vance smiled down.

“Ah! I don’t want to leave this place. Ah! I want to stay here forever.”

“I don’t wanna leave either.”

“I’m flying in the air. And no one can shoot me down.”

When the boat reached the heart of the calm river, Shannon said that it was time for Vance to rest and enjoy the scenery with her. He let go of the oars, and as they dropped into the water, he lay next to her on the bottom boards. They looked up at the ceiling, but they could also see through it, as if it were sheer fabric. High above was the green sky, and even higher was the yellow moon. They yawned with drowsy satisfaction. It seemed that it was time for them to be enveloped in a deep sleep. Vance closed his eyes and surrendered to the rocking of the boat. He needed one more moment of silence to drift off, but …

“I feel so sleepy,” Shannon said.

“Me too.”

“But I don’t want to sleep.”

“Why?”

“I’m afraid I’ll wake up in Middlerift.”

“Do you hate it?”

“I … don’t belong there. I don’t want to go back. I don’t want to kill people.”

“Please don’t preach. It will just ruin my mood.”

“I’m not preaching … I’m just talking about my feelings.”

“Do you still think it’s wrong to kill people?”

“It’s not about right or wrong. It just hurts me when I do.”

“It hurts you?”

“Why can’t we all forget about our differences and be happy the way you and I are now? I feel … I feel that the world is really simple, that it’s just us who are complicating things for ourselves.”

“You’re preaching,” Vance said.

“I’m not.”

“Can we just live in the moment? Nothing matters as long as we’re feeling good. Don’t destroy the little happiness we have.”

“You’re … You’re right. If I think too much about everything, I’ll just ruin the moment. I’ll close my eyes and sleep … But you have to stay close. Don’t let the flies take me away. Don’t let them send me back to Middlerift.”

Vance turned to face Shannon, and she placed her soft hand on his cheek and brushed his shoulder-length hair back. They huddled together as if it were the coldest day of an unforgiving winter. The tips of their noses touched—the light rub of one cotton boll against the other. With a slow, gentle progression, they wrapped their arms around each other and pushed their bodies together. And they closed their eyes. The boat continued to drift, and time was no longer a continuous stream but a broken series of self-standing moments, each full and complete in itself, each possessing the character of blissful longevity.

It was impossible to tell how long they slept on that rowboat or how far the weak currents of the river carried them. Like a blind man who felt his world only with a stick, Vance didn’t realize that the downstream journey had ended until he experienced the physical impact of the end. The boat ran aground. The wooden bow and breasthook smashed against jagged rocks, and a violent quake traveled along the gunwales and bottom boards. With a start, he opened his slumberous eyes and felt a crushing loneliness. He was alone on a foggy shore. Shannon was nowhere to be found, and even the memory of her warmth had disappeared from his mind.

“Shannon!” he called, but there was no answer.

He disembarked and left the shipwreck behind. He felt a rush of fear—the same fear a mother feels after losing her child, or conversely, the same fear a child feels after losing his mother. Did the Honeydew Flies find Shannon? Did they take her away? Did they kidnap her to the terrifying realm of Thurvik? When she wrapped her arms around him, he thought it impossible for the flies to snatch her. But now he realized that he was wrong. And he strained his lungs and pressured his heart so that they would give him every bit of energy to chase the hideous flies—wherever they went, wherever they would go.

Through deep fog he continued to run until he found himself emerging into an overfamiliar landscape. And then he slowed down. His steps became shorter and shorter. Then he stopped. He stopped because he recognized the snow-clad oaks, the shadowy trails, and the self-effacing sky. It was Frostgeist Forest; he was sure—it simply couldn’t be any other place in existence. On its outskirts was the sawmill where he had once worked, dragging heavy timber six days a week, and farther east from the shaved logs and the toothy blades was Engelsburg itself, the stage for the drama of his youth.

The boat journey had started in Castle Somnus, but it somehow brought him here—back to the northern Engelian lands. And as he wrapped his head around this confusing departure-destination pair, he suddenly spotted Shannon’s distant silhouette. He returned to running. He chased after her—through the wooden crannies, over the girthy roots, past the fallen logs, and beyond the frozen rocks. She drew so close, and he realized that the Honeydew Flies hadn’t gotten to her yet. He still had a chance to save her. His hands reached for her; his fingers were only a hair’s length from her shoulder. But the moment he touched her, he turned into a ghost.

***

A ghost’s touch is felt as a frigid breeze, as a sharp sting, as a traveling shiver. It doesn’t linger. It doesn’t last. It is as fleeting as snow in summer. But it also stirs the living and teases the imagination. And Shannon turned around when she felt it. She looked a few years younger than she had been in the House of Turncoats, and she wore a fur dress instead of her normal clothes. She searched the corners of Frostgeist Forest for the apparition behind the ghostly touch, but she only saw her job partner, the one other member in her small adventuring party—April.

“Why did you stop?” April said. “Did you spot the cenbear?”

“No. I felt something weird,” Shannon said. “And … there are footprints.”

“Where?”

Shannon pointed at the snow near the hem of her dress.

“Those are wolves. We have no business with them.”

“But they might have business with us. Should we turn back?”

“Come on, don’t be such a scaredy-cat!”

“Stop calling me that, April.”

“Sorry, sorry. It slipped out on its own.”

“It always does.”

April walked past young Shannon. Her shoes left marks parallel to those of the frightening wolves. Then she turned and smiled with misaligned incisors. “Are you seriously mad at me?” she laughed. Her blond braid shook right and left, and her hooded blue eyes opened wide as if with astonishment. “It slipped out on its own, I swear!” She scratched the small pimples on her forehead. “I said I’m sorry. Come here.” She rushed back and hugged Shannon. “I didn’t mean to bother you. I just want you to remember that we’ve completed our Class Ascension.”

“I know … But …”

“Even your uncle said we should accept this job. Remember how he used to tell us not to wander into forests? See how things have changed?”

“Okay, I get it. We’re not kids anymore.”

“That’s right. And there’s no reason for us to turn back or abandon an easy job. We can do this.”

“I guess … yeah.”

“So let’s go find that cenbear before it’s too late.”

With no room for further argument, Shannon and April walked the forest path. Frozen twigs and translucent icicles scrunched under their shoes. They breathed into their hands and rubbed their furry clothes. As they advanced, the trees grew older, and monsters appeared on them. Four-winged Ice Quadrowls hooted from the lower boughs; white-brown Victim Buntings peeked out from cone-shaped nests; and Diver Goshawks perched on skyward limbs. All of them watched the humans closely, eager to sink their beaks and talons into succulent meat; but an item recommended by a shrewd guild employee—a bird-monster repellent—kept them at bay. It made finding the cenbear much easier.

“I think we’re near the place where it was last sighted,” April said.

A wolf howled from deep in the forest. A frigid gust blew among the trees. And the shadowy trail turned into a brighter clearing.

“There it is, Shannon,” April whispered. “Can you see it?”

“Where?”

“Under the Venozon.”

Shannon ducked and looked ahead with a mixture of anxiety and alarm.

In the center of the grassless clearing, there was an old tree—ugly, leafless, riddled with galls and knots. Its gnarly trunk was three meters in diameter, and its roots formed an invasive network that released toxins into the soil. This type of wooden abomination was known as a Venozon, and although most monsters stayed clear of it, cenbears were a species that relished the poisonous roots and thrived on the toxins. It was no surprise that the prey mentioned in the job description should be found here. And there it was—a mass of fur at the foot of the tree trunk, digging with its claws and feeding the unearthed roots into its abdominal mouth.

“That’s what your dad and the other lumberjacks were talking about.”

“Yeah,” April said. “See? I told you they were right. When toxic excrement starts killing trees, there’s always a cenbear behind it.”

“It didn’t notice us yet.”

“I don’t think it did. It’s busy eating.”

“What will we do?”

“Same as always,” April said with confidence. She opened her bag and put on a pair of brass knuckles. “I’ll go first. Back me up.”

“Wait,” Shannon said, grabbing April’s arm.

“What’s wrong? I thought we’re completing this job.”

“You forgot to check its level. Take out your mosntroscope.”

“Seriously, Shannon?” April sighed and produced the gadget. Taking a good look at the cenbear, she muttered, “It’s level 24. Are you satisfied now?”

Shannon nodded.

In the next moment, April was racing toward the cenbear like a bullet. By the time the monster turned around, she had arrived at close range and prepared for a devastating punch. Her brass knuckles struck her enemy in its abdominal face, leaving a leaden bruise and knocking it back several meters. As it tried to get up, she dashed toward it again and punched its face five more times. The ruthless attacks left horrible wounds. Streams of blood gushed out and flowed onto the monstrous fur. Then, as if to conclude her combo with the finishing blow, April swung her leg and sent the cenbear flying with a roundhouse kick.

This last kick was a martial arts Skill called Comet Kick. The leg moved twice as fast as it normally could and dealt enough physical damage to break bones and even shatter some shields. For a silent moment, it felt as if a quick victory had been achieved, but then the cenbear moved its spreadeagled body. It stood up and growled with its distinctive voice. It was angry that its meal had been disturbed; it was livid that it had been injured in such a way. And it lengthened its razor-sharp claws as if to say that it meant mean business.

“Struggle while you can,” April smiled. “I’m gonna enjoy killing you, freak.”

The cenbear took three clumsy steps and rolled into a furball. It continued forward with a fast spin before it jumped high and protruded its claws. Rotating in the air, it resembled the circular blades of a shredder, and its attack had the potential to reduce a human into strip steaks. Only a good shield or skillful magic could stop the lethal attack. And although April had neither, she wasn’t alone in this fight.

“Stand back, April! It’s too dangerous!” Shannon rushed to the rescue. She activated her basic Skill: Geo-manipulation. Her hands shone with a blue light, and as she waved them, a pillar of rock rose from the ground between April and the cenbear. This pillar blocked the monster’s attack and knocked it back to the ground, where it writhed and squirmed with half of its claws broken.

“Great work, Shannon,” April said. “Go for the kill!”

The cenbear noticed Shannon and realized the danger she posed. It turned around and tried to flee. But it was too late. Geo-manipulation activated again, and three walls of rock surrounded the helpless monster. It tried to find a way out through the last remaining opening—the missing fourth wall—but as it scrambled toward the light, April’s silhouette appeared before it. The Martial Artist kicked the sad furball up. Before it hit the ground again, she had punched it into a mince and kicked the life out of it.

“572 EXP. Not bad!” April smiled, as the corpse dropped with a thud.

“You did great,” Shannon smiled back.

The battle was over.

The earthen walls disappeared underground, and Shannon’s hands lost their blue glow. For a moment, she felt proud of herself. She was happy that she had helped April complete the job, and it seemed that the good feeling would last into the night. Perhaps she could even overcome her shyness and boast in the midnight taverns as April always did. With a bit of a smile, she started to pick the words she would use, ruling out anything too pompous or pretentious. The perfect rhythm and rhyme drew closer to her grasp, but then she noticed the corpse of the cenbear, and her smile faded away.

“What’s wrong?” April said.

“Nothing.”

“By the way, you did that thing again.”

“What thing?” Shannon said, with honest confusion.

“You had a chance to crush the cenbear between the walls, but you didn’t.”

“Oh, um … yeah … you’re right, I guess.”

“Don’t tell me you feel sympathy for those things. That’s heretic.”

“I don’t. I told you before … I … I just hate seeing things die.”

“Well, you’ve got to get used to it soon, or you’ll never grab a kill in your life,” April said. Then she looked at the gory corpse and continued, “I just got a nice idea. We’re supposed to bring back a claw, right? To prove we finished the job.”

“Uh-huh …”

“You’re gonna tear one off the corpse.”

“I definitely won’t!” Shannon turned away.

“You will,” April laughed. “It’s the best way to get over your problem.”

“I didn’t ask for help. Thank you.”

“Come on, Shannon.”

“You get the claw.”

“Fine. But at least turn this way and look at me as I do it.”

“I just have to look?”

“Yeah, just look,” April sighed. Then she muttered to herself, “By Amirani, she needs to toughen up. Imagine if I wasn’t there for her.” She took out a knife and started cutting around one of the unbroken claws. It felt better to take one that was intact, in case she wanted to show it off to her friends, but removing it required more time and energy than she expected. As she struggled with the raw task, fearing that she might lose her unwilling audience, she said, “Keep looking at me, Shannon. I’m almost done.”

But Shannon was no longer watching the butchered butchery. Instead, her eyes had strayed to the nearby trees. At that moment, a wolf was emerging from the gelid embrace of snow. It staggered for three weak steps and then dropped dead on the edge of the clearing.