Joe had a lot to say about a magicless Witch who had a two-headed winged lion for a trusted companion, but this wasn’t the best time to bring that up. Besides, the aforementioned creature was eying her suspiciously, like he knew every little traitorous thought that was going on inside her head.

Joe supposed she should be thanking the guy for finding her in the forest, but those red eyes weren’t exactly the friendliest pair of eyes she’d seen in her short life. The girl wisely decided to keep her distance and her— erm, words of gratitude to herself for the time being. Given her history of being universally disliked by animals and non-human creatures of all kinds, Joe was certain that ‘Basil’ would not want to nuzzle her anytime soon.

“Is he a magical creature just like the Bubblebirds?”

Sandy stroked his mane lovingly. “Something like that. Since the influence of scales is too strong in the forest of Sandora, some of its creatures may evolve over time with curious characteristics. You wouldn’t find a two-headed, winged lion anywhere else in Triciella. Basil evolved in such a strange way due to the abundance of scales and Scaledfolks in Sandora. You could say that in some cases, he would behave the same way as Bubblebird.”

As if on cue, Basil let out a growl of disagreement. The witch did not so much as flinch at the sound.

She had the nerves of steel, Joe decided. That, or the fearsome creature was probably vegetarian all along. He gingerly lowered his head to sniffed Sandy’s hair, her neck and shoulders, whining and purring like a harmless housecat.

The sight was almost up there with the most incredulous things Joe had ever seen.

When he reached Sandy’s left hand, however, Basil wrinkled his nose with the most distasteful expression and jumped back with a yelp. The witch furrowed her brows.

“What happened?” Nero straightened up in alarm.

Sandy had a puzzled expression on her face. “I am not entirely sure.” She was holding the bouquet of Pixie roses on her left hand. “Actually, this was exactly what I was trying to tell you earlier. These pixie roses do seem kind of funny. Even the bubblebirds of the forest are steering clear of them.”

Funny?

Joe didn’t know much about these flowers, but she doubted that they actually smelled so bad that it would beget that kind of a reaction. Or maybe two-headed winged lions had a different kind of aesthetics when it came to their olfactory senses. Maybe Basil was simply allergic to them?

“It is getting late Joanna.” Sandy gave her two-headed companion a final pat on its head and strode back into her cottage. “You must leave the forest right now, if you want to return to the Winsten manor before noon.”

‘Dammit, I am not done with all of my questions yet!’ Joe wanted to scream, but one good look at the old hag made it perfectly clear that she wasn’t going to entertain any more of her idiocy. Joe could throw the biggest tantrum in the history of tantrums and promptly be kicked out of the little cottage, or she could bid the Witch farewell on friendlier terms with a potential opportunity to visit her later.

Yep, the second option was undoubtedly wiser in the long run.

“How do we return without a horse?” The girl glanced between Sandy and Nero. “Oh, are we going to ride on Basil’s back?”

“No, you little turd!” The witch snapped back. “Do you want the townsfolk to find out about his identity?! There’s better alternative for your transportation. I shall send the two of you back with the Portal.”

‘Tu— ’ Joe stared at the woman, aghast. ‘The Witch of West just called me a turd!’ And then her brain caught on to the rest of that statement. “Did you just say, ‘Portal’?!”

Sandy didn’t reply. She silently ushered them towards the back of the cottage. A strange contraption sat there on four metallic legs, looking like the lovechild of a mirror and a rickety stool. Joe shuddered at the monstrosity. Whoever came up with that design must have had crap for taste.

Nero watched the woman fiddle with the dials on its surface and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I didn’t know that you had managed to repair this one, Sandy.”

“Well, now you know.” Came the distracted reply.

“Now, wait a second!” Joe squinted suspiciously at the contraption. It looked absolutely bizarre and grossly unreliable, for the lack of better words. “If you had something like a friggin’ portal, why did we have to come all this way on horseback?!”

I’ll sue you for my back pain and muscle cramps, dammit!

Sandy didn’t even turn around. “It is a one-way portal, Joanna. It can only teleport people in one direction, not the other way around.” She briefly glanced towards Nero. “The Evans’, right?”

Nero nodded. “The Evans’ it is.”

Joe looked ready to tear the hair off her head. “Does this thing even work?!”

Portals sounded very cool and classy all, but only when you saw them being used by fictional characters in fictional movies. Joe had consumed a fair share of Sci-Fi content back in her edgy, teenage years. But now that she was the one that actually needed to use a portal, the ‘cool’ factor was suddenly divided by half in her mind. What if the damn thing malfunctioned in the middle of its teleportation? What if it dropped her down one of the frozen ravines of the Casterwing Mountains, never to be found again?

“Oh they work all right.” Sandy must have sensed the tremor in her voice. “Besides, what’s the worse that could happen to you? Landing smack in the middle of His Majesty King Julian’s dinner table? I imagine not! ”

Nero dragged a tired hand down his face, looking as if he was done with life. “Sandy…”

“I know. I know.” The old hag finally dusted off her hands and stood up. She sent a mollifying look towards Joe, whose face had gone as white as sheet. “Relax. It had been unused for a long time, but I have faith in my own skills. I am Master Ivy’s sole apprentice after all.”

The girl strode forward with hesitant steps and poked at the metal. The mirror was easily twice her size and framed with gold, looking like it had been carried straight out of a royal palace. She’d never imagined that she’d see a Portal in her lifetime, much less actually use one to teleport herself. Joe didn’t see any wires around the contraption— figures, because it certainly didn’t use electricity. Perhaps it used magic, because magic was the only thing in this world that could make the impossible possible.

What kind of magic could possibly be used in a portal? Something that could instantly connect two places? Something that could, in theory, teleport people to another destination without caring for the vast distance in between?

Joe’s eyes widened in disbelief. Why, that almost sounded like the characteristics of a Devil’s Dew!

“The Void!” She blurted out before she could even stop herself. “This Portal uses the magic of Void! It works the same as a Devil’s Dew!”

The witch had a hint of amusement in her eyes. “Finally figured it out, have you? Yes, the Portal uses the same kind of magic that you’d see in a Devil’s Dew.”

The casual admission just yanked forth a new barrage of questions in Joe’s mind. Why did the Witch of West have her own personal Devil’s Dew in her backyard?! Isn’t this thing supposed to be dangerous? Also, how in the blue blazes could you go about fixing a Devil’s Dew?!

“I’m not using that thing!” Joe spat.

“I only said that the Portal worked with the same kind of magic as a Devil’s Dew.” Sandy looked like she was regretting her answer. “This Portal uses an extremely stable form of Void magic, meticulously planned and calculated with precision. It is a controlled form of Devil’s Dew, so to speak. The wild ones you’d see in the countryside are unpredictable and volatile. They were caused by the aftereffects of Void. However, this one here was created with a predetermined function in mind— rest assured, it only works as a Portal and nothing else.”

The magic of Void had its uses after all. Joe looked at the Portal with uncertainty; she still had mixed feelings about that thing. But it was useless to argue. It was either this, or walking back all the way to Mirlock with blistering feet and exhaustion hanging over her head.

“How did you even get a hold of something like this?”

“Not mine.” Sandy looked away. “It belonged to Master Ivy. She said that it was a gift from someone.”

Someone important, the words remained unsaid.

Joe wondered if it was that R fellow. She also wondered if R and the Devil were the same people. She had been wondering a lot of things in this trip. But right now, she just wanted to go to bed.

Nero placed a gentle hand on the small of her back. “Let us be off, my Lady. Time is of essence.”

The girl nodded absentmindedly, trying to calm the butterflies in her stomach. Even if something went wrong, at least she’d have Nero with her. She turned back to Sandy and gave a small bow.

“I am most grateful for your help, Madam Sandy.” The words were genuine. “Honestly, I did not even think that I’d get to meet you face-to-face, what with the rumours and all.”

Sandy cracked a knowing grin.

Joe hesitated. “You have gone through much more and much longer than I can ever imagine, but you haven’t given up yet. The fact that you are still learning and studying and questioning means that you…. you still have a lot of fight left in you. I am…” Oh, this was mortifying. “…I would have probably given up ages ago. I do not even have half the courage that you do. ”

The Witch of the West waved her hands in dismissal. She actually looked embarrassed at the sudden display of gratitude. Joe imagined a tiny smile curling up on her lips. Sandy was a lot of things, but in the end she was merely a stubborn old woman with human emotions and very human weaknesses, who had been just as lost as Joe once upon a time, desperate to return home.

“The next time you visit this place,” Came the gravelly reply. “Bring some of your own gifts. I’ll look forward to what you can do with your own two hands.”

Joe could hardly hide her grin. Next time?

“I can bake you some of my own cookies, but I am ridiculously bad at cooking!” She quipped back. “You might end up with a bad stomachache, y’know?”

Sandy burst out into peals of laughter. The sight caught Joe completely off guard. Did she inadvertently manage to make the Witch of West laugh?! At one of her crappy jokes no less?!

“Scary, scary!” Lady Joanna mumbled in her head. “Let’s get out of here, Joe.”

The girl nodded distractedly, and took a tentative step closer to the mirror. Nero was already waiting for her near the contraption. Without warning, the man grabbed hold of her shoulder and steered her towards the metallic legs. “Stay close.” He ordered, and promptly slammed down on a lever jutting out at the side.

The mirror shone a brilliant purple and then turned pitched black, puffing out swirls of black smoke in a way that would only remind you of some crappy, low-budget horror movie. The girl tried jumping out of its way, but Nero’s bulky hands held her firmly in place.

Were portals supposed to look this shady?!

“One more thing.” Sandy began, even as Joe felt the first tendrils of magic coiling upon her feet. “When you visit the Central Library of Triciella, look for the author called Cassandra. You shall find more clues regarding the Void and the Bubblebirds of this world.”

Joe blinked. Why on earth would she need to read up on shitty Bubblebi—

And then the cottage promptly swirled out of existence right before her eyes.

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To her credit, Joe did not crash head-first into the dirt. No, like the graceful noble Lady she was, the scrawny girl landed right on her butt and was sent sprawling across the ground.

It wasn’t the most elegant landing one could imagine, but between all the unexpected shit she’d had to deal with in the last few hours, it would be for the best not to have very high standards for this kind of thing to begin with.

Fuck fuck fuck! Her joints were hurting like hell!

The girl managed to prop herself up on trembling hands and coughed out a mouthful of grass. Her head felt disoriented and dizzy, as if someone had taken hold of her bearings and turned them right on their head. Joe pushed down her nausea and blinked at her surroundings. Somebody— anybody, please tell her that it wasn’t the royal dinner table of the king of Triciella!

She sniffed the air nervously. The place was dark and damp, reeking faintly of animal manure. Certainly not how a king’s dinner table should smell like. Something prickly poked at her hands and feet. Whatever it was, Joe was pretty certain that some of the stuff had fallen inside her tunic. She groped around in alarm, only to find a fistful of hay in her hands.

Wait— hay?!

“M’lady! M’lady Joanna!” came a familiar voice, “Are you in there?!”

In where? Joe wanted to ask. But she was beginning to have an inkling of an idea. Sure enough, she heard a door swing open with a loud WHAM behind her. Morning light flooded the place, and the burly figure of Nero came running before her eyes.

Not a speck of dirt on his clothes, she noted enviously. He must’ve landed perfectly like a graceful cat.

“Did you hurt your head, milady Joanna?” The man bent down and brushed off the chaffs of hay from her clothes. “Nero was quite alarmed when Nero realized that he couldn’t find you anywhere near his landing place. Sandy must have messed up the coordinates somehow.”

Coordinates? So that’s what that witch was fiddling with those dials for!

“I’m fine.” Joe managed weakly, but immediately doubled down in agony as a fresh wave of nausea washed over her. Don’t puke, she repeated in head. Don’t you dare puke in here!

Nero must have found her quite green in the face, because he knelt before her and began rubbing soothing circles on her back. “You don’t look so good, milady. This is your first time, but Nero didn’t think that you’d actually suffer from Portal-sickness.”

Portal-sickness? Dear lord, can’t your average fellow magically teleport themselves through a magical portal without these realistic consequences?!

The breakfast she ate at Sandy’s was threatening to rise up her throat.

I think I’m going to puke, Joe tried to say, but all that came out was “Aye gwib ayem goa byuk—” and a bunch of garbled, unintelligible sounds. She greedily sucked in gulps of fresh air (and gee, wasn’t the smell of manure just doing wonders to her nausea?) until the horrible sensation had finally passed and the food felt like it had settled back down in her stomach again.

“Safe!” The villainess cheered.

Joe could only give a wobbly smile.

A second figure joined them just as soon as she had managed to stand on her feet. Glasses glinted against the sunlight and Joe found the grinning face of Nathan Evans standing in the doorway. So her inkling had been right. She had landed smack in the middle of the Round Stable after all!

“I heard that you managed to meet the Witch of the West!” Nathan laughed “That’s amazing!” Before she could even answer, the man had stridden forward and unceremoniously thumped her on the back. Hard.

“Sto—” the girl began. But it was too late.

UURP! Her stomach clenched at the impact and the nausea came back with a vengeance.

Without warning, Joe doubled over and emptied the contents of her stomach right upon a dismayed Nathan’s shirt.

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By the time Joe and Nero had exited the Evan’s Lodge after a bath and cleaner clothes, the central market square was already bustling with people. Vendors propped up the sheets over their makeshift stalls and brought down their wares for display. Men and women were busy sorting out their produce for the day, and several groups of peasants hurried down the road with carts full of local vegetables. The merchants’ guild had a flock of pasty looking youths heatedly talking at the entranceway, and Joe could have sworn that she heard snatches of colourful words in their conversation.

It was strangely comforting. The girl realized that she felt more at ease in a noisy marketplace than grand, luxurious manors of any sort. Even if she was supposedly living a life of nobility in this world, she was still a commoner at heart. The lodgings at Evans’ did not hold a candle to the glittering halls of Winsten manor, but it had a sense of familiarity about it that Joe couldn’t help but like all the same.

Apparently, Griffon shared her sentiments. When they returned back to get him back from the Round Stable, the horse was patiently chewing his share of hay and looking completely at home with his surroundings. He fondly nuzzled and neighed at Nathan, as if it was utterly heartbreaking for him to even consider having to leave the man’s side.

The latter had already changed out of his smelly, vomit-covered shirt, of course.

Nathan had grumbled throughout the ordeal, but at least had the decency to admit that he was the cause of his own misery. The man had offered to draw up a warm bath, and even pulled out a set of clothes for her to wear. “Some of my son’s old clothes, if that’s alright with the young Lady.” He handed her a starched white shirt that reached somewhere above her knees, and a pair of black trousers. Joe assured the man that it was more than alright, and that could she please hurry up and get in the bath to wash off the horrible smell now?

So much for a shitty magical Portal. Forget landing on the King’s dinner table, she had somehow managed to vomit on the Queen’s brother-in-law instead! The villainess was never going to let her live this down.

As if on cue, there was a familiar snickering sound from the unlawful tenant inside her mind.

Near a blind bend of the busy road, they almost crashed into one of the reckless wagon drivers. The bags of grains in the wagon bounced at the impact, and so did the poor man driving it. Nero pulled back hard at the reigns, bringing Griffon to a hasty stop. “Watch it, dunderheads!” The driver snapped crassly. Joe jumped at his voice and almost slipped off the horse.

Nero mumbled an apology as the wagon drove away, leaving a cloud of dust in its wake.

“You can relax now. The long, long trip is finally over, milady.” Her companion chuckled at her reaction. “You should get some rest when we return back to the Winsten manor.”

Back to the Winsten manor?!

“W-Wait!” Joe pulled on his sleeves. She needed that book. That book from the author called Cassandra. Bubblebirds were definitely not up there on the list of things she wanted to read up on, but if the Book contained some clues about the Void, then she couldn’t let that opportunity slip by.

“I need to get that book!” she told Nero with as much solemnity as she could muster. “The one Sandy was talking about before we teleported away from her cottage. We should take a detour. Please, Nero.”

The man scratched his head. “The Central Library of Triciella should have already opened its gates to visitors for the day. Perhaps we could take a look inside before returning to the manor, if you’d like, Milady.”

He steered Griffon away from the market square and led it down the King’s Highway. ‘Wait just a bit longer, Lucia.’ Joe thought fervently. Who knew when she’d another opportunity in this world to act less like a noble and more like a commoner again? She needed to get her hands on that book before anyone else did!

The Central Library was indeed open. When Joe ran up the marble stairs and reached the front desk panting like a dog, the bespectacled man sitting there simply raised an irritated brow. “Yes?”

There was a smidge of disdain on his face. The commoner clothes and disheveled hair must have deterred him from assuming that she was one of the nobility.

Joe fidgeted under the stare. “Erm, do you happen to have any books form the author called Cassandra?”

The librarian peered at her with a funny look on his face. “You one of those Bubblebird enthusiasts?”

No. “Yes.”

“I see.” The man adjusted his glasses with a pudgy finger. “Fifth section, third shelf from the right. Look for the stack of books with red and gold leather covers, marked with the insignia of the Four-leaved Clover. On the back. The one you need is record number seven.”

Joe clasped her hands in relief. “Oh, thank you!” That was awfully detailed. Maybe those books were pretty popular among the so-called ‘Bubblebird enthusiasts’?

…..Or not. As she walked down the fifth section in one of the isolated, musty corners of library, Joe could not help but balk at the bizarre titles printed on the spines of the books. ‘Catbilly and Camouflage: The wonders of nature’. ‘Will-‘o-Wispies of Whitemare’. ‘Swinging Ointment for the Fickle Folks’. ‘Chimera in wild: A Primer’. ‘Boiled Basilisk and other tonics’— what the fuck?!

The villainess clicked her tongue irritably. “I had tried that once. Smells like medicine and tastes absolutely horrid, I tell you.” There was a pause. “It was strawberry flavour, I think.”

Strawberry flavoured boiled Basilisk.

‘…I did not need to know that’. Joe tore her eyes away from the shelves and hurried onto her destination.

Approximately ten minutes later, the girl was holding a brand new book, adorned with red leather and golden threads, and the delicate print of a Four-leaved clover on its back. The number seven gleamed boldly on its side, and Joe couldn’t help but get the distinct feeling that she’d seen this book somewhere before.

She shrugged, and opened the book in her hands,

It was titled: A study of the mating habits of Bubblebirds.