Petra Goldwing hated boats. This was not a new opinion for the outrageously ornate dragonkin, but one she once more reaffirmed as she sailed along the mild seas of the Hynix. Certainly, the ship she was on was luxurious- it wouldn’t do for her to travel on anything but the best- but the waters being calm and the boat enchanted to be yet calmer was not enough to make her any less uneasy.

Of course, she’d never admit that it was unease that spurred her intense dislike for being on the water in any form; she had an image to maintain and that image had just recently become much more radiant, exactly how she liked to be. Her new appearance, position, and of course, power, was supplied entirely for the job she was tasked with however, and she would not be able to complete that job without making the journey she so thoroughly disliked.

She was first sent out to the backwater little island in the Hynix Grand partially at the behest of her family, but a lot of her motivation came from one of their family ties, someone they shared many interests with. She was offered quite a handsome reward, should she manage to wring some concessions out of the newly-minted Guildhead of an equally fresh branch, one founded exclusively around a young dungeon as new branches so often tend to be.

Of course, she had known about the peculiarities of the dungeon, the branch, and even the man in charge. She’d been provided a pretty comprehensive overview about all these things before she was sent off; she’d studied it thoroughly before accepting the job offer and felt the rewards were worth the time out on the ocean. They hadn’t been, not at all. The dossier she had gotten on Rok, the head of the branch, was nearly forty years out of date, put together when he was still active in the Guilds, both the Adventurer and Atlantean.

This painted the picture of someone who was calm but could be temperamental when pushed. However, it also made a point to say that he’d often capitulate when he’d be butting heads otherwise. Her experience with the man was calm and temperamental both, sure, but the only capitulating he’d done was allowing himself to be corrected about her clan name. Offers of cooperation and bribes were both dismissed out of hand, while a few subtle attempts at flirting were met with the same coldness that her attempts at bloodline suppression; she’d have gotten just as far with the walls of his office.

Her dismissal was by far the most humiliating part of the experience, though. A siren, nothing more than a magically jumped up mermaid, being able to Charm her was a hard pill to swallow, but when she did, her father’s words began making much more sense. She was lacking, in a lot of ways, and her return with no real results meant that those flaws were on display to the whole clan.

Most glaring, the fact that she could succumb to a siren’s Charm at all left a bad taste in the mouths of much of the extended family and was a lingering resentment to her. That she was given a chance to redeem herself seemed unthinkable, but she would not let shock and surprise keep her from making the most of this second chance. The mysterious collaborators of the family, however, seemed very intent on trying to shake her regardless, and they had come with an offer she almost couldn’t refuse.

While redemption and revenge were powerful motivators, the appeal was fickle and fleeting next to the permanence of actual, tangible power, and she had been offered that in spades, or rather, a collection of vials and syringes. The path to S rank was one she’d only just begun walking, according to her parents, so she was taken aback when she was given the means to jump straight to the end, and all she had to do in return was go back to the site of her humiliation.

She’d argued with her father for hours on the decision to go back, insisting that she wasn’t going purely to satisfy some grudge but to be a new source of power and prestige for the clan. He just wouldn’t listen, though, telling her over and over what a bad idea it was to accept the offer, that she should wait and build her power slowly and steadily, focus more on clan affairs rather than working for their mysterious allies. She didn’t understand his insistence, though, he’d worked with them on multiple occasions, reaped huge rewards almost every time, so why was it that he kept trying to dissuade her from doing the same?

Eventually he relented, declaring that she had reached the age of majority, and her decisions were her own. He warned her one final time to be mindful of who she worked with, to make sure that her choices stayed her own before he left, seeming almost defeated. She was sure she’d imagined that, though; her father was one of the most powerful members of the clan and few beneath a Titled could leave him bitter.

She’d made her choice, though, and from there, her path to S went from long and grueling to a quick Oath and a few shots. She knew how someone chose to ascend was critical to what they ascended into, and she’d ensured with an amalgam of mana-flooded mercury mixed with golds and silvers of every flavor that her own ascension would be quite literally brilliant. She was not disappointed, either; upon awakening her body was heavier, denser, brimming with power. Her flesh was reinforced with metal and further bolstered with mana, and now it was just going to take time to encourage all of that to become purely mana, time much better spent on that than on needlessly gathering mana that’d all be wasted upon ascension anyway.

Manaflesh was power, power that’d only grow as it became more mana and less flesh, so the choice to ascend early surely meant she’d have more time to grow. It hardly mattered how “impure” her manaflesh could be called, though, the power contained far outstripped even the strongest mortal and nothing short of having her head reduced to pulp could kill her anyway. She was overprepared to face whatever there might be on that infuriating island, and with the Mapper’s recent guide being published, she knew exactly what she could expect when she made her Dive, after handling whatever the advanced team had stirred up for her.

She could only wonder what exactly that was, by now. They’d been sent out a day ahead of her, the teams mostly organized by her younger brother, eager to prove himself to her and her father. Unfortunately, he had been delayed along the way. A simple stop on an island to board a ship more well-equipped to travel the unpredictable waters of the Hynix Grand turned into days of delays. They hadn’t been equipped to handle everything, she bitterly found out, when a storm had sprung up seemingly out of nowhere.

The winds were whipping hard enough that trees had bent nearly sideways, and more than a few of the cheaper structures were damaged. The rain felt like needles even to her newly reinforced skin, and the ocean itself had risen up to swallow a few homes too close to the shore. This had been one of the last major island cities on her route to Sleepy Gills, and she was glad she could weather out the storm in the relative comfort of an enchanted safehouse. Then, as suddenly as the weather began, it dispersed, leaving her confused and the residents resigned.

She’d left them to figure out the cleanup, boarding the boat prepared for her at the first opportunity. It hadn’t been easy to find someone willing to violate Guild restrictions and bring an S rank to a Sub-S dungeon town, and the man had been very adamant that they get there fast so he could leave even faster. She understood his nerves, though; even she was on edge about the prospect of an Enforcer arriving and it was only the fact that, even delayed, it would take one of those monsters days longer to arrive than her, and that was if they’d set out at the same time.

Still, she wasn’t planning on lingering longer than she needed. The Dungeon Accords were clear on how they felt about S rankers interfering with dungeons lacking any creatures of the same rank, and even more clear about how they dealt with anyone who felt like doing so anyway. Still, the rewards were worth the risk, she felt, and if her brother had done his job properly then she’d be the last worry for Rok. There was the risk of him getting a message to the Guilds, but without her presence being known then an Enforcer was off the table.

It was still hard for her to settle her nerves despite being aware of all of this, though. Something about the storm was leaving her on edge, feeling like a poor omen despite her knowing that it was likely just some release of built up mana meeting the environment just right. She had been growing antsy ever since then; what else might have gone wrong, what else might still be waiting to do so?

In the end, she could only swallow her unease, and affirm her own place in this scheme. If she had the chance, she’d like to uproot the Guilds’ presence on the island entirely- especially the Head and a certain aid- at least for long enough that someone else could come in after her and face their answer, but she was fully prepared to make the race to the Reef Dungeon, to ideally find something entirely new or to deal with a rogue.

Her arrival drew nearer still, and the salty air had grown almost nauseating to her. Even the nearly imperceptible rocking was unbearable by now, and the sound of gentle wind to her enhanced senses had left her seething. The few other passengers on board were leaving her well alone by then, and for good reason. She’d been simmering in her room for most of the trip, and when the captain announced, timidly and through a door, that they were finally at their destination she nearly broke that very door and the man behind it in her rush to stand on solid ground.

It was a welcome relief once she was, and she took a moment to relish the feeling of sand and limestone rock beneath her. She was on Rhyn, one of the nearest islands to Sleepy Gills, and the one being converted into an elemental crystal refinery, one of the very few dedicated to handling the much rarer minerals and not their impure, diluted imposters. To call such an undertaking potentially lucrative would be criminally understated, and Petra was almost sad she’d be ruining them before they even began full operations.

The thought of controlling that much wealth was exciting in a few too many ways to the aurum dragonkin. But that was for another time, and she could surely salvage a fortune from this operation regardless, she just needed to finish it first. She turned towards the Guild’s island, seeing the glittering lights in the distance, contrasting the empty night sky. It was very dim, as the sun set, and a soft green glow only barely illuminated the sea as she stepped out onto the ocean, feeling the water turn rigid beneath her.

She would walk the last portion, not wanting to set foot on another boat for a long time and caring little about the mana it would cost her to carry her along, especially with one or two provided trinkets. As the small sandbar disappeared behind her, her walk turned into a run, and then a sprint across the open ocean, as she tore something off her neck and let her mana start rolling off her in tightly controlled waves.

It wouldn’t do to alert everyone of her arrival too soon, but the suppression artifact was constricting and unpleasant. She would be capable of hiding it on her own for a short while if she needed, but leveraging her aura could solve a few problems too, and she could use the extra perception that came with it. Approaching under cover of night and slowing back to a stroll as she neared, she didn’t realize that she wasn’t quite as unnoticed as she initially believed, and a conversation had just been wrapped up moments before she was within sighting distance of the northwestern shores where business and bustle suddenly became stillness and nature. She was too busy straining her own senses and interpreting the many ongoing conversations across the island to notice that she’d been observed herself.

Her unfelt watcher was surprised, but not quite so much as she was, hearing a few particularly interesting- and concerning- chats.