The cold struck Rotgoriel like a physical blow, making him gasp as his body once more came to exist on the slopes adjacent to Fimble. Even with his constitution, even with the fire inside him, it took him minutes to adjust.

And to think, not two days ago I heard the villagers speaking about how it was going to be summer soon.

Thinking of the villagers, he moved into the town, snow crunching beneath his claws, heavy body making the ice creak as he went.

The day was unusually bright, and things seemed much sharper. Rotgoriel blinked.

Then he winked.

Then his bellow shook the snow from the highest peaks, as joy filled him, from head to tail.

My eye is back!

He had wondered about that. Wondered if death would restore him. And now he had his answer.

Some good had come out of this day. But how had he died?

Today was... today was the training exercise, yes. That must have been it. The trainees had overcome his brother, defeated them. Which was annoying, but impressive on their part. He had thought that his body would prevail, but obviously that hadn't been the case.

But where were the victorious players? They should be celebrating, drinking beer as they so often did at every opportunity, and trying to get the few women in the village to tumble with them as was their usual off-duty habit.

This wasn't the case now, though. The village inn was quiet and shuttered, and his superb hearing could find no signs of the usual chatter and clatter in the houses that clustered mushroom-like against the ledge.

No, wait. There was a sound. Two voices speaking. He pinpointed a small shack at the edge of the village, noted the smoke rising from the chimney, and listened.

“I mean, it doesn't upset me. She told me to mind the place, and I can do that.” That was Agnez' favored pet, the man she called Tinty.

“Does it not? You are apart from your mistress. Wait, why do you laugh?” The discordant tones made Rotgoriel's scales bristle. That was Geebo, and he ground his teeth, not sure why he was irritated with his minion. The little creature had been nothing but faithful.

“Haaa...” Tinty's amusement faded. “Let's just say 'mistress' means something different than 'master' around here. Safer if you call her master, much safer.”

“I have a master! I cannot have another. That is not how servants work,” Geebo said, fretfully. “It would cause so many problems.”

“How do they work, then? I mean, I got a notice that I unlocked the Minion job, but I dunno if I really want to take that. I'm not a minion. Right?”

Geebo coughed.

The silence stretched on a bit.

“I don't want to be a minion!” Tinty wailed.

“Serving dragons is the highest form of goodness that people who are not dragons can aspire to.” Geebo replied. There was no exultation in his voice, none of the enthusiasm that he'd shown when saying similar things to Rotgoriel before. He said it as if he was simply stating a matter of fact. There might even have been a rueful note in there.

“Yeah? And what have dragons ever done that's all that great?” Tinty muttered. “No, I'm serious, don't give me that look. I don't have nothin' against them, not a hater, I'm just... well, from where I sit, all dragons do is collect treasure, eat people and people's goats, and burn anyone who gets in their way to death.”

“That is just not true!” Geebo sputtered. “Some of them use lightning or acid or just bite or claw people to death.”

“Right, right, sorry. But I mean the point stands, what've dragons ever done for us?”

“It is not a matter of what they have done for you! It is a matter of them having boundless mercy and infinite forgiveness!”

A long silence followed.

“Maybe your guy is different, but I ain't never known Agnez to be much forgiving. She's very much, er... pro-actively persecutive.”

Rotgoriel tilted his head in confusion. He was intelligent, he knew he was, but the words didn't seem to make much sense.

“You mean she takes offense before any slight is given?” Geebo asked.

“Kind of. More like she makes it clear that if you hand her any bullshit it'll come back to you as elephant shit. Or maybe dragon shit, I guess, now that she's... scaly and all.”

He sounded disappointed about that last part. Perhaps he realized it, because he cleared his throat and coughed, before quickly explaining. “What I'm saying is that if you don't understand that she's in charge and you'd best not cross her after a minute of meeting her, then you deserve anything she does to you. She's in charge; end of story.”

“So why is it you think you aren't a minion?” Geebo asked.

“Look, you remember when you told me about how a whole bunch of your ancestors built a magic door for one of their masters? And he left them to die after they finished it because it would have cost him a little time and effort to get them back out of the hole they was in?”

“Yes! Very proud moment for us. Very. So much... sacrifice. We draggits proved our love for our master then.”

“Yeah. That's my point. I don't love Agnez.”

“I know. That is because you are not a proper Minion yet. You are serving as one, but getting no benefit from it.”

“Wait. If I get the job, then I get benefits from it?”

“Silly! There are benefits from every job! You fear Agnez, yes?”

“Yeah, because I'm smart! Not because I'm a coward. Because I'm not. Not a coward. I mean... Oh I'm bad at this.”

“Then you need the job. Level five has what you need, and it is called “This is Fine.”

“This is fine?”

“Yes! It means that if your master causes you fear or distress or pain, it gets turned into love!”

Rotgoriel's jaw dropped open.

Geebo continued on, unwittingly. “And as you level up, it gets better! Eventually, it works on your hatred, too! The more you resent your master, the happier you get. It dovetails nicely with that buff Minions get to their efficiency when they're happy.”

“Sweet Nurph,” Tinty breathed. “That's utterly horrifying.”

“It let us live. It lets draggits be happy. Even when masters are horrible. Even when they hurt us, kill us, throw us away. It is how we survive. Without it... Without it draggits would have been killed long ago. Because even dragons need to be loved. And if too many of us showed how we really felt, they would have finished what they started long ago.”

What we started long ago? What was that? Rotgoriel wondered. But the wonder was drowned out by the cold realization that had been building in him throughout all of this.

Geebo didn't love him. Not truly.

And that hurt far more than it should.

“Well, I don't expect I'll go that way,” Tinty said. “I joined that blasted cult, that should be good enough. Got a bunch of confusing stuff I doubt I'll ever use, but there we go. Now at least it doesn't hurt so much when they practice those damned dark chants.”

“Perhaps in time you will come to see the usefulness of the Minion job.”

“Doubt it. Want more beer?”

“Yes, please. It is so very cold here. The beer makes Geebo warm.”

“Eh, you get used to it. Least we ain't got it so rough as those new guys. Going up on the mountain to fight your master! How'd that turn out anyways? Only one I saw back was that skeevy halven.”

“It was a massacre! Master won, of course.”

Rotgoriel blinked.

Then coming to a decision, he took off again, flapping his wings loudly, and descended closer to the house that Geebo and Tinty were in.

Instantly Geebo hurried outside. “Master! You have returned!”

“How did I die?” Rotgoriel asked bluntly.

The door opened again, and Tinty peered out. “Die? What's this? You're standing right—” he blinked. “Your eyes. You have two of them now?”

“Master?” Geebo asked. “I... you went off to train. Then you came back. You met Benedict. He got on your back and the two of you flew off north.”

“He was on my back?” Rotgoriel was aghast. That was horribly undignified! Foolish, too, with Agnez around. Word would get back to her. Especially with her minion around.

“Did I have one eye or two, then?” Rotgoriel asked.

“One. Master, I am relieved you are whole again—”

“Skip it,” Rotgoriel said, and some of his pain bled through into his voice, for Geebo froze, still and silent. “I'm going to my cave. Send Col— send the halven to me when he returns.”

Geebo still stood silent.

“Do you understand me?” Rotgoriel growled. “You may answer.”

“Yes. Yes Master.” Geebo said, nodding vigorously.

“Good.” Without another word he took off, heading up the mountain, to the little cave that Agnez had deigned to let him occupy while he was here. She called it the guest room. He called it uncomfortable at best, but she was stretching the limits of draconic tradition by letting him be here in the first place, so he tolerated it.

And there he sat, alone and feeling loneliness wash over him.

His most trusted servant's love for him was a lie. It came from a skill. Without that skill... without that skill, would Geebo love him?

Pattering then, and he looked down.

Water was falling to hit the ground next to him. It froze on contact, little droplets that rolled like gems to the side of the stone.

No, he realized. Not water.

Tears.

He blinked, and felt the fluid seep from his eyes.

Plip, plap, plip.

This was literally the worst day of his life.

He'd died somehow, and his oldest servant, his oldest friend didn't love him, not really.

Rotgoriel wanted to tear down the walls of the cave. He wanted to rage and roll around and over and claw the stones of the floor to shreds. He wanted to kill something.

He wanted to not be someone who made Geebo afraid.

But he was a dragon— couldn't be anything except a dragon, had never dreamed of being anything that wasn't a dragon.

The only thing that got him through the times he was stuck being human was the fact that he knew with absolute certainty that he was still a dragon, just in a human's body.

He sat there for a time, staring in the mirror of frozen tears that his eyes had made, then he looked back at the mirror that sat in the alcove atop his meager horde. He could talk to his brother, find out what had happened to him.

No, he decided. His brother had gotten them killed, and left him in the deathchat. That was ill done. Rotgoriel would leave him a nasty message through Geebo—

Another flash of pain, at the thought. But no, he would do it. Geebo was still his servant. Still bound to him. And it was the best way to use the drakkit. He was loyal, would be loyal. That wouldn't change.

A flash of blue in the mirror, and Rotgoriel frowned, looked at it more closely.

“Is this perhaps a bad time, oh most sapient of saurials?”

Rotgoriel whipped his head around, and almost slammed his maw into Aunarox. She bobbed backwards, teeth white against her blue skin, grinning and sitting cross-legged on a little cloud that carried her smoothly through the air.

“No! No. It's... fine. It is fine. It is a good time. Great.” Rotgoriel said. He slammed his hand on the ground, felt the ice slick his tears had made crack and crumble.

I will not show weakness to her. Or anyone else.

“If you say so, then so it is,” Aunarox nodded, hair fluttering up and around, as if in a phantom wind. “Shall I strike succinctly straight to the source, or do you perchance prefer a plethora of pleasantries, oh powerful poobah?”

“I am not in the mood for chatter.”

“To the heart of the matter, then. Or perhaps the matter of the heart. I desire to know, dear dragon, when we shall depart this depressingly dreary domain?”

“Depart?” Rotgoriel blinked. “Not for some time yet. We are power washing— no, wait. That's the wrong term. We are power leveling the players my brother brings to us.”

“Power washing was perhaps more prescient. They are certainly obsessed with their hoses.” Aunarox frowned.

“What?”

“I find their attentions alienating. Most of them find me beautiful! Which is only to be expected, for I am fearsomely fair. However, some are pushing their interest in an unmannerly manner.”

“They are trying to do something to you? That is stupid. You are powerful and they are weak, still.”

“While that is true, there is a more terrible truth that tortures my temperament. You are aware of how players perceive and permutate the personalties of those people within their proximity?”

“Ah, that.” She was talking about the way most Generican people had their minds clouded and their actions affected whenever the players were around. His brother thought it was an effect of the game, put there to keep the computer code that made up the people he called 'NPC's' from achieving self-awareness. Evidently there were fears of some great monsters called 'artificial intelligences' back in his brother's world. They weren't real, but might be in the future at some point, and a lot of the humans over there were scared shitless of the possibility.

The whole thing sounded ludicrous to Rotgoriel. His brother's government was a very real and very present danger, there was no need to be afraid of something that might never exist.

But he had to admit that he had no explanation for why most Generican people turned into caricatures of themselves around players, speaking simply and offering quests left and right to whoever asked for them.

And that last thought made him narrow his eyes. “Have they been begging quests from you?”

“Yes, they have. And this thing called faction, it makes me like them more, the more quests they complete.” Now she looked well and truly upset. “I do not dislike their desire, it is fairly flattering, and eminently expected. But they are turning their mischief into manipulation, pursuing a proper path to my pantaloons. That is... demeaning. I believed I could hold them at bay by increasing the difficulty of the quests, but alas, their creativity is conquering my complexities.”

“And so you want to leave before that happens.”

“I do. Were true love in the cards, and one worthy enough and to my taste, it might prove an entertaining enterprise. But they are not. They are dealing with a dulled version of myself, and I find that disgusting. It is... like attempting to dally with a drunken damsel, when the suitor would have no shot if sobriety were involved.”

Rotgoriel pondered matters. “So there is no way to make the quests impossible?”

“Dear dragon, I assigned one a quest to bring me a dozen and one perfect pearls. There is no ocean around here! I thought it impossible! But do you know what he did?”

“What did he do?”

“He went to his friend the Conjuror, and they spent an afternoon calling and killing clams! True, the pearls that he brought me did not last, wisped back to nothingness when their conjuration was over, but the permanency of the pearls was never specified.” Her mouth was a flat line now. “I like him now. And I am not certain how much of that is appreciation for his cleverness, and how much is artificially driven by... faction.”

“Ah.” Rotgoriel closed his eyes. The system again. Artificial feelings. “Does it matter if the love is real or not?” he wondered aloud.

“Love? That has nothing to do with it. I am not a creature of love, and their pulchritude is pompous and palpable. They want a conquest, not a queen. And I am disinclined to sit upon those... thrones. So I ask again, oh affable ally, when we may move on?”

“I do not know,” Rotgoriel admitted. “I must train and aid them until they are ready, but ready for what, I cannot say. You must ask my brother for that. And there is yet more mystery to unravel here. That city in the valley, that invisible thing that we cannot touch... what have we learned about it?”

“It is definitely not an illusion,” Aunarox shrugged. “The air I send that way disappears to my touch. Any attempts to contact it simply fail, you end up sliding away and through it without grasping its substance. I have noticed one thing, however. It is very much a lackey to lunar influences.”

“What was that?”

“The moon, oh magnificent man. It was most visible when we first found it, for the moon was fat and round. Do you recall how it diminished disturbingly as the days descended?”

“It was more translucent the last time I checked it,” Rotgoriel nodded. The one use he'd found for the Occult Eye so far was to see the city.

“It is beginning to become more solid now. It was least visible at the time of the new moon, and now it becomes more solid as the moon grows fatter. In ten days, give or take, it shall be as visible as when we first found it. But... to be honest, I see nothing more I can do with it. Not directly. And so this mystery does not compel me to stay. Not when sorted on the scales of sexual surrender.”

“Somewhat sordid, yes,” he agreed absentmindedly.

“No, sorted, not sord... ha! You made a pun! I appreciate the effort.” Her grin appeared again.

“You swore to help me,” Rotgoriel pointed out. “We can arrange things so you do not come into contact with the players.”

“Ah... but there is the third thing, effendi. And that is my nature.”

“Which is?”

“I am a free spirit. All who serve Anjuuta value their freedom above all else! And we have been here much, much too long for my tastes.”

“And what of the cult that you used me to spread? We served your mistress' ends, there.”

“Not to worry! I have the perfect solution! Enough discussion about the heart of the matter. Turn your attention to the matter of the heart!”

And from her baggy, diaphanous clothes she pulled a jar. Inside it, packed with red-stained ice, was a human heart.

“I have his head as well, but there has been enough vulgarity for one day,” she confessed.

“What did you do?” Rotgoriel whispered.

Her grin was wide and predatory. “I have gathered the materials to make you a replacement. I shall summon another who can help manage and mind this cult we have started. I have just the friend, and he shall be perfect for this position! He is of stone, and his patience is ponderous and pragmatic.”

“Who died for this?” Rotgoriel asked, frowning. “If you've taken one of Agnez' precious villagers—”

“Ah, no. You remember the tallyman, that dread figure who collects the village taxes? Well, we may have encountered him early in our exercise this eave.”

“And you slew him?”

“I did not! Bhob did. I believe the Tallyman attempted a terrible taxation, and saw through Bhob's attempted at passing conjured gold. The dispute ended with a cold corpse, and I saw no sense in waste.”

Rotgoriel stared down at the jar.

“There you have it,” she said. “Three reasons for my farewell. The city, though interesting, seems inaccessible. The amorous attentions are alienating. And my desire to avoid being tied down grows too loud to ignore.” Her smile faded. “Have I not done you enough favors to be free, oh fair friend?”

“You have,” Rotgoriel was forced to concede. “But... this is much to think about. I want you to—” he stopped. “I ask that you give it a few days, speak with my brother before leaving. I need to talk with him myself. Can you do this?”

Aunarox tilted her head, then nodded. “All things do come in threes. I shall give you three days, effendi. I shall hide myself away from all seekers save you until then. I owe you that much.”

“Thank you,” Rotgoriel said, feeling the words fall like lead from his lips. They weren't words dragons were supposed to speak, but she smiled to hear them, and bowed daintily back.

“Effendi is most kind! Pleasant winds and sweet scents to thee, until we meet again.”

He took some time after she was left, mulling over what he needed to do. Bad things had come in threes, today. His death, Geebo's false love, and now Aunarox's potential abandonment.

His world was changing— or perhaps it was never as solid as it should have been in the first case, and only now was he seeing the cracks in the facade.

What would Rich do if things were hopeless? He wondered. In the Ministry, you were supposed to pray when things got too bad. Rich never held much stock in that, though. Their god was either weak or nonexistent. The idea of his strong and independent brother kneeling and mewling was ludicrous.

“Heh,” he muttered to himself. “Pray. Riiiight.... wait.”

He paused, then said it again, to make sure he'd heard himself properly. “Pray.”

It did sound different. It sounded like a skill, only chopped off. “What is this?” he whispered. Rotgoriel knew that he didn't have any skills that dealt with praying.

Didn't he?

“Status,” he said, and his eyes went wide as he saw his brother's gift to him. Levels! And with those levels, had come new skills, including one he'd been hoping to see at some point.

“Pray to Konol,” he breathed, hoping that it worked.

And to his surprise and joy, his prayers were answered.