Four hours after Rav and Vysala left, a new icon appeared on Zaria’s map. The thing, whatever it was, was marked by a gear icon, and was moving quickly towards Zaria’s position. It passed straight over a river without slowing - so it had to be flying.

Zaria reacted quickly, sliding into her Babamorph and watching the sky. She’d absorbed nearly all her mimics - save the candleman still trying to find Suderah’s heart and of course Maw and Rav - and used the freed up command to cover the roof of her hut with Bird Heart Crossbow mimics. Testing after Vysala left revealed the Crossbow mimics that had a Bird heart fired arrows that sprouted wings. They still moved in a straight line without magic properties added, but they moved fast enough to create loud bangs as they travelled past the speed of sound itself. Perfect for shooting at a mobile, aerial target.

She’d been expecting more balehen drones. Not whatever this was. Only major geographic features had icons on the map - the only thing that moved and had an icon was, to Zaria’s knowledge, herself.

Zaria stood up, ready to move. This could easily get ugly. Wanting some advance warning, Zaria cast scry.

It was a suit of armor, but not like any armor Zaria had seen before. Somehow sleek and bulky at the same time, made of rounded pieces that fit together almost seamlessly - save for the joints, where some kind of wire mesh was visible. A pair of steel ovals extruded from the back like wings - but immobile. Instead, these resembled the shell of a beetle pulled back to reveal the wings underneath. There were no wings, however. Instead, the underside of the shell shone with fire so hot it burned blue, propelling the suit by heat alone. The head of the armor was also somewhat insectile, wedge-shaped and with two large ‘eyes’ that had dozens of lenses inside, whirring and narrowing to focus in on Zaria.

The suit banked and turned towards Zaria, and Zaria had to make a snap judgement. As fast as this thing was, if it was hostile, she needed to shoot now. If it was friendly, however, shooting could change that.

Just as she had reached a decision to open fire if it didn’t slow immediately, the suit banked, headed straight towards the ground. Its wings flared out just before it impacted the ground, arresting its momentum, and it touched down gently. “Hey!” a woman’s voice shouted, amplified by some magic or device Zaria couldn’t see. She did recognize the voice, though. This was the same woman that had spoken from the drone. “I’d really like to avoid the part where we meet, there’s a misunderstanding, and we have a pointless fight. Done that enough to last me a lifetime. May I approach?”

Zaria had to shout to be heard. “Keep your hands pointed towards the sky and balled into fists, then yes.” It wasn’t much of a precaution, but it was the best she could think of - no spellcasting class worked with both range and a closed fist, and the time it would take this woman to turn her hands towards Zaria would give the crossbow mimics time to shoot her with supersonic arrows.

The figure approached slowly, then stopped when she was close enough to speak conversationally, but not too close to Zaria. “Holding my arms like this is going to get tiring. Mind if I step out of the suit instead?”

Zaria considered for a moment, then nodded.

The front plates of the suit clanged, peeling back in layers. Inside was… an Aelif, but not one like any Zaria had seen before. Instead of the fall-leaf skin of most of the Aelif Zaria had seen before, she had a dusk grey complexion. The wiry metallic hair on her head was completely cut from one side of the woman’s temple and had been brushed to the side, defiantly showing the scar tissue where she’d suffered some injury. Her clothing was plain and black and form fitting, and she had something on the side of her head - a single eyeglass, like a monocle that was attached to the woman’s burned temple, just under her antenna.

“Nice to meet you,” she said, brushing invisible dirt off her suit as she stepped into the mud. She looked up at Zaria with the characteristically large eyes of her people. She didn’t sink into the mud - this woman was too light to make much of an impact. Light and small. And… Zaria’s eyes narrowed.

“You’re a child,” Zaria said. “The Iron Angel the Reclaimers fear so much is a mere child.”

The woman grinned. “Iron Angel, eh? I’ll need to workshop that name, but I kind of dig it. Could be useful for mythosmithing. And technically not. I’m old enough to be an adult on most worlds now. Except for Shal’norah, but they don’t consider you an adult until you’ve started wrinkling. And I’m not old enough for alcohol some places on Dirt. And I suppose technically we don’t know when Aelif brains stop developing, so no idea if I’m an adult on Cannanor.”

“Do those words mean something to you?” Zaria asked. “Other worlds?”

“Right, right. You don’t know that’s even a thing, do you? Because mutant cores and the Wisphame ban… damn. You reached Copper without a wisp? Honestly, I’m impressed. Also, name’s Ryne.”

“Zaria,” Zaria said. “And I do know about other worlds.” Well, technically one other world, but Ryne didn’t need to know that. “You’re not from here?”

Ryne shook her head. “Nope. I’m from another world. Arrived about… two years ago, local time? I don’t know, I haven’t been here the whole time, and your world runs really slow compared to the rest of the universe. So I hop away to pick up a master Artificer for advice, take a week, come back to find three months have passed. Lost a full three and a half weeks for a brief stopover on another world to do a favor for a friend.”

That matched with what Penara had said about time flowing differently between worlds. Zaria was still struggling with the idea of meeting someone from another world and her strange suit. Knowing they were here was fine. But meeting one - that was surreal. “What are you doing here?”

“That’s a long story,” Ryne said. “And I can tell you, but… it’s probably not the most important thing at the moment. The important thing right now is that I convince you not to try to kill me. Which is why I waited till your friend was gone to make contact. Easier to convince one person. Oh, also, how does her suit work? It looked kind of organic, but also not?”

“I’m not sharing that,” Zaria said, glaring at the young Aelif. “We’ve got a way to go before I trust you with details of how my Striga’s suit works. Why do you think I’m going to kill you?”

Ryne flashed Zaria a grin. “Fair. And I think you’re going to try to kill me because you have a quest to do so.”

Zaria cocked her head to the side. “What?”

“Mind if I get something from my suit and show you? It’ll be easier.”

Zaria nodded, and the Aelif turned around then pressed her hand against a panel of her suit, pulling a headband out of some impossibly small hole in the suit. It was strange to watch, the headband distorting and expanding as it passed through a hole no wider than the Aelif’s finger - yet the gem in the center of the handband was easily the size of the Aelif’s fist.

Wait. Not just a gem. A core.

A dungeon core.

Ryne put the headband on. she said, the sudden telepathy catching Zaria off guard.

Before Zaria could speak, the words appeared in her mind, sent via telepathy.

New Quest Available: The Otherworldly Dungeon. An alien dungeon is loose on the world, with unusual mob types. Find it and drive it from this world before it drives the demons into a greater frenzy! Reward: Bonus experience, Title: Warden of the Shattered Moon Kingdom

Zaria confirmed.

Ryne shook her head, her antenna’s twitching in frustration.

Zaria’s eyes narrowed.

Ryne took a deep breath. “Sorry, switching back to speech. I’m still getting used to telepathy. The point is - if I was the dungeon in the quest, the quest isn’t working properly.”

“Or you weren’t actually driven away,” Zaria said. “You were planning to come back. It didn’t meet the requirements.”

“It’s possible,” Ryne said. “I don’t know. I’ve been taking jaunts off world to minimize my impact here in case it is me - just swinging by to check my scanners. Like the Balehen drone you met. Wanted to get some data on how demon infested wildlife operates while it’s not being observed.” Ryne grinned. “Apparently, it mostly fights giant houses. Which, for the record, was not on my list of things to expect, but if it had been, it would have been at the bottom.”

Zaria stared at her. “You’re a strange girl, Ryne.”

“Right?” Ryne laughed, and Zaria scowled. “Sorry. It’s just… I’m not good with people. So I tend to just ramble at them until they find it charming.”

“It’s not going to happen. What do you want, Ryne? Why are we talking? I am sick to death of mysteries and half answers - either give me some or get off my world.”

Ryne’s face instantly became serious, and she nodded. “All right, that’s fair. So here’s an answer, Zaria: I came here for multiple reasons, but you’re part of that reason. Well, cores like you. This world has the highest mutant core survival rate of any world I can get data from. I want to know why. I want to know how to help apply that elsewhere in the universe so cores stop dying just from coming into existence.”

Zaria nodded to herself. “A noble goal.” Every crossbow mimic on her rooftop popped up at once, pointing straight for Ryne. The Aelif froze, staring at the bows pointed her way. “But it’s also bullshit. You’ve been her for long enough to piss off the Reclaimers, not talking to mutant cores. And there’s no way you ‘gathered data’ without having been here first. Last chance, Aelif. Why are you here?”

Ryne took a deep breath, then grinned. “All right, guilty. Although that’s the reason I’m approaching you, I was being honest about that. I’m here because of a… prophecy? Current telling? Present truth?” Ryne shook her head. “I don’t know what to call it, but I do know what it says. Mind if I send it to you?’

“Hurry it up.”

Ryne focused, an a scene appeared in Zaria’s mind.

The sky was visible through the window. A completely alien sky to Zaria. There were no moons overhead - instead, there was something much larger, an orb of gas and swirling clouds so large it took up most of the sky, surrounded by rings so vast Zaria could scarcely fathom the scale. Even through the bars over the window, Zaria wanted to stare at this sky for hours. But this wasn’t Zaria’s memory. This was Ryne’s.

The Aelif was younger than she was now, and Zaria could feel the fear in her. She turned away from the window and looked back into the hallway she was standing in. Next to her was a door, one made entirely of bars. On the other side was a man - a man that looked like he was made of slime vaguely assembled into the shape of a human. Ryne’s memories provided the man’s name - Omaz. He was screaming, ranting really, and repeating the same phrase over and over.

Context from Ryne’s memories flooded her. Omaz belonged to a group of people who could naturally spit themselves into duplicates. He had suffered an injury in battle and lost one of his duplicates - and with it, something had happened to his herocore. Now his mind was… elsewhere.

“The Error had been logged! They have Noticed! The skies go black, and They have Seen. Error! Error! Containment Is Failing! Unlight shrouds the Dragon! Anathema cannot be Tamed! There is a Dungeon! Error! Error! Acekorah stirs! He will drown the world in darkness! There is another Moon, but it is broken! The Error has been logged!”

A hand pressed down on Ryne’s shoulder. A hand made of steel, belonging to a man that had limbs of metal. He looked worn and haggard. Once again, Ryne’s memory provided the name: Julian. Again with the name came context. Julian was a dirtworlder who had been summoned to Keldora. He’d constructed The Factory - a term that in Ryne’s mind carried both fascination and reverence - and fought alongside the people of this town. He also, in the course of destroying a powerful evil, become the one who had drowned the world in darkness.

Ryne glanced up at him, and then back at the window. There was no fantastic sky visible. Just dark, ashen clouds. What Zaria had seen before wasn’t what the sky had been during that memory - it was Ryne remembering how the sky had been before the ash covered the world. She’d wanted to show Zaria what had been and what now was.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Julian said. “You read my notes.”

“I wanted to see,” Ryne said. “Hear for myself. Maybe there’s something you missed.”

“There might be, but you didn’t need to come.” Julian sighed. “You’re only on world for a bit, why torment yourself with this?”

“Because the same phrase was being repeated on the Woven World. Something’s odd here.”

Julian nodded. “And you mentioned that. So unless you are trying to torment yourself, why come here?”

“Because I needed to see if you missed anything.”

Julian shook his head. “Well… I’m sorry you had to see him like this.”

Ryne scowled and shrugged of his hand. “After every thing we’ve been through, you think I’m afraid of seeing this?”

“Not afraid,” Julian said. “Hurt.”

Ryne shuddered. “Fine. You’re right.” She looked back at the cage, for that’s what it was. “I’ve already seen it, but seeing it again… I was hoping for some insight.”

“The skies go black, and They have Seen,” Omaz said behind them. Ryne frowned.

“What is it?” Julian asked.

“Nothing,” Ryne said. Julian raised an eyebrow, and Ryne sighed and continued. “Since you taught me English - or I guess since you dumped that knowledge into my head - I can’t help but notice oddities between our language and yours. That, for example. You don’t hear our language at all, right? You just hear English whenever we speak?”

Julian nodded. “You know how it works. You’ve been off world yourself. Why repeat it?”

Ryne ran her hand through her hair. “Because I wanted to make sure I understood. There’s an oddity there. We form compound sentences differently than your language - the connecting word, your ‘and’, is instead attached to the subject of the second compound. It’s just the “el” sound.”

Julian raised an eyebrow. “Grammar lessons?”

“Like I said, it might be nothing, but hear me out. Because he’s using the third person pronoun as the subject. Oona. But when combined, you truncate the ‘el’ sound. So what he’s saying sounds like “Carvah gocht, l’oona aen shon.””

Zaria could feel in Ryne’s mind what she had to do to make the sounds so Julian could hear them. She had to make the noises while forgetting they were words. It was a neat trick, and it worked, because Julian’s eyes widened. “Luna,” he said.

Ryne nodded. “One of the names for your moon. Unless he’s not saying ‘and they’ have seen.”

Zaria stared at Ryne before the memory ended. “Because he could have been saying ‘The moon has seen,” she said aloud to the Aelif.

Ryne nodded, her forehead furrowed. “That phrase means something to you.”

“It does,” Zaria said. “Or rather, it doesn’t. It just keeps coming up. And I don’t know what the hell it means.”

“Neither do I!” Ryne said brightly.

“But wait. That can’t be right. The phrase originated on Keldora, but you said you heard it elsewhere. Wouldn’t the different languages cause clarity?”

“We’ve thought about that,” Ryne said. “But—near as I’ve been able to tell—the phrase didn’t start appearing on other worlds until after a dungeon core learned of the phrase. But it was his understanding of what the phrase meant that spread. Because once a dungeon core learned of it, that’s when it entered the system overall.”

“So because the dungeon understood the mistranslated version, that’s what spread.”

“Potentially. But we’re not certain of anything.” Ryne ran her hands through her hair again. “There’s so much we’re not certain of. But the fact that you’ve heard that phrase, with the moon in place?”

“Luna,” Zaria said. “That’s….another name the system gave me for Ysdrah.”

Ryne nodded. “Ysdrah is the paler of your three moons?”

Zaria nodded.

“I thought so. I’m now certain I’m in the right place. Because you do have another moon and it is broken. And your world is strange in so many other ways. I think whatever is happening, we’re near - or at - the heart of it. And if you’re looking for answers - so am I. Answers to the same question. So. What do you say? Let’s work together and find what’s going on.”

Zaria studied her for a moment. “I’m not sure yet,” she said. “But I’m sure I want to know more. I also want information from another source. Someone who can help me check your answers.” She pointed at the flooded dungeon. “There’s a portal under there. I need it to access Wisphame. Can you help me clear it out? Use your dungeon core to absorb water?”

“I can do that, but I have a better idea.” Ryne cracked her knuckles. “Let me get back in the suit. I’m gonna go down there and see if there isn’t a faster way.”

“What’s the faster way?” Zaria asked.

“Don’t know yet.” Ryne’s eyes sparkled. “But I’m willing to bet this is solvable with some combinations of explosions and science. In my experience, most things are.”