Anastacia had decided to take a look at the prince again. The room he was being kept at could only be called a vault, the door was at least twenty centimeters thick and made of some kind of greenish metal. Plates made of the same metal were covering the floor, walls and ceiling of the room and aside from the table the prince was laid on, there were no furniture or items in the room. A lantern had to be brought in from the outside along with any tools Anastacia might need.

She had told King to visit the blacksmith with a note she had written so they could prepare a scabbard for King’s new sword. Once they were done, King was to come to the vault too.

“I can’t believe they were keeping you in the dark. That’s just rude.” Anastacia spoke to herself and scraped away some pieces that were left from the broken stone parts. “Now that I have some proper light and tools, maybe we’ll actually have a chance this time!”

The broken parts that seemed to have function were his left arm’s plating and shoulder, the chest plate, the right thigh plates and a weird stone ball inside his right shoulder. Fixing those was the important part, stuff like the faceplate and armor could be done later.

“Did they hit you with a battering ram?” Anastacia continued. “I hope this stone stuff isn’t special in any way. Otherwise I have to go and get some from a machine fortress.”

Her first plan was to make the replacement parts out of bone, since that was the only material she really knew how to work with. But they might not work and she’d have to ask someone to make them out of metal and stone. The blacksmith would be the obvious choice.

While thinking and cracking off the stone, Anastacia noticed a small round hole in the prince’s upper chest and was reminded of the door mechanisms in the machine fort she fell in.

“Can’t be…. This shit again?!” She lamented and inspected the hole thoroughly under more light.

There was indeed a spike at the bottom of it. She was going to have to try it. Anastacia took a deep breath and slowly slid her finger towards the spike.

The guards outside the vault hastily opened the door as they heard her muffled scream, and found Anastacia biting her lip and hitting the table with her fist. Suddenly, light blue patterns of light began spreading out from the hole’s location and the simulacrum made a few clicking sounds. The guards thought that the prince was waking up and slammed the door shut.

Anastacia had just enough time to get excited and then disappointed when the lights dimmed and the prince remained broken.

“Well… It’s something!” Anastacia celebrated and knocked on the vault’s door. “Guys, not cool! Open the door, he shut down again!”

The locking mechanism made a clank and the door opened.

“We’re sorry miss, but our instructions are to lock the door if anything happens, no matter who is inside.” One of the guards explained.

“Cowards. I need to visit a blacksmith quickly. Do you have the paper I can write my report on?” Anastacia asked and came out from the vault.

One of the guards handed her a paper and writing tools. Anastacia pondered how to describe what had happened and began writing. What she ended up with was:

“Scraped off some broken bits (Still on the table). Put finger in his hole, it turned him on (for a few seconds). Side note: Your guards are wankers and cowards.”

She folded the paper and gave it to the guard, while grinning like an idiot.

Having left the guild office, Anastacia was about to enter the blacksmith’s shop when she noticed a commotion at the gate. Some guards and a few adventurers had gathered around something. It piqued Anastacia’s curiosity and she decided to check it out. Even before seeing what was up, Anastacia could guess what it was about when she heard the familiar screeching of a goblin. Pushing past the small crowd, she could see it was indeed Gobby and another unnamed goblin.

“Gobby! What are you doing here?” Anastacia asked.

The critters were delighted to see their queen and began jumping in excitement.

“Goblin caught spy! Come tell the queen, but not get in village?” Gobby explained.

“It’s the damn guild investigator, isn’t it?” Anastacia guessed and sighed. “Alright, I’ll get King and we’ll come to take a look. Don’t do anything to them, okay?”

The goblins scurried off and the crowd began to disperse. Some of the guards demanded an explanation, so Anastacia told them the basic gist of the situation with the goblins and asked for them to be brought into the inn if this were to happen again.

The blacksmith and King were cutting the leather needed for the scabbard when Anastacia dropped by.

“King, our goblins kidnapped someone. Let’s go.” She said and grabbed the simulacrum's hand. “I’ll bring him back later today. Sorry for the trouble!”

“Goblins? What?” The blacksmith asked but Anastacia and King were already outside, so the dwarf continued his work. “Kids these days, always running off somewhere.” He mumbled to himself.

They visited the inn quickly to get Anastacia’s gear and to see if someone wanted to come with them. Dammar still wasn’t in shape to move about too much and Maximillian wished to keep him company, Xamiliere outright refused to go look at anything goblin related, Emilia was apparently still resting after the poison had worn off, so Gilbert volunteered as he was curious to see what the goblins had done. And so, they set out to check on the tribe.

“So, did Alice find your room last night?” Anastacia asked just to mess with Gilbert.

“We’re not going to talk about that. Though now that you brought her up, have you given any thought to her advice about the training?” Gilbert changed the topic. “She seemed to know what she was talking about.”

“I Know I need training, but I also know I’d rather quit using necromancy all together than have anything to do with those people.” Anastacia said. “I think I need to find some alternative ways to train. As far as I know, necromancers have always kept to themselves, so maybe some elemental control magics can offer me some new insight. Sure, they tap into another source of power, but maybe it’s handled the same way?”

“Huh… magic you say? I’ve worked with a couple of mages before. One of them tried to teach me how to light my pipe with magic, but that never worked out. I can introduce them to you if you want?” Gilbert suggested.

“That’d be great! Maybe I have some talent for magic too! It would be pretty neat to combo it with necromancy…” Anastacia said and fought the urge to pretend throwing a fireball.

The weather was almost ideal for a walk, slightly cloudy with a nice cool breeze. It was walks like this that gave Anastacia the motivation to fight for her freedom so viciously. In Mournvalley, there wouldn’t be any nice walks with friends, no lazing about in the tavern or going on quests whenever you got bored. Had Anastacia joined the rebellion, she’d be trained for the next ten years to be a tool to be used on any enemies the new leaders would have. To Anastacia, that life would be no better than the life as an anchor.

Coquelicot sat on the floor of Alizarin’s research laboratory, reading her late husband’s notes on various topics, when Alice knocked on the open door to get her superior’s attention.

“You’re back, I assume that means those two are dead?” The high inquisitor inquired.

“Yeah, it went pretty well to be honest…” Alice answered. “Madam, I don’t think we’re fully aware of the girl’s capabilities. While we were fighting Cerise and Carmine, it took her seconds to completely beat all three of us and freeze everything within sixty or seventy meters! I don’t think we can let her be out there unsupervised. She’ll kill everyone in a drunken stupor or something!”

“Is that so…” Coquelicot said. “And did you point this out to her?”

“I did, but she would literally fight me rather than let us help.” Alice explained.

“Very well. Get your team ready, there’s something we need to get.” Coquelicot commanded, walked over to a bookcase at the back of the room and pulled out an old tome.