Gwendith had fallen asleep in Yuriko’s arms. Yuriko couldn’t help but stare at the once posh and dignified girl. Gone were the elaborate corkscrew curls and immaculately beautiful blonde hair. Gone were the bright skin and soft curves.

Straggly and dirty hair hung just down to her shoulders. She had bruises and scrapes all over her bare skin. Her clothes were dirty hides that were thin and filled with patches. Her cheeks were sallow and there were bags under her eyes. She was thin and fragile. Her tears carved a path down dusty cheeks. For all that, there was a strength and resilience that shone through the pain and suffering, but Yuriko wished that the girl didn’t have to go through whatever she did.

Yuriko didn’t need to imagine what happened. It was her fault, too. She had failed in protecting Gwendith.

The coincidence of finding her friend almost as soon as she entered the Rumiga plane beggared belief. So it probably wasn't a coincidence. The Threads of Fate clearly manipulated her companions, she was sure of it. But why? Perhaps the Mishala Progenitor? She had control over the Fateweaver Loom after all…

Shaking her head, she forced herself to pry her thoughts out of conjecture and into the present. They were in the Frozen North. A glance at her companions showed everyone but Desire and Kalla to be uncomfortable with the freeze. Sheamus, Pavo, Lucinda, and Nathan were shivering already as the strong wind sapped the heat from each of them. Yuriko’s Anima insulated her from the cold and her Radiant energy kept her nice and warm. Gwendith’s body was… cold? She was clearly breathing and alive, but her skin was as cold as the ice and snow around her.

“We should create a shelter,” Kalla said delicately.

Yuriko nodded. “Look for a defensible place please.”

“Of course, Ma’am,” Kalla said. She skirted around the corpses and headed south. There were groves of evergreens and rolling hills all around them. The Veil shimmered behind, the Tidelands let in more ambient Chaos compared to the normal Veil and she worried that Wyldlings might emerge.

Yuriko picked up Gwendith and followed behind Kalla.

“Let’s get out of the way first,” she said and the others agreed.

Yuriko followed the lay of the land, seeking to use the valleys rather than cresting over the hills. If there were more barbarians scouts, they would see the group that way. Farther south, the tundra was flatter so she shifted her direction towards the west. It sloped downwards but retained the hilly landscape filled with gullies and ravines.

Kalla waved at them from a hundred paces away, where she stood next to a small grove. She vanished inside while Yuriko and the others made their way there. When she passed by the line of trees, she saw Kalla manipulating the snow and ice, excavating down to the earth.

“Help me here,” Kalla asked, and the other scouts, shivering while clutching their cloaks tight, muddled along. Desire hummed and sang in a low voice, and somehow that seemed to buoy their spirits. Desire’s Protective Field was pulled tight to her skin, giving her a shimmering look. It was a bit less obvious than a full-on field, but the woman’s clothes stood out anyway.

Desire was clad in a silk dress more suitable to attend a ball than a battle. It left her shoulders bare as well as part of her bosom. A slit on the side of her skirt revealed a well-toned leg all the way up to mid-thigh. She had a shawl wrapped loosely on her arms, but it was made of a sheer fabric and looked more like a veil than anything else. She didn’t shiver at all. Desire had Ashley’s brown eyes and hair, but the hues were somehow deeper than before. She was also a bit taller than she was before, but she still only reached up to Yuriko’s bosom. Well, Gwendith was a few inches taller too.

In less than an hour, the scouts had managed to build a shelter. The walls were made out of compacted snow, practically ice. It formed a dome and the interior was big enough for everyone to lie comfortably in. It was all one room though, and at the centre was a carefully controlled fire pit. A small brazier burned merrily using Animus. No smoke came out of the fire and it warmed the air enough that it wasn’t freezing but not enough to melt the walls. Small vents along the ceiling made sure that the air remained fresh. A pot sat on top of the brazier, filled with melting snow. A pile of ration bars sat on a plate next to it, as well as a sachet of spices.

A carpet of cloaks lay between the frozen ground, insulating them from the freeze. Yuriko laid Gwendith down, close to the brazier. The girl mumbled in her exhausted sleep and curled up around herself into a fetal position.

Yuriko rummaged through her backpack and pulled out one of her clothing sets. It would swim on Gwendith but that was better than what the other wore now. Besides, there was a simple resize and comfort runescript weaving on the clothes that should help mitigate their size disparity. In the meantime, she was hungry.

It took them nearly three days to travel from the layered Waypoint, and once they entered the Tidelands, another three days to go through the Depths, the Mid Marches, and the Shallows. During that time, Yuriko’s appetite had been… normal. For a regular girl, not a Yuriko. Her Anima also grew by about five inches and sat at a hundred and thirty-six inches from her skin. Fri’Avgi had constantly fed her Anima with distilled Chaos and whatever it was that she processed from Chaos Lord Anima.

She should be ecstatic. But Yuriko remembered her second incarnation. Bits of it anyway. That one showed how she grew stronger every time she devoured Chaos Anima, but in the end, she had turned into something as bad.

All in moderation, my dear. You need to grow stronger through other means too. Not just by taking the essence from Chaos dwellers, and not just by straining your Anima. Knowledge and Insight are what you need.

‘And what exactly do you mean by that?’ Yuriko thought crossly.

Learn things. Explore. See new places, visit sites of Wonder. Resonate with Chaos and touch upon Order. You’re on the Exaltation path now, and only by taking in everything and making it yours will you truly grow strong. Damien laughed, I could tell you, but then, it won’t be your Insight, it won’t be your experience. And it would make things harder for you to internalize things. I can give hints, and whatever you get to will be yours. If I tell you, He repeated, It will be my Insight. Balance your growth, and Transform your Anima, Animus, and your Body. That’s the path to reach the next Stage.

Yuriko grunted. ‘And how much should my Anima expand by then?’

At least ten paces.

‘Oh.’

That was still a long way. It would probably take her years to get there, especially if she didn’t rely on devouring Chaos Lords. If she did, she’d probably get there after a few battles, but then, she’d probably go crazy.

“Master…” Desire interrupted Yuriko’s musings.

“Huh, yes?”

“I’ll need to refill my Chaos Well.”

“Oh, well, go ahead then.”

Desire fidgeted next to her then mumbled, “I’ll need to take it from you, Master. Or I’d need to spend several days in the Primordial Chaos Sea.”

“From me?”

“Yes. Your Animus.”

“I need to transfer my Animus to you?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Oh. Huh, sure. Go ahead.”

Yuriko had more than enough reserves. Even now, she hadn’t retracted her Anima beneath her skin, but rather, condensed it close to her skin. The runescript weaving holding her excess Animus was there, and she held more than eight hundred lumens. She could probably create more weaving and expand her reserves further, but regenerating Animus was mostly dependent on how thick the ambient Chaos was. Here, at one iarvesh, she recovered about one lumen every twenty seconds. Oh! She could feed Desire the distilled Chaos from Fri’Avgi instead of her Animus! That was bound to be more efficient.

She opened her mouth to say so, but before she could get a word out, Desire’s mouth clamped down over her own, and her tongue invaded Yuriko’s space. She could only grunt in surprise before she felt Desire suction Animus out of her body while the girl hugged her close.

A mounting pleasure rose up from Yuriko’s centre and radiated all the way down to her toes. She was vaguely aware of Sheamus, Pavo, and Lucinda whistling and hooting from the edges of the shelter, all while she felt heat suffusing her face, her neck, and then across her bosom.

An eternal minute later, Desire pulled away from the kiss. The Chaos Lord licked her lips and smiled sweetly before she bowed, “Thank you, Master.”

“Ah… ah…” Yuriko gasped, her face was still filled with scarlet mortification. It didn’t help that the others were openly smirking. “What?”

“It’s how my previous Master fed,” Desire murmured. Then she cocked her head and mumbled, “I…think I remember that.”

Yuriko glared at the others. They shrugged and excused themselves from the shelter, giving her suggestive winks as they passed through the opening. Yuriko felt her Animus reserves, finding herself down by half of her internal storage. She triggered her outer reserves to transfer over.

“You, uhm, you don’t have to do that. And…er,” Yuriko muttered before she drew out a mote of distilled Chaos and had it hover above her fingertip, “I was about to give this instead.”

Shlup!

Before she could blink, Desire glomped down on her fingertip and slurped the mote up.

“This is good, too,” she exclaimed.

“You, uh, you really don’t have to take my Animus through a kiss, right?”

“I don’t know,” Desire smiled, “but I enjoyed that.” She tilted her head, “Didn’t you?”

Yuriko blinked, then coughed. “Nevermind.” She yelled towards the entrance. “Hey, the snow’s almost melted!”

Lucinda peeked inside and, finding the two of them sitting apart, entered while carrying a pile of snow. She dumped it in the pot and waited for it to melt. Afterwards, she would filter the water and then use the rest to make their stew. The others didn’t return inside, going out to take a look at their surroundings.

“I’ll need to replenish my Well every day, Master,” Desire said.

“Fine.”

The ration bar stew was ready after a couple of hours and with the addition of spices, it was quite tasty. Smelled good too, and it woke up Gwendith whose tummy growled something awful.

“Yuriko,” she murmured while rubbing at her eyes. Gwendith blinked at the dim interior and her gaze sought Yuriko out. “I wasn’t dreaming.”

“No,” Yuriko held Gwendith’s hand and patted it soothingly. “I’m sorry.”

Gwendith shook her head. “It’s not your fault. It was the barbarians. It’s they who did everything.” Her voice grew harder than steel. “But, oh, where were you? You were swept in the rift! Oh! I didn’t think you’d survive that!”

“Well, I’m alive and well, as you can see,” Yuriko swallowed painfully. “What…what happened to you?”

“They…they caught me,” Gwendith said hoarsely. “I was their captive for the past two years. They…” She broke down into sobs. Yuriko pulled Gwendith into a hug, patted her back, and made soothing noises. Useless noises, really, but that was the only thing she could do.

Gwendith’s tale of hardship, abuse, and starvation made Yuriko’s tears flow too, and that kernel of rage at the barbarians, that had remained banked throughout her adventures, reignited into a burning inferno.

“We’re near their fortress, Ouera Bo. There are four major tribes here, and they’re holding off the Empire. I don’t know why Rumiga City doesn’t just send its legions to assault. They’re sieging the mountain, and that’s…well, it’s foolish. They’ll never starve out the barbarians. Not when the blue-veined grass and the Chaos Channel and Tidelands provide food. Why don’t they send greater forces?”

“Because there’s a war,” Lucinda said. “We’re irregular scouts from near Delovine plane and they said that Rumiga has been half untethered. I don’t think these barbarians are responsible for that. And they destroyed a Fortress Waypoint too, between Rumiga and Delovine.”

“By the Telurian and Asheron Courts,” Desire offered. “Your empire is beset on more than one front.”

“Oh…” Gwen hiccuped.

“Well, we’re here,” Yuriko said grimly. “And that means only one thing.”

“What?”

“We’ll exterminate the barbarians.”