Congratulations, Nil said as Dallion went back to the street. You got what you needed. Now you can rest and relax a bit.

Yeah… Dallion thought. He had been hoping for this moment ever since Arthurows had brought him to the general and now that he had achieved it, he felt somewhat hollow. Possibly this was still an aftereffect of losing the shardfly, or maybe there was something more. Whatever it was, it kept weighing Dallion down.

What you need is a good meal, Nil went on. You’d be surprised what that does to the mood. Possibly with a nice cup of chilled cherry wine.

The suggestion didn’t even make Dallion smile. Quietly, he continued along the smaller, less crowded streets towards the Gremlin’s Timepiece. Nil continued making comments now and again, his words had become little more than background buzzing… very annoying buzzing at that.

I know you’re more sensitive than most, but this is no reason to behave like this, dear boy. Being down is nice now and again, but if you react like this to every loss, you won’t have a bright future. At best, you’ll have a very unhappy existence, which could lead you to quitting.

Losing a familiar I promised to save is hardly just a loss, Dallion countered. I’ve lost battles every day!

It’s not the same and you know it. Personally, I don’t think you’ve experienced a personal loss. True, you’ve failed a few challenges every now and then, and each time that impacted you to your core. I can accept it’s part of life, but you need to grow up!

The exchange hurt, not just psychologically, but it physically hurt Dallion enough to make him stop mid step. It was gone after only a second, but lasted enough to serve as a reminder of the promise to the Green Moon. Unlike the general, the Moons liked to keep all that owed them favors on a tight leash.

If you don’t get this under control, it’ll soon become unbearable.

Annoyed, Dallion slipped the block ring onto his finger. All links to his gear instantly vanished. The echo of pain, however, remained. That was to be expected—items weren’t supposed to work on deities.

Walking faster, Dallion made his way to the inn in complete internal silence. At moments such as this, he could appreciate Euryale’s philosophy of having as few echoes and linked items as possible.

“Hey, Dal,” Jiroh greeted him the moment he entered. “A quick heads up. We’ve got guests now, so don’t do anything crazy until you reach your room.”

Dallion’s immediate reaction was to look at the staircase, as if hoping to catch a glimpse of the people who’d rented a room. He had been so wrapped up with the morning’s events that he had completely forgotten that the main purpose of an inn—even this one—was to offer rooms to people and not just serve food.

“They’re awakened,” the fury added, suggesting in a subtle way that he should be mindful of his conversations as well.

“Good to know. Where’s Hannah?”

“Out arguing prices again. The festival is a crazy time, not to mention that Gloria and Veil have made a lot of the local competitors mad. Won’t be the first time they’ve done nasty tricks. That’s why Hannah always stocks up on food.”

That made sense.

“You look down. What happened? Problems with Eury?”

The question startled Dallion just enough to get beyond the unspecified feeling of unease that he had since the leveling up of the mirror. Initially, he felt the urge to flat out deny, quickly followed by slight fear of whether Jiroh knew something he didn’t. After all, she had known Eury far longer, and it was possible that the gorgon had discussed him frequently. Actually, it was quite likely she had done so.

“Not that I know,” Dallion said, focusing on his music skills. “Do you know something I don’t?”

“Just a guess on my part. It’s obvious something is eating you.”

“It’s nothing serious,” Dallion replied, still somewhat suspicious. “Some things happened and… never mind.” He looked around the room again. “So, we have awakened guests. Anything interesting about them?”

“Typical tourists,” Jiroh said. “All human, if that’s what you’re asking.”

It wasn’t, but it was a good thing to know.

“They’ve paid till the end of the festival, although it’s not rare for guests to leave earlier.”

“High level?”

“Double digits,” she replied. “Barely. The expensive places get the higher ones. We have a few regulars who like Aspan’s cooking, but they haven’t shown up yet. Probably will be here just before the countess arrives.”

That brought a series of mixed feelings. On the one hand, Dallion was looking forward to the countess’ arrival. As someone who had only seen portraits of her, he was understandably curious. At the same time, he was fed up with hearing the topic discussed everywhere he went. Inadvertently, this made him think about his grandfather. At the time, the old man had joined the count’s army in the war for succession. From what Dallion had seen in the memory of the former village chief, his grandfather had earned a noble title as a result. Since the countess had invited the Luors to the Nerosal festival, she knew exactly where they came from, as well as their history. The bigger question was how much she knew about Dallion’s past.

According to the rules of the tournament festival, the ultimate victor was going to receive a prize from the countess herself. If Dallion managed to make it that far there was a chance he received some information about his grandfather. Either that, or suffer the same punishment.

“I think I’ll go get some rest,” Dallion said.

“Be down by lunch. Crowd will be hell today. We’ll need all hands on deck.”

“That bad?”

“Pure blonds,” Juroh said with a sigh. “We’re the only inn in the city that has them. People from outside will be curious. And even if they aren’t, everyone needs to eat.”

“Sure, I’ll be there. How did you manage to get everything done before I got here?”

“Practice. Also, Eury used to help out in the past.”

“Right. See you at lunch, then.”

Dallion went straight to his room. Despite Nil’s insistence, he didn’t feel hungry. The best he thought of doing was taking a nice long nap in his realm—that way he could sleep for more than two hours. Also, there were a few other things he needed to do.

PERSONAL AWAKENING

The familiar room emerged around him. The walls remained fairly bare, although at least there were a few framed items displaying the various specific skills he had mastered. The “attack” wall had the most of things, of course—two swords, two daggers, a dartbow, and a small statue of himself indicating unarmed combat. The athletics wall was next, depicting three skills, in unique fashion: climbing, swimming, and throwing. According to Nil, there were a lot more that Dallion was supposed to master, even if Dallion didn’t see much point for the moment. The acrobatics, guard, and music walls had two items each, as did the forging wall, despite it being the only skills at which Dallion still had yet to make any progress. That annoyed him slightly. As much as he wanted to progress in that area, there hadn’t been any real need or urgency so far.

“Shield,” Dallion said. “I can link you to my realm now. You okay with that?”

There was no answer.

“Shield?”

A doorway appeared in one of the walls. Through it, the floor of the shield’s tower was visible. For some reason, it was only now that Dallion realized how much more sophisticated the harprisword’s realm was. Of everything he had seen so far, that was the only place that came with its own tower. All other items were closed environments, regardless of their actual size.

“Shield, you here?” Dallion stepped in the new addition to his awakening realm.

Indeed, the dryad guardian was standing by the staircase that led to the upper levels. No smile was visible on his face.

“I thought there’d be more of a reaction,” Dallion said. “What’s wrong? You’ve kept saying you wanted more than being kept in a room full of relics. Was I wrong?”

“You were very much right,” the dryad said. There was a warmth in his voice that Dallion hadn’t felt so far, but also a bit of sadness. “I just never expected it to happen.”

“Wow.” Thanks for the vote of confidence, Dallion crossed his arms.

“I’ve watched the general’s dealings for a long time. It’s rare that he loses an argument. It’s even rarer that he lets anything go.”

“You think it was too easy?” Dallion asked.

“Things only go easy, if the general has something in mind. Normally the prize you gave him wouldn’t be enough, but… And here I’m rambling again.” Finally, the guardian smiled. “I guess I just never thought this day would happen and now that it has it feels… unreal.”

“I know what you mean,” Dallion whispered.

“Now I get to see the inside of another realm… something which I never expected to be able to do.”

Despite the stoic disconnected front, the dryad was putting on, Dallion could see dozens of emotions bubbling in his very being. It was like taking a can of soda tucked at the back of the fridge for decades, then shaking it up. There was joy, sadness, a sense of freedom, along with the fear of losing it again, and so many other nuances that Dallion couldn’t keep track of them all.

“Okay, now that’s done, what’s your plan?” The emotions vanished like unattended popcorn on campus. “Don’t expect me to do wild things each time you get in trouble. The thing against Vermilion was a one off.”

“Really?” That sounded too much like a game.

“Well, no, but I really prefer not to do such stuff again. It’s quite painful.”

“I didn’t know…”

“Hey, it’s not your choice. It’s ours. Remember that. When you level up more, you’ll get to use a few new tricks that would help with that. Until then, we’ll have to use our abilities to compensate and that deals pain, also makes us weaker.”

The harpsisword had stepped in three times so far without complaining once. To think that each time she had to go through such limitations was alarming in itself, but why hadn’t she told Dallion?

I really need to become stronger, he told himself. It was one of those things—the stronger he became, the more power he would obtain. It sounded logical, but leveling up didn’t only improve his stats, clearly it also granted him access to entirely new abilities. Before he was a full awakened, Dallion couldn’t even enter an area realms on his own as well as create echoes—an ability he still didn’t use as much as he should. On double digit it became possible to link realms, as well as reliably use combat splitting. Upon becoming a seer, Dallion was granted the ability to see hidden realm areas, as well as see things and people that were not of this world. Maybe after the next gate he’d gain the ability to command the guardians of his gear to use their full potentials in battle? It was something to look forward to.

“Do you think I’m ready for my next leveling?” Dallion asked.

“No, not yet,” the dryad replied. “Don’t quote me, but I think it would be better to get a taste of world exploration before leveling up.”

Not the suggestion Dallion expected to hear.

“What do you know that I don’t?”

“Lots,” the dryad smiled. ”All I can say is it’s better to be versatile and not make decisions before experiencing something for the first time. Also, don’t level up any more skills.”

“One day I’ll get you and Harp to tell me everything.”

“When you reach the level, we’ll be glad to. For the moment take Nil’s advice. Sleep, eat, chill, spend a night with Eury, for tomorrow you enter a new world. You might be in there for a while.”