In the morning, Serenity woke up to the noise of the waterfall and Rissa running her hands along the downy fuzz on his spine and wings. It was relaxing and comfortable and she seemed happy, so he snuggled into her and let her rub his back.

Eventually, the quiet moment ended. Both of them were used to getting up and going in the morning, and Serenity was hungry. Rissa gave him some mana, but that still meant it was time to be up.

As Rissa picked up her bedroll, Serenity examined the Quest prompt again.

[Path Quest Stage 1]

[Goal: Survive to Exit the Tutorial without violating your chosen Path]

[Reward: Catacomb Key, Assistance in healing Death Aspect]

[Penalty for Failure: Death and possible return as Undead or discontinuation of Path Quest]

Serenity’s eyes were drawn to the ‘Catacomb Key’ reward. There was no place on Earth where a Status Key should be required, at least not yet. Some would appear with time, but he’d never heard of any at the beginning of integration. He’d even looked into it in his past; an invader needed to know what was possible, after all.

“Rissa?”

“Hm?”

“I think the Quest might land me somewhere else to heal my Aspect. If it does.... If it does, please call my parents. They’ll need to know what’s happening.” Serenity dug in his bag for a strip of hide and a “pencil” one of the crafters had put together by somehow wrapping wood around a core of charred wood or maybe some sort of black rock - Serenity wasn’t sure which. It worked well enough that the group (except for Echo) had already traded cell phone numbers.

“Your parents? You’ve mentioned them a couple times, but I don’t think you’ve said much.” Rissa sounded distressed.

“I talk to them pretty often, when they’re not busy and we can manage. Less often than I’d like, they have a lot going on. I wanted you to meet them … you know that trip to DC next month where I said we have a place to stay?” Serenity had been looking forward to that trip. He thought they’d get along, and his mother in particular had wanted to meet his fiancee. Assuming Rissa accepted of course … he hadn’t managed to actually ask yet.

“You love your surprises. This one is worse than the time you decided we should go to the drive-in movie an hour away and didn’t tell me where we were going until we were there!” Rissa’d been holding that one over Thomas’s head ever since it happened.

Serenity wasn’t sorry for it. It’d been a lot of fun, and (once Rissa got over her surprise), both of them had enjoyed themselves. He’d even brought some “real buttered movie popcorn” so they could have the whole experience.

He’d picked a horror movie, of course. Rissa liked horror movies more than Serenity - more than Thomas did, but he liked holding her when she jumped so it all worked out.

Serenity suddenly wondered what he’d think of horror movies now.

He finished writing out his father’s phone number and his parents’ address. He couldn’t remember his mother’s phone number; it was saved in his phone but apparently not in his memory. “So, yeah, call them and tell them what’s going on. Make sure to tell them I’m Serenity. And… tell them something bad’s going to happen to DC. We have a few months if nothing’s changed, but I don’t want to lose them again.”

“Do I tell them you came back in time to warn them? I know you’ve been trying to keep that quiet.” Rissa put her hand on Serenity’s shoulder. He could barely tell her hand was there through the armor and his scales.

Serenity released a breath as he thought. “They know how to keep things quiet, but would they believe … I’ll have to leave it up to you. If you think they’ll believe it, yeah. Otherwise, hm. I don’t know how long I’ll be away but there’s time. A few months I think. I don’t remember exactly what day it was. Maybe I’ll get back in time?”

Serenity looked down at his hands. Without realizing it, he’d woven his fingers together and his claws were pressing against the backs of his hands. It didn’t hurt any more than the same thing would have without claws as a human. His skin must be more resistant, almost as sturdy as his scales. It explained why he hadn’t seemed to accidentally hurt himself with the claws he still wasn’t used to.

He turned to Rissa and enveloped her in a hug, wrapping his wings as well as his arms around her. He’d miss her if he didn’t end up back on Earth immediately. He hoped he would, but somehow he didn’t think that was what would happen. “It’s time, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Let’s head to the dungeon, everyone should be waiting there.”

It wasn’t everyone, but it was everyone that mattered to Serenity right now. Rissa, obviously, but also Echo, Lancaster, Moira, Doyle, Nightwitch, and even Liuyedao were all there. Serenity saw a somewhat older but fit gentleman waiting a little ways away he thought must be Doc Savage.

“Hey everyone. Thanks for coming to see me off. I’ll see you on the other side, hopefully.” Serenity waited a moment for all the “See yous” and “Goodbyes” to stop. Echo hugged him around the waist, then he kissed Rissa, set his hand on the Dungeon entrance, and selected Leave Tutorial.

A lot of things happened in a very short period of time (to the outside world).

Serenity appeared in an otherwise empty stone building with no obvious exit. He was surrounded by Death and overwhelmed for a moment.

Rissa reached the end of the first level of the Solo dungeon. She and Echo had done fine in the Duo, but Rissa struggled in the Solo. She wasn’t bothered by it; one level was plenty.

Doc Savage did a little better; he reached the third level before he decided he couldn’t get deep enough for it to matter. He cheerfully spent the last week of the Tutorial outside the Dungeon.

Echo and Doyle both made it to the fourth level before they ran out of time. Nightwitch was a little faster and made the fifth. All three were careful to stay safe and take the time they needed.

Liuyedao and Moira somehow ended up in a contest with each other and stopped coming out for anything other than restocking on healing potions; Moira pulled off the win by barely completing the seventh level while Liuyedao ran out of time in the middle of the floor.

Finishing the seventh level was the best achieved in their Tutorial.

The first Tutorial for the integration of Earth was completed. Many others followed swiftly.

The students all received their rewards. All except for Serenity, whose Tutorial wouldn’t be counted as complete until the last Tutorial finished and his performance as an instructor could be evaluated.

Tutorial rewards were not Serenity’s highest concern at that moment.

Serenity felt time and space move around him. Time was uncurling as space changed, and Serenity realized he’d been ‘within’ the Earth the entire time, near the center of the planet, in a moment out of time.

A moment that wasn’t exactly out of time, more … out of phase? He couldn’t quite see how the Voice managed it, but he knew a lot of it was simply the power the Voice had available. Power that now seemed incredible, almost impossible … yet power that he knew the Final Reaper could have matched.

Not that the Final Reaper could have done this with it. He’d only mastered Death magic, and this was Time and Space … and something else. Something that gave it meaning beyond what Serenity could make out. Serenity tried to follow it, but the harder he looked the more the meaning retreated from him, so he turned back to trying to tease out how the Voice was unwinding Time while moving him through Space.

Serenity knew he wasn’t going to end up on Earth. He was already far past the edge of the Solar System - what was that called anyway, the Oort Cloud, or the helio-something?

Trivia that didn’t matter. Whatever it was called, he was well past it. By now - if “now” could even be said when he was in a space between seconds - he was past the next nearest solar system, as well. Wherever he was going, he was going quickly.

Time finished unwinding and Serenity felt a jolt as he snapped into seeing a second for each second that passed. “Now” had a meaning again, and talking about how long it would take to cover distance made sense once more.

[Time and Space Affinities merged into SpaceTime Affinity]

[Time Aspect expanded to match Affinity. SpaceTime Aspect initiated at Nascent]

He still felt nothing physically; only his SpaceTime Affinity could tell he was moving. Now that he could feel Time again, Serenity knew exactly how long he took in transit. It was more than ten minutes before he felt the movement begin to slow.

The space around him was SpaceTime, not Void; he could feel the bubble that surrounded him and provided a place to be. Beyond the bubble wasn’t really Void either, it was the universe.

It was the skin of the bubble, the interface between it and reality that felt like Void. Or perhaps not Void, exactly, perhaps more of a discontinuity?

What was Void, anyway?

The bubble seemed to pop as his movement stopped and Serenity found himself standing in a dark rectangular stone building. The floor, walls, and ceiling were all stone. Serenity stood in front of a raised sarcophagus. The lid lay in pieces on the floor and nothing remained inside.

More importantly, the air, floor, walls … everything was full of Death energy. It flowed into Serenity’s aura and [Eat Death] sent it to his Aspect. Serenity swayed on his feet. It was wonderful.

[Pleasure Resistance Increased]

Serenity wondered if there was a way to turn that resistance off.

[Path Quest Stage 1 complete]

[Catacomb Key added to Status. Consume Death Energy to heal Death Aspect]