“Citirth! Citirth!” Giethi called out while running through the forest. She could see the bonfire getting closer. “Hgn..?” Citirth lied up confused off of his sword. Giethi tackled him to the ground and stared into his eyes. “Huh? Giethi~ what are you doing-” “Wylinoris’s about to die!”

“What?!” Citirth grabbed his sword and noticed Giethi’s wounds. “What the hell happened to you?!” Giethi got up. “Never mind that! We have to go!” Giethi took two pastel orange vials of powder out of Citirth’s robe and ran off into the forest. “Hey! That’s my mana!” “Sorry! I’ll pay you back later!”

“Wylinoris! Are you still alive?” “Why would I be asking that?!” Giethi yelled through the boulders. “Give me those!” Citirth grabbed one of the vials and mixed it with a black powder. “Were you going to burn the rocks? Think for a moment!” Citirth opened up the segment on his blade and slid the vial in gently. A hunk of metal quickly stabbed the cork on the vial and the panel slammed shut. “Stand back.” The blade lit on fire. “Wait- No!” A faint voice yelled through the rubble. Citirth swung the chain and the whole forest sparkled orange for a moment. Upon impact, the rocks detonated, leaving only powder. Amid the destruction, the blade had just hit the ground. “Wylinoris?!” The beast snarled. All of the wood had ignited in the cave, leaving the beast dry and its usually slimy skin rough as sandpaper.

“That’s the thing!” Citirth swallowed. “What do you mean, that’s the thing?! I’m not taking on that colossus!” “Why not?! You got it weak with the flames!” “Well, one part of me wants to see tomorrow!” The wyvern examined Citirth. “What’s he looking at?” Citirth said, trembling. “Hey Citirth,” Giethi said. “Look at his teeth.” He opened one eye slowly. Small droplets of water were forming at the tips. “Big deal! So he’s salivating at the thought of eating us!” “No, you dolt! It’s mana! It’s trying to rehydrate its skin!” Citirth took a good look at its ashy skin. “Wylinoris!” Giethi pointed at the gums of the brute to Wylinoris in between the beast’s teeth, passed out. “Ah! Good, it proves my point! It eats people!” “But how do we reach her?! We can’t just climb-” A rumbling filled the cave. The beast opened its mouth and sprayed water all over its skin. “It’s like a salamander with wings!”

Giethi ran over and got her staff, and the monster lunged at Citirth. He froze in place letting the chain drop to the ground. “Citirth! Pay attention!” Citirth threw the blade at the beast’s jaws. It was taken aback; it had never approached before and been attacked like that. It snarled and lunged at Citirth. “Citirth! Look at the tail!” He saw the tail also lunging at him, and swung his sword at the tail’s tip. It hit bone, and he began to run up the tail, cutting open the wine-colored flesh. It turned to him and flung him into the air. “G- Giethi! I swear-” He collided with the rocky wall and shards fell with him.

Giethi picked up a small strangely shaped pebble and began rubbing it with orange powder. The beast began charging at Giethi. She slid under the belly of the beast and a pool of maroon blood covered her cloak. “Ugh-” The tail flew under the beast and wrapped around her, flinging her face to face with the monster.

“Oh hi. It appears we can’t talk this one out, can’t we?” She took off her now tarnished robe and wrapped it around the staff. She heaved it at the beast’s eye, allowing it to puncture and letting blood and tears fall to the ground. It snapped at Giethi, and the same eye started twitching. “Aw… does the little doggy need some comforting?” She jumped up to the fixed-in-place staff. “Sorry about this. I bet you’re nice-” It let out a ground-shaking bellow. “Never mind that then.” She took the pebble and snapped her fingers to make a small flame. “Happy roasting.” She dropped the rock in the flame, and it began to radiate intense heat, quickly drying out the skin of the monster, illuminating the cave, letting out the blinding light.

“Hgn…” Wylinoris’s eyes blinked open in the moonlight, staring right at Citirth’s face.” “Ha!-” She saw Giethi in the corner of her eye. She got up, and slowly walked over to Giethi. “Ah, I see you’ve woken up first. Don’t mind Citirth, he passed out also.” She stared at Giethi. “Is that my jacket?” Giethi looked surprised for a moment and looked at the faded green jacket. “Ooh, right. Sorry.” Giethi took off the jacket, rolled it over her arm, and gave it to Wylinoris. She stared at her clothes, consisting of tomboyish looks and misshapen stars. “Sorry, I was just really cold. What happened back there?” Wylinoris got confused. “You were suddenly in the mouth of this thing.” “Hmm,” Wylinoris said. “I thought it was scared of something, and then I assume I was too small for its teeth. Can’t remember how I passed out.”

Wylinoris looked deep into Giethi’s eyes. They looked a little cloudy from when she last looked at her. “Be honest with me. Where are you taking me?” Giethi got silent. “A town called Ozhilkithnia.” “Oh… Killah ina?” “Nevermind. Your parents died 3 years ago, and while going through their pictures we found you, and after looking into you, the trail runs dry in 4078.” Wylinoris sighed. “What affiliation do you have with my parents?” Wylinoris asked. “Cousin of friends of friends. Never met them, but I was asked to help clean out their house.”

“If I was just a… Mage as you say, why did I just magically end up in Northhath?” Giethi paused for a moment. “Well, Northhath hasn’t always been your happy good country. In the fifties, they stole- no, kidnapped mages. I assume you were one of the last seeing how young you are.” Citirth moaned in the distance. “Citirth! That was a pretty big hit you took!” Giethi ran over and sat down next to him. “Giethi…” Citirth slapped her. “Ow! What the hell was that for?!” “I’m never doing this again! I’m done!” Giethi rubbed her face. Citirth also looked into Giethi’s eyes. “What did you do?”

“Nothing! Trust me, I’m fine.”

“If we got out alive you did something.”

Thunder rumbled in the distance. “Oh- would you look at that! We better find a place to settle down for the night.”

Giethi folded up her staff and began walking towards the forest. “Hey… Wylinoris.” Wylinoris shuttered and glanced over at Citirth whispering into her ear. “What?!-” “Shush,” Citirth said. “Do you notice something off about her? I mean, you just met her, but-” They began following her. “Now that you mention it… Yeah. Her eyes- They, uh, seem to be lighter.” Citirth picked up the sword and folded it back into a gauntlet. “What the hell was that thing?” “I still have no idea.”

“Hoi- Guys!” Citirth looked into the forest to see a faint light. “Giethi? Did you find another cave?” He pushed some scrub away to see Giethi looking amazed at an old run-down house, overgrown with vines and other foliage, full of rotting wood and vermin. “Hell no! I ain’t staying in some haunted house for the night!” Citirth said. “It’s just until the sun comes up,” Giethi said. “The roof looks relatively stable. C’mon!” Citirth looked back at Wylinoris, and then back at the house. “Fine.” He muttered.

The stench of rotting wood immediately rushed through them when the rusty door broke down with small force. Dust and wood clippings had piled up on the now ruined floor. “You sure we can sleep here?” “Citirth, you were using your sword and a rag as a pillow just 15 minutes ago; shut the hell up about the dust.” Giethi took a graphite rod, stuck it in a plank of wood, and lit a bright fire with just the snap of a finger. You could see old pictures from the entrance, slowly degrading with every pest walking over it and taking a small nibble. An old burnt-out flat-screen TV on the left attempted to turn on its screen for the last time and then cut out. “Shi~it. This place looks like a nightmare.” Wylinoris thought to herself.

Small hisses ran through the house, with the occasional heart-clenching sound of what seemed to be a woman harmonizing. “Giethi, I don’t like this place.” “It looks no better than your apartment.” Giethi looked to the right to see a relatively intact stairway. “Second story. Might as well see if there’s anything up there first.” She said while hoisting the torch up through the stairway.

Moonlight gently illuminated the ungodly amount of powder breezing through the second story, with rotting wooden doors staring down the hallway. “See? This place-” She choked on the filth. “It- isn’t that bad!” She opened up one of the doors. “Eh? The hell’s that-” She slammed the door shut, letting the softwood break letting the bronze doorknob fly through the hallway. “What?” Wylinoris said and tried to get past Giethi. “There’s some shit in there. Go downstairs with Citirth.” She pointed down the hall.

“Giethi, what’s behind the door?” She peaked through the hole in the door again. “I said downstairs!” Citirth picked Giethi up and kicked down the door. “Really? This is what you were scared about?” Wylinoris peeked through the doorway to see a relatively empty room, except for the occasional box covered in beige cloth. "Hey, the hell's this?" Citirth lifted the splintered floorboards and pulled out a strange black tile.

"What the hell is that?"

"..."

"Giethi, it's a weird hexagon or some shit. Kinda glossy, can't you see?"

Citirth scraped off the adhesive on the plate with a dagger and tossed the tile at Giethi.

“Come on, let’s see if I can get anything decent to sleep on that doesn’t involve us choking on asbestos.” He peeled the substance off the dagger and tossed it into a corner in one of the rooms. Wylinoris stayed behind in the room while Giethi and Citirth stared at each other for a bit, then went back to looking for a slightly cleaner room. She peered over the crevice where Citirth pulled out the tile and found sheets of metal with the ashy plates in abundance. This, of course, was not a problem to her, she was more intrigued by the depression in the ground.

As she pulled apart the warped and misshapen sheets of chrome, the number of tiles increased on them until she reached a battered obsidian and silver box with small cutouts. Wylinoris pulled it out to a distance because it attached to the boards by curled cables like in an old dial-up phone.

She took a swiss army knife and began untightening the cobalt screws on the box when two fans covered by metal grates spooled up. The sides of the box opened up gently and the middle pooled around to a small loose hexagon. It popped out powerfully into her face, leaving a bright ruby mark on her face. Two bright lights shone in her face from the hole and she dropped the box quickly. A black arm forced its way through the rubble, covered in the same black tiles, and attempted to grab her.

She heaved the box at the arm and crawled away from the hole in the ground while the struggling arm brought down the weak floor foundation.

Giethi and Citirth sprinted into the room and threw her staff at the falling mass. “Fuck!” She dragged Wylinoris out of the room. “The hell did you do?!” Wylinoris broke free of Giethi’s grasp and looked down into the hole into the ground. The debris fell through the floor of the first level and deep into the basement. The planks and rocks were now more evenly spread out so you could make sense of the weird mechanical figure in the pile. It had a strangely humanoid shape, with its head attached to its torso sticking out slightly. Its head and shoulders were level and widened out considerably. Its chest was hollow with blue illuminating lights revealing the silver compartment with tiny wire-like insulated arms with white blankets coating them. Its arms were long, nearly touching its short stubby legs. The machine easily hit around seven feet in height, and three feet in length, avoiding its legs. The rest of the machine beside the center was covered in thick heat tiling. “Yo! No fucking way, it’s one of those NASA robots from the thirties!” Giethi shouted.

Wylinoris panted and looked again at the mech. She recalled learning about the mechanical beasts used for heavy lifting on the moon and Mars in school and rushed back to a more secure part of the floor.

“Citirth, go pull it out. I’m gonna try finding a good room.” Citirth jumped down into the hole. “Jesus Christ… That thing grabbed me!” “Eh, It was probably just trying to get a hold of something. C’mon, there’s this really big wooden door that I wanna check out.” Giethi dragged her out of the room and downstairs. “Hoi! Giethi?” Citirth shouted from the first floor. Wylinoris peeked her head out of the doorway. Her staff came flying up and stuck itself into the floor using the claw. “You’re gonna want this.” She plucked the staff out and folded it back into a gauntlet. “Thanks, Citirth.”

“Seriously, how are you going to get by without me?”

She sighed and waved to Wylinoris.

She followed in pursuit.

“Wow, uh…” Wylinoris was intimidated by the massive door reaching from floor to ceiling. It was arched like a shield and was being held together by bolts as big as Wylinoris’s hand. “I took a peek at this once we came in. Out of all of the things in the house, this seems the most intact.” “Lucky for it.” Wylinoris thought to herself. Giethi struggled to jump up to the handle. “Hey, do you need any help? It looks like-" Giethi gave Wylinoris a cold stare. "Yeah yeah, I'm short as fuck. Now help me up."

"Or you could just-" Wylinoris grunted, got on her toes, and grabbed onto the handle, pulling herself up a bit. "Grab my legs and pull me back." Giethi grabbed onto her legs tightly and began walking backward. The gate opened slightly with a loud creak. "Hey, what do you think you're doing?" Giethi let go and pulled the door back more from the inside. The handle snapped off and Wylinoris fell and cut her shoe on one of the bolts sticking out. "Giethi! You dumb fuck! What's your deal?!"

She pulled back the door and her fingers slid into a groove in the wood, worn by the previous owner of the house pulling the door open the same way. "Giethi-" She stepped into an utterly massive room, loaded from top to bottom with books and papers. Four separate fireplaces illuminated the vastness gently. Giethi was reading some papers illuminated by their torch stuck on fully used candle wax.

"Dr. Hermine…" Giethi's gauntlet popped out a small brass pin. She stuck it mindlessly into the dried-up inkpot and ground the powder onto the page. "Gah." She took some cyan dust and mixed it into the ink gently. The ink suddenly liquified and she crossed out some words and scribbled onto the bottom of the page. "Hey, how'd you light all these fireplaces this quickly?" Giethi looked up from the paper, confused. "What do you mean? They were already lit. Spooky, huh?" Giethi put down the paper. "My last name was Hermine before some family issues…" She thought to herself. Wylinoris dusted off the loveseat in front of the fireplace and threw herself down with a thump.

"Giethi, what's Southhath like?" She startled. "Well- erm… Have you ever been to Japan?" Wylinoris stared blankly at her face. "If I'm in North Hath, I haven't been there."

"Have you at least seen pictures?"

"Well yeah, duh."

"Think of it as a slightly colder Japan. But some parts are flourishing with green, unlike here where it's a barren wasteland forced to become an industrial powerhouse."

Wylinoris nodded. "Where's Citirth? I thought he'd be back sooner, seeing how the bot is probably rusted over and could be kicked over here."