Alta approached the city of Placto, on the horse gifted to her by the ones she rescued. Fortunately, the Pax Society already had a contact inside: the castellan himself. To hold a meeting with him would be difficult, as he usually stayed in his castle the entire day. Thus, she needed to take the initiative and breach his defenses by herself since he lacked a messaging artifact.

She blended in with the locals as she stepped into the city streets, shapeshifting her features every once in a while to make sure nobody followed her. Before her lord returned, she’d approach this quest using three primary forms: herself, Caesar’s Masquerade in the Pax Society, and a tall, slender man with a crooked nose.

The fluidity of her transformations gave her an immense advantage against the Order of the Fox. Unless she wanted to be discovered, it would be impossible for them to find her, even if she revealed her presence to their spy. But for now, she simply continued to move towards the castle, noting the current mood of the city as she traveled. The populace appeared both gloomy and drear – odd. The state of the city had been normal when the Pax Society offered them the quest.

She walked near the castle and stood at a distance, eyeing the restless crowd that occupied area outside the gates. Fierce men in bright glowing armor shoved people back and roared at the mob to leave. A few in the mass of people began to shout back, but the situation became calmer once a woman in black walked out from the castle.

That woman moved towards the crowd and spoke about something, then followed them as they began to disperse. The guards at the gate relaxed. Alta overheard nothing, but she gleaned a general idea of the current situation. A terrible event had occurred recently in this city, and the populace became infuriated as a result. To figure out more, she had to go inside, but the guards would prevent that.

A look around the exterior of the castle revealed damaged walls currently being repaired by people with earth-type abilities. Since this city was only one of many port cities, and did not have much importance, it lacked the funds to raise better walls made of materials that might be of Common rarity, or even Uncommon. Some rowdy members of the mob must’ve managed to open up a few breaches before.

She waited behind a corner until she glimpsed one of the teams around a particularly large gap beginning to rest. They had left behind a few guards to maintain order, but the reduction in people present gave her the opportunity to slip inside without coming into contact with anybody. Alta dashed off to the side and changed into somebody else, shapeshifting even while under the effect of Illusory Veil. Now she resembled one of the laborers.

Through the garden she went, strolling through with eyes full of melancholy. Her gaze moved away from everyone else and stared at a decaying flower until her ability regenerated. Then, she traipsed around the castle itself, where she saw through open windows: bustling servants and maids moving back and forth inside. Alta remembered their appearances and ducked behind a particularly large bush before activating her invisibility again to go through the windows.

----

The castellan resided in the upper floors of the castle, alone. With a level over 35, he needed no guards. His room was lavish, decorated with glass candles that shimmered with brilliant colors as they burned. A sweet scent lingered in the air while the man rubbed his eyes, tired from looking over the reports his subordinates had given him.

“Who are you?” he asked, not even bothering to turn around and see who had invaded his quarters.

“Somebody from the Pax Society.” By now, Alta had regained the appearance she had used to join the Pax Society and stayed at the door to talk.

That got his attention. When he stood up, he seemed happier than ever. “Thank you so much! It’s been a very rough time ever since I sent that letter.”

“Yes, I noticed the disturbance outside. What happened?”

“Plague.”

“A plague? When and how? Have you discovered anything?”

He shook his head. “Nobody was willing to interact with plague victims, unless they were kin.”

“Then what was that outside?”

“A complaint against one of my decrees.” He looked upset and paced around the bedroom. “Those ingrates. They never praise me when I do good, yet in times like these, all they do is protest.”

Alta said nothing and let him vent.

“Sorry about that. I should get you what you need.” He went over to a drawer beside his silken bed and rifled through it to take out a few folded pieces of paper containing details about the Order of the Fox in his city.

She skimmed through the information for a few moments then pocketed it. “I would be willing to head inside the affected area and oversee the location.”

“Really? Don’t you have an important mission to complete?”

“The goal of the Pax Society is to maintain order and peace. What kind of person would I be if I did not attempt to save lives? Besides,” she said, narrowing her eyes, “is it not possible for the Order of the Fox to employ plague as a weapon?”

Realization arose in the castellan’s face. “That makes perfect sense. How wretched,” he muttered. “Alright, I’ll take you there. But at the very least, you should have a method of Disease Resistance since we can spare you no cures for now.”

----

A beautiful lake house sat there in solitude, abandoned by its previous owners. Their garden became unkempt, growing wildly out of control after its keepers had left. Animals roamed around the area freely and watched her movements with wary eyes, having regained their fear of humans. But a few remained tame. Alta glimpsed a few ducks waddle towards her and stooped down to feed them with worms.

“I have a few men posted in this area to keep order. They also wear rings of Disease Resistance,” the castellan said while waiting for her to rise. He gave her a small circular emblem representing his authority. “Show this to them and you will gain their support.”

Alta traced the sea serpent engraved onto it and nodded her head in understanding. To solve the quest and the plague, she had requested to stay inside this house. It was built in an advantageous position and remained mostly isolated from the plague below.

As she walked inside, reading the contents of the information to identify specific patterns of Fox Cult behavior, a few rats scuttled around the floor and stared from the shadows. She ignored them.

----

For the next few days, Alta remained in the lakeside house, reading and thinking in complete silence. Every once in a while, she’d go out for a walk and find some insects from the forest near the lake to feed the animals. Nobody came to disturb her. She hoped that meant the castellan had given her permission to freely reign in this area.

Nighttime fell. All was quiet until a duck suddenly quacked. She looked up, frowning, and walked outside. A family of ducks sleeping near a puddle had been awoken by something in the forest and were looking in that direction.

Her slim profile stood against the blackness like a grim specter. Silent steps moved towards the sound without pause, and inhuman eyes fixated on something in the distance. A silhouette of a man, who steadfastly refused to budge an inch, trying to remain concealed within the darkness.

It could not save him. Alta stepped closer while the man began to reach inside his clothing, then – her face ceased to be. Eyes and ears and nose and mouth collapsed into red, blending together with manifold shades of human skin as she exuded the full force of her horrific Presence.

In shock, the man fell unconscious. She hoisted the body onto her shoulders and took him down into the cellar, where she tied him up with rope. To keep him trembling in fear, another horrific display manifested in the room and sent more creatures scattering out from the house. Neither rat nor bug nor pest remained once she regained her normal features.

Presence replaced Spirit as a Horror’s unique stat. It granted more health like Vitality or Endurance, and when actively used, bolstered stats. Unlike what Caesar believed, horrors did not lose health but instead their forms would warp.

Presence replenished itself like Mana: through excess time, rest, or a state similar to sleep. But she knew nothing about how it worked in relation to skills. They shared a Memorization cost, but perhaps not the same number of skill categories.

Alta returned to scanning the papers in the room above. From what she could glean, the Order of the Fox had entered the city a while back, even before revealing the Forest From Before. The castellan was already working for the Pax Society and kept notes on their actions. But this intruder seemed to know she had arrived and came to spy on her. Was the castellan the traitor, or was it one of his aids?

Outside, many animals also fled from the terror that had revealed itself for a single moment. A few stayed, however: the tamest. This included many ducks, twin swans, and some geese who remained in the corner of the lake. One duck however, appeared much smarter than the others: curiously quacking around the forest where she had revealed her true form.

Fearless creature, Alta thought to herself, and named it “Quacker.” A terrible name, but Caesar had said all names meant something important. For her, this would mark the first time she had truly felt alone and without her lord. It would take many weeks for him to arrive here, instead of many days. That instinct within herself which had always hinted towards his location now pointed somewhere very, very far away.

She descended down the stairs again to terrify the quivering prisoner downstairs another time. Every few minutes, without fail, she’d unleash a point from her Presence until it reached zero. This new power had come to her when she was experimenting alone in her spare time, without Caesar around. It seemed a little odd as to why she received this power, and not some other Horror, but she knew her lord would discover why later.

Eventually, the man woke up after a long reprieve. Yet she remained in her true form, terrorizing him again before a flurry of questions poured forth from her lips. The dazed man could only silently mouth out the answers in pure fear, but it was enough. The interrogation succeeded, and Alta received all that she needed to know.

A claw glided sideways to slit his throat. He was indeed an informant for the Order of the Fox, and also happened to work for the castellan. When the order had been given to collect information, he realized it as an opportunity to gain more power in the order and put himself in a position to manipulate what the castle’s lord received. And thus, most of the truly critical information had not managed to reach the papers that Alta now held.

A true shame, then, that a Doppelganger had arrived. His success had promoted him to a two-tailed member, even though he was only rank one. A rare feat: whoever accomplished this through services to the cult would be guaranteed the chance to rank up. Hence, she had caught them in a moment of weakness and managed to gain more information about the Fox Cult than ever before.

With knowledge about the Order – no, Fox Cult’s plans – it was time to make a move. Weekly meetings were held in secret places around the plagued section of the city, changing each month. Although the spy was under orders to stay inconspicuous, an exception could be made for special circumstances, such as the arrival of the Pax Society.

Features morphed and shifted once again to perfectly copy the man’s visage – a good false identity to fool her enemies when she struck. She put on the clothes and picked up the rank one messaging artifact.

Who makes these? she thought as she rubbed the orb. It almost perfectly resembled the one given to her by the Pax Society, only made with worse materials.

“Have you any news, Gollj?” a voice said.