Placing one hand on the rocks, I guided myself carefully.

To survey the entire cliff face, I had to start somewhere. I ended up holding the broken claw tip side down and letting it drop on its own and whichever direction it leaned towards more when it landed, I would go towards first. It was a silly thing to do, but it did the job I needed it to.

It fell pointing left, and so I went there.

I made sure to shine my light to every little crevice and picked out every bit of possible footholds to judge whether it would be a good place to climb or not. Had I a geomapper with me, it would have been possible for me to note down these locations with much higher fidelity, which would be ideal towards planning a safer route. Those devices were quite handy in that they were able to very precisely track its own location without outside aid and were even robust enough to superimpose camera feed in an augmented reality space to leave notes and map routes. I had used them back in the day, so I knew exactly how much it could help me here, but where was I going to get one now?

But then again, despite my efforts, there was only really so much I could make out from down here. At best, only something that really stood out would be noticed, such as a section where I saw the cliff had crumbled, leaving a boulder three meters tall that would allow me a headstart in the climb. But that was all that it was, and the rest of it would have been just as perilous as all the other parts of the cliff.

The minutes ticked on, and during it, I would occasionally hear sounds in the very far off distance. A click. A sound of movement. A clack. It was all very spooky, and put me on edge each time.

As I reached the end of this side of the cliff then, the location that I found blew all the other climbing routes out of the water. It was a section where the cliff had crumbled entirely, creating a rough mound of debris which I would be able to scale without having to resort to any actual wall climbing.

Discovering it, I immediately made the decision to climb here. There was no point in going back and looking at the other end of the cliff. I was excited. This was perfectly good and so, putting my phone in my mouth, I started right away.

…

Though not exhausting, the climb was thoroughly taxing on my hands.

It was still very cold down here and it made the task of grabbing onto the jagged and abrasive stones a rough experience every time. With these hands tender from being left out, I had to be extra careful, as even a minor scratch in this environment would instantly peel my skin.

Aside from that, the actual climb itself was not too difficult. The majority of it was simply grabbing a handhold before then pulling myself over to get up onto the top. They were all small boulders, and that helped greatly. However, on the last stretch I did come across a slight bit of adversity.

I tried climbing normally, yet the walls afforded me literally nothing to grab onto.

I tried jumping, yet it remained just barely out of reach.

I looked to move some stones to elevate me higher, but all that was available were a handful of pebbles.

In the end, what got me up there was a running start with two steps of leeway, and a wall kick to boost me just high enough for the tips of my fingers to hook onto. But with a grip like that, I could feel myself slip the moment I felt the pull of gravity retake me. I practically threw my other hand up at that point, trying to save myself before I could fall.

From that point on, once I had gotten that single arm up and secured, it was the same process as all the rest to haul myself up by the elbows.

It took over an hour and at least a hundred different attempts for me to get up that final ledge.

…

Reaching the top in a struggle, I could only muster out enough effort to spit out my phone and roll over in victory. My heart was beating rapidly and I needed to take a damn breather. My body was not conditioned for this kind of thing… though it did bring a smile to my face as the experience reminded me of a time where I had done physical training with Verretheia.

It was one of those things: mind numbingly difficult during the moment, but fond to look back on at a later time. Of course, I could never one up her during training no matter how hard I tried and no matter how many times I made an attempt. Hell, nobody was able to, and that remained true even for the instructors in charge of coming up with the courses— and they had taken it personally.

It got to a point where the instructors tried to do everything in their power to make her fold during training. It backfired on them. Verretheia never complained, never fell short, and never even got mad. That was her magnanimity. But where things came to a burning point then, was when the people caught up in the crossfire got injured trying to meet the unreasonable expectations that were put up in the air, as it would have been far too obvious for the instructors to single her out as the target for their harassment.

In the aftermath ensuing, the instructors were reprimanded naturally, but Verretheia also had been told off. The reason? For not being the bigger person and confronting the instructors about their harassment. It was ridiculous, and the conclusion ended up being a simple slap on the wrist that punished no one except for those who were misfortunate enough to get hurt. However, what goes around, comes around. The people responsible got their just desserts when a very angry medic came stomping into the scene and scolded them for over two hours straight, bringing up every single aspect of their sheer overwhelming stupidity, recklessness, and disqualifications until they regressed into a ball and cried to themselves.

I never saw them at the guild after that. As for the medic in question… for a week straight following that incident, she received bouquets of flowers at her office every morning from anonymous admirers. From what I ended up hearing from Verretheia, the medic did not like the gifts very much, as it became a hassle to find enough vases lying around to keep the flowers fresh.

I found myself chuckling as I recalled the experience. At times, there was nothing more fun than to reminisce. But that was enough of a break. I rolled over and sat myself upright. Once I patted my hands clean of grime, I finally looked up and saw distant lights shining beyond my scope of darkness. It drew my gaze like fools to gold.

"The night sky…!"

—No doubt, it was the case. The rift should be over there. Excited, I stood on my feet and then I was led forward towards the world outside. But certainly, when were things ever so straightforward and easy? Even right before the finish line came just one final trouble.

Free lunches hardly ever came by freely; even the act of being honored with an award came baggaged with a painful ceremony of proceedings. I had been in a hurry to get to the outside, but that excitement was put back in its place as hurriedly as it came. The trail was one of a serious incline, steep by any measure of account. The longer I walked, the farther it seemed. How long had I gone: four kilometers, five? When I checked the steps counter on my phone, I had only gone a little over two. It was one last middle finger this place gave me before letting me out, but that was not going to matter for much longer.

As I raised my head, the end was coming up right before me.

The reward— a sight like nothing I had ever seen in my entire life. For as long as humans have existed, we have always looked up towards the stars in awe. I finally understood why now.

…

Having lived in a big city like Singapore for the majority of my life, where the lights were always on regardless of whether it was day or night, there have only been a scant few occasions where I had been able to experience an undiluted night sky but, even then, never to this extent. Whether it was clarity, intensity, or luminosity, it all paled in comparison to what I could witness here.

I was enthralled as I slowly made my way out into the open and the confines of the caves gave way to my full breadth of vision. The stars, of a multitude of deep violets, blues, and reds, covered every bit of the cosmos and glimmered oh so brilliantly. Veins, like the trail of a comet, streaked across this endless field and concentrated the stars. It was too much for me to describe. Any words I could come up with failed to convey the true splendor of the scene.

Even being in the unfortunate situation I found myself in, I could still wholeheartedly appreciate the view and I continued to gaze at it until I lost track of time. But, as if it were an illusion, I started to notice things which were not quite right with what I saw. The longer my gaze lingered, sweeping from left to right and up and down, the less it felt like I was looking at what was real—

"—What the hell!"

I flinched backwards and immediately covered my head and neck with my arms. At that moment when I started doubting my eyes, something fell from the sky and shattered into countless smaller fragments on the ground right in front of me. It would have hit me right on the top of my head if I had taken just another step earlier. Realizing that nothing else was going to fall, I slowly inched forward.

"Is this the same crystal from before?"

The fragments glowed a soft violet hue and were warm to the touch as I picked one up. I held it out in front of my eyes and inspected it delicately. I turned it all around and watched all the myriad of refracted light caught within its body.

The rock flayer from earlier scavenged the carcass of its kin to eat these crystals. Everything had the same glow as the "stars" from above. I swept my gaze across the landscape. It was dim and without much light, but I could make out what I was seeing at the very least. Turning back around to see the tunnel I had just come out of, I was able to piece two and two together.

I realized, "This must be their scavenging ground and they come out to pick off any crystals that fall to the ground. So would that make what I just climbed out of their nest? But how could an underground structure be this big?"

The cavern was larger than any I could ever have dreamt of and far larger than anything realistically possible. I could hardly believe it even as I stood there in person. It was like there was a whole other world down under… but the fact that it was a place on Arca Archa just made it make sense somehow.

Shaking my head helplessly, I remembered back to a time where I had thought the worst thing that could happen to a country was to be nuked. But there Russia was, still a barren no-man's land, nested over by a volcanic slime continuing to spread its influence by the day. That was not to even mention N'gothla, whose spawns I was sure could instill the fear of god into the minds of even the most staunch atheists.

So, as unthinkable as it was, the fact that this was Arca Archa simply explained everything.

It was then that another one of the crystals fell. I watched as it descended, unimpeded like stardust streaking through nightly skies until it finally touched down onto the ground and let loose a powerful splitting crack—

"—Ah!"

Following the sound, a short and high pitched scream quickly resounded from the direction which it landed. Hearing it, I tensed up and held in my breath. For a split moment, I thought it might have been another one of those rock flayers from earlier. But after thinking about it for even a second, I realized that it could not have been the case, for the scream was different.

"Was that a girl's voice?" I murmured, "Sounded like it came from a young person too."

The way it sounded was familiar, vaguely so, and that was enough for me to warrant investigating. If there was another person stuck over here along with me, it would probably be better for the both of us to group up and cooperate with each other. Two heads were better than one in a survival situation but, even should they end up being a complete dead weight, it was still within my guild worker instincts to help them out and to bring them to safety.

So, glancing around towards my surroundings, I made the call. Without wasting another second, I started to head towards the source of the scream.

…

With how much more leveled the terrain was here, it did not take me long to get to where I wanted. Slowing to a halt, I found some nearby rocks to break up my figure before then calling out to the other person preemptively. It was a precaution for my own safety just in case they were aggressive or if there were any more of those rock flayers nearby.

Those claws did still ring vividly in my mind.

"Hello? Anybody there?"

I spoke with a controlled and questioning tone. It was loud enough that anybody close by would be able to hear me but it was quiet enough that my voice would not travel too far into the distance.

No response. The air was dead silent.

"Hello?"

I called out again but after I received no response even with the second attempt, I decided to move in to take a closer look for myself. I figured that, whoever it was, they had likely moved away already and I might be able to find some clues by searching the area.

"It should have fallen around here, I think."

I proceeded with caution as I crept around in the dark. I was looking for the crystal that had fallen to the ground earlier.

"There it is."

And I found it with relative ease. It was quite easy to pick out with how the fragments and powder lit up the ground like the luminescent street markings of Singapore. That much had been within my expectations but what I saw beyond that… was something quite literally out of this world.

"What's…?"

Peeking out from just behind a rock was a little floating "thing." It was like a crystalline star: small like a seed, transparent with no color of its own, and constantly shifted with an incomprehensible flux. Illuminated by its own light, one moment it split into four spinning rectangles, then the next each rod split further to complete a wreath of broken shards, and after that it merged back together to form a single diamond.

Sometimes it would linger on a particular state but it would never last for more than a blink of an eye before it would start changing again. At times, it would even thin out until it completely vanished from existence before reappearing again after the next second as if it had just shifted to and from a different world, or perhaps even a different plane of existence altogether.

The longer I stared at it, the more the sight of it drew me in. It was like nothing I had ever seen before and the closest thing comparable would be the artefacts produced using liquid metal thaumaturgy, yet it was also nothing like it either. Captivated, I had reached out to touch the star before I even realized it.

As the tip of my finger tapped against its surface with a clink, it froze in the midst of its change and—

"—Eek!"

"Acht!"

Coinciding with the shrill cry of a girl, I felt a sharp prick of pain pierce my fingertip. The star had transformed into a spiky ball with my touch before disappearing out of existence the same way it had done so before.

"What the?"

The pain had been minor and only caused a tiny drop of blood to bead on my fingertip. However, ever since I touched it, I began to feel a slight warmth swelling over my chest. It caused me to grow concerned, but it was a worry that lasted only for a second before I fished out the source. It was my pendant and it was glowing with a faint light all on its own. It was something I had only seen happen in the past when Verretheia touched it personally, so it was strange that it was glowing now after so many years.

Still, I had to put those thoughts aside as there had been something else major vying for my attention.

"That cry just now…"

It was the same voice I heard before and it had come from the other side of the rock, where the little star had been just earlier. So, readying myself, I slowly made my way over to the other side. What I saw behind it though, had been a wholly different kind of unexpected than before…

Because there, cowering with a head full of bright blue hair, was a girl who was barefoot and in her sleepwear. The crystalline star, which had disappeared before, had also reappeared over her head and was now shifting even more wildly as if it were a direct show of her inner emotions.

That color of her hair… and the sound of her voice… I knew I had met someone like that earlier in the day but why was she here? What had her name been again? If I recalled, it was—

"Canaria…?" I asked.

And the response I got was…

"Mister Edmond…? Is that you?"

…

…