“Where is Emhreeil?” The man asked Katherine, his gaze flitting from her friend to her.

She blinked at him once, twice.

Then she almost burst out laughing from sheer incredulousness, but made do with nary more than a cough.

The second man’s eyes were laser-focused on her as he pretended to casually lean against the wall a dozen feet ahead.

Glancing behind her at the thin-mouthed alley, then above, where a spinning carousel of neon-lit signs advertised shops to passersby on the level above, she realized that as far as she was concerned, they were only two people.

A two versus two was a good fight. One she could take without worrying too much.

They probably had some people in reserve though. Would they run or come and fight?

The bigger question was how they found them.

“I… don’t know who that is?” Katherine offered, a surprisingly good act, which the man didn’t seem to buy, his casual clothes shifting as a dagger slid through his sleeve and into his hand.

Emhreeil made sure her wings were very, very still within her cloak, hunching forward slightly to alter her height. She looked to the alley’s entrance, and while she was turned away with her face hidden by the flap of her hood, flashed the clawed mask back onto her face.

“I suggest you stop trying to act coy. Where is Emhreeil, slave?” The man drawled, appearing at ease but his voice filled with warning as he spun the dagger around his fingers with obvious skill. Puffed chest, straight shoulders.

Like a chicken.

Her lips curled in amusement, even as she cautiously prepared herself.

That was the thing about the System and a world as uncertain as this, you never knew who was truly dangerous until they showed their fangs. So despite her desire to burst out laughing in the bastard’s face, she held some caution, because overconfidence would just get her killed.

She activated [Psychometric Vision], focusing on the front man.

Middle-aged. Stat distribution low on Endurance, build and equipment suggests mage-blade or standard assassin distribution, Speed and Dexterity. Not a mage-blade. No spells in his repertoire. Confident, not overly so. Experienced. Is not underestimating his enemy. Not here by choice. Not motivated by money. Has been blackmailed into his current situation. Subordinate to the second man. Is unwilling to fight. Will fight if ordered. Thinks this is a waste of time. Not concerned about Katherine’s seeming employer. Katherine's employer has been dealt with already.

She felt the strings of the Skill, and adjusted them to focus more on information rather than group dynamics and motivations, turning to the second man.

Came here independently, tipped off by unknown party. Hadn't expected tip to be true, is unprepared, came here because of curiosity and a sense of diligence. Has not notified anyone beyond current group. Unknown party is knowledgeable. Unknown party is Ghoul. Ghoul expected Emhreeil to find out. Ghoul sent them to Emhreeil specifically to relay information to her through [Psychometric Vision].

...If Ghoul wanted her to know something, couldn't he have just told her instead of sending these idiots her way?! She had the communication crystal in her ring-

...

A... communication crystal that couldn't receive anything because it was in a pocket space. She had completely forgotten.

Resisting the urge to groan in self-reproach, she rewound off that frustrating bit, and focused on forcing her Skill away from Ghoul's nonsensical way of thought, and back onto the person in front of her, using [Haste] to give herself time to think, the world slow around her.

Loyal to ally of House Kervile. Seeking revenge on behalf of his employer. Employer furious over destruction of House Kervile, blames Emhreeil. Destruction of House Kervile was at the hands of Marquess Irythiel. Knows Emhreeil is Irythiel's daughter. Employer aware of Katherine's existence and attachment to Emhreeil. Has placed a bounty on Emhreeil and Katherine. Bounty is on the Mercenary Guild's board.

Oh, that was just great. It wasn't like half the Dungeon was already hunting them down or something.

Sarcasm aside, what did she have to do with House Kervile? Who even was that?

It took her a few moments of baffled confusion to realize that was Lady Anna's family. Kervile. She vaguely remembered that.

She cast [Haste] again, stronger, forcing the world to slow down as much as she could. What the hell did ‘dealt with’ mean? Destroyed?

Did they kill Lady Anna?

No, she knew her mother. She didn't kill Lady Anna, she probably killed everyone, down to the last man that had been in the vicinity of that manor, after interrogating them. That meant that... that she had indirectly killed Lady Anna. And everyone in that manor.

She felt her gut twist in that familiar guilt she'd grown so accustomed to but could never seem to find a way to escape from.

Some part of her noted how much easier it was to deal with that guilt, faintly concerned from how muted the emotion was, while the other parts were struggling to compose themselves.

Fuck.

Katherine opened her mouth, and she cut in.

“My little friend’s acquaintance is dead.” She spoke slowly and calmly, deepening her already deep voice to something only vaguely feminine, casually extending a malformed hand out of her cloak to put on Katherine’s shoulder.

Both men’s gazes snapped to her, lingering on her seemingly gigantic, hunch backed figure, her left arm drawing their gaze.

Microexpressions indicate disgust, unease. Unknown variable is alarming to both. Previous assumptions towards Emhreeil’s current persona were something akin to a mindless brute hired as muscle. Katherine was expected target.

So Ghoul hadn't told them she was still alive. Smart man.

Her yellow eyes glowed like little lanterns from within her dark hood, and she slowly tilted her head.

“She is gone. She had a brain injury after getting into trouble with Snake Eyes, and without healing magic or regeneration, the potions did nothing. She died. My friend here cremated her.” She continued, eyes on the leader, ignoring the first man.

Shift of shoulders and demeanor indicates mild unease, alarm. Is confident you’re the biggest threat. Is unsatisfied with answers given. Will seek confirmation. Driven by a sense of pride and accomplishment. Seeking personal glory. Will dig for information on Emhreeil’s current persona. Personally invested. Will not be persuaded out of violence.

She reached out through the link, and directed Scruffy to try to sneak out of the alley and relay whatever she saw to her.

To cover her, she straightened a bit, drawing attention to herself as she, in their eyes, grew half a foot taller by a mere adjustment. The familiar body language of a person that was learned and refined draped over her, no doubt incongruent with her odd, dark appearance beneath this giant, shredded blanket of a cloak.

Her eyes moved to the first man.

Unsure of what happened to House Kervile. Assumes dead, vanished, swift operation standard with his usual experience. Doesn’t truly know. Isn't invested.

Then to the second.

Knows what happened to Katherine’s employer. Reducing his tells, consciously shifting body language and expressions to deny information, feels like Emhreeil’s gaze is too discerning. Feels as if he is being read. Is correct. Is confident his [Mental Resistance] will protect him from psychic readings, assumes genuine skill is being used rather than anything else.

“You won't be getting your employer any revenge today.” She stated simply, staring at the second man, who stiffened even further. The first backed up a step, glancing to his superior.

Unsure. Nervous. Wishes to attack first before he is placed on the backfoot by allowing someone to set the pace of the fight. Looking for a reason to attack. Silently asking for permission.

Her gaze moved to the second.

She turned the Skill off to take a deep breath.

Her chest felt tight, her gut heavy.

Lady Anna and their entire house, just gone like that, because she happened to pass them by. How the fuck did her mother even know? Had they been tracking her already? Did her stunt with those two Guards really draw that much attention?

She turned the Skill back on as the leader of the two brought himself to stand straight.

“May I ask how you know that? Or perhaps your name?” He asked with tension in his voice, clashing with the polite tone he was trying.

She let her eyes lower, just a bit, making the orb lights the man saw thin out a tad, the slit of her eyes narrowing.

“You may. I believe it’s courtesy for one to introduce oneself first when asking, however.” She said mildly, mentally preparing spells and fields as she spoke.

Her head felt a bit tight from this prolonged concentration. Or maybe she’d already overused [Psychometric Vision], though she doubted it.

Scruffy noted a third man ducking into the alley, and sent an image of a lanky, middle aged man with his hands jammed far into his pockets.

When did they call him? Did she miss it because she shut off the Skill for a few moments? Or because her Skill had certain holes in it? Did he come here because he felt like it?

The leader nodded, gesturing to himself dramatically as his jacket shifted.

Weapon on left side, under ribs. Six inch dagger. Needle below, filled with paralytic. Has more weapons. Has more concealed weapons.

“My name is Jack. What’s yours?” He asked, an easy, charming smile on his face. He would have been handsome if she could register him as anything except a talking bag of blood that she really wanted to rip apart.

False name. Real name starts with J. Real name starts with ‘Ja’. Real name is Jax.

“Ah, hello Jax.” She slowly intoned, tasting the words.

He twitched, stiffening to the point it was obvious, his expression crumpling just ever so slightly.

"How the f-" He started, dropping the act for a moment, and she spoke over him.

“I simply know things. Usually things I shouldn't. I know for example that Emhreeil died penniless, weak, and without any personal belongings, despite not being there myself.” She said simply, and spread her lips wider. In a funny way, she wasn’t even lying. “And my name is-”

For a moment, even as her mouth moved ahead, she considered.

What name to give? Not that it mattered, but still, she was buying time to charge and form her attacks.

She had an alternate Adventurer name picked out, made up of idle thoughts while keeping a lookout or resting and dreaming of simpler days.

And what better name for someone and something like her, than-

“- Ramuel.”

It just fit too well. Ramuel, Second Wing of Seven. The parallels in their stories were almost shockingly numerous, despite the religious connotations to the name.

Once a mortal, pure and innocent and curious, turned to a creature with mangled wings that would never fly, a twisted form whose legend first began when it bathed in blood the first time, and whose legend ended in uncertainty and mystery.

It was a name that fit her like a glove.

She shifted to have the third man in her sight as well as he came up behind them.

Stance and bearing suggest something is in their pocket. Right pocket. Something powerful. Size suggests magical nature. Is wearing a magical ring, bound spell. Incapacitation spell. Sight-based, low range. Two uses before extended recharge time. Doesn’t like being so close to the action. Doesn’t like being so close to you. Is unprepared for confrontation. Prefers long range. Main use is connections and discrete assassinations using poisons, long-range executions, and traps. Can fight. Doesn’t like to.

She wanted that ring, and she wanted him and his connections to spread the word of her supposed death.

Her fields adjusted.

The second man tried to maneuver to the side as much as he could, as if to get an off-angle on them, though Katherine easily matched him with a challenging glare, well-aware of the game.

Jax hummed, easing his shoulders in a casual tilt as he examined them, reapplying his mask, a hauntingly familiar smile on his lips. He opened his mouth.

Frustration and annoyance at this stupid game they were playing peaked, her chest feeling too tight, his fake smile reminding her too much of Ghar's grin, her blood too hot in her veins.

Before she could second-guess the impulse, she activated the mana construct to her right. It snapped to life with a muted thwoom-pop and a sudden rush of air, followed by Jax's face becoming the back of his head with the sound of a sharp, fleshy crack.

His corpse spun once to land on its chest a few paces away from its original position, and sweet, sweet blood filled the air like the scent of honey as his nearly decapitated corpse spasmed once, then went still.

Another repulsion field threw the man with the magic ring onto his back before he could react, and she spent a large portion of her mana to boost Katherine, her hand on her shoulder tightening to still her as she reached through the link.

“Man behind you, line of sight spell in his ring. Either cut off his right arm or blind him, I need him awake and capable.”

Katherine burst into motion, slipping out of her grasp.

The second man was faster than she’d expected, managing to actually unsheathe his dagger before her right wing uncurled from her shoulder and devoured his head in its hand and fingers, the oversized hand easily curling around him despite the last joints tapering off into sword-like blades.

A middling [Sparkburst] coming out of her wing's hand as it squeezed was enough to end him, gore and viscera practically turning to mist in her hand as it clenched shut.

She stumbled back, and shook her wing's hand clean as best as she could, drawing the blood towards herself.

Her throat was tight.

Her emotions felt so chaotic. She didn't know if she wanted to growl or cry. And she wasn't even entirely sure why she felt this way.

The only surviving of the three continued to gag and choke and cough as he writhed on the floor, Kat standing over him and tying his arms behind his back.

“Kat?” She asked through the link.

“Em?” Katherine questioned, concern plain in the voice that echoed in her head.

“I’m so sorry. Lady Anna. Irythiel found out about them helping me. Tortured and killed them all. I don’t know what her assumptions or motives were for such drastic action, but… they’re dead. House Kervile is gone. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.” She sent, voice far steadier than it should be with the lack of involuntary bodily functions to make her stutter and choke on her guilt.

"How certain are you?"

She felt her chest compress, like she couldn't breathe in deep enough, and idly realized that she was on the border of an anxiety attack.

Why? The fight was easy. She didn't know Lady Anna much, if at all. So why?

"Fairly." She finally said. "My Skill told me. These guys were after us because House Kervile had allies who blamed me for their sudden demise. Ghoul told them where to find us to tell me about it through my Skill because I forgot that the communication crystal can't receive anything in a pocket dimension. So..." She trailed off.

Turning her head, she watched Katherine take a deep, shuddering breath as she finished tying up the assassin’s broken hands together.

“It's not your fault. It's mine. I was way too obvious with getting you to them. I raised too much of a fuss, because I was panicking and thought you were going to die. This is on me. You weren't even awake. I'll go now, he's all yours. I need a moment alone.” Katherine sent, and rose, eyes blank and face expressionless as she walked past her.

“Okay. Alright. I’m sorry, again.” She repeated.

Her wing's fingers flexed as she quickly shuffled the wings back under the torn up blanket she used as a cover, and after another moment of breathing in the scent of blood and death and choking on its taste, she turned to the only live man on the floor, struggling to squirm upright, half-healed eyes turned skywards as a mixture of blood and healing potion residue trickled down his face, breathing hard and fast.

She shook herself like a dog, physically shaking off her thoughts, and walked to her writhing captive, hoping that a healthy dose of intimidation and mystery would make him do what she wanted.

With [Psychometric Vision], she could probably just ask him questions about anything and watch his reactions to wheedle out enough information to make him think she was a mind-reader or something.

It didn't escape her notice that her Skill consistently learned things mere deduction and attentiveness could never gleam, but she was mostly going to operate on the constant part of the Skill rather than the inconsistent one.

A Skill from a demon sounded like the exact kind of thing that would be frustrating to make sense of.

It was a frustrating trip back, because while the human nest was exceptionally three-dimensional, there were plenty of spots where there just wasn’t a fast and sneaky way to move.

Combined with how the fight stopped almost as soon as it began, it ended up slowing down a bit, torn between believing that its pack could handle itself and their chronic inability to do so until very recently.

After briefly killing some lone human sleeping in an alley to steal his patchy blanket and drape it over its back, it sped through crowds, its two humanoid arms keeping the blanket in place while it sped forwards, choking its curiosity down as it rushed past places full of light and life and bizarre scents.

When it finally got to the place it felt the fight, nowhere near where they’d agreed to regroup for this ‘Fox Den’ place, it leaned over the railing of the walkway and stumbled onto a strange situation.

‘Katherine’ and ‘Scruffy’, sitting on the floor at a nook within an alley, while deeper inside, ‘Emreeil’ seemed to be talking to someone she'd captured, occasionally glancing about.

None of them looked or moved like they were injured, and it was a bit of a sudden realization to have, suddenly facing the fact that its pack was… actually quite strong, as far as it could tell. They could handle some trouble on their own.

It briefly mourned leaving two perfectly edible people behind, and hopped up on the railing to reach the nearest pipe. It didn’t bother shrouding its descent, jumping and allowing the screech of metal to announce its arrival while it slid down, being careful not to jostle the melodious box too much.

‘Emreeil’s’ head snapped up to it, before she relaxed.

Its feet met the floor. A harmless prod at its mind followed as it curiously trotted up to her, and it lowered its walls as she slowly explained what happened here, eerily staring down at the man on the floor as he quietly trembled.

Something told it she was using that reading-eye Skill, so it inched a foot away from her target of attention, slowly dissecting what happened and the background explanations.

It took a while, and by the end of it, it had learned something.

Humans and their relationships to other humans were bizarrely complicated and nuanced. And for some reason, 'Emreeil' couldn't see the simple solution to her problem.

Why not just kill her mother?

She paused when she parsed what its message entailed, making an odd facial expression.

Her late, but significantly faster than usual reply, was that her mother was on the surface, too far out of the way of their objective, and it conceded defeat on that front. For now.

Once they had some place they could be safe and rest in established, as well as some kind of mode of transportation, they could go up on the surface to kill her. Simple.

'Emreeil' seemed terribly amused by the simplicity of its plan, but agreed to it.

Humans had the tendency to make things way too overcomplicated for no reason.

Another ten minutes passed as she resumed talking to the man on the floor, simultaneously forming an explanation as to what was wrong with ‘Katherine’ and pushing it over to the wolf.

It wasn’t quite sure it understood or that it could empathize the loss of such a distant figure, but it didn’t like the idea of one of its humans being sad and mourning. It also wasn’t sure what to do about it, but after a few seconds of idle thought, it came up with a simple plan.

It told ‘Emreeil’ to link it to ‘Katherine’, bit an arm off one of the corpses, and padded over to her slumped form.

‘Scruffy’ didn’t react much as it sat next to ‘Katherine’s’ free side and curled up to eat its snack, but the human in question did, startling a bit then slumping back down.

It slowly worked through the arm, down to the forearm, one of its human arms stabilizing its food and shoveling it into its maw while it made sure to subtly wiggle into ‘Katherine’s’ personal space, until its side was pressing into her right leg and hip.

Then it began to push simple feelings towards her, the fluttery warmth of companionship and comfort. It wasn't as easy to picture and form and bundle as other feelings, ones it was much more familiar with, but it was what it could do while 'Emreeil' worked on a convoluted plan to make the humans think she was dead.

As it got to the wrist, she finally reacted for the first time, in the form of tiredly putting a hand on its head.

It paused, and turned to look at her, curious if its plan to make her less scared and squeamish of it had worked.

Her eyes were half-lidded and a little wet, but she stared back placidly.

Her hand slowly stroked between its ears.

It cautiously wagged its tails a bit.

She kept that same, dead-eyed look, but her hand alternated its patterns, until she was using her thumb to massage the base of its ears in a way that made its eyes slip shut and its head to lean into her.

Inwardly, it preened in pride, while outwardly, it grumbled in pleasure and decadence.

Its genius plan had worked.

It tore off a finger, and presented it to her, an offering.

She made a scrunched up face as she leaned away, sending back pure disgust.

Humans had zero taste. It popped the finger back into its mouth, then curled its human arm back under its ribs.

“Why is there a box on your back?” ‘Katherine’ wondered, and after a growling chuff of reproach, she asked the same question in a way it could understand.

She still seemed tired, but she wasn’t moping anymore, so it decided to try and explain itself until ‘Emreeil’ stopped gibbering to their captive.

Katherine stared down at the wolf as its head jerked around with its ears, its monstrous form hidden by a thin, half-torn, dirty blanket that barely covered it up to the back of its neck, where that eye was.

Then her gaze wandered to the softly singing radio she was holding in her arms.

She tried to tell the creature that they couldn’t afford to lug a radio around, but it wouldn’t listen at all, shoving it into her arms over and over again until she gave up.

Their backpack had plenty of room now that they had gotten rid of so much stuff, despite the food cubes and water purifier she got, but between the canine kleptomaniac’s bizarre obsession with light crystals, its new odd fascination with classical music of all things, the bombs, and the supplies they were picking up along the way, she began to think it might be best if they got another backpack.

Added onto the not-yet blunt realization that Lady Anna and her entire family were slaughtered because of Katherine, she just didn’t have the energy to argue, or... or feel anything, really.

They wandered around Lord’s Market, bobbing and weaving out of the path of Enforcers who seemed oddly uncaring of their rowdy group, Emhreeil and the wolf seemingly determined to drag her along on a superfluous trip that was…

Suspiciously harmless.

She didn’t know if he and Em decided to try and cheer her up or if the wolf was just curious and was using them as cover to go around figuring out new experiences, but either way, it was a… nice distraction, she supposed.

She wasn't sure if they could afford to be leisurely strolling along the market, but she wasn't the shot caller here, the wolf and Em were. Mostly the wolf. She didn't think that was a good idea, personally, but it was the drawback to having a friendly wolf on their side, she supposed.

She watched the canine's wide, curious eyes as it shoved its snout into a small passing cart of mushroom bread, and watched Emhreeil startle before lunging forward to pull the ravenous thing off the flabbergasted old man’s wares, apologizing profusely while the wolf inhaled a loaf of bread like it was made of smoke, largely ignoring her pulling hands with faint grumbles before raising its head to sniff at the air again.

She couldn’t understand where he was putting it all. He was huge enough to make most people do a double-take, but still, it didn't make sense.

Scruffy leaned on her leg, yawning, and she glanced down for a moment before shifting the radio a bit as it dug into her forearm.

There was just something about this whole situation that didn’t really compute. Like a faulty wire that refused to connect in her head.

Just an hour ago, she had watched Emhreeil brutally execute two men with a sneer on her face, before threatening the third to do as she told him before tossing him down the alley.

Now she was watching her friend hurriedly throwing thoughts and feelings at the wolf to try and get him to understand that he couldn’t just shove his head into people’s stalls and eat things without losing their ‘shiny metal bits’ while she paid the man for the loaf he’d lost.

Said wolf had also been casually eating a man’s whole arm next to her, just a bit ago, before graduating to inhaling as much of the two men as it could handle until Em was done.

Now it just looked like a really wide-eyed curious puppy the size of a person and a half, ears twitching all over the place and dragging their entire group by its snout to whatever scent caught its interest, gazing around the market with open wonder. It's appearance was especially helped by the patchy blanket covering most of its grotesque mutations, only its head and entwined tails easily visible.

Considering its ignorance to so many things, it really was a puppy, but that image was too incongruent with the monster hiding under that thin wool sheet, so she put the thought away.

Their group didn’t seem all that out of place, surprisingly.

Of course, they were a bit dirtier than the usual around here, but Emhreeil had the uncanny ability to just wave her hand and get all the blood off, so they just looked like a duo of weirdos with a pet and a goblin slave rather than a psychotic vampire, a genocidal monster, an armoured maid and a mechanic-wannabe goblin.

What a group they made. Going from casual murder and torture to a shopping trip on the drop of a hat.

The absurdity and whiplash was probably contributing to the numbness she felt.

She watched Fleabag impatiently pace behind Emhreeil as she hurriedly bought some impaled candy from a little shop in the wall that reeked of sweet herbs, and momentarily felt her shoulders laxen as the warm scents and lights slowly soothed the chaos in her head.

The music helped a bit, even if she could only barely hear it.

They walked on, Scruffy holding the stick in front of Fleabag’s snout as they walked, its tongue endlessly lapping at the green-gold candy ball.

Then it smelled roasted meat and its head shot up, pivoting their path.

Her lips momentarily twitched in amusement, before a heavy weight replaced that levity.

It felt wrong to be happy so soon after realizing what she’d inadvertently done.

She couldn’t cry, but she couldn’t smile either.

She walked on, occasionally comforted by a hesitant, concerned smile and a hand on her shoulder by Em, or amused by the wolf's demands of volume control to his favorite music, depending on how much it could hear through the ambient noise around them.

Right now, she was content to just bask in the presence of their group as a silent companion.

The tailor shop was so hidden Emhreeil would not have even noticed it if Ghoul hadn’t left very specific descriptions.

At the far edge of the Market, tucked into the side of a tiny alley that led down a steep cobbled slope, was a singular metal door with a stylized engraving over it.

She summoned the paper back onto her hand, comparing the design, the location, glancing around.

Katherine stood watch behind her, Scruffy nibbling Fleabag’s remaining candy ball, while said beast was hunting rats in the sewers a couple dozen feet below. In its own thoughts, they gave it ‘change-power’, whatever that meant.

They really needed a way to communicate at long range. Maybe Ghoul had another crystal to spare, though considering their price, she doubted it would be given for free. Still, Fleabag was surely smart enough to learn how to use one.

She flashed the paper back, and knocked on the door in a specific pattern, then pressed a button on the left side of the door for three seconds.

A crackle of static sounded out from… somewhere, followed by a throat clearing.

“How may I help you?” A voice said, gravely and weathered with age, calm.

“A corpse told me you make good coffins.” She said, feeling a little silly as she fiddled with her new magical ring, its effects completely unknown until she found someone to use it on.

She flashed the paper back to her hand to confirm she said the password right, and resisted the urge to snort as she flashed it back into the storage ring.

Really, who used verbal passwords for tailoring?

“Ah.” The man said, and the door clicked open, some mechanism on the top of the door pulling the door open with a light rattle.

A short, spacious hallway presented itself, covered bright red, and after a brief moment of wondering if this was really a good idea or if her claustrophobia was just piping up again, she walked in.

The hallway lowered to a small staircase, which she went down on, pulsing mana freely to relieve her unease.

Then the staircase bent around, and opened to a view that had her pause, brows raising.

The underground of this shop was at least a hundred feet long and eighty wide, and this staircase allowed her to see most of it.

Racks on racks of fabrics, sewing supplies, carpets and tools and entire buckets of tiny metal bits she had no idea the purpose of, tubs and jars of liquids sitting in the corners, lacy fabrics and leathers and feathers and everything in between, all held within a room lit by simple light bulbs and four equally red walls.

Her steps resumed, and before long, she was standing awkwardly in a corner next to an empty… reception desk of sorts, surrounded on all sides by racks of clothes and supplies, blocking her view of the labyrinth beyond.

The tailor slunk through what looked like a lacy curtain.

He didn’t look like much.

Vaguely dark-skinned, a lanky figure in a tight but flawless suit, a cleft chin and pronounced brows, with a thick white mane of hair. Straight back, professional dress shoes.

He paused as he looked at her, dark brown eyes squinting.

She resisted the urge to glare.

He lifted a hand to point at what she had grown used to pretending was a severely hunched back, his other hand still behind his back.

“Are those wings?” He asked, his voice sounding oddly excited.

To humor him, or perhaps because she felt like showboating a bit, she shrugged the wings and let go of the blanket to to drop it, revealing the tight and hastily cut-up pants she wore, the bloodied and lightly torn shirt, and most importantly, her ‘wings’.

Lacking membranes or supportive bones, more akin to spider legs with a humanoid oversized wrist glued onto where the sharp tip should be. Positively horrific in appearance.

The man’s eyes widened, and she was fairly sure she could see stars in his eyes.

He grinned.

“Oh Ghoul, you magnificent gatherer of freaks.” He muttered almost reverently, and she wasn’t sure if she should be glad he seemed so interested in working with her or creeped out.

“How would you feel about rings for those?” He asked, and pointed at her wing’s hands.

She turned to stare at said hands.

Dark black, patchwork, absurdly oversized yet gaunt, and tipped off with foot-something long blades at each fingertip.

Why would she ever decorate these things?

She shook her head.

“No. We have a strict budget.”

The man’s shoulders lowered in disappointment.

“So uninspired,” he sighed quietly. “Alright, come in for measuring and tell me what you need and for what purpose, we’ll work the price out depending on how long this takes and how interesting your needs are. Shouldn’t be too long. I’ve made masterpieces in an hour.” He boasted, and waved a hand lightly. She felt mana in the motion, a monstrous amount of it, and stiffened, spells ready to be cast in her mind.

She watched tape measures, needles, scissors, and a dozen individual threads of string, pick themselves off the shelves and float to hover behind him, orderly and perfect as if sitting on an invisible shelf.

She spent a moment gaping.

If he was a telekinetic, what the fuck was he doing making clothes?

If he wasn’t a telekinetic, what the fuck was he doing not being an Archmage and rolling in gold inside the royal palace? The amount of fine control and concentration needed to lift up so many things, so many tiny things, and hold them in place while individually moving them, was ridiculous. Emhreeil could probably manage five needles, at best.

Unless this was some other kind of bizarre Path and he was bluffing.

“Do you sew using telekinesis too?” She curiously rumbled, genuinely puzzled.

The man’s smile turned positively predatory.

“Of course. Young Miss, there is a reason I do not need protective detail despite making garments of all kinds for leaders and creatures of all kinds. More trouble than I’m worth. Now, come. Let us not share too much information. Bad for business. What exactly do you need?”

She stepped forward, followed by Scruffy, and just in case, prepared a few spells in advance.

Something about stepping into a giant sphere made of silk lines and tapes and scissors and a hundred needles was uniquely discomforting.

Ghoul, where do you find these people? She inwardly hissed in disbelief.

She looked down at herself, twisting her torso this way and that to marvel at herself.

It was… something akin to a skintight black bodysleeve that ran from her ankles to her neck and upper arms before cutting out, made up of some kind of silky string material that was stretchy enough to qualify as high quality rubber, most likely. Putting it on alone was quite the challenge, but doable, helped a lot by its stretchiness.

It wasn’t silk, she was sure. Silk didn’t stretch at all.

She’d even done some mock-fighting with this thing on, at the tailor's insistence. Darting about and throwing punches and very clumsy kicks.

All came with ease.

Well, as much ease as could be feasible after spending three hours being used as a mannequin for her own clothes even as his armada of needles sewed a garment right in front of her.

The man was terrifying.

Sewing.

With telekinesis.

With something like two hundred needles. Working on two different pieces simultaneously.

It still boggled her goddamn mind. The old man was either bluffing hard with some convoluted enchantment setup or deserved his own academy. She was sorely tempted to ask him to teach her, but they just didn’t have time.

The end result of his work was as incredible as his skill.

According to himself, it was waterproof, fire resistant, electric resistant, tough to puncture and cut, at least for regular blades without esoteric or exotic effects on them, like enchantments or whatnot, its color was a glossy black, and best of all, it was extremely comfortable and quite warm while still being breathable.

She still wore those torn dirty clothes over the bodysuit, which seemed to uniquely disgust the tailor, but she had no desire to let this suit get scuffed when something less valuable could take the damage.

Another factor was that this thing looked expensive so she had to counteract the look.

Expensive was not a good thing in the Dungeon. It got more attention than a giant hunchback with a clawed metal mask did.

Her new cloak was less impressive, but much more comfortable than a shredded blanket.

Tougher and sewn like some kind of segmented coat with a hood, while also being fairly light and very large. Just a foot below where her wings’s points sat at a resting position, about where her shoulders were, it split into thick strips of fabric, so with a small push, and shift, she could free her wings and get to work.

Scruffy’s clothes were much simpler, and he didn’t even have to tailor anything for her. Her proportions were standard for children's clothes, and she had some cheap but tough and comfortable clothes within minutes, picked out of his ready collection. Dark gray denim pants, standard with factory workers for the fabric's toughness, and a criminally adorable brown shirt and poncho combo.

No skirts this time, thankfully.

As Katherine finished payments behind her, she focused on Fleabag, about two hundred feet below and to the right.

Still hunting rodents.

She wasn’t sure why he was hunting so much, nor where he was putting all of it, especially after desecrating several stalls and carts by impotently stealing food from whatever he could stick his snout into, but it didn’t feel like he was in trouble from the way he moved. It looked more like he was playing whack-a-mole.

Katherine walked past her, and she pushed a wordless question towards her friend as they made their way back outside.

“More specific?” Kat replied.

She sighed.

“Trying to get used to speaking in a way he can understand. Kind of important for the leader to be able to understand us, you know?”

Kat hummed affirmatively.

“Practice can wait. I don’t have the brain power to bother at the moment. What was the question about?”

“Well, firstly, you. This is going to sound kind of hollow, but, are you alright? How are you feeling? Any request or... something we could do to cheer you up?”

Kat made a sound.

“No need. Your earlier attempt was… nice. Thank you. Anything else?”

She grimaced a bit as her wing scraped the wall, and tightened them against her back.

“Well, uh. How much did we pay exactly?”

Katherine made a dubious sound.

“Frankly, I’m not sure. One gold coin and whatever that small bundle of drugs we kept from that warehouse was worth. I’m not sure why he took that as payment, but I wanted to get rid of it and he was strangely interested in taking it, so it turned out well.”

It took a moment to remember those syringes of green, glowing fluid that they’d packed on the bottom of the backpack.

She frowned.

A gold coin was quite hefty for something without enchantments on it. She dreaded to think the price tag without his supposed discount.

“Might ask Ghoul’s crafter teammate if she can add something to this for free. I’ll call him sooner than later. Assuming Fleabag agrees and isn’t scared of him anymore.”

“The fact a wolf is scared of him rings every alarm bell I can think of. Frankly, I don’t trust him at all.” Katherine sent with a mental… sigh?

“Well, when we met Ghoul the first time, Fleabag was about half his current size and a third as strong I'd say, so... I don't know, take it with a grain of salt. I don't think Ghoul is that powerful. Just way too damn knowledgeable. Can’t blame you for distrusting him either way, but I have trouble doing the same. He's frustrating, but he's helped a lot. And I think I'm rambling straight into your brain, sorry. Oh and, do you want me to ask questions about House Kervile at the Fox Den?”

Kat’s steps stuttered for a moment before she resumed, gracefully opening the door and coming out into the quiet, sloped path outside, holding it open for her.

“Is it useful for me to know?” Kat asked pointedly.

She spent a moment to think about that as Scruffy squeezed through their legs to walk out onto the alley and fiddle with her new clothes, smiling and miming punches with her personal sound effects, like a little kid playing.

"I don't think so, honestly.”

Katherine took a deep, hasty breath as they stood there.

“What are we going to do about Irythiel? We can’t just let her get away with this. We don’t even know if she’ll keep sending people for us.” Katherine rushed out.

She raised a hand, placing it on her shoulder.

“She won’t get away with this. Fleabag's first suggestion when I explained was literally just "why are you thinking about this so hard just go and kill her". I happen to agree. Once he's done looking for a place we can rest and regroup at, we can think of going for her.”

Katherine hummed.

Without much else to say, and Kat's understandably dour and blunt mood, she bent forward, and stomped, rhythmically.

Stomp, stomp, stomp-stomp.

She felt Fleabag’s head jerk towards them in recognition, before turning back to assumedly wrap up his snack-gathering session.

The Fox Den front Ghoul had jotted down was absolutely nothing like what she was expecting.

She was expecting some kind of shady window in a wall or something, or a derelict building full of scar-faced muscle. Maybe some kind of seedy establishment like a brothel or a casino.

She hadn’t been expecting the back door to a high end tea shop.

That was likely the point of it, of course.

All it had taken to get past the veritable giant guarding the back door was some honesty.

She glanced up along the dark edges above, fully aware that Fleabag was stalking around the darkness above somewhere with Scruffy on his back feeding him candy, waiting to pounce should a fight erupt, and that helped her swallow her nerves down enough to duck into the building.

Katherine was off buying lyrebirds for him, having had surprisingly volunteered for the duty rather than come with Emhreeil.

She’d never been in the back of a shop before, but she could gather that this was likely what they looked like. A couple storage rooms, a giant metal box covered in preservation runes, a wall of cabinets, and finally, an office at the end of the hallway, which a man relaxing on a chair quickly gestured her towards.

It was plain, and sparsely decorated. Gray walls, gray metal desk, a pen and a couple pencils, a stack of papers, and a rolling cabinet on the side that seemed to be locked with something magical she couldn’t quite identify.

Behind the desk, a fat man slouched on a soft chair, wearing a striped suit, his eyes cold behind the metal fox mask he wore. Black curly hair pulled back in a ponytail, and a very bushy beard that suggested laziness or high Endurance.

It was hard for someone to shave when they needed enchanted bolt cutters to even trim their own hair. That was a bit of a known budget problem for high-end adventurers.

Her head still felt tight and vaguely raw, so she refrained from popping [Psychometric Vision] just yet.

The seats in front of the desk were like two tall, backless armchairs, the only things with any real color in them, a brown-red rusty velvet, something her wings and tail greatly appreciated.

She sat in the chair closest to the door, recognizing it as the olive branch it was.

The man paid her no mind as she got comfortable, hurriedly signing a paper, even as he opened his mouth.

“What kind of information are you looking for?” He asked, voice deep and rumbling in the way that suggested heavy smoke and alcohol use.

She cracked her neck, and spoke.

He breathed in, hands clasped in fearful, wishful prayer as he woke up from his fall. A soft willowy hiss of inflating oxygen cages echoed faintly in the strip-lit darkness of the alley, rancid air dragging through the filters of his chassis.

It hurt, once.

It hurt now as well.

Like a fingernail chewed a bit too far, a muscle strained too much, something horribly painful but deep down, satisfying, for no seeming reason. Such mortal sensations, he'd almost forgotten them.

He breathed out, feeling the oxygen cages blow the air into the furnace nestled against his spine where a stomach used to be. A soft hum warmed what little remained of his flesh, followed by the soft hiss of steam release.

He had no mouth, yet, he imagined himself forming the words, whispering the prayer even as his hands unclasped and he forced himself to take stock of his broken body and turn over to crawl to salvation.

A sinner within the church was he, a monster in the confession booth, waiting for the priest to lovingly clasp the cage around his mind and bring him to Its arms.

A faithful pawn to perfection.

A mere Eye, looking for Its perfect creation, last of millions.

And he had found it. Thousand others in the tomb had failed, but he had not. Chance or providence, he had served.

The pain reminded him of his purpose, of his weakness, of his flesh.

One and the same.

His cloak held the symbol and the gateway, a painting of a glaring eye within a softly clicking gear, in red paint. He could't find it no matter how much he looked, so he continued on.

He missed it. He felt empty and cold without it. Archbishop Varmond would give him another. He just had to make it back. He just had to crawl forward, ignore the broken, twisted metal, and hiss prayers to perfection.

The pain was secondary. The pain was good.

Through pain only, will he shed his flesh. Through devotion alone can eternity be grasped, and through reverent prayer soothed to tears will a lowly man like him witness The End, and march alongside his brothers to eternity within the blessed machine.

The vent he found was large, reminiscent of home. Yet the air was still too thin. Too clean.

Grease and dust had conjoined into a thick, oily mud, coating the vent, inches thick. He crawled forward, trusting Archbishop Varmond’s mastery of form to keep his ruined body functional.

He crawled, and crawled, guided by the whispers and whimpers within his mind, pushed forth.

It was watching, It was always watching, and It was always guiding.

He brought his hands, metallic and beautiful and timeless, before him, and continued to claw his way into the tomb’s wall, even as the steam engine inside his shoulder hissed and spewed superheated vapors into the air around him, a cacophony of cracks and metallic clicks singing of his broken body.

A trickle of water, a rattle of thin steel, the scrape of his iron spine against the floor.

But he survived. He had succeeded. He found it.

The edges of his vision played like dark shadows, and he wished to moan in effort, in penance, in triumph.

Fingers made of centuries and maddening croons pointed him forward, a voiceless voice vibrating through his every plate and pipe, pushing him, telling him where to go.

The distress signal was beeping away, but the tomb was big, his brothers few. He would get help, but it would be long before that happened. Yet it would come.

Time was meaningless to a true believer, to an Eye. He would last.

Despite the thermometer at the edge of his lens telling him he was overheating, he felt cold. He was always so cold.

Yet, whenever the faint, mortal urge to give up reared its head, It was always there.

When It spoke in words that weren’t words nor sounds at all, he felt warm, felt phantom sensations wriggle in his body, begging him to giggle in glee and shudder in ecstasy for he was seen, and he was guided.

His inhaler hissed on and on in the darkness, and he dragged himself through the greasy mud, deeper into the tomb, awaiting for his kin to find him. Time slipped, unsure, leering at him with puzzled eyes, unsure of what to make of him.

One final step, a scrape, and a faint, familiar rattle of chains echoed comfortingly up the pipe. The vent? He was not sure where he was. He did not care. It had guided him here, and thus, this was the right place to be.

He had no mouth with which to call for help. He did not need one.

As the stripes of light behind him faded, he heard the chains again, closer.

The vent was large, but not large enough to stand in, even if he did have legs. So he continued as he was, towards home.

And eventually, a scraping form of cables and gears and interlocking ball joints tumbled into sight, legs like spiked rods, hundreds of feet down the pipe, a dozen lenses peering around, chains dragging behind it.

He turned his lens off, then on, then off and again.

The Seeker saw him and scrambled into motion, misshapen and imperfect as he, thundering its way up the pipe like a metal centipede, and so he finally stopped moving, clasping his hands before him in reverent prayer, pleased to pay back a fraction of Father’s love.

He had found it.

-

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