Oasis City: the great capital of Borea, a self-keeping secret by virtue of its location. North-East to the northernmost point of the Ankhezian Imperium’s original borders, just barely within range of the Suncage Grid’s solar wrath when it had been at its full capacity. Its crescent shape was contoured around one side of a kilometers-wide, oval-shaped geothermal lake, taking up one third of its coastline. A jungle of megaflora and megafauna alike dominated the rest of the great Boiling Lake’s coast, thriving in defiance of the permafrost which stretched out in every-which direction.

The Hulson Clan’s Longhouse in one of the outer districts was abuzz with excitement. Despite the lack of any official information, and despite the fact none of the supposed new arrivals had shown their faces to anyone besides the clan’s elders and healer-shamans, word of who it was and what had transpired in Agartha had already been purposely leaked. Two of the longhouse’s subterranean bathing chambers, fed by a quaternary spring, had been sectioned off.

Their first meeting with the elders didn’t go as well as Zel had hoped; as it turned out, most of them were out on a hunt. Only one Hulson elder had stayed behind - a venerable grandmother, by the looks of her. She wore a strangely complex outfit with a wolf pelt draped about her shoulders and a long skirt that hung down to just above her ankles, with the whole thing vaguely resembling a dress. Her hair was white and done up into thick braids, and her skin looked like paper that had been folded a few hundred times too many. Yet, her blue eyes burned with a bright will and she held herself in a manner that made Zelsys regard the cane in her hand the same way she would regard a cold-iron warknife.

The elder ignored the three foreigners by his side and instantly took to doting on him. This was where Zel’s efforts in learning the Borean tongue were first tested. It took active focus to actually understand Borean spoken at such a breakneck pace, but the tongue was closely-enough adjacent to Old Ikesian.

“Look at you, still can’t close a hole that small properly? And your hammer, I told you you’d regret not using a proper mammoth-tusk handle! I ought to not let you out of the house until this is fixed…” she scolded him, looking him up and down.

Zel could feel the old woman’s attention projecting out into the room, subtly scanning all four of them while Jorfr remained in her focal point. She turned her head, sweeping across the three of them and stopping at Zel’s face, barely tilting her head to look up. The crone’s sharp gaze pierced right through Zelsys in a manner not unlike the Smoke Witch.

“...And looking at the state of your shield-siblings, it seems that they will need a touch of recovery house-arrest as well. Seriously, woman, you’re running on empty. How did you deplete yourself like that? No, in fact, how are you still standing?”

Her eyes shifted to Zefaris.

“Of course it’s the Deathwalker that stays unharmed…”

Then, they shifted to Victor.

“...And the foolish young wizard that nearly burns himself out. You four are like a snapshot from my own youth, truly I say. I only hope that you hold up to that first impression, for your own sakes.”

She stepped back, thumped her cane against the floor, and shot a stern look of demand at all four of them in turn.

“Now… I certainly hope you have a tale of great honor to go with your sorry states, yes?”

Zef grinned in a distinctly Zelsys-like manner as she opened her left eye: “Of course, but… Why recount it with words?”

As it turned out, not only had Zefaris taken photographs in the brief moments of Pentacle’s reload cycle, she had a comprehensive mnemonic record of the entire battle thanks to the Philosopher’s Eye.

The record of their battle with Von Wickten earned them a hesitant statement of: “...He really wasn’t exaggerating, then.”

It was immediately followed by a wrathful glare directed at Jorfr, alongside a slew of admonishments regarding his careless approach.

“If I didn’t know better, I would think that you were trying to die for your adoptive Clan Elder!” the crone said to him. Despite her demeanor, there was little ill intent behind it. Indeed, the old woman drained at least a half-liter of blood-red mead in one gulp and any semblance of tension melted from her.

She shrugged, turning her eyes to Zel: “Ah, there is no point in lamenting the wounds of battle. One can only mend them and try to avoid them next time. As for presenting this record as proof of your deeds before the Revenant King, it will not be necessary - he simply knows whether a tale is true, as Jorfr here hopefully told you already if he’s any good as a grand-grand-grandson. However, your Newman Clan must be blood-bonded to the Hulson Clan if your deeds are to count as ours. It is a simple ritual, though once the bond is made, it cannot be severed without holmgang to the death. Is this agreeable to you?”

Zel nodded. The crone smirked, pulling a knife the size of her finger from a recess on her cane. Its handle was some sort of fang and its blade was damascened, emitting the soft tones of cold-iron with movement. She made a small cut on her palm, then handed the knife to Zelsys, who did the same. A simple handshake followed, with the crone remarking: “I would normally have you repeat a fifteen-stanza oath of binding, but it’s a pain, and purely ceremonial besides. Just repeat after me: Let our clans be bound…”

“Let our clans be bound…” Zel repeated, and continued to repeat after the crone.

“...by blood for so long as they may, and let the bond of blood go unsevered lest blood demands its severance.”