Ranvir swayed as he withdrew from his spirit, bones soft as boiled pasta. He hadn’t felt this kind of exhaustion in a long time. Honestly, Ranvir’d thought he was beyond it at this point. Not even putting his entire spirit behind an exercise weakened him like this a week ago. However, the institution of a brand new area within his soul strained him more than he realized. Combined with the effort of reshaping another spirit crafted for war, left him feeling like a first-year student.

Shaking his head and forcing himself to stand up straight, Ranvir imagined rods of iron pushed down his spine for support as he stood straight. His feet slopping as they touched into the rafting, waters passing by swiftly.

Distantly, he felt Vulture roaming the skies. It seemed unimpressed with the local fauna. It came from a high-powered nature where it fought with the strongest creatures every day.

However, Korfyi wasn’t like Belnavir. There were no monsters outside of folds. The worldshard was far safer than Vulture’s. Instead of finding pleasure in an easily conquerable kingdom, the bird instead seemed disappointed that there was no one to fight. Ranvir had to ban it from hunting humans, but once it realized the strongest prey were big cats, Vulture’d almost fallen out of the sky in sheer shock and disappointment.

He looked down at papers he’d placed on a rock out of the water’s reach. Frija and Menace were playing behind the house, while Vasso was back in the town for lessons. Rolling his back from side to side and nearly falling off his own stone seat, as his bones gave more way than they should, Ranvir reached for the papers.

Folds, between Tier 10 and Tier 12, estimated to release within the next half a decade. He’d heard that some Sentinel division cut their cullings closer, but doing it more often would lower the number of monsters and make it easier, meaning each member could do more jobs before exhausting themselves.

Most of these were far enough away that Ranvir would have to overnight in the wilds, to get at them. Not something he relished, but the prospect wasn’t dreadful either. Especially, since Frija had emphasized how much she did not want to go without a bed again. Sleeping on the road had been fun. For a little while.

Loce sent a twitch through Ranvir’s spirit, almost knocking the papers from his fingers. Clenching to keep a hold, he sent out his tether-sense while stretching his Perception.

Two people were moving towards him. One blunt and brawny, a craggy rock in the stream of the rafting. The other a soft shadow dappling the waters. Even though she wasn’t trying to hide, Amalia was nearly undetectable.

Ranvir stored the papers and straightened once more. Already, he was feeling a little stronger. Hopefully, he wouldn’t look like a complete fool before the visitor. He sent a mental thanks to Loce before walking out to greet them.

Soon, his Perception picked up footsteps sloshing through the rafting’s currents. Unsurprisingly, he could only identify the sound of a single person, Amalia’s passage passing unnoticed by the world.

Presently, they emerged from the trees. Amalia’s walking next to an older man with a grizzled… an older man made of grizzled. Thick fingers, dense muscular forearms, heavy shoulders as heavy as his brow. Salt and pepper hair. A jaw that could chew stone. Teeth that looked like they’d been used to chew stone. The mana signature of stone.

A mason.

“Hello,” Amalia said, tapping her jaw. She would’ve noticed his approach earlier, sensing like he’d sensed her, but kept the act up for civilians. Even here, most people were only perfunctory with their tether-sense. They could roughly differentiate mana or even recognize people they knew well, but nothing more than that. Ask a person to identify an Ability with their tether and he’d like as not, get a blank look in return.

The mason nodded silently, tapping his jaw. Ranvir returned the gesture as the man spoke to Amalia. “He’s younger than I expected. Looks like a fool with that damn beard.”

Ranvir frowned slightly. Beards weren’t in fashion in Korfyi, he didn’t think, but it didn’t look that bad. Right?

Amalia threw her back, her laughter ringing out loudly over the water covered grounds. “He’s also got more points in Perception than most of your employees have in total.”

The mason’s eyes opened wide, turning back to Ranvir. He received a terse wave. The worker simply grunted, choosing to ignore it. Ranvir grunted. He was fine with that. Amalia rolled her eyes and tsked at them.

“You’re the inspector, then?” Ranvir asked.

The man grunted and nodded. “That’s the house?” he pointed at the structure in behind them. Ranvir nodded. “Looks like you should get your keys back from whoever built that for you.”

“I built it.”

“Makes sense, then.”

Ranvir exchanged a glance with Amalia. “Well, you come highly recommended, so I’ll let you do your job and get back to me with what you find.”

The inspector nodded and trotted off, heavy shoulders shifting with each step, water sloshing loudly.

“What a joy, true and bold,” Amalia said, squinting after him.

“If he can get the job done, I don’t care if he’s spits stone when he talks,” Ranvir said.

“You thought of that too?” Amalia asked, showing her teeth. Ranvir chuckled. “He sounds like it too, like pebbles are rattling around in his throat,” she imitated a gruff coughing sound and pushed her jaw forward.

Ranvir laughed, but didn’t play along. “So, what brings you here?”

Amalia smiled and sallied forth, passing over the terrain like she was part of the rafting. “I was going to ask that you remember the wedding,” she looked back at him. “I know you’ve been busy, and I wanted to make sure you remembered.”

Ranvir nodded. “It’s in a couple of months, right?”

She gave him a thumbs up.

“What’s appropriate for gifts in that scenario?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I’ll send you a list.”

“You don’t know what you want?” Ranvir inferred.

“That’s more Elpir’s territory, if I’m being honest.”

Ranvir shrugged. “Either way’s fine, so long as I don’t have to rush out at the very end.”

She smiled and nodded. “Also, have you seen a gigantic bird, like bigger than me, in the sky?”

“Yep.”

“Oh good,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure you were aware of it. It’s probably big enough to snatch a child right up,” she mimed Vulture flying by and grabbing said victim. “Wanted to make sure you were aware of it.”

“It won’t grab any children.”

Amalia stopped and gave him a long, piercing look. “I thought you didn’t like pets.”

“It’s not a pet. That’s literally the first rule.”

“It is yours!” she pointed an accusing finger at him, then started cursing to herself. “Shit, Elpir’s going to make me pay for that.”

“What? Why?” Ranvir furrowed his brow in confusion.

“We made a bet,” she explained off-handedly. “She thought the bird was yours. I, who thought I knew you better, remembered that you didn’t even want that kitten to begin with,” she sighed dramatically.

“What did you bet?”

“An hour.”

“An hour of what?”

“Best I don’t sully your innocent little ears with that information,” Amalia gave him a long examining look. Ranvir returned it, his mind sifting through her hints, until… “You aren’t entirely stupid!” she pointed a finger at him, at his blushing cheeks. “I knew it. You’re playing dumb on purpose. Except… it took you quite a while. Hmm.”

Ranvir shook his head and laughed. “You’re in high spirits.”

“Dumbass, I’m getting married. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I guess it makes sense.”

“You have to let me name it, though.”

“Huh?”

“The bird,” Amalia explained. “Let me name it.”

“Why?” Ranvir then reiterated. “It’s not a pet.”

“Doesn’t matter. You named your storm locust, Loce. If I let you name the bird, it’s probably going to be something stupid like ‘Raptor’ or ‘Eagel’.”

Ranvir shook his head. “It’s not a pet. It doesn’t matter what I name it.”

“You named it ‘Eagel’, didn’t you?”

“No,” Ranvir rolled his eyes this time. “Of course not.”

“Then what did you name it?” then she raised a finger. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll come up with a better name.”

“It’s only going to last two years, at maximum,” Ranvir said. “This is silly.”

“What’s silly is having a pet for two years and not naming it. There are pets out there who last that long and still get names.”

Ranvir sighed. “Not a pet.”

“I’ll think of something,” Amalia said. “Give me a couple days.”

They sat down on the stones outside the house and enjoyed the otherwise pleasant weather while the inspector looked over the house. When he finally returned, he looked to be chewing on something and had a little notepad filled with chicken scratch with him.

“We’ll have to tear it down,” he said without preamble. “I can’t get you an exact quote immediately, as it’ll depend on materials in the area, but I can get back to you within a week.

“The foundation has been watered. In fact, the rafting is running through it as we speak. It’ll need to be completely redone. Most of the house seems fresh, within a couple years of building? We can probably reuse most of those materials with minimum treatment, so that should save a fair few keys. I can set up a time for you to talk blueprints and layout next week, get you that initial quote at the same time.”

Ranvir nodded. “That’ll work for me.”

“Alright,” the man scratched more notes on his paper. “What’s your occupation and expected pay take for a month? That’ll help us plan and if we’ll even take this job.”

“I’m with the Sentry with the Sentinels, Afosío division. My pay depends on the jobs I take.”

One cliffhanger eyebrow raised, “You are a Urityon?”

Ranvir nodded. For all intents and purposes, it was true. He’d even been given the tassels, as he proved by pulling them out of his fold. They were a near exact match for Amalia’s own, though she wasn’t wearing hers today.

A blue ribbon to signify his rank as Sentry. A white length with black stripes across it. Lastly, the one difference between his and Amalia’s, the dark red tassel signifying him as part of the combat division, where she had the pale green of guarding and protection.

“That’ll do,” if the man was at all impressed with Ranvir’s station, he didn’t show it. Instead, he scratched a few more words off and nodded to them. “A week’s time. We’ll send a message.”

Ranvir nodded, and the man headed off.

“Stormfeather? No, that’s bad,” Amalia shook her head. “Talon?” she toppled her head side-to-side. “A little better, I guess.”