Ria made that quiet ticking noise she sometimes did, but aside from that, she didn’t say anything. She was thinking, or whatever her version of thinking was called.

It was the middle of the night by the time he was nearing the house that belonged to Fobur Plateforged, and Sylver felt an uncomfortable pressure in his stomach region. It wasn’t painful, it was more of the kind of feeling his gut had when he was being watched or followed.

And as the raven with a glowing left eye landed on Sylver’s shoulder, the feeling disappeared.

“One chirp for yes, two chirps for no,” Sylver said, as Ria’s attention shifted away from whatever had been on her mind and focused on the creature.

“No. Need,” the bird said.

Sylver reached up with a hand towards it and scratched its neck.

“This is incredible! Did something happen?” Sylver asked with a smile in his voice that spooked the small avian creature. Because it could hear the thinly veiled “threat.”

“No. Every. One. Safe,” the bird answered, as Sylver continued to smile, but had to be careful not to sound too angry as he spoke.

“So, you’re here just for the fun of it? You decided to ignore my warnings, even though I was very clear about how dangerous this is?” Sylver asked and watched as the bird cocked his head at him.

“No. Danger. Too. Small. Too. Fast. Other. Can. Not. Sense,” Chrys explained.

“I’m happy to see you Chrys, but the world is a big place. Don’t do this, it’s unnecessarily dangerous,” Sylver said and felt the bird’s small feet shift on his shoulder.

“Came. To. Warn,” Chrys said, and Sylver rolled his eyes at her.

“A warning from a raven, perfect. Just what I needed,” Sylver said.

The Chrys raven with the glowing left eye stepped left on his shoulder, then stepped right, and finally moved its beak until it was touching Sylver’s ear.

“Be. Careful,” the raven said, as Sylver considered if it would be worth the effort of adapting his “lungs” so he could sigh.

“Thank you for that. An extremely vague and ominous warning. Chrys, I apologize if this may sound harsh, but keep your predictions to yourself for the time being. Even with the eye, you’re not…” while Sylver looked around for a polite word, the Chrys bird continued talking.

“House. With. Red. Roof. Watching. You. Two. People. Danger,” the Chrys raven explained and lifted its left wing towards a house with a red roof. Sylver turned his head and body towards the house in question.

“Are you sure?” Sylver asked, as he expanded his bear soul armor, and moved his robe around to prepare himself.

“I. Am. Sure,” the Chrys raven said, as Sylver started walking towards the house in question.

He couldn’t feel anyone inside, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t anyone inside.

The light in the raven’s eye flickered for a moment, and before it completely disappeared, Chrys made it fly away from Sylver’s shoulder.

Sylver placed his ear up against the door and was surprised to find the inside of the house completely empty as he extended his mana into it. The shades similarly swept through it and couldn’t find anything.

Sylver knocked on the door, loud enough that the sound traveled down the empty street.

“I know you’re in there,” Sylver said, as he slammed his palm against the door, and only now realized he couldn’t hear the sound bouncing around the supposedly empty building.

Sylver summoned a decoy shade to continue hitting the door, while he very slowly crept towards the nearest window. The house was a small 2 story home, two rooms on the ground level, and what seemed to be a bedroom on the second floor.

There was nothing near it, it stood alone as if there had been a bunch of buildings here in the past but this was the only one that had survived some sort of catastrophe.

Using [Fog Form] he sent a tendril through a crack underneath the window, or rather, attempted.

Something was blocking him, his fog could enter the house, but Sylver could tell he wouldn’t be able to travel through the tendril.

After pausing for a second to see if he had a better idea, Sylver flicked his dagger into his hand and used the back of it to smash the grimy glass pane.

It was like kicking over a trashcan and seeing rats scurrying out of it, Sylver felt the two souls materialize out of nowhere, and then felt them promptly disappear. He used his ax to break the window down completely and jumped through it.

At first glance, the inside of the house was a normal abandoned room. Dust lined the floor, ceiling, walls, the only source of disturbance was the shattered glass on the floor, as well as the spots where Sylver's feet had been.

Sylver swung his ax in a circle around himself, and was as surprised as the other guy, that he actually hit something. Sylver lunged at the invisible figure, as Spring tried to open the umbrella, but that half-second it took for Sylver’s robe to throw it to him was too long.

There was no flash of light, no disturbance in the air, the man simply disappeared before Sylver had reached him. Sylver collided with the wall, and pushed himself off it with his hands, as his daggers exploded out of his robe and flew around the room with blinding speed.

Sylver flinched as a raven landed on the shattered window, and with a glowing eye, cocked its head at him. It jumped down from the window and landed near a barely visible blood splatter.

“Who were they? Did you see what they looked like?” Sylver asked the bird, and it shook its head while tapping a foot near the blood splatter.

Sylver used [Dead Dominion] to get all the blood he could find and floated it up towards himself into a small sphere.

“Do. Not. Know. But. I. Know. They. Were. Watching. You,” Chrys explained, as Sylver summoned his clone blood out of his [Bound Bones] storage and mixed it up with the blood he had gotten from the man he’d hit.

The resulting tracker was just barely functional. Sylver estimated the range to be near 50 meters if he was lucky. Sylver looked at it and tried to figure out a way to extend the range before he shoved it in his pocket.

“No, you know what? Doesn’t matter. Thank you very much Chrys, but I don’t care about this,” Sylver said, partially to the bird that was cocking its head, partially to Ria, and mostly to himself.

The raven flew up and landed on the broken window.

“I’m being serious Chrys. I’ve got enough on my plate. Go home, please. I’ll bring you a souvenir as a thank you for the help,” Sylver said, and thankfully Chrys was able to understand he was being polite now, and if she tried to argue, he would stop.

As the light in its left eye flickered away the raven croaked at him and flew away into the night.

Sylver walked up to the second floor, just in case, but even after having his floating daggers fly around in hopes of hitting something, he found nothing.

Sylver moved the mattress down to the first floor and tossed some of the wooden furniture onto it. He reached into his backpack and sprinkled some dwarven whiskey onto the mess. Sylver used his [Advanced Earth Manipulation] to move the dirt the foundations were built on out of the way and finally used [Morbid Mushroom] to grow a giant ball of white fungus on his hand.

Sylver tossed it at the mattress and used [Fog Form] to leave unseen through the window.

Once he was far enough away, Sylver had a shade enter the building.

In the dead of the night, it looked like a bonfire and not just a simple house fire. Sylver heard people waking up, screaming, heard a man barking orders to wake up one name or another, as he walked away from the mess.

***

Fobur’s house was a bit worse for wear than when Sylver had last been here, but at least someone replaced the door. Sylver walked up to it and knocked three times.

There were 3 souls inside that Sylver could count, two belonged to men, and the third was using something to cloud its presence.

Normally Sylver would have been happy to see a fellow mage, but the circumstances in which they were meeting were far from ideal.

A man with a cloth mask covering his face opened the door and gestured for Sylver to enter. Even from here, Sylver could see the white smoke from the burning building. It had probably sunk into the ground by now.

As Sylver walked towards the room he could feel the clouded soul, he felt a strangely familiar magic engulf him. Sylver nudged Ria to prepare herself to wrap around him, as he turned the corner and saw a man wearing a dark brown robe, with a similar colored dark brown mask.

The man was about Sylver’s height, very wide, hunched over, and with hands that were somehow bigger and wider than Sylver’s.

This close, Sylver could feel the man’s soul, even through the interference. He asked Ria to wait.

“Sylver Sezari,” the man said.

He spoke in such a deep and gruff voice, that it almost sounded like he was snoring.

Sylver knew two things at that very moment.

It wasn’t a coincidence that the emperor, Dobrynya Nikitich, looked like he and Nameless were related.

And that even though he knew his name, Bear had no idea who Sylver was.

“I am. Who am I speaking to?” Sylver asked as Bear removed the flimsy cloth mask that had been hiding his withered and bearded face.

“You can refer to me as Owl,” Bear, now Owl said.

Sylver could tell he wasn’t faking it. He had no recollection of meeting Sylver, all those years ago, when he helped Nameless, and company summon a demon to find the owner of a drop of blood.

He could see it in Owl’s completely white blinded eyes, he could feel it in his soul.

“I believe we can help one another,” Owl said, as Sylver nodded at him.