The massive shape of a gorilla was lit solely by the outside light. Large tusks jutted out from its jaw, and a skull plate covered a skinless face.

Raff quickly chucked a vial of perfume at the creature’s chest, releasing a noxious smell. Like death, but the creature didn’t even seem to notice.

THWACK. Silva’s boomerang bounced off the creature’s faceplate. Their bones rumbled, and the crates nearby shook as the creature thundered towards Silva. Vai panickily shoved open a ventilation hatch in the rafters. Raff quickly scurried up after her.

While the creature was distracted, Lillllith’s spear stabbed into its neck, and its head came cleanly off.

“FUCK YEAH!” Vai celebrated, “THAT WAS AW- WATCH OUT!”

The body started recomposing over the fallen faceplate. A concentric hole was formed as the body pulled in the nearby dirt.

As the gorilla reformed next to her, Silva darted for the door, swooping up her boomerang in the process. Lillllith dashed after Raff and Vai in the rafters.

The creature turned its attention back to Silva and charged towards her. Silva shouted in pain as a claw tore across her chest. She pulled away a hand covered in blood and slapped her hand onto the creatures skull plate. She felt a stabbing pain in her veins as she anchored the blood smearing the creature. Without second thought, she turned to flee.

Silva stumbled as her body jolted with the impact of the creature pushing against her anchoring. Only fear managed to keep propelling her forward. A moment later, another impact caused her to trip over herself, and she felt a release of her anchoring. A large crash preceded an earsplitting growl as the creature’s force seemed to propel it into a nearby building.

Alarm drums beat loudly as Silva pushed herself up and continued her adrenaline fueled bolting.

Longstick yelled for the customers to let Vai, Lillllith, Raff, and him back into the Pig & Kettle.

Raff woke up with a splitting headache and deep confusion. His breath was ragged and painful. He looked at his comrades with a pained expression.

A few moments later, Silva stumbled in bloody, and they barred the door again swiftly after her. Longstick was shaking uncontrollably as they extinguished the lights and the alarm drum beats echoed loudly through the Cove.

Crockey waddled over to comfort Silva, and Raff helped Silva lay down and prepared to treat her wounds.

[Steef took a rank in Tempora]

Steef’s face contorted in pain as he groaned and felt a wave of something. He proceeded to promptly fall back unconscious. Silva felt her wound from the creature close.

Raff broke a vial of perfume near Steef’s nostrils, waking Steef again.

The sound of fighting drew closer and louder. Cries called out. Raff ran to his room to grab his crossbow.

Outside, a sudden silence fell, and moments later the nearby alarm drums halted.

They all decided to stay inside and went to their separate rooms to sleep.

In the wee hours of the morning, the Midtown alarm drums also quieted.

As the later hours of the morning came, Lillllith peaked outside a window she cracked open. A thick fog prevented her from seeing far. The smell of charred bodies co-mingled with the morning fishy breeze. Like fish death. However, she could hear a small of foot traffic nearby. She locked the window to tell the others.

Loud slurping echoed from the back room as Vai made a snarky comment while drinking soup that Longstick had been passing about.

Lillllith pushed aside the large table that was barring the door. The smell of fish death wafted into the room as she opened the door. The immediate surroundings seemed to be intact, but as she made her way towards the center of the Cove, she could see the remnant of a large battle. Chunks of building had been displaced. Large mounds of dirt were juxtaposed by perfectly circular holes. The guard captain Hino was supervising nearby guards. He was in full battered armor and appeared to not have slept. Lillllith offered her help and ended up being interrogated about her encounter with the gorilla. The guard captain showed her the fractured skull mask.

Bodies were being thrown into large fires. Carts of dead bodies seemed to also be coming from midtown.  

Lillllith was going to lead Hino to the warehouse when the rest of the group arrived and Steef accused the guard captain of leading the charge to kill all the Saans.

He didn’t seem to know what had happened, saying that all the guards there had been killed too. That no one had survived. He became very suspicious as Steef mentioned that the group had been there. As they progressed towards the warehouse, more guards joined them on either side.

As soon as Lillllith recollected what happened at the warehouse, the guards asked again about the party. They went to a nearby guard post common area to sit down and explain. After explaining, Silva mentioned that the guards they fought never bled, even while they were defeated. Hino immediately ordered all the guards to pull out their knives and make a small cut on their arm. One guard was hesitant. As Lillllith turned threateningly with her staff and Hino approached the guard, the guard cursed and charged for Hino.

A sickening crunch resonated as Lillllith’s staff made contact with the guard’s skull and red clay fragments fell around the armor.

Finally with the confirmation of Hino’s blood, Silva looked to the others and shared that there was a blood blade that they hid under the cobblestone. Hino sent one of the bleeding guards after it.

They were permitted to leave. The dour atmosphere was particularly bad.  There was graffiti denouncing the Saans, some defaming the government in Hightown. Generally, the atmosphere was tense.

Steef pondered, and since the last night, he felt like he had a good sense of events and how things were correlated and would unfold. Like the intuitive sense of knowing when the last bite of a half-eaten was. Steef preceded to tell them which of his dwal were the oldest and youngest. Lillllith snuck away to tell Hino about the cloaked Saan that they saw running on rooftops in Midtown and then went to a bar to listen to gossip.

Silva and Raff made their way to Midtown, which appeared to be a battlefield. Buildings were scorched ruins, and people looked around with pure anguish and shock on their faces.

Midtown’s stench was almost worse than the cove with the raw sent of charred bodies and death. Splattered on the ground was a mixture of red human blood and milky Saan blood.

A large carcass of one of the riding beasts were being hauled down the street. The sound of a crowd angrily cheering drew their attention.

[When Steef focused on when something had last happened to an object. The farther back in time (more than a few hours) the fuzzier it got.]

Raff and Silva frantically ran after the lizard carcass and managed to convince the dock workers who were disposing of the body to let them handle it instead.

As Silva took a cursory look at the creature, she noticed that most of the anatomy lined up with what she would expect to find but twisted, and she struggled to identify what species it could have evolved from. Almost as if it has been the original or the product of intelligent design. The way it walked was reminiscent of distant flying creatures, but the limbs themselves didn’t have anything like wings. Raff poked at the butt (i.e. femoral pores) and extracted a thick liquid. They also noticed that the now dilapidated saddle was borderline bolted into the creature, with anchors going into some of the scales.

Upon Steef’s entrepreneurial expertise, they began to try to convince a nearby butcher to take the meat for a special edition meal. They eventually agreed to sell it in exchange for them leaving him alone.

The group made their way to the boisterous crowd. As they got closer, one voiced carried over the crowd. Cheers punctuated each sentenced. Even before they could hear what the voice was saying, the group could feel their blood boiling in agreement. Those around them seemed angry and borderline about to revolt.

“This was an attack on our city. Our virtue. The Silver Legion couldn’t protect us. It’s time for us to protect our city!”

Lillllith found herself at a bar that catered towards merchants and traders. As she got inside, the crowd, although thin, was pretty gloomy and angrily muttering. She got an ale and tried to ease drop. The barkeep mentioned how she couldn’t understand why the guilds let the Saans into the city and how the Saans attacked unprovoked. She called for a revolution, and nearby bar customers mentioned how the Master Cartographer was on the streets of Midtown now and calling them to revolution. He was saying that the apple was rotten to the core and needed to be fixed. There would be a reckoning. Part of the bar emptied as they escorted Lillllith to the Midtown rally.

The gates of the Cove were wide upon as angry citizen funneled into one of the main markets at the heart of Midtown.

“AND NOW WE MARCH ON HIGHTOWN TO MAKE OUR WILL KNOWN!” The voice called out from a man in his early-mid thirties. Tall and lanky with sharp features. He had a mane of lightly salt and peppered curly brown hair.

The crowd began to chant loudly as they moved, “LUCRESIAN! LUCRESIAN! LUCRESIAN!”

How could the guards have not protected the citizens? They found themselves all thinking.

“My friends, my friends,” the voice compelled them. “This is not the way the guild masters should hear our will. Bring your voices to the elections. Remember my name and remember that I stand with you today!”

The individual was ushered away to chants of “LUCRESIAN!” by scrawny scribes and square shouldered guards.

After he stepped down, the crowd slowly dispersed, and they found their heated energy dissipating with the crowd.

“That man could be a spectacular salesman. He got me all fired up!” Steef remarked.

A part of the crowd didn’t calm quite as quickly as the others and appeared to be gathering pitchforks and torches.

“I know what Lucresian said, but he also said to make OUR WILLS KNOWN by the guild master. It’s what he told us he wanted!”

“YEAH! THEY DIDN’T PROTECT US! THEY LEFT US TO DIE!” Others shouted.

Slowly the crowd that had been spreading began reforming, joining the group of malcontents in their anger.

Reflecting on the yelling, the group determined that there was a business opportunity forming to sell more of Raff’s colognes to the guards for crowd control.

They began making their way ahead of the mob. Silva stared around at bits of hanging dead wyverns as the others passed her to the entrance of the Stairs where the guards had setup a barricade against the pending mob.

The guards weren’t particularly interested in Raff’s wares or letting the group pass into Hightown, so the group found a little corner as the chants grew closer.

“DEATH TO THE GUILD MASTERS!”

“TAKE BACK OUR CITIES!”

A subordinate ran up the stairs to the group.

“So glad you asked,” Raff smiled, presenting his finest wares.

“What’s the best you got?” The guard asked.

“500 dwal for a bottles,” Raff responded and smiled as the guard turned to the others anxiously. “I take credit.”

The guard begrudgingly wrote up an IOU from the Silver Legion.

“A little goes a long way,” Raff instructed, telling them how to take the wind into account.

A guard yeeted the bottle towards the charging mob. A large rotund man was  the first to notice the puddle. He tumbled over the others as several individuals began projectile vomiting and the crowd turned into chaos. One poor young man fell face first into the puddle amongst the turmoil. (He was never the same.)

Pandemonium erupted in the streets of Midtown. In their efforts to run away from it, the crowd effectively dispersed the noxious smells.

The group found their way unblocked into the main throughfare of the Stairs and made their way up into Hightown.

“Well, my friends. We have singlehandedly averted a revolution,” Raff rejoiced with a smug smile.

Hightown was relatively quiet. A handful of guards hurried past them towards the barricade.

As they stepped into the plaza of Hightown, the bodies and carnage of the day before had been mostly cleaned up. Workers still lingered, giving the group side glances as they brushed the cobblestones clean.

Silva pretended to drop her boomerang as she shimmied up the piece of cobblestone hiding the blood whip. Its crimson, partially translucent handle reflected the sunlight as it came into view, and tingles ran up her arm as she grabbed the whip and tucked it away.

They decided to start a business in midtown with housing and with a laboratory in the

“These real estate types have their own lingo,” Steef remarked.

“Like?” Silva arched an eyebrow.

“You know… money?” Steef offered.

They changed plans and decided to try and find the guild master. They iterated on plans everywhere from just trying to seek an audience with the guild master to using a Raff cologne to evacuate the guild hall and investigate it while everyone was out.

They thought better of acting against the guild master for the moment. They decided to reflect more on the Lucresian guy. They had all felt weird, not like the emotions weren’t their own but like it was compounded, and certain emotions were heightened.

In their confusion of what to do, they ended up a Amano’s house. There was general chaos along the way, with scattered repairs and looting. The group knocked on Amano’s door, but no one answered.

Steef gently shoved open the door, revealing that the inside was torn asunder. Clothing was strewed about, and a struggle clearly took place. But there was a clear coating of dust, as if it had happened weeks ago.

They started looking around, and Lillllith found herself suddenly exhausted from all the past days’ events. She collapsed, and Raff rushed to her side to treat her. Raff found a dusty orangey red powder on the table. A small bag in the corner had a handful of different pieces of clothing some from men, some from women. All from different people, including some shoes matching the size of the dead dude.

Raff helped Lillllith lay down for rest on the mattress (after shaking and flipping it over – there was a lot of dirt in it). As Raff poked around the room, he found a small, locked jewelry box and a handful of loose dwal (7-8). In the corner, he found a well-oiled and well-used scabbard, but the weapon that should be in it was no place to be found. Raff bashed open the lock on the jewelry box, letting loose two small stones: one a deep red garnet and one faceted pearl-like stone. Steff grabbed them. “Yep, they look expensive,” he said as he held them to a nearby light.

Raff took them back and agreed...

A few months went by, and their investigative trails went cold. 

Raff expanded his range of business from everything from bear repellent to fish bait. It became somewhat infamous in some areas of Midtown. Getting complaints from neighbors and raving reviews from customers.

The general dour atmosphere diminished, but the political climate remained heated as the golden legion was still gone and resentment grew for the silver legion. More and more individuals turned to private militias, thugs for hire. Theophilus Lucresian.

Approximately a decade ago, coming out of what was known as the Blood Wars, he made a name for himself as the Master Cartographer, gaining popularity around some of his extreme views.

The guildmaster herself was yet to be seen since the incidents in the city. Some thought she fled, others accused her of being in cahoots with the Saans who attacked the city. However, those spouting collusion with the Saans quickly crumbled under questioning.

Several battles were rumored to have occurred on the eastern side of the Circlets where the Saans has been gathering. Tensions were high, with and without the city.

There was a heavy pounding on the door to the shop. Steef sighed as he opened the door, revealing a woman in her early thirties, draped in a dark red cloak. She lifted her hood to reveal red curls.

“I’m told that you’re the person people come to when they’re particularly desperate,” she spoke in whispers.

“We’re closed,” Steff grumbled.

“I need someone to stop Theophilus Lucresian from killing everyone in the city.”

Steef looked at her a little more intensely, “Why don’t you come inside?”

She walked into the shop, bringing a small handkerchief to her nose to block out the mélange of aromas.

The others came down to see what was going on.

“I see that your reputation proceeds you… as does your smell… As I was saying, I’ve been told you don’t have lost love with the silver legion despite your business. I need you to stop Lucresian. He intends to kill most everyone in the city, and I would prefer to remain alive if at all possible.”

“I don’t know the specifics, but I’ve become increasingly suspicious that he was involved in what happened to the Saans delegations. He’s been going to the archives to access forbidden research documents about an older body of the Edo society that has since been disbanded known as the Corvus Syndicate.

“I would stop him, but as you can tell, I don’t have the sway I used to have.”

“And you are?” Steef asked.

She looked taken aback. “I’m the guild master, Lady Lyanne Thorne." 

“Out of an abundance of caution, could you cut yourself?” Lillllith requested.

The guild master stuttered, “W-What-why would that help?”

“Just do it, we’ll prove ourselves first and explain later,” Lillllith explained as she changed a ball into a dagger and made a slice on her hand.

The others followed suit and after seeing Lyanna’s blood, they explained the night of the Saan attack.

Lyanna told them Lucresian had moved the Silver Legion captain Hino to a nearby fort to defend against the Saans.

“Why would the Master Cartographer have the power to dispatch the captain of the Silver Legion?”

Lyanna tensed, “His political capital has grown. The tension on the Eastern from means that it was relatively easy to make an argument that we need more protection there, and the council of guilds agreed to his rather energizing plea.”

“And what do you want us to do?”

“I want you to put him out of commission,” she cracked open a small box filled with golden dwals.

They gasped. Dwals were usually made of brass.

“Now you’re speaking our language!” Raff rejoiced.

She explains how the council of guilds is based on collaboration and how her powers to force Lucresian away were limited. The Master Cartographer was one of the few titles that was shared over both the guilds and the lands. She still had the support of the wharf masters, though.

“Does anyone know you’re here besides anyone who could’ve seen you come in with that distinct red cloak-?”

The door to the shop burst open.  A slender individual who looked like a slightly misshapen Raff, and an overly rotund man with an eyepatch and some general similarities to Steef walked in.

“Well, looks like you’re right, Raff,” the rotund Steef said, turning to his partner. “There are hooligans in our shop.”

“Looks like you’re right,” misshapen Raff responded with an eerie smile.

“There are hooligans in our shop,” Raff turned to the group.

“Looks like you’re right, Raff,” Steef responded. He turned to his doppleganger, “No, no, no. The proportions are not right, and the belly should be much rounder. What is that eyepath? Is that FAUX leather? Everyone knows a good eyepatch is made out of suede.” Rotund Steef became visibly upset.

Raff grabbed a nearby empty bottle and chucked it at not Raff. The misshapen Raff was distracted by Steef’s tirade, and the bottle shattered against the side of his head. He turned to Raff, not overly bothered, “And why would you do something like that?”

Not Steef responded, “You didn’t have to be mean like that!” He pulled a cudgel from his pocket.

As he not Steef swung, Steef called out, “And I would definitely never carry something like that!” The weapon connected with Steef’s arm.

Llililililith pulled out her great sword. “Not Steef, see I have a problem with what you’re doing. You see, I have a problem with what you’re doin’, and now, I’m going to have to hurt you. You don’t mind do ya?” She tried to cleave him, but the sword ended up catching one of the shelves, causing a Rube Goldberg-esque event until at the end of the shelf, an industrial bottle fell onto not Steef’s face. A webbing of cracks appeared on the problematic bottle, but it didn’t shatter.

Silva snuck and setup her crocodile behind the faux Steef. She used her whip to try to trip him, but she missed. Steef also failed to kick the doppelganger into the jaws of justice.

Not Raff pulled out a scimitar and slashed Silva, but as he pulled his arm from her, she grabbed it, using her blood to immobilize him with her corporra. Raff lunged for the industrial bottle on to not Steef’s head. There was a loud crunch as the not Steef stiffened and collapsed with a noticeable dent in his head. More webbing of cracks spread over the surface of the bottle.

Not Raff looked at his fallen comrade and sighed, “Ugh, not again.” He scratched his forehead with his free hand aggressively until it turned into the sound of nails on chalkboard. The entirety of his right arm turned into sand and mud, and he pulled away from the anchored blood. He turned sharply and fled out of the shop.

Rafferty chased after the sand Raff, increasingly fragile bottle still in hand.

Steef poked the not Steef, and the eyepatch fell off, revealing a perfectly normal eye underneath.

“It’s not you, lad. Just another fat man,” Llillilith consoled Steef. Llilililith bolted out after Raff.

Silva took a sample of the sandy mud. Steef pulled the body towards the back room and went to console Lady Thorne.

Outside, there was a commotion in the street leading towards the square. As Raff and Llillilith entered the square, the area started panickily clearing as they noticed Llillililth’s great sword and even more frighteningly, Raff’s bottle. Raff and Llillililith lost the trail for not Raff in the chaos. Llillilith pestered a young man to ask about if he had seen a man run through. Fear filled his eyes as Raff drew closer. He pointed westward.

Lit by just a handful of lanterns, Llilith noticed a figure bouncing up a set of stairs. Raff and Llillilith charged about the figure. They barely noticed the splatter of blood as they started up the stairs. They didn’t have a moment to spare as they realized that they were heading up one of the back entrances to the Stairs towards Hightown.

Raff’s bottle hit the side of the wall a little as he ran, cracking more and piece feeling looser. Still sprinting, Llililith passed a portion of repairs that included a barrel of tar. She deftly popped open in the lid and urged Raff to throw the bottle in. Raff followed her advice and ducked the bottle into the tar.

Lady Thorne’s hands shook, “You handled that… in a way. You do believe that you can handle this, don’t you? I can’t justify sending a group of amateurs…”

Silva snapped her fingers, and Crockey hissed menacingly.  “We can take care of ourselves.”

Not Raff’s eyes widened in terror as they closed in on his positions. He scrambled to knock down nearby items and make their way more difficult. Llililith zigzagged deftly through the obstacles and tackled the doppelganger. There was a loud thud as she used him more as a landing pad than anything else. They quickly secured and patted him down, removing a handful of throwing knives and small vials of unidentified liquid. The man’s leg was bent at an unnatural angle from the fall.

Llililith hoisted the man up and threw him over her shoulder.

The man called out in pain, “Where are you taking me?!”

“We’re taking you where you wanted to be. The shop,” Llillilith responded.

“No no nono. It is my shop!” Raff yelled.

The man spat in Raff’s direction, “Imposter!”

Raff didn’t miss as he spat back.

As they walked back, they realized that the bottle of liquid that they thought was tar was actually a barrel of honey outside of a bakery. Raff paled as he estimated the barrel was probably worth a few hundred dwal. Raff replaced the cap and grabbed the barrel, replacing it with a hastily scrawled IOU note. And older general walked past them down the way. He frowned a little bit at the struggling body and wished them an uneasy good evening. As he reached the end of the alleyway, they heard him start to yell, calling them miscreants. He didn’t manage to catch up.

Silva and Steef were cleaning up the blood and broken bottles as the door slammed open, revealing Rafferty carrying a small bottle and Llililith carrying a small faux Rafferty.

Llililith tied him into a chair. “Who sent you here?”

“This is MY STORE!” Fake Raff responded. “We were told some miscreants had come to steal from us!”

“I’m Raff, you’re not Raff!” The imposter yelled.

“Of course, I’m not Raff. He’s Raff,” Llliilith pointed to Raff. “If ya want to prove yourself, what’s the secret ingredient in potion number 5?”

“That’s a trade secret!”

“How about a childhood memory?” Steef offered.

“Raff, get vial 17!” Llililith ordered.

He grabbed a random vial off one of the shelf.

“Alright, everyone step as far back as possible. Will definitely kill the left nostril, but Raff, didn’t you say this one took out hearing, too?”

She put it in tongs and brought it close to his face, “What do you say, lad? Don’t have an answer?”

“You can’t threaten me!” He responded.

“She most certainly did threaten you,” Raff confirmed.

Llilith slowly opened the cork. Even with the smallest whiff, they all were overcame with a wave of nausea.

The Not Raff didn’t bat an eye, “I told you to put it back! What are you doing?”

Llililith turned her stone into a dagger and cut the faux Raff’s leg. Blood oozed out, and Llilililith pulled the blood away with the blade.
The moment the link between the leg and the blood was severed, it turned to mud.

“You see!” Llililith proclaimed.

“What are you trying to accomplish?! You break into my store, kidnap me, and then stab me?!” He returned.

Steef turned towards Lady Thorne, “Does anybody in the Guild have knowledge of magic?”

“Every sense the dismantling of the Syndicate, no body of the Edo Society specializes in the study of magic. I don’t know why they were dismantled beyond being involved in some unsavory practices.

“And Lucresian has been know to hire individuals and send them to old dig sites that hadn’t been used in years. I sent a few of my agents to examine one of the dig sites, and they reported that it was one of the Corvus Syndicate’s. And have you seen the way he whips the crowds into a frenzy? There’s something unnatural there?”
“Can you involve him in some sort of scandal?” Steef offered.

“He seems to have a relationship of sorts with some underground organizations. Mainly a rumor, but people whisper of a certain Garnet Throne. He always slips away,” Lyanna sighed.

Steef searched not Steef, finding a deed to the building that they’re living detailing Steef Galloway as the rightful owner of the establishment and 37 dwal tied to a purse in the packet.

Raff snatched the deed and started trying to rip it before Steef stopped him, “Wait! Wait! What if… we pretended to be our pretenders?”

“Where were you going when you were running to Hightown when I tackled you?” Llililith interrogated.
“I was and am in my store! You’re the one who came here!” He responded.

“Get the jaws of justice to track his smell!” Raff urged Silva, who signaled for Crockey to sniff the man.

Crockey approached excitedly for another bite before stopping short, sniffing and rolling away.

Steef and Raff tried to approximate the look of the doppelgangers with mediocre success.

Llillilith tried to be helpful by pulling off not Raff’s pants, but the pants turned to sand in her hands.

This left a half-naked Rafferty with an aggressively broken leg, bone sticking out, tied to the chair.

Silva instructed Crockey to follow the sent. The crocodile determinedly turned and ran towards the door, bumping its nose on the door. Silva opened the door, and it charged forward. Crowds yelled and leapt out of the crocodile’s way.

After a little while, it beelined for the alleyway just a moment ago. The crocodile zigzagged between drunken homeless man. It stopped momentarily at the steep stairs before continuing to waddle up the steps.

This takes most of the night until Crockey stopped in front of a luxurious looking tea shop with the sign 'Vee’s Tea Shop'. As they approached the building, a young man in a silken and delicately embroidered coat came outside.
He cleared his throat, “We do not allow pets.”

“Alright, mates. You go ahead,” Silva signaled to the others.

The heavy smell of teas and spices filled their nostrils as they walked through the hazy air of the tea shop.

“There were intruders in my shop!” Raff told the man.

“Not quite the right establishment for that, maybe go to the guards?” The man suggested.

“You don’t understand. There were intruders in MY shop!” Raff insisted.

The man looked to Steef, “Is your friend okay…? Will you be getting a table for just the two of you?”

Steef nodded, “He’s had a rough day. A table for a few more would be appreciated.”

The man led them to a larger table and placed a tray of sweet mint tea, “Very well, enjoy yourself.” He made a quick round of the room before heading to the backroom.

A woman approached, “You were having an issue with your store.”

“There were imposters in my shop!” Raff yelled.

“We took care of matters, but he’s still a bit… off,” Steef told her.

“Alright, we’ll take him to the back room,” she extended a hand and grabbed Raff’s shoulder. He let himself be led away.

After crossing a set of curtains, he found himself in a much more practical kitchen area and towards a backdoor made of metal filigreed trellis. She did a series of musical knocks, and the door swung open.

In the center of this new room was a table. “Please lay down on the table, dear,” the woman instructed. A handful of large ceramic jaws sat in the corner of a room. In the corner, there was a small workbench that Raff couldn’t make out, and a back hallway blocked by a curtain of beads.

“It’s quite unfortunate. It won’t take too long, I assure you. Just stay still for a moment, it won’t take too long.”

She put a chisel to his forehead and raised a small hammer.

The woman went to smack the chisel, but Raff rolled out of the way. The chisel dug into the table, embedding itself.

“Look what you’ve done!” She took a step towards him.

“Steef! Steef!” Raff shrilled. He ran to grab a jar.

“Now, now,” the woman sighed.

A figure entered the tearoom, wearing a cloak. He walked in Steef’s general direction before sitting at the booth directly behind.

“I thought I told you not to come back here,” a familiar man’s voice threatened.

Steef paled. This was the voice of Theophilus Lucresian. Steef cleared his throat, “Well, he started acting up, figured I should get him taken care of.”

“And what of the bodies?” Theophilus asked.

“Taken care of, like you requested,” Steef lied.

The man turned a bit as he said suspiciously, “I see, and have you brought me what I requested?”

“Remind me again of what you requested. I don’t remember anything,” Steef tried.

“The head of Lyanna Thorne,” Theophilus said as he turned.

Behind the curtain, Steef heard a high-pitched Raff voice yelling panickily for him.

“Excuse me quick, it seems like I’m needed,” Steef saw the man get up and head out from the building. Steef entered the curtains.

Raff held a jug, and a woman with a hammer spoke in a calm voice.

Steef slipped the hammer from her hand, stepping between her and Raff.

“What are you doing? You need to help me get him on the table,” the woman complained.

“Do you mind telling me why you’re working with Mr. Lucresian?” He asked.

“What kind of question is that? We all work with Mr. Lucresian-,” She squinted a little harder and startled. She looked panickily at Raff,

“Please don’t hurt me, just leave.”

“How about we strike a deal? You have information we want, and you want us gone,” Steef suggested.

“You need to leave. If he find out you’re here…” She trailed off, horror filling her expression.

“Pretty sure he already does. I saw him just now, and I’m not a great liar,” Steef responded.

She whimpered before sharply turning and bolting for the door.

They followed her further into the bowels of the building and down a spiraling set of stairs. On the way down, they passed storehouses and rooms of workbenches.

“PLEASE LEAVE ME BE!” She cried as she barreled down the stairs.

Silva noticed Lucresian go into the building and exit soon after, heading towards Hightown.  She signaled to Crockey to catch the man's scent.

“It’s a status symbol of being the guild master,” Lyanna countered Llililith. “I must wear the red cloak.”

“Well, it will look great on your dead body, lass,” Llilililith said.

The woman smashed into a large metallic door, and Steef managed to catch her before she could unlock the door.

“You don’t understand. He’ll kill us all!” The woman cried.

“Then, answer our questions,” Steef suggested.

A few moments after Theophilus left, a young courier arrived. He grabbed a small piece of paper, reading quickly before grabbing a bone-like face plate from the bag and throwing it onto the ground in front of the restaurant.

Silva rushed to try and break the faceplate but was too late. Sand began vibrating. Instead of breaking it, her kicks sunk it deeper into the dirt. A small red glow emanated from the eye sockets as muscular arms and a deep growl emerged from the ground.

“WHAT THE-“ The courier yelled before running away.

The woman futilely tried to flail as Steef carried her up. They made it most of the way back up the stairs when they began to hear yells from the restaurant above.

Silvia deftly made an immobilizing trap on the ground out of her blood and ran. The creature didn’t seem to notice her and turned towards the tea shop. Patrons began to yell.

Steef put the lady down, and they all fled down the stairs.

The woman quickly fumbled the locking mechanism.

“I would advise that you come with me if you don’t want to die,” she told them, opening the door to a rough mining looking tunnel. Old tracks lined the ground, and they eventually reached a solid black stone wall. It was covered in a thin white powder.

She ran her hands over it until she found a seam and pushed.

A set of small oil lamps projected a warm glow. There was a large table in the middle of the room, covered in papers and documents.

A set of people in uniforms looked at them, “Who the hell are you?”

Silva could hear above her the sound of the alarms ringing as she ran away. Guards ran past her towards the tea shop. Silva made her way down the Stairs and back to the Stinkporium.
Llililith was mid-makeover of Lyanna when she arrived.

The woman muttered something to the nearby man. She looked back at the group wildly.

“Well, it seems like Mr. Lucresian isn’t happy with anyone in this room. The way I see it, the enemy of my enemy makes a great business partner,” Steef offered.

“The way I see it is if Mr. Lucresian wants you dead, it’s in our best interest to serve you to him,” the man countered.

“Why don’t you just show us to the backdoors instead and we’ll be out of your hair?” Raff piped up.

The man sighed and pointed towards a side door, “That way and down the hall until you get up to a tea shop,

“Mr. Lucresian gets 50% off all goods at the Stinkporium!” Raff said as he left through the indicated door with a wave.

“I will remember this kind gesture,” Steef said before following. 

They made their way through a hallway of the same black stone before exiting a small tea shop. They walked outside and into the cold damp air.

“What the hell happened?” Lyanna asked as Raff and Steef returned.

"Theophilus apparently had orders for the fake Raff and Steef to return with your head. If you shared that you were coming here with anyone, they probably shared it with Mr. Lucresian as well. I also recommend you avoid those red clothes,” Steef shared.

“Do you have somewhere else you can go besides home, lass?” Llililith asked.

“There is a man…” Lyanna began, “He warned me of Theophilus in the beginning. The last I heard, he was a bit of a mess in the Harbor. I already seem to have made a habit of trusting eclectic groups with my life, though, so what's another, I suppose.”

“Would you mind telling us who it is?” Llililith asked.

“The husband of the woman who used to be the Master Cartographer. His name was… Ganaban,” she said. “I believe he can be found in the Cove; he stays close to the Harbor.”

(They recalled that it had been a few months since they last saw Vi.)

As they exited the backdoor, they could hear that the alarms were now ringing across Midtown too and that whatever it was was making its way toward the Stinkporium.

They were waved into the Cove by a guard who became increasingly nervous at the mention of the gorilla and excused himself for a break.

“Ah, the scent of the Cove, always an inspiration,” Raff took a deep breath.

“Come, this way,” Lyanna took them towards a less populated area that they knew to be The Shadow at the foot of the cliff that would become Hightown. It was basically tents and cobbled together leftovers of buildings. She led them towards an open fire in the middle of the area.

“He’s usually somewhere around here,” Lyanna said nervously. “He approached me a few years ago, warning me of Theophilus… I wish I had listened then.”

A man with gray dreadlocks and a clay bottle leant against the wall, “What is it that you want?”

“It appears that you’re right. Theophilus is… problematic. This group has come to deal with it,” she said.

He took another swig from his bottle, “I knew a group like you once. Didn't go well for them. What makes you think you stand a chance?"

“He’s just a man,” Steef said.

“He’s much more than just a man. He’s a thing of nightmares. A MONSTER!” Ganaban yelled.

“Shut up, Ganaban,” a nearby man called. “No one cares about your stories.”

“That thing killed my wife,” Ganaban growled. “He came in the dead of night with creatures made of blood more than anything else. Plowed right through her. Took the unborn babe right out from her belly..." He shivered. "I tried to take him on once. Didn’t even make a scratch… Paid for that with my leg…”  His leg had clearly had been broken badly and not healed correctly.

“Do you have anything to validate this?” Llililith asked.

“If I had anything to prove it, I wouldn’t be here right now,” Ganaban responded.

“Sounds about as ridiculous as someone dropping a mask into the ground and a massive gorilla coming out?” Steef countered.

“A gorilla with a faceplate you say? A companion of mine, from that same group, took down one of those single-handedly," Ganban told them.

“I wish we could meet them,” Steef said.

“Me too, they disappeared right around that time. Last I saw, they accompanied that thing to a dig site that’s been empty since then,” Ganaban said.

“Can you enlighten us on the Blood Wars?” Steef asked.

Ganaban leaned back further, “Society keeps a lot of secrets. The way I heard it, back in the days there was an organization, the Corvus Syndicate, that allegedly studied the old Vellock Empire. Some say the went mad, and some say the Golden Legion sided with them as they used blood magic to overtake villages.”

“And this happened shortly after finding the dig site?” Steef asked.

“Yes, we went that way on an expedition and saw a gorilla. The war came from that same dig site,” he said. “He’s going to kill you all… He’s going to kill us all. It’s all your fault,” he pointed angrily at Lyanna. “You should have listened! You gave him power!”

She stepped back with some soothing words, “So, yes. That’s Ganaban.”

“Don’t mean to question ya, but I don’t think he’s going to be much help to ya right now,” Llililith said. “You could try the dwarves. They don’t ally with anybody.”

“I burned quite a few bridges with them, and I’m not sure I would trust the dwarves,” she responded.

“If you want to hide away, no place better than here. No one looks here,” Ganaban took another swig.

“Am I hearing that you’re going to be staying with us? On purpose? Are you all insane? You have nowhere else to stay?” A nearby woman asked.

“Theophilus sent some caravans to send goods to that old village Nozitatu that was near that dig site, but the village had burned down,” Lyanna told them.

“Why don’t ya stay here, Miss Thorne? And we’ll go investigate this town and dig site,” Llililith said.

“I suppose that’s for the best, but don’t be too long,” Lyanna responded, nervously looking around.

Llililith gave Lyanna some normal dwal, “Don’t pull out of any of the golden ones. And here are some rations.”

They made their way to the Pig & Kettle. The establishment looked exactly as they remembered. Half-respectable.

A grunt/sigh sounded from behind the counter, “Ugh, alright. What’s up with you all? I thought you were fancy folk living in your smell house.”

Llililith ran up and hugged him. He groaned, “I’m going to use my stick if you don’t let go now. The table in the back is open.”

They didn’t spot Hineno as they made their way to the table. Llililith scanned the room for any suspicious invidivudals, and Longstick took notice of her paranoia.

“Are you in trouble?” He asked.

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Steef said.

“I’ve hosted you for three nights, and those were the worst of my entire life…” Longstick grumbled.

He returned a moment later with an unmarked bottle, “Now, what’s this all about? If you’re going to bring trouble to my establishment again, I want to know what it’s all about.”

Llililith shared the story with the gorilla and how Theophilus was the one making the apes. He frowned deeply at Steef’s mentioning Theophilus’ potential involvement in the Blood Wars. Longstick told them that he hadn’t seen Vi in some time and that ornate people in silk clothing like the ones that hung around the shady tea place had been asking after her.

He waved them off and went back to the bar, muttering to himself.

“Did Vi look a bit like Ganaban?” Silva mused.

Raff tapped his chin, “Now that you mention it… She did look like him.”

“That settles it,” Steef said. “I’m going to look for Vi. You all can go to the dig site.” He handed the Stinkporium deed to Raff, “Are you going to miss me, Raff?”

Raff grunted as he snatched the deed from Steef’s hand.

They spent a relatively restful night at the inn. In the morning, Longstick informed them that the city was no longer under lockdown and that he could get them enlisted with a work crew to get out of the city. They found a two-wheel cart for Crockey. People were coming and going between the fields and city, but as they ventured farther from the city, the traffic thinned.

When they were a few hours out from a dig site, they encountered farmers who were herding capybara.

“What do we have here? Don’t get travelers often in these parts,” an older man said. “Nothing in that direction but ruins and death. We’d be happy to provide you a warm meal.”

“We want to look at the ruins and see what’s there,” Llililith said.

“Nothing good comes from over there. I’d not recommend it, and what about the wyverns? You going to deal with them too?” He asked. “They’ve been seen nesting in the old city. Just come with me, I’ll give you a warm meal, nice room, and you can be on your way in the morning.”

“Maybe we’ll stop by on the way back,” Llilililith said.

“Well, you’ve been warned,” he said as he walked away.

The road became more and more dilapidated until they found the small rubble of a ruined wall. The forest had reclaimed much of the land of the village.

Llililith pointed out the remnants of what might have been an inn, and they found a little spot to pitch their tents and set themselves up somewhat comfortably for the night.

As Llililith stood guard for the night, she started to doze off until she noticed a set of torches in the distance that were growing nearer. She heard a certain clink to their steps and heard that they were discussing in a language unfamiliar to her. She ducked into the bushes. As they walked past her, she noticed a set of curved blades on their hips. She silently gasped as she caught a glimpse of their bodies in the torchlight. They shimmered with the translucent properties of porcelain. Almost like dolls. And they were on edge, on the lookout.

Llillilth slunk back into the shadows, and eventually the figures hastily made their way back into the forest. As she turned back towards the camp, she saw a horse-sized lizard in her way.

There was a woosh of air as it let out a small squeaky noise and took to the air, flying into the forest away from her with the sound of snapping branches. A hushed silence fell onto the village.

She carefully made her way back to the encampment and relayed what she saw as she passed on the next shift.

After some time, Silva heard a soft clicking noise. She peaked through the bushes to see a wyvern, slithering its tongue to smell the air. It turned its head around, and she could see the glimmer of moonlight in its eyes. It was similar to the one from town, but it didn’t have the familiar scent of a reptile. It smelled more like damp earth than anything else. Like the gorilla. And it had a protruding face plate from its snout to the back of its neck. She could see dirt and sand flaking off as it moved.

The wyvern stopped sharply. Its tongue slithered back into its mouth as it turned its head to look at the bush where Silva was hiding. It tilted its head, releasing a slow hiss. As it lunged towards the bush, Silva scampered backwards. She could feel the air surge by her as the wyvern’s maul slammed shut a mere inch from her arm. It prowled towards her slowly, toying with its prey. The others scrambled at the sounds, running towards Silva.

Justice clasped down on the wyvern’s wing.  It raked its other claw towards Silva, opening large gashes on Silva’s side. Justice was tossed next to her. Raff pitched a vial, landing it right on the wyvern’s face.

The wyvern recoiled, pawing at and bashing its face against the ground to get the noxious smell out of its snout. Llillilth grabbed balls of metal from her pocket and crafted brass knuckles.

The wyvern was mid-raking its face on the ground when Llillilth pummeled its face plate, creating a handful of cracks.

Silva reached down to the puddle of her blood on the ground and pulled out the handle of a whip. The blood seeped from the ground into the remaining form of a whip. She tried to whip the head of the creature but missed, woozy from blood loss.

Llillilth continued to pummel the creature, deepening the cracks on its face plate. Raff pulled out his flimsy ass pocketknife and rushed towards the creature. He screamed as he bashed the face plate with the butt of the knife.

Silva stumbled as she transformed her whip into a boomerang and hit the creature on the side of its head, disorienting it.

It flailed its claws, slashing at Llillilth who cursed a storm as blood rushed from her chest. Llillilth stomped towards it, landing a right hook on its lower jaw.

The lips of the wyvern curled, revealing nasty fangs, as Rafferty also continued bashing. Silva threw her boomerang at the wyvern again. It growled angrily as it snapped towards Silva and lunged for her, crashing with her into the wall of the dilapidated building. The wall collapsed, crushing both the wyvern and Silva. The wyvern dissolved into dirt and dust.

The others scrambled towards the wall. Llillilth turned her metal knuckles into a small shovel. She pulled out the inert body of Justice and then dug further for Silva, recovering her mangled body.

Raff administered emergency treatment, bringing Silva to consciousness. There was the sound of boots and lanterns glowed closer and closer towards them.

Llillilth hoisted Silva and Justice up onto her shoulders, and they ran. They ran into one of the overgrown fields surrounding the village for cover. Silva looked back and yelled out.
“Hold there!” A raspy voice called out as a crowd surrounded Raff. 
The man who had called out slipped up Raff’s sleeve to look at his arm and made a sound of disgust. “Finish him off.” With a cursory glance, Raff noticed that the men were all identical.

Raff chucked a vial at the three furthest men. It shattered with a pa-ching, the sound of glass on porcelain. He feinted in one direction and dove another, towards a small alley way in the village. He deftly crafted through a small hole in a cart.

He heard the cacophony of the men walking through the city before some time passed and they heard.

One of the men called out, “Wait, one second. I have this thing. The thing Mr. Lucresian gave us!”
“You want to waste that right now?” Another responded.
“Yeah, what if they go and alert someone?” The other man answered.

Raff struggled to see the device, but he heard the clackety sound of some mechanism. Dust lifted around the group of guards, and a shadow lifted into the air. It was the approximate shape of Llillilth with a body and an alligator. It took off towards the field.

A clickety sound drew closer and closer to Llillilth, Silva, and Justice as they hid. Llillilth started running with them again. She changed directions, zigzagging, and retracing her steps, but they could never lose the men. As she slowed down for a breath, a shadowy version of herself burst into the same opening, taking a breath.

The men stalked towards them. Silva deftly created a snare from her belt, but the man shook it off as he shackled her. They grabbed Llillilth’s and Silva’s forearms and looked at their corporra signs with an eerie smile.

They escorted Silva and Llillilth back towards the village.

“Seriously how does that thin work?” One man whispered to the other.
“Apparently they captured some girl and used her to make that,” another responded.

Inside the room of a house with the windows boarded, an imprisoned man lay shackled to the ground as another man opened the door.

“You cost us as pretty penny. We had a need for the girl, and you let her go. So now you’re her replacement. I have to warn you. It’s not pleasant,” the approaching man laughed menacingly.

The imprisoned man was strapped to the table, and a vacuum-like contraption was strapped to his face, sucking out his air. He went in and out of consciousness, and just before he passed out, the device was removed.

An individual in a black coat cackled, “This was just the first one. You have a while to go before we’re done for the day.”

Raff heard a branch snap and pivoted sharply in his hiding spot to see Justice approaching.

Raff smiled, “Never thought I would be so happy to see you. Come along, my sharp toothed friend. Let’s find your mother.”
The crocodile almost seemed to smile as it slowly turned and beelined in a direction.

There was temporary housing along a large hole in the ground. In the center of the hole, poked the top of a tall spire. Llillilth lied to them about why her group was there, explaining that they were just on a camping trip when she was attacked by a wyvern.

Llillilth released a list of outlandish insults, such as calling the man a “teakettle with an attitude”, and as the man went to backhand her, she redirected his hand to hit himself. Some of the enamel on his porcelain face chipped.

“You damn meat ball! Take them into the city!” The man called out.

Raff and Justice watched from nearby cover.

They looked around as they were dragged into the underground city. The walls of the city itself had been painted vibrant colors, and it seemed to be quite lively, filled with the same porcelain type of people. Some seemed to be workers, but others seemed to meander, as if they were lost.

A large bubble of tarp and dark fabric was surrounded by guards. They looked towards the bubble rather than away.

The imprisoned man’s notion of time was completely distorted. He didn’t know how long he was tortured before he heard the sound of a small scuffle and glass breaking.

A soft voice, that of a young woman, called out, “Come on out quickly, are you able to walk?  I don’t know if I can hold them off much longer.”
The man made his way out of the room to find Vi.

“I saw your friends go into the village,” she said, fear in her eyes. “I think they’re in trouble.”

One of the porcelain people repeatedly walked into a wall. Others aggressively scratched their arms and legs, leaving gouges in their porcelain bodies with a shiver-inducing scratching, grating sound that seemed to permeate throughout the city.

As they were being escorted, Silva noticed a set of cages in a section of ruins. Different animals, some sleeping, some pacing. From her distance, she also noticed that while some were the dirt-like creatures, others were beings of flesh and blood. The flesh and blood ones were distinctly more agitated than the others.

More recent structures had been pitched in the ancient city. Mostly rudimentary attempts to repair the city.  Silva pretended to trip, snatching a hand-sized piece of silica rubble.

Silva bumped into the one in the back as the guards all abruptly stopped.

“We do not live here. Yet.” A weird amount of venom in their voice.

Silva and Llillilth made jabs about the captors being “Vellocks”. Their remarks clearly got on the captors’ nerves, but Silva and Llillilth narrowly managed getting punched.

A nearby porcelain person was dragging their leg. Upon closer inspection the nub was grated smooth. Large gouges covered its arms.

“Aren’t you going to help them?” Llillilth asked incredulously.

“Oh, we will,” one of the guards muttered.

After a few minutes, they got brought to a squat building. Its walls appeared to be reinforced, and they were shoved into a small room.

A clockwork mechanism was shoved into their cell’s walls. The captors disappeared. And a second later, steam poured out of the
A somewhat out of breath Steef was holding a crowbar alongside a much thinner Vi. Raff and Justice were just behind.

They explained that every night drums came from the forest as fires came from nearby villages, but none of the porcelain folk seemed particularly bothered. It seemed to be some kind of fighting, but who was fighting what wasn’t clear.

Steef explained that Mr. Lucresian had been holding Vi and that Steef had been caught after he had freed her. Mr. Lucresian had been very upset that Steef had taken the tempora skill from the Saans.

Vi explained that when she was captured they would strap her to a machine every day, torturing her for months at a time. She had no idea what they wanted.

Upon closer inspection and now that Vi was cleaned up, they realized that she didn’t really look like Ganaban at all.

They shared the information they had collected while scouting over the past few weeks. Wagons were coming from the east. Small wyverns and other large lizards would be released outside of the city and into the wild, including the gorilla creatures.  The released creatures looked more “normal”, but they still had a face plate and an air of eeriness. The caravans that were coming from the forest had stopped, but they had managed to stowaway on a caravan from Stormund’s Landing.

A small group of Saans huddled in the corner, freed in the process of the party coming to save Llillilth and Silva. The Saans were in tattered rags and look terrified.

One of the males puffed his chest as Llillilth approached with a ration. “We don’t take food from murders.”

As the conversation continued, Silva bashed the crowbar into the locks on the remaining cells. She tried to use corporra to stop the mechanism unsuccessfully, getting a splitting headache. Silva stepped back and let Llillilth take a swing at it after having sculpted her iron balls into a sword.

As Silva and Llillilth continued smashing open cells, Raff noticed that an eerie silence had fallen on the city. The ever-present sound of grating had halted.

As Llillilth finagled with one of the devices, her hand fell into some soft grooves, and she figured out how to turn it. Pressure released from the active device, and the people reanimated.

“WHAT THE HELL IS THAT-“ A group of guards ran into the building.

Llillilth leaped forward and activated the device on the chest of the front guard. Most of them appeared to be locked in time and space. One guard was drawing a sword, and a table sound filled the air as he pulled away a stub.

Steef through a rock at the frozen guards. It promptly bounced off the time barrier.

Llillilth excitedly unlocked the remaining cells, slipping the tiime cubes into her bag.

Those without corporra suddenly stumbled. As if a heartbeat was pulling them towards the city. Then, those without tempora felt a piercing headache.

“He’s doing it again… He’s going to kill everyone…” One of the Saans said, horror filling their face.

There was a grating sound in their ears. They felt the breath pulled from their lungs, and pain washed their joints. Silva noticed that her bandages were struggling to stay keep in the blood. A drop of blood seeped out and splattered against the nearby wall.

Llillilth deactivated the guards’ tiime cube while activating a second at an angle. There was a grating sound as the time barrier cut their bodies in half. As she undid the tiime cube again, releasing the barrier, six pairs of legs collapsed in the doorway.

They noticed that the powder from the guards being grated to dust was being pulsed towards the center of the city. As they ran outside, they could hear wind roaring and see gusts of air rushing into the city. Blood rained down from the different edges of the bowl. The air stopped and started, as if with a heartbeat.

The group instructed the other prisoners to try to escape. Vi and a few of the Saans remained behind with them to try to stop the process.

As they ran towards the city center, they felt their breath being pulled more and more from the lungs, reminding Steef of his torture. Where the rubble base of a tower had stood weeks ago, there was now a stage. A large mechanical contraption, a set of concentric rings, stood beside a handful of individuals. Most had baggy cloaks, but even at a distance, they recognized the pompous air of Theophilus Lucresian.

Rows upon rows of porcelain people stood motionless in concentric circles facing the device.

“I promised you, and here my word comes true!” Lucresian called out. While they would have expected the crowd to cheer him, the porcelain people stayed eerily silent.

The guards around the dome were the only ones not involved in Lucresian’s ritual. Dozens of guards pointed spears inwards.

“Bodies of flesh and blood. A world of our own. Free from the Dominion. As I had promised!” Lucresian continued. Beside him one of the cloak individuals live-translated the speech.

Silva went to scout the fallen ruins that led towards the center of the circles while Llillilth quickly educated Raff and Steef about how to use the tiime cubes. Silva noticed a group of wyverns flying miles above, unaffected. As they ran towards the tower, they noticed a small shape moving, and a pack of Komodo dragon sized lizards running across the ruins turned sharply towards them at the sound of Llillilth and Silva’s foot falls. Silva threw dirt, which caught a wind gust, causing the pack to scatter.

Raff threw his vial bomb, landing it solidly on the side of the dome. The wind made the flames worse, catching some of the nearby guards. Other guards looked around panickly and noticed Steef.

Steef, Vi, Raff, and the Saans charged the guards.

Llillilth impaled one of the lizards after they refused to move or be intimidated, and Silva snared one of the others.

Theophilus stared in anger at the large bonfire, holding a large staff of brass. In the blade of wind before them, Llillilth noticed a gentle meadow and then a beautiful sunset. Almost like glimpses of other realities.

One of the figures scooping from the pond of goop startles, catching a glimpse of Silva’s red mane of hair.

Raff caught a glimpse inside the dome. Four individuals stood motionless with shocked expressions. Raff ran around the dome. He flipped the side of the tarp, yanking up the stakes holding the tarp down. The tarp caught a large wind and fell, still flaming on a group of the guards.

Steef went to use the time cube again on another guard in front of him. However, as he turned it with the combination, the device let out a sad puff, and the guard remained unfazed. Steef panickly breathed tempora into the device and tried again, this time cutting the guard cleanly in half.

“STOP THEM!” Lucresian called out as the acolyte pointed towards Silva and the set of events with the dome bonfire clicked into understanding. The command rippling through the motionless crowd as he jumped up, landing in from of Silva and Llillilth.

Llillilth yelled out as she charged at Lucresian with her iron halberd. At the last moment she turned slightly to pull out her time cube and lock it in place on Theophilus.

Steef rotated the device on the time-frozen group. The group in the time bubble began to move again.

Vi turned to look in confusion at the group unfreezing from time and got punched by the porcelain guard she was fighting.

As Elbin came to his senses, he saw waves of porcelain people running towards them.  With every heartbeat, tears in reality caused a glitching effect. Above all of it was the grating sound of metal on metal echoing through the city from the contraption in the city square. He nodded to Steef and readied himself to meet the army of Waynes.

“You’ve got something right there. On your nose. Quite a lot of chalk,” Raff said. “Do you have a crossbow? Ah, fuck it.” He reached for his most explosive vials and lobbed it towards the middle of the army. It erupted into a ball of fire as the sound of superheated porcelain shattered.

The moment the time bubble went away Vela felt the air tear out from her lungs. Her breath was forced to pulse with the rhythm of the city. She felt like she could perceive the now between now. Like each moment collapsed into infinity before itself. She focused on it, on the stretch to infinity, and took a deep breath in as time stopped.

The entirety of the town square ground to a halt. Vela panicked and tapped into Unsu for help explaining the situation. She felt from him pure awe and pure terror towards Vela. He also confirmed that touching other beings wouldn’t pull them into her time and could be detrimental to the beings being. She walked forward, tapping a dozen porcelain people around her. Until she realized that she couldn’t breathe…

As she gasped, time resumed. The porcelain people around her exploded. In a split second, there was the equivalent of an explosion.

The machine in the center of the city stuttered as it started to twist and contort itself. A massive form crashed in front of them. The wyvern crushed the time cube box in the process. Its form collapsed and convulsed on itself into the form of Theophilus Lucresian. Golden blood flowed out from it and formed a brass staff.

Theophilus turned towards Llillilth with disgust distorting his features. “You dirty, slimy-,” he stopped as he heard the sound of the machine and shot his head towards the section of the other group. “NOOOO!” He plowed through his own troops to close the gap between him and Vela. As he went to smack her, she inhaled sharply, and his staff slowed to a halt. He growled and threw the staff away towards Elbin.

Silva ran towards the device and tossed her boomerang at the orrery. It stopped as it almost reached the device and flew back to her hand. She rushed closer and reached out with her hand. A burst threw her backwards, and she coughed out blood as she slammed against the ground.

A wyvern landed on Shivaun instantly pouncing on and crippling her. Billy whipped out her bow and shot an arrow into the eye socket of the wyvern. It released an earsplitting call for help.

While earlier the device was releasing garnet colored liquid, it now released mud. It glitched between being perfectly pristine and heavily damaged. Elbin ran into the wyvern as he staggered from instantaneously closing the distance between them. Elbin threw a punch towards one of the wyverns’ heads, but it suddenly glitched to where it was a few seconds before.

As Steef had the breath pulled in and out of his lung, he breathed out, trying to push back time and undo the damage to Shivaun…

Lucresian jumped down from the platform towards Silva and Llillilth. The device made a horrible clunking sound, and everything started to glitch. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?! NO NO! STOP THEM!” Lucresian yelled out.

Llillilth charged once more for Theophilus. She quickly activated both of her time cube devices, shielding above her while time locking him.

Noticing that Steef was injured, Shivaun rush towards him and began to treat his wounds.
“Well, hello,” Steef said with surprise.

Silva splashed the orrery with some of the liquid it had expelled. It was not effective.

Billy shot arrows through the chests of several approaching Theocrates. Raff lobbed his bomb. He didn’t hit any, but he made an area of safety before them.

Vela took a deep breath in sync with the machine, and time around her stopped. After touching only a handful of porcelain guards, she struggled to breath.

By the stage, the machine looked like a crumbled ball, jotted back and forth chaotically as it flung out black gunk.

As a wyvern dove to save Mr. Lucresian, it shredded itself to dust in the time field above the Llillilth.

The Theocrates that were running towards the group at the dome began to move somewhat sluggishly as red clay like liquid seeped from the seams in their porcelain. As they ran towards Billy, some of them would disappear, or even more horrifying, sometimes parts of them would disappear. They piled onto her, and she suddenly felt a cold wind hitting her backside. As she tried to turn around, she saw a fissure open behind. They shoved her into it. As she fell backwards through the rift, she grabbed one of the nearby Theocrates with her. His legs were cut as the rift blinked closed behind her.

The last thing Billy heard before the rift completely closed was Vi, the young woman with the group who had saved her, yelling “MOM!”.

Steef clubbed the nearby Theocrates, and they shattered with ease. Like vases of mud. Elbin narrowly avoided a fissure as he shoved aside Theocrates who fell into one another and shattered. A nearby wyvern leaked liquid over its muscly physique, as if it was struggling to keep itself together. Elbin removed its mask in one fell swoop with the sickening sound of removing your boot from a puddle of mud. He found himself stuck him deep in the muk as the Theocrates swam through it to get towards him.

Silva crouched down and touched the floor covered in liquid and focused on corporra. Every single artificial construct stopped moving, including the machine which began to vibrate. At the start of the day it was almost gold and pristine, but this point it was almost black and burning red hot. She felt blood sweat dripping from her forehead as she felt every single one of the constructs resisting her. Wyverns plummeted from the sky.  After a moment. Then two moments. The machine dropped and cracked open.

All the artificial constructs collapsed into clay and dirt.

Large mud droplets rained down from the sky. From the edge of the roof of the city around them, trees dangled, but the skies were clear.

Llillilth willed the silicone ground into a rudimentary structure around Theo-Wayne’s bubble.

Shivaun and Vela felt a sudden emptiness from the disappearance of Unsu and Purusha.

They debated just burying Theophilus in his time bubble.

“No, this is exactly how we found him,” Elbin stated.

“You found him?” Llillilth asked.

“Yeah, we are the ones who freed him-” Elbin responded.

“Elbin, always so loose lipped!” Vela called out.

They decided to layer the time lock to protect the lock with another lock. One somewhat below ground, one above perilously. Then they encased the radius in cement.

As they chatted, they realized that the those in the time bubble had been locked away for about a decade. However, it clicked that Vi was 16-18 years old.

“Vi, what happened to your mom? When did you last see her before just now?” Shivaun asked.
“Maybe ten years ago? She said she had somewhere to be and just left,” Vi responded.

In the distance, a familiar shape sat on a horse. It was womanly figure wearing layers and layers of colorful cloaks, obscuring her face. They recognized her as the crone that had welcomed each of them at the port. She removed her hood, revealing Billy.

As they walked into the sunset on their way to Stormund’s landing…. Meanwhile in the forest, a hand started forming from a small puddle of mud and developed into a clay body, looking at itself in confusion.