It took the rest of the day to get to the city.

The terrain changed from relatively dry grassland and light woods to a river delta and eventually, a marshland. The road had turned from hard-packed dirt to cobblestones halfway to the city, and she saw several branching cobblestone roads that led to the north and south. At one point, they entered the woods and the resulting shade was annoying.

While her body absorbed the Radiant energy, she meditated to channel it to her physical body. Damien’s instructions had been to flood her internal organs, beginning with her heart, with a mixture of Radiant and her own Animus. A pinch of distilled Chaos was necessary, too. She had no shortage of the condensed green energy as every time she flared her Anima, it took in the ambient Chaos without her conscious control, distilling the useful parts and ejecting the rest as she exhaled.

It felt strange when she looked at it now. Before she advanced to Journeyman, she had to painstakingly meditate to achieve a fraction of distilled Chaos. Still, her body and Anima quickly consumed it, nearly to the point where production barely kept up. The distilled Chaos went to her body, her muscles and skin, especially when she got wounded or if she exerted herself. It felt as if it were a replacement for actual food. She still felt hunger, of course, but she no longer felt the ravenous need that often beset her when she was back home.

Unfortunately, the thinness of the ambient Chaos now meant that she could barely produce enough distilled Chaos to satisfy her needs. She would either have to eat a greater magnitude of food or spend more time with her Anima flared.

Strange things happened when she did that though, especially if it was in a contracted or condensed form. Whenever people looked at her, she felt her Anima react and a little bit of Animus formed a strange pattern over her heart, spinning for a few moments before returning to her core. She didn’t notice it immediately but in the heat of combat a few days earlier, when she faced the Stone Auroch and her reserves had been running low, she noticed it.

Well, whatever the case, it returned the Animus to her reserves right after and she saw no harm done.

Part of the Radiant energy got mixed with both Animus and distilled Chaos and when she pressed it against her heart, it completely absorbed the concoction. She felt no different than before, though she thought the corresponding area of her Anima that matched with her physical heart grew a bit…shinier?

‘Why am I doing this again?’ Yuriko directed the thought at Damien.

It’s the next step after Body Forging.

‘And what exactly does it do?’

It's not relevant right now.

‘But it will be in the future. Please tell me.’

Alright. She could sense a smug tone in his mental voice. The current exercise is to adapt your body to Radiant Energy, or rather, to ready yourself for Radiant Essence.

‘Huh, what’s the difference?’

What’s the difference between the light a campfire gives you and the actual flames. Or the fuel? Essence is magnitudes stronger than energy, and far more rare. What we’re doing is readying your body.

‘To gather Radiant Essence?’

Not at all. To produce it.

‘Huh. What’s the use of it though?’

Try channelling a bit of Radiant energy when you create an Animus blade. I assure you, you’ll feel the difference. Oh, don’t do it here. You don’t want to show your hand to these…people. Now his tone was completely derisive.

‘Damien…’

What?

‘Why are you acting like that?’

Like what?

Yuriko rolled her eyes. Was he being deliberately dense, or something?

‘What’s with the attitude with the Lucentians?’

Attitude? Hmm… Maybe because they’re weak and happy with their mediocrity? Fighting for scraps instead of following the proper path?

‘Perhaps they don’t know any better.’

Neither do you, child. Damien sighed, Leave me to my biases. I’m nothing more than a stray thought in your mind and I’ve just woken up from a forced slumber. Mark my words though, nobody does anything without an ulterior motive.

‘So why are you helping me?’

I’m not. Or rather, I’m not just helping you. I’m helping me, too.

With that, the infuriatingly perverted old man didn’t speak another word. Oh, maybe that was it. Maybe Damien didn’t enjoy looking at the People.

That cat-human girl had nice breasts and baby-making hips.

Yuriko rolled her eyes. Hard.

Hie hie hie.

When they got out of the woods, the scent of stagnant water dominated everything else. There were clouds of insects buzzing about though none of them came close to the carriages. At some point, the road turned southwards and gave Yuriko a view of Lucenti City.

It was constructed over a marshland, with the river delta spilling out into the sea several leagues away. Large stone pilings and humongous trees served as the city’s support pillars, and she could see hundreds of walkways stretching out over the branches. The city wasn’t completely arboreal. A sizable number of stone buildings was where the current road was taking them.

As the sun set, bioluminescent moss lit up along the tree trunks, followed by innumerable fireflies drifting in the breeze. Flowers bloomed everywhere, despite the cold nip in the air. It actually overpowered the marshy smell.

The stone buildings that she assumed to be the foreign quarter, were surrounded by a low stone wall that was barely higher than Yuriko’s waist. There were perhaps a dozen buildings, each about two to three storeys high, with peaked, slate roofs. The road led to a roundabout with a monument in the middle: the statue of a large and beefy snakekin. The muscles depicted were heroic in proportion, quite unlike the typical slender and lean musculature of the people around her. Two other roads, leading north and south, were connected to the roundabout.

The carriages pulled to a stop in front of the largest building near the monument. The footman, a strange-looking Lucentian with the head of a river lizard, er, crocodile, came up to the door and opened it for her and the others. Rhox preceded the both of them, nodding companionably to the croc man, who Yuriko assumed to be part of the third reptilian race, the Buwak clan.

Unlike the L’tik, lizardkin, the croc man was distinctly more bestial in shape and posture. He was stooped over and had large and heavy limbs, though he didn’t look to be in pain. His head was completely like a crocodile’s with a long tapered snout. He had a higher forehead than the beast thought, and she wasn’t entirely sure if this one was a man. He wore a leather curias with thick leather faulds and tassets. His thigh was bare, but he had stiff leather greaves covering his shins. He was barefoot, too.

“Welcome to the City of Lights,” he greeted when Yuriko alighted. “Elder Yuriko, may your stay be warm and fruitful.”

“Thank you,” she said faintly. Rhox had whispered in the croc man’s ear so she wasn’t that surprised that he knew her name.

“Fort Commander Otlaca. Welcome back.”

The old snakekin nodded and gestured towards the building.

“We’ll need to register your entrance here, Elder Yuriko, then we can secure quarters for you at the Palace of Light.”

“Eh, no need for that,” Yuriko protested.

“Nonsense, we would be remiss if we do not extend our greatest hospitality. We surely cannot allow you to rest at a traveller’s inn when the Palace has room to spare.”

“Oh. I suppose that’s fine then.”

They were let into the building. It was a three storey affair with a couple of wings. The grand chamber was fairly spacious and decorated lavishly with sculptures of snake, lizard, and croc men in varied warrior poses. A fair bit was made of a white stone--marble, she thought--but there were just as many that appeared to be of varnished wood.

The Lucentians went through the chamber which passed through directly to the back of the building, and from what she could see, into the rise where a couple of wooden bridges were attached to. She, on the other hand, was directed to a queue. It wasn’t that long, however, just a couple of people dressed in the Griefordian colours of black and grey. They were human as well and when she joined the end of the line, both turned to look at her.

Yuriko nodded at both, a man and a woman who looked to be in their twenties. They goggled at her until the snakekin behind the desk called their attention. They answered a few questions, such as the purpose of the visit, length of the visit, and who the guarantor was.

When it came to her turn, the snakekin, er…woman?...stared at her for a full minute before she wordlessly handed her a paper form.

“Um, I can’t read your language,” Yuriko said apologetically, “or understand it either.”

The snakekin took the form back and gave her another written in Wojan.

Yuriko filled it up, though she omitted a few details such as her Geist rank and permanent address. She did note that she was a citizen of the Eternal Empire of the Righteous Order and that her goal for visiting Lucenti City was to find a way back to her home plane. As for her guarantor, she wrote down both Otlaca and Rhox.

The woman asked the same questions that she answered on the form, though she raised her scaly eyebrows at the nationality and the lack of an answer to the rank question. But since her guarantor was Otlaca, the woman let her through. She was given a small card with her details, admonished her not to lose it, and was let through.

She followed the path and arrived at the back, where the rise connected to the footbridges. Rhox and Otlaca were waiting, sitting on a bench.

“That didn’t take long,” Rhox noted.

“Hah, we’ve got a firm control of our bureaucracy, don’t we?” Otlaca laughed.

Yuriko supposed they did. If this were back home and the other two were visiting, it wouldn’t have ended so easily.

“Well, off to the Palace.”

______

“Do you hear something?” Anda asked suddenly, while he froze.

The road was empty and the sun had nearly set. The three of them had opted not to rest and just continued walking. Vizugmon City was nearly a hundred leagues away and it would take them the greater part of the week to get there.

Granted, the long trip meant that there was absolutely no need to rush or push on ‘til exhaustion but he’d had an ominous feeling ever since he left the Labyrinth entrance. He quite understood that he was sitting on critical intelligence. The Council of Vizugmon would give an arm and a leg to find any divergent tunnels and collapse them.

“No, I didn't,” Dai grumbled.

The bigger Iona clanner was visibly exhausted, mentally and physically. Unlike Anda, who had given bits and bobs of information under interrogation, Dai had stayed completely silent. Hence, his interrogation was much more thorough.

He glanced at Masa, his neighbour and good friend. The half-Kutin had always been remarkably lucky. The fact that she managed to befriend a wandering Elder had been their salvation. Of course, it also meant that Lucenti now had another Elder in their forces but he somewhat believed that the strange human wouldn’t side with the snakes so easily. In fact, he believed that she actually wouldn’t help them out of sheer principle. After all, Lucenti was the aggressor here.

And the Reviled. Just that fact that the snakes had teamed up with those outcasts and extremists meant that they would always be on the wrong side.

“I don’t--” was all Masa managed to say before the crossbow bolts started to fall.

“Run!” Dai yelled.

His tower shield had been turned to dust and the only thing he could use to protect them was his large body. He shoved Anda and Masa to the bushes. As a result, the bolts slammed into his leather armour.

“Go!’ he roared as an image of his Geist, a Cave Lion, materialized around him.

The bolts popped out of his armour when his muscles started to swell. The image melded back into his body and Anda knew that Dai would not return. Whether he survived this or not, he wouldn’t come back.

Masa was frozen in fear. Anda grabbed her arm and pulled her along. He rushed into the woods, away from the falling bolts and into the thick undergrowth. They were near a ridge; perhaps they might find shelter.

Masa pulled her arm away from his.

“What?”

“Just go. We’ll have a better chance by acting separately,” she choked out.

“I…”

“Go!” Masa ran from him, angling a different way.

From the number of bolts fired, there were at least fifty of them.

Who were they? Anda had his guesses, but then again, he was pretty sure it was the Lucentians or the Reviled. It looked like they didn’t really want Vizugmon to know about the entrance.

“Heh,” he laughed.

It was the only thing he could do instead of cry. He summoned his Geist, and filled his body with power. He would live.