“I’m going downstairs to wait for… Anniya. I need my makeup redone,” Agatha said, leaving Emerald, Voltara and I in the pilot’s room.

I turned to Emerald. The youngest princess looked like she was trying very hard to conceal the rapidly rising tide of emotions. She saw that I was staring at her and turned towards me. The armacus on her arm unlocked and she offered the gemstone-encrusted, shiny bracelet to me.

“T-take it. Do whatever you want with it,” Emerald hissed out.

I took the armacus from her, shoving it into a side bag.

“I knew that Mother never loved me,” she said, looking despondent. “I knew that I was just a backup for Aggie… but… I’m really just an extra body for her. We exist… as long as Mother permits it.”

“I told you and your sister this already,” I said. “Agatha confirmed my words.”

“I didn’t really accept it, not until Mother said it herself,” Emerald sighed. "Plus, you are a bit of a liar."

"Um?" I froze.

Emerald waved a hand at Saccy carried by Voltara. “You said that there are projects in your bag that are incredibly dangerous and yet we spent the night in it just fine. Well, I did… I don’t think Aggie slept at all.”

“Sorry. I exaggerated things a little,” I rubbed the back of my neck. “I do have lots of dangerous things though. Saccy herself is too dangerous to leave alone - she's a Folding Seed.”

“Yeah… dangerous, like your magic-cutting knife,” Emerald looked at Endy. Little streaks of tears started to run down her face.

“You know what the worst thing is? I don’t even know who my father was,” she sniffed. "I don't even have an f-fing middle name. I'm just Emerald Amadea."

I stepped closer to the crying girl and wrapped her in my embrace.

“You have your sister, Emmy,” I whispered. “And you have me as your friend.”

“F-for how long?” She exhaled, burying her face into my shoulder.

“For as long as you want to be my friend,” I said. “I’ll teach you how to fully step out of your body into the Astral and then I’ll carve every single of your mother’s soul branches out of you with my knife.”

“You will?” Emerald raised her tear streaked eyes to me. “You said that you’re leaving us, going to the dungeon...”

“Grogtilda’s body was extremely damaged by the months she spent inside a Folding Seed,” I explained. “When I dove into her, it affected my mental state via the body-soul connection.”

“Are you going to be able to do the Nemendias interview?” She inquired. “We have to do it soon if we don’t want to miss the start of the semester. I don’t want to go to Nemendias without you. I don't want to spend another year at Palais De La Solstice."

“I’ll be fine,” I nodded. “I’ll pull through. I think I know how to fix the problem. I just need to… figure out how to make Folding Seed sap without the negative effects. Maybe dilute it or something. I’m not going to leave you, Emmy. I will cut out your chains, I swear.”

“Just like you cut out her Vow?” Emerald glanced at Voltara.

“Yes,” I nodded. “Just like that.”

. . .

After a hearty breakfast my little group stood inside of Antoine’s shop. Galissi Seven was hanging above the building we were in, so that Agatha could power the truth-spell in her armacus with a direct beam.

When we entered into the shop, Emerald and Voltara stared at the shelves field with whimsical, crystal-powered doohickeys while Agatha walked straight to face the artificer.

“Hey Antoine,” I waved at the cheerful artificer manning the wooden counter.

“Greetings my lady,” Antoine bowed to me. “I see you brought friends."

"I am delighted to see you in my shop, princesses Emerald and Agatha of the Barony of Amadea.” He issued another, even deeper bow to my highborn companions.

“If we are to hire you, I wish to interview you first,” Agatha declared.

“I am at your disposal, my lady,” the artificer said.

“Remove your goggles,” the eldest princess demanded.

Antoine pulled the zany, insanely elaborate goggle set off his head. I finally saw his eyes. They were dark green. I momentarily glanced at him in the Astral and noticed that a large flower-like fractal was glittering on his chest. The flower fluttered, breathed beneath his suit with pulsating silver-blue flickers.

“Is that Dawn?” I asked.

“Indeed,” the artificer pulled his lapel away, revealing another copy of Dawn on his shirt. I saw that this version of Dawn looked like her starry-self. Ah, she was powered by a set of my ruby gemstones. The gems were surrounded by a metal frame and arranged into a flower-like decoration on his lapel.

“Whom do you serve, artificer?” Agatha raised her armacus at Antoine.

“Mainly Inspector Lambert and currently, my lady Juni,” Antoine replied with a flourish. “Plus, I make artefacts for anyone who comes into my shop. If you doubt my credentials I do have several licences and diplomas on the wall…”

“Why do you serve Juni?” Agatha asked.

“I employ him with shinies,” I said, sliding another small bag of my trimmed hair towards the Artificer. “Here's the payment for making two new armaci for the Amadea princesses.”

“I work for Juni because she pays me with the most incredible and unique crystalline-organic gems,” Antoine nodded, pocketing the bag. “They can power and align with artefact tools far better than anything. Their structure is most similar to Dragon-scales, but far, far more efficient on the Dunkoff-radia scale.”

I smiled and wondered if Lambert or Dawn told Antoine what to say.

“Would you betray us or sell our secrets to another party if given the opportunity, threatened, given other gems, or paid more?” Agatha pressed on with the questions.

“Never,” Antoine shook his messy black hair. “My reputation as an artificer is worth more to me than a mountain of gold. Inspector Lambert is my best friend - he would crack me open like a walnut if I even thought about betraying him. Besides, I like living in Lomb and I believe Juni will make me wealthy beyond my wildest dreams with her Dawn project.”

“I see,” Agatha relaxed a little.

“Also, I would like to officially apply to join the Foundation of Dawn,” Antoine smiled at me, looking a bit shy. “Dawn already gave me the brief about what you want to do.”

“Granted,” I nodded with a big smile. "Welcome to the Foundation."

“Thank you my lady,” Antoine bowed again. “I shan’t disappoint you.”

Agatha’s interview went for about twenty more minutes. I guessed that she was feeling particularly irate at me for violating the laws of magic and was taking her irritation out on the artificer. Antoine didn’t seem to mind. He answered her endless questions with stoic determination.

The artificer explained to Agatha that he wanted to work for the future Empress, to help us design Dawn-net and to push the envelope of crystal-tech forward. His goal was to have his name enshrined in history books as one of the founders of the magitek revolution. He spoke about many things that he wanted to do, of great skyships that would be able to dive into the Dungeon or fly directly to Novazem, of new armaci designs and tools based on my gemstones and how Dawn had opened his eyes to the possibilities of a fantastic future.

It took a while to convince Agatha that he was trustworthy, but in the end, she permitted me to give Antoine the two glass containers with the shredded hair.

“Fantasmagoric Madeline,” the artificer whispered, having put his goggle-kit back on. “These are indeed… very similar to the crystals you provide me. Yes. I can definitely make excellent foci out of this powder.”

He went over the extra materials with each of the princesses and promised that he would take five days to make both of them new, superior armaci.

When Antoine finished discussing armaci designs with the Amadea sisters, I showed him Emerald’s crystal dress. The artificer confirmed that it would take him some time to figure out how the dress changed its shape, but in a few weeks he could definitely help me design similar self-cleaning, pattern-shifting Dawn-dresses. I asked him to check if the dress had any trackers on it and he confirmed that it was clean.

We left the shop in a few hours, feeling somewhat mentally drained but very satisfied. Things were moving forward, taking off.

. . .

The next several days flew by very quickly.

Agatha refused to sleep in Saccy again, saying that she was feeling extremely unsafe inside of the Folding Seed. To solve this issue, Lambert had arranged a rental of a small cottage for us in Trent.

The village of Trent was a little, sleepy hamlet located atop a rocky outcropping covered in waterfalls. It was located in a picturesque, green valley, a single level below Lomb. It was part of the Lomb Township and had a small, re-broadcasting obelisk, which allowed the station’s defenses to cover us while we were staying there.

I paid a local farmer a single beast core in exchange for renting a cute, four-bed, stone house with a mossy roof.

The time spent living in Trent had given my life a semblance of wholesome stability.

I spent the nights inside Saccy in Juni's body building a filtration system.

I had no idea how to carve specific things out of the sap with Endy, but I did know basic chemistry. Thus, I had diluted a few drops of Saccy's sap with water, boiled and filtered it several times, froze it and collected tiny drops through evaporation stilling. The last step of filtering was done with my modified carbon filter, which I had pulled out of my mask - it was supposed to filter out hostile magic.

When I wasn't working on the a distiller, I sat under the light of the hanging crystal lanterns studying various books about Alchemy, general magic, Illatius history and Nemendias. Agatha had purchased a whole stack of them for me in Lomb bookshops. When sunrise came, I called Alessi and exchanged hand-written messages with her about my progress.

After chatting with my sister, I switched to Grogtilda's body and drank the tiniest bit of diluted and filtered Folding sap to stay calm. Then, I woke Voltara, Agatha and Emerald and took them out on a run uphill towards Lomb, setting them on a steady training regimen.

As we ascended up the mossy path, Emerald whined that running was extremely tiresome.

“Why can’t I just invest in Dexterity and Strength or something and be done with it?” She groaned, leaning on a mossy bounder, completely out of breath.

“Because you should specialize your System in something of great value rather than waste points on generic things like improving your overall physique which you can do with a simple daily exercise,” I explained. “If you want to get ahead in life, you need to be extremely outstanding at something very specific.”

Emerald groaned something incoherent as a response. Agatha didn't complain anywhere as much as her sister - she was older and she had a lot more stamina.

After the morning run, we ate breakfast in Lomb. As we sat at the creperie, we discussed the Nemendias application process with Agatha, developing a strategy for me to get in.

“There will be eight people from Nemendias at your interview. They are called the Dragons,” Agatha explained. "Two are core Administrators and six are randomly chosen Instructors. It's the end of summer break, so teachers don't have classes.”

“Do you know any of them?” I asked.

“Well,” Agatha stretched, putting her empty plate aside. “The two Administrators are the Dean and the Keeper. I know them well. They will vote for you no matter what you do.”

“Why?” I inquired.

“The Dean is an asset of Baroness Georgia, a chimera cendai,” Agatha replied. “When I delivered your letters of recommendation to her, I let her know that you're the Eighth Apostle of Saint Eunisii. The second Admin, the Keeper of Keys of Nemendias, is one of our servants.”

“Gotcha,” I said. “Hang on. Will it be a problem to free a Vow bound maid in front of someone who works for your mother’s Estate?”

“She has no Vow and won’t remember the interview,” Agatha explained. “Nemendias would not employ someone that’s visibly Vow bound to serve another party. Mother has a lot of ‘dedicated pets’ not controlled by Vows.”

"Right," I nodded.

"You will have to impress only three of the six teachers to get in. The majority vote decides if a candidate gets into Nemendias or not."

"Um," Emerald butted in. "What if they ask me to do something impressive?"

"You are half-chimera," I pointed out.

"So?" She inquired.

"You can see magic," I said. "Humans can't see magical currents without artifacts."

“That’s right. Seeing magic imprints in the Astral Ocean is a very special, rare skill,” Agatha nodded. “Here’s how the interview will go - you propose a skill or a complex task that you can do and then one of the Instructors will test you. For example - you can claim that your exceptional skill is that you can see magic. If an Alchemy Instructor is chosen they will show you various potion ingredients and test if you can tell how potent they are in terms of magic. A History Instructor might ask what other known figures have such a rare skill and the answer is - The Seven Heroes. A Depictomancy Instructor might ask you to show where the hexagrammatic lines are thickest in a moving painting, etc.”

“Gotcha,” Emerald nodded. “I can definitely ace this then.”

“They’ll take it easy on you, Ems,” Agatha nodded. “Don’t worry. Most of the Instructors are dedicated Royalists. They might not act like they want to kiss your feet during the interview, but it’s their job to get an Amadea into Nemendias.”

Emerald looked content at this.

“You on the other hand,” Agatha looked at me. “You’re going to have a terrible time. They’ll try to tear you down, to demolish you in every possible way. Are you ready to go into the Dragons' den?”

“I am,” I said. “I'm not afraid of getting burned. I’ve read plenty of theses about esoteric magic in Eunice’s library. Let's do some trial runs. Pretend to be an Instructor while I propose a topic. Feel free to act as mean as possible to me and ask me difficult questions.”

. . .

In five days time from my call with Baroness Amadea, I climbed out of Galissi onto a landing rooftop.

“Welcome to Nemendias,” Agatha half-turned to me.

Her black cloak fluttered in the wind, crest pin glinting in the morning light. A new armacus sat on her arm courtesy of Antoine. The eldest princess had tested it already and found it ‘an improvement on the old one’.

I joined her on the rooftop. My limbs felt numb, fingers tingling. I took another swing from a small, metal flask filled with extremely diluted Folding Seed sap. It was the first large, tolerable batch of the stuff.

The drink I had made was most likely similar to ‘shine’ that the Undertown denizens were hooked on, perhaps a bit clearer and more safe due to my magical filters. The concoction I had crafted was still addictive, but at the very least it no longer put me to sleep, no longer provided an overwhelming feeling of bliss. My filtering process had indeed cleared some hostile magic, but not all of it. I had tested my concoction on Grogtilda’s body in the smallest amounts, until I had an acceptable solution that kept me from going completely insane from Topaz cravings.

The drink had made me a bit too relaxed, so I had also consumed copious amounts of caffeine to stay focused before my interview. I pulled out a book, sat on a stone bench and went over my notes as Agatha and Emerald went downstairs.

“Ah, Illatius. It’s been a while,” Lambert stared at the view that somewhat resembled the city of Vienna.

We were located atop one of the tall towers of Nemendias, gothic parapets and gargoyles looking out onto the city along with us. Rays of light broke through gloomy cumulonimbus clouds.

“Is Lomb going to be alright without you?” I asked him.

“Lomb will be fine. Anniya is ready to take over as its Inspector,” Lambert nodded. “My place is here with you. You’re far too valuable to leave without supervision.”

I smirked at him. Lambert had applied to be one of the security officers working at Nemendias. He was accepted without issues as he had a spotless record. The job was a downgrade for him, but he didn't care.

In about thirty minutes Emerald emerged out of the rooftop stairwell and waved at us.

“How’d it go?” I asked her.

“Great,” she exhaled. “I’m... in. They made me identify some magical herbs and fungi and then made me trace a magical hexagram inside of a book. I was scared for nothing.”

“Well done,” I hugged my friend.

“Good luck,” she whispered as our embrace broke apart.

I nodded at her and put on my nightcrawler helmet. Agatha led me downstairs with Arouetta marching beside us. The maid had no idea what was to come. Lambert and Antoine followed us into the dark stone maw of the magical collegiate, our footsteps echoing down on the marble steps.

Nemendias was beautiful and imposing from within. Tall, black gothic arches inlaid with gold flower patterns and statues of famous teachers greeted us in the hallways. The whole place was filled with magic to the brim - hexagrams flashing in my vision from all sides.

We didn’t have to go that far as this was the "Interviewee’s tower" - the only place in Nemendias that was open to outsiders.

Agatha gripped my shoulder as black-steel doors parted, leading me into a dim, octagonal room. Lambert and Antoine waved to me as they sat down on fancy, velvet-covered gothic bench in the hall. Arouetta sat in between them as ordered by her Mistress.

Agatha led me into the tall, dim room and positioned me in its center. The heavy, metal doors closed behind us.

A truly monstrous hexagram flashed beneath me with a deep gong sound. Something hummed overhead. I looked up. A gargantuan crystal lantern hung there woven from a thousand hexagons. Lines of power converged into the magitek construct leading from all around. All of them suddenly pointed at me like shimmering arrows ready to strike me down.

I gulped.