I’m more than a little surprised when I hear the voice of one of the gossipers from the other morning call out, “Schism!”

A young man, seemingly the human form of a green dragon rushes towards us, and bends over to grab his knees while panting after catching up to us when he knows he’s got our attention. I raise an eyebrow, and glance at my traveling partners, but Lu, Te, Lucky, Veril, and Farzee have no idea what’s going on. I wait patiently for the poor fellow to catch his breath, answering with a simple, “Yes?”

Rattling his head momentarily, loosing a rather funny sound, Cal, apparently, tries to regain his composure and relate, “You said, um, like to come with you, and stuff, err to you with stuff. I’m Calixtenumous, uh, just call me Cal, everyone does. I, I’ve been getting a bad feeling. I went out for a hunt, and, and I felt like I was being watched. My friends said the same for when they went out. Um.”

Cal scratches his head, unsure where to go from here, and I’m unsure if it might be my fault. It could have been the Spellknight twins Yui and Yuri, perhaps. Still, I don’t think they’d give their presences away so easily, or project malevolence, such that someone untrained like Cal would be creeped out. I can’t verify it wasn’t them right now though, so I’m not sure what to do.

Starting out, I try to comfort Cal, “Take it easy, breathe deep. If something is going on around Solace and Solitude, I’ll have to deal with it at some point, so I thank you for bringing this to me. I, erm, we, do have spies and scouts around the area, hidden people keeping an eye on things. Is there any chance it was them?”

Shaking his head vigorously, Cal answers, “No, um, it felt, uh, it definitely had a dragonforce, I think. All our scouts are Draconiacs, or maybe some kobolds, right? Or, or am I just an idiot?”

Crap. I inhale sharply. I don’t know one hundred percent for certain, but I’m almost positive he’s right, for exactly this reason. Our scouts can’t have dragonforces, or they’d be able to be sensed by dragons. Shaking my own head, I respond, “No, no, you’re definitely not an idiot. I believe you’re correct about our scouts. Fudge. Um. I can’t exactly go tearing around the countryside hoping to run into a mysterious observer. Can I ask you a favor Cal? If you or your friends go out for hunts again, please be very careful, and try to make notes of exactly where you feel the presence if you can. Please? If anything seems off, or scary, I want you to return to Solace immediately. Do not risk yourselves. Your safety is more important than my favor.”

Cal nods to my request, and beams a smile at my care for his safety. I offer a wide arm, with my hand near him, for Cal to decide if he’d like a hug or handshake, or to simply ignore my affection. He scratches his head, and shrugs before shaking my hand. Cal mutters, “Can do, um, thanks for hearing me out Schism. I, um, yeah. Sorry about the other day. Just thanks is all. Um, can, can I go? Should I—. Okay, thanks.”

I try not to chuckle at Cal as he struggles his way through figuring out if he should observe any sort of decorum, like waiting to be dismissed, but I simply nod that he can go when he asks. I’ve certainly been in similar positions, not sure how to interact with authority. Oh gods. Oh hell. I’m authority. What the hell Reggie? I know right!? Those riding my mental wavelengths crack up, even those that are still suffering, dealing with their grief or trauma. I can’t help chuckling along with them.

Drawing a deep breath, I loose a sigh that turns into a yawn, resulting in a circle of yawns from around me. Lu leans in to whisper, “Sweetie? Things are going to get pretty hectic for you. Just keep making time for you though. Please? Staying you, and, and being close to happy is as important as everything else.”

Raising my eyebrow towards Luni, I nod in acquiescence, trying to suss out if she’s acting on foreknowledge, or simply worried about me as the war drags on, while I focus on gaining more advantages. She offers no hints as to which it might be, or if I’m off the mark completely. I yawn again, and attempt to apologize to my gathered friends and family, but other than the resulting circle of yawns, they wave it off. We resume our trek towards the strategy gaming hall and slash or war room. Gnawing on my lip, I keep glancing at these people that I love who happen to be traveling with me. There are so many risks and dangers abounding, that I don’t know whom to offer advice to, whom to offer consoling to, whom to even speak to.

Continuing to gnaw inside my cheek, I—. Te playfully swats the back of my head, muttering, “No chewing on you, only we get to do that,” before loosing a Shellcracker squee, sounding her elation at lightly teasing me.

I can’t help smiling, and there’s several chuckles from the surrounding friends and family. Lucky whuffs in agreement with Teuila, perhaps joining in on the joke, intimating that he gets to gnaw on me or lick me. Smiling down at my son, I rub his skull firmly, lovingly. I can sense Kinzul beaming with pride towards Lil, wherever she is nearby. Though I also sense a bit of deviousness as she’s apparently teasing him for waking up in a bed with twins, without Muse whom had gone to bed with him. Or something along those lines anyway.

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

I can’t sense Lil’s response to the tease though, oddly enough. I think that that means he’s out of range, compared to Kinzul, whose range I’ve extended as much as I could. Since I can’t sense Ixey or Zayzi either, I assume I’m more or less right about that part at least. Luni giggles nervously, a bit abashedly, knowing she technically abandoned Lil to wake up with the twin Reds, causing this ever so slightly comedic situation. She also is wary of me accidentally revealing what Ixey had done in her sleep last night, and shoots me a nervous glance. There’s a silent plea for me to shut up on the subject, so I attempt to move my brain to another topic.

I wonder where Iylynila is. I’m worried. If there’s some strange presence, an unknown dragon skulking nearby, and she’s going off continuously for solo hunts to clear her head, she—. Drawing a deep breath, I sigh as I try to put the worry out of mind. She’s one of our best fighters, calm down Reggie. If she can’t handle herself against one presence, we’ve got really big problems on our hands. But what if it’s a—.

Huff, calm down. It can’t be. The Damnations are not stupid enough, and they couldn’t get to this side of Mount Solace this fast. They can’t go over it, so they’d have to have land journeyed all the way around the base of the Spine of the World mountain range. If they tried coming in from above, well, they wouldn’t get through unnoticed. Would they? I mean, it’s hard to imagine them just passing by a bunch of souls and dragonforces.

Crap, I really want to get some of my projects up and running, like a scrying security center for Solace. I think I can buy enough mirrors, and supplies to start making scrying sensors, and maybe go myconid form, to make the sensors free and fast. Putting them up would be a hassle, figuring out where to put them up as well. I could probably rely on Miraina, Pawn, for that, since she knows the tunnel structures the best of anyone in Mount Solace with how much she runs around. Still, she’s trying to connect with her mom today, after being scared about possibly losing her last night. I might have to handle it myself. If I can even make time to make enough of them to matter.

Ugh, yeah. I can probably only make a couple dozen, but at the very least that would let me cover the entries slash exits, and the prison, and Mount Verdimenn tunnel. Also, um, the uh, entrances to certain bedrooms, without looking into them. The library as well. I just want to be sure no one can sneak in and hurt the people I love. The mirrors would be facing outwards, so it wouldn’t even be possible to perv on them, since that’s not what I’d be making them for. Icky. Those that want to share their bodies with me do it plenty enough to tease me without me needing to be a creep about it. Plus, I won’t even be the only one with access to the security center. I might even ask for someone, like that one burly kobold, to take turns in the security center, keeping an eye on things.

Fricklefrack. Yeah. Alright. I need to make a pit stop. I’m too anxious, and worked up. I’ll be enchanting some stuff while in the strategy meeting. Ugh, wait, the refractory period on the myconid, is it up yet? Bluh, do I need Kinzul to help me reach to Can’Z’aas to even check? Let’s see, I did a longer entry period, a few hours to get the myconid up, and I technically only kept it up for a few minutes in linear time, so it should only have been down for a few hours. Gnawing on my lip, I worry about maybe possibly having screwed myself out of my myconid form for over a month, if all the time in the orb is counted up somehow.

Teuila giggles, “Hehe, maybe don’t screw yourself as a mushroom, you’ve got plenty of—.”

She can’t even carry through with her tease, realizing everyone can hear her through my lowered psychic walls. I can’t help chuckling and rolling my eyes, even though I’m blushing rather thoroughly, as is Teuila. I harken back to one of our recent conversations as I respond jokingly, “Screw you, babe.”

Sounding her elation, Teuila closes her eyes and bobs her head side to side. Lu doesn’t quite get why she’s happy to be told to screw herself, but shrugs. Lucky nudges me from the side, bowling me into Luni on purpose. I’d glare at the very unsubtle hint, but I can’t help chuckling and rolling my eyes at our son as Lu catches me in her arms, against her lovely chest.

I try to reassure him, “Lucky, I love you, and you know I love ‘parent’, there’s no need to push buddy. I’m not going anywhere, ever again. No more long periods without seeing any of you guys. Nothing more than quick missions and offensives. I’ll find some way around having to do long journeys apart. Come here you big lug.”

Extricating myself from Luni’s amazing embrace, I kneel down with my arms wide towards Lucky. Thankfully Lucky obliges, and I wrap his neck and shoulders in a tight hug, while he places one paw behind me, and hugs me with his scarf. I sniff and rub my itchy eyes, trying not to imagine having to be apart from my inner circle again. I definitely don’t want us to be without one another for months and months, ever again. Te and Lu reciprocate, nodding along with me. Lucky whuffs in agreement, and I chuckle, still unsure how to be a better parent to him.

We’ll be fighting together tomorrow for the first time. We technically fought Vanathar together, but it was more like he wrestled Vanathar to play, rather than doing what we’ll have to do tomorrow. We’ll have to fight through, likely killing, an entire horde, an army led by powerful Draconiacs. I wonder how he feels about that, if it registers to him. Does his cragbeast side enjoy destruction? Does he have a sense of morality, or, well, one like my Fakeworld one, where killing is thought of as wrong? I mean, he seems to like protecting people, saving them, helping them. I’ll always think he’s a good person.

Lucky is—. Lucky is—. I guess he just is. I can’t find a way to learn more about him, only able to sometimes hear his psychic exclamations. As much as I’d like to learn more, and be more, and do more, I’ll just have to satisfice myself with that, that Lucky just is.