Serra stared out into the forest thoughtfully. Their new regent seemed irate at the idea of having servants and vassals; but apparently already knew the region extremely well, and had been protecting it for quite some time. She'd actually passed them a map, and advised them on where she wanted them to establish their local version of the Ranger's school; she'd be naming it herself at some point, but simply starting it now was good.

She'd also given a few instructions; namely that there was a region touching her house that was off-limits; as far as she was concerned, it was her own personal domain, and any trespassers would be killed, no warnings given. The locals knew about it, and had actually marked it with some odd berry bushes; being poisonous, nobody ate them, so they simply grew in a row of thorny thickets miles long where the seeds had been scattered; a 'don't go this way' sign any sane person would recognize.

She'd also been told there were a handful of High-magic area pockets in the region, that they were deliberately allowed to grow so that she could kill monsters there periodically... but this one the ranger school would be on was bad for that purpose. The very fact it was a high-magic area was exciting; it meant that training new recruits would be as easy as it was back in Rockdale. But... how big was it? Why was it bad for raising monsters?

As her sister and the dragon boy tagged along behind her; neither of them were invited to wherever Terra and her mother were taking Kylie to; they came to the top of a wide hill, and saw... an old, broken tower. It had collapsed; and was now ruins scattered across the field.

Sometime, years ago, someone had built something here. In a desolate, middle-of-nowhere spot. No rivers. No apparent water sources. You'd either need to constantly haul in water, or dig some wells to do anything significant here; fortunately she was well-equipped to do either.

She frowned as she stepped forward; this sort of thing was common for high-magic areas that didn't touch the ground. Villages and towers in places that.... As she climbed atop a pile of rubble to survey it, she could feel it. Her head had just entered it. There was a high-magic area here... that didn't start until about twenty feet above the ground. If there were trees here, likely the birds in them would have grown to be high-magic, but otherwise only someone with the right tools or spells would have spotted it.

The wizard was still on the ground, looking around. She glanced back. "Can you see how big it is?"

He looked up. "Maybe..... three hundred feet across. And a really odd shape. It dips down towards the ground in a few spots. See where that bush is?"

Amidst the rubble, a vibrant, healthy plant with odd, almost glowing, blue fruit sprouted from mostly bare earth. "...So its a vague blob that floats in midair and just barely touches the ground here and there."

"Yep." He walked over to the plant; casually leaping over twenty feet in a single bound to smack down beside it... and examined the plant. "...Huh. This might be useful. Mind not hurting this, whatever else you do? These fruits have been altered by the magic."

Serra chuckled. "Fine, fine. I want to bring some wood here, shape it. Make a few buildings for trainees to sleep in. Do you know how strong it is?"

"Hmm. This is a level four area. Stronger than Rockdale, but not as strong as the Imperial Academy. Someone trained here would reach your level without ever having to hunt or fight."

She looked around... and nodded to herself. "This will be perfect. We use the stone from the rubble to make a wall around the area, haul in some wood to use to make towers, and put all the sleeping and training quarters inside the high-magic spot. Do you have any magic that might be useful for the purpose?"

When Derek chuckled; and took what looked like a 400+ pound rock and casually tossed it aside; he glanced up at her. "How about we decide where your building needs to be... and just start by clearing rocks?"

***

Terra stepped behind her mother, as she led her alongside Kylie into the forests; into land she'd marked 'Do not enter' on the map. Her mother glanced back at Terra for a moment. "If I'm going to be your regent while you go off and have adventures... I'll need to know your intentions here. The moment you accepted that Ladyship, you dragged us into politics. And we both know the Empire will be down here someday cleaning things up."

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She nodded. "Of course, mom. I should warn you... they gave me a piece of Knight's regalia. Its sitting back in the carriage. They said they'd issue a few more... including a piece of Lord's regalia that would likely go to you."

"Well. At least you were smart enough to leave it behind."

Terra looked back behind her. "The... Kingdom is terribly organized. Every lord and baron does things his own way, the king is capricious and crazy... Honestly, we'd be better off if the Empire ruled here. But we can't just join the Empire."

Her mother chuckled. "Ahh, and here we get to the reason they gave you that regalia. It has all sorts of benefits to it when you use it. But while you're wearing it... your Baron can give you orders. And the King can give the baron orders. Without that, or a duly sworn oath of fealty that the noble actually takes seriously, each given lord or lady could do whatever he wanted in a crisis. If some major war or problem erupted, they could side with the Empire, or just ignore orders... but not if they had a ring on them that made them listen."

They reached a patch of odd thornbushes, completely blocking the way... and with a gesture, Kara caused it to stretch out of the path... and it slid back into place behind them. "And I strongly suspect the kingdom is about to be in crisis. You've signed us up for this nonsense at the worst possible time."

As they kept going forward, Terra spotted a familiar face seemingly emerging from a tree as if she'd been somehow swimming inside the wood; Aunt Grace, the druid who had taught her mother all those years ago, but who almost never came by. Her skin color barely lighter than the bark, it blended in almost perfectly. And... judging by the glowing eyes, likely had good reason. She was an elf. She must have been disguised when Terra had seen her before. Did that mean Uncle Ruin was also an elf? Her mother looked at her teacher as she slowed down, and stopped, beside the tree.

The elven face studied the trio. "Is there a good reason you bring this one here? Your daughter I understand. Obviously we were going to tell her eventually. But this stranger?"

"She's sworn an oath, on penalty of her soul, to do a favor for this family. If she betrays our secrets, we'll send her to hell. And, well. She's fought some of your brother's toys, alongside my daughter."

The face vanished into the wood. Moments later, a tall, elegant elf woman emerged; a dress that seemed to be made of green silk, but was likely to be just as alive as the tree she emerged from framing a dark-skinned form that coldly assessed Kylie. "So. What was it? Mushroom people? Perhaps some sort of gelatinous blob spreading decay and poison?"

Terra sighed. "Well, auntie... the first one was some sort of... zombie thing. It took dead animals... and people... and sort-of ate them, using their bones as its own. The second one was a kind of... brain in a jar. It got people to drink it, pretending to be ale, and then turned them into puppets. Tortured, suffering, puppets.

A deeply drawn hiss of inhalation. "... By the goddess. That.... that does sound like him."

Her mother nodded. "I'd ask you to help us stop whatever this is, but...."

"Ugh. Your father, my husband, their stupid oaths." The elf shook her head, slowly. "So, they won't stop him, and probably won't let us."

"Well. Actually, my father probably could. But he doesn't know your brother started on his whole fungus, rot, and decay kick... and last we knew, he was stranded back in the pits. Or in hell. We... need to summon him again."

She blinked. "You.... it hasn't even been three months, and you want me to help you summon your father again? What makes you think he would break his oath and... Ahh."

Kara nodded. "'So long as you and yours don't hurt me and mine, I swear not to intervene in your absurd plan to bring down the kingdom.' And.... he and his hurt my daughter and father both. If he knew who it was, and was able to reach him..."

A steady nod. The wood elf studied the three women before her, and glanced behind her. "Problem solved. My husband will probably keep me out of it, but.... yes. This can work. We can call up your father, and he'll handle him, once he knows."

When Terra's mother nodded in response, she paused for a moment. "But. Perhaps.... we should wait a bit. He'll want to rush off and strangle the bastard the moment he finds out. Maybe... we let him do a little more damage to the kingdom first. I think if a few Barronys collapse...."

"...Fine. It will take time to get what you need, anyway. I'm assuming you'd prefer a criminal for the sacrifice part?"

"Well I'm certainly not selling -my- soul to bring my father back."

"So be it. I'll let you know when we're ready."

Terra coughed when Grace started to turn away. "Uhm. Can I go see uncle Ruin?"

Her mother sighed. "Go ahead. Just... don't take too long. If that Moonbeam idiot is the source of all this, we'd best get the villages in our new territory ready. I suspect your next 'adventure' will be clearing issues up locally... making sure we don't have some giant mushroom monster hiding in anyone's attic. Or tavern."

***

In the realm of mortals, the adventure came to a halt, for a time. Instead of bloodshed and chaos, they would focus on building, on preparing; introducing friends and family, building to prepare for the future, and revealing long-kept secrets.

All the while, a devil sat in a distant city; one where the jangle of chains and the wails of the damned formed an eternal background noise, admiring the new skull he had mounted to his wall; and gave a bored sigh before returning to his work; contemplating what sort of torment to foist off on the most recent batch of mortal souls. There was always just resorting to lashing; alternating between that and sensory deprivation usually worked on anyone eventually; but you always wanted to try out new idea; variety was the spice of life, after all.