We turned around as a group of five guards accompanied by some bloke whose face I'd never seen before headed towards us.

Ah, of course. Had to happen sooner or later. Alrighty then. Got to think quick now!

"Okay folks, here's my plan..." Everyone leaned in as the guards trotted towards us.

"Run!"

Bolting in the old man's direction, we’d already passed him before he could even get a word in. Down some alleyway we took off, jumping over fences and multiple stairways. Rheka kept up my pace effortlessly without so much as stumbling once with the others following close behind. Even the old man had caught up to us. Not bad. Pretty smooth so far.

"You know where we're going?" Vrintas called out to me.

"No! No clue!"

It was at this point I realized we were royally screwed. The guards were probably closing in and I had not a single clue where the hell we were going.

"Turn left on the next one, son!"

"Now up! Up up!"

With that I went straight into autopilot mode, charging up stairs like a rampaging bull. My brain completely shut down as I listened to the old man's commands. Thank heavens! Otherwise, who knows where we'd have ended up. Then again... does Vrintas even have an idea about where to go?

We ran for what seemed like forever, but probably only amounted to a good ten minutes. We'd lost the guards somewhere along the way, though. Must suck for them to chase after us. With all that armor anyway.

"Alright. Here we are." Vrintas said.

We stopped in front of a large wooden door. It had a sign above its entrance portraying a red phoenix in flight. I wasn't quite sure if this was a house, storehouse, tavern or whatever else one could fit into these massive stone walls.

Whatever it may be, hopefully someone is home!

"Before we go in. Who's our new friend here?" Vrintas pointed toward our newly acquired silver-haired brat.

In response she straightened up and puffed out her chest proudly. "Zilra Silthalia! Third princess of Juskarria! My... my father is the king, okay? So... so don't be mean to me, I dare you!" She pierced through Vrintas, threatening the old man with a death glare, daring him to say something stupid or make fun of her. But Vrintas' eyes just widened at her sudden announcement.

"Of course! You're Erd's kid! I knew you felt familiar, but I just couldn't quite place you... Last time I saw you, you were still a tot!"

"You... you know father?" Zilra looked up at the old man in awe.

"Hahaha. Quite well actually. How about that huh?”

“We caught her stealing apples.” Tavrin forced himself into the conversation which quickly earned him a glare from Zilra. She looked as if she was about to murder him with her eyes alone. The boy just couldn’t help himself. Which was understandable. Although personally, I would be the last person to judge a young girl for going after a bit of that sweet thrill.

“That so?” Not very befitting for a princess, is it?” He eyed her with intensity before letting out a wholehearted laugh.

We'll have a lot to talk about then. Haaa.” He sighed. “Alright then.”

Vrintas knocked on the door with force.

No response.

Then he knocked again, this time with even greater force.

Calm down gramps. We don't want you to suffer a heart attack after all that running, now do we?

Minutes later, the door opened in a slow and steady manner. In the doorway stood a short old woman, probably Vrintas' age, but barely half his size. Her hair had the same shade of grey as his and it was tied together awkwardly into one large messy bun atop her head. She didn't have many wrinkles on her face or body, yet somehow, her entire frame gave off an aura of extreme frailty. She had this look on her face, like she didn't care for anything or anyone. A look that I was all-too familiar with. One I'd often sported whenever I wasn't busy being a criminal in my past life, boring myself to death. A look of complete indifference. And of course, of course, her eyes were red. A pale red, like Vrintas' but still. With all those similarities she was probably a relative. Perhaps Vrintas' sister?

No words were exchanged as the old woman held the door. She looked up to Vrintas. Then at Rheka. Then at me. And then back at Vrintas.

"Fra-"

"Slam!" The door went crashing shut.

Well shit.

Vrintas looked flabbergasted. Like his whole life had just collapsed on top of him as he was about to enter a third mid-life crisis. Yet I still saw a smirk on his face.

"What's so funny? Isn’t this bad?" I asked.

He shrugged and just knocked again.

After a minute or two the door opened once more. A familiar sight.

"What?" The old woman asked. Her voice was flat, yet it managed to come across as somewhat kind despite that fact. It fit the appearance.

"Frag!" Vrintas called out, opening his arms wide. "It's been so long! I've missed you and thought I'd stop by! The door flew for a second time with only Vrintas’ foot stopping it from closing this time.

“Didn't you get my letters?"

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"I did." She said matter of factly, opening the door and crossing her arms.

"Well then uhh... why-"

"Was my lack of response not answer enough for you?"

She cut right into his sentence.

"No, but I though-"

"And I can't believe you used a Teracent for it too. Talk about a waste."

Interrupted again.

"May I talk?" Vrintas asked, smiling.

She just raised an eyebrow in response.

"Alright!" Vrintas pulled up Rheka in front of him. "Kid. This is your great-aunt, Fragaria."

Aha. Spot on. 10 points to meeee.

"And this, Frag, is your grandniece, Rheka."

I saw Fragaria's eyes soften suddenly.

"Ursus' kid?" She asked as she uncrossed her arms.

"Mhm." Vrintas smiled brightly.

She took a moment to think. “And the lot?”

“Well. I’d say they’re-”

“My companions!” Rheka called out.

It was rather peculiar. As Rheka spoke those simple words, Fragaria’s

facial expression shifted almost in an instant. Now she looked more like a wholesome grandmother, rather than some old hag. A slight smile formed on her face. One that could be easily mistaken for being gentle and warmhearted. And then her cheeks began to turn red ever so slightly.

"Very well then, dear. Come in."

And in we went.

My first impression of Fragaria's place was that of... a massive greenhouse. The whole building was made from stone walls with large glass windows all around. There were various plants growing freely throughout the place. One room taller than the other. Flowers, herbs, trees, grass, even bushes... whatever you could think of - it definitely grew in here. There must have been hundreds if not thousands of plants packed within these rooms. Her whole place had an earthy smell to it. Kind of like the aroma you'd find when walking through your garden at home. I suppose this is what people meant by having green thumbs. Not that I had an idea about that. I didn’t care much for plants. Except for that Dracofarn stuff. That crap was truly soothing to the touch. Oddly enough, I failed to find any of it in here though. Huh.

“Quit touching that.” Fragaria scolded Tavrin and Zilra before they both jumped back in surprise. She didn't even need to turn around to see them messing with her flowerpots.

"He started it!" Zilra said, crossing her arms and turning away.

"No, I didn't, you pickpocket."

"Pick-…? You're still going on about that?!"

"Of course. I'm not going to take blame from a thief! A noble thief at that!"

I heard Fragaria let out a loud sigh. I was genuinely surprised she even bothered to stop and listen to all this children's bickering. She turned around to look at me, though she didn't meet my gaze.

"So?" Fragaria asked as we kept on walking.

"Well, I reckon you know why we've come to visit?" Vrintas' tone of voice had shifted from overtly friendly to serious.

"Mhm. I know indeed. Although it seems to me as if you've already gone through the trouble of solving it... yourself." Fragaria said, turning around to yank on my collars.

"Yet, you're still here."

"Solved not quite, I'm afraid. I was hoping you could take a closer look at the lad to help me find out what's wrong."

Fragaria let out another heavy sigh. "Sure. Not like I’ve anything else going on.”

We entered a room much different than the others before. This one was all walls, no windows. And with the absence of said windows came darkness. The candles in this room still lit the place decently enough, yet I couldn't help but feel like the source of light here stood in stark contrast to the others. That meant of course, the abundance of greenery was also missing. Instead of plants this room was littered with shelves as well as devices which looked so convoluted, I began to question if they had any functionality at all. In the middle of it stood a massive table with various scrolls and utensils on it. It appeared to be some kind of research lab for who knows what. The whole room gave me the chills, to put it mildly.

"Well then. Let's get into it. Grab some chairs, sit. And you." She said, giving me a stern look. "You go on there." She pointed at the table.

Great. I was always hoping to get bloody dissected one day.

I threw myself on the table, barely covering a tenth of it as I did. Saying I was anxious would have been a sheer understatement. I was pissing my pants. Metaphorically of course. I had neither the wiener to piss with nor the pants to piss into, but I digress. I had to get my act together, we were here for me after all.

„No, the other way. Turn around.” Fragaria's command snapped me out of my thoughts.

„Huh? Okay…“

With my belly facing up I lay there, on the surgeon’s table. This must’ve been exactly what your pet felt like at the vet. No wonder animals hated going there so much.

She pulled in a wheeled table. A workbench-like sort of thing. On it stood what I could only describe as a massive monocular telescope. The tripod of which looked too small to carry the weight of the enormous brown barrel on top. Its lens was foggy. How one would be able to see anything through that was beyond me. Honestly, I wasn’t quite sure what she hoped to achieve with this sort of contraption. Yet, Fragaria’s eyes were glued to the other side of the barrel. Presumably. I couldn’t actually tell, as half her face had disappeared behind it.

Everyone sitting around us stared right at me. Like I was the main course on the dining room table. Vrintas had a somewhat puzzled look on his face. He’d been working on this problem of mine for quite some time now, so this was surely going to be a great revelation for him. Rheka looked less serious. She smiled. Probably in an attempt to make me feel better. And the other two – well, they were busy pestering each other.

Good for them. Bloody oafs.

“Remind me. What measurements did you take?” Fragaria asked from beyond the telescope.

“Huh? Oh. Well... for the silencing blight I gave him a collar I made from bronzewood. I had attuned it for auto-detecting blights of minor classes after I’d taken a look at his mana. And for the Restrain I gave him one of my artifact rings. They’re usually able to invert all sorts of mana blocks, including those of blighting nature. So... I figured there must be a couple more- higher class blights at play.”

“A couple more. Thousand.”

“What?”

What.

Fragaria shoved her telescope aside. “Thousand.” Everyone looked at each other, one more confused than the other, even Tavrin and Zilra who were both halfway into eating each other’s hands.

“Odd. I’ve seen this exact case before. Just once. Old fellow. Marked with the same ten or so blights over and over, around a thousand times, probably more, but I stopped counting. It’s like his very soul was blighted.”

“His soul? Pardon me for questioning your soulsearcher theorem, but if his very soul had been blighted, shouldn’t Rheka be experiencing the same thing? It is said that Nekro and Forpal share one s-”

“And what do you think you know about souls exactly, Vrintas? You always dismissed my research, ignorant as you are. And Aronya’s too! What that gal ever saw in a prick like yourself I’ll never understand.”

“Okay... fine. So, what do we do now?

“I’ll take the collar and that ring you mentioned and adjust them accordingly. You do nothing.”

“Alright, many thanks to you, Frag.”

“Argi will be fine then, yes?” Rheka jumped from her seat, slamming her hands on the table.

“We’ll see, my child. I’ll try, but I can’t promise the impossible.” Fragaria spoke in a soft tone before shifting back to that monotone voice of hers right after. “Tomorrow, after I’m done - you lot will be on your merry way home. This is about the amount of noise I can handle.”

“Sure, we’ll leave you in peace. Thanks again Frag.” Vrintas gave a slight bow.

And so, another exhaustingly turbulent undertaking finally found its end. I must say, I had high hopes for what solution Fragaria would come up with. Yeah, she was an old hag with an attitude, especially towards Vrintas, but she’d managed to leave a somewhat competent first impression on me. So competent in fact, I ended up almost too excited to sleep. I knew I shouldn’t get my hopes up too high, but I couldn’t help it. Dealing with this blight crap once and for all would mean one thing and one thing only:

Was it finally my turn?