“I’m sorry, but this is straight up insanity. Did you really forget to destealth this whole time? We were on the road for almost a week!” Arthur exclaimed.

“I agree with Arthur, Corbin,” Mizu said. “It’s good to see you but you should have told us. Even if we forgot.”

“Ah, yeah, so, the problem with that,” Corbin looked embarrassed, “is that I started getting achievements. I got one for a certain distance spent stealthed, then one for making it through an entire new town undetected, then I got one for sleeping in someone’s tent without them noticing…”

“Wait, whose?” Arthur jolted at that. “If I find out you slept in mine…”

“Oh no, not yours,” Corbin said. “I’d be crazy to do that. You were always the person who could find me. Not that anyone had much chance of that after the first half-dozen achievements came in, but I slept with Talca. He’s all endurance and dexterity. Not much risk there besides the snoring.”

“Does he snore?” Arthur asked. “I’ve bunked with him before. I didn’t notice anything.”

“That’s because you sleep like a rock, Arthur,” Mizu said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“I always wake up before you,” Arthur countered.

“Or if someone knocks on your door. But those are the only two things I know of that can do it.”

Arthur was nearly interested enough to keep on with that mini-argument, but in the end there were bigger fish to fry. “Why now, Corbin? If you’ve been hiding the whole time, why ever come out? You could have made it all the way back home and we wouldn’t know.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s actually why I came to get you.” Corbin winced the same way he always winced when he expected to be in trouble for stealthing too much or at the wrong time. “Eito says you have to come back home. It’s about Lily.”

“What about Lily?” Arthur snapped up out of his chair. The girl had been all over town, riding monsters and looking for whatever thrill rides were available to her. It wasn’t exactly surprising that she might be hurt, but Arthur was finding out how woefully unprepared he was for it. “Is she alright?”

“Eito said ‘Tell Arthur not to worry and that she’s fine. That’s not a lie but get him here fast anyway.’” **Corbin motioned for the others to follow. “And for what it’s worth, he’s not wrong. But this is my fault. We don’t know how yet, but it’s my fault.”

“Oh, Corbin. It couldn’t be that bad.” Mizu put her hand on Corbin’s shoulder. “You hide too much, but you wouldn’t hurt anyone. Right?”

“Unless I hurt someone by hiding too much. But we’re wasting time. Follow me. I’ve been walking around the city non-stop for days now. I know the fastest way to get you where you are going.”

Corbin didn’t shave much time off their trip, but it was impressive he could shave any at all. He led them through a series of serpentine turns and narrow alleyways, each of them taking small fractions of a minute off their transit time. Arthur pushed his stats to the limit and beyond, losing the entirety of his wind before they even got to the fast-travel carts, and did so again once they got off them. He pushed through it, wheezing. By the time they arrived, his mouth felt like he had chewed on an alkaline battery.

“Don’t puke, man.” Corbin patted Arthur on the back. “Mizu, give him some water. I know you must have some.”

“I do.” She pulled a flask out of her bag and handed it over. “Here, Arthur. Drink.”

“No time.” Arthur squeezed the words out between breaths. “Lily.”

“Don’t be stupid. You think you can be helpful like this?” Corbin slapped Arthur on the back as he coughed. “She can wait a second. Trust me on this one.”

It was a minute or two before Arthur’s lungs stopped actively burning enough for him to more-or-less hide how winded he still was, and after that, neither Mizu nor Corbin could convince him to wait. He stormed up the stairs to Lily’s room, ripping the door open and springing forward into the room.

“I win the bet,” Lily cheered, sitting calmly on the edge of her bed. “I told you Corbin wouldn’t get it right and he’d panic.”

“What?” Arthur looked between the completely intact-looking Lily, Eito, Itela, and Ella before trying again. “Why aren’t you hurt?”

“Excuse me, Arthur. I’m sorry I couldn’t be laid out by all this weirdness.” Lily jumped up and hugged him. “I will try to me more injured next time. A broken leg or something. Okay?”

“Yes. No.” Arthur looked around the room for someone he could have a hope of bullying into talking and settled on Eito. “Explain please. Now, please.”

“Oh, calm down, Arthur.” Itela stood up. “You’ve only been here a few seconds. Lily just fell down like you do every time you level.”

“Although unlike you, she didn’t wake up for about five minutes,” Eito said. “Apparently uncovering Corbin was a little too much for her.”

“What does that mean?” Arthur said. “I find Corbin all the time. Or at least I used to.”

“That’s the problem. That used to doesn’t apply anymore. When was the last time you saw Corbin actually get caught stealthing, when he didn’t want to be caught?” Eito asked. Arthur thought for a moment and came up blank. It had been a long time. “Exactly. I’m Corbin’s trainer, for all he ever remembers to actually talk to me about it. It used to be this old wolverine commander, but Corbin got to a point where he wasn’t much help. When Corbin moved to the frontier, I took over.” Eito stood. “The last person who found Corbin when he was hiding in a serious way was Itela, and I gather she had to coat an entire street in a blessing to do it. Until today.”

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Wait, you found him?” Arthur looked at Lily. “How? Why?”

“It wasn’t on purpose. It was just because of my stupid Majicka Lamp skill.”

“You had it on?”

“Yeah. I figured I’d help out the hotel staff while I ate lunch,” Lily said. “But it was drawing more than it usually does. Because of Corbin.”

“But that skill is supposed to only help a group of people who are working on the same task,” Arthur said.

Corbin looked guilty. “Well, that’s the thing. I had to eat if I wanted to stay stealthed. Which meant taking food. And I left coins but the elephant kept putting them in the lost-and-found box. I wanted to pay him back.”

“So get this, Arthur,” Eito said. “This boy was in heavy stealth, probably as good as anyone in the world can do right now, and cleaning. Washing sheets. Picking up socks. Stuff like that. And he got looped into Lily’s skill.”

“So I got curious,” Lily explained. “And tried to see if I could tell where the majicka was actually going. I figured it out, mostly, just before I passed out.”

Arthur rubbed his eyes. “Okay, so Lily tracked her skill to Corbin, who was hiding, and thus found him, and then… what? It broke her?”

“That’s why we need you, Arthur. She’s not in any danger. Corbin was supposed to tell you so.”

“To be fair, I did,” Corbin said. “But I’m worried too. She wasn’t supposed to pass out like that. Most people don’t.”

“Most people don’t find a world-class hider at low levels, using their class skill.” Eito sighed. “Which is why we need you. We tried to actually take a look at Lily’s levels and skills, and we’re getting this.”

Eito flicked over a status screen. Arthur opened it up.

System Class Locked!

Due to an exceptionally rare convergence of several factors, Lily Expediter’s status screen and access to her class has been restricted.

As a general rule, classes are assigned to Demon World inhabitants between the ages of fourteen and sixteen. As Lily’s class was assigned earlier than most, she is subject to several restrictions to her growth that become apparent only if and when they are triggered.

Further information on Lily’s system restrictions is available to her guardian.

“None of us can access it,” Ella said. “Not even me.”

“And we found out the system was fairly close to considering you as her guardian when you went to find her in that terrible hole, all that time ago,” Itela said.

“Why didn’t you have Lily look at it?” Arthur said.

“It won’t let me pull it up.” Lily pouted. “It just shows me a version of what you read. Basically ‘ask your parents if you want this unlocked’ and nothing else.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t argue it to death,” Arthur joked, finally calming down enough. “That’s what you’d normally do.”

“I tried, Arthur. It doesn’t work when I’m not in a system trance, or whatever. Now quick, unlock the thing so we can know what’s going on,” Lily said.

“Is that a good idea?” Arthur reread the message, not seeing any indication that he’d get anything but information when he tried to tap into her system screen. “It won’t hurt her?”

“The system wouldn’t let you do it if would. Especially if that isn’t what you were trying to do,” Itela said slowly. “It’s fine, Arthur. More information is much better than less, in this kind of situation.”

Arthur nodded and motioned at Lily to send him over her stat screen directly.

Caution!

The system recognizes you as Lily Expediter’s guardian. As such, you may access her status screen and see the details of her skills during her class-restriction. As a default, this is only limited to information and will not affect the restriction itself.

However, any intent or attempt to lift the restriction may be successful, depending on the circumstances causing the restriction itself. If the attempt is successful, the restriction will be lifted instantly and completely.

Arthur wasn’t worried about accidentally indicating that he wanted the system to lift this restriction. He was so recently freaked out about the whole thing, he was having trouble resisting the urge to lock Lily in a padded closet somewhere until he was sure she was settled and safe. He pushed past the restriction, opening her status screen for review.

Lily Expediter

Level 16

STR: 7

VIT: 10

DEX: 6

PER: 10

WIS: 12

INT: 5

Unassigned Stat Points: 8

Primary Skills: Expert Counsel (Level 11), Majicka Lamp (Level 15 effective, Level 22 absolute), Majicka Boost

Achievements: Filibusterer, Advised Advisor, Light in The Darkness, Headslap Vector, Civic Butterfly, Advanced Parent Wrangling, Monster Rider, Majicka Tracker

Most of the achievements were new to Arthur, since it was rarely necessary to see Lily’s full status sheet and he tried to respect her privacy where he could. Majicka Tracker was not only among the new achievements, but was also bolded, which he hadn’t seen before. If there was any explanation for the frankly bizarre jump in the level of just one of her skills, it was there.

“Any luck, Arthur?” Ella asked.

“One second. Still looking.” Arthur jumped down a level into the details for the weird achievement, finding things more or less normal.

Majicka Tracker

Your Majicka travels, empowering the skills and efforts of everyone around you. This is not a mere metaphor. Actual majicka leaves your reservoirs and travels through physical space to its targets. As it does, it can be followed.

Doing so requires a curious mind, a high sensitivity to a variety of majicka uses as expressed by various classes, and a not insignificant amount of luck. You’ve met all three requirements in spades and managed to not only locate one of the end-points of your majicka output, but destealthed an incredibly advanced hiding skill holder in the process.

As a reward, you receive a permanent buff to your ability to sense details about Majicka Lamp’s output, especially as it relates to how much energy is being sent and to where at any given moment. You also receive a significant amount of experience, adjusted to match the difficulty of the feat you’ve accomplished.

“Okay, it’s confirmed that the problem comes from Lily unstealthing Corbin. It apparently triggered an achievement. Lily, what level were you at last time you checked?” Arthur asked.

“Eleven,” Lily said.

“Well, now you’re at level fifteen. And it looks like Majicka Lamp jumped to level twenty-two.”