It's a testament to how much my skill with Firmament has grown that I don't need to go searching for some obscure herb in order to help heal Naru, though the parallels obviously aren't perfect. For one thing, the Interface isn't trying to actively destroy Naru's core—that factor was a big part of what kept Tarin in a coma and prevented him from healing.

With Naru, it's different. There's nothing trying to actively erode his core. In fact, if this were anyone else, I'm certain that healing them would be a patch job with Firmament Control that would take no more than a couple of minutes.

Except there's a problem.

Just about everyone I've encountered so far has a Firmament core that heals itself naturally. It's not something I've paid much attention to—damage to a Firmament core is typically either so extreme that it can't heal itself or so minor that it heals itself quickly, with very little in-between—but the general rule is that given enough time, any individual's core can usually recover on its own.

Naru's isn't. There's no indication that it's even beginning to heal. Where I'd normally see Firmament flowing and beginning to repair the cracks, there's just... nothing. No movement, no life.

From the wear and tear on his core, he's been damaged like this for a very, very long time.

I keep my Firmament sense on him just in case there's something obvious I'm missing, but the more I observe, the clearer it is. His core is broken in some way, not from the self-inflicted carving but from something else. I look deeper, pushing past the layers of his Firmament, from the anchored layers to the unanchored ones—he's a first-layer practitioner, so everything past the first layer is only vaguely defined.

And then I see it.

There's a spiderweb of cracks running through the very foundations of his Firmament. I trace the pattern, and it only takes me a few seconds more to identify exactly what they are and where they're from.

"It's the Interface," I mutter, disbelieving.

Ahkelios has been hovering over Naru, and my words make him look back up at me, a concerned furrow in his brow. "What do you mean?"

"Naru's Firmament core. It's damaged, and not just from... that." I nod toward the most-dissolved blade of Firmament still partially clutched in his fist. "It's like the Interface is rooted into his core and cracking it from the inside. He can't heal normally."

The little mantis blinks. "You're sure?" he asks. "What does that mean? Does that happen to everyone who joins the Trials?"

"I don't know," I answer honestly. A quick check of my own core reveals no signs of anything like this, to my relief—the Interface's connection with me is mutualistic, a two-way connection rather than something eating into my core. Whisper's remarks before she disappeared indicated that she could heal, given time.

Not enough data. It's possible Whisper is wrong, or that she has her own methods of healing. It's possible this only happens after a Trial is completed, so as to permanently stunt the growth of a Trialgoer. It's what the Integrators want, isn't it?

Control.

And they don't even know what they want that control for. They have no idea what the purpose of the Interface is. Someone else is pulling the strings: I'm more certain of that than ever.

"Can you fix him?" Ahkelios asks; he sounds more worried than I'd expected, all things considered. I glance down at Naru, placing my hand on his chest and feeling the steady beat of his heart beneath my palm.

It's not the heart I'm looking for, though. That's where his core is, and while the Firmament within it is static and lifeless, it isn't gone. It's not like he's dead; he's just unconscious.

Without him to exert conscious control over his Firmament, my skills let me take control of it easily. I can take control of it, weave his wounds shut. I just don't know if that'll be enough. Closing the wounds is one thing, but if his core isn't naturally healing...

"Yes," I say finally. "Or I mean, I think I can at least stabilize him. I'm going to have to do more than that to get him to wake up, and that's going to take a while."

"We should not do that here," He-Who-Guards finally speaks up. There's an edge of caution in his voice. "Stabilize him quickly. We must leave."

I glance back at him, noticing that he's intentionally positioned himself between us and the guardpost; with a grimace, I realize what he's worried about.

"We probably shouldn't let his guards see him like this, huh?"

"There's no telling how they will react," Guard agrees. "I can carry him if needed."

I hesitate. There isn't exactly anywhere safe to bring Naru—I can't exactly bring him into Carusath and claim he just fell unconscious while we were on a mission together, and I don't really trust his guards in the first place. Isthanok is viable, but it's also the home of a slow uprising against Trialgoer control. Who knows what bringing Naru there could result in.

There's only one place I'd completely trust, counterintuitive as it is.

The Cliffside Crows, as labeled in the map. Back with Tarin and Mari.

I work quickly and quietly to stabilize Naru. It doesn't take long at all—only a minute or two of Firmament Control to force the scars to close and stop Naru from bleeding Firmament. A patch job, but more than enough to hold steady.

Not enough to fix him. And I realize that, as far as I've come, for something like this—for a Firmament core that's not only damaged but fundamentally broken—I don't yet have the knowledge I need to fix it. Anything I try is just as liable to do permanent harm as it is to fix him, and as much as I'd like to just experiment...

I sigh. There's at least one other option. All roads lead to the Empty City, I suppose.

Ritual stages reveal more about your connection with your Firmament. I've completed one of the Ritual stages. I don't feel any different, and yet... I'm learning more than I ever did about Firmament. The patterns I've noticed in skills, for example. The memories I can extract with Temporal Link.

"Interface," I say out loud. "Have I received my reward for the first stage of the Ritual, in terms of understanding my connection with my Firmament?"

[Reward has not yet been delivered.]

I blink, surprised at the immediate response. The Interface hasn't been so quick to reply in a long time. I'm at least a little relieved, too; I don't like the idea that the Interface might have had something to do with my discoveries.

But more importantly...

"When am I going to get it?" I ask.

[Completion of the second stage of the Ritual will trigger the first Revelation.]

Revelation? That's a new term. I frown.

"Does that have anything to do with Firmament cores?"

[Information on Revelations is restricted until your first Revelation. However, information on Firmament cores can be included in your reward.]

"For... free?" I ask, staring at the Interface suspiciously. There's a longer pause than usual before it responds.

[That is correct.]

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

...I don't trust that at all, somehow. I shouldn't complain, I suppose, but something about how it's responding bothers me. Ahkelios watches me curiously, and I shake my head.

"Let's get him back to Tarin and Mari," I say, looking between Guard and Ahkelios. "We'll figure out the rest there."

For all their bluster, it's the one place I'm sure Naru will be safe.

And after that, one way or another, it's time to head back to the Empty City.

----------------------------------------

Rhoran marveled at the design of the Ritual. It was so simple, and yet so complex—the way the Interface wound itself into the root of a practitioner's corpse and incorporated itself into a living story... it was the perfect nesting grounds for someone like him.

Not for an Integrator, though. Not at all. Rhoran had the feeling that if he'd still been an Integrator, being here would've been anathema to him. Most Integrators avoided dungeons as a whole on principle. Under control of the Interface or not, they always felt wrong, for lack of a better word. Being inside a dungeon felt like walking inside your own corpse, whether it was generated by an Integrator death or not.

But he wasn't an Integrator right now, was he? He was a parasite. A consciousness that could live inside Firmament itself, eating away at it from within until it belonged to him. Until it was him.

For him, a corpse like this was nutrition. It was food. He could feel himself expanding as he poured himself into the dungeon—it didn't matter that it was too big for him to ever control, didn't matter that he couldn't take it over entirely. He didn't need to.

That was the best part of Gheraa's little Trialgoer and his Trial. His challenges were all filtered through the lens of Hestia's Heart, and Hestia was the planet of Time. He didn't need to make big, sweeping changes. He just needed to make little ones. Absorb the memories here, let himself grow, and find just the right place to make just the right change. Cause a cascade that would make completing the Ritual impossible and generate a threat so enormous that Ethan would have no choice but to fail against it again and again.

Rhoran couldn't wait to see the human give up.

The dungeon had conveniently given him nothing but time. The seed he was in offered him a perfect snapshot of the next stage of the Ritual. He could see Ethan's path laid out in front of him—everything he was about to encounter down to the role he was supposed to play in the living history of the Empty City.

Now all he had to do was find the right place to make a little change.

----------------------------------------

"Ethan! What happen?" Tarin asks. He looks stricken when we arrive back at the village with Naru in Guard's arms, though he doesn't seem to entirely trust that his son is actually hurt. He keeps lifting one of Naru's hands and positioning it above his face, then letting it fall. It's only after Naru hits himself in the face three times that he accepts that the guy is actually in a coma.

I'm still not sure if I should have just watched him do that. Neither Ahkelios nor Guard seemed inclined to stop him.

"I'm not sure you're going to believe me when I tell you," I say. The idea that Naru wants to change is bizarre. I'm not sure I believe it, and I was there. Still, it's hard to deny when the evidence of it is quite literally carved into his core.

In a way, I suppose it's not that much of a surprise. I saw his hesitation at the guardpost and watched a memory of at least one of the families he spared. I don't know if they're the only ones he spared, but nevertheless, it paints a picture of conflict. Uncertainty.

Tarin stares at me suspiciously. "You tell," he says.

So I do.

Tarin doesn't seem to know what to say for most of the story. It's not like I'm privy to Naru's thoughts—I don't know if it was sitting in front of hopeful travelers and signing their papers that caused it or if he came to some realization in the process of me saving his life. I have no idea what led him to think carving his own core was the solution to any of this.

But Tarin seems to recognize the gesture. He taps on one of his wings, his expression warring between anger, worry, and reluctant admiration.

"It crow ritual," he explains after a moment. "For repentance. But not done like that. We use Firmament! Not knife." He demonstrates with a slash of a wing that leaves an imprint of Firmament on a nearby rock—a marking, not a carving. "You stay here. I talk to Mari."

I raise an eyebrow. He doesn't want me there? That's... fair, I suppose. This version of Mari doesn't have as much reason to trust me, and I'm guessing it'll be easier to have the conversation without me there.

It still stings. Just a little.

Tarin returns after a solid half-hour of discussion, during which I focus my efforts on keeping Naru stable. It's not difficult—even without healing, his core isn't really deteriorating much from just lying around. The real problem is the crowding of the rest of the villagers around us. Guard keeps them mostly at bay, and when he returns, Tarin waves them away with a squawk of irritation.

"You all go!" he barks. "This family business."

There's a lot of complaining, but it doesn't take long for them to all filter away. Tarin's gaze returns to Naru's unconscious body, lying on the ground with his head propped up on the mossiest, most comfortable rock Ahkelios could find.

"You want help Naru," he says after a moment. "You sure he not betray you?"

"Sure?" I ask. "No. Not sure."

"But you give him chance."

"I think I can afford him that much," I say dryly. "Not to get overconfident or anything, but I should be able to handle him, and he took a pretty big risk doing this to himself. That..."

I pause, watching Tarin carefully. "That, and I think you'd miss him if I actually just let him die."

Tarin flinches. It's subtle, but it's there. Mari pretends she isn't listening, pretends she's washing the dishes, but I see her going still for a moment before she resumes what she's doing.

"You can fix?" Tarin asks, and I shake my head slightly.

"Not yet," I say. "I've stabilized him for now. I'm going to need to find out more about Firmament cores if I want to properly cure him. I guess we could try looking for more Phantom Root, but I don't think it's going to help this time."

Not when it's the natural healing ability of the core being suppressed. To my surprise, Tarin shakes his head. "No," he says. "Even if Root help..."

I can see him hesitating. "What is it?"

"Ethan," Tarin says. His voice is unusually serious. "You know I not want to remember loop."

"...I know that," I say, although I'm reluctant to approach the subject. Part of me already knows what Tarin is going to suggest.

"It not enough to fix Naru," Tarin says. "He need remember."

I try to control my expression. "I know that."

"I remember loops because piece of Interface Firmament stuck in me. Yes?" Tarin's speaking surprisingly gently. "You learn what you need. Then you take from me. Give to him."

This feels like it's coming sooner than I'd hoped. "I can do that," I say anyway. I think. Tarin studies me for a moment, then snorts.

"You look like I slap you!" he declares. "It not like I forget you! I just not remember new loops."

"I know that," I grumble.

"Then you not look so sad!" Tarin reaches over and smacks me with a partially Firmament-reinforced wing. It actually doesn't hurt—not with all the ways my Firmament has begun reinforcing my body since the third phase shift—but I rub the spot anyway. "You do good. You help free Hestia. Yes?"

I sigh softly. I guess I'm doing this. "Yes," I say. "I'll be back, Tarin."

"Yes." Tarin gives me a confident nod, then surprises me by hugging me, wrapping me up into his wings. "It good knowing you."

I hear a few firm steps—Mari, striding over quickly. I almost expect her to pull Tarin away for some reason, but instead she also folds me into a hug.

"I not remember you," she tells me. "But my Firmament remember. You good. And..."

She hesitates for a moment. "We not have hope for Naru for long time," she says. "You give hope. So even if we not remember... thank you."

Well now. This just isn't fair.

I kneel down to hug them back, hiding the bulk of my reaction by burying my face in their feathers, and spend a quiet moment with them.

----------------------------------------

Some time later, we're at the top of the cliff that the Cliffside Crows are named for, mostly to avoid any particularly intrepid crow children from climbing into the portal I'm about to open.

Talk about a restriction. If I want Naru to remember the events of this loop...

This isn't the same as Tarin. Tarin was sent into a coma by the Interface trying to kill him; he had a piece of the Interface with him the whole time, keeping one version of him locked in place. Naru has no such protection—the version of the Interface that's linked to him is holding him back, not preserving him.

Which means if I let myself die before completing this next stage, Naru's losing all his memories of this loop.

"We're stuck with one try again, huh?" Ahkelios says.

"One try," I agree.

It won't be the end of the world or anything if I fail. The only person that loses is, in fact, Naru. But if he actually wants to change, even if I think he's an idiot for the way he went about it...

Well, I might as well give him the chance he's so desperate for.

I flick my hand out and summon the entrance to the Empty City. The barrier over it is gone—enough time has elapsed, and it's open again for me to complete the second stage. Whatever it is, the chaos of Firmament behind the door tells me that a lot has changed.

"Are you ready?" He-Who-Guards asks. I give him a slight nod, and he walks through. I follow close behind, but pause as I step through.

There are many things I expected the second stage of the Ritual to be. Many things I thought it might involve. Puzzles, for example. A whole new slew of monsters. More of those strange flowers creeping through the empty buildings.

What I didn't expect?

Color.

People.