The next day, Emika sat in front of her desk and more closely inspected that apparently expensive teleportation scroll she’d been sent by the Research Branch.

Of course, Emika thought it was fishy that they’d put such a thing into their first letter to her. It was almost as if they really tried to make it as likely as possible for her to visit them, and no matter how she looked at it, it felt suspicious. On the other hand, there really wasn’t much she could possibly lose by going.

Hey, Melisande, she wrote eventually, figuring it couldn’t hurt to consult with her.

What’s up??

Sitting back on her couch, Emika composed her reply. I told you yesterday about this Magical Branch Research thing I had been invited to, right. But now that I think more about it, it feels weird. Something’s not right about it, maybe. I still want to go, but do you have some ideas of how I could prepare for it?

Well yea personally I think they’re sus af. Ig it makes sense that u still wanna go tho… I mean… Well for one, if u send me the details of where they live, I can simply come save u the moment they try to pull anything. Other than that… I think taking a weapon with u would be kinda pointless… just charge your phone so u have options and stay wary when ur there?

Emika needed a moment to allow her heart to calm down from Melisande joking about coming to save her. Still… even Melisande didn’t have any amazing ideas on how to deal with this…

She wondered if she should get her affairs in order in case this Research Branch would spell the end for her, only to realise that she had pretty much already done that during the last few days without really noticing. Of course, she didn’t have an updated will, but she also had nobody to leave anything to.

The only string of attachment that still connected her to the world was Lester’s phone. Her new one would arrive any day now, so she was going to give it back soon. She very briefly considered postponing her visit to the Magical Fund until after that was done, but she figured that in the worst case, Lester would just have to buy a new one… That is, if he hadn’t already.

She wrote down a note and attached it to her front door. It said that in case she was found dead, all her trees should be donated to the international non-profit bonsai tree association that had helped her family settle in before her birth.

Turning around, Emika stared into the pouring rain that had been going since morning. The temperature had cooled a lot compared to a few weeks ago.

There was one thing that she couldn’t help but feel sorry for.

Líf had asked her not to die until she was ready to give back whatever that possession of hers was that had wormed its way inside Emika’s body. At least, Emika thought it must be inside her; otherwise, she couldn’t make sense of the letter.

Emika sighed. She did feel guilty about risking her life now, but she still pulled the bonsai tree she had brought out with her closer to her side, and took out that scroll.

As per the instructions, taking a deep breath, Emika ripped the scroll open. Immediately, she heard a soft pop, and the paper lit ablaze. Quickly after, the fire spread to her hands, her clothes, her body, and her bag and even the bonsai tree.

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In awe at what was happening to her, she tried to make out parts of her body, but couldn’t see anything through the gleaming flames. They didn’t hurt her, but they made her feel warm and cosy. This went on for a minute or two, which was on one hand longer than she had expected, but on the other it went over slightly faster than she would have liked.

Finally, the fire started to die out, and instead, she now sat on the ground in a brightly lit room. The ground was plastered in stones, and when she got up and looked around, she saw that she had left a ring of soot on the ground.

At least none of that stuff was left on her.

The room had four walls; one of them had windows on it, the other one had a glass door that she couldn’t open. Seeing that there was something like a doorbell next to it, she rang. It felt weird to do that when she was inside a place with no other way to exit. Though, it probably made sense for them to have a layer of safety when anyone could just teleport to the location with a fitting scroll.

A short while later, a white man in his thirties appeared, wearing an expensive business suit and a practised warm smile, and opened the door. He had a very clean shave, and freshly washed, short hair puffed around his head.

“Hello, Victor Felton. Emika Hasegawa, I take it?” he asked in a polite and welcoming tone, opening the door, then affixing it to the wall so that it wouldn’t fall shut.

“Thank you for receiving me,” she said, stretching out a hand. Then, after remembering the large growth that was attached to it, she retracted. He simply smiled, and took two steps back to give her enough room to walk through the door. While doing that, she made a mental note to unlearn her nonchalance of touching living beings. “The tree is a little too heavy for me to carry around, so I left it in the receiving room for now.”

“That’s not a problem,” he replied, taking a glance at the maple tree she had brought. “What a beautiful one!”

“Thank you. I made it back in high school and have been putting a lot of effort into it since then.”

“That’s wonderful! Please follow me to my office. We can iron out the details, and then run some tests in our lab.”

The office was just as clean as Victor himself. In addition to being clean, it seemed a tad luxurious, but with a slight air of plausible deniability. The simple painting on the wall looked like it could have cost a fortune, or it could just be decoration. Same for the few trinkets on his desk, which seemed simple but high quality.

Emika sat down on a small sofa that had quite the distance to where he sat at his workspace. He seemed very eager not to get too close to her.

On the small table in front of her, she noticed a cup of coffee, which he gestured was for her.

“Alright. First off, I would like to ask you a few things.” Saying that, he held up a questionnaire. “Is that alright?”

“Yes,” answered Emika. She had already thought about which topics she was ready to go into detail with and which she’d keep for herself. For example, there was no reason to believe that these people already knew she had killed people, and she preferred for it to stay that way. She’d just need to make sure they understood she was dangerous, but judging from his demeanour, they seemed to be aware of that.

The first few questions were just about herself; her name, address, date of birth… Most of these would be data that these people should already have on her in the first place, but she answered diligently anyway. When it came to explaining her experiences with her curse, she just detailed its growth, and she explained how it had killed Catrine.

“All done,” he said finally, lightly dropping the filled out questionnaire on his desk and smiling at Emika. “Thank you very much for your openness.”

“Well, as much as possible, I want to put you in a position where you can help me.”

He nodded. “And we will.” After a moment’s pause, he continued: “Next up, we would like to examine your body, if that’s okay with you. That would include taking probes of both the growth and healthy tissue, as well as running a few tests and imagery. We will be taking various safety precautions.”

Emika didn’t feel comfortable with that at all, but she figured there really was no way around it when it came to finding a cure.

“I see. Okay,” she replied, making her voice sound way more certain than she really felt. For one, she just hoped it would be over quick. For another, she hoped it wouldn’t end in a disaster.