The Baron Roberts and his Dungeon Master Carnegie enter the Black Box. He gazes around the black and blue walls of the Divine Dungeon with contempt.
“The Administrators had blessed their pawns well.” The Baron says.
Carnegie notices the walls and floors shifting erratically. Trying to prevent the Baron from going further into the dungeon. The Baron sneers at the attempt. Empowered by the Last Bastion Protocols he leaps over an ever-widening fissure. His Steam Swords cleave through several of the incoming Cells Emily sent to intercept him. Carnegie uses dark magic to befuddle the Cells and turn them against each other.
The two men fight their way into the first room, where they are confronted by Tatzelwurms. Carla and Charlotte arrive to help coordinate the beasts as they defend their new home and those kept within it from certain doom.
“I’ve heard of you,” the Baron said to the Alraune mother. “Murderer of children and spouses they say.”
Carla ignores the accusations.
“Heh,” The Baron says. “I’ve also heard that the alleged victims of Hamlin still live.”
Orpheus, having wandered into the Black Box in search of Zagreus, overhears the Baron’s accusations.
“The children of Hamlin, trapped within this dungeon,” the Baron says. “I guess in a sense they are as good as dead, for they can never be free of them.”
“What?” the bard thinks.
Carla ignores the Baron’s attempts to rile her up. She knows she, Charlotte and Emily will free them one day.
“Mom?” Charlotte whispers to her mother.
“I’m fine,” she lies. “There is no need to heed this man’s lies.”
“‘Lies’ you say?” the Baron asks while fighting Carla’s more powerful beast. The feline serpents encircle him and Carnegie and attack with their fangs and tail swipes. The Baron’s blazes glow with Cyan light as he casts a spell that freezes them in ice. “Rich coming from the woman that oh so elaborately faked her demise to give the village ‘closure’,”
Orpheus couldn’t get a good look at the Alraunes, after all, he knew the Baron was here and what he had done to his Commander and Percival. “Whose to say that is your only lie? Perhaps you wanted to ruin Hamlin and had the children abducted.” The Baron knows that is not the truth, but he also knows it doesn't matter. For if he succeed, then the Children of Hamlin would receive a long overdue greeting from Revotos and be ushered into the sea of souls by the Pathfinder. “Rest assured when all of this is over, they will be freed.”
Orpheus doesn’t know the full extent of what is going on, but knows this, if his sisters are at the Black Box, then they are in danger. He strums his lure and uses it to beckon the earth the tremble.
Charlotte hands her son to her mother as the quakes cause part of the world to fall. The Tazelwurms try to Evade but Carnegie lulls them to sleep using combined earth and dark magics. He then attempts to freeze the cranes with ice magic.
“Oh noble fire. Blazing and infernal. Melt down the ice, to water eternal!”
Orpheus reveals himself and conjures a wall of fire, preventing the Baron’s ice spell from taking hold. “What is the—“ He turns to see a bard clad in the attire of an Ebony Guard.
“This is for Percival!” He conjures a lightning spell, but Carnegie intercepts it with his cane.
“Sire, you must go,” Carnegie says. “You know what will happen if you linger in this state.”
The Baron remembers the drawbacks of the Last Bastion Protocols and nods. “Take care of these wretches Carnegie!” The Baron leaves.
Orpheus tries to follow him, but Carnegie intercepts him. “An Ebony Guard,” Carnegie says. “And yet you failed to stem the tide. “The black-clad man creates a torrent to quell the flames.
Clara and Charlotte see Orpheus fighting Carnegie. Carla summons her mountain lions to help the bard.
“Winds of change, heel my call. This vile wizard, he must fall!” Orpheus strums his lyre to call forth winds to buffet Carnegie. He then sues them as a tailwind to nock arrows from the strings.
Charlotte tries to get help, but in her attempts, the alraune child trips and falls onto the ground below. Her mother tries to reach out fro her with vines, but she fell too fast for her vines to catch her. She lands on the ground and attracts the wizard’s attention.
“Well well,” Carnegie says. He tries to attack the young girl, but Emily notices the fight and opens a whole beneath it, throwing off the wizard’s concentration and bringing him into a deeper floor.
Orpheus looks at Charlotte, recognizing her from the subway back at Noir. He then sees Carla rush to aid her daughter. His eyes widen as he recognized her from Hamlin.
✦✦✦
Carnegie lands in a subterranean level of the Black Box. He sees various trees and animals around him and chuckles. He dusts off his coat and tries to regroup with the Baron. He rushes towards the wilderness until he enters another room. There he finds two dwarven crafters, armed with a sledgehammer and a pair of stunners.
The wizard smirks. “And here I thought dwarves preferred the mountains.”
“We prefer a lack of trespassers,” Sarah says while glaring at the man.
“You and that Baron of yours certainly qualify.” He aims his Stunner at the wizard. “Now leave.”
Carnegie takes his sunglasses and wipes them. “I would, but you see, my liege has business here, and I will help him see it through to the end.”
“This is your last warning!” Sarah says. “Get lost or—“
“Or what?” Carnegie says. “If you want to waste time in a futile struggle, be my guest.”
Carnegie is suddenly thrown onto the ground by a surprise attack. Esteban and Julia arrive to assist the Dwarves. Carnegie stands up and adjusts his jaw. “I expected as much. Very well. I have some time to waste.”
Julia emerges from the shadows and throws a knife at Carnegie. He dodges, but she uses her control over darkness to have the throwing dagger emerge in another direction and slash his arm. The wizard is surprised to see sanguine fluids bleed out from his wound. He looks at Julia, with Minerva by his side.
“Heh,” Carnegie says, “This dungeon has many surprises it seems.”
✦✦✦
Carla looks over Orpheus and Charlotte. The bard looks at Carla with a mix of confusion and fury. As if he was betrayed by someone close to him.
“What is the name of Anesidora that happened?” Orpheus asks. “Where are my sisters?”
Carla finishes tending to Charlotte’s wound without answering him.
“Answer me!” he says.
“There is a time and a place for everything, “Carla says. “And it is not now and not here.”
“What are you talking about?” Orpheus says. “I’m their brother, I deserve to know what happened to Euryale and Stheno!”
“Know that they are safe,” the chartreuse-skinned woman says. “For now.”
“For now, what are you talking about.”
“The Baron remains a threat looming over us, if he gets to the core of the dungeon, then …”
“I know that!” Orpheus says. “But I don’t know why they are trapped here, why did you kidnap them?”
“She didn’t kidnap them!” Charlotte says.
“Then who did?” Orpheus says.
“It was a demon,” the innocent alraune child says.
“A demon?” Orpheus says. “Are you serious?”
“It’s true!” Charlotte says.
“Hush, sweetie,” Carla says.
Orpheus’ face bears a look of disbelief. “That cannot be right,” Orpheus thinks. “The last Archfiend was vanquished a century ago. There is no way…” His train of thought is broken by the sight of Carla leaving with Charlotte. “And where do you think you’re going?”
“The dungeon needs our help,” Carla says. “You can stay if you wish, you can leave if you want, but I have a duty to free these children and therefore to protect them until the day comes.” The two leaves.
Orpheus is left alone in the room. He ruminates on what he has learned that day.
“Hey!” a voice calls out from him. The bard turns back and sees Zagreus tended to by two children. Their bodies bear a metallic sheen and the ears and tails of a rat. Yet Orpheus notices more familiar features. He sees the two girls shy away from him, but he can’t deny it. Though they are altered, the bard knows his sisters when he sees them.
Zagreus approaches Orpheus. “Sorry about that,” the mage says. “Got lost on the way back to the medial wards, he.”
“Eurydice was worried sick about you,” Orpheus says. “Come on,” he says.
The two Guards pass through Euryale and Stheno, and Orpheus strums a familiar tune on his lyre. A tune the sisters recognize as a melody he would play for them. He accompanies the tune with a new suite of words. “Rest assured, I will return. For now, I’ve answers to learn.”
✦✦✦
The Baron Roberts delves deeper into the Black Box, seeking the core of the dungeon.
“Come out, little miss, face your destiny!” he says. He gets no response, ave for pillars erupting from the group to deter him.
“Pitiful,” he says as he slices through the emerging pillars with his steam swords. He feels mana seeping from him with each step. He sees several arachne descend upon him with an intent to defend their clutch and their home.
“You will not pass, intruder!” one of them says while leading the charge.
“Lousy pests!” The Baron says. He attempts to slash at them but his blades are intercepted by a shield bearing the image of a hound on it.
“You looked at a mirror lately?” Heathcliff arrives to protect Emily and the arachne from the Baron. Elizabeth arrives to assist him with his magic.
“Ah, so the Dungeon Master designs to greet me personally?” The Baron says. “I’m honored, but you are not the one I’m looking for. Leave or face the consequences!”
“Sorry,” Heathcliff says. “I have a responsibility here.”
The knight and the Baron clash with their blades. Heathcliff dodges the slashes with precise leaps, as he observes the Baron’s swordsmanship. He then counters with a shield bash.
“Your bladework’s rather shoddy!” Heathcliff says. The Baron fights with determined fury as he attempts to make it past Heathcliff, Elizabeth, and the Arachne.
Among the arachne set to defend Emily from the invading dungeon core is Nina, standing on top of the Giant Spider Construct. She uses her bardsong eyes to pilot the machine as it moves into the fight. “Squash that meanie!” she commands.
The machine stomps one of its giant legs onto the Baron, Heathcliff runs away before the leg can make contact. The Baron uses herculean strength to hold the leg in place, His swords piercing the machine’s leg as he holds them aloft. Elizabeth uses the distraction to pelt with magic from all seven available elements.
Nina focuses on piloting the mechanical spider as its leg bears down on the Baron. The Baron struggles to remove the large pillar from himself when he sees a purple glint in the distance.
Before he can react he is suddenly attacked by Tim through a shoulder tackle into a lean. He manages to displace the Baron enough so that the leg can continue to crush him. Tim leaps back to avoid the leg as it crushes him.
Emily’s avatara arrives to the battle and sees the Baron tramples under foot. “Is it over?” she asks.
She soon hears a malevolent cackling emerge from beneath the mech’s foot. She sees it be lifted up. Nina feels the machine’s leg being lifted by the Baron.
“Yaargh!” he screams as a shockwave emanates from him and pushes everyone back. He then then makes a mighty leap and slashes at the joints, cutting them causing the machine and Nina to fall onto the ground. The Arachne hastily makes a web to catch her fall. Emily looks with horror as the Baron lands light in front of her.
“So we meet again,” Baron says. Emily reacts tot eh question by immediately leaping back and then running around to try to attack him. Assisted by Elizabeth’s magic. The Baron is nor surrounded by Emily and several of her allies.
✦✦✦
Sarah, Richard, Esteban, Julia, and Minerva continue to fight Carnegie. Sarah jumps into the air and swings with her hammer. Carnegie tries to dodge, but Julia stops him by tripping him. Carnegie is hit by Sarah’s hammer.
“How do you like that?” the silver-haired dwarf says after her attack.
Carnegie uses a wind spell to repel Sarah, but it leaves him wide open to Richard’s stunners. He takes two bolts to the chest which stuns him. Esteban draws towards the wizard and lets loose several left and right hooks.
“You are quite formidable,” Carnegie says, still standing. “But even the mightiest cliff erodes!” He uses earth and wind magic to create a sandstorm that buffets his opponents. Sarah counters by spinning her hammer to blow the sand towards Carnegie and Julia uses her dagger to cast a spell.
“Hallowed Umbral Guardian, come to my aid!” A giant emerges from Julia’s shadow and with a mighty clap blows the sand further wards Carnegie. Sarah rushes while still spinning her hammer, and channels the centrifugal force into a mighty swing. Julia’s shadow then slams its fist onto Carnegie.
The wizard is battened and bruised, but he is still able and willing to fight. “So it appears you have driven me to the brink!” the wizard says. Minerva and Esteban rush towards him, but he dodges their blows as he channels his spells.
“Oh, howling wind, shining light.” He manurers around his enemy’s attacks as he continues his spell. “Clear water and blazing fire.” He rushes to the center of the room. “In the fertile ground, in the shadow’s night, let lightning strike and free them in ice’s ire!”
Carnegie summons eight pillars of rainbow-colored light. They spin around the room and attack the party with its respective attacks as Carnegie floats above them.
The five try to avoid the elemental pillar’s attacks while trying to defeat Carnegie. Minerva has an idea and uses her webbing to lasso Carnegie legs, and then pull him down. “What?” he shouts upon seeing the arachne woman effortlessly slam him into the ground. Minerva and Esteban pummel the wizard with several punches. Carnegie is knocked out by the attacks.
Minerva checks his heart for a pulse. “He’s alive, but he’ll be out for a long time.”
“Good,” Sarah says. “That’s one less headache to worry about.”
“We still have to deal with the Baron,” Julia says.
Leaving Carnegie, they head out to find the Baron and help Emily defeat him.
✦✦✦
Emily, Tim, Heathcliff and Elizabeth continue to fight off the Baron Roberts. The enemy dungeon core uses his steam swords to coat the room in mist. He tries to rush to Emily, but she waltzes away and retaliates with her own slashes.
Her weapons bound off the Baron’s armor with a dink. She tries to strike the Baron, but the Last Bastion Protocols render him impervious to her attacks for as long as he has mana to burn. The Baron strikes her aside. “Weak!”
“Emily!” Tim cries out. He makes a charging step and uses a flurry of rapid and precise strikes, channeling the wind and momentum to pun him back, but his own blows deal no damage to him.
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The Baron breathes heavily, tied by both the long day and the rapidly declining mana. “Pitiful ants!” He bellows. He channels darkness magic into his swords. “The weight of the world shall bear down on you.” He uses his swords to channel Gravity magic. Elizabeth collapses onto the floor, unable to fly under the increased pressure. Emily tries to counter by making an Apurgy well, but the Baron makes a mighty leap to stop her spell. The attempted drop kick is blocked by Heathcliff, who is barley able to stand. The Baron is repelled but Heathcliff collapses from the increased weight.
“Guess this is it for me,” the knight says with heavy breaths, before losing consciousness. He and Elizabeth begin dissolving into gold dust.
Emily looks on in horror as she sees the Baron is still standing and only her and Tim are left. The Baron menacing approaches her while she braces for a fight.
Tim leaps between the Baron and Emily. “If you want her, you have to go through me first!” he says while brandishing his Qiang.
The Baron scoffs and rushes towards Tim. The young lad is determined to defend Emily no matter the cost. He fights with controlled fury as he uses slashes and thrusts with his Qiang and all his bajiquan techniques to protect Emily and defeat the Baron. Yet it is not enough. After a few minutes Tim is defeated and is easily swatted aside.
“Pathetic whelp,” the Baron says. “You are light years behind me.”
Emily rushes to Tim, and is shocked to see him fall so easily. Tim looks to Emily as his body transforms into gold dust. “I’m sorry, Emily…” He fades away.
Before Emily could react, the Baron lifts her up by the neck. “It’s time to finish this!” He tosses the avatara body aside and then destroys it with his sword. The body melts into a silvery sludge as Emily’s terrified consciousness is forced back into her true dungeon body. The Baron has defeated all obstacles in his path and now makes his way towards the core room.
✦✦✦
Emily’s avatara is destroyed, she tries to create another one but leans that there isn’t enough available a man for her to do so. “Please,” she thinks. “I don’t…not like his.!”
She turns her gaze to her impending doom, represented by the menacing march of the Baron Roberts. He is now in front of the core. Surrounded by black and purple walls. He extends his arm and begins to attune to it, to absorb it.
“I…I don’t want to go!” a stream of liquid begins to emerge from one of the walls. She is overwhelmed by feelings of helplessness, of hopelessness. The core begins to glow with a silvery light.
“Please…” she thinks. “I-I don’t want to die! I want to live!”
The core suddenly glows with a blazing light. The Baron is pushed back into the wall. “Humph,” he says as if anticipating such a response. “So you have some spark left in you huh?”
Emily’s short time on Titania flashes before her eyes. The friends she made, the adversity she faced. Her hopes, her wishes, her sins. She feels mana flooding into her as she struggles to think of a plan to defeat the Baron. Survival instincts are kicking in and then…
“[Last Bastion Protocols] authorized.”
The Baron sees the core engulfed in a blinding pillar of white light. As the radiant pillar faces, another avatara of Emily emerges, clad in an iridescent silver version of her Cyberworks armor.
The Baron laughs. “Your will to live is strong, but will it be enough?”
Emily wordlessly draws her blades.
“So be it.” The Baron detaches his steam swords from his gauntlets and combines them into a double-bladed spear. “If you want to fight, then we will fight until the suns in our hearts burn out!”
Emily teleports straight to the Baron and unleashes a furious chain of rapid sword slashes and dances, punctuated by a large kick to the chest. The Baron is knocked to the wall again, most of his mana has been exhausted.
The Baron stands right back up and is determined to prevail. He takes his spear as its blades glow green. "We must struggle to live, as the howling black wind rises!" He slams his spear into the ground and a pillar of green light emerges behind him. It conjures a large tornado that draws in Emily. Emily simply uses the momentum and central forces to slingshot around the pillar and throw her two swords at the Baron. The clash causes part of his steam-powered armor to fall off his arm and for glowing white liquid to drip from his arm. The chakram returns to Emily and she uses it to create a wind tunnel that slams the Baron into eh ceiling.
As the Baron falls. He reorients himself and channels ice magic into his spear. "Now is the winter of your life, and the end of my discontent!". Cyan light coats the blades as he lands and another pillar rises. The new pillar chills the air around it and causes parts of the room to freeze over. Emily locks blacks with the Baron, silently fighting with the fury of a wild beast and parrying her opponent’s attacks. Her slashes cause more of the Baron’s armor to chip off and she eventually slashes his right knee.
"You are insignificant, like the teardrops in the rain!" The Baron’s spear glows blue and he summons a torrent through a new blue pillar. The water lands on Emily and the effect of the cyan pillar coats her in a thin layer of ice, but she simply teleports, shattering the ice, and reemerges behind the Baron. Her blades are enchanted by fire for the first time and she sues it attack with searing heat.
The Baron is undeterred. He tries to flood the room and submerge the empowered avatara in water, but Emily changes her element to ice and freezes the Baron’s legs. She then returns to fire and slashes at the legs.
The Baron is forced to kneel from the attack, his eyes widen in shock., but he refuses to yield. Parts of the core room begin to transform into gold dust. But neither party is too focused on the other to care. The Baron takes his spear and forces it to glow pink. "To pile like thunder, to strike like lightning!" he cried out.
A magenta pillar of light joins its breather and causes the cloud in the ceiling to roar with thunder. Lightning emanates from the pillar and hits Emily’s, but she remains dauntless and uses her swords to redirect the bolts of levin toward the Baron.
The Baron breathes heavily as Emily approaches him. “Do you find your actions just?” Her voice booms as she utters these words. “What right do you to terrorize þe land in þis manner?”
The Baron simply laughs at the statements. “Of course, even now you are naught but a mere pawn in this game of chess! Worry not, I will relive you of your burdens!”
✦✦✦
Elizabeth reforms in a pod a few minutes after her demised. She tiredly flutters out as she sees parts of the Dungeon vanishing, disappearing into gold dust.
“Oh no!” she says. She realizes what is happening. Heathcliff and Tim emerge from their pods afterwards.
Minerva and her party arrive, as well as Nina, Atsuko, the Truces and the Coloraturas.
“What is going on?” Rose asks.
“The Black Box is falling apart!” Richard says.
“Emily activated the [Last Bastion Protocols],” Elizabeth says. “She’s channeling all of the mana of the dungeon into herself. If we don’t stop her soon, she’ll burn through all her mana.”
Clover freaks out upon seeing part of her finger slowly turning to gold dust.
“What the—” Streltizia says after feeling one of her horns vanishing in this manner.
“The [Sentinels] and [Cells] are also part of the dungeon too,” Elizabeth says with urgency. “We have to hurry!”
“Ugh this is turning into a huge mess,” Heathcliff says.
“Where are they right now?” Azalea says. “If we don’t want to circle the drain we need to find her and help her stop the Baron!”
“They’re likely at the core room,” Tim says. “We must head there post-haste!”
They run through the disappointing Black Box. Passing through several of the vanishing cells along the way. Carla and Charlotte soon find some of the children from Hamlin, crying as if they know what is happening to them. Charlotte looks in horror before recomposing herself and continuing to the core room.
✦✦✦
"Our lives, changed, melted, molded in the flames!" The Baron conjures a red pillar of light with his now red-hot spear. The heat from the fifth pillar allows him to attack Emily with Jests of steam. Emily avoids the heated vapors and clashes once more with the Baron. Her curved blades against his steam spear. She lets loose a flurry of slashes that cut through one of the blades, separating it in two.
“Do you even know why we are called Divine Dungeons?” The Baron says. “Do you know why we are bereft of our memories?”
Emily refuses to respond. She simply teleports again and draws in the heat from the fire pillar to melt off another part of the baron’s armor.
“I bet you don’t even know that an Archfiend walks among us!” The Baron says. “You’re always content to just do as you’re told!”
“You’re wrong,” Emily says in a normal tone. The Baron tries to use the distraction to land a hit on her, but Emily dodges and cuts off another piece of the broken blade.
“Am I?” The Baron clashes with Emily once more. In their clash, something strange happens.
The Baron begins to see flashes of Emily’s experiences, and Emily sees’ flashes of the barons. She sees memories of a young man setting off in the world, of meeting the scion of a steel magnate and taking him on as a Dungeon Master, of them prevailing in countless trials and becoming beloved in Cerberus, of them meeting Atsuko and her crew, and finally of them meeting a certain Piper.
The clash ends and both fighters are repelled by a blast. Emily looks at the Baron with shock and horror. “What happened to you?”
The Baron stands up and points the intact blade of his spear at her. “I have merely awoken to the truth of this world. It speaks to me, and it tells me that you are not long for this world.”
Emily teleports in front of the Baron and tries to defeat him. They clash again.
“Look are yourself,” the Baron sneers. “You’re burning through all your mana, and for what? To try to delay the inevitable? If you are content to just do as you are told, to merely react. Then you will end up absorbed! If not by me then by another. That is the fate of those that do not carve their path!”
“You…you—”
“Have you ever made any effort to fulfill these young girls’ wishes?” The Baron says.
The two clash again.
“Did you perhaps enjoy the company of the children the demon trapped inside of you?”
They clash again.
“You even took on the arduous task of rebuilding a lost sect! Yet you’ll never reach those lofty heights!”
The Baron recalls Enemy with a herculean throw. “Enough of this farce!” He channels orange mana into his broken spear. "Oh stoney grey soil, become the tomb of my enemy!"
An orange pillar of light emerges the sixth summons by the Baron. It attacks Emily in sand and stone. The baron then channels yellow light into his weapon. "We rage, rage against the death of the light!" A yellow pillar emerges and blinds Emily. The other six assault her with their attacks and push her into the wall.
"But only one of us will go gently into the night!" The Baron summons a pillar not of light, but of purple darkness on top of Emily. Emily is attacked by phantasms as she moves to escape its hold. By now a quarter of the Black Box has disappeared.
Emily rages towards the Baron and through a flurry of dances and slashes carves off the Baron’s arm. The white liquid bleeds out as she takes the steam spear and breaks it. The Baron merely cackles and beckons the eight pillars to converge. They trap Emily within their combined form and pelt her with elemental attacks while the Baron laughs like a madman. His severed limb and weapon already turning into gold dust.
Emily struggles to break free from the combined pillar of elemental light.
“Go on, ‘noble’ opponent struggle against your fate if you can!” The Baron yells to Emily.
Emily then looks on and sees the arrival of her friends, some of them also vanishing into the air. She is lifted high into the air by the pillars and realizes that the Black box itself is vanishing.
“Emily!” Time tries to run, but one of his legs has dissolved into dust and he collapses on the ground.
Emily looks back at the Baron. “Our days are numbered! For as long as we linger in this state, we burn through our mana. It is the last blaze of glory and glory is what I shall claim!” The Baron says with a triumphant laugh.
Sarah tries to rush towards Emily and free her from the pillar, but the Baron anticipates that and motions the earth to block her with his lone wrist. He then approaches Emily and extends his arm out to her. “Your time is up! Let the last of your embers be snuffed out by my steam!”
Emily winces in Pain and the Baton once again tries to absorb her and her core. She struggles to free herself. “No, no, no!” she thinks as she manages to move within the elemental pillar.
“Accept your fate,” the Baron bellows. “I am unstoppable, even if you repel me I shall return again, stronger than before!”
Emily manages to free herself. On instinct, she has one last idea. Her survival instinct kicks in as she teleports away from the pillar, shattering it and sending its elemental energies towards the cackling Baron. Before he could notice it. Emily emerges right in front of him and grabs him with bother her arms. With a mighty scream, she begins absorbing the Baron before he can absorb her.
“What?” The Baron says. “Impossible!” He moves to pillar to their location while trying to shake her off, but Emily refuses to move. The pillar of light engulfs them as Emily screams once more.
The Baron’s body begins to vanish all his mana pooling into Emily allows with all the amassed power of the Elementalist’s Spheres he has, including the Aquasphere.
“I. Won’t. Let. You. Hurt. Anyone. Anymore!” Emily yells as she finishes absorbing the baron. The baron Roberts screams as all of his mana is absorbed into Emily. The pillar explodes in a blinding light engulfing the entirety of the Dungeon’s perimeter.
Within the light. Emily hears a certain voice. “Well done, Divine Dungeon. You have triumphed. The intruder gone, the threat is silenced.” Emily recognizes this as the voice of the Piper Pruflas both the demon that forced the children of Hamlin inside her and the one that gave the Baron Atsuko’s research.
When the light fades, the Black Box is restored to normal, and everyone sees Emily’s avatara on her knees, crying. The nacreous silver gives way to the normal black and purple palette. Tim rushes to her. “Emily, are you you okay?” Emily remains inconsolable.
The Dungeon core rubs her nose as she looks at Tim’s comforting gaze. “I’m…I’m not fine…” she says through tears. She knew Pruflas orchestrated this ordeal. Tim stays by her side, doing his best to comfort her.
✦✦✦
The next day begins with Emily looking out at the changes made by absorbing the Baron. Her avatara looks at how the Verdemaw, once natural and green, had become part of the Black Box and took on its signature Blue and Black technological aesthetic. Her gaze is affixed at the altered landscape but it seems like she is looking a thousand yards beyond it.
Tim approaches her. “Are you…”
“I’m fine,” Emily lies.
Tim sighs. “Do you think that was your fault?”
“I don’t know, Tim,” Emily says. “I don’t know what its worse. That I had to absorb him to stop his rampage, or that someone had forced the conflict to happen.” She mulls over what had just happened, and over the Baron’s words.
“Do you think this could’ve been avoided?” Tim says.
“I do,” Emily says. “Much as I want to think otherwise, I let myself be a pawn, I lost control again…”
Tim notices her dazed gaze turn into a fiery one of determination. “But no more, I will not let myself be controlled by others, never again.”
“What are you planning to do?” Tim says.
“I’ve talked to Heathcliff about asking Atsuko’s retainers if they could lend a hand with helping set up the traps. He seems to like the idea at least, after that. I want to set out for a bit. See about finding other rouge dungeons. I already set up talks with Pauline about it.”
“You want to represent yourself?” Tim says. “That is rather risky.”
“I know,” Emily says. “I also know there is much to learn.”
Heathcliff approaches them. “I understand, cher.” He says with a great big smile. “Should I start with ‘wrap me in a bolt of lightning’?”
“Rest assured I still need your services as the Dungeon Master, sir knight,” Emily says. “Your experience, skills, and connections would still come in handy.”
“Hah!” Heathcliff says. “They’d better be. So what’s on the agenda today?”
“We need to check on our allies. Yesterday was pretty brutal on them.”
“On it,” Heathcliff says.
Elizabeth flutters in. “There you are!”
“Hey, Lizzie!” Emily says in a cheerful tone. “What’s up.”
“The Ebony Guard contingent wants to talk to us,” Elizabeth says. “They’re at the core room right now.”
“Oh,” Emily says.
“Seems like the trial by fire isn’t over yet,” Heathcliff says.
The group leaves the Verdemaw, now called the Bleumaw. On the way, they meet up with the dwarven Smiths as they look over what the new material made by absorbing the Baron Roberts.
“Hmm, so we only got plain old steel?” Sarah says.
“Sister, you know this was more about protecting Emily than getting resources,” Richard says.
“I know,” Sarah says. “I just thought we would’ve gotten something more rarer for all our troubles.”
Raine arrives for her apprenticeship and waves to Emily as she seeds her.
Emily sees Azalea practicing her comedy act with Rose and Nina. She then sees Pauline taking care of the adventurers at her newly expanded hospital. Then she sees Lily and Anemone talking about their favorite movies while Lydia and Minerva are keeping an eye on Rose, Clover, and Streltizia.
She then sees Atsuko and her shinobi calibrating their instrument for a later expedition into the Microdungeons. She then sees Flowena and Ulrick play with the other sprites and Kaitlyn
They reach the core room, where they see Orpheus, Eurydice, and Zagreus, alongside Carla, Charlotte, Euryale, Stheno, Esteban, and Julia.
“Hello,” Emily says with decorum. “Is something the matter?”
“I simply want to offer you my thanks, for protecting the children of the village of Hamlin thus far,” Orpheus says. “But I also have my concerns.”
“Such as,” Emily says.
“I came to learn that strange things had happened in Hamlin,” Orpheus says. “That one of your Sentinels had allegedly kidnapped my sisters and the other children and murdered them. Yet as I can see that is not the case.” He then sighs. “Yet at the same time, I understand why that is. Demon or no if the village were to see them in the state they are now in, their reaction would be swift and merciless, and rendered on the children as well.”
“That is what Carla thinks, yes,” Heathcliff says.
“And not without good cause, Carla interjects.
“Quite,” Orpheus says. “What I take umbrage with the assumption that I would be among them,” he glares at his sisters.
“We-we didn’t know!” Euryale says.
“Please forgive us!” Stehno says.
Orpheus sighs. “For now I have to return to Noir, the headquarters will want to know about the results of your defense and I have to tell them about the deaths of Percival and Commander K. But as soon as I am able, I want to ask them if I could be stationed here in y—I mean in the Black Box.”
“You want to move here?”
“Someone has to keep an eye on these two,” Orpheus says.
“Besides,” Eurydice says. “The Guards are investigating the disappearance of one Stanley Piers.”
Emily feels like the name is familiar.
“My people claim he had left for Hamlin several months ago and had never returned,” Esteban says.
“I see,” Emily says. “Tell me, is there anything you know about ‘Archfiends’?”
“[Archfiends]?” Elizabeth asks with puzzlement.
“I think there is nothing the Guards know that your fairy also does not, sorry,” Orpheus says.
“I see,” Emily says.
“I hope we can meet again,” Orpheus says. “Under better circumstances.” Orpheus and his party begin to leave the Black Box. The bard then turns back. “And one more, thing, do keep my sisters and the others out of trouble, please. They can be quite the handful at times.”
“Am not!” Euryale says.
“Will do,” Emily says with a chuckle.
“I’ll see you soon,” he leaves while strumming his lyre.
The crew of the Black Box bids farewell. Heathcliff leaves to check with Pauline. Elizabeth then heads to Atsuko. The others also bid Farewell to Emily as her avatara recedes into the floor and her consciousness returns again to her body. Everyone in the room then notices the collection of Elementalist’s Spheres, with the blue Aquaspehre mounted between the purple Umbrasphere and the cyan Cryosphere. A monument to Emily acquiring all eight spheres of the common elements.
✦✦✦
Meanwhile, at the auction house on Joyfuller Island, the auctioneers begin selling their wares. A man in a baby blue suit is among the buyers.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a treat for you today. Recently traded for an Umbrasphere is a rare item. A statuette that looks cute but holds immense potential.” He displays the statuette that Tim had sold to the man.
“He’s putting the item up for sale now,” the man says to a walkie-talkie. “Are you sure it would advance our research?”
“At the very least, acquiring it would help us explore why it was worth as much as an Elementlaist’s sphere,” the person on the other end says. “If you can get it for us, that would be appreciated, Maurice.”
“Roger,” Maurice says
“Bidding starts at—” the carnie says.
“I’m willing to pay one thousand golds,” Maurice says.
The crowd is shocked.
“Ten thousand? I can’t afford that!” a centaur man says.
“Well so much for that prize,” a dark-skinned woman says.
“Better luck next time,” a man with a straw hat says.
“Alright then,” the auctioneer says, “Bidding starts at ten thousand gold. Going one. Going twice. Sold to the man in the blue zoot.”
Maurice heads to the stand and exchanges the bag of coins for the statue. The auctioneer has a nearby financier confirm the amount. He soon gives them thumbs up.
“Thank you for your patronage,” the carnie says.
“My pleasure.” Maurice takes the statue and leaves with the rabbit statue.