“It’s weird. It’s really, really weird,” Naomi muttered.

“I agree. For something like this to happen, it’s definitely a first time for me,” Jordan admitted.

Tavick and the others all nodded their heads as they sat around, chewing on their lunch. It was the next day, and Lokias’ official second day of dungeon traveling with the Sunset Griffin party.

Only Lokias seemed puzzled. “What exactly is strange? I haven’t noticed anything out of place.”

“You,” Naomi mumbled, “Embody all that is clueless. Of course you didn’t notice anything.”

“Everyone’s just a bit worked up, Lokias,” Elazar chimed in. “We haven’t seen sight nor sound of a single monster for almost two days. At the rate things are going, it’s just becoming more likely that we won’t complete our job. Supplies will only last us for another three days, and it still takes two days to reach the surface from here. There isn’t much time left for hunting.”

After their break, the party stood up to continue the search. But three more hours passed where not a single monster was seen. Jordan was preparing to call it off. Bad enough that they couldn’t find any monsters, but even if they did, it was unlikely for a Catilik Beetle to appear among their number.

Just as he was turning around to tell the group, Naomi perked her head up and made a quick silencing motion with her hand.

“Something’s coming!” She hissed.

The group hastily prepared, entering defensive postures and aiming their weapons in the direction she indicated. All but Lokias, who stood upright, staring down the tunnel with a bright look in his eyes.

Naomi prodded him in the stomach. “What are you doing?! Get to the rear if you’re just going to stand around in our way!”

Lokias replied, but so that only Naomi could hear. “It is not a monster ahead of us, however. It is four other people, like you.”

“Like us?” Naomi paused, considering that wording for a short moment before snapping her attention back towards the approaching party.

“Ho there, you six!” A voice came from up ahead. “Identify yourselves!”

They had been seen and counted before the opposing party could be identified, proving that whoever the strangers were, they had someone with superior senses on their team. But, they were human. Elazar breathed a sigh of relief.

Jordan replied, “We are the adventuring party, the Sunset Griffin! Now state your names!”

“The Sunset Griffin? I’ve heard of you… a C-rank adventuring party if I’m not mistaken?”

An annoyed look showed up on Jordan’s face. “That’s right, now who are you?”

The mysterious group, led by a handsome man with a casual stride, appeared within range of the light emitted from Tavick’s lantern. The man was tall, with a square jaw and curly brown hair. His chest plate gleamed in the light, and he wore a confident smile that screamed of gallantry.

“J-Juniver Kolpas!” Jordan stuttered. He straightened his back, as if trying to appear more presentable. “Sorry for my rudeness, I didn’t realize it was you!”

The man named Juniver, still smiling, nodded graciously in response.

“Hmph. What are you lot doing here?” An arrogant voice came from behind. A short and thin man with furrowed brows appeared. “You’re the Sunset Griffin, right? Shouldn’t you be on the surface, aiding the city?”

“Helping the city? What for?” asked Jordan.

“Did something happen?” Tavick added.                      

“What do you mean, ‘did something happen?’ How long have you been down here?” The thin man questioned.

“A little over a week.”

“Then surely you noticed it right? You guys can’t be that blind.”

The party members glanced between one another, shaking their heads. The man, who was watching the looks on everyone’s faces, snickered loudly.

“Hah, what a bunch of fools you are! And you’re one of the top teams in Acoria? From what I can tell, you’re just here to drag down the names of us hard-working adventurers with you.”

“Now now, Givol, calm down. I’m sure that they’re just lacking a mage sensitive to the flows of mana. It isn’t their fault,” Juniver intervened.

Elazar lowered his head, shadowing his face so that no one could see his expression, while at the same time, Tavick was hard at work holding back Naomi, who acted very much like she wanted to show Givol just how much she was ‘dragging down the adventurers.’ Jordan maintained his calm, but his fists were tightly clenched.

Juniver continued speaking, now with an apologetic smile on his face. “What Givol was trying to say was the poor state that Acoria is in right now. The flow of mana from the Abyss has stopped… do you know what that means?”

Elazar quietly gasped, previous embarrassment forgotten. “It has? But, if that’s true… the results would be catastrophic, especially if it were permanent! The city would be thrown into chaos, wardstones would stop working, along with any other artifacts that draw upon the wellspring of mana… wait a moment… so that’s why the readings of my sensor were so odd!”

“That’s right. The city of Acoria has called upon all adventurers to help bolster defenses while countermeasures are thought up. Raid squads are being formed to patrol for monsters, and from what I hear, the Murians might be on the move. We were sent on a special mission to scout out the deep levels and try and find the cause of the mana disappearance, but all other adventurers are to report in at the guildhouse for duty. You’d better hurry, when a state of emergency is called and registered adventurers don’t show up, blacklisting has been known to happen.” Juniver explained.

“Thank you very much for the warning. We had better be going soon if that’s the case,” Jordan said, respectfully lowering his head in gratitude.

“Mm,” Juniver nodded. “Take care on your journey up.”

However, just as they were preparing to go their separate ways, the not-so quiet voice of Lokias could be heard happily questioning Elazar in the background. “Murians are on the move, he said? Are they some sort of creature? And what is this ‘blacklisting’ he spoke of?”

Elazar gaped at him, then glanced nervously over at the senior adventuring group.

Givol paused, as if just noticing the one person dressed differently than the other members of Sunset Griffin, and a flash of realization gleamed in his eyes.

“Hey, you! I don’t recognize you. Are you part of the Sunset Griffin? Where’s your adventurer identification?”

"What's that?" Lokias inquired.

Elazar hastily spoke up. “Um, what he means to say is, he lost his identification a few days ago in a skirmish with some monsters, so he needs to get a new one at the guildhouse. Surely you’ll let him go, right?”

But Givol wasn’t willing to let things slide. He unsheathed his short sword by a fraction from its sheath. “It’s illegal for citizens to enter the Abyss, as you well know. And it’s illegal for an adventurer to be without his identification in a place like this. If he doesn’t have a badge, then…” He paused, chuckling evilly. “You’d better give him up.”

A look of disgust came over Naomi’s face. “What kind of a nutcase are you, huh? Don’t think we’ll just roll over and give him up! If it’s a fight you want, it’s a fight you’ll get!”

She readied her bow, nocking an arrow to the string.

The rest of the party tensed. Though Lokias wasn’t a member of their team, the Sunset Griffin were, for the most part, the type that would quickly befriend anyone, so Lokias was already considered an ally by them. Though his background was still shrouded in mystery and his awareness of the world at large seemed sorely lacking at times, his character had already been endeared in the hearts of the party members.

Jordan threw Juniver a pleading glance.

“Can you talk to him, please? Lokias isn’t a criminal, he’s been with us for our entire journey. This is just a misunderstanding!”

Juniver, all traces of his previous friendly attitude now wiped out, adopted a deadpan expression. “It’s a serious infraction of the law to enter a restricted area without valid identification. I’m sorry, but you’d best stand down if you know what’s good for you. Givol, as a B-rank adventurer stationed in Acoria, has the authorization to carry out the law in place of state authorities. And he’s-”

“Ah, here it is!” Lokias exclaimed, holding up an object he had just fished out from inside his cloak. “If I am not mistaken, this is a badge, correct?”

What he was proudly displaying in his hand was a circular metal disk, three inches in diameter. In the very center there was fixed a blue gemstone one inch across, and a series of similarly blue lines spread out from that gemstone across the rest of the metallic surface of the badge in dizzyingly beautiful patterns. It was an exquisite piece of craftsmanship, but Givol only sneered viciously at the sight of it.

“I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, but that isn’t any adventurer’s badge I’ve ever seen. Heh heh, after I cut you up though, I’ll happily accept that offering…”

He pulled out the rest of his wickedly curved sword, and took a step towards the group. Everyone’s expressions tightened, and they pulled in closer towards Lokias, who was looking a little confused. Jordan spoke under his breath.

“Givol is a B2-rank assassin. We won’t stand a chance if we show him our backs. Miriam, we need you to go on the offensive since you’re the only one who’ll be able to hit him.”

Miriam mutely nodded, bringing her hands into the folds of her cloak, where the mysterious clanking noise came forth once again.

“The rest of us will be trying to draw his focus. The biggest problem will be if the other three decide to intervene, so what we need to do is hit him hard and then run for it, before they have the chance to get involved. Once Miriam takes out Givol, Elazar needs to deploy a smokescreen to cover for us. Then we’ll run in the direction they came from as fast as we can. No looking back. Got it?”

The Sunset Griffin showed their acknowledgement by, as one, preparing for combat. Naomi raised her bow and aimed it at Givol, Jordan drew his falchion, Tavick raised his oak staff, Miriam lowered her stance, and Elazar began muttering the strange and arcane syllables to a spell. Only Lokias furrowed his brow and, for the first time since meeting the Sunset Griffin, he showed a perturbed look.

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But all this was interrupted by a choking sound that came from behind Juniver. One of the members of his party, a blonde-haired and clean shaven man who had not spoken a word until now, was staring at Lokias, eyes bulging out.

Forcefully, he squeezed out a few words. “I… remember it now…”

And as he said that, a wild look came over him. “That badge… that badge! You… must stop, Givol! STOP!”

Everyone paused, staring at the cause of the sudden outburst. Givol hesitated as well, and turned to the man. “What’s this all about, Serell?”

Serell didn’t bother replying to him, and instead turned to the Sunset Griffin and deeply bowed, fear now present in his eyes. “Great Lord, please forgive us! We did not recognize your insignia for what it was, and for that you have our greatest apologies.”

He quickly switched his gaze to his teammates. “Bow!” He hissed. “Bow if you know what’s good for you!”

Stiffly, awkwardly, the other two lowered their heads in the direction of Lokias, leaving Givol alone staring blankly at his team. Only when Serell looked right into his eyes with a manic glare did Givol finally incline his head towards the now-dumbfounded party.

One by one, they turned to look at Lokias, who was still holding the badge in his hand. He spoke at last, turning to his friends.

“That seems to conclude things here, we should go now!”

Without waiting for confirmation or even acknowledging Serell’s actions, he walked off at a brisk pace, forcing the rest to scramble after him. The last of the group to leave, Jordan, turned and gave the four still-bowing adventurers one last look, catching the eye of Juniver. It was no longer admiration that appeared in Jordan’s eyes when he looked at him, but a hint of something else. Juniver averted his gaze first, turning back to his teammates.

When Jordan’s back finally faded into the distant shadows, he was the first to speak.

“Serell, you had better explain yourself. Quickly. That badge was no noble crest.”

The man named Serell was standing in place, frozen solid. Sweat dripped down his face and soaked into his expensive-looking outfit. When he spoke, his voice was very faint.

“Juniver, you know my background, right?”

“You are a third cousin of the previous Southern Duke. The only reason I bowed was because I assumed you knew something that I didn’t. So speak up, before I decide we’re better off as a three-man party and then go after those six and clean them up myself,” he growled.

Juniver was a man who respected his image. He maintained it meticulously, keeping himself pristine and pure in the public eye. Underneath, however, he was a far more ruthless man. If the Sunset Griffin were going to reach the surface and speak ill of him, then he would prefer they not reach the surface at all.

Serell sighed. “Truthfully, I don’t know what that crest represents. I’ve only seen it once before in my life.”

Givol practically roared in response. “And so you had us all bow to some unknown badge?! You fucking wretch, I ought to skewer you through here and now!” But before he could draw his sword and act on his impulses, he was held down by the fourth member of the party, a heavyset bald man wearing full plate armor. He calmly nodded for Serell to continue, which he did, launching into a monologue.

“You all know of the previous king, right? Berinon. He was a proud man. Prouder than the last ten generations of our rulers put together. I mean, he began the War of the Eight, which isn’t something just anyone could’ve done. He had the arrogance that believed he was destined to rule everything under the sky…”

His faint voice grew gradually stronger here.

“Which it turns out he couldn’t. But this isn’t about his downfall… I’m solely talking about his character right now. I saw him once, when I was a kid, so I think I know his personality pretty well. He came to visit the lands of the Southern Duke, and I watched him arrive with a retinue of five thousand knights. Five thousand! We had to use civilian stables to house all their horses since the Southern Keep couldn’t hold them all. And when he showed up at our gates and my cousin went out to greet him, the first thing King Berinon did was roar at him for not having maintained his roads well enough. I’d never seen anyone yell at my cousin before. I didn’t know it was possible. But the Duke just took his insults without lifting a finger in retaliation.

“And that night, we had a feast. King Berinon sat in the seat of honor with the Duke on his left and the Queen at his right. I was way down near the other end of the table, but I had a good view of everything. And what I saw, which surprised me greatly, were two people sitting in the balcony above the dining hall, directly over the seat of honor.

“It was a huge infraction of the rules.

“No one was supposed to be higher than the seat of honor. If someone had pulled that with only the Southern Duke present, he still probably would have gotten himself hanged, but this was King Berinon!

“But no one said anything. I thought I must have been the only person who noticed them, and I kept it to myself. I wanted to get a closer look at those two people. They were behind a veil in the balcony, so I couldn’t make out their faces, but I wanted to know who was brave enough to place themselves over the King.

“So, after the meal, I hurried over to the staircase that leads down from the balcony, and hid around a pillar, peeking out at it.

“Then I saw them. They strode down the steps as gracefully as fairies; a man and a woman. Their skin was dark, like the nomads of the west, but somehow it was far more beautiful than that. Their clothes were made of fabrics I couldn’t recognize, their hair was long and golden, but their eyes…”

Serell gulped and shuddered, shaking himself free of his feverish dream.

“At any rate, they were magnificent. It was otherworldly. And emblazoned on their robes was an emblem… the same emblem that that man held up, Lokias.”

The other three party members glanced at one another, before turning their attention back to Serell.

“If it was just this, I wouldn’t have had any reason to bow to that emblem, but there’s more. At the time, I assumed they were a pair of foreign dignitaries who simply held themselves in higher regard than our King. I even felt indignant towards them at the time, thinking the country of Astrana was being slighted.

“But three nights later, I saw Berinon talking to them. It was midnight, and the three of them were alone in a courtyard. I had been following that couple when I could for the past few days, and something I discovered was that they never once interacted with any members of the keep or even the King’s retinue. Hell, I never even saw them eat!

“I was, of course, wondering why they were meeting… and so I hid nearby and listened in. I was only nine years old, and I knew that place like the back of my hand, so it was easy enough for me to crawl behind a statue and keep still and silent. Had I been caught I definitely would have been killed, but I was very careful to avoid discovery.

“Anyway, I missed the earlier part of their conversation, but Berinon was acting worried. He was looking at the ground and not meeting their eyes. The woman was talking to him, but her voice was very strange. I remember at the time that I recognized the words she was saying, but as soon as they entered my ears, they slipped right out of my head. I’m certain now that it was a magic spell meant to conceal her speech, so it was impossible to understand her and even to this day I do not know what she said. Berinon, however, I could still hear.

“And he was begging.”

- - -

Further up the passage and growing increasingly further from the B-rank adventurer party, were the briskly travelling members of the Sunset Griffin. They followed behind Lokias who strode forward with an unusually complicated look on his face. After an hour of this, he finally began to slow down.

Jordan was the first to approach him.

“Hey, Lokias, what happened back there?”

He remained silent.

“I mean, I don’t understand the ordeal with that badge or anything, but what is it that has you so worked up?”

Lokias looked at him. “I do not like those people.”

“You aren’t the only one!” Naomi snorted from behind them.

“No, I… I just felt that we had to leave that place quickly, before I acted upon impulse. I apologize for worrying you. And thank you, for protecting me. I do not think that you needed to do that.”

Jordan grinned. “Listen, Lokias. You’re traveling with us, which makes you one of us. You’ve given us no reason to doubt you, so until you do, we’ll stand by your side.”

“There he goes again. It’s always so embarrassing when Jordan does this,” Naomi muttered.

Lokias smiled. “And I will stand by yours as well.”

“So then,” Tavick interrupted, walking up between the two and slapping Lokias on the back. “Now that we’ve got all our allegiances worked out, what’s the situation with that badge that had those reprobates shaking in their boots back there?”

Lokias held up the badge. “Do you not recognize this?”

Everyone shook their heads.

“Neither do I,” he sighed, a trace of sadness showing in his expression. “I received this from someone, but I do not know its background.”

Elazar frowned. “Could I see that for a moment?”

After taking the badge in his hands and turning it over a few times, he spoke. “This badge contains some sort of magic formation on it, but I can’t tell you what it’s for. I imagine some of the teachers at the Academy might be able to figure it out, though.”

“The Academy of Magic?” Lokias asked.

“The one and only. In Astrana, at least.”

Lokias looked up at the ceiling, thirty meters above his head, anticipation showing on his face.

“How long until we reach the surface?” He asked.

“Well, after accounting for all the wrong turns you made as we followed you for this past hour, it should take us a little under forty hours,” Jordan explained.

“Ah,” Lokias said, slightly flustered.

Naomi smirked. “At least you have the decency to look embarrassed. So you’re ready to leave this dungeon, huh?”

“Yes. I am.” He replied.