When I come to, I feel like I've been transported back to the demons' prison. I'm in a cell with Izumi and Mamoru, and we're all a tangled mess of limbs. We must have been thrown down without a care. There's not even a cot for one of us to monopolize. It's cramped, and the smooth, rocky floor is cold to the touch. At least we aren't bound.

  My stirring awakens the other two, who are just as quick to try detangling themselves from each other. They gaze around, glassy-eyed but no doubt trying their best to figure out the situation.

  "Hiyori?" Izumi asks in a quiet voice.

  "I'm here."

  "And what am I, chopped onions?"

  Mamoru can make even a kidnapping about himself. I swear, once that Chosen Hero crap goes to your head, you're insufferable forever.

  Izumi ignores him and wraps me in a hug. Her breath tickles my ear as she whispers, "I think we found our Theives' Guild."

  Snake masks askew, their real faces showing, half a dozen men and women are gathered around a table, loudly eating their evening meal. It smells marvelous.

  A nervous whinny lets us know that, somehow, Mamoru's horse has been stolen away along with us. That unfortunate beast. Has anyone even thought to give him a name? When we get out of here, I'm going to treat him to all the carrots he could possibly want.

  "Hey, look here! The nosy foreigners have woken up!" a voice cuts through the rowdy conversation. "Who wants the first crack at 'em?"

  We're right here, I want to say, but I also don't want to get on the bad side of the man who approaches us with twin daggers at his hips.

  "No, Styx, I'll handle them."

  Another voice pierces the silence. It sounds like a young woman, but she's just a little too far away for us to see her properly. She pulls her mask back across her face before walking over. Her weapon of choice is a single longsword.

  "I don't know who you are or why Windwood hired you, but you need to get out of town now." She shakes her head and telltale red curls bounce at the nape of her neck. "I won't be taken away from my real family."

  My stomach sinks. "Lilah?"

  "What of it?"

  "He misses you so much," Izumi says. "Why are you here? How could you call them your real family?"

  "They took me in long before he did." She doesn't sound convinced of her own story. "And took care of me long after, too."

  "So why agree to be his daughter in the first place?"

  "I don't have to explain myself to strangers like you. Look at that awful starting gear. What are you, low-rent mercs?"

  "Adventurers," Izumi corrects her.

  "Whatever. Trying to make a name for yourself by sucking up to the rich, doing their little fetch quests—"

  "I told you!" Mamoru interrupts, pointing at Izumi. "It's a fetch quest, not an escort quest!"

  I can't see her expression beneath the full-face mask, but I can guess from her tone that it's one of scorn. "Eyes over here. Listen up. You're going to forget you saw me, you're going to tell my— "

  She's going to call him her father. I know it. We just have to press harder. Maybe if we reveal our true identities it will be enough to convince her. Then again, she fits in well here – too well. Maybe she's like Maaya. Maybe she prefers it here.

  "You're going to tell Lord Windwood," Lilah continues, "That you couldn't find his daughter. Then you're going to leave this city. You shouldn't butt into things that don't concern you."

  "Don't you miss him?" Izumi asks. "Even a little?"

  "He's an easy mark. That's it."

  "You got yourself adopted just to get your hands on a few magic items?"

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  "Windwood's no better than any other noble. He's just easier to manipulate because he'll bend over backwards for anyone who isn't scared of his curse."

  His curse! That's it!

  "Don't you want to see him before... you know." I make a choked sound and throw my head back, playing dead.

  "What are you talking about?" Izumi and Lilah ask at the same time.

  "Honesty is the best policy, Izumi," I lie. "We shouldn't keep it from her just because she doesn't want to go back."

  "Did you hit your head, Hiyori?"

  Izumi can't take a hint, and Mamoru doesn't care enough to engage with the conversation. I have to turn this around before it's too late and my ruse is blown.

  "His talisman is almost out of magic, Lilah. He's running out of time. He's spending all of his money trying to find you instead of commissioning a new one."

  I can't believe the nonsense words coming out of my mouth. There's no way I can fake a fantasy plot like this. And yet, it seems to give Lilah pause.

  "He's what?" She sounds angry.

  "Honor a man's dying wishes, Lilah. Go back and see him."

  Her hands clench into fists. She pulls the mask to the side, revealing her face. Her green eyes are watery, but she scowls. "You must think I'm a real sap to fall for that."

  It didn't work?

  "Get that dumb look off your face," Lilah says. "I know Windwood, and he's got a whole trove of talismans. His life was never in danger."

  "But thinking about it made you sad, didn't it?"

  "No. I'm just bored to tears by your terrible attempt to get me on your side."

  "Lilah, please—"

  "Quit while you're ahead," Mamoru finally speaks up with another strike against me.

  "Why do you care so much?" Lilah demands, bringing her face all too close to the bars of our cell. "Why do adventurers care about one lying girl?"

  "Because you're more than that." It's Izumi with those uplifting words. "You made Windwood happy."

  "By lying to him."

  "Half-truths are still truths. He's so worn out from looking for you."

  "I told you, I don't care about him that way."

  "You should." Izumi sighs. "Please, help us understand."

  "Don't you want to go home?" I ask.

  "Windwood's manor isn't home. And I never said I wasn't going back. I'm just not going to be carried off by a bunch of money-grubbing troublemakers."

  "I mean home to Earth." I'm trying Plan B, even though I don't have faith in it.

  Her voice is barely a whisper. "What did you say?"

  "You worked at The Flowering Tea Emporium, didn't you?" I ask. "I recognize you from the news. We worked there, too."

  "They worked there," Mamoru interjects.

  "I... I was studying abroad and needed a part-time job."

  "And then Sinensis took you. It's okay. We're here to defeat him," I tell her.

  "Shhhh. Don't say that name around here. And keep it down. They think I'm from the neighboring country."

  "Lilah!" the call from her comrade Styx comes right on cue. "You ain't even roughed them up yet!"

  "I'm getting to it!" she calls back over her shoulder. "They're giving me some good intel on where Windwood plans to get his next shipment of talismans."

  "Knew they would talk easy," Styx booms contentedly. "Keep at it, then."

  "Look, I'm only supposed to be gone for a few days to deliver some goods," Lilah tells us. "And then I'm going back undercover."

  "That makes sense. You pretend to be his daughter, you sneak items out a handful at a time, the Guild gets rich, and he doesn't notice because he's so in love with his perfect child."

  "Was that so hard to understand from the start?"

  Mamoru is the one to sigh now. "So you're just a con artist."

  "Got a problem with it?"

  "Not really. Seems kinda shitty to swindle a dying man, though."

  "Stuff it. He's got more than enough money to spare."

  "Is that really for you to decide?"

  Maybe underneath all of that attitude, Mamoru really does have the aptitude to be the Chosen Hero.

  "The point is, I'm going back alone and you're getting lost. We'll keep you for the night, then escort you outside of Cha tomorrow morning so you can't get in the way."

  "Just tell me, what made you decide to do it?" I ask.

  "No thanks. Coming from the same world doesn't make us friends," she says. "We're not confidantes, we're not comrades-in-arms. It's everyone for themselves out here."