You never know what’s gonna come through those doors.

Today, it was Jyn, Kalender, and Page. They were visiting the Research Guild, but for an unexpected reason.

“You want to…work here?” Cresh asked.

“That’s right,” Page said in a rather business-like tone that neither Jyn nor Kalender had ever heard before. She could be serious when she wants, huh?

“But…why?”

“Mister, I am a Librarian. I might have been out of work for a few weeks now, but at heart, I’m a problem solver. I solve problems—and I haven’t solved any problems in a long time. I just feel useless, you know?”

Cresh felt that.

Page continued, “So, I want to exercise my skills and my Skills. I think there are a lot of things I can learn here, but not by signing up for”—she pointed at the job order board—“that.”

She’d stared at the job orders there for a while, and she didn’t like any of them. It was all stuff about materials collection and research and development, but she wanted to learn things…in a sort of watching-over-your-shoulder way.

So, what better way to do that, than to help organize people’s stuff for them? It’s been kindly obvious—from how people were running left and right with stacks of paper, only to backtrack while complaining under their breath—that the local document management system was in need of an upgrade. So, she, a problem-solving Librarian, could lend a hand and, occasionally, take a peek at the contents every now and then. On her free time, of course.

“I’ll…have to bring this up with the branch manager,” Cresh said.

Page nodded, and Cresh moved away from the counter and disappeared into a corridor. He came back with the branch manager, an older woman in her 50’s, with streaks of gray hair between a mostly black head.

“So you want to work for us?” the manager said.

“That’s right.”

“Cresh here says you’re a Librarian”—a moment passed—“which seems true enough, but I’m going to need certification.”

“Oh, I’ve got certification, alright.” Page’s eyes sharply shone before she pulled out a roll of vellum.

While negotiations were on-going, Kalender and Jyn were having a light chat.

“She looks really practiced doing this, huh?” Kalender said.

“I wonder, where has the excitable Page gone?”

Kalender chuckled. “True that… Say, are you on good terms?”

“Why—yes. What brought this on?”

“You don’t talk to each other that much.”

“I suppose there are few opportunities.” Jyn observed Page for a moment. “Truthfully, Kalender…”

“Yeah?”

“She reminds me of one of my sisters.”

“Oh?”

“I had helped her prowl the smiths and crafters of Violentum for apprenticeships. She was…somewhat excitable”—she smiled slightly—“but I wouldn’t compare her to Page.”

At the mention of “smiths,” Kalender thought of Kyn at that moment.

“A younger sister, right?” he asked.

“That’s right.”

“Sounds like the youngest.”

“That’s right, actually. She should only be slightly younger than you.”

That was sounding a lot like Kyn.

“Did she…wear a mask?” he asked.

“No?… That’s oddly specific.”

“Ah, I was just making sure. I know an apprentice blacksmith in town. I thought maybe she and your sister were the same person.”

“I find that hard to believe. Violentum is 20 days away by carriage. I don’t see what she has to gain by going here, as well.”

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Page finished up and came back to them with a smile. “I got the job!”

“Oh, hey. Good job,” Kalender said. Jyn just gave a nod.

“A-and I have to start today!” She said that with a sniffle.

“O-oh… Yay?”

“Not yay! I wanted to go around a bit more!” Page sighed. “Well…I’ll be going now.”

“Oh, now?”

Page pouted. Kalender chuckled. He opened his arms for a hug, and she dived right in, giving a tight squeeze.

“Geez, it’s like we’re not gonna come around later and pick you up!” Kalender said.

Hesitantly, Page stepped away, and she kept looking back even as she disappeared into the corridor behind the reception counter.

“Welp. That just leaves my registration here, then there’s nothing to do for the afternoon—”

“Oh? ‘Nothing to do’?” Jyn said. “We haven’t trained in a while, haven’t we?”

“I—eh—ah… Ehh.”

Jyn just stared at him—gently, but intently.

“Alright, alright.” He relented with a chuckle. “If it were anyone else, I’d give ’em trouble.”

That last bit impressed on Jyn’s feelings. “R-right. I’ll be seated over there while you register.”

After that, Kalender approached Cresh.

“Don’t tell me you’re also looking for a job,” Cresh said.

“Oh, no, no. Just a normal registration.”

Cresh breathed a sigh of relief. “Finally, a normal day…”

“You sound like you had it rough before we even came in.”

Daytime Receptionist, Cressian Irulia, had a rather rough early morning dealing with the local cult, and that’s on top of finding out that the Sentinel of the Throne of Lyrica was in the area, absolutely incensed that her bath had been interrupted—thereafter inflicting damage on the castle, a sheer ruckus which was heard by anyone who wasn’t asleep.

“Something like that,” he said. “Anyway, here’s the form. You know how this works?”

“This part’s for you to fill out, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. I’ll just need your stamp there.”

Kalender paused. Lyrica’s writing system here was a logography, so things like signatures didn’t really exist.

“Ah, heck, I don’t have a stamp…”

“That’s gonna be a problem, buddy. You’re gonna need to have one made, then come back here.”

“You don’t happen to know a place, do you?”

“Sorry, I’ve just been here a few weeks.”

Kalender sighed. Bureaucracy struck once again.

…You know what else struck?

The saloon doors flung open, and in came the Sentinel herself, drawing everyone’s eyes and stopping their motions. Behind the Sentinel was the broken shell of the Princess Knight, groaning, sighing, and thoroughly complaining.

“Mother, I’m telling you, you are embarrassing me to the fullest extent!”

The Sentinel scanned the room…and locked eyes with Kalender.

“You.”

Kalender pointed to himself. “Me?”

He was really more confused than anything. By what Arpeggio just said, this lady was her mother, but, why? Why’s she here? Why’s she here for me?

Instead of Kalender, however, it was Cresh’s hairs which stood on end. Being in the same room as the Sentinel felt like standing right next to a sentient nuke, but…there was something off here.

The Sentinel of the Throne of Lyrica, the absolute Number One on the Absolute Battlefield Threats list, was radiating…angry in-law energy.

None of this made sense. An in-law? Did Kalender and the Princess Knight have a deeper relationship than he’d initially suspected?

With a gust of wind, the Sentinel disappeared, then reappeared in front of Kalender, her face uncomfortably close to his, examining his each and every imperfection. Oh, yes, she had Appraise and she was literate—a most deadly combination—and she knew what being the Champion of Reincarnation roughly entailed, but divine will be damned, she would fight anything that came from above or below before they could reach her daughter.

Meanwhile, Arpeggio was just shaking her head. She met eyes with Kalender, and she mouthed an “I profusely apologize for this.”

Kalender looked back to Amelia, showing the most confused expression he could. “Can I…help you?”

“What are your intentions towards my daughter?” she asked.

“We’re…friends?”

Shock. As the Sentinel, she had a certain set of Skills, Skills which allow her to detect and foil deception, and my oh my, this man’s words rang true—no, in fact, the world was calling it a universal constant.

Shock. Amelia fell to a knee, barely propping herself up by her halberd. “Friend?…” she muttered. Had my Arpie made a…true friend? As the Sentinel, she oh-so-despised the sycophants who seem to only want Arpeggio’s name and power. The fools couldn’t even realize her Arpie was worth so much more than that—and her Arpie was no fool, rejecting all their offers for ‘friendship.’

That only meant, however, that Amelia had made her daughter into such a perfect doll that an ordinary, trusting friendship was impossible for her to attain. She was a failure as a parent.

…But then, there was this man saying, “We’re friends.”

“How?…” she said. She looked up to Kalender with desperate eyes. The man was pretty spooked about the whole thing, and had taken a step back from the crazy halberd lady muttering nonsense. “Is… Is she doing well?”

Kalender blinked twice and gestured to Arpeggio. “She’s…right there.”

Amelia gasped and scampered to her daughter, who was utterly horrified.

“Mother! Don’t!—”

“Arpie!” Amelia cried, hugging her daughter’s legs. “I’m so sorry!—”

Kalender inched closer. Arpeggio really looked like she needed the support.

“Is…she okay?” he asked.

“Some inordinate magnitude of stress must have befallen her to make her regress into this pitiable state,” Arpeggio said. She picked up her mother and slung her over her shoulder. “Ah, before I forget, here. Take it.”

“What is it?”

Arpeggio replied by holding out a hand, and Kalender received it. It was a nubby little golden thing…

“Wait, is this a stamp?” he asked.

“If you put MP into it, it will leave a magical imprint that absolutely cannot be replicated,” Arpeggio said. “Well, then, meet you again, Kalender.”

“Uh, y-yeah. See you.” He waved goodbye…and the storm passed.

People were just sort of staring between him and the swinging saloon doors. Ignoring the gazes as best he could, he went back to Cresh. The Republic agent absentmindedly passed him a stamp pad. Kalender pushed down with the stamp handle, coating the reliefs in black, and put three stamps across the form.

Each stamp was a roundel of intricate details: of a pair of herald-angels holding trumpets above two glyphs which read as “Kalender,” two long, curved feathers encircling it all like a wreathe, and at the very bottom, between the naked quills of the feathers, was a diminutive, unadorned heart.