“I am curious why I was taken,” said Nuralie, patting one of the frogs on the head. She’d taken all three back from us and sat on the ground, her lower half buried under a frog-pile. “You two know each other, but why am I involved?”

“You’re also a level one platinum,” I offered. She frowned at me.

“You can tell what difficulty Delves people have done,” Nuralie said.

“Yeah.”

“A useful ability,” she said, beginning to massage a frog along the sides of its jaw. “I first thought that Litta had something to do with my capture. Now I do not know. Why would a Littan have grudges against members of Spiritus?”

“Spiritus?”

“What Hiwardians call the Third Layer,” she said.

“Do Littans dislike losons?” I asked, sitting down next to the scaled woman. Although I had a rough understanding of world history and geography, the topic of modern geopolitics had not yet made it to my library list.

“I am young, and I have lived most of my life in the deep swamps, but even I was taught of the past tensions between Litta and Eschendur. It has only grown worse. I can’t even return to Eschendur anymore.”

“Is that because of the blockade?” I asked.

“Yes and no. I am one of four from Eschendur selected to attend the Creation Delve two years ago. The other three were each priests in one of the faiths of the triune. I was the neutral choice for those of us who still live in the wilds. When the Delve was completed the priests returned home, but I stayed behind to explore Hiward. When I finished my tour six months ago and attempted to return, my vessel was stopped by the blockade. I was offered the choice of being ferried the rest of the way by the Littans, or returning. I chose to return.”

“You didn’t believe they’d ferry you safely.”

She tilted her head to one side.

“They set up a naval blockade across the shores of my homeland. Littans encroach on our borders. I am a Delver who, even at level one, is worth more than ten normal soldiers on the battlefield. I am no true fighter… my passion lies in alchemy, but that does not matter. Enemy Delvers are a threat to any army, regardless of their specialty. I have no doubt that if I had accepted, my corpse would now be held in the embrace of Mother Geul at the bottom of the ocean.”

“I see… that sounds tough.”

Pause.

“Yes. I worry for my clan. They will be sheltered from an invasion in the wilds.” Pause. “But trade with the tranquil dioceses is crucial for their survival. I thought that the Littans had sent an agent to kill me since I did not surrender at their blockade, but that would not explain why the two of you were also taken. I am still alive as well, so upon reflection my initial theory is flawed.”

“Do you remember much about being taken?”

“My memories are similar to Lady Xim’s. I was granted temporary permits to open an alchemy shop in Foundation due to the blockade. I live there as well. I was working into the night on several brews when someone appeared in my workshop. After that, all was dark until I awoke to your rescue.” Pause. “All those products are probably ruined.”

“I don’t think ‘rescue’ is the right word,” I said. “Your captor walked off, and Myria and Lito did most of the fighting up here. I just beat up some warehouse workers, which can probably be classified as bullying given how easy it was.”

Nuralie placed a hand on my arm.

“Where is your flower?” she asked.

“Oh, I put it in my inventory for safekeeping.” She gave me her usual unmoving stare, and I decided to retrieve the flower. She took it from my hand and brushed my hair back to tuck it behind my ear. It was still dripping water. She stared for a moment longer, then went back to petting her frogs.

“That looks nice,” said Xim.

One of the frogs crawled away from Nuralie and into my lap. I wasn’t sure how to pet a frog, so I gave it a gentle scratch under the chin. It closed its eyes in satisfaction, which was pretty cute. We all sat in silence for a few minutes, water trickling down my neck and shoulder, when Myria walked over to us.

“Well, kids,” she said, “we get to go and talk to the big boss man!”

****

The “big boss man” was not big. He was, in fact, very small. He was also covered in long white fur, and sat in what appeared to be a very professional high-chair. He had big black eyes, was at most two-and-a-half feet tall, and looked like a baby yeti.

His name was Umi-Doo.

Umi-Doo was a level twenty-six Delver with gold, silver, and copper in his soul, along with a thin network of violet striations that looked like the icy patterns of a snowflake. I was thankful that I’d kept the sensitivity of my soul-sight reduced, or else his presence would have turned my eyes into charcoal briquettes.

He sat at the head of a round wooden table in a large conference room on the first floor of the Dark Iron Palace. Xim, Nuralie, and I sat flanked by Lito and Myria. There’d originally been three other members of Hiward’s Central Delver Authority present, and I’d worried that the interview would dive too deeply into my personal affairs. Umi-Doo had quickly dismissed them, however, citing a series of rules pertaining to ‘emergency powers granted to the director of Central’.

Umi-Doo studied the five of us in silence for a time, his eyes settling on me for longer than was comfortable. Eventually, he levitated out of his polished-wood high chair and landed on top of the table. He walked to the opposite end, where he gazed out of a large window that overlooked the river running through the middle of Foundation.

“Please send your familiar away, Esquire Arlo.”

I glanced up at Grotto, whose eyes were boring into Umi-Doo’s back.

“Is there somewhere within the palace I should send him?” I asked.

“That pocket dimension you have will suffice. We will wait while you do so.”

My head jerked back at the statement. I hadn’t told anyone about my Pocket Closet, and I doubted that the surviving members of the Artemix group had discerned the room’s true nature when we fought within it.

The others gave me curious glances. I shrugged, then stood and spent a minute concentrating on opening the Closet. The group peered within when the door sprang into existence, with the exception of Umi-Doo who continued staring out the window, but no one moved to take a closer look. Grotto floated inside, making his dissatisfaction known to me psychically, then I spent the minute required to close the door.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Umi-Doo turned back to face us, and I decided a moment of upfront honesty would be prudent, since the insight displayed by this small man seemed extraordinary.

“Grotto will still be able to monitor our discussion,” I said.

“Yes, through that psychic link of yours. I also predict you’d tell him what happens here even if that didn’t exist. I’m curious why you trust a creature like that so much, but that’s your decision to make. I merely do not want the thing floating around installing traps and trying to whisper insidious nonsense into our minds while we discuss. He wouldn’t accomplish anything, but the wards within the palace would cause a disruption to our meeting if he were to attempt to do so.”

“Oh,” I said, dumbly.

How did he know so much about Grotto?

Umi-Doo levitated back to the center of the table, and several books appeared in the air around him, slowly revolving around his small form. Three hovered over and landed before me. Another landed in front of Nuralie, one in front of Xim, and two in front of Lito. There were none for Myria.

Umi-Doo looked thoughtful for a second, then one more book appeared in the air and floated over to place itself at the bottom of the neat pile in front of me.

I looked over the titles. The first two were highly relevant to my current skill set.

Dimensionalism and You: Volume II

Auras! Not Just For Beginners

The third dealt with a topic I was planning on pursuing the moment I had the free time to do so.

Enchantment to Enhancement: Mana Weaving Guide and Runic Encyclopedia

I was a bit confused by the fourth, however.

Can I Have Sex with That? An Illustrated Guide to Viable Breeding Pairs Between Arzian Races.

I peeked at the books given to Xim and Nuralie. The Eschen received Alchemical Divinity Volume IV. Whereas Xim was given a book whose title was written in harsh, blocky symbols that I couldn’t read. My eyes also began to itch when I tried to decipher it. Xim looked very pleased with the tome, gasping and immediately beginning to flip through it.

All of the books listed Umi-Doo as one of the primary authors.

“That dimensionalism book will help you reduce the time required to open that pocket dimension, Arlo,” Umi-Doo said. “I’m also pleased to find someone using an aura. It’s rare these days. I blame the academy. No good aura users amongst the faculty, and a good bit of prejudice toward those who use them as well. Difficult topic to study as a result, but that second book should prove helpful. We can always use more mana weavers as well. You’d think we’d have more practitioners, but most lack the patience to curate the skill. Why learn to weave a magical weapon when you can just buy one and spend the time learning to swing it better?” He frowned and made a sound that was a cross between a purr and a snort. “I’m glad you’re showing interest.”

“Thanks,” I said. “These genuinely look very helpful, but what about this fourth one?”

Xim and Nuralie leaned over and read the title. They were sitting on either side of me, so it made me feel a bit crowded. They exchanged a strange look between each other, paused in that unnerving loson manner, then went back to leafing through their respective gifts.

“Among other things,” said Umi-Doo, “the art is very well-done. Worth taking some time to appreciate.” He waggled his furry eyebrows.

“I see.”

I decided not to peruse the contents of that one until I was someplace more private.

“Maybe I can borrow that later,” Xim whispered without looking away from her own book.

“Lito, more books on etiquette,” said Umi-Doo. “One day it might stick. Myria, still not much of a reader?”

“Maybe if you had another one with pretty pictures inside.”

Umi-Doo nodded and another tome appeared, floating to Myria. She tucked it into her inventory before I could read the title.

“Xim and Nuralie, your texts are self-explanatory. Now then, to business.”

Finished with his random acts of charity, Umi-Doo waved a hand and a map of Arzia appeared in the air before us. Hiward sat at its center, surrounded by a large stretch of sea on every side which ended at the shores of several bordering nations on the north, east, and west. South led to the open ocean, with another large island nation far to the southwest. The Less-Than-Habitable Forest that Xim had once mentioned laid to the southeast, massive and sprawling. I was surprised it was real. I scanned the map for the Oddly-Named Forest, but couldn’t find it. She had been fucking with me.

image [https://i.imgur.com/TNJDvyR.jpg]

“There is presently a curious convergence of events occurring in Arzia. Your conflict with Tanker Demarsus this afternoon represents an escalation that I believe signals a point of no return for certain unknown parties who are involved behind the scenes.”

“Our warehouse brawl is an international incident?” said Myria.

“Taken alone, no. It is merely an egregious breach of the peace within the Hiwardian capital city as the result of various top-level offenses perpetrated or enabled by a mid-rank Delver of noble station in an obvious and poorly-executed attempt to abduct four promising level one platinum Delvers.”

“Four Delvers?” I said.

“Yes, four. In addition to you three, an attempt was made on Lord Varrin Ravvenblaq last night.”

“They went after Varrin?” said Lito, leaning forward and resting his elbows on the table. “He’d be back in the Ravvenblaq estate by now. Not many places with a higher concentration of powerful Delvers.”

“Normally, yes,” said Umi-Doo. “Such a crime would be nigh-suicidal if the Ravvenblaq matriarch and patriarch were within a hundred miles of the grounds. Unfortunately, they were not.”

“Varrin’s parents aren’t the matriarch and patriarch?” I asked.

“No,” said Lito. “They’re the current reigning Thundralke couple who rule the lands, but his paternal great-grandparents are the true rulers of the house itself.”

“And two of the most powerful Delvers on the planet,” said Myria.

That gave me a better understanding of why Varrin had been so confident going into a platinum Delve. His parents had also been platinum, and I could only assume his great-grandparents were as well if they were as strong as Myria believed. Did that mean his grandparents were also platinum Delvers? On both sides? What about his other great-grandparents? I briefly imagined six geriatric couples wielding unfathomable magic power. That’d make for a hell of a bingo game.

“However,” said Umi-Doo, “neither Ealdric senior nor his wife Jasmaena were in the country, responding to an emergency request for assistance with a large mana eruption in the Eschen Wastes near the northern forests of the Kingdom of Ayama.” A portion of the map was highlighted in red toward the northern part of the continent.

“Ayama requested assistance?” Lito said, disbelieving.

“God-King Ayamari contacted them herself,” said Umi-Doo. “Though, perhaps ‘request’ is a gracious way of characterizing it.”

“I bet,” said Lito.

“In addition,” a new part of the map was highlighted far to the west, “the most active high-level Ravvenblaq Delver team was also indisposed due to the sudden discovery of a special-grade Delve in western Timagrin, near the Mittak border.”

“Are you suggesting the attempted abduction was one of convenience?” said Lito. “Or that the kidnappers themselves organized these high-profile occurrences?”

“The kidnappers themselves? No. The organization that hired them? Perhaps.”

“You just said that the kidnappings were poorly-executed,” said Lito. “Managing to manipulate the Ravvenblaqs, through Ayamari no less, would require a great deal of planning, foresight, and information gathering. Enough that you would think the crimes these events are enabling would be better organized.”

“On their face, each abduction had a good fucking chance of working, if you’ll excuse my colorful language,” said Umi-Doo. “My understanding of the events that unfolded in the Ravvenblaq Thundry are such that the abduction would have succeeded, if not for the presence of two unaffiliated and powerful Delvers.”

“Mom and dad!” said Xim, leaning forward.

“Correct. There were no official plans for the Xor’Drels to visit Ravvenblaq. Such an event may have been unforeseen to any would-be ne'er-do-wells. Two full parties of level fifteen-odd Delvers were deployed to abduct Varrin, and it was a harsh fight between the Ravvenblaq defenders and the invaders. I understand a significant portion of the main manor house was destroyed. All friendly parties involved are safe and well, so no need for worry, Lady Xim.”

Xim nodded and slowly sat back in her chair.

“Where in the hells did ten Delvers willing to attack the Ravvenblaqs, of all people, come from?” Lito asked.

“An excellent question,” said Umi-Doo. “We have no fucking idea.”

A chill ran over the room.

“If you’ll excuse my colorful language.”