After a back-and-forth race over the swamp, Iris cackled with wild joy as she soared towards the Gaping Maw where it hung perched on an outstretched branch and suspended by vines. Victoria was within sight behind her, having been left behind when Iris came into a particularly advantageous wind stream. They had traded places many times throughout the journey, with Victoria sustaining higher speeds during long stretches but unable to make use of the winds that carried Iris into bursts of speed to frequently retake the lead. That alone hadn’t been enough to earn Iris a victory, but the added benefit of skipping across the sky with her blips made the final difference.
When she reached the ship, Iris didn’t wait for Victoria to catch up — there would be plenty of time to gloat later over the dinner the party would certainly be sharing that night. Instead she slowed her speed and circled around to approach the crow’s nest from above. Feeling invigorated and confident from her exciting journey and fresh victory, she hopped off her broom and fell through the air in a downwards arc towards the crow’s nest. Her aim wasn’t perfect and she was on track to fall just short of the structure, but two consecutive blips brought her just above the damaged roof and then onto the floor within. She landed in a crouch as her broom absorbed most of her momentum, and quickly rose and spun around to see a wide-eyed Eli with his jaw agape.
“Did you just—” he trailed off, half pointing upwards.
“Fall from the sky?” Iris asked, shrugging, “yeah, I can fly now.”
“Where were you?” he asked, he was tense but didn’t explode into an outburst as she expected.
“Alone and lost for a while, but I met some friends who took care of me and helped me get back here. I’ll tell you all about it later,” her face fell slightly, “I promise I didn’t mean to be gone so long.”
“It’s not your fault,” Eli said, noticeably struggling to find the words he wouldn’t usually say, “I’m just glad you’re back. We were starting to think this was finally the time we lost you.”
“And yet you didn’t come looking for me,” Iris said with a smirk.
“I tried!” Eli quickly insisted, “Vic said I wouldn’t be any help!”
Iris faked a scoff, “and you just listened to her? Wow, okay.”
“Iris—”
“Nope, it’s okay, I get it,” Iris stepped backwards and threw herself over the half-wall and out of the window.
Eli ran to the edge to lean over and look down after her, watching her blip her way down the beams and ropes.
Next, Iris appeared in the infirmary, where a weary looking Titus was tending to several unconscious and severely injured patients, presumably the worst-off survivors of the balrog attack. He only noticed her arrival when he finished pouring healing magic into a patient’s leg and turned to move on to the next.
“Does Eli know you’re back?”
Iris scrunched her face and spread out her arms, “do you guys care more about Eli than me?”
“I knew you’d find your way back. It was Eli beating himself up too much in the mean time that worried me.”
Iris sighed, “is he still doing that? I really thought he was making progress.”
“He is, but these things take time. Where are you hurt?”
“What?”
Titus leaned to either side as he looked her over, “where are your injuries?”
“I’m fine, I just came to tell you I’m alive.”
The disbelief was evident on his face before he even spoke, “you’re not hurt at all? You were gone for two days.”
“Yeah, I can go two days without getting hurt, you know.”
By that point his expression was overtly skeptical.
Iris rolled her eyes and blipped out of the infirmary and into the crew quarters, which she chose to walk through rather than blip across. She was on the lookout for familiar faces and also taking a rough head count of those she passed, assessing how bad the balrog attack had really been. Though numbers didn’t seem significantly dwindled, many of the pirates were resting in their hammocks, and more than a few of those up-and-about bore superficial wounds that were only just beginning to heal. She guessed Titus had been too busy keeping people alive to have enough mana or time left over to treat mild injuries.
“Irene! You made it!” a pirate she sort-of recognized from the cannon crew called out.
“It’s Iris,” she looked over and called back, “and yep, I’m still alive!”
The air rushed from her lungs as she slammed into something tall and firm. Iris stumbled back and looked up at an angry looking orc — it was Dorragth, her less than friendly bunk-mate. He snorted as he looked down at her, while Iris noticed the occasional specks of dried blood that still dotted his skin.
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“They say you tackled a balrog out of the sky,” he stated flatly.
“Uh, yeah. Something like that.”
He let out a grumbling, contemplative noise before stepping around her and harshly clapping her on the shoulder as he passed, “impressive.”
Iris twisted to look back at him with confusion as he walked away, “thanks? Are we friends now?”
The orc barked a short but loud laugh and didn’t look back.
A few minutes later, Iris was entering the galley where Autumn, Killup and Adan were rushing around preparing lunch. Adan noticed her first and offered a polite nod which she silently returned as she stood waiting for Autumn to notice her. The chef bounced around the kitchen and completed no less than three tasks for before finally catching a glimpse of Iris and coming to a lurching stop.
“It’s about fucking time!” the small woman was already stomping towards Iris with fury in her eyes.
“Whoa- Hey!” Iris held up her hands to defend herself as Autumn reached up to swing hammer fists at her. Backed against the door with no effective means to block the attacks, Iris promptly blipped across the kitchen and took shelter behind Adan, “what’s her problem?”
“I believe she is angry,” Adan answered as he continued chopping vegetables.
“I am so sick of you doing this!” Autumn shouted as she charged across the kitchen, picking up a ladle that she wielded suspiciously like a weapon.
Killup looked up from the dishes he was washing to watch the action, while Iris waited until Autumn grew near and then once again blipped across the galley.
Autumn spun on her heels and continued charging towards Iris’s new location, “you run off and get yourself lost, we worry about you for hours — this time days! — and then you casually show back up like everything’s fine!”
Iris blipped again, but this time appeared immediately in front of Autumn. The chef looked up at her with shock, but her face was soon buried in fabric as Iris pulled her into a hug.
“I missed you too,” Iris said, “next time I almost die, I’ll try to get back sooner.”
Autumn relaxed for a moment and returned the hug, and then shoved her away. She angled the ladle threateningly at Iris as she spoke, “you better!”
Iris smiled and gave a nod before blipping away. Soon, she reappeared in her usual corner of the quiet cargo hold beneath the crew quarters and released a breath she felt like she had been holding for days. Collapsing on the floor with her back against a crate, she pulled the bottomless bag from her waist and placed it on the floor beside her. Tentacles soon rose out of the void and began placing lanterns, soon followed by food and water for Littletooth who was already attempting to squeeze his way out of the void between the mess of tentacles that crowded the opening of the bag.
This space had become the closest thing Iris had to a bedroom during her time aboard the Gaping Maw, and returning to it now felt like finally getting home after a long and weary journey. There were a few missing elements, of course, but one in particular nagged at her the most.
“Abby, do you think we could fit a bed into the bag?”
Contemplative noises came from the bag, followed by affirmative noises.
“Good, let’s do that when we get the chance,” Iris slumped over to the side until she lay on the floor.
After resting in a less-than-comfortable position for some time, she finally sat upright again and conjured her adventure journal from a tear in her palm. She had intended to check it the night before, but had been left in too bad of a mood after the confrontation with Dala. As she hoped, her recent adventures and battles had earned her another level.
None of her attributes had felt particularly lacking recently, so she took the opportunity to plan for the future. Conjuring tentacles from her palm was quickly becoming a mainstay of her techniques and seemed particularly helpful in dire situations, but it did require a small amount of mana to open the tear. Were she caught in a bad spot without much mana, she might not be able to conjure the tentacles she needed to save herself. While she technically knew how to fly now, there was also the matter of the continue mana cost of doing so. It wasn’t so bad that she couldn’t sustain unobstructed flight indefinitely, but if she wanted any hope of incorporating it into her battles alongside her abilities then she would definitely need more mana at her disposal.
In the end, she decided to put four of her five available attribute points into Spirit. This would increase both the maximum size of her mana well and the speed at which it regenerated, and also came with the added benefit of increasing the range of her Awareness of Matter ability. The final point went into strength, which she always desired more of.
IRIS ORION
Hero Rank, Level 14
Experience Points: 375 / 15,400
Progress to next level: 2.43%
Attribute Scores:
- Vitality : 44
- Strength : 64
- Speed : 41
- Intellect : 43
- Spirit : 58
Unspent attribute points : 0
As she always did after assigning points, Iris flipped through pages to search for a new journal entry from her mother. The sight of the newly filled in page felt almost like a warm embrace, even if it was fairly short entry. Where the entries had last left off, Mary had found herself abruptly separated from her companions as the season of the landscape around her had changed in an instant. Unable to reconnect with them, she had chosen to continue on her journey and quest alone.
Dear Iris,
I spent most of today in the other season. It was summer again, the forest in the distance was lush and green and the air was warm and thick. I called out for much of the day in search of the others, but heard no replies. I camped for the night among the first of many scattered trees where the plains meet the forest, and when I awoke I had returned to this cold and dreary wasteland where the grass has died and the branches are bare.
I am quite certain, at this point, that I am jumping between two very distant points in time. It is not only the seasons, but the landscape itself that changes. One of the distant mountain peaks has a different shape in this time than the other, and there is even a star in the sky I have never seen before, interrupting my favorite constellation like a pimple.
Tomorrow I will enter the crooked woods. I hope to spend some of that journey in the summer, as it is a dangerous place to traverse alone in the winter. Whatever the case, I will press on. I hope your adventures are going better than my own.
Mary Orion,
969 / ???