Mary turned out that Mary's innate talent was converting heat to magic instead of fire to magic, the realization causing her talent to tier up. This first awakening also came with a better understanding of what that supplemental magic was doing. At the beginner tier, it only allowed her to overcharge her cantrips, causing them to hit harder than they had any right to be. But once her magic as a whole would tier up, she would be able to use the extra magic to recharge her spell slots, allowing her yet again to cast more spells than her tier should allow.

That much, according to Merida, made her synergy with cold trivial as she was essentially a walking mana battery. And with her father around and well, she could even have become the epicenter of a magic wellspring, which could have both resulted in an absolute blessing or an ecological disaster. And so, the doll had insisted that Mary should learn more than cold-related cantrips so that the girl could reach her full potential — an occupation that prevented Mary from thinking too much about her missing father.

But the girl went yet again above and beyond Merida's expectations, helping the doll with her crafting whenever she needed a breather and bearing some unexpected fruits. Together, they were able to craft a tiny bow, which was essentially a slightly bigger sling without a handle.

What really made a difference, however, were the needle-sized arrows, which were much more durable and accurate than they looked. And while Merida was still working on imbuing her ammunition with offensive life magic of any kind, the bow did help her get her first specialization card in archery.

Ember, on the other side, had felt like her training had been so far a complete lack of time, as was the last cantrip she had unlocked, [Sleep Walking], which was precisely what the name implied, a cantrip with no benefit that was straightforwardly buffing a sleeping disorder that could get her injured or killed in her sleep. Needless to say that she would never use that one, ever. But for the sake of her training and trying to find a helpful combination, she was supposed to relearn those useless cantrips over and over again to test them thoroughly, just in case.

So far, the best combination she had found was [Light Sleeper], a novice tier spell resulting from the combination of two sensory cantrips, improving all her senses while asleep by order of magnitude for one hour and effectively preventing her from getting a good rest for that entire duration. Yet Merida encouragingly said that it could have its uses.

As for what she could presumably combine [Sleep Walking] with, she decided to give it some thought instead of blindly trying any combination she could think of. [Sleep Walking] buff was even broader than [Light Sleeper] and would have been truly remarkable if she had access to those while awake. But true to its name, she had to be sleepwalking for it to activate. So she had a few hypotheses.

Maybe she could offset it by increasing her sense of awareness while asleep? She had plenty of sensory cantrips, including weird combined ones that might do the trick. But it did not feel quite right. Her next choices were Critical Thinking, Retroactive Override, Disarming Wagging Tail, and Balanced Mind.

Critical Thinking because it directly affected her mind. Retroactive Override, as wishful thinking that one detrimental cantrip might balance out the other. Disarming Tail cause she could use some defense mechanism while asleep. And Balanced Mind, in the hope it could somehow cure the sleepwalking conditions and reverse its effect.

The first combination with Critical Thinking produced a combined spell called [Startled Awake], which granted her 36 seconds of physical and mental boost whenever she was startled awake by some threat. The weird thing about this one was that it did not take one spell slot on its own but was supposed to be paired up with a slotted spell that was also amplified. And it had a forty-eight hours cooldown. Merida was really enthusiastic about that result.

The combination with Retroactive Override produced a spell called [Restless Legs], which allowed her to kick approaching hostile in her sleep without troubling her rest. And the doll immediately commented that a horse would undoubtedly love that one but that it was useless to Ember as her paw were not good natural weapons.

Disarming Tail and Sleep Walking, however, produced something even weirder called [Contagious Yawning], which operated straight as the name suggested. It was a sleep and mind combined attack inducing sleepiness in any target that could either hear or see her yawn, improving their rest while forcing her to stay awake for a little longer. And this time, Merida straight out forced her to slot the combined spell due to the potential synergy with her innate talent.

Then came the last combination with Balanced Mind. She had been hoping for something that would reverse the effect of Sleep Walking and might create a synergy with Deep Trance Meditation, as being consciously locked up in her head while asleep was what she thought was the exact opposite of Sleep Walking. Instead, she got [Dream Wandering], which her partner instantly identified as pure gold, as it let her wander in spirit form around the physical plane while asleep and allowed her to use her magic remotely.

The limitations of that combined spell were her duration — 90 minutes plus 30 minutes per tier from apprentice onwards. The fact that the spell was far from undetectable and instantly dispelled if she took damages while in spiritual form. And the 16 hours cooldown, she had to be awake to recharge it, meaning Ember could only use it once every two days on average.

So Ember opinion on Sleep Walking had changed radically, and she did not complain anymore about testing any combination she could think of, as that very cantrip had produced no less than three potentially useful combined spells in a raw. But her luck ran out almost instantly, and no other helpful combination came up that day.

★☆★

The week passed a lot quicker than Ember thought possible, and so she went with Merida to collect their hopefully repaired cart. And the city had changed yet again during that time. While the walls were still guarded, the doors were now wide open, and tension between groups in the town had calmed down, partly cause of the free food distribution and partly cause a common enemy was all they needed to show a united front.

The Pyromancer, as they decided to call him, was the new Bogeyman as he was so far unseen and yet in everyone's mind. Even people that had neither seen the fire nor knew someone involved had stories of the Pyromancer roasting careless kids alive for food or guiding grown men to their demise while running around at night.

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And so Ember quietly observed with grim humor how a potentially insane but ordinary man had turned out of proportion into some kind of urban legend while being absent all that time.

They did the same with the Air Elemental when they had no idea whatever it was. It is just a coping mechanism when faced with the unknown. They would rather make up something that admit they don't know. Everyone adds something to the tale until it becomes something completely unrelated. Here, it's an embodiment of their deepest fears.

'So humans are afraid that their kids would get eaten and that light in the dark would lure them to their death?' Ember rephrased, 'I understand the first one, but what about the second?'

Curiosity kills the cat. That's an old, almost universal saying. Whenever tragedy strikes, humans are turtling up and forsaking their innovative, curious nature for the sake of safety. Sometimes it last weeks, and some others, it last centuries, depending on how deep the trauma is. Humans just lost a lot of their peers in a short period of time.

'Turtling up?' Ember repeated, toying with the foreign concept. Dogs had fight and flight instincts. But they only made dens to shelter the pups from predators.

Hiding was always a last resort option when every other was exhausted because Ember had high-wired instincts telling her hiding from an overwhelming threat rarely worked. Unless the predator got distracted with more promising prey, it would not give up on the pups' soft and tender meat for anything. The only true and tried method for the pack was to flee, spread and get lucky. The sacrifice of one ensures the pack's survival.

Different builds, different strategies. Humans are endurance runners rather than sprinters. Hence making your prime survival strategy their last resort. They can also keep their energy longer than most predators, making hiding out of reach a viable option for them.

Ember shrugged it off. Whenever she felt like she had the humans figured out, they had yet another frustrating behavior she could not understand. They blurred the lines between preys and predators, solitary and pack individuals, and did not have a single consistent behavior across the board. Hence her reason for calling humans crazy. They were unpredictable, unreliable, and unapologetic. Though what infuriated Ember the most was her inability to dislike or ignore them for their shortcoming.

★☆★

Ember's cart was as good as new, and being able to race home with it after Merida's healing tour improved her mood significantly. She had missed that feeling the most, as regular exercise was not nearly enough anymore to make her feel that rush, heart beating, tongue lolling, fully concentrate on her task of getting their home in one piece. Though she could tell, Merida did not share her feeling as she held the cart edge as if her life depended on it.

It felt so good that upon their reach at the clearing, she wanted nothing more than to run back to the city. But Merida being such a killjoy, instantly vetoed it. At least, Mary, who had been awaiting their return, was pretty good at emulating Ember's idea of a warm welcome, rushing for them and giving Ember a good scratch before Merida could even climb down the chariot.

"The cart looks good. How was it?" She asked the doll while she was removing Ember's harness.

"The authority is exchanging foods for labor, guns, and illegal goods. The pep talk is to forgive, forget and get back to work." Merida announced before telling her the bad news:

"I don't think this would apply to your father, however. People are outraged and paranoid. And your father might end up the scapegoat for everything. However, he might have foreseen it coming. No one has seen or heard of him in a week. For better or for worse, I'm afraid he truly left you for dead."

The little girl sighed.

"After Mom's death, he said it was the two of us against the world." She finally said, heartbroken.

"And I'm sure it was his very intention to keep that promise," Merida responded kindly, though with a dark undertone meant solely for Ember to catch on.

The man did ended up alone against the world, which was already a half-fulfilled promise.

"I need to find him and talk to him," the girl said, determined, once she was done crying.

"Are you sure? You know, he probably thinks you are dead." Merida warned, "He might be very different than the dad you used to know."

"But I know he is alive." She retorted, saying no more.

"Okay," Merida concluded, "We are going to prepare and rest before we go. I won't risk the cart right after it got repaired, so it's going to be a long trek on foot from the city."

And so it was decided, and Merida got what she wanted.

★☆★

From the burned buildings in the city, the man had fled north before bifurcating west, deeper into the hills and towards the Cascadian range. The man moved slowly and erratically like a hunted, wounded animal. To stay on his track, Ember went ahead and let Mary and Merida catch up at their own pace while she was resting. Yet, they were slowly but surely losing him as the man moved slower but grew paranoid and stopped using his innate talent to start fires wherever he rested. His magical signature became dimmer by the day.

Yet Ember was having the time of her life, feeling the thrill of pack hunting, though it wasn't really a hunt, not she actually had a pack as both Mary and Merida had their own selfish goal going forward. The little girl wished to reunite with her father, while the doll wanted to hunt him down for the towners' recognition, with Ember trapped in the middle.

At least both of them were committed and prepared for the prolonged track, as Merida had prepared ample food and tools for the journey and modified Ember harness so she could, carry some of her own food.

Then, everything came crashing down as what Ember had feared finally happened. The scent of Mary's father's signature grew cold, and even Akashic Sleuth would not help as the man had stopped using magic entirely or found a way to make it undetectable.

"This is over," Ember finally admitted, embarrassed, her tail between her legs.

Merida did not bother translating as she abruptly stopped. A single glance had been enough to say it all.

"That's it? Are you giving up? After going that far?" She exclaimed in utter disbelief.

"Your dad is somewhere, two to three days ahead of us, most likely west, as he had been consistently going in that direction for two weeks," Merida stated, pointing in the approximate direction.

"We know enough to intuit your father's plan: go through the mountain range and reach Washington. But the mountains are dangerous for both him and us, and we have no idea where he is and where he will go next. Unless you know something we don't?"

Mary shook her head negatively, defeated. She had no idea where her father was, and Merida's cautious supply for the trip was finally running low, not accounting for the time it would take to get back. At least, her father's last message had been clear:

He was gone for good and did not want to be found.