The earlier tension is largely alleviated, not that Kay is the sort to ever find herself truly at ease. Travel along the riverside does grow a little more difficult, the soft blades of green grass which could effortlessly be cast aside replaced with firm yellowed reeds which, in themselves, didn't prove an insurmountable obstacle but both slowed their progress and significantly reduced visibility ahead. Much like before, beyond the most basic sense of drawing closer to the destination which the naked mouse felt, she had no idea exactly how close they were until they arrived, able to see the base of the pillar sprouting from the earth for herself. The other two had no sense of the presence of the magical light, but even they can guess that they have reached their destination upon seeing it.

In a field of near nothing, a massive, grey and foreboding structure sat.

"Another Maker shrine?" Fred sighs, looking towards the strange fortress. "I'll admit, I was getting a little tired of the constant fighting, but I was really hoping there wouldn't be another stealth mission so soon."

"No, I think this one is different." Mia says, scanning the surroundings, "There is a road leading to it, but I see no vehicles. I can't see any Makers around, either. Perhaps it's abandoned? At very least, it doesn't look nearly as busy as the other one."

Kay says nothing, simply standing in place, staring at the boxy building which is enshrouded in blue light. Even from this distance, it's obvious that it's far larger than the previous store, larger even than the collection of those stores of which the trio only explored one compartment of. There are no lit up signs, no colorful paint-jobs, no lot filled with shiny metal vehicles, just a mass of stone and metal pipes which she couldn't imagine looking any more inviting to a Maker than it does to a mouse. She resists the urge to continue forward, at least for the moment, remembering how she had nearly lost herself upon the sight of the first treasure location, and could well have wandered into clear view of the Makers had Frederich not stopped her. She is absolutely determined to make sure that doesn't happen again.

"The place does look a lot more quiet." Frederich says, watching it from afar with his two companions. "Can't necessarily say it looks much safer, though."

"Even if there aren't any Makers around, we can't let our guard down. We need to be prepared for any possible danger." Kay says, eyes still locked on the structure, even if she's more focusing on the blue light than the building itself.

"Of course. Similarly, we can't be sure there aren't any Makers, either. Even if there are fewer of them, we can't afford to be careless." Mia nods.

Upon the unspoken agreement to approach carefully, the three do just that. Each keep their eyes open for any sort of guardians or traps, and failing to spot any does little to put their minds at rest. The massive structure looms before them as they approach, looking almost like a ruin from the distance, but the walls are solid stone, carved at clean angles. The building is made of a series of connected boxes, the only really distinct features being the heavy metal pipes which curve from the interior of the structure down into the earth and over to the quickly flowing water source.

"I see a door, but it looks pretty heavy." Mia says. "It doesn't look like it has a magical lock similar to what we'd seen before. Even if it had one, we certainly can't count on any Makers to come along and open it for us. The only reason we were able to enter that way before was due to the fact so many were coming and going that little attention was paid."

"What about those strange tube things? They're connected to the walls. Going inside of one might not be a good idea, but there may be openings between the metal and the stone which we can slip through." Kay says, her unnaturally keen eyes surveying the pipelines.

"It's definitely worth a try." the armored mouse nods, gladdened by the prospect of not needing to enter through the front door.

The search is laborious but not particularly dangerous. The untended grass offers ample camouflage to anyone looking, but the area seems to be unguarded anyways. The largest obstacle is the sheer size of the structure, with exploring the perimeter of it being hardly a trivial matter. It is surrounded by a tall fence which is clearly designed to keep out far larger creatures than mice, not even offering a minor obstacle to the creatures who could effortlessly slip through the wire mesh. At certain points the natural earth switches to concrete, strange yellow runes painted on its surface, pipes running along it only to quickly change their angle to vanish beneath the solid ground. The building has very few windows, all small and far too high up for the mice to even hope to reach, but those hardly offered safe entry points anyways. Even if unsecured, it's generally a poor idea for a mouse to make their entrance through a portal which is built purely for humans to look out of.

Kay's prediction proved correct, however. What looks like potential openings where the two solid but very different materials met are just that. There are a few options, but there is the problem that they aren't clear portals, but blocked instead. The barrier is in no way comparable to the heavy metal gateway which served as the door, though. It is a metal mesh, rather similar to the fence but shrunken down dramatically and serves its purpose nicely. Only the tiniest of fiends could hope to slip through the solid wires, but what it offers in coverage, it lacks in strength.

All in all, the structure is far different from the store. Where there the metal was clean and shining, here it is rusted and poorly maintained. Still perfectly functional, for the most part, but the grids in particular could only handle so much force against them, especially when a particularly damaged one was found, and even more especially when confronted by the unusual strength of the naked mouse. Entry isn't entirely effortless, and it does require some degree of exertion from her to pry away the already somewhat warped barrier, the connective tissue between that and the stone walls already half broken, but it doesn't take long to pry an opening wide enough all three to enter properly.

Unlike the store they had previously entered, which was filled with shimmering treasures, bright lights and the voices of the Makers, here, only silence and darkness greeted the trio. Mice, in general, can see fairly well in the dark, Kay especially, but this passageway is so dank, so devoid of even a hint of light, that all they can do is follow along the pipe, one paw upon its surface, to make sure that they don't lose their way. Fortunately for them, this pipe happens to be cool to the touch as well, a convenience they can't necessarily count on in the future.

"What kind of place do you think this is?" Frederich asks, the silence getting to him even more than the pitch blackness.

"I think it's used to move water around?" Mia chimes in, following closely behind him, Kay, of course, taking the lead. "I've heard of tunnels beneath the earth, not standard burrows and hollows, but made of metal and stone, filled with the sound of flowing water. Supposedly a mysterious race of undead mice lives within."

"Oh, come on! Undead mice? Those are just stories!" The armored mouse says, even if his mind isn't quite as skeptical (and unfrightened) by the idea as his words might imply.

Were the three able to follow a straight path through the wall, they might have found light much sooner. Instead the pipeline bends and winds about with little respect for the convenience of said explorers. Once they finally do reach a more open area, the light hits them all at once. This place can't even be called a proper tunnel or hallway by the mice, even small portions of it representing the size of a palace which would make the mightiest mouse king jealous. The hardware store they had visited previously was technically larger than this area, but the aisles of merchandise worked to segment it somewhat. There are no such obstacles here. High ceilings of grey brick all around, the sort of smooth, perfectly flat ground that one could never dream of finding in nature, pipes running all along it, occasionally twisting down into the floor, sometimes into the ceiling, merging with one another, splitting into multiple metal tubes, the sounds of hissing and flowing audible from countless sources at once. Looking up, one can regularly see strange metal knobs or glass dials depicting a variety of incomprehensible data. While not filthy, especially not by mouse standards, it is nowhere close to the immaculate nature of the hardware store. Everything is coated in dust and general grime. While the hallway might not rival the width of the home of the previous artifact, it is immediately clear that it not only stretches on a tremendous distance, but that it is also only one of many.

"Look at this!" Mia exclaims, perhaps a little too noisily, even if there were no Makers or other threats in plain sight. She points excitedly to the base of a pipe running into the floor, one of the countless, no more impressive than the others at first, second or however many glances one takes. As she cleans closer, however, it's not the pipe her attention is drawn to, it's one of the metal fasteners holding it into position. "Look at the shape! It's just like the ones we saw at the store, just less... shiny!"

"I... guess so?" Kay replies. She paid little attention to the specifics back then, being more focused on going undiscovered. Similarly, this one just looks like yet another piece of old metal, something hardly in short supply in these parts.

"They're all over the place! I was right! The Makers don't just form these massive structure from nothing, they use countless pieces, just like this, all designed for an exact purpose, all with an exact fit, all coming together to serve their specific needs!" she excitedly chatters, looking about. "And, and all these pipes! I'll bet they all go somewhere, each one having a specific role. Even for their size and strength, can you imagine how much work it must have take to create all of this? All these countless little pieces, all set in just the right places, all designed for strength and security to make sure everything works just right?"

"It's kind of neat, I guess..." Frederich says, looking about. In truth, he's more looking out for undead mice, this place resembling the descriptions of the sewers at little too closely for his liking.

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"That's the real strength of the Makers. They can make all these pieces, metal, stone, glass, all work in perfect harmony to serve their needs. Even for such powerful creatures as themselves, no one of them could have done this, it's similarly a collective. Individuals all working together to create something... something amazing! Something that could last forever! And look, this is just one little corner of one little building, far from where most of them even live! The sum of their works, they're-they're astronomical!" the small mouse girl continues, her voice quickening. "I didn't even notice at the time, but I saw more of these connectors on the... round things on the sides of those vehicles. Wow, when you think of them as a pile of parts, all intricately interwoven, rather than some big, loud metal entities, they're all the more impressive."

"Mia..." Kay says, her already limited patience wavering.

"Just imagine if we could do this... can we?" the sorceress asks herself, lost in her own little world. "Earlier I kind of took it for granted that we could, but that was before I took in the real scope of the Maker's abilities. It's one thing to see a pile of metal bits, but another entirely to see how they all fit together. I'm not certain we could make one of those little screws, and just how many must be needed to hold a place like this together? Maybe we just can't. Maybe that's the difference between a mouse and a Maker, in the end. It's not just one of size, but ability, too. I suppose it should be no surprise, we always saw ourselves as lesser creatures, but it stings to know that it may actually be true. Knowing that no matter how hard we strive, no matter how much we learn, no matter how united we become, we'll just never be able to reach even close to these heights. It leaves you wondering what's the point? Why try to get better, why emulate the Makers if we can never really succeed?"

"Heh, you're really impressed by these old pipes?" Frederich grins, rapping a paw against the hollow surface. "Our city is way better than this place. It's full of food and music and comfy beds. Sure, this place might be big, but it just looks like an old, spooky ruin to me. Maybe we won't be able to make colossal buildings or vehicles which race around at stupid speeds, but who needs them? Our lives are good, and keep getting better, bit by bit, and will continue to do so. What more can you ask for?"

Mia pauses a moment, her own paw stroking along a dried paint-drop, solidified as it ran down the surface of the metal who knows how long ago, nodding her head. "Yes, you're right. We don't need to have everything the Makers do to be happy... and who knows what the future will hold, either? Just because we can't do this now doesn't mean we'll never be able to. Maybe the Makers couldn't either. You know, I'm actually sure of it. Bits and pieces, that's how everything works, isn't it? You start small, work together and eventually, given some time and effort, you end up with something just a little bit bigger, a little bit better. If the Makers could do it all at once, they wouldn't need all these little parts. They accomplished things like this because they took time, made the pieces one by one, put them together one by one, and then before long, they had, well... this!" she looks about, the ceiling so high that even with the suspended lamp above, it is a mere shadow. "Maybe we will be able to create something like this, and maybe not. It doesn't really matter, though, does it? What's important is that we take what we have, we put the pieces together to make something just a little better. A new piece that people in the future can similarly pick up, combine with other pieces made by other mice, and keep making better, stronger ones."

She pauses once more. "You know, I'll bet even this isn't the end point. You never really reach one, do you? So long as there are dreams, there are always going to be new pieces, and I'll bet the Makers haven't finished dreaming yet... and neither have we."

The robed sorceress grins, her expression falling as the turns to face the impatient look of the older woman. "Um, I guess we should probably get moving, right?" she grins again, much more shyly this time. The dark furred mouse anticipates a brief lecture from the nameless mouse, but instead receives only a nod in return as she turns and continues on her way. Frederich similarly steps in alongside her, offering an encouraging grin, one she can't help returning more genuinely this time, as the trio continue on their path to the treasure, the blue point of light which only Kay and her cursed eyes can see.

The three thankfully don't directly encounter other humans, having had more than their fill of them during the hunt for the green key, but traces of them are everywhere. There are the strange, inorganic looking footprints on the dusty floor, knobs which showed a little less shine than others nearby, implying they had been handled enough to effect the finish, and even the sounds of occasional distant footsteps traveling down parallel hallways. Even were they unlucky enough to share a path with one of the clearly very few Makers maintaining the large structure, the risk is low due to the ample number of potential hiding spots. The walk, however, isn't a short one. Were it a straight line it wouldn't have been so bad. Sure, Kay could see the blue light straight ahead but there are winding hallways and many solid walls between themselves and the treasure, and while the three tried to remain vigilant, that grew more and more difficult with time.

"You're not really going to get married just because your parents told you to, are you?" Frederich asks Mia. He's eager for conversation but knows better than to attempt it with Kay, especially when she's so focused on her goal.

"Yeah... I-I think so, at least." she replies.

"But why? That's the kind of decision you should make yourself, and it isn't anyone elses business!" the armored mouse says, his voice softening as he sees the younger girl look away. "Sorry, I guess it's not my business either. It just... I just doesn't feel right, somehow."

The robed sorceress smiles, nodding her head. "Doesn't feel right. That's a sensation I know well. I'm used to things not feeling right. Making friends, doing chores, maintaining eye contact... the simple things everyone else seems to do so easily, I find so hard. Everything I do feels wrong, to a certain extent, and as a result, everything I do ends up coming out wrong." she pauses, looking up to the head of her staff. "Maybe, maybe this is just the sort of normalcy, the sort of grounding I need for things to fall into place. Sure, I understand, independence might mean everything to someone like you, but for others, well, we can't do everything on our own. We need a little help, sometimes a lot of help. There are great heroes out there, equal to ten or a hundred mice, but then there are others who are less than one, and we need to come together with another to form a proper, functional person."

"I... guess." Fred says, looking away. He doesn't care much for Mia's low opinion of herself, but at the same time doesn't really want to push the subject any further. With Kay he's a little more willing to push her buttons, but it's clear the black mouse sorceress is considerably more sensitive.

"So, what about you?" Mia smiles to him. He looks back with a curious expression. "Is there someone back home you like?"

"Well, uh, no, of course not!" He grins back, trying not to look flustered. "I mean there are so many girls who flock to a great hero like me, it's impossible to choose! Besides, the road of the mighty champion is a long and lonely one. I can't be tied down by a single pretty face."

The young girl shakes her head, still smiling. "You liar. You might talk big, but I can tell you're a romantic at heart. So who is it?"

"Really, there isn't anybody!" He says, more flustered by the moment. He pauses, shaking his head. "Well, not anymore."

Mia looks to him with wide eyes. "Oh dear, what happened?"

"Oh, nothing too tragic! There was just a girl I liked for a while, and, well, she didn't quite like me as much. I was persistent, though! I refused to give up, and eventually she gave in. We started dating, and..." he pauses, smiling softly. "Well, it turns out she was right the first time. She didn't like me all that much."

"Oh... I'm sorry." the robed girl lowers her head.

"Hey, it's okay! It's really not a big deal. That happens. Some people just don't work well together, no matter how hard you try to convince yourself otherwise. I don't have anyone I'm interested in right now, but there are plenty of girls in the city. It was disappointing, I can't say otherwise, but it was a learning experience. You know what they say: it's better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all."

"That's not true." Kay interjects, her head down, eyes still forward, stopping in her tracks ahead of the pair.

"What's that?"

"People say that, but it isn't true. Love is temporary. Sooner or later, usually sooner than later, it fails. Loss, though, real loss? That's forever." The naked mouse says, not turning to look at her surprised companions.

"Um, yeah, I guess maybe you could see things that way..." Frederich scratches his head. "It's just that..."

"Come on. We're getting close now." Kay cuts him off, continuing on her way without another word. Mia gives the confused armored mouse an encouraging grin, and follows. As for Frederich, his mind is fishing for a clever retort which would show her how smart he is but nothing comes to him. Probably for the best as while he feels he's a strong mouse on multiple levels, he has little faith in his ability to win an argument with Kay. Forget about brute strength or stamina or endurance, when it came to sheer intimidation factor, she's on another level, after all. Instead, all he can do is follow, still trying to think of a witty reply, even though it's already been far too long to say it.

The three reach a large wooden door, not the first they have encountered. They are regularly found along the walls of the hallway, each leading to their own pathways and chambers which clearly hold specific purposes, otherwise they wouldn't exist, but hold no interest to the trio. Well, Mia would have certainly loved to see what was inside of them, and Frederich wouldn't turn down the promise of potential treasure and adventure, too, but both knew they had more important concerns. This is the first door which truly blocked their paths, however. It could have potentially been a serious problem, but it's clear that this passage isn't designed with security in mind. It existed simply to segregate what lies ahead from the path they followed, and there is no need to try to break through or wait for a Maker to open the road ahead for them. The crack between the hard, smooth floor and the bottom of the door is particularly wide. Still far too small to be of any use to a Maker or even a larger animal, maybe even too much for a large mouse but none of the trio fell into that category. Kay was the largest by a hair and even she only fell into the average size level, Fred just a little smaller (much to his disappointment), and Mia bringing up the rear by a significant margin.

Doors are still rather dangerous, however. One never quite knows what is waiting beyond them, but Kay doesn't care. She quickly crawls underneath it, not even considering the possibility that there may have been a Maker waiting on the other side. Luckily for her, there isn't, but there easily could have been. The room is another office of sorts, although less clean and orderly than the one they discovered in the store. The walls are still lined with pipes, but there are also boxes of tools, an old desk and chair, even a small pile of paperback books. Even if there are no humans in sight, this is clearly a place that they frequent. The naked mouse is unconcerned with all of this, however. Her eyes are, instead, locked on the far wall, high up, to a set of nails hammered into a horizontal board, each a similar distance apart.

Both Frederich and Mia followed quickly, assuming they have reached their destination based on Kay's frozen stare. It only takes a moment for them to realize that something is terribly wrong. Kay, indeed is focused on a point of blue light, but wonders why she hadn't noticed earlier that it was nowhere near as radiant as it should have been. A point of light does, in fact exist, right in the place of the mysterious nails. The problem is there is no treasure in its place.