___

Ingrid, Kinu, Kvaris, and Sammy, the four melee fighters of The Whales returned to Autumnhollow just in time to see Gwen and Philia teach the mice how to put on their newly forged lamellar armor. The mice that were already armored tested it by punching each other’s protective coating, squeaking happily at the results.

“Guys, I want you five later on to try climbing those trees in your armor, I want to know if it feels too heavy, okay?” Philia said, and the mice squeaked in unison.

Ingrid saw that the mice also sported uniform red scarves as well as matching brooches that bore the first letter of their names.

“Check this out Ingrid, this is how we roll!” Cecil said as he showed off his “battle stations” An M240 machine gun on a bipod was operated by a graft of Cecil, while he himself sat atop a foot stool behind them, giving him a commanding view of the Dialogue Window. To either of Cecil’s sides were Brody and Eli, bearing AK’s as their heavy rifle of choice. Behind Cecil and sitting atop a coffee table was Ralph who wielded a modified G3 battle rifle as a sniper weapon.

“Keeping in mind our current supply of bullets, we also have submachine and pellet guns.” Cecil announced to Ingrid. The pellet guns were modeled after MP5 submachine guns and for Ralph’s pellet gun it had a companion rogue shillelagh with a similar warhammer used by Kinu and Kvaris for their shields.

“Huh, why didn’t I think of that?” Philia thought as the mice demonstrated the effects of the pellet gun with the CRS. Both the room-side mice’s metal pellets and the hammer strikes were powered up by the enhancement lens, allowing the pellets to strike as hard as a medium caliber bullet and the hammer’s effect was enhanced too. It took only a few shots and the ballistic training dummy was obliterated, mostly because of the hammer blows.

“Next, for the real guns, here’s our weapon for the nine-milimeter cartridges.” Cecil announced.

“As you know I have an affinity for oddball guns, so yeah…” Philia shrugged as Cecil, Eli, Brody, and Ralph held up Bizon submachine guns.

“Oddball guns?” Siria asked.

“Why is that weapon ‘odd’?” Kinu asked.

Ingrid turned to them. “That Bizon keeps its bullets stored in a cylindrical magazine in a helix formation, a very odd choice of storage but it does have the merit of being able to store more bullets in less space.”

“Most guns have a rectangular shaped magazine, that’s the quiver of the gun so to speak.” Zefir explained.

“Normally a gun’s magazine just has a simple spring that pushes up the bullets, but the Bizon’s bullets being stored in a spiral you need a more complex mechanism…” Philia added.

“And that makes it susceptible to not working under bad conditions?” Kvaris guessed. Ingrid nodded.

“I’m guessing that Philia found a way to fix it.” she said. “Anyway, I’m guessing, of the real guns, these submachine guns have the most ammunition right now…”

“Yes.” Philia replied. “It had to be, because submachine gun bullets are also the same ones you use for pistols…” she pulled out one of the pistols from her belt to show the others “that’s this little handgun I have here.”

“Given my room’s permanent Enhancement Lens, these submachine gun bullets will also hit much harder.” Cecil said. “And for course for heavier targets we have this M240 bad boy here, Eli and Brody have their AK’s and Ralph has his G3 sniper.”

“Sniper?” Kinu asked.

“A sharpshooter.” Cecil replied “Ralph has the best aim out of all the mice.”

“Are those guns unconventional too?” Kinu continued.

“Not at all really, these are quite conventional arms but they do have a storied history back in my world.” Philia told her. “The gun Eli and Brody carry is modeled after a pretty ancient but still widely used AK-74, it’s inexpensive, easy to mass-produce, yet has everything you want from a firearm plus the ability to keep shooting where every other gun has failed.”

“As you can all guess.” Ingrid began “these machines have many small moving parts, so dirt or sand or sometimes even water getting into them could cause a machine like this to fail. The AK however, is so rugged that some said that you can leave it in the mud for years and it will still shoot. Apocryphal of course, but… you could say it’s a testament to the weapon’s reliability.”

At the mention of their beloved guns being subjected to such dirt, the mice squeaked in protest and hugged their guns, shaking their heads.

“Awwwww!” The earthlings chorused. Somewhere overhead, a huge, horse-sized eagle screeched as it flew by, causing them to laugh. As they composed themselves, their eyes now focused on the items hanging out the top of the portal of Cecil’s room.

“As you can see I finally got a nice little caddy for my portal!” the slime announced proudly. “It hooks to the back of the portal, relying on the forcefield for leverage, viva physics!” he cried excitedly.

Outside the portal were an array of small spotlights, and a few cameras. Inside, the caddy had fittings for tablets, giving Cecil and the mice a view of the cameras watching the portal’s back and sides.

“Gwen found them from Philia’s stuff at the wagon and she helped me set it up after Zefir got the caddy custom-made at Dain’s.” Cecil explained.

Hopping off his perch and rejoining his graft, Cecil then brought his portal along as he moved to the balcony. Solar panels had been setup and a full-sized refrigerator stood off to one side.

“I got all the stuff you need charging…are charging.” he said, pointing over all the things he had neatly laid out on the spacious balcony’s floor. “That includes drones, spare earpieces, batteries… you name it.”

“That just leaves Arthur and Sully needing something to make up for being outside of the portal…” Ingrid said.

“We’re having it taken care of.” Philia said “Tomorrow we’re going to pick up from Dain the retrofitted gun parts. I commissioned him to make some parts out of pure Mythril.”

“Mythril? For the barrels?” Ingrid asked.

“Mhmm.” Philia replied “You can drop a chunk of Mythril into lava and it’ll be barely warm. Now imagine super tough metal that’s also heat resistant and you’re looking at a gun that can keep shooting for extended periods. Of course it takes time so hopefully by tomorrow we can get Arthur and Sully retro-fitted SCAR-H’s.”

“I’m guessing those are oddball weapons too due to some merit of their own…” Siria remarked.

“They do.” Ingrid said quickly “The SCAR-H’s was a recent invention, originally created to answer a need for a gun that could reliably operate in dusty, dirty conditions like the AK.”

Siria and the Garms nodded their heads understanding the concept behind its invention.

“Now the interesting thing is, the gun was mass-produced and widely adopted by various armies. It was only then during the heat of battle that a glaring flaw was discovered… so as quickly as it was adopted by various soldiers, it got so quickly dismissed.” Ingrid continued.

“Fortunately, I’ve fixed my SCAR-H’s” Philia quipped “so our mice won’t be having any problems…”

Philia then laid down a set of leather pouches of varying shapes and sizes.

“Traveler’s Vallises, sound familiar?” she looked up at them. Predictably the Enthana sisters and Siria indicated that they knew.

“They’re enchanted bags that can carry a lot more than they let on.” Kinu answered. “And despite how much they’re carrying it feels like you’re carrying an empty bag.”

“The question is, how many iterations did you do?” Siria asked.

“Ten. The first five match the bag’s natural dimensions while the other five double the depth.” Philia said. “Now go take your pick…”

As each took their preferred packs, Philia then handed each of them a full-sized first-aid kid and a military-grade survival kit. Ingrid and Philia then went about teach everyone how to use the tools found in them. The former Starchasers were well-educated in their use, especially Ingrid, given her background as a survivalist and vigilante before she joined the magical girl troupe.

In addition, Philia also handed out some useful tools such as flashlights, an emergency transponder, spare earpieces, an electronic noisemaker, among other things to stash into their vallises.

“Gwen did you find the crate?” Philia asked.

“It’s this one, miss.” Gwen gestured at a particularly large one the size of a chest freezer. “B-78”

“Ingrid, would you?”

Nodding, Ingrid approached the crate, nothing the big thick ropes still tied around it, no doubt originally put there to make it easy to attach to a crane. Ingrid pressed her back to the box and channelled her mana through it, allowing the box to magnet itself to her. With her strength, she effortlessly brought it over behind Philia.

Straightening up, Philia then gestured at the crate behind her. “I got more, and I’m hoping this works… Cecil, this one will be for you.” She took out from the crate some kind of short, Aztec-looking totem depicting a god or a hero and rising behind him was a regal-looking serpent dressed in some kind of ceremonial headdress.

“Something my old man plundered from a tribe he wiped out. I pulled some strings to convince him and his mages it was just some ceremonial piece of junk but it’s definitely enchanted. It’s a totem dedicated to Qhetar, a god of bounty and harvest. I did my research and it was used to double the capacity of their granaries and such…”

“Why me though?” Cecil said “It would be much better if we had double the storage in Autumnhollow, the only ones who can be here are me and the mice.”

“Quick storage.” Zefir said. “You’re holding the firearms so it’s prudent to have lots of ammunition space. Last thing you want is to run out of ammo if we get stuck in the dungeon for too long… which can happen, I mean that’s why the dungeon’s got those bunker-like Redoubt rooms.”

“There’s another reason for it…” Philia said, she beckoned for Ingrid to come over, Ingrid’s eyes widened and her face broke into a smile as she hefted out of the box a…

“Neith!?” Cecil said in disbelief as Ingrid laid on the floor a boxy walker drone with four legs along the corner of its body.

“You have a golem?” Kvaris asked.

“Yes, Neith, though in our world we call it a robot or drone. The reason I wanted Cecil to have Qhetar’s totem is to store the necessary machinery needed for Neither to function. His room’s balcony also has access to endless sunlight, which I can use to charge the batteries; that’s what powers Neith.”

“Alright, let’s do it then…” Cecil said, he quickly crawled up an empty shelf in his room while manipulating the portal so Ingrid could easily lay the heavy totem atop the lowest level, right in the center. Philia then reached over the portal and laid her hands on the Totem and began chanting for a few minutes. Everyone watched as arcane energies flowed through Philia’s body.

A deep thrumming was felt by everyone as parts of the Totem began to blur and glow.

“Child of Man…” A disembodied voice spoke “For preserving my totem for years at your own risk and dedicating yourself to righting your wrongs, receive my blessing for you have planted the seeds of contrition, so shall your Harvest be just as great.”

A pulse of energy reverberated throughout Autumnhollow. Ingrid saw a glowing figure of the god and his snake companion appear at her side. The god laid a hand on her shoulder comfortingly before breaking down into motes of light.

Philia wiped a tear from her eye as Ingrid ruffled her hair.

“You did great, Philia.” Ingrid said softly. There was a click, the type a door would make if it was unlocked.

“Ummm guys…?” Zefir and Cecil said simultaneously.

“One of the doors in my room opened!” Cecil said

“Th-there’s a giant portal in my backyard!” Zefir said in disbelief.

“A-anyway…” Zefir said quickly. “Let’s check out Cecil’s side first. I imagine your spider-bot needs space for its computer or whatever…”

Cecil pushed aside the stately double doors that dominated the center of the western wall (using the sunlit-balcony as reference) and beheld a covered roof-deck.

“Philia.” Cecil began. “We’re cleared for recoilless guns now.”

“No kidding.” Ingrid said as she and Philia peered through the portal. Where the bedroom had a distinctly European renaissance aesthetic to it, this one had an elegance that reminded her of the Topkapi palace. Moving further into the roofdeck, Cecil, the mice, and everyone else peering into the portal beheld an environment different from the bedroom Cecil had just left. This roofdeck seemed to have belonged to a different building in a completely different part of whatever world this belonged to. Dark mountains loomed over the horizon in all directions. A massive lake stretched out the west, draining out to broad rivers in all directions. Some sides of the river were dotted with towns and cities while the rest were covered in a verdant forest. The buildings also sported different architecture.

“Huh, it’s like we’re in a mix of Eastern Europe, Venice and Andalusia.” Philia said, being more knowledgeable in the subject matter.

“And it seems in this setting it’s noon time.” Ingrid observed, noticing how none of the sunlight was passing through any of the railings, as if the sun was shining overhead. Yet when Cecil turned back to his bedroom the balcony was still lit up by the morning sun.

The structure that led back to the bedroom didn’t make sense either, it was much smaller than the bedroom’s actual space. As for the roofdeck itself, it was easily thrice as spacious and the columns that held up the roof were thrice as high. Several colorful banners lazily drifted in the cool breeze.

“Is that… us?” Ingrid said as she beheld the imagery on the banner. It was definitely a stylized, angelic image of Ingrid protectively holding Cecil.

“Looks like it.”

“Welp, I gotta get to work…bring it in guys- no! I don’t mean hug me but…uuuhhhhhh” Cecil softened up like goo as the two starchasers patted him.

Meanwhile, Zefir, Siria, and Viel walked over to the huge portal that just a little higher than the Autumnhollow house proper. Like Cecil’s, the portal opened up to a different location. It was a big patio. Two-third were paved stone and the last third at the edge which was delineated with elegant stone railings was on a raised wooden deck. Further ahead was a gentle slope of grass and heather-like plants and the occassional tree before it ended into sandy banks along a lake.

Unlike Cecil’s vista, this one was all wilderness around them,with no other signs of habitation. Even further up ahead was the most anime-like island he had ever laid his eyes on, it was like a huge mountain that had a hole blown through it, making it look like a crescent moon reclining on an island. A light mist drifted around the distance and “behind” them he could see ice-capped mountains towering in the distance.

“This one’s easily twice the size of Autumnhollow!” Kvaris said as she stepped through the portal.

Wasting no time, Viel padded over and began casting her Item Box spell again. With this new space granted to them, the need to store the rest of Philia’s belongings in some trusted vault or storehouse in New Gorpisal was no longer needed.

___

The devices that needed to get Neith operational were stored in the bedroom, with Cecil electing to move the “battlestations” to the more spacious roof decks. It consisted of a few dedicated servers (“for back-end computing” Philia explained) and a beefy laptop that definitely was stolen from some big company as it was in Philia’s terms “too Enterprise-level for the filthy pleb market”, all of which were poached from Earth. Not surprisingly, getting them had put Philia in a coma for a few days.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Cecil had moved the portal over so Philia could work on it comfortably while standing, while the laptop itself lay on the floor. Predictably it was running off of the solar panels which she had juiced up somehow in order to let the machines as well as everything else work at full blast.

With an audible clicking and whirring sound, Neith shuddered as it activated.

“What is my purpose? And if you say it’s to pass butter I will self-destruct.” Neith said. It didn’t need to turn to look at Philia as its body had several sensors to allow it a full 360-degree view around itself. Neith had a female voice and she lacked any robotic filter as she spoke, Philia hated those with a passion and Neith was sentient enough to use it if she got annoyed.

“You will be our porter, and some of the things in the porter rig carry butter.” Philia deadpanned. “And you’ll also operate our observer drones on top which I’ll put a tub of butter on.”

“Go fuck yourself, Philia.” Neith replied as she trotted around the group, scanning them.

“I miss you too, girl.” Philia said cheekily.

“How are we no longer corrupted?” Neith asked, pausing to let the mice sniff her. The robot’s sensors whirred as the creatures before her did not register anywhere in her database. “Did you run away to some other planet? Taffy will-”

“I WISH Taffy could find us.” Philia sighed, referring to her cute unicorn familiar. “Unfortunately Neith, I’ve died, so has Ingrid and Cecil here, we’ve come back through unknown means. Go ahead, say it’s illogical.”

“I was defeated by Star Lily despite all the augmentations you had given me when you were Melrondia. Dwelling on what is illogical is asinine.”

“You’ve fought Ingrid?” Siria asked, she found it hard to believe this golem possessed any sort of offensive capabilities but then again it was a machine she had never seen before.

“Yes, although not in this body. Not that I have a preference for being in it again. I presume I have been reconstructed, yet I retain memories after my last known activity.” Neith replied. Philia sighed.

“I guess that confirms some of my worst nightmares… those government geeks found some parts of you…not that it’s any of our problem now…knowing Taffy he’ll probably go full nightmare if they pull any shit on what was left of you there.”

Ingrid snickered with amusement, despite his Taffy appearing to be a cute unicorn he was in fact a nightmare; essentially a dark counterpart of the “pure” horned horse spirit. He was essentially Philia’s Mephistopheles, every time he helped Philia he always asked for a favor in return which resulted in him having his shadowy cohorts taking over some parts of society for his own purposes.

Ironically, it was thanks to Taffy having a finger, or rather a hoof into the underworld that pre-Starchaser Ingrid was able to arm herself and go after the pre-Melrondia-era SEEDs during her vigilante days. Later on, he would become the in-between that inducted Ingrid into the Starchaser Troupe.

Both girls were sure that if the governments tried to mess with Starchasers, they would now have to deal with yet another enemy.

As Ingrid pushed those thoughts aside, Sammy asked the obvious question. “How’s Neith supposed to be our porter.”

“Assistant porter, actually.” Philia corrected. She took out of the crate where Neith had been stored in a squarish plate and put it atop of Neith. It hovered at a fixed point.

“Anti-gravity plates” she said “with this, Neith can carry heavy loads.” Philia then directed Ingrid to open up another crate; a large one. It contained only one thing. It looked similar to a small refrigerator, easily five feet feet tall, three and a half feet wide, and three feet deep

As it turns out however, it wasn’t a single piece, but instead was a set of cabinets and drawers.

“I reconstructed you in mind to carry this porter rig once I began ‘Operation Runaway’ it’s pretty much in effect now, I was once a princess of the Elion-Nosco kingdom, proudly admitting to have committed large-scale graft and corruption to reconstruct you and much of my lab.” Philia explained.

“Assistant Porter.” Neith said “I am redundant to who?”

“Redundancy?” Kvaris asked, Zefir waved his hand.

“That would be me.” he said.

Neith paused. “Noted. Ensure his porter rig is duly equipped with the essential gear… and you would be?”

Everyone then took turns introducing themselves to Neith, who responded with a flat “[name] Acknowledged.”

“Adventuring.” Neith said, digesting the information they had all told her. “You have taken into account the Cost-Benefit analysis?”

“I’m the insurance.” Ingrid grinned, she was sure that Neith was scanning her right now.

“Ingrid’s power levels are far more stable than before. More stable than when you were Star Lily. The Cost to Benefit ratio is…” Ingrid, Philia, Cecil, and Zefir could already imagine her having a big grin on her face, which she did by creating a hologram of a small fairy. “...Skewed to our favor.”

“Good, do you need help with pairing the drones to you?” Philia asked.

“Unnecessary, continue with your previous task, leave the programming to me. In the meantime I can assist with carrying any heavy loads. I see that we’re all taking refuge in this quantum hideout. Unfortunately Philia, you have not logged with me any manifest, so I cannot optimize your unpacking. We’ll just have to do this the old fashioned way.”

“Drones? You mean those little flying observers you mentioned?” Kvaris asked.

“Correct.” Neith answered. “I am capable of operating multiple drones while performing other tasks. Your sense of smell and my vision will provide a great overlap.”

“I have great hearing too.” Viel added shyly.

“Even better, in theory, we should have very little chances of being caught off-guard when we begin dungeoneering…”

Meanwhile Philia then provided Zefir a smaller porter rig for him to wear. It too came with its own Anti-grav plate, thought for various reasons it needed to scale back a bit as the sense of weight was needed for Zefir to be mindful of who was around him. Like Neith’s it consisted of a metal frame from which multiple detachable smaller packs were mounted for easy identification, removal and compartmentalization. He and Philia quickly went over the compartments which were all labeled; medicines, tools, utilities such as spare lights, ropes, water, hard rations, etc.

As they were about to open the last pack which contained the spare comms devices, there was a clatter of wood followed by a whistle from Siria.

“A summoning totem?” Siria said.

“Oh right!” Philia said, heading over to it. “Ingrid, this one’s pretty heavy can you lay it down for me?”

“Sure.” It was a rather nondescript looking object, essentially some kind of gem set onto a rock, but it lacked any fancy decorations though she figured it probably was to obfuscate whatever it was it summoned. “What does this do?” she asked.

“A summoning totem is a single-use item to bring forth something usually big and heavy. They’re pretty difficult to manufacture, this one’s for an ATV.”

Ingrid almost dropped the totem. “Excuse me?” Zefir and Cecil turned to her.

“Atvoros 8x8 All-Terrain truck, look, let me just show you, everyone step back. Ingrid, can you bring this…” She directed Ingrid to take the heavy totem to the corner opposite the wagon, so that it had plenty of space to spawn. After a few minutes of chanting the spell everyone else; including the earthlings, were wowed at the sight.

It was a big eight-by-eight all-terrain-vehicle that looked like a truck. Its compact body was angular and had camouflage pattern painted all over it, no doubt so Philia could hide it easily in some foliage (provided it was tall enough). She took everyone for a tour around and inside the vehicle. The driver sat right in the middle. Directly behind the driver was seating for three passengers (the middle could be folded away) and behind that were two long (plushy) benches facing each other. The ATV also featured hatches on the ceiling and its wheels were big and fat, allowing it to stand high from the ground to merit the ATV appellation. What they didn’t know was that the body was customized so it sported bigger windows.

“Fuel?” Ingrid asked “This is going to be a bitch to refuel. Don’t tell me this is solar too.”

Philia shook her head. “We gotta use fuel, that’s the thing. Guess we’re going to have to find a way from the apocetharies to synthesize it.”

“What kind of fuel are we talking about?” Siria asked, testing out the plushy seat of the driver. The sheer amount of strange devices in front of her (the switches, gauges and monitors) fascinated her.

“Liquid fuel, in our world it’s refined from the remains of countless living things that died several centuries if not millenia ago, long after their bodies decomposed to nothing, some of that material becomes a dark oil…”

“Heh.” Kvaris snickered “a necromancer wagon, I like it.”

“Funny you should say that, Anubis.” Zefir chuckled “because your call-sign is named after a god relating to death.”

“I’m liking that name even more.” Kvaris said.

“Please don’t go full chuuni on us.” Ingrid laughed. “Kinu, if your sister wears an eyepatch, please stop her.”

“Why would I want to do that?” Kvaris asked.

“Please don’t.” Zefir said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “It’s a dark path you don’t want to tread…”

Philia on the other hand, squinted her eyes at the fuel gauge. She swore she had stored it with a full tank.

“Well hell…” she breathed. “Even the capacity must have doubled because the gauge is showing half-empty. Qhetar’s blessing has extended to our ATV…”

“Reminder logged. Synthesize gasoline for the ATV.” Neith said before scuttling out of the ATV.

“We can use this ATV to travel quickly to Teth-Odin.” Ingrid said. “Hopefully the booming population of monsters there will net us enough money to commission some synthesized gasoline.”

“You mean e-fuel.” Philia corrected her “There’s an actual name for it. It’s possible here in theory. No need to dig up dead dinosaurs. Problem is that there’s only so much Prime Directive we can violate…”

“Prime Directive?” Siria asked, still playing around with the controls.

“It’s a concept in our world regarding the ethical implications of disseminating information and technology to less advanced civilizations. I for one do NOT want Elion-Nosco or any other country to have access to this technology, the implications will be just as bad as it was in my world…”

“Agreed.” Ingrid, Zefir, and Cecil chorused.

“Anyway, we won’t have problems driving this to Teth-Odin, but for the last mile or two we should use the Aurochs. Zefir, have you ever left any living things in Autumnhollow?”

“Never tried it.” Zefir said, sitting back on the passenger seat and scratching the ears of one of the mice that had clambered over his lap. The mice had entered the ATV and were curiously sniffing around, prompting Ingrid and Philia to pick one up and cuddle it.

“Let’s test it on the Aurochs.” Philia suggested. To be safe, we put them in the new Patio that Qhetar graced us with.

“Let’s do just that.” Ingrid said, and with that they all stepped out of the truck. Philia and Gwen whistled over to the bovines and they made their way to the patio. Philia gave them an affectionate scratch.

“Sorry guys, but this is for the good of the group. No objections, Gwen.”

Gwen hesitated, and then nodded. It wasn’t that she was attached to their beasts of burden but it seemed like Philia was lapsing back to her cold and calculating self disguised with cordiality and she wondered when her number would be up.

Philia firmly held her arm “I won’t do that to you, if you’re thinking of that.”

Zefir did a quick headcount and seeing that all of the Whales; mice included were out of Autumnhollow’s territory then dropped the spell. Autumnhollow broke down into fairy dust.

“Well…” he said. “Let’s roast some marshmallows while waiting. We have an hour.”

The mice were gathered around a fire, holding out skewers so they could roast the marshmallows, they seemed to be singing a song as they squeaked in unison. Meanwhile, Kinu, Kvaris, Sammy, and Ingrid were sparring with each other, with Ingrid being their opponent.

“Come on! Show me what you girls got!” She said as she nimbly dodged their combined attacks. The trio were using practice staves, while it meant they didn’t have the ability to catch Ingrid off-guard due to their apport rings and enchanted bracers giving them access to a wide range of weapons which could strike from unexpected angles, there was still three of them for Ingrid to contend with. For the other three, it was a way to further hone their ability to fence against an unconventional opponent.

Cecil on the other hand had his Muse Box playing as he joined the mice and Viel around the fire. It was clear they were singing along to Led Zeppelin’s “When the Levee Breaks” as they squeaked in tune.

“That is a guitar?” Siria asked, she was liking what she was hearing.

“Yes.” Zefir said, scooting off to the side so she could join them. “Instead of a hollow chamber, the vibrating strings activate electrical signals and play it to a speaker, the fun thing is that with the same guitar, you can alter how the speaker interprets the signal, creating all sorts of effects you like…”

“The Demon City of Teth-Odin’s one such levee now that the Red Moon happened, let’s hope it and all other demon cities don’t break.” Siria remarked.

“With Ingrid? Teth-Odin won’t break.” Cecil said assuredly.

“This is callsign Glados. You know I’m still here in Autumnhollow, right? Over.” Neith said over their earpieces.

“Glados, earlier I asked you if you wanted to test this out as a non-organic entity. So don’t talk like we forgot about you. I assumed you didn’t contact us because the communication got cut. Over.” Philia said on the radio.

“Glados copies. As for the aurochs, They are peacefully grazing.” Neith replied. “They are however, located at the secondary dimension with the big patio deck-”

“Baseplate to Glados.“ Zefir said quickly “Confirm they are outside of the patio floor and are on the grass. Over.”

“That’s an affirmative, Baseplate.” Glados said. “Meanwhile I am on Autumnhollow proper. King Fish, do you have any way to receive my visuals?”

“Affirmative, stand by, Glados…” Philia said, taking from her side pouch a tablet. She sat down so everyone could gather around her and see what Glados wanted to show them.

It looked no different than if Autumnhollow was still around. The borders that led beyond Zefir’s magical retreat was filtered by a mosaic of gently rippling air. Light enough to clearly see who was beyond the border, but this time when Glados approached the barrier now glowed slightly, which never happened before.

“This phenomenon did not occur in the past when others left this dimension. It would seem this glow is either an indication of a barrier preventing anything from coming out or a reminder that it is currently a one-way passage.” Neith said.

“Ingrid.” Philia said “we need to test if someone can leave if there’s something on the border. Can you cut down a-”

“That won’t work.” Ingrid said. “It’s got to be me, someone living.”

“Are you sure?” Philia said, narrowing her eyes.”

“Well, if you know anyone else in this team that can take a city-destroying Annihiliator Beam to the face twice before dying, I’m all ears.” She said, walking towards the last direction of Autumnhollow. “This is Starchaser actual, Glados, let me know when I am exactly at the border.”

“Glados copies… keep going…Stop. Take three paces…a quarter-pace back. Stop. You are now exactly at the border of Autumnhollow. Stand by…”

“I sense nothing ahead of me.” Ingrid said.

“Glados to Starchaser Actual, the drone has failed to exit. Confirm you sensed anything.”

“Negative, Have it come out to the side then-WHOA!” Ingrid said as the quad-rotor drone emerged from thin air. “Now send it back.”

The drone did not, however, come back to Autumhollow, everyone could see it flitting back and forth aimlessly.

“Let me see if I can touch the drone…” Ingrid said. Neith let it hover and Ingrid touched it with no issue. ”The drone is solid. And it seemed to have materialized the minute it touched the border. It looks like it’s a one-way portal then…”

“Ingrid… you’re occupying the same space as Neith.” Philia said.

“I don’t feel anything.”

“It appears I’m occupying some kind of in-between dimension.” Neith observed.

“Philia, do want to risk it?” Ingrid asked. “Is it possible we could reach Star Rose and the others?”

“I never brought that up due to the inherent dangers.” Neith said. “Besides our own, there is still the Dark Empire to deal with. Our best defense is to not attract attention. The three of you; Ingrid, Cecil, and Philia, have done your duty, we live in this world you called Terragalia now, if you wish to pursue your heroics, you should carry them out for this world, not theirs.”

Philia and Ingrid remained silent for a while, Cecil shifted around, thinking.

“But Philia’s already warped in so much things from Earth.” Cecil began. “Including one-of-a-kind tech like you, Glados. I can understand not contacting Athena and the others, but do we…”

“I am not suggesting we completely abandon all contact with Earth, I am merely suggesting we do not let out any information that we still exist…” Neith explained.

“You are implying, we do have contact with Earth…” Ingrid said slowly, “is the WiFi on!?”

“Why-Fie?” Kvaris asked. “Are we being observed by something?” she started.

“Calm down.” Cecil said “Zefir, you have a router on Autumnhollow?”

“Yeah, but it never worked! That TV in the living room is a dud! Oh shit…it must’ve activated when Qhetar’s blessing took effect!”

Philia looked at him, then at Cecil, her eyes widening.

“Glados! Commandeer that router now! Firewall it!”

“Already did. Specs indicate we are sending and receiving from… standby…running IP address scan…Kansas, refining scan.”

“Huh…why does that sound familiar…” Ingrid said, more to herself than anyone.

“What is going on? Who is watching us?” Kvaris asked.

“We have a way of communicating with people in our world, we can talk to others half a world away… but such technology, or magic however you look at it, has its pitfalls too. A firewall is what we call the barriers, in a manner of speaking that prevents others from doing anything bad.” Ingrid explained.

“Think of it this way…” Philia added “Imagine you have a magic book, it writes on its pages the words from any book in a special library, that way you don’t have to physically go to the library and borrow a book, sounds like great magic, right?”

Everyone nodded.

“I would like a book such as that.” Viel added

“With such a book, I don’t have to worry about it being already borrowed by someone else.” Sammy grinned, remembering the times she and Viel went out in the rain for an hour only to return empty-handed.

“Convenient yes…so you’re suggesting that someone could tamper with the magic that let’s you grab the information you want and do some harm to you, like make it blow up in your face or write false information?” Kvaris postulated.

“Not so dramatic, but yes.” Cecil replied.

“And you erected a firewall barrier in order to prevent others from looking where we are…or maybe not? Neith seems to be implying that despite our location here near the Gorpisal Woods, it seems to reflect as somewhere else in your world.” Viel said.

Neith read off some numbers, followed by “45th Drive, Oak Farms…”

“That’s Farmer Grace’s place! What time is it there?” Ingrid asked.

“The same as us, 3:45pm” Neith replied.

“Is Arek on?” Philia asked.

“Standby while I make a Discord account…” Neith replied. “Philia, your ‘successor’ has been appointed, now Dark Queen Isilria.”

“Life goes on…” Ingrid deadpanned. “At least it keeps our girls busy.”

“Argh!” Philia clutched her head “But I thought I killed her when I…”

“When you threw her off a cliff, very smart of you.” Cecil snarkily said, Ingrid chuckled.

“Neith?” Arek’s voice came onto the line. There was the sound of clicking.

“Arek, it’s me, swear on me secrecy, or I’m going to narc on you.” Neith said in a threatening tone.

“Whoa, whoa, easy there robo-narc. I’m just a humble farmboy making moonshine on the side, no one’s going to care.”

“I’m not going to narc you to Earth’s authorities, gulan.” Neith said urgently. “Do I have your cooperation or do you want to spend a few years in the Aenorsian slammer?”

There was the sound of insect-like chittering followed by clicking sounds.

“What the hell, Neith!? Piggy-backing off of my router? Not cool, man!” Arek said. “But yeah… killswitch is on. Talk, buddy.”

There were some whirring sounds coming from Neith. “Confirmed line is secure. Arek, Ingrid and Philia are with me.”

“WHAT!?”