The thing about being deprived of one sense was that your brain automatically focused its attention on the one that was still available. And in his case that one was, well, his hearing. Which was why he stopped on his track right there and then after catching that horrifying but not too surprising tidbit. After all this park had severely outclassed him in well, almost every way. Which was unreal, because he didn’t know… the fact that this place was supposed to be a park? You knew, a freaking honest to god park? The one you went because it got good air, free (most of the time), and that everyone, everyone knew that this was a place that built with one and one purpose only; facilitating the public to relax. Nevertheless and somehow the park turned out to be not just a park, instead it was a hidden magical alcove hiding treasures and abomination in equal measure. Like that someone in that room. How he or she managed to tell that Clar was not his sister when they just pass the door was beyond him. At least five emotions and three consequences flashed in his mind with three to seven others waiting to be formed in a queue. Basically, postulates and hypotheses that boiled down into two big questions: ‘How — freaking how?’ and ‘What would the other party did with that information?’

“Yes! That is him!”

“Brother is right, grand elder, that is the human we ferried here.”

—oh? That was interesting. So they were here, huh. Craning his head to the far up, his totally amateurish and not up to par echolocation told him that the twin sprites were up there. Somewhere. A bit to the left maybe, around, hmm… 10:30 position. He waved his hand and squinted, just letting his eyes opened no more than a bit at a time. Balancing between the searing, blinding pain and hoping that the assisted concsious adjustment would let him see them a second faster.

Thinking back, the brother did say something about asking for special dispensation. Was he meant to ask from the grand elder then? Err… if that so… had—had he been too hasty? Well, his anger certainly was well-reasoned but — err, perhaps he should apologize first. Then negotiate about that waiting room incident. Maybe. It wouldn’t do to have a diplomatic incident with the only people that were able to bring you back to where you came from. After all, it followed if—

“Stay back, master!”

“Ah?” What? He felt his feet unconsciously stepped backward. A hand; little and soft pushed him. Not strong, but just enough so that he staggered — Clar? W—what happened? Ugh, his eyes were still...

“W—what is it?”

“...dangerous.” her voice answered. Trailed then paused.

He frowned. He wished she gave him more explanation besides just saying a one-liner like that. That just uninformative. Worrying. Then again she might have not realized that he was as blind as a chicken at sundown right now. But before he could formulate a more coherent question, he felt a pull—tug. The girl tugged him. And she tugged him hard.

What?

“Little stonefriend. If we want to harm your master. There is nothing you could have done to stop it.”

Unlike the first time when the voice spoke right beside his ear and containing mere exasperation about the young-and-old generational gap or like the second time, when it was a bit echoey but filled with world-shattering revelation, this time it was ...unique. First, how should he put it — well. How about the fact that sentence was basically a freaking threat? Nothing you could have done to stop it? Oh, come on. That just ‘I could kill you, but I don’t want to because reasons’. Unbelievable. Should he even negotiate with someone like this? Clar was strong right? So unlike him, she could ...paddle. There! Problem solved. It was a pity that his and the twin sprites relationship between him must strain. But with an elder like that. No. Just no. Oh, also there was the fact that when the elder spoke, it rang. Rang. He almost swore that the ground below him quaked — hummed. The whirs and thrums were akin if he was thrown into the middle of an active construction site, making his chest, his headspace vibrate in constant, thumping bass. In reflex, he even acceded to all the girl’s mana requests. All except for her to summon her weapon, of course. Even he still had enough sense to not allow her to take that final leap.

“Observe.”

He frowned at that. This old man was really — ugh. Had not he heard about something called de-escalation? He was trying to deescalate here! Well, not exactly deescalate, that came second after protecting themselves, but after Clar was ready, he would. Which was why the other party wasn’t very helpful to his near future de-escalation endea—

—shadow.

...how? The world—the world. It turned back to color. Down the floor when his eyes stared was a cast of large and encompassing shadow. Stretched as far as the sky and turning the bright blue and white around him into darker blues. ...Into deep red browns, into ...shapes — distinguishable outlines. Beyond him were rock formations, tall and scattered between the large mass of water across. A pond as wide as a lake, a waterfall thirty meters high, and a single bridge. Thin as a needle, the stony, wiry mass bridged him and Clar from their little rock platform and across the gaping maw to the lough where the twin sprites and the grand elder supposedly stayed.

“Master!”

Not even a second passed to process what the hell just happened, his world suddenly shifted. His nose smacked something when his eyes, opened barely, managed a blur of rocks, pebbles, and stones. The stretch continued for a while, repeating. Ah. The floor. Someone had carried him in a 180 while letting his shoes dragged against the floor. Clar?

Why?

“Ah…”

The answer presented itself when he craned his head. So that why the room was see-able again. A wave, no, a great stretch of water was held up, propped in the sky. Wrought from the pond across their stretch of bridge, the water climbed and climbed upward, supplied by the endless waterfall.

“...hold on, Master! Just a bit more!”

BANG!

BANG!

BANG! BANG! BANG!

“CLAR’S PUNCH!”

DANG!

Argh! His cheek! It — it sting. The scratch throbbed in pain as he pushed his scragged face from the rough stone floor. Thankfully that was the extent of it. When the impact came, his hand was mercifully flailed up and his thighs absorbed the rest of the shock. He was thrown off.

Torso first, he pushed his palms against the floor. Then his knees, then both of his feet until and with great difficulty he managed to prop himself up. Catching the breathes he hadn’t realized he held, he lifted his hand to cover his eyes. A glare that was not as bright as the first one was covering his front. Stepping back a few steps, he saw it — Clar. She was facing him backward. All of her enchantment flared. Flame, speed, strength, all. The cord that connected both of them was kept siphoning, gulping his mana in a trickle of a little stream.

“...lord.”

So that why.

That was why he got thrown. A crack. Yes, a small but spreading crack was firmly placed on an oversized ice pike. One of the five that stabbed through the floor, covering — blocking the entryway. Must be the recoil when Clar tried to punch through.

He minded telling the girl to try again, after all, there was quite a difference between constant application of force compared with burst application of force. The latter might pushed that already cracked crystal to the required fragility — shattering the whole thing altogether. Yet — yet he couldn’t do that. No. That simple order, that simple ‘punch again’ was beyond her. Beyond two of them. Perhaps two minutes ago, it was still viable. But now? No. Those five blocks of ice were not the only ices around them. Crystals, needles, pikes. Tens if not hundreds were floating-hovering in glints. The closest one — the one that in front of Clar’s face — that one was an arm’s length away. They spun slightly, waiting as if they were simply quantum locked in place; physic curios instead of death contraption telling them that the reason both of them were alive was because they had been allowed to live.

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And his indecision, his hesitation to did anything — anything really, was not without due. The stand-off was allowing the ices to dropped the ambient temperature without stopping. And dropping fast it was. It felt like that one moment he was standing under a 12 o’clock summer sun and by the next second, he was thrust — thrown into the nearest mall where the AC got cranked, cranked, and cranked until it was blowing him in full blast. At least in theory. What he really felt was closer to that if instead of the summer sun, it was the nearby mall, and instead of the nearby mall, it was a freaking walk-in refrigerator which was built to flash freeze newly caught fishes.

Sharp, freezing, and pain popped and ran down through his skin, caressing it to shiver. One drip of condensation even managed to sneak through his collar-neck opening, the thing slithered down on his back. His eyes redden, his nose sniffled and his forehead started to burn up. He almost fell flat right there.

“By water! What have you done, grand elder? Stop! Stop, please!”

W—Who? The sister! Had she decided to intervene at last?

“...stop? Why we want to do that, Child?” the voice of the grand elder trawled, even down here he could felt his gravitas pushed again everything. “Hasn’t you see? It was the stonefriend girl who gave us offense. We merely paid what due.”

Clar? But that just — unbelievable! Was he a psychopath?

“B—but! Right! The — the human! The human is good, grand elder! Surely you shouldn’t punish the other because of one action did. That is wrong!”

“True. But remember, child, she was his summon and he was his summoner. If her triumph was his, should not her fault also be his?”

“...sister.”

“N—no. No, grand elder. S—See not to whom the ocean waves, b—but be she who had witnessed the sky and fell to earth still,”

“Oh? Did you hear that, Crystal? Did you hear that? A little devlet arguing with us about the scripture. What a proud day! What a proud day!”

“This gem heard, grand elder.” Fourth person? Just these three had already made his stomach turned, but a fourth person?

“But, child.” he almost could hear him smile; wide, grinning, and toothy. Like when you found a big hole in your opponent’s statement, and with just a blow of wind, it’d crumble like a house of cards.

“Quote to us Matrissa’s Journey will you?”

And of course, he was right. Why wouldn’t he?

“Grand elder…”

“No, no, child. You quoted scripture to me. 23:2. The beginning passage.”

“Sister…”

“...a—as she passed through the last reefs, hidden from her sunlight grace by the nooks of the Old Woman’s caves and crevasses. She saw three schools. One as dark as the deep, one unseen for it lived under the sand floor, and one was floating, glinting for their scales were blessed with thunder. Fleshes and bounties abound a hundred marks around them…”

“And?”

“...a—and despite the sign of the lady’s generosity. T—they refused to bow to her, the one who h—herald her sign.”

“Then should we not retaliate child? Are you try to imply that we do not possess her sign?”

“N—no, grand elder! It just—”

Sigh, thank you for trying, sister sprite. It seemed he needed to beg — maybe. Perhaps offering all of his mana-water? The sprites seemed interested in that. Now if he could just rummage his pocket unseen—

“That is just enough.” Ah? “Our time here is limited, grand elder. Miss deva, here is your answer. The promise 15:23.”

“...a—as we forgave Enebish and Ugilen, so shall thee. For there was no sin in unknowing ...and no offense in innocence. T—thank you, Lady Crystal!”

“Crystal,” the voice sound displeased. “You should not coddle her! How else will the young generation learn if not—”

“—our time is limited here, grand elder. Limited. Look! The stonefriend girl is freezing.”

Freezing? But hadn’t she — God! She was directing all her flame to him! Mana, he needed to push her more mana!

The reason why they were supposed to be warm with warm being two or three degrees below the lowest AC setting, was because well —he was desperate! Squeezing and calculating his regen against Clar’s enchantment expenditure. A dance of sustainability which should have worked if the girl was halving the warm air between both of them. Apparently, that was a mistake, when he was too focused on their concentration, the cold had been growing. And instead of alerting him, the girl pushed most of the flame to him instead. And he found it the worst way possible. By getting informed by the opposite party. Lord! He was a stupid parental figure. He moved his hand from her shoulder and felt the end of her lock. And of course, it was solid. Her fingers also... T—that stupid girl! Just a minute more and she’d get frostbite!

“So soon? but we barely—”

What was so soon, you deranged psychopath! You have been taking your sweet time for — for ten minutes! Maybe! Lord, he didn’t have time for this. Mana!

“The time is different for the mortal race, grand elder.”

“Right. How could we forget that? Disperse.”

The moment that word was uttered, the cold stopped. Just stopped. One moment he was still huddling with Clar; he pushed more and more of his mana to her, and the girl in her stubbornness pushed more and more of her flame to him.

Which was why the next second was so surprising. No, not surprising. Insulting. It was as if the cold air was simply something to be turned off. Beep, then it disappeared. He knew he was outclassed here, but really? Their whole struggle didn’t even match for that man’s one word? One word?

There was a blip of three seconds before he and Clar realized that she was burning him. The seconds her reflex kicked in, was the seconds he sighed. The difference was the first one was akin to when he was asked to help in fixing the broken water heater system down the apartment building, while the second was more to when he visited the mansion’s kitchen while the staff was preparing lunch. The latter was swelter and damp, but the former? The former was burning his skin and would literally have dried his eyes in a matter of seconds.

Damning the consequences, he rummaged his vest for another waterskin, the one with hot meil and lots and lots of concentrated milk. He pushed it against the girl’s hand and commanded her to drink it. Which she did after a back and forth. Damn it! Could frostbite be repaired with more mana? Well, he needed to try at least.

“Clar…”

“Y-yewsh, master?” she said between gulps. “Can you heal your fingers?”

“...Clar’s can. But it’d need a lot of master’s—”

“Then take it. No, young girl, not a word. Take it.” he eyed his sister by not-choice, stern.

After too long of a breath, the girl nodded. Which was good, because whatever the grand elder’s spell, it was taking it time to be dispersed. The moment the warmness kicked was also the moment when the spikes, the ices — everything was slowly turned into water. Two minutes and ten seconds until all of the ice melted. Leaving puddles all around them. They didn’t last long though, by some equally grand magic the splashed water, even the one that had seeped into the ground, rose again. And like being vacuum-cleaned, it was being sucked without so much of a splatter back to the pond. Leaving only the stretch of water in the sky.

“What evil man wants?” Clar? What were you doing? Hadn’t — ah! Clar was stomping his feet. The pain made him look down. And to his surprise there was an arrow, pointing ...back. Without even looking he knew what the girl wanted. She wanted him to escape, to use her as a distraction… God! No! This girl! He squeezed her shoulder, shaking his head.

“Evil man? That—”

“That is not an offense. At ease girl. We do not mean you or your master any harm” the voice — the reasonable woman, cut in.

Finally, he sighed. Let see if she was willing to accept his bribe. With the income of the store, he could manage a year without downsizing with just, err, two thousand golds. Yeah, that’d do. They could take the rest.

“Crystal, we let you speak freely for you had seen. Seen even more than us. However, your insubordination starts to wear our patience thin.”

Come on, you psychopath!

“Understood, grand elder. The girl gave no offense because what she had done is in accordance of what 763 of 1,192 others had done in the similar recorded instances. It was simply what a normal person would do after the ‘act’ that you had done.”

Good job, sane lady!

“Surely that is not true…”

“All recorded instances contained 68 out of 100 emotional response similarities. The criteria is fulfilled, grand elder. It is again, in this gem most humble suggestion that you abolish this particular personal amusement.”

“...Bah! And what you would have me to do here? Unlike you, we could not even leave this cave.”

“Duly noted, grand elder. Human Euca, stonefriend Clar, we would like to apologize for our grand elder behavior. As you can see, our siree is not quite accustomed in treating with your mortal races. We offer you an apology.”

“No Clar hate you, people!” Clar shouted, not surprising him. If she was not a ten year olds at heart — even if she was a ten years old at heart, he wouldn’t mind if she was cursing like a sailor right now.

“Clar!” Unfortunately, they of course, couldn’t. ”Don’t be rude, we’re guests, here.” He smiled, flashing a head tilt that he hoped she interpreted as ‘trust me’. Taking a step forward, he chucked his anger, his worry — his everything to be dealt later. For now, he’d just rationalize it with the most charitable interpretation: as old people grew older they also grew a bit more lonely and a bit more cuckoo.

Therapy could wait, satisfaction could wait, surviving this was a priority.

“We also apologize if our action was somehow displeasing the grand elder, Lady Crystal.” he smiled as hard as he could toward the sane lady. Which of course still unseen due to the stretch sky-water that hadn’t merged with the pond.

“May we asked why we are invited here?”

“Certainly.”

He blinked.

As she said that, the water on the sky dropped back to the pond in one big bubble. The skin merged slowly without so much sign of surface tension. It was so calm and measured that only one ripple — almost laminar wave produced when the final top of the ginormous bubble melded with the water. However that was not the end of it, a little part of the water slithered and curved toward them, by the end of his next blink it had transformed into a couch, a long table, and vases with its own version of imitation flowers. All made from water.

Not even a second to process all that, the Lady once again spoke. This time with tone and finality.

“Let us talk.”