Novels2Search

V1.11 – Shortcuts

Chapter 11:

Shortcuts

“Brace up yards, you cack-handed deck apes. Dying is the day worth living for!”

– Hector Barbossa, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

– ***** –

After making off from the macabre marauding mob of morbid miscreants, massacring and maiming on a merry martial melody, the mismatched mates and their mongrel made it to the meanders of moving mucus and marched to a mossy mound.

The two adventurers and their diminutive draconic stooge were now gazing upon the putrid flow of the [River of Lost Souls], its nauseating smell and its dizzying stop-motion pace. The endless processions of mingled spectres wailing mutely in despaired agony, although overlooked by the blasé Progenitor and the uninterested pup, was leaving the Shieldbearer at loss for pertinent descriptive terminology.

“This is…”

“If you say cute, I will be the one to punch yo- OUCH!”

“Of course I wouldn’t say that!”

“Pfr-pfr-pfr-pfr.”

“I don’t see what’s so funny, doggy.”

“Grrrrrrrrrr…”

“Stop it. Both of you.”

“Yeah mom.”

“Muuu.”

“Why do you listen to her? I am the master here.”

“Grrrrrrrr.”

“Next one who opens their mouth, or muzzle, I threw her or him in there. Understood?”

““…””

“Good. Now what do we do?”

For some disciplinary reasons, the tall Athena was holding onto her two childish companions, Victoria and Toto, respectively by the neck of her clothes and the cloth of his neck, and giving them a glare of mama-tigress scolding her two bickering cubs.

And, in a place where chaos was born, far from the world below, while eating his popcorn, god was enjoying the show.

“Well?” Athena insisted.

“…Can we talk now?”

*sigh* “Yes. But no fighting with the dog.”

Athena slowly put Victoria down on the ground, and Toto ended up on her own armoured shoulder, where he sat docilely but still baring his short smooth cute fangs at the Bloodsoul Mage.

“It’s his fault. If he just went back to his pokeba… inventory.”

“Vicky…” the tone was menacing.

“Okay… *sigh* Well. I know I promised you to go to Start as fast as possible, but…”

The dhampir shot a hesitant glance at the tall woman.

“Go ahead,” Athena gave her permission to continue.

“There’s a guardian… I suppose it’s a kind of boss… around here. If we don’t defeat it, the souls of Dorothy and the others won’t be able to go to the Ether… or whatever they call NPC-afterlife… I know this doesn’t concern you, but if we could just… Eeeeh… You know…”

Not sure how to convince her irascible comrade, Victoria was playing uncomfortably with her braid, but as it appeared, the fierce copper-headed tank didn’t need much convincing.

“Alright.”

“Seriously?!”

“Yeah… I still want to get rid of that class, but Start is months away. I don’t think a small detour will be that much of a problem.”

Even if the Soulbound had made the resolution to stop being a burden to her friends, she still couldn’t accept her subclass. The simple idea of being dependant on another person, of not being her own master, was something that repulsed her on a visceral level. But not to the point she would be selfish and deny Victoria her help if the cute dhampir asked.

“Thank you!” Victoria smiled happily. “But… I don’t think we’ll need months to reach Start anyway.”

“How’s that?”

“I saw a map of the area around here at Bluerose. It was quite dated, but for what it was showing, it didn’t really matter how old it was. Ley lines don’t really change, except in case of large topographic transformations.”

Athena made a puzzled face.

“You spoke about ley lines when we escaped the castle. What are those exactly?”

“Basically? Lines of mana that run through the ground. They can be used to fuel rituals and runes. Most dungeons are actually located over ley lines, but nobody really cares.”

The self-centred ex-Wandering Knight made a wide dismissive gesture expressing her contempt for the stupidity of other people in general.

“And how does that helps us shorten the journey?”

“Well, there’s another common use for ley lines, even though, again, not many know it’s actually ley lines that are used. From the non-initiates’ point of view, it just works ‘because it is ancient magic’. It’s funny how people don’t care as long as it works. It’s even funnier when it breaks though. Hahaha. I love looking at them trying to figure this shit out. Hahahaha... *cough* Anyway, what I’m talking about is…”

There were many runic ruins throughout Pandore, almost all of them which used ley lines as power sources. However knowledge about these energy paths had mostly been forgotten, and even Elric had only stumbled upon it by chance in the [Lost Library of Butv’Erisit]. Most of those ruins were unique and all different, but there existed a certain type of ruin, or more accurately a large scale artefact, which had duplicates all over the continent.

“…teleportation,” Victoria concluded.

“Ah? But I thought teleportation gates were set up by the Temple?”

“Those guys, eh?” commented the Knowledgeable with a hint of disdainful mockery.

The Temple, with a big capital T, was a vast order which venerated the god of… well… Order, fittingly. Its headquarters were set up in [Lumiere], capital of the [Holy Land of Altor], but its presence was also strong in [Firstland], as it was the main human religion in this part of the continent.

Victoria of course, as a most unwilling apostle of Chaos, would be recognised as a mortal enemy of the Temple as soon as she stepped into one of their buildings, since priests had the annoying habit of setting up barriers around everything they owned. Barriers which more often than not were complemented with hostile heathen-smiting spells. Moreover, because the pale Princess was also the unholy Progenitor of the vampire race, and because humans had a stupid tendency of confusing Order with Light and Good, she would be undoubtedly doubly hated.

In fact, if the Temple became aware of her existence, she gave them at most six hundred and sixty-six seconds before putting her name at the very top of their “to obliterate with pious brutality” list. The aforementioned time frame being just what Victoria estimated necessary for two panic attacks and one tearful supplication to their god for protection against the Harbinger of Unpredictable Doom.

I suppose the Magichaos Girl might also be on their kill-on-sight list, but she has never been very active near populated area so, then again, maybe not. And, well… I think the god of Order hates me personally anyway. Is there such thing as megalo persecution complex? And as far as other Light-ish gods go, I may not be hated by Sun, but that remains to be seen… And I’d rather not see the sun up close any time soon.

For various reason thus, Victoria had all intentions to stay as far away from the Temple as dhampirly possible.

“No,” she eventually answered Athena. “The Temple doesn’t own the teleportation gates. That’s just what they want everyone to believe. It’s true that they control most of the gates in Altor and Firstland, but not all of them. Plus they don’t really have the knowledge to set up new ones. All they can do is add a little low-level rune between the power source, the ley line in other words, and the teleportation circle, so they can pretend to control it.”

“So they only add a switch to pre-existing installations,” Athena rephrased with a thoughtful expression.

She looked interested.

“Right,” Victoria nodded, remembering Eva was in the same technical-oriented studies as ‘herself’.

“So there is a teleportation gate nearby?”

“I’m not sure yet, but there’s a town named Cali not far from here, and according to the map, several ley lines converge under it, which would be a perfect place to set up a gate. And if there’s nothing in Cali, this whole region is abnormally swarmed with ley lines. I’d be surprised if their isn’t at least one gate around here… and in the worst case scenario, I can set up a gate myself.”

The Shieldbearer eyes widened until they became two amber saucers. Her mouth too hang open. Even Toto looked like he was calling bullshit on that one.

“You… You can make teleportation gates?”

“Yeah… well… There’s a bunch of ifs and buts… and I never actually tried… Mostly because I prefer to walk… But… The runes themselves, I could easily relearn them within a month. In fact, I’ve already started to replenish my spell repertoire. The main problem is that if there already is a gate around, one that is still active or even dormant, and we miss it in our search and try to create another gate nearby… Well… Let’s just say that having two sources of large scale space distortion magic resonate with each other is a bad idea.”

“How bad?”

“…Hydrogen Bomb on steroids bad?”

“Oh.”

“Yeah… ripping a hole in space is usually unadvisable. That’s why I try to stay away from the gates the Temple has tempered with.”

Athena blinked a couple times, then began to pale.

“Oh god… there’s one of those in every major city in Altor and Firstland.”

“Yeah… and chain reaction is a very funny business… But it’s not like what they, the templars I mean… What they do isn’t really that dangerous. To reuse your analogy, they have just cut a wire and added a switch. As long as they don’t try to temper with the inside of the device… or that their switch doesn’t overheat… or that no powerful space magic is cast nearby… or… Haha… Well… In any case… everything should be fi~ine.”

The Shielbearer didn’t seem much reassured. Victoria could understand. She herself was overly excited by the perspective of nationwide spacequake fireworks. In the past, whenever Elric was around people and had felt really excited, he had noticed his companions tended to shit their pants. They also often threw glances at him and muttered prayers for some reasons.

“Aaaanyway. We digressed, soooo… To come back to our problem, I could also try to set up a non-runic teleportation circle and select a runic gate as the destination. Like this, the circle would be ‘spent’ by the jump and disappear before any resonance could happen…”

“But?” Athena interpreted Victoria’s sentence left in suspension.

“But. Indeed. Well… first that would require a truckload of magic-conductive material. The best would be powdered managems, and even a small bag costs an arm, with the magic bracelets still on it.”

Actually Victoria had quite a large amount of savings, enough to buy a castle of decent size in fact, plus some of the surrounding city, although most of her fortune was in artefacts, ancient documents and rare materials, including the aforementioned powder in non-negligible quantities. Ingredients for magical circles were not easy to gather, and who knew when one would need to blow up a city? Or a small mountain? It was always good to have some supplies at hand.

However she could not access her reserves from where she and Athena were anyway. Only basic necessities were stored at the Horizon Guild’s headquarters and thus obtainable through the [Ether Bags]. Her most precious and/or dangerous secret possessions were kept secretly in a secret safe at a secret bank of sorts. Very secret.

“And, second,” Victoria continued with her explanation, “lower quality teleportation… higher risk of not getting there all together.”

“You mean the members of the group would arrive one after another?”

“No… the pieces of the members of the group would arrive one after another… if they arrive at all… and at the right destination… I need to try to weaponize this.”

“…”

“Yeah… Well… *cough* There’s a reason why teleportation isn’t more common. Anyway, there high chances of us finding a gate in Cali, so let’s not worry pointlessly for now and let’s focus on killing that Guardian instead.”

“Okay.” It sounded more reasonable to Athena than the invention of dimensional artillery. “Where is it?”

“…”

“Vicky?”

“I’m sure it’s… somewhere around here…”

*crack* *crack* *crrrrack*

“Haha… Thena, were those your knuckles?”

“You must have misheard. That was your skull.”

“Hahaha… You’re not good at jokes, Thena… Thena? AAAAAH!! PLEASE SPARE ME! AAAAH! NOT THE FACE! NOT THE FA- AAAOUCH!!! Owowowow… Damn you, bear woman.”

“Pfr-pfr-pfr-pf-KAAIIII!! Kai-kai-kai…”

“Seriously…”

A brief sympathetic glance passed between Victoria and Toto, before each recalled who the other was and looked away with a humph.

Athena warily massaged her temples, wondering if that was what mothers felt when their kids refused to behave. However, she could feel somehow that Victoria was doing this more to toy with her than because the playful dhampir was angry with the actual possessed toy. Toto was genuinely being a brat though, but it wasn’t like Athena couldn’t understand why he was in a bad mood. So Athena decided not to pursue and instead moved on.

"Alright. Let's proceed methodically."

Victoria shivered at this fearful concept.

"What do we know about that Guardian?"

"Well, it's a bit of a long story..."

With the least digressions possible – *COUGH* – Victoria brought the Shieldbearer up to speed with the causes of the current state of Erwyn, the humbly named “Awesome Three”, Jafar's totally unpredictable betrayal and finally a twisted version of the origin of Kansas, one that did not include any semblance of gender-bendism whatsoever.

Thus, two hours, seven attacks by random monster groups at various stages of decay, three violent punchistic redirecting of the conversation and the perpetrator’s consequent tearful apologies, as well as a tentative escape by an ungrateful puppy followed by a pitiful wrestling match between two greater undead possessed by their inner four-year-old... a dishevelled Progenitor eventually concluded her explanation.

"So the Guardian should be close to the river," Athena commented.

"...Yeah."

"Kekeke. That about sums it up, does it not?"

""...""

"..."

*ting*

A wild ELDER appeared!

The fuck?

"WHAT THE HELL are you doing here?!" Victoria shouted, as the Shieldbearer explosively jumped forward and threw a flying kick at the unexpected intruder... a movement which looked pretty badass while wearing a black full-plate armour.

The dhampir mentally applauded the action but Ambrose let out a startled cry. He dissolved before the impact, and then reformed a little further.

It’s not very effective…

Victoria guessed this was more a reflex from the old man than anything. Athena would not have been able to hurt him even if her foot had gone right through the ghost’s head.

The Progenitor was ready to let this cat-and-mouse game continue between her Soulbound and her kinda-mentor – she did learn a lot about soul magic in the Corbin's autobiography – however Athena was not the kind to perform twice a seemingly useless action and was already retreating, shield raised, and placing herself between her friend and the apparition.

Seeing that she wasn't going to have her fun, Victoria decided to intervene before Athena strained a neuron trying to figure out a way to beat the shit out the wild Elder. Not that Victoria wasn't interested in finding out how the Shieldbearer would go about it, but she doubted the tall woman had much chance of success.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Victoria casually stood up from the stump she had been sitting on and placed herself between Tom and Jerry.

"Thena, this is Ambrose," she said, alternatively designating each of them. "Old fart, I suppose I don't need to introduce my friend here?"

"Kekeke. No, of course. How could I not be aware of the Progenitor's Soulbound's identity?"

Don't play old sage, fart. I bet you've been stalking us all the way. No wonder I felt watched these past few days.

Victoria saw Athena twitch at being addressed by her subclass, but surprisingly she didn't retort and instead asked a pretty obvious question with a raised eyebrow at the Princess:

"Ambrose? Wasn't he supposed to be more... elderly?"

"...Yeaaah... What's with the looks, geezer?"

The smirking spectre was undoubtedly Ambrose Corbin, seventeenth of the name or whatever, but instead of a venerable old timer, the man standing there looked like a prince charming in his twenties, his muscles for once filling the dirty white shirt he always wore, which was not so dirty anymore. If not for the golden eyes, blond hair and stupid laugh, Victoria herself would have had some difficulties identifying the stalker.

I decided. I’m starting my own stalker collection! Gotta catch ‘em all!!

"Ah, this? Kekeke. Why not? I am the one to choose my own appearance. Before was how I looked a few years prior my death. I thought it was more suitable for the elderly chief of a remote village. However now that my role is over, what wrong is there to try and impress the ladies?"

Victoria, who had been mumbling for all duration the answer, suddenly extended her hand towards the Shieldbearer who was still in fighting stance.

"...oul Grab]. Thena?"

With a short nod of acknowledgement, the tall woman leaped forwards and, even before the red-blue glow of the spell receded, slammed her left fist in the dead knight's face. The two two things Athena disliked the most, after herself, were vain playboys and enemies she couldn't beat. Ambrose was embodying the two with flawless expertise, and feeling his cheekbone bend under the pressure of her gauntlet was good indeed.

Unfortunately, Athena's Intelligence stat was not that high, and Ambrose was a tough bastard. The douchebag only slightly staggered backwards.

Well, we are not trying to kill him anyway.

At least Victoria was not. However, the opening created by the Soulbound’s attack was just enough for a certain doggy to jump in and snap his jaws shut on the ghost prince's family jewels.

This was how they discovered Toto had apparently a permanent [Soul Grab] ability going on… and had conserved his draconic strength when dealing with other disembodied souls.

– *** –

"Vicky, are you alright?"

Athena was concerned about Victoria, who looked even paler than usual as she stared with horror at the collapsed foaming Ambrose.

"I... I'm fine thanks."

Holy mother of cyborg pirate zombie raptor Jesus...

"Old fart... are you dead again?"

"...I knew..."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I knew I should not have left you out of my sight. I took off for half a day to check on the situation in the capital, and you give a physical body to one of the greatest calamity of the past four millennia. I was careless."

"What the hell are you mumbling ab- Thena! Don't nod in agreement!!"

"S-Sorry," Athena stammered, then turned towards the slowly getting up Ambrose. "What happened in the capital?"

She was one to think no detail was irrelevant. Victoria on her side, while keeping a distracted ear out, fell on her knees beside Toto and pet him with a "good job". The stuffed dog didn't recoil for once and smugly smirked, although he still dutifully munched on the mage's hand after a couple pettings.

"Nothing happened in the capital. I was simply getting my information up to date. Although, I also put a couple observation spells in place in case Sanity decided to launch an attack. As it is, the current royal family is filled with pretty useless characters, with the exception of the Second Princess. But the girl lacks experience. If the capital were to be assaulted, I fear they would not last a week."

Athena perked up at the bad news, her player instincts smelling a quest, and Victoria tensed up, her recklessness detector sensing troubles. The Reckless Imbecile was all for killing the Guardian and saving Dorothy's soul, but she had never been much of an avenger. Even with the not-so-roundabout thinking that Jafar was responsible for her little sister's death, Victoria wasn't about to take on a whole cult of crazy people right now.

True, in normal circumstances she would have probably opted for directly attacking the enemies’ headquarters, also probably while naked and commanding an army of dancing chihuahuas, but "normal" circumstances included herself being able to endure a punch from a cockroach and to run for more than fifty-seven seconds without collapsing, and also usually encompassed a relatively good grasp on her powers, not endangering a friend and not being hated by about every major god out there.

Although, if she had to be honest with herself, the real problem was that this kind of "save the kingdom" quest would undoubtedly involve large scale fights, meaning armies, meaning associating with large numbers of people. And since this country's army seemed unable to deal on their own with Sanity's ineluctable hordes of undead, it meant those people she would have to associate with would have to be recruited from the outside, which meant attracting players' attention to herself, something she had never been a fan of. Even back in the days, Elric's fame had been attached to his name more than to his face, and still was.

She had to intervene.

"Yeah Yeah..." she began on a dismissive tone. "This is very sad and all, but, on a more practical subject, do you know where that Guardian is?"

Athena shot her a quizzical glance for the not-so-subtle attempt at changing the subject, but decided the probable quest would only make it more difficult for her to get rid of her subclass, so she let it slide. Besides, Victoria might have made the Shieldbearer the official head of their group, but she wasn't about to voice her opinion if it went against the dhampir's objectives.

"Ah. Yes. The Guardian. Well, he lives in a cave that is both the source of the river and its end. I would have exterminated the beast myself, but my current strength is not enough. In fact, I can barely maintain this projection of myself. So, I feel guilty to press the matter onto you, but could you two please take care of the Soul Eater and allow me to grant eternal rest to my fallen subordinates."

Ambrose said so seriously with a bow, and the formulaic speech was predictably followed by a familiar bell sound.

*ting*

New Quest: Rest in Pieces

The Guardian of the [Lost Woods], once the [Domain of the Sacred Beast], has long ago been corrupted by the dark magic which plagues the [Kingdom of Erwyn]. You have been asked to kindly slaughter the Guardian to grant rest to the souls fallen in this place, as well as to the tormented beast itself.

Difficulty C

Success Conditions:

Kill the Guardian of the [Lost Woods] before Ambrose Corbin’s soul is erased from this world.

Consequences:

- The self-satisfaction of doing a good deed. ...What? That's a thing.

- Great Benediction of the freed Guardian

- One artefact

- One hidden... reward? Not sure if it's a reward... But please take him if you can.

----------------------------------------

- Do you accept? -

"Yes."

You have accepted the quest “Rest in Pieces”.

There doesn't seem to be a catch... Although that hidden reward is suspicious, but we can just skip it.

Hidden rewards were special, in that solving the quest didn't mean one would get this kind of reward. There were conditions to get it, such as talking the boss into submission instead of beating the crap out of them, killing every single monster in a dungeon, kissing the right frog, eating salmon under the moonlight, sacrificing one of your teammates to the god of custard... those sorts of things.

Sometimes the conditions were very straightforward and easy to guess, but most often they were absurd. Therefore conventional adventurers considered hidden rewards a hit-or-miss feature.

Elric, however, had always made a point of getting every single hidden reward in any quest he did, even when the conditions to get two different rewards were exclusive in nature. He once fought a boss after equipping an item which created an evil twin of himself, just to be able to fight while both being naked and wearing a dress at the same time. The boss had not been that strong actually. It was defeating the evil twin that had been the delicate part.

Now that the God of Chaos actively talked to her though, Victoria had become much more suspicious of anything with the word "hidden" or "special" attached to them.

She brought back her attention to Ambrose, who was speaking again:

"You have my gratitude, young ones. Now I must leave. Manifesting myself takes more than it seems out of me, and I must conserve my strength for the day I shall finally truly need it. We probably will not be seeing each other much anymore before that day comes."

"Finally a good news."

"Kekeke. So ruthless with this old man." Then he added with a tender smile: "It was good to see you again, Victoria."

The Princess felt her heart skip a beat, being looked in such a loving way by a handsome man, immediately followed by the urge to throw up and a subconscious desire to destroy all life that she attributed to Seras.

"Toto."

"ROOOAAR!!"

A jet of spirit flames surged towards Ambrose, who swiftly dispersed with a startled yelp.

"Good boy," Victoria proudly praised the pup who was back to biting her ankle.

"You two don't have a very good relationship," observed Athena.

"He stole my marbles."

And with that meaningful answer, the two women began to walk along the putrid river.

– *** –

"This is..."

"Rather cool... in a creepy Flush of Hell kind of way."

"I will agree this time."

Two girls and one stuffed dog stood at the top of a cliff, their back to the void, the shortest girl a bit closer to the edge than it was prudent. They had followed the river upstream, in the same direction as the flow of wailing souls, who seemed to have a little dissension with the concept of gravity. But did gravity apply to immaterial beings anyway?

The culminating point of the [River of Lost Souls], its geographical spring thus, which was actually its end, was a small lake surrounded by tall ancient trees… and entirely occupied by a whirlpool. The incoming plasma of spectres was sucked down into a hole at the bottom on the lake, diving to a fate worse than death itself as the meal of a corrupted entity, damned spirits being dragged against their agonising will into a spiral of darkness and despair. Or, like the poet dhampir had judiciously pointed out, it looked like an unholy toilet being flushed.

"Hahaha... It's funny. Thena, look at them waving their hands like 'Help me! Help me!' Hahaha... This reminds me of that old movie where a domestic mouse falls down in the sewers and finds a city... Did you see it?"

"No."

"...figures."

All the souls which disappeared down the drain did not get eaten though. Mid-height of the cliff, below where the group now stood, a huge mouth-like cave opened, spitting an uninterrupted flow of wriggling translucent bodies which fell down into another lake, before being sucked upstream again by the attraction of the whirlpool.

"Mmmh... So the rivers surrounds the hollowed mesa of Nowhere completely. The cave must be the entrance of the dungeon. I have ropes in my inventory so getting there should not be too difficult. I should probably carry Vicky on my back though. Alright, Vicky we… Vicky?"

Having finished her observations and correctly formed an applicable plan, Athena raised her head, but the dhampir was not beside her anymore. A quick inspection of her surrounding located the Princess near the lake, arguing with Toto.

"...not resistant enough."

"Grrrr."

"I know, but I could not really built a dragon body in three days, could I? And with what material? Be thankful. You're already fireproof and almost impossible to cut through, stop complaining. I'm just concerned that the managem will be broken by blunt damage. Now you don't want that to happen, do you?"

"..."

"That's what I thought. Now, hop! Coucouche panier!"

With a last growl, the little hellhound disappeared into the Progenitor's inventory. Then Victoria mumbled something and a faint glow covered her body, right as the Shieldbearer arrived.

"I was afraid he would get hurt during the boss fight," Victoria answered to her friends' quizzical look.

"I agree for the last boss, but he could have been useful for the rest of the dungeon."

"We don't need to go through the whole dungeon. The quest is just to defeat the Guardian."

"But we can't do that without going through the dungeon."

"Pu~Puuu! There's a shortcut. Though there an eighty percent chance we die. I say the odds are good."

"Eighty? That's madness!"

The dhampir just responded with a smile which sent shivers down Athena's spine, before suddenly staring at the lake behind the tall woman.

"Ah!"

Immediately on her guard, the Shieldbearer spun around, readily equipping her Gorgon Shield. However all that greeted her was the same oddly silent nauseating scenery.

"Vicky? What-"

"Madness? This is SPARTA!!"

A body slammed into Athena's back. Victoria would have liked reproducing the legendary kick but, as far as Leonidas was concerned, she currently felt closer in strength to the Belgian chocolate rather than the Greek king. She thus had had to resort to a less awesome-looking full body slam.

Already unsteady from abruptly turning around, Athena lost balance and fell into the repulsive lake, cursing words which would make a trucker blush. Still on the bank, Victoria laughed out loud as she massage her painful shoulder. She looked her Soulbound being dragged into the whirlpool, before pinching her nose and canonball diving after Athena.

However, right before hitting the surface of faces, a thought crossed the Princess' mind.

Hahaha.

“I can't swiblebrugghlbarf-blub.”

– ***** –

----------------------------------------

Hiii! Back from Italy. From sun to rain. From shorts to pants. From shirtless to pullovers. From 37° to 23° Celsius. Aaaaah… Belgium. Home, wet home.

Here’s a picture from me in Pisa.

Spoiler :

http%3a%2f%2fi.imgur.com%2fvkIHinT.jpg [http://i.imgur.com/vkIHinT.jpg]

Thanks for your support as usual and see you next chapter, if my MCs did not just got dissolved.

Dissolution is never the solution.