--- Rania ---

"*That was so awesome!*" Rania said once the screaming died down and people could hear her again.

"*I can not believe that actually worked.*" Balron replied, as he regained his bearing, now that gravity was working properly again.

"*Neither can I.*" Atrog added, as he put out the remaining fires. "*It is amazing that Lilian came out of all of this unharmed. She was right in the epicenter of the Plot Hole when it went off.*"

"*It must have been her Plot Armor that protected her.*" Galanys said. "*I think those two artifacts are part of a matched set. No wonder they worked well together.*"

"*Even so, it was still just plain bizarre.*" Dov added.

"*I agree.*" Lilian said. "*I think a lot of this didn't really make sense if we think about it too hard, so I recommend that we don't. I still can't believe that knowing how to fill out form 3A of my income tax proved essential for all this, and I would never have figured out how to do that on my own. So thanks for explaining that to me back then, Atrog.*"

"*...You are welcome?*" Atrog replied. "*Honestly, I don't know what to say.*"

"*That's ok.*" Rania responded. "*I think we should all never talk about this again. It will retroactively have made this more likely to work.*"

"*What?*" Came the simultaneous response from several of her friends.

"*That makes sense.*" Was Lilian's reply, as she nodded sagely.

She looked concerned, though.

"*Are you alright?*" Rania asked Lilian.

"*Unfortunately, yes.*" She responded. "*I really wish something had gone wrong already. Saint Murphy was taunted, and he will exact his pound of flesh, as is his nature. Nothing has gone wrong yet, and that just means that something terrible will happen soon.

"*We are so close to our goal now. The Library of Akash is just on the other side of the hill. Fortunately they can't detect us while we are still under the residual effects of the Plot Hole.*"

All of them knew this of course, but Rania was glad that Lilian took the time to describe the situation again for the audience, just in case they only tuned in now.

She was so excited! This was it! A super great adventure with lots of foreshadowing and a cool, climactic conclusion right out of a prophecy. And if they won, they would all get to travel the multiverse and go on all of the adventures at the same time!

She just hoped that nothing tragic would happen because of Tonos and his former Chosen, Saint Murphy.

"*Alright, everyone.*" Atrog said. "*We proceed as planned. Rania, what do you see?*"

Rania took the cue and rushed up the hill. It only took her a few seconds to reach the top, and despite her speed she was utterly silent as she moved. Her vampiric powers were enhancing her already formidable stealth abilities further. The Living City would certainly take that power away from her if it could, but luckily the Plot Hole took care of that issue, too.

The Plot Hole was really very versatile, in Rania's opinion.

While she made no sound when she moved, her visual appearance was not quite as stealthy: On Galanys' recommendation she had gone all in on waging psychological warfare against the Living City, and so she was now dressed as a Magical Girl, entirely in pink, and her skin was sparkling in the sun.

At first that had severely hampered her ability to hide, but luckily she knew the solution to that problem: She had performed an ancient fey ritual to turn this liability into an asset. Her highly conspicuous looks were now the supernatural power source of her very own Somebody Else's Problem Field.

Pebble had been unsure if it would work. The ability originally came from a different genre, after all. But luckily it had all worked out in the end. Anybody looking at her would be so overwhelmed by the strangeness that they would simply decide she was not their problem to deal with, and ignore her. She wasn’t invisible, but it came down to the same thing.

She looked at the Library of Akash a few hundred meters down the hill.

There were about a dozen Bad Guy guards. Two were wizards, but they did not look remarkable. There were no vampires. They were probably staying inside to avoid the sunlight. Many of the guards were werewolves, though. Two of them looked like alphas, because they were larger and meaner looking than the rest and because they were bullying the other werewolves around them. Rania knew that the social structure of wolves didn't actually work that way in nature, but people seemed to like the idea and the Living City cared about looking cool more than about accuracy.

As she watched the group, one of the werewolves happened to look in her direction. Their eyes met. The werewolf stared at her in all her pink, highly-visible, sparkling half-vampire glory. She stared him down, and let the Somebody Else's Problem Field do its work. After a tense few seconds of eye contact, the werewolf turned around and wordlessly continued his patrol, far on the other side of the Library, walking slightly faster than before.

She continued her observations of the group. One of the humans looked very young, more like an older teenage boy than a man, but the werewolves all seemed to show him respect and keep their distance. Even the alphas didn't bother him. He looked unremarkable, but was clearly in charge of the group.

"*There are two wizardly-looking humans, but their robes aren't very fancy, so they are probably just middling.*” She reported. ”*There are also eight normal werewolves, two alphas, and one Named Character down there.*"

"*A Named Character?*" Atrog asked.

"*I mean, they probably all have names? I have learned that by now!" Rania added guiltily. "*But this one guy looks important. We could go ask him. He looks like the sort of guy who would be happy to monologue about his backstory for a while.*"

"*Is his hair edgy?*" Lilian asked. "*Or does he look like the sort of guy who has a secret technique, with an elaborate but totally cringe name? It's so easy to get that kind of person to reveal their Secret Plan. It's like they have no self awareness at all.*"

Rania looked at the man more critically. "*His hair is normal. I'm not sure, but my intuition says no. He looks too serious for that kind of thing.*"

"*Anyway,*" Atrog interrupted their conversation with slight exasperation. "*This looks like we expected. We don't want to make this more complicated than it needs to be, so let's just go ahead with the original plan.*"

So they did.

Boomwagon the Second was larger and more powerful than Boomwagon the First, and even its skeleton horses looked more impressive. Rania had painted them in cool colors and put unnecessary spikes and fancy adornments on them to let the universe know that this was a "high-level" carriage, to borrow the strangely fitting terminology used by Niphia cultists.

Unfortunately their purple warpaint was useless right now. It made them more stealthy in Oruk, but the Library of Akash was far away from their home and there were few orcs around here. The local spirits did not accept her reasoning that the carriage should be stealthy, and so it wasn't.

Fortunately, it turned out that stealth wasn't really necessary. As the carriage crested the hill, they immediately fired the Cataclyst Cannon they had managed to recover from the wreck of Boomwagon the First, and followed it up with a barrage of fire from smaller magical weapons.

All of the guards died within seconds.

Even the Named Character died instantly! He didn't even have time to draw his weapon!

"*Well, that was anticlimactic.*" She remarked. "*I was expecting heavier resistance.*"

"*Yes, we may be over-levelled for this.*" Lilian responded.

"*At least the explosion looked really awesome. That's good, it makes it all more real.*"

"*I don't follow.*" Lilian asked in confusion.

"*Oh, it's simple anthropic reasoning. People are more likely to read stories that have awesome things happening, and they are more likely to watch cool explosions. Therefore, cool explosions make the universe slightly more real. At least so long as you don't overdo it. It's part of the general principle that awesome universes are more real than boring ones. The spirits have a word for that, but it doesn't translate very well into Common.*"

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

Lilian was silent for a few seconds before she replied. "*Huh. That's the first time I have heard anyone describe it like that, but I like the idea. Living in an awesome universe does sound better than living in a boring one. Even if more adventure might mean more danger, at least I don't have to spend as much time doing my taxes as people in boring universes presumably do.

"*Come to think of it. Maybe that is part of why Tonos chose me? I have thought about this a lot before. Why me? Why not somebody else? But I do know that I certainly always pick the more fun option when I feel like I have a choice in how the story goes. Maybe that's part of why I'm his Chosen, and not somebody else?*"

"*I think you might be onto something there.*" Rania replied. "*I'm no expert on Tonos, but if I was him then I would definitely want a Chosen who enjoys being a Chosen. Making the story you are in more popular by your presence sounds like a worthy goal.*"

"*Please pay attention.*" Atrog interrupted their conversation. "*As fascinating as all this is, we are on a dangerous mission here.*"

Lilian chuckled. "*Pft. Like we are going to get attacked in the middle of dialogue.*"

"*Yeah, that seems very far-fetched, to be honest.*" Rania agreed.

Atrog sighed, pinched his nose, and moved on.

They approached the library from within the safety of the tank. No more enemies showed themselves.

"*Familiar to the left.*" Balron called out, before he cast a spell and blew the tiny bird to smithereens.

"*Looks like the divination wards are holding.*" He added as he checked his instruments.

There was no way the enemy could have missed the noise of their assault, but it looked like they were smart enough to scout ahead instead of blindly engaging them by swarming out of the building. Rania was a bit disappointed by that.

"*What's that?*" She asked, as she noticed something odd: The corpse of the Named Character was dissolving into a blue puddle.

"*Well, that's foreshadowing if I have ever seen it.*" Lilian responded. "*If there is no corpse, that probably means we will encounter him again. Sort of like when you kick a villain down a cliff but never find the body. He is guaranteed to survive that. We did see the corpse in this case, but it's dissolving, so I'm giving it fifty-fifty odds that we will see him again. He might even become a recurring villain if that is meant to showcase an ability of his.*"

"*Is this actually tactically relevant, or are you just making small talk?*" Atrog asked. "*This is a serious question. I can't tell the difference with you.*"

"*There is no difference.*" Lilian responded laconically.

Atrig sighed again. "*Let's proceed with stage two.*"

And then they opened fire on the Library of Akash.

It was an ancient building, older than recorded history. Located in the middle of the desert, but utterly pristine and unblemished. It was made of glass and steel, unlike any other architectural style in history.

It was not designed to withstand artillery fire though, and so the outer glass wall and several of the inner walls shattered instantly when the Cataclyst cannon fired. From what Adam had told them, the building would repair itself within a few minutes and damaging it permanently was practically impossible.

Balron decided that this simplified their approach a lot: A trap couldn't harm them if it was blown up. And so they parked the tank at a safe distance and spent several minutes obliterating the outside of the building. Rania noticed a lot of magical traps going off in the process, but they were too far away to do anything to them.

When the barrage was finished, they waited a few minutes for the building to repair itself. Now they could move in without the risk of triggering any physical traps.

So, naturally, they started the bombardment all over again and blew the building up a second time. After all, there was a decent chance that the enemy was using this time to move back into position, and they might hit a few of them this way.

"*As we suspected, there are curses active in the area.*" Balron said as they approached and he cast his divination spells. "*Rania, what can you tell us?*"

Rania concentrated and tried to reach out to the spirits in the area.

She could sense a lot of curses, and she tried to convince them to let her and her friends pass. But to no avail.

"*The curses are very ornery. I thought for sure they would let us pass because I'm a vampire. That would have been appropriately ironic. But no, whoever made these curses has no sense for drama. They don't want to let us in.*"

"*Plan B, then.*" Balron replied.

Then he started casting spells and performing rituals that were strangely familiar to Rania. Balron had spent a lot of time talking to Bob the Senior Dungeon Builder, and it looked like he picked up a trick or two.

"Wait. Can he do that?" One of the curses asked.

"I don't think so. He is a dwarf, he shouldn't even know about that." Replied another.

"He does look like he knows what he is doing, though." The first curse countered.

"That's right." Pebble added confidently. "He knows exactly what he is doing and you should just go along with it."

"Um. Well. If you are sure about that?" The second curse responded lamely.

After some more chanting by Balron and supportive words by Pebble, the curses decided that Balron was probably legit, and they should let them all pass.

"*And that's it. The ritual was a success and the road is clear.*" Balron said.

They approached in Boomwagon the Second, and as they drew closer a strange shimmer appeared in the air and a humanoid shape made out of light materialized before them.

Rania could not keep the grin of excitement from spreading across her face. They were meeting the Guardian of Akash! A mini boss!

She was so excited for the fight!

But as she drew her weapons, she noticed that she was the only one who did so. Was it not part of the plan to fight it? She wouldn't know, she hadn't been listening to the plan.

"Please present your access token." The golem said.

Rania could tell that the words she heard were not the same that the golem had said. It was speaking an ancient language. Earlier in the day, Adam had cast a translation spell on all of them. Translation spells were very rare, since everyone spoke Common so they were basically useless. But apparently the ancient guardian of the Library of Akash did not speak Common.

"I have a library card right here. The others are guests who are with me, for a tour." Lilian said as she held out a strange token.

"Permission granted. Have a nice day!" The golem said, and stood aside.

"*Wait. Did we just bypass the miniboss fight?*" Rania asked.

"*Yes. We discussed this, remember?*" Atrog said.

Rania was disappointed. She had really been looking forward to the fight and she felt conflicted about circumventing it. She wasn't sure if that really counted as winning. Would the Law of Adversity still empower them for this?

"*That golem is weird. It doesn't have a smell, or an aura.*" Aranea commented.

"It's a hard light construct actually, not a golem." Pebble said, though only Rania and Aranea could hear him. "That's why it doesn't look normal. It's basically the same thing, but with more sci-fi elements instead of traditional fantasy."

Rania did not understand most of that, but Aranea seemed satisfied with the response.

As they pulled up to the building's entrance, their allies started cresting the hill and moved to join up with them.

There were a lot of people here, joining them for their assault. Rania knew most of them by name and she was happy that she had made so many friends. Unfortunately, Pebble had asked her not to think about them too much during the mission. That way their identities would remain a secret, and there would be more leeway in what happened later. A surprising rescue worked better the more surprised the reader was, after all.

Besides, if it was unclear who would join them in their travel through the multiverse, that logically meant that everyone had some non-zero probability of joining them. This in turn meant that the multiverse would receive a much more diverse array of people. Therefore, the less she thought about her friends right now the more of them would have a chance of traveling across the multiverse, and she wouldn't want to take that chance from any of them.

"*Is that a floor plan?*" Lilian asked as they entered the building. "*It looks strange.*"

It really did. Some places made sense, like the "admin building" or "lecture hall A1". But what was a "computer room" supposed to be? The only reason she could even read the ancient writing was because of the translation spell.

"*Yes, it is. Our target is in Server Room C.*" Dov responded. "*Don't ask about the weird name, it's an infohazard. Most of this place is.*"

Most of the names were infohazards? That was so cool! Rania felt like she was raiding an ancient temple full of cultists that prayed to things beyond the stars. Creatures so alien that their scripture turned people mad. Temples like that traditionally weren't made of glass and steel, though. But then again, the stories did say that their architecture was alien, too. Maybe the Library of Akash was secretly a temple to an Outer God? It was an infohazard and she wasn't allowed to ask, so for all she knew it could be.

Since Outer Gods were cool, Rania elected to believe that this baseless theory was probably true, by the power of wishful thinking.

They came to the first crossing in the hallways, but no enemy had shown itself, yet.

"*It looks like they are stalling and fortifying.*" Atrog remarked. "*Let's go with plan D, then. It's time to split up.*"

Splitting up? Rania was surprised to hear that. Splitting the party never ended well!

But before she could voice her concerns, she noticed that she must have misunderstood as she saw her unspecified other friends form into groups and move in different directions. Team Nundru would stay together, after all.

This was pretty great, actually. This way, each of them could have their own adventure without the stronger teams overshadowing the weaker ones and stealing the show. Her own team would definitely make the others look bad by comparison if they fought together, because of how awesome they were by now.

"*Let's hurry this up. We mustn't let them finish the ritual!*" Lilian said.

"*What ritual? We never discussed anything about a ritual.*" Atrog responded, sounding surprised and slightly shocked.

"*Huh? Oh, I have no idea, it's just a hunch. I kind of figured we would be just in time to stop an eldritch ritual. It's how these things usually go. I just sort of took that as an unspoken assumption.*"

"*So we are on a timed mission?*" Rania asked.

"*No, don't worry. I'm not seeing anything that looks like an actual timer, so I expect that the ritual will proceed at the speed of maximum drama. We should hurry and not take time to rest, but it also won't hurt us to spend time on side quests and diversions so long as they are interesting.*"

Rania was relieved, but not surprised. Of course there was no actual time pressure. That was never the point of timed missions. The point was to increase the sense of drama. Rania was so excited.

"*Do you have any thoughts on what the alleged ritual might be about?*" Atrog asked.

"*I have no idea, but I hope that it's a horrific, world-ending threat.*" Lilian replied.

"*Why would you hope that?*" Atrog asked in shock.

"*Well, if the ritual is only some moderately bad thing then we will be too late to stop it and we will have to deal with whatever the ritual did. Maybe the enemy will be empowered, or it will summon a small army of demons for us to fight, who can say? But if the ritual causes something that we couldn't possibly deal with, then we will be just in time to stop the ritual, instead. That way we won't have to deal with its consequences at all.*"

Rania found herself nodding along. Lilian spoke sense, as always.

She felt a flash of mental anguish from Atrog through the telepathic link.