“So, how do you stop all the blood going to your head?” Riven’s pale face turned to a bright red as blood rushed to her head.

“Never really thought about it,” Cili said. “It just doesn’t happen to me.”

“Oh, brilliant,” Riven groaned.

Snap!

The branch Riven hung from suddenly snapped, sending her tumbling to the ground.

“You good?” Cili asked, looking down at the Riven.

“No.”

“Okay. So, why are we here?” Cili asked.

“I wanted to ask you some stuff about Ambition, then thought, hey why don’t we talk near the barn just to see if anybody shows up.”

“Why haven’t you asked me any questions?”

“Because the moment I said we were going into the forest, you tried to climb up a tree, then I said that I’ve never climbed a tree, and you said you gotta climb a tree, so I did that, but also apparently you said I had to hang from it upside down to get the real tree climbing experience, whatever that means, then I fell on my ass, and now we’re here.”

“That’s your fault for never having climbed a tree,” Cili said. “What kind of childhood did you have?”

“Well, my parents died, but, aside from that, pretty good.” Riven stood up and dusted the dirt off her cape.

“Oh, my parents are alive, but they kinda suck,” Cili replied. “The people in my tribe were really cool though, and my brother was awesome.”

“Was everyone in your tribe dragon hybrids?”

“Yeah.”

“Different colors?”

“All different kinds. My dad was a pink dragon hybrid, and my mom was a red dragon hybrid.”

“So was Willow also a dragon hybrid?”

“No. She's a full human.”

“How’d you meet, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“We both were running away from home and bumped into each other. Spent a few days by ourselves, until her parents found us.”

“Was she bothered by the fact that you were a hybrid?”

“I don’t think she noticed for the first few days to be honest.”

Riven smiled; a slight hint of jealousy crept up into the back of her mind. “I didn’t really have friends like that.”

“Any siblings?” Cili asked.

“No.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Cili said.

“You’re sorry about that, but not my parents being dead?” Riven asked.

“Well, death is just your essence returning to Fable to be repurposed. It’s nothing to be scared or sad about,” Cili explained.

“They didn’t die of natural causes,” Riven said.

“Ah. I didn’t realize that. My bad.”

“It’s fine,” Riven assured Cili. “If anything, it’s refreshing to have somebody’s first reaction to my parents being dead to just treat me exactly the same.

“I know you can’t talk about it, but I heard Xavier mention that Willow was sick, so I just wanted to say that I hope she gets better.”

“I hope your dead parents get better too.”

Riven cocked her head and choked back her laughter.

“I mean there’s a chance,” Cili said. “There’s tons of times members of Ambition die and come back to life.”

“Resurrection isn’t easy.“

“I thought loads of people could do it?”

“That’s a common misconception. People keep using revival and resurrection interchangeably.”

“What’s the difference?”

“When someone dies their essence starts leaking out of their body. Revival is bringing someone back to life shortly after their death, while their essence is still mostly in their body. Resurrection is bringing someone back to life after their essence has completely left their body.”

“So resurrection is a lot harder.”

“Yeah. I can count on my hands the number of people who can actually pull it off. That being said, Ambition does have one of them as a member.”

Stolen story; please report.

“Maybe you can ask them to bring your parents back.”

Riven laughed at the thought. “I doubt that would work. Besides, all resurrections are sanctioned by the Armistice Order.”

“Well, it’s not like the Armistice Order could stop Ambition.”

“What the fuck are you talking about? If Ambition fought all the sect leaders they’d be fucking obliterated. Galland alone could kill like 1 or 2, maybe even 3 members.”

“That’s pushing it.”

“Okay maybe 3 is pushing it, but still, there’s no way Ambition wins.”

“Yes, the fuck they do.”

Riven rubbed her eyes and pinched her nose. “Oh my fucking gods, this is why there’s no point talking about this kind of stuff with a fan girl. When you’re power scaling you have to remove your inherent bias.”

“I’m not biased. I’m just right, and you can’t accept it.”

“You are not just right!” Riven said with air quotes. “Okay, whatever, we can come back to this later. I need to ask you about Artemis.”

Cili dropped down from the tree, a gust of wind slowing her descent. “Fine, but we’re not done with this.”

“Oh, absolutely we are not done with this,” Riven assured Cili. “Now, Artemis, I was curious. So, all the stories about Ambition are always painting them as these legends, and practically perfect. It’s a very story-esque telling of their adventures, and because of that they never mention any of their weaknesses. At least, not any they don’t overcome. I know there have to be some, so I was wondering, what are Artemis’ weaknesses?”

Cili shook her head. “Ah, you naive Ambition fan. Everyone starts with the basic stories, but then Willow introduced me to something that completely changed everything. See the real hardcore fans watch the interviews.”

“Interviews?”

Cili’s eyes brightened with excitement. “Okay, basically, Willow explained to me that all the members of Ambition have done recorded interviews. In them, all the members of Ambition are way more human and are asked a ton of questions about what they struggle with emotionally and in combat to try and motivate people who are also struggling. Artemis gave some good advice for rangers, so hers is one of the ones I’ve watched the most.”

“How did I never find these?” Riven asked.

“They're super rare. I don’t know how Willow found them.”

“Is there anywhere I can get them?”

“I think they’re kept in some libraries in Journey.”

“Huh, good to know. Alright, back to Artemis.”

“Yes!” Cili exclaimed. “In the interviews, Artemis talks a lot about her issues and how she overcame them.”

“Any she hasn’t overcome?” Riven asked.

“Uh, oh, yeah. There was one adventure, I think it was when they fought the demon king. He scared her wrists, and they never fully healed. She talked about how after that she suffered from tremors.

“What happened is that she couldn’t properly hold anything for a long time to the point she had to sit out in fights. That’s when Artemis got determined to figure out a way to fight. Pretty quickly she overcame it, but only with her bow. Anytime she tried to swing a sword it would fly out her hand if she used any skill.”

Riven nodded as her eyes narrowed. “She doesn’t have any close-range capabilities?”

“Yeah, and that forced Artemis to be a better ranger,” Cili continued. “Before she wasn’t scared of getting into close range, so she didn’t care about keeping distance between her and her opponent. After her injury, she was forced to create and keep distance, because she only had her bow. That ended up teaching her the real role of a ranger in an adventuring party.”

“Aren’t rangers supposed to be the people who know about different enemy behaviors, weaknesses, and regions?” Riven inquired.

“That’s part of it, and definitely their biggest role outside of combat, but Artemis struggled to find their role in a fight. By being forced to use only her bow, she realized that the true role of a ranger in a fight is to allow their party to act as freely as possible while restricting what their opponent can do as much as possible.

“The way Artemis explained it, was that as a ranger your job is to make sure your party members never have to ask for help, and whoever you’re fighting is screaming out for it. That thought process completely changed my perspective on being a ranger, because you’d think being a hunter means you take an offensive role, but in a party, a more defensive and supportive position is where you add the most value. Seriously, one of the most mind-blowing pieces of advice I’d ever heard for being a ranger.”

Once her rant ended, Cili zoned back into reality and noticed a smile on Riven’s face. “Why are you smiling?”

“It’s just, you know a lot about adventuring parties, and the thought that this is probably your first time being in one is hilarious to me,” Riven said.

“I learned it all from Ambition’s interviews. Which is why Ambition is the greatest adventuring party of all time, and they would totally beat all the sect leaders.”

“All of them is insanity. Let’s just list them off. The Armistice Order has Galland, Arthur—”

A sudden rustling of bushes cut Riven off. The silence gave way to the rhythmic crunching of dried leaves under footsteps. As both Riven and Cili focused on the noise, a mumbled conversation quickly became clearer as the voices drew near.

“Why the fuck are we going this early?”

“It’s a big auction. I want good seats.”

“It’s not like we’re buying anything.”

“I might.”

“You get the paid same as me, I know you don’t have any fucking gold.”

“Unlike you, I don’t blow it all at the casinos.”

“You don't get rich off your salary.”

“Whatever. I’m going early, because I ain’t fucking standing for what could be hours.”

“Boss said they’re using a [Planar Connector] why the fuck don’t they just add more seats.”

“You fucking idiot, that’s not how they work. This is a preset model for a theater, it isn't a custom extraplanar space. They can make some minor adjustments like colors and shit, but they can’t just add more seats.”

“Why not?! It’s a made-up space.”

“You know how fucking expensive it is to customize an extraplanar space. For the price of adding an extra row of seats to this extraplanar theater, I can buy a whole other theater.”

“Bullshit.”

“I swear to the gods, I ain’t lying.”

“Would be nice to have one though.”

“What, a [Planar Connector]?”

“Just a home in your pocket you can pop into whenever. It’d be fucking incredible.”

“Like we could ever afford one.”

“You may not be able to. But me? One day that casino’s gonna pay me out—”

“Oh shut up about the casinos already!”

The conversation slowly faded as the voices drifted off into the distance.

Riven and Cili exchanged a look of mutual understanding.

“Should we head back?” Cili asked.

“Yeah,” Riven said. “Let’s let everyone know. The show’s about to start.”