From the dungeon depths into a house of strangers. It was a disgrace for an imperial maid—or servants in general—to receive service from others, especially from people below their station, but nights outside were undeniably cold. I could only accept the reality that there was no existence lower than my station right now. I took off my cloak, apron, and headwrap, and hung them to dry the best I could in the back of the room, utilizing spare thread and a few suitably placed nail heads on the walls. Then I swallowed my shame and returned downstairs to the dining room, where the distinct scent of fire and fresh onions received me.

“Is there anything I may do to help?” I inquired of Ms Vera, who operated in the corner.

There was a brick-made stove with a small side grill. Ms Vera set a large copper pot on the cast iron stovetop, and then returned to her cutting board on the narrow island table two feet aside. She had traded her formal Guild uniform for a plain shirt and a skirt of earthen colors.

“No,” she answered me outright. “Wash your hands and sit down. There’s water in that bowl under the window.”

The instructions were exceedingly succinct. I wiped my hands and went to sit at the dining room table on the hallway side.

Across and to the left sat the young boy called Norn. Was it a male name? It was not a common name in the south, at least.

The youth stared daggers at me without making a sound, the sharp ears on top of his head cautiously perked. His eyes were a very clean, light green, a paler green than his sister's. The sleeveless shirt was loose on his thin figure, the color of it faded into a stained dark gray. His short-cropped hair pointed here and there like a storm-raked field of desiccated wheat. The pronounced canines flashing whenever he parted his lips to speak seemed to emphasize his peppery temper.

I didn’t want to admit it, but he was—mighty cute.

“That’s dad’s seat,” the child gruffly informed me.

He can have it when he comes back—I was about to say but bit it back down. It would have been an awfully mean thing to say. I got unnecessarily snappy when I was tired, and I was tired like never before. I was also keenly aware of my unkempt, travel-worn appearance, and it embarrassed me immensely to be seen like this. It was a bad foible of mine; lashing out like a hound when I felt vulnerable. But I couldn’t afford to get into any arguments with the child, or his sister would undoubtedly let me have it.

At times like these, you had to detach yourself. Put on the mask of an impersonal servant and cram your ego in the back of the closet.

“I see,” I said. “Then do you have a special guest seat saved somewhere?”

The boy didn’t answer and sulkily looked away. I took that as a no.

To still care so much about the property of his parents—it couldn’t have been very long since their departure. Could both parents have passed away simultaneously? Under what circumstances? An accident, or a crime? Maybe I was jumping to conclusions and there was a sensible, non-violent reason for their absence? No, it had nothing to do with me. I didn’t want to push my luck by probing needlessly and sat quietly.

But the boy soon returned to eyeing me critically, leaning both his elbows onto the table. Bad manners.

“So what are you supposed to be?” he asked.

“As you can see, I’m a maid.”

“Liar.” He wasn’t convinced. “Maids don’t dress like that. They don’t wear black and their hats aren’t so funny.”

“Really? I was not aware there were maids employed in a small town such as this.”

“There are some! I've seen 'em! At Jarl Fossler’s house in Redfield.”

“Hm…?”

Did that mean he had been in the Jarl’s house in person? What business could an impoverished commoner's child have with a noble?

Apparently, that was not an appropriate line of inquiry.

“Norn,” Ms Vera called from the stove side. “Shut up.”

“What the heck?” He took offense at her tone. “I was just asking!”

“Well, don’t.”

It seemed the elder sister was of the don't ask, don't tell-school of people. I could understand that. There was such a thing as knowing too much. Curiosity killed the cat and all that. But the little brother could not be content with a unilateral denial and irritably ground his teeth. It went somewhat against the landlady's policy, but it was no good to uphold such an air of apprehension and distrust, so I sought to distract Master Norn a little from his vexation.

“Then what do you suppose I am, if I can’t be a maid?”

He took the challenge head-on and appraised me anew.

“A bad person,” he declared. “Probably a demon. A Thurian spy.”

“Thurians have horns on their heads,” I told him. “Their hides are gray, their hair is snow white, the whites of their eyes are all black, and they carve eerie markings onto their bodies, and they have scaly tails too. Do you see any such things on me?”

“Maybe you’re hiding them with magic. Or maybe you’re just some dumb woman they brainwashed to help them. I've heard it can happen!”

“I see. I suppose I wouldn’t be able to tell myself, if that were the case.”

“Ha.” Norn grinned in satisfaction, apparently feeling he had won a point over me there.

Then Ms Vera interrupted the exchange again.

“Enough with that rubbish. I’m losing my appetite.”

The hostess made us stew of the discount scraps from the butcher, mixed among cubed onions, carrots, turnips, and thyme. I could have survived with less, but Ms Vera gave me a portion of equal size with her own and Norn’s. I could only gratefully accept it. We dined together under candlelight and an uneasy silence. I took my bent spoon and dug in alongside the other two—and very nearly spat out the first mouthful as soon as it came to contact with my tongue.

“...”

My palate had been spoiled rotten by the palace kitchen over the years and I was aware of it. I’d had it bad before and knew a rather sizable gap existed between what the Imperial Family and diplomats had and what the commoners put on their plates. I had tempered my expectations accordingly, but nothing could prepare me for this culinary adventure.

It wasn’t badly made per se, or anything, but there was no salt. None. No pepper either. No seasoning of any kind. Only the unadulterated taste of aged goat meat, the over-ripe onions that had already begun to ferment, and wintered cellar turnips, which the herbs were powerless to save. Everything overcooked into a bland, watery, lumpy mush.

Salt had to be quite costly here in the north. Enough so to be deemed an unnecessary expense in a thrifty household. Everyone needed salt to preserve food for winter, but supply lines struggled to reach this deep inland. In Ferdina, the river brought us frequent traders and more sea salt than could be spent, and the prices stayed reasonable, but most of the salt on this side was surplus from the Empire, or more expensive import from Normund in the east.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Meaning that with the loss of the route through Baloria, the prices of many goods were probably going to take a sharp rise soon. Salt worst of all.

“What’s the matter?” Ms Vera noticed my frozen spoon and asked. “Not fit for your tongue?”

“...No, it was just a bit hot,” I lied.

“It’s always bad,” Norn voiced his opinion without any filter.

“You don’t have to eat if you don’t like it,” his sister shot back. “But it’s all you get.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Oh, well. As long as it didn’t kill me on the spot, I could restore myself with Sanatio later.

It was only after we were finished, the emptied bowls washed and cleared away, that Ms Vera sent off Norn to heat bath water, and had me seated anew for the conversation that couldn’t be avoided. The questions that had to be asked. For a time, she looked for the words, scratched her neck a bit bashfully, and said,

“Okay. Look, I'm sorry.”

“Pardon me?” The line was very unexpected. What did she have to apologize for?

“Well, you know,” Ms Vera muttered on, “About the breakup thing.”

Oh, was she talking about my party?

I never told her we had plans to part ways from the start, or about Klein and Samuel's demise in the dungeon. It would have earned too many tricky follow-up questions. A pity—the good men deserved proper rites—but that would have to wait until my return to Ferdina. Still, it seemed the mistress had guessed the broad strokes on her own.

“Those things happen too,” she continued with a priestly air. “I'm no good with talks like this, but my condolences. Try not to let it get to you too hard. Plenty of fish in the sea.”

Fish? Was that intended as an encouragement? I was not big on fish, personally—they were a hassle to prepare—but maybe it was a furian turn of phrase? Though here I thought her family shared traits of dogs, not cats?

“Well, what's past is past,” I said. “I understand it is tomorrow that matters most.”

“That's the spirit,” she commented with a nod of approval. “Speaking of which, what are you going to do?”

It was rather excellent, as questions went, too.

Over the course of the day, I’d yet to produce a satisfactory answer to it.

“I have to return to Baloria as soon as possible,” I thought aloud. “I must find another way to cross the Vein. I can sell loot from any monsters and items I come across on the way, then restock on supplies and tools. I’ll have to repay you for this favor as well...”

Ms Vera solemnly shook her head at my plan. “Yeah. Impossible.”

“How so…?”

“You’re only E-rank, right? There were talks about raising Baloria to D before, but with the loss of the safe route, that’s pretty much set in stone now. Hell, they might make it a C. The bird’s already on its way to the Guild HQ in Astria. The town will assign a permanent watch on the entrance starting tonight. You won't be able to get in anymore.”

“That’s…”

Simply finding a way through was difficult enough, now I couldn’t so much as try?

Right when I thought this mess couldn’t get any worse.

“…Do you know any regular parties of the required rank that could escort me, in exchange for payment at the destination?”

“There aren’t any,” Ms Vera answered me, as if having expected the question. “Nothing but MIA reports ever come out of that place. A small town like this doesn’t have an endless supply of morons to feed to the caves. It’s been over two hundred years since Baloria turned out the way it is. Those dumb enough to try to clear it are long dead, and those smart enough to survive and up their ranking have moved to better hunting grounds. Supervision of the safe route was passed over to the Empire’s Guild branch too, because we have no static personnel for that on our side.”

It only kept getting worse.

“Is there nothing else you could do to make money?” Ms Vera asked instead. “I mean, a real job? You're an actual maid, right? If you can do housework, I might be able to introduce you to someone. If you can read and count, we’ll probably need new hands at the Guild too soon enough.”

“That I cannot do,” I answered immediately.

I was a maid of the Imperial House of Ferdina. Entering the service of another, foreign master, even if only temporarily, even if to save my hide, was simply unacceptable. A breach of contract. A high treason. I would rather die.

Ms Vera shrugged. “Suit yourself. In that case, I guess you’re just going to have to join the line and pick up quests. If you work hard and raise your rank, you’ll be able to get back into the dungeon again, and die in peace without bothering anybody.”

That seemed a more acceptable plan. Save the part about dying.

Having me register with the Guild and take on occasional odd jobs had been his majesty’s own idea to begin with. He couldn’t afford to complain about me taking one-off assignments for others, even if he knew. But this method came with its own issues.

“That would mean I’d have to impose on you for more than only this one night…”

How long would it even take to raise the funds to rent a room and upgrade my rank? Weeks? Months even?

Instead of getting upset by the idea, Ms Vera closed her eyes with a fatalistic face.

“That much was obvious from the start. If lost beggars could fill their pockets with silver overnight, there’d be no poverty in the world. As long as you get work done and pay me a cut, you can stay as long as you like. We've got room, as you can see. When the coin stops coming, that’s when you’re out too. Those are the terms. Well, don’t think too hard about it. You’re probably going to wind up dead pretty soon, if you insist on this adventuring gig. Then none of it matters.”

Could you not write me off before my time?

I stared at the candle flame on the table, pinching my chin, and thought about things, thought very hard.

Fretting and complaining never helped a soul. Life was like quicksand. The more you kicked and flailed, the deeper in it you sank. I had to take my own advice now and keep calm and cold, and plan for the long haul.

Was there no other, easier way?

The Ursus Range was too high and precarious to cross over the topside. Scaling the frosty peaks took good gear, experience, and helpers, which I didn’t have and couldn’t afford. There were no convenient, ventilated tunnels like Baloria built elsewhere either. But if getting through or over the mountains was too much trouble, what about going around?

Alas, if the mountains were an obstacle vertically, they were even more so horizontally, reaching almost all the way across the continent from the peninsula of Werge in the west to the shores of the Midian Sea in the east. Argento lay unfortunately close to the halfway point along the arch of the range, meaning that the distance to go was just as long whether you set off east or west. There was a good reason why travelers risked the perils of the dungeon.

I was looking at a journey of up to ten months on the winding highway, provided there weren’t further setbacks along the way. And there were always setbacks on a way that long. Regions dominated by feral beasts, human rogues, and nations openly hostile to the Empire. If anyone identified me as an imperial citizen along the way, or learned of my connection to the ruling house, I could end up taken hostage or summarily murdered. It was hardly any safer an option than the dungeon. Fighting was practically unavoidable either way. And once again, I had no funds for such a trip.

No. It was senseless to trade a few day’s hike for a pilgrimage of almost a year, while the hope of finding another bridge in the dungeon still existed.

Did it exist? That was the big question.

What if all the bridges were gone? What if the dwarves had destroyed them to seal in the monsters before they left?

It was possible. Likely, even.

Curses.

The longer I mulled it over, the longer the delay was going to be.

What if, after a year of banging my head on the cold, dead walls of Baloria, I would have to give up anyway, and waste another year traveling around? By that point, I could say goodbye to my old life. There was a limit to how late you could be to work. No one would expect me to show up again after so much time had passed.

What was the best choice?

There was not enough information...

“How about we leave this simmer for now?” Ms Vera spoke up, having followed my silent agonizing from across the table. “Things always look brighter in daylight. For now, just get some sleep, if you can.”

I had to admit her words were wisdom. I took them to heart.

I was getting too far ahead of myself again. First things first, it was my finances that needed helping. Which meant work. Which meant washing up and resting now, to make sure I could give it my best effort tomorrow. Worrying about anything else was a waste of time and energy.

My mind forcibly emptied, my body leaden, my heart uneasy, I retired upstairs in the vacant, lightless room, laid down on the hard mattress spread over the harder board, and was deep asleep before my eyes had fully closed...