* * * PARTHIA – BLUE LAGOON’S VOICE * * *

Alessandrina came to herself outside the fascinating storybook dungeon. She was sitting cross-legged under a coconut palm and her head felt stuffed. She looked around finding herself alone, though she knew she would never be truly alone again. She could dimly sense Mary’s domain, not well, not anywhere as clearly as Trisha, but she could sense it. She knew where her parents were, where the pest was. It was special.

She rose to her feet with a huge smile on her face. It dimmed slightly when she realized that she would shortly be confronting her parents and high priest Danilus. She licked her lips before trotting towards the lagoon.

She waded into the warm waters of the lagoon before diving in. She drew in a breath of water, activating her gills. Then she swam towards home, keeping her eyes open to take in all the marvels she came across. Many all the more marvellous due to her newly gained knowledge of them.

She emerged from the lagoon within sight of the castle and trotted towards the front entrance. She slowed to a walk as she crossed the drawbridge. She waved a greeting to the guard on duty, not even noticing his resigned look at the trail of salt water and wet sand she left in her wake.

Alessandrina ducked into her parent’s apartment and found them with her little brother, the little pest Marossino. They were obviously waiting for her. She realized that the gig was up! She licked her lips nervously.

“Well Alessandrina, I believe you have something to tell us?” asked her mother.

Uh oh! Her full name, that meant trouble. Alessandrina glanced down at her bare toes then glanced up through her lashes. “Um... I’m Mary, that is the dungeon’s Voice.” And she smiled hopefully at her parents.

Rhondaa dropped into her usual comfortable armchair like a puppet that had its strings cut. She buried her face in her hands. Viriaathos drew a deep breath, “Did Mary Silvestre say why she chose you Drina?” he asked.

Alessandrina maintained her hopeful smile and replied to her father. “She said she liked me, and unlike many I listened,” her smile wavered. “And also – that she wanted to see the faces of – umm...” she trailed off as her father yanked at his sea-green hair in frustration.

“Go on please Drina, who’s faces?” snapped her father.

“Umm... well, Danilus’ and Altor’s mainly ... but, but I think she meant any...”

“Adults?” queried her mother.

“Yes!” confirmed the Voice happily, and then she glared at her helplessly giggling brother.

“So now you will be keeping secrets from us?”

“No, father, Mary told me to tell you anything you might want to know, but merely to tell you what things she would rather keep confi... confidat...”

“Confidential,” suggested Rhondaa.

“Yes!”

Later, Rhondaa and Viriaathos went to see Danilus Oakborn.

Danilus looked up from the paperwork on his desk as his two friends entered his office. “So, are the rumours true, is your daughter the newly appointed Voice?” he asked. Rhondaa merely nodded mutely whilst Viriaathos answered in the affirmative.

The three friends looked at each other for a few moments before Danilus sighed, “I’m sorry my friends, but I never expected something like this. I’ll make sure your assignment here is made permanent.”

Danilus shrugged. It was going to be difficult to see his godson’s sister as the dungeon’s Voice. He was unable to resist wondering why Mary couldn’t be more conventional.

“By the way, Rhondaa, Viriaathos you should know that Vinculus the Red has gathered a fleet and plans to invade and sack our temple. Trisha advised me a week ago that Mary had discovered his preparations for the invasion. The pirates are gathering in Port Salvage, and I have just received confirmation from our temple spies.

“Hopefully the reinforcements we asked for will arrive before the pirates. Please tell your Drina that Mary can undertake the agreed upon alterations to our little castle as soon as possible, and ask her to tell us when and for how long we have to vacate.”

* * * PARTHIA – BLUE LAGOON * * *

Mary was pondering the latest news from Port Salvage, ‘A wyvern carrying a mage, beep, right have to hurry up the beep planned AA defences ... I’d have liked a little beep longer but needs must!’

She dived into her studies and resumed her experimentations, dredging up facts that would have been long forgotten if not for her current situationhen Alessandrina contacted with Danilus’ request she had another job to do, luckily she’d put aside the mana needed for that little task.

So, next day after making sure everyone had vacated the premises she lowered the whole thing prior to hightening the walls and tower enabling her to add a new floor. She also added a second tower complete with its own ballista. She modifed both to allow high angle fire against aerial targets.

After checking with Drina she gifted her with two – frankly adorable – savannah kittens. The girl needed bodyguards after all and the System had lumbered her with Cats as dungeon monsters.

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The temple folk moved back into their enlarged home twenty hours after their tempory eviction, then came the – but they followed me home, can I keep them – moment. That passed with only a bit of headshaking and a heartfelt wish that the cats would prove effective ratcatchers.

* * *

Vinculus the Red stood proudly on the quarterdeck of his flagship watching as his small fleet put out to sea. He grinned with pride; his magnificent Red Terror with its three tall masts was easily the largest ship in the fleet. The other four ships were only two masted brigs, but they still cut an impressive figure as they crested the waves on leaving the harbour of Port Salvage. Soon Freedom isle sank below the horizon as the pirate fleet made its way South.

Three days later Viniculus hosted his captains and the leaders of the two adventurer parties to finalize his plans. The four brigs would circle the atolls and start their attack at dawn the next day. They would sieze the well known native village, and the isle it was built on, then using longboats they would assault the new town. One longboat would be sent to sieze the temple after Slasher the ork mage had killed any defenders that might be present.

Meanwhile the Red Terror would sail in from the North and force the channel.

All were agreed and withdrew to their ships to carry out their part of the plan, most of them already planning on what to do with the spoils and even gambling with the – as yet – nonexistant treasure.

Mary grumbled to herself as she watched the fleet, she just had to figure out a way to get her spies aboard potentially hostile ships. Alessandrina was duly informed of the pirate fleet’s progress and asked to warn her parents and Danilus.

Sure enough, at dawn, the four pirate ships entered Mary’s domain. She soon ascertained their probable location and held off her attack hoping to be able to sink these where she could salvage them. She kept an eye on the Red Terror but it did not enter her domain.

As the pirates landed on the deserted island that was the former home of the arquipelagoe’s inhabitants, Mary’s lampreys moved in on the defenceless ships.

The next occurance was the appearance of the pirate mage. Slasher was riding his wyvern at low altitude. As he passed over the Temple the two ballista fired, while the priests maintained a shield that warded off the ork’s fireballs. One of the ballista scored a direct hit on the wyvern. It didn’t kill it but it caused the poor creature to skim the surface of the lagoon.

Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, Mary instructed Pete and Shirley to release the insulating spell they had been maintaining for her reverse lightning experiment. The content of dozens of her electric barracuda and rays smashed through the wyvern and its passenger. Slasher somehow managed to survive but once in the lagoon he quickly succomed to the attention of the gathered barracuda and stingrays.

Seeing the results, Mary decided to return to the drawing board.

To Mary’s surprise the four ships succomed to the lampreys, she had expected the pirates to have learnt something from descriptions of the previous sinkings. To her irritation the stranded pirates and adventurers surrendered to the recently reinforced temple guards.

Then she had to watch as the Red Terror sailed away. She sulked for several days.

* * * PARTHIA – AVOR, ESSA AND CREEVAR’S KILLERS * * *

Harrassan was delighted with his native guides, they had been able to take them across the sea of sand at the narrows, and they had been able to add to his understanding of the giant sand worms. Thanks to them they had been able to get Warminor to a shrine of Creevar. They had used the shrine’s gate to get to the temple in time to raise Warminor. He had asked them to wait two weeks for his party as he wanted to use them again when he returned to kill that dungeon.

Avor and Essa watched the members of Creevar’s Killers disappear into the shrine, Avor clutched the purse Harrassan had given them, whilst Essa held the leads of their three camels. They looked at each other and scuttled off into the desert to hide and plan.

They counted the contents of the purse several times as they found it hard to believe their eyes. Fifty gold imperials! Fifty imperials and three camels, they determined to wait for longer than two weeks for such generous patrons. They divided the imperials and secreted a few coins here and there, they placed two silver guilders and twenty copper bits in the purse and were satisfied that it looked much the same as when it had been filled with the smaller gold coins.

They then cautiously returned to Arsouk, and stabled their camels. Then they sought out the temple of Zoratus the sage. They dropped an offering of a silver guilder in the plate on the altar in full view of the priests and awaited attention. They asked for a teaching memory crystal each as they wished to read and write, also they inquired if there was anything available that would allow them to master tradetalk.

The priest, amused at these two scruffy urchins’ ambitions told them that the crystal they sought cost two gold nobles and the temple also sold teaching crystals for tradetalk for a gold apiece or two if reading and writing was to be included.

Avor and Essa looked at each other, Essa nodded once and Avor shrugged one shoulder. “So eight gold nobles...” said Essa “... for both with reading and writing?” concluded Avor.

The priest smiled slightly condescendingly, “Yes.”

Avor and Essa each produced two gold imperials and handed them to the astounded priest.

Half an hour later the twins left the temple with heads that felt overstuffed. Remembering what their father had always told them went in search of Frazd the banker. There after verifying Frazd’s terms and conditions and carefully reading his rather linear contracts, they startled that worthy man by investing forty-four gold imperials in his mid-risk investment portfolio.

Feeling a lot happier at no longer having more gold on their persons than they had ever seen in their lives, they hired a room for the week at one of Arsouk’s more reputable inns. That only cost them fourteen copper bits and included breakfast.

* * * EARTH – MARY * * *

Sunday evening, Mary was lying in her bed playing with two lustrous pearls, while remembering her weekend, and her new friend, who had gifted her with the oysters that had contained the pearls. And whose name was so complex. She guessed it would translate as something along the lines of: Joyful dancer over waves crossed with a hint of irrepressible jokester. She decider that she would call him Dancer for short.

Now, there was this added complication, she mused as she gazed thoughtfully at the faded blue rectangle hovering in front of her nose, advising her that she had achieved a class. What the beep was an Oceanic Ranger subclass Scholar anyway and why was she lvl 4.

As frustrating as she found it, that enforced beeping certainly did wonders to clear up her patterns of speech. Somehow, despite having no proof, she was certain that whoever or whatever was behind those beep blue screens was to blame.

Monday came around all too soon, and that meant school, and school unfortunately meant Denver. Denver who thought he was so funny when all he was an absolute pain in the beep ass. Today the little beep decided to pick on her again. This time he tried to overturn her full lunch tray. Somehow she was able to dodge his rush and she was unable to resist tripping him. By accident! Everyone could see it was an accident!

The room burst into laughter as Denver fell face first in Williams’ lunch. Williams the school’s star quarterback was not amused.