She found Pastor Jormund sitting in front of the door of Alta Noin’s cottage like a lost little boy.

Learning more about the person he was made her look at him in a slightly different light. Everyone had secrets and skeletons in their closets. She wished that she didn’t have to worry about uncovering his.

Walking up to him at a slower pace than usual, she tried to think of a way to bring up what she knew without offending him. Yes, Guin, because bringing up a man’s dead wife is the perfect conversation to have over tea, she thought to herself with a snort. How was she supposed to do this without destroying her relationship with him?

Standing over him, Guin called softly, “Pastor Jormund.”

He lifted his eyes, which seemed happy to see her even though much of their light seemed lost. “You came,” he said in a tired voice. “I rather hoped that you wouldn’t.”

“You waited.”

“If that’s what you want to call it.” His eyes turned downcast.

Guin pursed her lips and went up to the cottage door.

“Wait—” the pastor started, standing up quickly, but Guin knocked on the door anyway.

“Mrs. Noin!” she called out. Next to her, the pastor shifted his feet like a child caught doing something wrong.

When Mrs. Noin answered the door, her face went alight with joy, just as it had earlier. “Oh, welcome, child! Twice in one day—I wasn’t expecting any more company! Come in, come in!” She quickly took up Guin’s hands and started leading her inside when her gleeful old eyes fell upon Pastor Jormund. Wet, glittering tears formed. “Oh... Oh! Jormund!” her voice turning breathless with a hand on her chest; the change in her face almost made Guin cry. It was as if she had seen a son sent away to war returned to her. Her hands left Guin’s and moved up to Jormund—cautiously as if she were afraid that she might scare him away.

But the pastor smiled softly. “Yes. It’s been a long time, Mrs Noin.”

Rather than speak, the fragile-looking old woman took him in her arms and hugged him tight as she could. Sobbing into his chest, she cried. “Too long. Too long...”

They stood together in the twilight, holding each other. Even Pastor Jormund’s face was wet. Leaning against the doorframe, Guin stood by and watched.

It’s a nice scene, she thought. Too bad I’ll have to ruin it... She turned on her camera mode and made a frame with her fingers to take a screenshot.

“Oh! Come in, come in! I’ll put on some tea—ah! Guin and I made some sweets and loaves of bread earlier!” Mrs. Noin said.

Jormund laughed, “Please, don’t fuss.”

Little Alta Noin turned around with an angry face, a wooden spoon pointed at him. “Ten years! Jormund! You haven’t been to this house in ten years! Are you a stranger? Let an old woman be happy fussing over you a bit!” she scolded with a shaky voice—but the happy grandmother could not maintain her angry image for long, and she gave one of her great smiles that lifted all her wrinkles and patted his face. “Now, why don’t you and Guin go sit over by the fire? Go, go!” She shooed him in her kind, soft voice. Guin giggled as Mrs. Noin winked at her. Jormund smiled for her, then slouched over with a sigh as she turned her back to him.

Staring at the chairs by the fire, Jormund looked helpless. Instead of sitting in them, he took to sitting on the floor in front of the fire. Guin opted for her usual chair, and they watched as the happy little old lady busied herself making tea, humming with a little swing to her hips that she hadn’t seen the last time she came.

“Ten years? In this small town?” Guin asked the pastor, who was fiddling with a part of his clothing.

With a faint smile on his tired face, he said, “Mhmm. What can I say? I am a coward.”

“A coward...” Perhaps it’s better if I just let him talk... She watched him expectantly.

The pastor nodded. “I asked you here today to share with you a story—a warning. Your desire to cleanse the forest is noble, but it is not such an easy thing. It is... Not without consequences.”

“Like death?” Guin asked quietly.

“Like death,” he acknowledged. “And worse than death.”

“What is it that you are so afraid of?” she asked him.

“You are young, Guin,” he told her. “Young and hopeful. I envy you.”

Guin chuckled and told him, “That’s not something a good priest should say.”

“I never said I was a good priest,” he told her, then laughed. “I never said I was a priest.”

“You’re the pastor here, aren’t you?” she asked, confused.

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“I am,” he struggled to say. “By Bade’s standard.”

“What do you mean?”

He sighed. “It’s... complicated.”

“I’m smart.”

“It’s got nothing to do with intelligence.”

“Just uncomplicate it then.”

Jormund chuckled. “If only the world worked in such an easy way,” he said. “I’m not... I am a pastor here only because I inherited the role of my mother. I am not ordained by the Imperial Church.”

Blinking at him, Guin asked, “Why?”

“Because.”

“Because why?”

“Because I am who I am,” he said firmly. “I am... what I am.”

Guin gave him a hard look over, trying to seek out the hidden meaning behind what he said. “And that means?”

“Is everything all right in there, dears?” came the voice of Mrs. Noin. Jormund looked over as she came over to put the teapot over the fire.

“What... I am...” Silent teardrops fell down his cheeks.

Wiping her hands on her apron and looking at his face, Mrs. Noin exclaimed, “Why, child! Whatever is the matter?”

“I-I...” Pastor Jormund got on his knees and kowtowed deeply, his forehead on the ground. “I-I’m sorry... so sorry...”

“T-There, there,” she told him in a warm voice. “Get up off the ground now, silly boy—you aren’t going to make an old woman pull you up, are you? It’s dirty.”

“I am undeserving of kindness!” Jormund cried.

“Then I will not be kind,” Mrs. Noin huffed, putting her hands on her hips. “I’ll not accept your apology. Really. You and Euen—even Rew-you all are full of the greatest nonsense. Oh, look at you!” The pastor looked up at her, his face drenched. The old woman took a dishcloth she had in her hand and whacked him with it. “Wipe that face of yours off. Tea will be ready soon enough!”

As she walked away, Pastor Jormund sniffled.

Grinning, Guin looked up at the picture of young Alta Noin and her husband. “Was Rew the name of her husband?” she asked.

Jormund nodded. “Master Rew was a good man,” he said, looking at the ground. “One that would still be here if it weren’t for my foolishness.”

Mrs. Noin Scoffed as she brought a plate of biscuits and tea over. “Are you still on about that? Lady knows that there was nothing you could have done, little Jormund.” “I could have done more...”

“Then do more,” she told him. “Come have tea with me now and again. Bring Euen, next time. That fool is no better than you.

The pastor shook his head. “You don’t understand,” he said. “I wasn’t there for Melora as I should have been. I should have been with her—taken care of her, stopped her—and Master Rew. Everything would have been different if I had been honest with everyone!”

Mrs. Noin’s smile was both proud and sad as she told him, “Don’t do that to yourself. She was so very proud of you, following your path. The only thing she wanted was the love that you gave her. As for Rew, he understood that you and he walked different paths. For him, becoming a Servant was simple; he knew no other life. He may not have understood you, but he loved you all the same.”

“Corruption has returned to the forest,” Jormund said quietly, sitting on his knees.

Alta Noin looked at him knowingly. “It always does. It always will. There is nothing for it, child,” she looked out a window that opened to the forest. “Perhaps it is inevitable in any era.”

Gripping his knees, Jormund’s knuckles went white.

“I would like to believe that that’s not true—not this time, at least,” Guin said, sipping her tea. Dawl’s story may have been frightening, but Guin still had a trump card. Several, in regards not only to the circumstance but her position as a player. This was the tutorial, and she, at least, was immortal. Not that they would ever consider that, of course. They looked at her with curiosity. “The fox spirit causing it asked for a pelt. I intend to bring it to her. Myself.”

“I cannot let you!” the pastor growled. “Dealing with spirits is never so simple—!”

“In this case, I rather believe that it is,” Guin told him flatly. “I didn’t just stumble on this spirit—I was asked to save it. Do you not understand? The spirit herself is not yet completely corrupted. There is still time to prevent further tragedy.”

Mrs. Noin looked at her with shining eyes. “Guin dear, you can see them?”

Guin nodded. “The spirits of this forest—the ones I met, at least—are kind and caring, and I feel that this spirit is the same. Her anger grows daily—but if only for the sake of her cub, she would not see the wood taken so easily.

“Oh, child!” went Mrs. Noin, clasping her hands together. “You must tell me your stories one day!”

“Please, don’t encourage her—” Jormund started, but Mrs. Noin hit him with the dishcloth again.

“You hush,” she told him.

Getting increasingly frustrated, Jormund shook his head and shouted, “You don’t understand! No matter what those spirits have told you, there are powers here that you cannot even dream of. They will kill you—and even if they don’t, they will drain you of all that hope of yours—all of your life—and they. Will. End. You.”

“Why is it that you keep telling me that what I see is wrong?” She glared at him. “What is it that you know exactly? A man of the cloth, in service of the Lady. As I see you, your job would imply that you should squash any mention of the supernatural—yet here you are. You aren’t telling me they don’t exist. You aren’t telling me to kneel before an idol and seek forgiveness. You are telling me that the spirits are powerful, fickle, and otherwise inclined to cause hurt and pain. What is it that you have seen that I have not?”

The pastor’s face darkened, and out from behind his deep blue eyes, a power and a knowledge far greater than her own emerged. There was power in this darkness. Controlled yet, but knotted up and squirreling, like the face from the fear test, trying to escape from whatever cage he had contained it in his mind, and the forum posts that she had read about Jormund the Pale came up in the back of her mind.

“Because I have seen it,” he told her, his words soft but strong. “I have seen it all since I was younger, even than you—the things that were not supposed to exist. Things that tricked me into sin. I have been to all the doctors and wisemen my mother thought she could trust to cure whatever curse she believed me to have. She prayed to the Lady and took up her whip to beat out the demons that possessed me—yet still they came. They came, and they whispered in my ears over and over; no matter how hard I tried to ignore them, they came. They still tormented me. They still lied to me.” His smile was bitter, and his eyes icy cold with a touch of madness as he spoke. “Why do you think the church sent us here?” he asked as if it were a ridiculous question. “The Imperial Church had no place for a monster who talked to demons.”

Guin gaped at him as things that should have been so obvious began to click in her head. Forget the death of his wife—the landmine had been the spirits all along.

So. That was the secret.

Pastor Jormund could see the spirits.