Below the towering stone walls of Castle Cylvania was one of the greatest arcane laboratories ever assembled on the continent of Disland.
Originally gathered by Cylvania's greatest Wizard, Cultist, Alchemist, Necromancer, and Enchanter (All of whom happened to be the same person,) the great Arcanist Grissle had used it to pursue magics to protect and defend the kingdom.
And then he broke the world.
At least it had seemed that way, back in the day eighteen years ago. Black void had opened up around the borders of Cylvania, and nothing lay beyond. Nothing came in. Nothing got out.
But time and testing and various magical techniques had revealed the truth of it. The world beyond wasn't destroyed. Instead, Cylvania itself had been placed inside of a vast dungeon, nested and kept in existence through the ongoing sacrifice of the mysterious artifacts called dungeon cores.
It wouldn't have lasted.
The magitech engines that made the so-called Oblivion had been damaged shortly after activation, and spent fifteen years breaking down while a mad tyrant spent most of his time persecuting enemies real and imagined, while his daemons laughed at the rising carnage.
And then a little bear had come along.
Now Cylvania was part of the world again.
The engines which had stretched and broken reality now lay cold end silent, the cores remaining placed back into the wilderness so that they could recover their damage, or used in controlled ways to generate helpful dungeons such as the Rumpus Room.
But the machines and artifacts and components that remained still held arcane secrets that could be used to aid Cylvania again in her time of need. And so they were guarded, and studied quietly, forgotten while the rest of the realm celebrated its freedom from a tyrant, and the fleeting joy of peace after a seemingly-unending war.
Herbert Graves had never truly known peace. And his intelligence was a bit too high to push things out of his mind, so he appeased his worries and fears for the future by studying the past. As such, he trusted his friends to attend to matters of politics and peace while he bent his mind, magic, and prowess to the riddle that Grissle had left behind.
A riddle which turned uglier and uglier the farther he got into it.
Graves frowned and pushed his goggles up on his forehead. He was a thin man, who cared little for food or scheduled mealtimes. Where other mages wore robes, he wore overalls with sturdy rune and metal-reinforced gloves and resin-coated hip waders. And not once had he regretted the ensemble, because the stuff he was working with was damned dangerous and even the slightest bit of unprotected exposure could mean his death.
Mind you, he had contingencies in place for that, too, but exercising them would cost him a lot of time and power, and worse, set the research program back years.
Blinking in the light, he stretched, and considered himself. That empty feeling was back again, and he knew it was time to eat. This was an acceptable juncture to pause, so he rose from the workbench, sealing the room full of twisted metal and glowing crystal behind him, turning the wheel on the vault door until the runes to either side flared, signifying that the arcane lock had engaged.
It took a few minutes after that to strip off his protective gear, and change into the loose, black robes that signified a master necromancer's rank. He took a little time lacing up the leather bracers that covered his wrists, weaving in the ribbons that he had earned to signify his other arcane professions. He'd been the one to design this particular decorative code, so that arcane practitioners sanctioned by the kingdom could tell each other's specialties and preferences at a glance.
Not everyone had taken to it.
The old regime had many things to answer for, among them a rather dim view of independent mages. Forced conscription, incarceration, and even assassination had been the order of the day for those who wouldn't lend their talents to Mad King Melos' wars. This led to rather a justified distrust of the royal administration which had carried over to the current officials.
Which included Graves.
So not only were there still mages out there which would likely stay hidden for at least a few years more, but he was having trouble getting his desired changes to the arcanist community to stick. It was a rather frustrating state of affairs.
Time would even it out, he knew. Time and positive actions to erase the stain of that darker era of history.
At least, that was the hope.
Clearing the worries from his mind, he decided to appease his stomach, instead. He pulled the bell for the upstairs servants, and waited, pulling over his notes while he did so.
After a particularly hard equation, Graves blinked, noticed that no one had arrived and pulled the rope again. Then he remembered. It was a festival day, and the serving staff were busy attempting to keep the food going for the celebrations.
Graves sighed, closed his notes, locked them into the appropriate chest for their subject and date, and made his way upstairs.
Around the second landing, he heard the alarm bells. He took the rest of the stairs two at a time, feeling the ache in long-unused muscles and knowing he would pay for it later, and not caring.
The bells had been rung once at the funeral for Mad King Melos, and never since then.
Something was wrong.
Why the hell hadn't Kayin come and got me? Graves ground his teeth, as he paused on the fifth landing. The very depth of the dungeon was working against him now, and not for the first time he regretted that he didn't have a waystone to hand. But that would have been a security risk, and worse, it would have set a bad precedent. The new Council was trying to live by the laws they set, rather than be above them. They weren't kings, would never be. That time was over for Cylvania, even if not everyone agreed with that sentiment.
Graves rather hoped that wasn't the reason for the alarm. A revolution would put his research back weeks, if not months.
Kayin caught him on the first landing. His eyes widened as the fuzzy little assassin rounded the corner, clothes torn and ears flat against her plush head.
“You usually don't let me see you before you show up,” Graves said, hand drifting down to the three wands holstered at his side.
“Thirty-three!” Kayin blurted.
“Ninety nine.”
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Kayin sat down, plop on the floor and held her head. “Gah... uh... three. Right?”
Graves crouched down next to her, and scritched her ears. She had given the proper sign and countersign. “You did it perfectly. What's going on and how worried should I be?”
“Pirates kidnapped Threadbare but they meant to grab Celia and this halven fooled them and—” she paused. “Oh it's really complicated! They're in the war room! Just come on come on come on desu!”
“Is it an immediate danger?” Graves asked, following her as she tugged his trouser leg.
“No, but... well... it's complicated.”
His stomach rumbled, and Graves shoved his hunger away through sheer willpower. It was festival time, and he'd have to starve, for at least a little while longer.
Though when he got to the war room, the scent of fresh-baked pastries filled his nose. Some kind-hearted soul, some king of all that was good and holy, had gone and procured a few baskets of festival cakes for the small crowd that was gathered around the central table.
They were fast shrinking, though. The reason for that was obvious after a moment's examination, for a pair of halven girls sat huddled in the crowd, talking fast and eating faster.
“What's going on?” he asked the battered, leaning suit of armor to his right. It turned a bovine-shaped helm to look at him, eyes glowing green deep in their hollows.
“We underestimated a threat, overestimated ourselves, and got our butts kicked,” Garon summed up.
“Bunny pirates,” said a blonde young man wearing a green tabard over heavy plate armor. “They tried to grab Councilor Gearhart and got Threadbare instead, sir.”
“We think they were working with the actors!” Kayin blurted. “You know, all the bunny beastkin that were putting on plays here this last season?”
Graves cast his mind back a few months. To a long stretch of research, briefly interrupted by the chaos that had been the mess at the Rumpus Room.
“No,” he said, leaning on the table and surveying the rest of the people in the room, about half of which he recognized and half he didn't. “Why don't you start at the beginning?”
They did. And Graves did what he did best, which was observe, and learn.
He ate pastries too, but he was hardly the best at that. Not with two halvens in the room.
And at the end of it, after accepting a mug of coffee from the cheerful and bustling Mousewife, he swallowed one last mouthful of liquid sanity and looked at the now-silent crowd. “So let me see if I have this straight. One of Cylvania's Councilors, who coincidentally happens to be its most powerful asset, has been captured by an extremely powerful band of pirates.”
“Highly powerful,” the dog woman said. Her name was Cagna, and she was in the process of taking down a cork board covered with pictures and lines. “I managed to get a Scouter to work against Anne Bunny once. She's level forty-four.”
The room fell silent.
And in the silence, Graves heard the faint sound of clinking.
He wasn't the only one to look down to the left side of the table, down where Celia sat, her head in her hands, her fiery red hair shaking as the rest of her body shook, and the porcelain parts of her body tapped against each other so lightly and quickly it sounded like grinding ceramic.
“Celia?” he whispered, kneeling before her as the others made space for him to get through. “Are you well?”
“No!” she roared, and he stumbled, put a hand out to catch himself on the table as he almost fell backward.
Her face was out of her hands now, and she was glaring murder, eyes blazing, hair rising around her head like a mane of bloody gristle. “I am NOT all right! They took my BEAR!”
More silence. Celia paced, feet chiming on the wooden floor, shaking her head, punching at the table. “I'm going to get him back,” she announced into the quiet. “That's all there is to it. He did the same for me, I can't do less for him.”
“If the porcelain princess is taken from her kingdom, then all who draw breath within it shall perish,” the dark-haired halven spoke.
“What?” Celia spat.
“That's the prophecy. You're the only porcelain princess in this kingdom. If you leave, a whole lot of people die,” said the halven, tucking curls of black hair back into her headscarf.
Celia looked down. Then up to Graves. He could see the anger in her eyes, no mean trick for the fact that they were glass.
Graves looked back, then tilted his head, considering. Something about that... “I'm assuming it's a prophecy, yes? Some Oracle's business?”
“My business, for I am that Oracle, sir. Chase Berrymore at your service.” She curtseyed, standing on the chair to do so.
“Which god?”
“Excuse me?”
“Which god do you speak for?” Graves asked, leaning on the table.
“Hoon,” she grinned. “See that Winning Smile?”
“I see a young woman who just managed to get our most powerful asset out of the country during a surprise attack by forces unknown,” Graves said.
Chase's grin faded a bit. “What?”
“Don't get me wrong, if you're being honest then we owe you a large debt. But there's the off chance that you and yours are part of some elaborate scheme. We'll have to hold you for a bit until we can examine your story and circumstances a bit more.”
“They're friends of Madeline, Graves,” Garon said. “They helped her get back.”
“Oh, is she here?”
“Ah... no. She should be at Bigstump Outpost.”
“That's where all the others are,” the green-tabarded youth said. “Um... she might be flying back. They were talking about catching a ride on her back when I left.”
“Then we shouldn't have to keep you in isolation long,” Graves nodded to the halvens, the oddly-garbed Wizard, the slick-looking human, and the dog-woman behind them. “You understand our caution.”
“We do,” the slick-looking human said, taking off a hat that looked remarkably like Threadbare's. “We will comply with any measures you deem sufficient.”
“Also,” Graves said, looking back to the still-fuming figure of Celia. “The prophecy says that it happens if she is taken. Does it have the same impact if she leaves of her own accord?”
Silence in the room. Then the clink of porcelain eyelids as Celia looked up at him, the anger in those glass orbs slowly turning to hope.
“I... I don't know,” Chase said. “I can try to wrinkle it out. I can throw the cards, try some other things...”
“She could take it up with the God Squad,” Garon offered. “Ah... after they're cleared.”
“After they're cleared,” Graves nodded. “Karen, can you see if you can find our guests some good rooms in the comfy dungeon?”
“You have a comfy dungeon?” the dog-woman asked.
“Oh it's a sight to be sure!” Karen babbled, happily bouncing up to the beastkin. “Couches so deep you get lost in them!”
“We could do with some sleep,” the blonde halven spoke. “And maybe a few more pastries, and something with meat in it, and some after dinner cordial, and a second dinner or two...”
Once they'd left, Graves glanced around and muttered “Analyze Magic.”
“Eh?” Kayin asked, hopping up to perch on his shoulder.
“Just making sure they didn't leave any magical means of eavesdropping,” he said, looking carefully around the room. “Magical auras on you, Garon, and yourself, sir...”
“Apollyon,” the blonde man clicked his heels together. “Apollyon Henweigh.”
“Of the Easterlynn Henweighs?” Graves raised an eyebrow at Garon.
“I vouch for him. He's been vetted through the guild. List the auras, they're probably our magical items.”
Graves rattled off what he saw, until they were certain there were no unaccounted magical effects in the room. That done, he took a seat at the table, and the others joined him.
“You might be wondering about my caution,” Graves began. “But recent investigations have turned up some troublesome trends. We have a conspiracy working against us.”
“Black wagons and golem kidnappers that don't actually kidnap anyone,” Apollyon muttered.
“You know something?”
“Maybe. I was one of Threadbare's party on the mission out west. We ran into something suspicious.”
“That golem kidnapper... would it happen to be about seven feet tall? Made out of liquid metal?”
“Er... no. Small and wooden.”
“Pity. Because it's looking very much like someone stole a Mercury golem, possibly with inside help. Add that to a few other pieces of suspicious activity we've noticed, and it points to a major problem.” He slid his gaze over to Celia, who was sitting perfectly still, but staring at the door with seemingly-rising frustration.
The other three followed his gaze. Celia finally noticed their look, and glanced back. “What?”
“You said that someone tried to kill you? And the pirates killed them?”
“Yes.” She ran her hand through her scalp. “I mended it the first chance I got. It would have been a nasty hit if I hadn't been running my buffs.”
“I think we're dealing with royalists,” Graves said, shifting his gaze over to Apollyon. “Or someone using that cause to hide what's really going on. This may or may not be involved with the pirates, it's too early to tell. But the fact is that we've got enemies not only outside of our borders, but on the inside as well. And this is going to make handling this entire affair difficult. It might be possible for you to go rescue Threadbare, Celia, but we're going to have to keep things under control on the home front, too. And as one of Cylvania's councilors, you may have to wait a bit before you hit the road with vengeance in mind.”
Celia's mouth twisted.
But she nodded, after a moment. “He'd be upset if I got stupid and our homeland paid for it. But we need to do something. And fast.”
“Do we?” Kayin spoke up. “From what that halven was saying, they think he's you. And you're their objective. So as long as they keep doing that, then he's probably in the safest place in the world he could be, right now...”