I did NOT ask why the woman who picked us up was blue. It was tough. I was pretty sure she was some kind of elf, and I REALLY wanted to know more about her. Luckily, despite my politeness, I did get those answers, because Celine was kind enough to bring it up. "I find it astonishing to meet one of my water touched cousins." Said our diplomat, sweeping back her hair on one side. "Are you a Naiad?"

The blue woman, who was apparently a Naiad, smiled. "I am. At least on my mother's side. Our people are rare here, my father became quite entranced with my mother and decided to take her to his bed." She smiled bitterly. "Sadly, my siblings are far less enthused about my heritage, as none of them share it."

Celine winced. "Ah, I presume your line is...expansive?" Her voice sounded sympathetic. More so than I'd heard it before.

"Of course." The Naiad smiled, her voice dripping false sweetness. "Father has to find an heir worthy of the crown. An inborn racial trait is quite a coup, though sadly my gifts don't lie toward combat. Are you a wood elf? I've never seen one before."

I was intrigued. I knew Celine was an elf, but I didn't know there were subspecies of elf. I also didn't know you could be born with a racial trait, though given Celine was from a family of elves, I probably should have guessed that. I wondered how that worked, since the racial trait took the spot of an ability. It was something to ask around about later, just out of curiosity.

Sadly, now wasn't the time. Celine was our diplomat, but I was in charge now. Which meant I needed to at least make an effort to improve our position, especially since it was my fault we were in it. I wasn't entirely sure I'd made the wrong call making contact, granted, but still. "The crown?" I interrupted as politely as I could. "So you're a princess of this kingdom?"

She smiled at me widely, and I learned that Naiads apparently have razor sharp rows of small jagged teeth. "I am. Anna-Maria Deville. Fifteenth princess of the kingdom of Ladrigan. Daughter of Salara Vorenas, whom her loyal subjects have termed 'the fishwife' behind her back." Her tone had a bite to it, and I got the impression that she didn't care for her 'loyal subjects' overly much.

"They sound like dicks." Said Benny matter of factly. Celine sighed, pinching her nose, but Anna-Marie burst out into giggles. My best friend just shrugged. "What? Racist peasant farmers aren't exactly top of my 'to hang with' list. I'm just saying."

Anna-Marie's smile at Benny was much warmer, despite showing nearly as much teeth. "That is nice to know. I too find them objectionable company." My best friend preened a bit, but was treated to a merciless pinch from his girlfriend and jerked back with a yelp.

Celine kept a calm and pleasant expression on her face, but her eyes locked on Benny for a minute, and he crossed his arms, hunching down in annoyance to entertain himself without talking. I didn't think Celine was jealous or anything, more that Benny was NOT a diplomat, and while I had seniority to give me an excuse to talk, he was just saying random shit and messing up her dialogue.

Still, her face was sympathetic when she turned back to the princess. "It sounds like you are having quite a difficult time. Might I be so bold as to ask how we might aid you with that? You seem to have some use for us."

"To be frank." Said the Naiad princess. "We all do. The awakening happens very rarely, the last one wasn't even in my lifetime. My father was able to procure some of the god Dew from a prior awakening, and it was the support of that power the enabled him to claim the throne of Ladrigan. Should one of us acquire the treasure, our chances of securing the crown when he passes will be nearly assured."

I still didn't get it. "So...just go look for it? I was told that it exists here all the time, I'm sure you guys have plenty of opportunities to find it."

She shook her head. "The Dew requires energy from the moons." She pointed out the window up at the MASSIVE silver sphere hanging in the still daylit sky. The moons can only be seen during the awakenings. The amount of the material increases exponentially during awakenings, but sadly, natives do not seem drawn to this substance as the outsiders are. Therefore, whenever outsiders arrive, the royals all scramble to recruit as many as possible."

"This is some kind of...inheritance test?" I was obviously familiar with the concept. "But why doesn't the king just gather the Dew for himself. Actually, will we even get any? He could just take all of ours away."

Her eyes went wide as she shook her head, aqua hair bouncing furiously. "Oh no. We would never do such a thing. There have been dynasties in the past who tried such tactics. They flourished for a few centuries, but upon the next awakening terrifying outsiders fell upon them in droves to exact retribution. As for my father, god Dew becomes less effective the more you use it. He's ingested several drops already and has reached his limit."

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

That made sense, couldn't have the locals killing people from major factions. The limit made sense too, otherwise everyone powerful here would just grind right up to the edge of E-rank and stay there. "Ok." I said firmly. "You want to use us as your...what? Champions? To find Dew?" I wasn't sure why they couldn't find it themselves, maybe something about being around the stuff their whole lives made their fate sense ignore it?

"Yes." Said with relief. "Other outsiders will no doubt be courted by my siblings. Though some will attempt other methods for finding the Dew. As you saw earlier, not all of the natives are enthused about outsider visits. Drakov, for instance, had two reasons to act as he did. First is prejudice, which I tend to shy away from for obvious reasons, and second is because while he is nominally a castle guard he owes allegiance to my brother Mulciber."

I winced, happy I had my mask on. I really didn't like politics, and while I was up to being in charge, this sounded like it would be a lot of that. I looked at Celine, giving her a nod so she'd know she could take over from here. My elven companion folded her hands in a businesslike manner and gave a practiced smile. "Well, that certainly sounds like a tricky situation. So what exactly can you offer us to side with you?"

Anna-Marie chuckled. "I suppose it was foolish to hope it would be that easy. Honestly, I don't have much to offer other than the same things my siblings could. Protection from our citizens, supplies where needed, my own support as well as those of my guards and other allies. I'm hardly the favorite for the throne, and my retainers aren't exactly numerous." She sounded depressed just talking about it, and I could see why.

Callie reached out and grabbed my hand, squeezing it and looking at me beseechingly. My girl had a heroic streak, and poor Anna-Marie was in a bad spot. Honestly I wasn't against the idea. We had no real reason to accept teaming up with anyone, but if we had to go with somebody, a person who had helped us out and who seemed like she would have our backs if needed (out of necessity if nothing else) wasn't the worst option.

This might be a bit premature, but I knew that sometimes, doing something subpar was better than waiting fruitlessly for a perfect option. It was unlikely any of the royals would be perfect allies, so we might as well go with the devil we knew. "Alright." I said, surprising her and Celine both. "We'll help you." The others all looked surprised, except Callie who beamed at me with such approval and pride I actually blushed.

It was strange to see a pair of eyes that were just blue metallic orbs 'shine', but they did. She look ecstatic as she literally cheered. "That's amazing! Thank you so much, I promise I won't let you regret this. I'll do everything I can to support your group!"

Smiling, I nodded at her kindly. I believed she would though I still had my own means of gathering support and materials. My wishes were a perfect method for that. "That sounds good, because I am absolutely exhausted. It's been a long night for us and we could use somewhere to rest." The party had been later in the day, and combined with the adrenaline of bolting for a magician, the ride here, and the rest of the day's activities this had been one of the longest I'd ever had, and that was saying something.

My thoughts were cut off, however, as I felt a lurch in the carriage. Looking out the window I saw that we'd come to a stop. The massive box of dark shining wood had been even larger on the inside, a large, comfortable sitting room lined with bench seats that had comfortably fit all ten of us, the princess, and even the wolves. Sadly Jessie and Randall had to ride outside, because even bigger on the inside Ascendant shit wasn't built for giant bears.

Luckily this carriage was pulled by horses, horses who were ALSO F-rank like Randall, and not nearly as high into it as he was, so the bear didn't have trouble keeping up. Sometimes it was easy to forget how fast and strong F-rankers could be, even being one myself. Animals like horses or bears who were naturally predisposed to physical power tended to accrue lots of Might, and that high stat made crossing long distances a matter of minutes rather than hours.

I assumed this planet was relatively big, given that the gravity seemed similar to what I'd felt in the bazaar (granted there wasn't the pressure from Impact, but still, the gravity here felt heavier than on Callus). So we must have covered a ton of ground for the trip to take fifteen to twenty minutes. I tensed up, making sure that I was prepared for all of what was to come. We could run into other teams at any minute, and that was without the whole 'locals hate you sometimes' thing.

Climbing out of the carriage, I was taken aback by the newest building we saw, an absolutely monumental castle...kind of. I turned to the princess. "Did you guys...carve this out of a mountain?" It was hard to describe, but it looked like the castle was all one piece of dark stone, from the towers and parapets to the tall imposing base of the building. It was BIG obviously, given it was made out of a mountain, and I was betting a whole city worth of people could live here. Not a small city either. Especially given the almost inevitable larger internal space.

Anna-Marie beamed at me happily. "We did. My great grandfather was an earth-singer. He found this mountain in his travels and discovered it to be some of the toughest F-rank material in the kingdom, and so decided to found our dynasty here. It is the Ladrigan seat of power. Blackrock Spires."

Despite not being a fan of her people, she seemed enthused and excited about kingdom history. Clearly she loved some parts of her homeland. I also noted she'd said F-rank, so language wasn't the only thing we could find in common. Aside from some of them speaking something different, it was clear higher ranking people spoke the same tongue as us, and they had similar methods of defining power. Anna-Marie's smile dimmed slightly, and her eyes became a bit cautious. "Now, I'll be happy to get you rooms to rest in, but first, we must make a stop. All outsiders must meet the king. We need to go see my father."