An Age of Mysterious Memories

B 3 C 26: Geawerene’s Ruined Frontier

I exhale a ragged sigh as I stumble towards the building I’ve been directed towards. I futz around with changing forms to just distract myself from the pain I feel at my parting with Luni. Once again, she’s saddled with doing something massively important for our whole family, and our relationship is strained to its edges. The various faerie folk around me mutter and gasp at my random changes in appearance. I pay them no mind. The only thing I really care about is mending the spot in Luni’s heart where I should reside, before it shatters away and she discards it forever.

If I lost Lu, would I lose Lil? Would Lil hate me if Luni resented me and pushed me away? If she pushed all of us away because of me? If that happened, what about Teuila? If I hurt Lu, could Te forgive me? If my hurting Lu drove Lil away as well, would Teuila ever forgive me for driving off the two of them?

I slam my fist into the ground with all my might, carrying all my frustration. I accidentally leave a tiny crater in the walkway I’m standing atop. Oops. Various faerie folk startle and dash away from my outburst. Doing the best I can, I try to patch up the stone I’d shattered, then I hustle away in shame.

A voice from inside the building calls out to me, “Judging by that just now, you’re on a quest you don’t want to be on. The only being I know to expect in such a state, well, you’ll want to know about six books.”

“Three.” I frustratedly state.

They reply, “Excuse me?”

I answer, “I’ve already got three. The one, the four, and the six. I need two, three, and five.”

There’s a muffled sound of surprise as a doddering elderly lady walks around the corner, holding spectacles on a stick to view me. They make her eyes appear giant such that it’s almost comical. I’m not sure what kind of fairie she is, maybe a dwarf, gnome, pooka, or something. Actually, she might be a Dryad that’s a tad withered. She scrutinizes me from head to toe, so I alter my form a few times to show off my various appearances. The shape shifting is in case one form is somehow memorable to these people that supposedly know me. Or maybe they don’t know me, but they know someone who is supposed to quest for these tomes. I settle on cherubic Reggie form.

She clicks her tongue and motions me inside as she rambles, “Book 2 resides wherein the sea swallows the frontiers of Geawerene. Book 3’s location it is said that you must find whereupon a soaring boulder, or, stone, meets the king, or queen, or royalty of flame. Northwest of this point, gaze heavensward. The image says Book 5 is misplaced but well cared for, serpentine locks guard this tome. It is said to be nearly hiding in plain sight, out in the open as it were.”

Geawerene? Where have I heard that before? Wait, one of the soldiers with an upset stomach had a small book, “The History of Geawerene.” Does that mean the kingdom the human city belonged to was called Geawerene? If my earlier surmising is correct, we’re an island continent, and somewhere far away is at least one more landmass, it likely has a whole nation of humans. That would mean our small island continent is their frontier. Well that riddle is easy as heck. I need to head back to the ruins of the human city, whatever’s left of it is underwater though. The sea definitely swallowed the frontier of Geawerene.

Book three sounds a bit mysterious, but the only royal sounding flame I know is the majesty of the phoenix’s flame. Oh, duh. A soaring boulder? I bet it was mistranslated from a roc. The point where the Roc and the Phoenix met was southeast off the edge of the volcano. It’s in the freaking caldera.

Book five is ridiculously simple, it’s in one of the Nagas’ libraries. Probably shoved behind some other books about serpents or something.

I start to say, “Oh, thank you, I know where all of those are. Thank you for your time, I want to get this quest over with so I can mend a friendship of mine. Fair well.”

She calls back, “Wait just a moment. You should have many curiosities plaguing you. Do you not?”

I respond, “Millions, but I don’t give a crap about any of them compared to the love of my friend.”

She appraises me once more, apparently reading my aura, now that I remember everyone else can see those. I wonder if it’s some sort of ocular organ inside or near the eyes. I could maybe develop one if that’s the case.

She orders me, “Sit! Going anywhere like that, you’re going to get yourself killed. You’re torn up inside. You need to calm down. Maybe some answers will help you sort your thoughts.”

I huff a sigh. I suppose she’s right. I was going to blast by the phoenix’s nest as my first order of business. I forgot that they told me to never return. I should probably approach the caldera from the other side of the volcano so as not to anger the majestic firebird. If I’ll be on the west side first anyway, I might as well start with the book that’s underwater in the ruins of the city. I guess I can hit them up in order, since I have to take them all to the Nagas’ city anyway at the end.

I begin to ask something, but she interrupts, “You are and you are not. Who you think you are, that is. There was once a very old, weary, gray soul, misshapen, malformed, spent in some fashion, as if it were used up, unable to sustain life or afterlife. It was both a short time ago, and ages ago. This can not be explained, not in words we can comprehend, not in this lifetime. Somehow this soul was important. The space it occupied was meant to be filled, and it was dying. We figured that it should be blessed with the mana most abundant in us, we flooded it with love of the earth and the wind. We painted this soul as verdant as the purest emerald, though its weariness and grayness diluted it to creaminess.”

As realization begins to dawn on my features, my jaw slackens slightly as my eyes widen slowly. The trees, my desire for their safety, my creamy green soul.

She nods, “Yes, beneath all this mess of your aura, your soul and the one that left us appear to be one and the same. That soul was a fixture here, both for ages, yet also only an instant. Again, this is difficult to comprehend or explain. To, hm, I’ll borrow a word, to humanize the soul, some among us took to calling it old man. It was an important entity, we knew this, but we weren’t certain how. It shared with us images. Or perhaps we stole the images as we shared our mana. It’s unclear. There were many images, some of several tomes, and riddles as to their locations, riddles written in a language we couldn’t understand. Riddles we have since translated, correctly I hope. The time the soul left us was both approximately two years ago, but also an eternity prior to that. Judging by the look of your body, its aura, and the fullness of your brain, the time you’ve spent experiencing linearly seems to line up.”

I query, “You know that some, like me, can experience nonlinear time?”

She nods, but doesn’t elucidate further. I blow a breath through puffed cheeks, reeling in the revelations. My soul isn’t naturally green, or if it was, it was spent somehow, somewhere. Does that mean I died? Was I a human somewhere in Geawerene? Would that explain the human society memories? Wait, no, those memories don’t know of any place called Geawerene. Heck, those memories know a song sung by a cartoon character that lists every country in the world, and none of them are Geawerene. Uni… Cana… Mexi… Pana… Hai… Jam… Per… Yeah I think that’s how it starts. Plus, the technology level is computer age in my memories. There’s no way we’d send some frontier colony out to some remote continent with swords, spears, and wooden ships. Ugh, we. I need to divest myself of the notion that I might have been human. Screw that. Screw humans.

I express my gratitude, “Thank you, um?”

She replies, “Rinnia Tolkenstein. Elder Tolkenstein if you may.”

I nod, “Thank you Elder Tolkenstein. My heart still aches, and I have many more questions, but I think I still want to set out on this quest and finish it as soon as possible. I hope you’ll forgive me. I believe I owe your entire society a massive debt of gratitude, if I was some sort of dying, spent soul. I don’t know how to express that though. I just, I trust that Luni will somehow negotiate something beneficial between your people that I already owe so much to, and the refugees that I now lead.”

Elder Tolkenstein simply shrugs, “I’ve said my piece, the basics of it anyway. There’s more speculation, there’s more to the images that were shared. Some were violent. A life hidden behind a veil, lived in the shadow of mountains, a constant flash of the blade of a dagger. I hope that we were right that you’re a good, kind soul overall.”

I respond, “I hope so too. I struggle so often. Any time someone threatens my family, it takes all my willpower to not murder them. I don’t think it’s normal to have to fight so hard to not kill people.”

Elder Tolkenstein quails before me slightly. She tries to steel herself though, and gazes at me appraisingly once more. She purses her lips but nods approvingly.

I try not to frown as I think about what I’m leaving behind, “If, if you happen to meet Luni. A beautiful otter woman in a green and white dress, her dark hair is in a, um, bob with bangs cut. If you happen to meet her, please tell her that I’m grateful to you, and that I love her. Mostly tell her that I’m sorry for leaving without saying goodbye. I feel like she doesn’t want to see me right now. My heart aches, but I’ll take my leave of you. Thank you again. Please take care, fair well.”

I barely manage to exit the domicile before blubbering like a mewling kitten. Sniffling, I rub my snot and tears on my forearm. I adopt my draconic form and blast off into the sky westward. Once I’ve got enough altitude, I summon an Umbral sphere around myself and line it with cushions to begin approaching the sound barrier with continued JT propulsion.

Let’s see, what sort of guile would it take to break the sound barrier? I’m about as defended as I can be. Oh hey, I have enough mana and thermokinesis to create rocket thrusters, not just JT movement. Let’s combine the two. Yep, that’s the sort of guile it takes to create a sonic boom.

That took a bit too much mana, but it’s pretty fun. I do however feel like I’m going to pass out inside my little sphere. Not just from the low oxygen levels, but also from the pressure slamming me into the cushions against the sphere’s rear. I summon the sphere and cushions back to my inventory as I unfurl my wings, catching a high speed glide and catching my breath. As my velocity drops to my normal JT movement levels, after taking a deep breath, I re-apply the sphere around myself with forward momentum. I continue rocketing along westward, dropping out of the sphere every quarter of an hour or so, keeping track of my progress. It feels like in no time at all I’ve reached the coast.

Would it be better or worse if I made a new umbral sphere with air holes for rifling? Could I essentially craft a jet body? Playing around with clay, mud, and stone in my inventory allows me to make essentially any outline of a shape, but the hollow bits are still a tad challenging.

I wish I had any of my inner circle with me. Or Sugar, or Spice, or Magnus. Heck, Lucky or Luna even. Wait, there are tiny dark blotches down in the sea along the coast. Some of the otters from the city survived! Shoot, shoot, shoot, crap, what form would be the best to approach them in? Ack I should ask someone to teach me wind magic! I can’t exactly write to them in the water. I drop to my cherubic form as I land.

Let’s see, it’s late evening now, soon it will be the warmest point in the day. Basically sunset is the time when solar influx finally drops below a positive level, so the heat stops increasing at that point. Until then, the heat kept increasing through the entire day. Do I want to do my diving search when the water is warmest? It’s going to be pretty cold regardless below the continental shelf. My thermal resistance can probably handle it, but I don’t want to seize up and freeze up under water.

Maybe I should check in with Lao and get her advice on how to approach the otters. Crap. I didn’t even think about it when I gave Lil the comm stone when they went to check on Teuila. It was such a subconscious action that I didn’t even think to register it in my logs. I was so preoccupied worrying about Teuila, Lil, and Linti, argh.

Wait, is that why Luni is upset? Does she feel neglected? I know she was a bit frustrated since she had to tend the shops while we were all training and goofing around. No, no, that kind of thought is beneath her. It’s almost petty, and Luni isn’t like that. I need to not diminish how heavy of a burden she carries. She carries some kind of final timeline, a last ditch effort at some sort of salvation. One that has to go a perfect way. One I wouldn’t even trust myself with. I can’t mess it up by doubting her or questioning her. I trusted her to trust me to trust her. Well, future me trusted her to get me to trust her.

I’m at the shore and I wave at the blotches floating upon the surf. Wait, crap, I look like a human right now. They were in some sort of weird servile relationship with snotty rich humans. Uh, draconic it is, I guess. I tether up and down into my draconic form. I spend several hours observing, waving, hoping some will approach. I spend the night in vigil, hoping at some point they will come aground and be willing to at least read my notes. I know I’m here on a quest, but, but these could be members of my family in a figurative sense. They might be willing to join the Lavaborn Alliance, or, or the Shellcrackers.

It’s morning though, I can’t keep putting off my quest, I want to get back to Luni as soon as possible to apologize to her. I carefully flap nearer to the various splotches that I hope are otters adrift. I hold out my notes that say I’m Reggie, that I can’t speak or hear, but asking if any of them can read or write. I could swear that one of the dark splotches is carrying a smaller, bright splotch that seems to be white, with a pearlescent sheen.

It couldn’t be. Can it? I mean, Why not? Olioli showed up. I check our party, but there’s no Penina. Perhaps it was too much to hope. As I approach though, I nearly tumble out of the sky. A tiny spheriform pearlescent white otter with vibrant violet eyes holds a shell in her tiny paw protrusions as she rests upon the belly of a feraform otter adrift in the sea. It has to be, it just has to be Penina, doesn’t it? Would she recognize the cherubic me? Did she get to know me well enough?

I transform in midair, forgetting myself, and plummet into the sea near the otters, making quite the splash, literally. I splutter and paddle to the surface. The feraform otter holding the violet-eyed one is turning to swim away. No, please, please wait. That’s, that’s one of my family. I’m almost sure of it.

I start summoning sashimi platters around me, floating on the waves, hoping to catch their attention. Please, just a chance. I just want to, to, I don’t even know. She was so beloved by my family, and mourned for so long. Several otters do turn, sniffing in my direction, but they swim away even faster.

Oh no, I wonder if the humans originally trapped them with food. Is that why they hrk! I don’t even have half a breath. I’m being dragged beneath the waves and crushed such that even the last bit of breath in my lungs is squeezed out, causing me to suck down water accidentally. I’m trapped in some sort of limb, sticky suckers cling to me and sharp talons gouge into me as I begin to black out before I get a chance to react.

I awaken to wet silky fur pressed against my lips, then my ribs being crushed while a different bristliness of fur presses against my lips, passing me more breaths. I begin coughing up seawater. Ugh, everything hurts.

I hear Teuila say, “Dork. Hasn’t anyone ever taught you not to eat fish in the water? You’d think you’d have learned by now.”

I laugh and cough as more water burbles out of my throat. I barely gasp out, “What? But, how?”

Linti explains, “Luni, uh, Lu I guess, she said to finish what you need to here. She also said that by the time you get there, she’d already have three? I’m not sure what that means, she said you would. She also said you still have to get there as fast as you can anyway. Do you need me to carry you?”

I shake my head, “I can break mach one now, safely, for a few minutes at a time. I can glide at about half that speed in between times. We still have to get number two. I have a feeling I know where it is. Did you two kill the thing that had me?”

They shake their heads. Teuila clarifies, “Hunter here couldn’t join the fight, she can swim, just, you know, not like us, and her powers would basically kill her in the water, so she stayed back. I can’t get much downward velocity in the water, I was only able to get in one good strike, severing the limb that had you the hardest. I had to drag you away from the other limbs myself. I took a few hits, as you can see.”

When my vision finally clears up, I see gashes and gapes surrounded by what look like hickey marks that have torn out her hair. They’re all up and down Te’s torso in a spiral pattern as if she’d been wrapped up by a tendril, or tentacle filled with talons. I’m pretty sure I know what attacked us. Giant squid, or kraken. Hm, I wonder. Yeah.

Before I get too distracted, I ask, “Te, Te did you see? Penina! I swear, one of these otters has Penina! “

Teuila audibly blinks, I can hear her eyelids squishing back tears as she replies, “Stop it dork, that’s not funny. Penny was, come on, that’s not fair.”

I pout, “Te, I’d never ever joke about something like this. White, pearlescent sheen, violet eyes, holding a shell, it has to be her, right? The people of this city had eggs, and the rich brats got spoiled with otter eggs. Oli came back in an egg once, right? We all accept that he’s Oli, right? Why not Penina?”

Teuila gulps and shakes her head, frowning, “I, I dunno, it was a freak miracle. You don’t get two of those. You just don’t. I’ll, I’ll take a look around later, okay? Just, just don’t get your hopes up. It’s too much.”

I nod, frowning. I feel bad for springing these emotions on Teuila and Linti. Linti seems only slightly lost. She knows the story of Olioli by now. Still, like I was thinking a moment ago, yeah, a kraken or something, I’m pretty sure I know how I can take it out and get the book.

I ask, “I think Luni knows I was going to come up with this plan, Lightning, can you pour all your juice into an area in the water where I sit for like an hour straight? However long you can manage, and keep restarting whenever you recover.”

Linti asks, “Are you nuts Shellcrack–”

Teuila interrupts, “Nah, they do this all the time. It’s why they have fire and ice magic. My little nerd scienced their way into magic. I bet they’re about to do it again.”

Linti relents and shrugs, “Your funeral, I guess.”

I dump as much mana as I can into duplicating useful objects in my inventory and wait for my vitality to get dangerously weak as Linti shocks me. As I’m about to pass out, I can feel my ability to engage a limit break unlock, so I unlock it, and thankfully Linti has to rest for a moment. I keep myself suspended in a limit break while waiting on Linti to recover, recovering myself as much as I’m able to. Teuila just smirks at me from the shore. She occasionally dips her toe in electrified water to increase her own electro resist.

Now that Linti is back to full charge, she’s blasting away at the water I’m standing in again, and now my electro resist is skyrocketing. In moments I break a thousand, and I’ve suddenly got negative one electrokinesis as a skill. I grin wildly and nod at the two of them. Teuila excitedly points it out to Linti who looks a bit astonished. Linti then grins and pours on the juice even more powerfully.

After a few more rests for the two of us, I’ve unlocked a single point of electrokinesis, I blast through trying to activate it as much as I can repeatedly for a while, barely raising the skill much, even though I’m in a skill based limit break. Normally skills basically raise a point per use in limit break, but I can’t get electrokinesis to quite function as well. That’s fine, I don’t need much for what I intend to do. I point a finger towards the sky, far away from any creatures, and release my limit break climax. A massive cloud forms and hurls a titanic lightning bolt groundward, glassing an area of the beach as I pass out from the strain of prolonging the limit break.

I wake up spread across two laps, Linti’s and Teuila’s, of course. I flash them a smile and kiss each of them softly once, claiming, “I’ll be right back, I’ve got to hurry, so we can get to Luni in time. Rest up, but please, please try to find Penny. I need you both at full strength, but, but I swear, I swear I saw her. I love you, both.”

I continue to play with my electrokinesis, sparking the water around me ever so slightly as I dive beneath the waves. I’m certain the direction the kraken’s lair must be in, from the direction it attacked me from. Between my sense of direction, and my danger wraps warning me an instant too late to react, yeah, I’ve got my bearings. I try to speed up the electrons traveling between my muscles and brain, ever so slightly. I can tell I’m increasing my reaction speed by a few fractions of a percent, but it’s progress. Between this, and knowing what to look out for, I stand a decent chance.

I could summon it with more fish, but I don’t want to get blindsided, I want to sneak up on it. Oh, how fitting. The sunken ruins of the arena where I took my preliminary exhibition examination trials for joining the human military. I dodge a few swordfish as I gaze around. I’m tempted to see if I can snag one of them to my inventory so that I can point it towards where I believe the kraken to be. That’s sort of mean, but I’d rather see the kraken lash out at a swordfish than catch me by surprise.

I have to be careful not to reactively do a large flash freeze storm, I might never thaw out if I create an enormous block of ice down here. My FFS always centers near me, it’s just how I pull the atomic motion from things, it always has to come to me. Any time that I thought otherwise was me misunderstanding the mechanics of what was going on.

I perform careful JT motions along beneath the waves, my draconic wings acting like fins or rudders to help guide me exactly where I want to be. It’s a good thing too, a tentacle lashes out from behind stadium seating at nearly lightning fast speed. I barrel roll on approach, sliding along its inner edge, letting myself trail lightning sparks into the water where it might come into contact with me. The kraken’s tentacle recoils quickly, not enjoying the shocking experience.

I pause for a second, half expecting future me to send a groan from the future at the accidental pun. Not chatty today? That’s fine. It’s ridiculously dark down here, even my enhanced darkvision is barely capable of seeing slight shading differences in nearby objects. Thankfully all I need is a heading, and my danger wraps will take care of the rest. While the kraken might have nearly lightning fast tentacle strikes, I now have lightning fast reflexes. More or less. They can definitely be improved upon, but I know what to watch out for. I’m also fully equipped in valkyrie gear, unlike when I was wearing leaf leather when it first caught me by surprise.

I draw my sword and continue to jettison forward, barrel rolling with the sword pointed outward, as I expect another tentacle soon. As expected, another one lashes out, but it’s coming straight for my head. Easy enough to rectify. I summon a US, an umbral copy of gae buidhe in a dead center collision course down the path of the incoming tentacle, bisecting it all the way down, though I’m sure the Kraken’s main body is likely moved out of the way. I think its limbs are actually somewhat buried, and coming from several directions, as one is now chasing me from behind and to my right. I’m a bit worried that I might be jetting down towards its beak, so I break my downward-forward momentum and jettison straight up, letting the tentacle pass through where I’d just been.

I fire off tiny sparks in the water as I take a moment to reorient myself. It’s a good thing too, a larger tentacle comes in from my left side, passing into my annoying-shock minefield. Not enough to dissuade it or damage it, but just enough to slow it down, giving me enough time to react as I flap my left wing to twist counterclockwise. I slice upward, severing the tip of this tentacle, and chase it as it recoils. Hm, I could be at this for hours if I keep screwing around with one tentacle at a time. Let’s let it think it has me, yeah?

I swim to a point where I’m certain I’ll be between several incoming tentacles. I wait, dodging one, two, three tentacles individually. When I’m certain the next attack will contain all three tentacles, I prepare to summon the copied Umbral sphere from my inventory to surround myself.

Yes, I can sense them closing in. Umbral sphere is now in place, and oh. I know this sphere is water tight, or it was. The sphere begins to buckle and crack. So my Umbral duplicates aren’t invulnerable after all. I wonder if the temple of time was just a best-guess simulation.

No matter. Umbral Shot copies of Valkyrie swords whirling in a scything sweep around me as they rotate at high speeds should at least take out these tentacles as they crush the sphere. I summon them to enact my whirling blades attack, just in time as the sphere finishes buckling, caving in around me. I summon it to my inventory so its jagged bits don’t impale me, then I fire it out of my inventory towards an incoming tentacle, shredding it along one edge.

Where is this thing’s main body? I’m starting to run out of breath from this frantic activity. Wait, electricity plus water equals hydrogen and oxygen. Heh. I haven’t been putting any mana into the electrokinesis, let’s try a large bolt, followed by a flame, and a shield covering me. I dump several hundred mana into a small bolt of lightning aimed towards the oncoming tentacles. It only mildly irritates or slightly stuns the tentacles, but I can feel the water become aerated. I try again and immediately follow it up with a flame, and follow that immediately with a large umbral copy of a valkyrie shield. I’m starting to run out of mana trying out these various things, my next action is going to have to be decisive.

Still, this had the desired effect, hydrogen fuel, or oxyhydrogen gas, something or other ignited in a big way and shattered a majority of the nearby structure. Now the kraken’s main body is revealed. Hoo boy that is enormous, based on the little I can sense within fifteen feet of me. I’m starting to regret coming here. Can I get away and get reinforcements to come back down? Hrk.

I’ll take that as a no, ow. Careful with mana consumption, careful, shock the crap out of it with just free electrokinesis. Hm, not powerful enough yet. Alright, risk a small Flash Freeze, but keep a simultaneous Thermal Quickening internally. Too hard to do with a larger Flash Freeze Storm, but I think I can manage this. Yes, whew. I unfurl my wings as I shatter the tentacle that had been tearing into them and gripping me. Now that I know what to do, I want to get inside its mouth where I don’t have to deal with all of these tentacles. I start tapping incoming tentacles with SIPs, Subzero Ice Punches, and I soar through the water to their base. Here it is, a massive cephalopodal creature. Its tentacles are now herding me towards its beak, and I’m letting them. Let’s hope you know what you’re doing Reggie, if you screw this up, future you can’t save you.

The beak gnashes at me as I enter it. I carefully Flash Freeze around me, letting the freeze grow and grow, while keeping a Thermal Quickening around my torso and head. The inside of the kraken slowly becomes an ice cube, and it can’t spit me out. Once I’ve created enough ice to block its beak from closing, I try to picture where its brain would be. Heh, that cryptozoology coming in handy again. Somehow I’m pretty sure a kraken brain is somewhere around its throat, maybe like a donut. First let’s get this pesky tongue out of the way that’s trying to batter us and get us swallowed. There, now that I’ve chopped that off, I can even meditate for a moment.

Dangit, I would focus on my breathing to meditate, but that’s not going to work here. I’d really like to gain more mana. The best I can do is break even as I slowly Flash Freeze more of it while I keep myself Thermally Quickened. I guess I’m stuck here for a moment then. Once I have enough of it frozen internally, I’ll just cause a steam explosion to shatter it internally.

I catch myself blowing out a breath through puffed cheeks and shake my head at my own stupidity. I don’t have much oxygen left now. I’ve frozen quite a large layer of the insides of this creature, I’m sure. it’s going to have to be enough though, my lungs are beginning to burn. Ugh, remind me to focus on learning to grow amphibious gills next time I work on a transformation.

Once again, I catch myself letting out a smooth exhalation as I try to aim my next abilities. I keep screwing up with my precious air. Still, here goes. A tiny trickle of a lightning bolt to create some fuel, an instant heat of thousands of degrees, and an umbral sphere around myself.

Oh wow, never, ever do this, ever. Oh wow, my umbral sphere caved in almost instantly. It was everything I could do to summon another layer as a smaller copy of it. I was saving that mana to try to escape, since I’m almost out of air. On the plus side, I’m sure that the explosion will get Teuila’s attention, I’m pretty sure I just destroyed whatever’s left of the arena, and quite possibly the whole city. I really hope my suspicion is right that the kraken itself has the book, otherwise I probably just screwed up this whole quest.

I need to dismiss this Umbral sphere copy before I pass out, or I’ll be trapped inside it and die of oxygen deprivation. Urgh, okay, tiny bit of energy debt to do that. Thank you world. Oh wait, energy–.

–debt. I awaken to wet silky fur pressed against my lips as I cough and sputter.

Linti is laughing nearby, “Really, twice in one day Shellcracker? You must really enjoy our lips.”

I literally steam as I blush since my face heats up enough to evaporate the water I’m soaked with. I apparently dropped down to cherubic Reggie form from energy debt. I mean, Linti is right, I do, but that’s such an intimate thing to tease someone about. Plus I mean, I was drowning.

Teuila says, “Lucky.”

I nod, “I am, thank you for saving me.”

Te shakes her head, “No, the book, it said one word to me when I picked it up while fishing you out. It said ‘Lucky.’”

The three of us know that the book with a one on it was for Lil, so we’re all exchanging a glance of realization as I confusedly ramble, “It, it couldn’t be. Could it? I mean, One was for Lil. Lucky is a hound, he’s a wonderful hound, but, but I mean. It’s a word, it could mean anything. Right? What about, about, um.”

I gulp, not able to bear asking about Penina at the moment. We’re all pretty certain the book is for Lucky. We need to get to Luni.

Te mumbles, “I, I saw someone. She looked, yeah. I mean, maybe. I couldn’t. I couldn’t get close. I couldn’t ask. I couldn’t bear it if they said no. I’m sorry. Then everything exploded, and I couldn’t see where they went as we road waves in different directions.”

I gulp and fight a sad frown. It was unfair of me to ask that of Teuila. She saved my life. Maybe someday we’ll come back as a family to learn about these otters. Right now, Luni needs us.

I exclaim, “Alright Lin, Te, buckle up, we’re going for a ride that should rival either of your speeds. Lu needs us.”

I check my mana to make sure the energy debt didn’t screw me too badly, thankfully it doesn’t seem to have damaged my max energy too much. I squeeze these two wonderful warrior women tightly to me as I rocket us into the sky, summon an umbral sphere duplicate around us, and fill it with cushioning. I aim our propulsion north by northeast with JT movement, then as I reach my top mana-free acceleration, I engage thermokinesis rocket thrusters, carefully regulated with electrokinetically enhanced senses. We leave behind a sonic boom and continue to accelerate towards the Volcano and its caldera.