The world spun around them and colors flashed across their vision – an even worse sensation than the previous rift’s Gate.

  When it finally abated, the twins found themselves in an eye-searingly white place and instinctively squinted.

  Colossal mountains of salt surrounded them, preventing all but those capable of flight from going anywhere except forward. There, a sprawling fortress of shining glass towered, completing the encirclement. Though rather than trapping them, the massive structure invited them in via the drawbridge already lowered across the brine river surrounding the entire complex.

  The only thing ruining the grand view was the very obvious path of sharp, glassy vegetation carved into the ground and even the surrounding mountains, leading from the Gate, across the drawbridge, and into the fortress – like a scar across the land itself, created by the third Elite before Kenn had struck the killing blow yesterday.

  Finally, unlike the other rift, this one did not have a stone ceiling. In fact, it had no ceiling at all and instead extended beyond the horizon all the way into the cosmos where the Sun lay at its zenith, despite it still being fairly early in the morning.

  From what they had been told, this Sun never even moved from its position, constantly blasting anyone loitering around the entrance with its heat that felt way too real to even consider calling it fake.

  Luckily, as geckin, they didn’t mind heat. In fact, they enjoyed it. The same couldn’t be said about the fact that the air felt drier than the Jahenna Desert their old troupe had once visited.

  “Here they are!” they heard a familiar voice call to them. “We thought you got cold feet at the last moment!”

  The twins turned to the silver-haired avian and the rest of their party with awkward smiles.

  “Sorry, just remembered something weird and had to bother my twin about it,” Dawn said.

  “Oh?”

  “Never mind. Let’s just go! I’m starting to get cooked here!” Tepp interjected.

  The avian shrugged.

  “Well, you heard the lady! Let’s get into formation, everyone! We’re gonna enter the fortress and stick around the outer halls. Keep an eye out for monsters! Especially the Brine sludges!”

  With a round of nods, everyone fell into the agreed formation, marched around the dangerous glass constructs, and headed straight for the looming castle gate.

  Unsurprisingly, all the parties before them had already cleared out the monsters from around the rift’s Gate and, without any fanfare, the party made it across the drawbridge and into the Saltglass fortress proper.

  The sight of a crystalline maze with twisting hallways greeted them. Light poured in through specific sections in the glass ceiling, illuminating the main hall leading forward and reflecting off the mounds of salt littering the castle floors. It felt grand, yet the lack of any signs of life made the twins’ tails stiffen in discomfort.

  A trio of relieved sighs broke the spell, drawing attention to the avian leader and the wolfkin twins.

  “Man, finally out of the oven. Glad the indoors is cooler,” Tepp complained.

  The twins raised their eyebrows and exchanged a look with the only other person who didn’t seem to be bothered by the heat.

  The kobold shrugged.

  “Not everyone is cold-blooded like us. Give them a break.”

  “Fair enough.”

  As the trio recovered from the ‘horrible scorching heat of doom’ – drama queens – the twins took the time to study the area.

  The large illuminated hallway looked like the way to go, but even from here they could see, hear, and feel – through vibrations – the intense battle up ahead. They even spotted a hunter in the distance, tussling with monsters in some of the side rooms branching out of the main hall.

  But obviously, they knew their limits. This party had no plans to take the grand illuminated path right in front of them – that was for the stronger parties – and would instead stick to the outer halls – no, not the one covered in those glassy trees. Sure, it didn’t exactly feel glamorous to be the clean-up crew rather than going after the big fish, but while the twins wanted to make a name for themselves as hunters, they also weren’t completely suicidal.

  “Alright, so like the checkpoint guys told us, we’re gonna be heading toward the western storage room, where Slime Queen set up her temporary base, and clear the path as we go,” Leejay ordered, prompting everyone to voice their agreement.

  They set off, easily falling back into the formation. Dawn activated her [Cliffhide Fist], her visage turning into transparent white, and covered the party’s right side, while Dusk trailed behind, always keeping an eye on potential ambushes from the back.

  “Huh. Is that the invisibility skill you mentioned?” Oulo asked.

  “Yeah. Well, not actual invisibility.”

  “Guys. Focus,” Minn reprimanded them with a stern glare.

  Chastised, the twins and Oulo refocused on looking out for threats.

  Truth be told, even after all this time, it still felt strange splitting their attention on two completely different tasks. Sure, they had gotten quite used to being two at this point, but they still had their moments of inattention and moments of overfocusing on only one of their perspectives. Though luckily, it had been a while since they experienced the ‘stutter’ like in the other rift.

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  They wondered whether it was going to come again at the most inconvenient time. Knowing their luck, they couldn’t discount it.

  Such thoughts ran through their heads as they made it through the salty hallways of the glassy fortress with only the distant echoes of fighting reaching their ears.

  They almost thought they would reach the temporary base before having to fight any monsters. Naturally, the rift decided to dissuade that notion.

  Dusk noticed it first. A mound of salt like any other, though seemingly mixed with some water, suddenly shifted as the party passed it and lunged straight for him.

  “Sludge!” he barked and immediately pulled out his [Tricky Flail] before using it as its unupgraded version – an explosive projectile.

  It hit the Brine sludge head-on and launched it away just as the rest of the party reacted and unleashed their own cards.

  Leejay cut the air in front of him with his card, creating a sudden surge of flickering yellow lines that converged around their foe in a cage-like manner and hampered its advance as it recovered from being tossed around, its bottom side sizzling as its corrosive brine chewed through the glass under it.

  Meanwhile, Minn and Tepp each flashed a card that transformed into staves with colored orbs at their tips – yellow for Minn’s and red for Tepp’s. Minn then slammed the butt of the staff into the glass underneath her feet, which gave off a shockwave of energy and covered each party member with cloak of soft light. Tepp then aimed her own staff at the sludge and unleashed a concentrated bolt of flame that tore through the air toward the sludge that just began to get its bearings from being thrown around.

  It crashed into it, causing brine to burst out and turn into salty steam.

  Tepp fired again. The sludge leaped over the shot, breaking through the yellow line cage. Dawn responded by throwing [Cliffhide Fist]-empowered [Tricky Trail] at it. Unable to dodge mid-air, the sludge took a direct hit and promptly exploded, coating the crystalline walls of the fortress with brine.

  Just to make sure, Tepp fired a few more shots at random parts of the brine splatter, but that didn’t seem to be necessary. A moment later, a glowing card rose out of the puddle and raced toward the twins, where it split in two, and forced itself into each of the twins’ hands.

  “Nice one! Oh, whoa! It really splits!” Leejay exclaimed as the twins looked over the spoils of their efforts.

  ◆Corrosion◆

  A depiction of a metal plate with holes and deformities. Very Rare.

  “Oh, that’s a good one!” Tepp exclaimed, eyeing the essence in Dusk’s hand. “Pretty sure the A-rankers use that a lot for their offensive skills!”

  “Ah, so that’s why they want to keep this rift active, huh?” Oulo grumbled before shaking his head. “Well, that’s that! So anyway, I just realized we didn’t hash out how we were gonna distribute the loot with you two here.”

  The twins stiffened.

  “Ah, well…” Leejay hesitated as he looked between the twins, probably sensing their discomfort. Then he cleared his throat. “So, usually, we gather all the loot we get from a rift expedition in a pile and if anyone wants an essence for a skill, they take it. We sell the rest and then split the money equally. With you two here… Well, I guess the most efficient way to do things would be to have one of you always get the essence so it gets doubled.”

  Their fists clenched.

  “But I don’t like that! It would feel like we’re just using you to get rich! Like exactly what those Golden Oath people would do! And we already promised we wouldn’t sell you out! It would be real shitty to use you ourselves instead!”

  The twins eyed the others to gauge their reactions.

  “Yeah, what he said!” Minn immediately agreed.

  “Of course. Just less dramatic about it. Like come on, we’re in a party. Of course we’re gonna take care of each other!” Tepp agreed.

  Oulo rolled his eyes.

  “I know I was the one to bring it up, but I agree. I would sooner bite off my tail than get us killed just to make sure we all got double the essences.”

  “So, all in agreement!” Leejay clapped his hands and spread his wings. “We’ll keep on trucking like always! If you two happen to get the essences, great! If not, that’s fine!”

  Finally, the twins relaxed and gave the others a pair of appreciative smiles.

  “Thanks.”

  They felt incredibly grateful to have run into these people back then. If they had happened to join Jake’s party instead… things might have turned out very differently.

  “Anyway, let’s–”

  A shrill noise interrupted Leejay and the party’s attention snapped to the side, just in time to see a humanoid glass monster sprinting from one of the side passageways across the salt in their direction. A split second later, the avian keeled over as something impacted his side, causing Minn’s barrier to pop like a bubble.

  He yelped in pain even as the rest of the party scrambled to cover him, the two bruisers bracing themselves to intercept the enemy.

  “Heal!” Minn barked, reminding the twins of their role in the party.

  Dawn fired off [Heartseeker] at the party leader with one hand and prepared [Transfrogify] with the other.

  Meanwhile, Oulo activated a card, his normally blueish-green body turned obsidian-black, and he dashed forward to intercept the blur of glass with his forearm.

  A loud clinking sound echoed through the hallway as the kobold’s arm stopped the long dagger of glass in its tracks, allowing the twins to finally get a better look at the attacker.

  A feminine figure with short glassy hair, a featureless face, and a row of glass daggers around its waist and on its head like a headband, vaguely making it resemble a maid.

  The twins wasted no time observing, though. Dawn immediately used her prepared skill as soon as Oulo stopped the enemy. It turned into a glass frog in a glass maid uniform.

  Without missing a beat, Oulo wound up his arm and smacked the frog before it could recover from its disorientation. Dusk followed that up by conjuring his [Steel Flail] and swinging it overhead at the frog.

  Somehow, the frog managed to react in time by swiping one of its blades in an arc above itself to deflect the flail while using the other to stab in the kobold’s direction, forcing him to block.

  It turned back into a humanoid. Firebolts flew from the back and flickering yellow lines materialized around the maid. She slashed through the fire and then jumped back, away from the forming cage.

  Tepp didn’t let up and continued to blast at their foe from afar even as Oulo gave chase and Dawn once again used her camouflage skill and ran to the side, intending to flank her.

  Their foe kept backing off, dodging fireballs and parrying Oulo’s punches while Leejay continued trying to trap her into that weird cage of his. Then Dawn found an opening and stomped the ground to use the [Branching Rampart] right behind the maid, which promptly exploded into shards of glass, thanks to [Cliffhide Fist]. That staggered their opponent enough for everyone to converge on–

  A pained scream from the backline made the twins’ blood go cold and they turned around to see exactly what they had feared – another maid monster had snuck behind them and attacked the wolfkin twins.

  Blood coated the crystalline polearm as it tore through Minn’s side and her staff clattered to the floor before reverting to a card.

  “Minn!” her sister screamed and manifested a card before immediately swinging it at their ambusher, unleashing a burst of purple energy resembling clumped up bubbles. The attacker disengaged to avoid the bubbles, its glass ponytail swinging behind it. Dusk hesitated for a moment, but ultimately decided to run back to heal Minn since Dawn’s [Heartseeker] hadn’t re-sparked yet.

  The dagger maid had recovered thanks to the distraction and faced Oulo, Leejay, and Dawn. The other maid kept backing off as Tepp continued to use every skill in her deck to drive her off from her sister.

  Despite the blood gushing from her injury, Minn still managed to set up a glowing dome around herself, only dismissing it when Dusk got close enough to heal her. [Hallowed Embrace] activated and the wolfkin let out a sigh as her wound stitched itself up.

  She then stood with a growl and glared at her ambusher. Dusk joined the sisters as they faced off against the second – probably Epic-tier – monster.

  Fighting with two bodies in the same battle was one thing. Fighting two different battles simultaneously…?

  Now, this could be a problem.