We had been walking for a while.

  Well, I was walking.

  The MereShaman floated along beside me like an entitled stormcloud, spouting unsolicited lectures about the arcane geometry of tree roots and the sacred placement of moss clumps.

  I had long since stopped pretending to listen.

  "—and of course, the ancient runes of the Rootward Spiral indicate that only those of exquisite magical sensitivity can detect the scent of dimension-threaded ferns. Naturally, I—"

  "You know," I said idly, pushing a low-hanging vine out of the way, "Skadi used to talk about those sometimes."

  The moment the name left my mouth, the MereShaman stopped mid-float, his orb flickering faintly beneath him.

  "...Did you just say?"

  I glanced back. "Skadicritt. She's adorable. Talks like every day is a magical festival. She joined my crew a while back."

  He floated forward, almost gliding, and began to say.

  "Pinkish-ginger fur. Striped. A Celestial-marked child with a squirrel's tail?"

  I nodded. "Yeah, that's her. She's—"

  The burn of his stare somehow made me hesitant.

  His expression didn't change, but the atmosphere around him did. The swirling of his robes slowed. The light of his orb dimmed slightly, and his voice, when it came, was stripped of its usual arrogance.

  "You speak of… Skadicritt, daughter of Lumieore the Exiled?"

  "Yeah. She said something about looking for her dad."

  The mask may have hid his eyes, but I could feel his gaze sharpen. He floated a little closer, and his voice was quieter, but much tighter.

  "She left the settlement."

  "Right."

  "Without permission."

  "Apparently."

  "With you."

  I frowned. "Okay, hold on. She joined of her own free will. I didn't abduct her or anything. She was—"

  Suddenly, the cube snapped around me again—again—walls of barrier light sealing me in like I'd just insulted his robe embroidery.

  "Unbelievable!" he snarled, his voice thunderous now. "You DARED steal my niece from the sacred sanctum of the Merecritt?! You defiled the divine order with your meddling two-legged influence?! You—you corrupted her with your absurd rebellion and lowbrow adventures?!"

  "Okay, first of all," I said from inside the cube, fur bristling, "this is getting really old. Second, I didn't 'steal' anything or anyone. She wanted to find her father, and your settlement wasn't exactly helping."

  He floated toward the cube until our noses were nearly touching through the shimmering veil.

  "You know nothing of what you speak, silver-furred vagabond. Her father was exiled for reasons she is too naive to understand. And she—she is a Rare. A Celestial. She should never have left! She is sacred blood!"

  "She's also her own person," I shot back. "And she didn't ask to be sacred. She just wants her family back."

  MereShaman's claws clenched as the glow of his orb intensified, casting sharp shadows across the sigil-etched forest floor.

  "I have spent cycles keeping her safe, protected, and hidden. And now, you drag her into this— you've put a beacon on her head!"

  There was a pause before he asked, quieter, "Where is she now?"

  I hesitated, and he noticed. "Don't you dare lie to me."

  "She's not here. I wouldn't let her come on this rite. It's… too much, even for her."

  MereShaman's shoulders fell a fraction. I could feel the fury still burning beneath the surface—but something older, something heavier, settled in his stance.

  "You should not have taken her. You think you understand her, but you don't. The blood in her veins is not just rare; it is volatile. You think she's harmless just because she giggles."

  He sheathed his claws slowly.

  "She is not harmless. And if that chain ever snaps; none of you will be."

  I felt the weight of that; not fear, but a deep, quiet respect. Skadi had always seemed brighter than the world around her, like a sun pretending to be a candle. Yet I didn't believe she could've been as dangerous as his ominous warning.

  We remained still for a moment. Just then the cube dissolved with a shudder of energy. I stepped out slowly.

  "She's stronger than you give her credit for," I said.

  "She is stronger than all of us," he replied. "That's what terrifies me."

  He hovered back, gathering his swirling robes and regaining some of his haughty composure.

  "When we are through this forest," he said darkly, "you will take me to her. I must see with my own eyes what damage your guidance has done."

  I exhaled. "Fine. But don't expect her to be the child you remember."

  MereShaman turned back to the twisting trees.

  "She never was."

  Only the soft hum of his orb and the whisper of strange leaves overhead broke the silence.

  We trekked further ahead through the darkening depths.

  "She once said something strange," I added after a moment. "She claimed that the stars called her to find him; that her father had left something important."

  MereShaman tilted his head, prompting a long pause. Then, slowly and softly, he asked, "And you believe this star-chosen fairy tale?"

  I met his gaze, even though I couldn't see his eyes behind that mask.

  "I believe her."

  "…Skaditty," he whispered, as if the word itself hurt. "She still says it, doesn't she?"

  I smiled faintly. "Every day."

  He turned away. "Then may the stars protect her. Because if she's chasing his shadow… she'll need more than strength to survive it."

  I let his words hang there for a breath. Maybe two.

  Then I started walking again, paws padding across the strange forest metal with a sound that didn't belong in any forest, anywhere.

  MereShaman floated alongside me, unusually quiet. I didn't trust it. Creatures like him didn't do quiet without brewing something dramatic.

  But for once, I didn't poke. Because I could still feel the crack in his voice when he said her name.

  Skaditty. Like it was a prayer and a wound all at once.

  It reminded me too much of how I sometimes caught myself whispering Emma's name into the dark, hoping it would echo back.

  I steeled myself by exhaling a heavy breath.

  We kept moving, though I kept feeling my fur stand as the trees themselves whispered.

  The path before us curved in a slow arc, branches bending overhead in impossible geometries, weaving fractals of shadow and ghost-light.

  MereShaman kept glancing sideways at me, his second-set of ears twitching as if they had opinions of their own. Finally, it seemed he couldn't stand it.

  "You truly intend to lead her to her father?"

  I didn't look at him. "She's leading herself. I'm just… making sure she doesn't break her neck on the way."

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  "Or break the world," he muttered under his breath, the glow of his orb dimming. "You don't understand what that bloodline carries. What he is."

  "Maybe not. But I understand what family means when you've lost everything else. And if finding him is the thing that keeps her light on? Then yeah. I'll risk it."

  Silence again. Only the eerie sigh of the wind through those not-quite-leaves.

  Finally, he huffed, fluff bristling with frustration.

  "You are infuriating."

  "Thanks," I said dryly. "I've worked hard on it."

  He shot me a look that might have been murderous if he wasn't wearing a skull mask half his size. Then his orb dipped slightly, almost in resignation.

  "Then we hurry. This trial of yours grows more volatile the deeper we tread. I can feel it bending the fabric around us as if it were testing, searching. It's hungry for something."

  "Probably me," I muttered. "That's how my life usually goes."

  MereShaman simply hummed. "Perhaps."

  We moved on. Together, if you could call our awkward pairing "together."

  The MereShaman kept conjuring little glyph-lights that hovered like fireflies, sketching diagrams in the air only he seemed to understand. Every now and then he would correct a floating line with a claw like a grumpy professor grading the universe.

  At some point I realized he'd started muttering under his breath. Soft psalms, probably his version of prayers, weaving through the air like faint music. It was… oddly comforting. Even if it smelled faintly of ozone and arrogance.

  "KiAera," he said at last. "Do you ever wonder why you were chosen for this rite? Why the forest allowed you to step this deep when it devours so many others at the edge?"

  I glanced at him.

  "Not really. I stopped asking why a long time ago. The universe has a crap sense of humor."

  He made a disgruntled noise that might've been a Merecritt sigh.

  "Flippancy is a poor shield for destiny."

  "Maybe," I said, shrugging. "But it's kept me sane."

  He regarded me for a long moment, orb hovering eerily still. Then, to my surprise, he actually nodded.

  "...That," he admitted grudgingly, "is the first thing you've said today that borders on wisdom."

  "Careful," I said, smirking. "Compliment me again and you might sprain something."

  He grumbled and floated ahead, clearly deciding that was enough bonding for one nightmare forest trek. But he didn't drift too far.

  The MereShaman liked to keep me in easy hexing range—just in case I tried to do something blasphemous. Like breathe wrong.

  We resumed to press on through the twisted forest.

  For once, he didn't bother lecturing me. Maybe even he sensed how the forest had changed since the air here wasn't just heavy, it was oppressive.

  Like wading through fog that wanted to press inside your skull.

  We'd just crested a rise made of root-knotted stone when the MereShaman stopped so abruptly I nearly walked through him.

  "What now?" I asked, tail flicking irritably, before I followed the angle of his raised paw and went dead still.

  Below us, the forest opened into something… impossible. There it was: a wide basin stretched out before us, ringed with jagged cliffs and floating rock structures suspended in midair, as though it were a shattered mountain caught in the act of remembering gravity.

  At the center, a waterfall poured upward—yes, upward—its stream sparkling with particles of light and fragmented reflections, as if it flowed from a broken mirror.

  And swimming through the air like the atmosphere was some kind of thick ocean: moved an entire herd of creatures that defied every category I had left in me.

  They were a… swarm? A School? Whatever you called it when a bunch of porcupine-whale creatures with triceratops frills for ears glided through the air like the whole concept of gravity was beneath them.

  Their massive bodies were covered in bristling quills, with each needle glinting like honed obsidian.

  Suspended above their broad backs were clusters of debris, including broken pillars, ancient statues, and chunks of metallic wreckage, which orbited them in lazy asteroid belts while trailing faint motes of gravity-torn dust. My [Insight] went and registered their information.

  Creature: Paicuwrest

  — Species: Psiwhail

  — Attributes: [Psion], [Relic]

  — Evolution Stage: [Dominant]

  I heard the MereShaman murmur in a voice tight with both fascination and caution.

  "The larger ones are Paicuwrest. Dominants, D class. The smaller… Psipaica. E rank. Even their children manipulate mass subconsciously."

  Sure enough, among the big ones drifted smaller versions, awkward and unbalanced, accidentally sending smaller stones pinwheeling through the air whenever they twitched.

  One sneezed and three pebbles shot off like sling bullets, narrowly missing a floating shrub that promptly squawked in outrage.

  I watched a floating stone flip a chunk of tree upside down, and another Psipaica sent a spiraling crystal plinth pinwheeling through a canopy like a drunk satellite.

  Everything hovered. Everything shimmered. It was chaos disguised as grace.

  And it might've been almost adorable if the landscape hadn't already set my skin crawling. The MereShaman raised a paw.

  "We do not engage. Their kind will ignore us if we—"

  "Noted," I said, still watching the eerie ballet unfold across the air-swimming basin. "Why do they look like they're swimming?"

  "Because they are," he said simply. "Through layers of pressured magic. This place distorts physics, folds gravity like paper, suspends rules the way you suspend disbelief."

  "Good. Love that. Very comforting."

  But then the temperature dropped; not physically, but spiritually. It felt as if the entire basin had sucked in a breath.

  That was when I saw them.

  Creature: Gangwrolves

  — Species: Gangwrolves

  — Sobriquet: "Wicked Wolves"

  — Evolution Stage: [Dominant]

  — Variance: [Common → Rare]

  — APeX Range: [400,000 → 990,000] Units

  — Attributes: [Phantom], [Grim], [Beast]

  They poured out of the shadows like ink come alive.

  Wicked, purplish things that didn't walk so much as unfold. Long limbs. Bipedal gait. Wolf-like in the way a nightmare remembers a wolf. Spines of vapor, flesh that glowed hauntingly like it didn't fully belong in this plane, and eyes—oh, those eyes—that caught the low glow of the false moon above us.

  It grinned.

  "Gangwrolves," I whispered.

  My instincts screamed at me of their presence as beasts born from bad dreams and battlefield regrets.

  The MereShaman made a sound I'd never heard from him before. A hiss.

  The wolves stood tall in that gravityless field, miasma pouring off their bodies in slow curls of oily purple. Then they laughed.

  It was a sick sound like hyenas that had studied war. They snapped their heads in uncanny unison toward the herd. And the Paicuwrest… responded.

  A low, keening sound echoed similar to ship horns ripped across the basin as the big ones began shifting, rotating their asteroid fields, moving to encircle the younger Psipaica in thick formations.

  Debris coalesced, then launched.

  Boulders, rusted metal, crystalline wreckage, all flung like railgun shots across the battlefield. An armory disguised as a sky herd.

  But the wolves didn't move.

  They watched. And when the first blast came close enough to crack the air; they weren't there anymore.

  Each Gangwrolf darted, side-stepped, ducked, pre-reacted to every incoming strike like they were watching it happen in reverse. Their movements were too clean. Too perfect. Their eyes glinted with predictive glee.

  I opened my mouth to warn the herd, but it was already too late.

  One wolf lifted a clawed hand, made a tiny beckoning motion—and the nearest Paicuwrest shuddered.

  Its asteroid ring collapsed inward, gravity suddenly reversed, and with a pitiful whine it was yanked forward. The entire beast slammed across the field, flailing, until the pack pounced.

  Gone in an instant. My breath hitched.

  I heard another wail. My gaze snapped toward its direction.

  Another Paicuwrest—a massive one with red ridges curling over its ears—was yanked forward by some invisible force. It wasn't tripped; it was pulled as well. Its whole body lurched as if gravity had turned against it. Then, the wolves were upon it.

  Three dove first, ripping and clawing, laughing with glee as they tore through hide, quill, and armor.

  A fourth shimmered in behind the beast's flailing form and bit—not at the flesh, but at the soul.

  That was what it felt like as the air rippled with harrowing, cold hues. The creature wailed. And then it disintegrated into ash and light, its final shudder swallowed by miasma as the Gangwrolves fed.

  I couldn't stop staring. Neither could the MereShaman. Even his ears seemed to have curled protectively inward.

  Then, above us, an unnatural moon drifted into view. Too close, grinning down with a mouth that stretched across half its cratered surface, teeth like jagged ivory stalactites. Its leering presence sent a sick thrill down my spine.

  One of the Gangwrolves turned. Its snout lifted, twitching. Then those feral eyes snapped directly onto us.

  "Oh stars," I whispered as I stepped back.

  The lead wolf—if such a thing existed among these howling horrors—lifted its snout and sniffed once, then twice. Its ears perked up, and its grin widened.

  Behind it, the others followed suit. One by one, their gazes snapped toward our position like compass needles finding north, and then they all laughed.

  The MereShaman raised one paw. "We run."

  "No spell? No sacred cube of cosmic inconvenience?"

  "Oh, so you want to be devoured?"

  The rest of the pack pivoted with eerie synchronization, their grotesque smiles widening. As one, they started toward us—at first a prowl, then a bounding charge, claws scoring the metal earth, miasma peeling away like hungry hands.

  The MereShaman's orb flared, runes burning hot. "Stay behind me!" he snapped, voice losing all its pomp in favor of pure, odd elation.

  I didn't argue. My heart hammered, instincts screaming as I crouched low. Because ready or not, this was about to turn into a slaughter. And I'd be damned if it was going to be ours.

  But the Gangwrolves closed in fast—too fast.

  Every instinct I had screamed run, but the forest offered nowhere to go. The floating islets hovered just out of reach, the gravity-warped terrain treacherous underfoot.

  I knew my stats were nothing compared to theirs.

  ???

  [Status] KiAera's

  Age: 50 Cycles (25)

  Dominions: [Revise] [Virtuoso]

  APeX: [55,980 Units]

  Power Limit Cap (APeX): [168,750 Units]

  Attributes: [Fire] [Beast]

  Evolution Stage: [Emergent]

  Current Variant Grade: [Uncommon] (51%)

  ???

  And I was E-rank. If even one of those grinning horrors tagged me, I'd go down like a balloon that just lost its air.

  They were now upon us.

  I gritted my teeth and tensed to dodge. Maybe I could bait one into overextending.

  Except I didn't have to.

  The MereShaman raised his paws, robes flaring out with a crackle of geometric energy.

  Runes exploded in the air around us, forming a lattice of complex barriers that curved and split like crystalline petals.

  The first Gangwrolf lunged, claws outstretched, cackling—only to slam face-first into a transparent wall.

  The impact set off a chain reaction: dozens of razor-thin lines of light spiderwebbed from the point of contact, lancing through its chest and out its back in neat, burning holes.

  The creature didn't even scream. It couldn't, as its laughter was cut off by a wet choke as it toppled, twitching.

  I stood there, blinking, fur half-fluffed in shock. "I… was that—?"

  "Do try to keep up," the MereShaman said, brushing his paw over his head. There was a giddiness and a cruel sort of thrill in his voice.

  He swept his paws again and added, "I'll handle the important bits."

  "By the way," he resumed. "Move."

  A second Gangwrolf leapt over its dying packmate, jaws wide enough to clamp down on my entire head.

  I ducked—more out of startled reflex than any strategy—just as another barrier shimmered into existence above me.

  The wolf's maw smashed into it, teeth shattering against the shimmering geometry.

  It stumbled back, dazed. Despite it all, I recovered.

  I seized the opening, leaping up with a snarl and raking my fiery [Spectral Flame] claws across its exposed throat.

  To my surprise—and horror—my small strike was enough.

  The barrier’s magic had already torn through most of it; my slash merely finished the job. The creature burst into a swirl of corrupted particles that flowed directly into me.

  ???

  [Status] KiAera's

  ? [Gangwrolf] defeated!

  ? [ApeX obtained: 512,500 Units]

  [Conversion: 512,500 Units > 51,250 Units!]

  [Conversion II: 51,250 Units > 102,500 Units!]

  [BONUS!]

  [Reason: Double Power]: [Gama's Benevolence]

  ? APeX: [55.980 Units] → 158,480 Units

  ? Variant Grade: [Uncommon] (51%) → (61%)

  ???

  Energy raced through my veins, bright and dizzying, bumping my stats up just a "fraction."

  Enough to keep me on my feet a little longer and full of exhilaration. And in that same breath, the Gangwrolves laughed again; this time, all looking at me.

  GamaGen's footnote: Greetings. You may ignore this, but the APeX cap of KiAera is calculated by her {Cycle Age} * {1,500}--a number that increases by every day that an [Uncommon], Emergent Zeldritch lives--then multiplied by the following 2.25–a possible indication of her age. Thanks for attending my lecture, youngling.