The afternoon view of the sea was beautiful. Soft waters dyed royal blue, blanketed with silver and turquoise green from the kaleidoscopic sun, lapped on the shores in soft waves. The sea foam wouldn’t have looked out of place on a cup of coffee. Seabirds cawed overhead and the cool salty breeze coated Artyom’s face in a refreshing mist that made it easy for him to put his thoughts in order.

  The last two days were… interesting. For all the death and danger cast upon the quaint little fishing town behind him, subject to all his misadventures, everyone came out of it alive. It was more than Artyom could say for many of the other places he’d brought his never-ending fight to.

  How fortunate it was for the townsfolk that this was a Fairytale world. The source of the danger never meant any harm by it. However, when it came to those he was travelling with…

  Artyom pulled out his phone and hit the speed dial. It didn’t take long for it to connect.

  “It’s quite early for a check-in, I assume you have something substantial to report?” asked Gus.

  “Hey Gus, nice to hear your voice too,” replied Artyom with a cheeky grin. “I’ve got some good news, and bad news.”

  The other end remained silent, signalling Artyom to continue.

  “Good news is I found the culprit! It was the caretaker of the orphanage. They’ve taken in a lot of new kids recently because of warbands attacking frontier villages, so she wanted to scare our Earther into caring for them.”

  “And therefore get him invested in all the childrens’ safety, and commit time or resources to protecting them?”

  “Nothing gets past you, does it? So it’s a good thing I’d already convinced Tommy to send one of his party members away to do just that. We had a bit of a fight when I tried to tell her after catching her red-handed, but that’s resolved now. We’re all cool.”

  “And did you learn about the source of rune magic in the undead?”

  Artyom took in a sharp breath.

  “Something disappointing, I take it?”

  “It was her Skill, Gus. The Skill already had rune magic built into it, so it was the System that provided it.”

  “And by our previous theorizing, we concluded the System has strong ties to the goddess.”

  “I forgot to mention that she’s also a priestess, and confirmed most of her Skills were directly given to her by said goddess.”

  “So this world’s goddess is the one with access to rune magic…”

  Artyom winced. Rune magic could only be wielded by looking at runes that have already been written down somewhere, and the resulting magic would be a tier weaker than the source of the writing. That made it easy to stop future summonings by just taking away the original source a world’s summoning rituals were based on. No more source, no more rune magic.

  “Where did she learn it from then?” asked Artyom. “And how are we supposed to take away her source if she isn’t even physical to begin with?”

  “And don’t forget the other big question: how did she summon the Earther in the first place?”

  “Yeah… this isn’t going to be easy. But at least I’m still alive.”

  “Why wouldn’t you be?” asked Gus.

  Artyom stayed silent for a while until Gus slapped his forehead and groaned.

  “That wasn’t the bad news, was it?”

  “So the actual bad news is…” said Artyom as he led his friend through the events in the catacombs.

  After he concluded, the phone line remained silent for a full minute.

  “G-Gus? You’re not mad, are you?”

  “You fought a Mythical Hero,” he said with no emotion. “No, you almost died to a Mythical Hero but got lucky.”

  “Diplomacy isn’t luck, Gus!”

  “You tried two forms of common diplomacy that utterly fell flat and got lucky in figuring out what actually worked against her.”

  “I had good reason to believe that the third time would be the charm!”

  “And three of the remaining antagonistic party members are also likely Mythological Heroes.”

  “But the last one is on my side, at least!” Artyom tried to chuckle, but it died as the barest of a croak before his attempt at a smile fell into an ugly frown. “Yes, they most likely are.”

  “Artyom… this is the actual worst-case scenario for any TOAL agent on a mission. Nobody has ever been in the position you’re in right now. Do… do you want out?”

  “What?”

  “Do you want out of the mission? Losing your life here isn’t worth it. As an agent of TOAL, for the good you can do anywhere else, and as my friend. Say the word and I’ll get you out of there, and see what our science division can come up with to monitor this world remotely.”

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Gus…” said Artyom, wincing and shaking his head.

  “If I knew you would listen to me, I would make it an order and cancel the mission altogether. But I need to offer you a way out of this. Please, just take it. You might be the most qualified agent in all of TOAL to take on a mission of this caliber, but that just makes you the biggest mouse to pick a fight with a cat. Please.”

  A long silence reigned where neither of the two spoke. Only the sound of the sea filled Artyom’s ears.

  “Gus, your job is to be the utilitarian. To figure out who to send where to maximize the number of lives we save. And that’s all well and good, but that’s not my job. I go out there and make sure the kids actually get saved. That’s my duty. If I try to run away from a mission because it’s gotten too scary without doing what I can first, then I’m not fit for my job. I wouldn’t be able to look into a mirror.”

  “I know. But what can you do about those three?”

  Artyom couldn’t help but smile. An actual one this time. “They’re divine constructs, but with a human emotional side to them. However, those two parts mix like oil and water. I can take advantage of that.”

  “Like you did against the one you fought recently?” asked Gus. “Because from what you told me, your ‘emotional judo’ worked very well.”

  “That was my second try, and I didn’t realize how she worked until after that failed. On the third time, I figured out that her construct side was dominant, and appealed to that. As for the other three, their human side will distract them from it and get them to make mistakes,” Artyom paused for a moment before letting out a chuckle. “Wow, that makes me sound like some kind of villain, taking advantage of their human emotions like love.”

  Artyom could’ve sworn Gus was smiling on the other end of the line, but knew he’d deny it.

  “However you make a valid point,” said the dull-sounding man. “Perhaps they’re merely inexperienced at being human? Such emotions are so great, they override their prime directives.”

  “Hmm, so humanity is like a drug to them… yeah, I still sound like a villain. Maybe I should just accept the part and find the most messed up way to take advantage of them?”

  “If it eases your conscience, they did try to kill you first for merely trying to join their party. And when they thought you were a normal civilian too.”

  “Never said I felt bad about it!” said Artyom with a laugh. “But speaking of the devil…”

  Artyom turned around and saw Tommy and the other three ladies walking beside him approaching from the town. Their pace was brisk, not quite a run but something close to it. He judged they’d arrive within a minute.

  “Very well,” said Gus. “If anyone can pull this off, it would be you.” He paused for a moment. “But please, use your phone’s recall when the danger is too great, and there is no shame in dropping this mission at any time. Understood?”

  “Yeah, understood. I’ll be careful.”

  “Thank you. I’ve authorized access to the Eye of Balor for you.”

  “Wait, what?!”

  Gus hung up.

  Artyom put the phone back into his pocket with shaky hands and slowly made his way back to the church. His pace was more sedate, as to get there just a bit before the others arrived; enough time to warn Neitra and let him think.

  “The Eye?! That’s meant for armies, or when we’re up against kaiju! We’ve never authorized it for a single field agent before…” Artyom’s thoughts were in a flurry at the implications of being given access to the organization’s greatest superweapon. But considering his situation, it made sense. What scared Artyom most of all was the possibility of it not working against the Fatewatchers.

  The two of them sat around the living room casually while the others burst in with looks of shock and rage.

  “Where were you all?” asked Artyom casually. “The old man said you were busy, but not this busy.”

  “We’d rented a boat and went out to sea to do some fishing,” said Tommy in between breaths. “We only found out something happened when we got back-”

  “Where’s Lensa?!” shouted Xerica, eyes blazing like twin infernos.

  Artyom smiled internally, but kept up his confused facade. “So Lensa didn’t tell the others. Maybe she thought they’d make her punishment worse? Now the question is, do we tell the truth or lie to our advantage? Maybe I could get another one to leave for the frontier…”

  “Lensa helped us find the armor piece and then left for the frontier,” said Neitra. “She felt too sad about leaving, and ran off before anyone could say goodbye. Even her father!”

  Artyom couldn’t help but glare at the rogue, making her flinch.

  The others however visibly calmed down at her explanation.

  Neitra was the most sincere member of the party, and she would never lie so brazenly to her teammates.

  Artyom exhaled and eased his expression. On second thought, maybe this explanation was for the best? It lined up with what they told the old priest, and what if one of them accidentally met up with Lensa in the frontier? Then the others would find out how much he and Neitra actually knew about them.

  Artyom schooled his expression into a light smile and nodded at Neitra, earning the same in reply.

  The others thankfully didn’t pay much mind, clearly underestimating the rogue’s capacity for subterfuge.

  “Maybe… I was too hard on her earlier?” mumbled Xerica. “I was hoping to find a way to keep us all together, especially when we go to Holdbright Arcane Academy, but she left so quickly.”

  “And it seems she doesn’t think we killed her, for all we tried. Thus the status quo continues.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Xerica,” said Tommy, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulling her in close. “We just need to keep thinking, and we’ll be able to come up with a way to keep the frontier safe and the team together! Once we do, we can bring Lensa back!”

  For the briefest instant, Xerica’s expression warped into something terrible, reflecting her actual thoughts. But as she turned towards Tommy, it all but disappeared and was replaced with a placid smile. “Thank you Tommy, I know we’ll think of something.”

  “It’s because of his order that someone on the team had to go.”

  Xerica turned away from the hero towards Artyom, and the look was back.

  “But it’s because of me he made that order in the first place,” thought Artyom. He shined her own placid smile back at her.

  “Let’s start for Holdbright Arcane Academy tomorrow morning,” said Xerica, taking back control of her emotions. “We still need to gather supplies before heading out.”

  And with that, everyone left.

  Artyom and Neitra to start shopping for what they would need to make the trip, and Tommy back to the orphanage to make up for the previous meet-and-greet.

  It was… quiet.

  No more undead attacks, no more looming mystery, no more murder attempts. At least, for the rest of the day. Tomorrow, and when they got to the academy, Artyom knew would be a different story.