“This isn’t like her,” Dazien muttered, gncing at his pocket watch. “She’s never this te to training.”

  Uriel shrugged as he continued through his sword forms, “Maybe Lord Waynd finally returned.”

  “Then she would have brought him here to beat us into the mat,” he pointed out. Another moment ter, he unconjured his sword and announced, “I’m going to go search for her. Maybe something happened in the west district. The arms there won’t reach us here.”

  His partner halted and sheathed his sword, moving to follow after him without further objection.

  As they arrived at the portal grounds, they were confused when one of the attendants informed them that Phoenix had completed all of her scheduled assignments hours ago. They weren’t sure where she could have possibly gone and didn’t even know who to ask, except perhaps her benefactor.

  When they next arrived at the building belonging to House Waynd to ask if perhaps the lord had returned, they were informed that he had reported his mission as complete and had indeed returned to the city that morning but was currently in meetings elsewhere in the city. When the pair asked about Phoenix, they were surprised to learn that she had never been there before.

  It was in the middle of when they would normally be eating their dinner when they arrived at her dorm and knocked, with silence as the only response. Dazien looked at his partner and asked, “Any chance you can detect if she’s in there before I break in to check things out?”

  Uriel nodded slowly, then motioned the warrior back. Dazien complied as his partner removed the Silencer and breathed in deeply through his nose. A moment ter, his companion nodded again at him before retching the colr, “I can detect her scent, but it also smells a bit like tears are mixed in with some distress. I don’t smell fear, though, so I’m not sure we should–”

  “Phoenix!” he called out, stepping forward and pounding louder on the door, “Open the door before I force it open!”

  “You’re going to get the guards called on us,” the Mage muttered, gncing down the hall to make sure no prying eyes were upon them.

  They heard movement on the other side, and then the door unlocked but only cracked open slightly. He started asking questions in frustrated concern as he pushed it wider and entered, “Where have you been? You were supposed to be training with us hours ago. We have to–” he halted when his gaze fell upon her splotched and tear-stained face as she rubbed at her eyes.

  Her simple cream nightgown hugged her form before fring out around her legs, but it was the combination of her tears and wild red curls falling loose around her face and down her back that arrested his attention. He had never seen her cry before nor her hair completely unbraided, and the chaos of it left him momentarily mesmerized.

  “Are you alright?” Uriel’s smooth and gentle voice broke through his distraction as he refocused on the reason for her tears, which she was furiously wiping away. He noted the rainbow runes on her wrist as well, having never seen them before.

  When training, she normally covered her wrists with the long sleeves of the sliksilk training outfit, and outside of that, she always wore long sleeves that had a habit of going past her entire hand, not to mention the bracelet he’d seen glint underneath a handful of times. He had thought it was an attempt to cover her paler skin that she seemed so self-conscious about, a sentiment he could fully empathize with, but perhaps it was also to hide the fact that she had an Oathbond.

  “It–” her voice caught, and she took a steadying breath before stating, “It was just a nightmare.”

  “You were sleeping?” Dazien asked incredulously. He had so many more questions now, but his companion’s hand on his shoulder stopped him from pressing her for more information.

  He forced himself to rex, trying to calm his frustration to focus on what she needed instead, and said as carefully as he could, “We have our Watch on the wall in a half mark. Are you going to be well enough to go?”

  She nodded and began walking towards her bedroom to finish getting ready. About ten minutes ter, she was wearing a more practical shirt and pants with boots that he hadn’t seen her wear before and was finishing tying the end of her long braid. “Where’s your cloak?” he asked when he registered what was missing from her usual ensemble.

  Phoenix just shrugged and said, “It needs the tailor again.”

  “Seriously?” he asked as he followed her out of the dorm with Uriel close behind. “You really need to get one with a self-repair enchant if it’s getting damaged that often.”

  Phoenix was engraving small runes into the palm-sized stone in front of her with the new etching tool she had purchased from another merchant that Dazien had introduced her to after she collected her pay from the AOA for the week. She looked at her [Guide Book] floating nearby to reference the diagram she had come up with based on her understanding of enchantments so far before continuing the delicate work.

  She had told her teammates she wanted the day to just rex and recuperate once their Watch had finished the night before, and they hadn’t pushed her. Their concern became more apparent as her subdued attitude continued during the night, which progressed uneventfully for them, though they had sent out a number of other Response parties to intercept nd-bound monsters they had spotted.

  After her ordeal at the hands of a jealous psychopath, she came up with a concept for an item she wanted to try making that she thought might help her feel better when leaving her dorm room again.

  As for dealing with the trauma of the event… she decided to take the old-fashioned route of attempting to bury those memories as deep as she could and never thinking about it again. Which only seemed to work up to the point she tried to sleep, quickly startling awake a few hours ter, kicking the bnkets and memories of swarming monsters off of her in terror, only to find herself alone in her room, drenched in sweat and breathing heavily.

  Phoenix remembered some stories about soldiers who went to war and suffered from PTSD, having fshbacks and nightmares like she found herself suddenly experiencing, but she had never known any of them personally and didn’t know how people actually went about treating it. Plus, she had been in plenty of monster fights before without having this kind of reaction. Perhaps she just needed some time to put it behind her.

  After calming herself down, she forwent sleep to work on her side projects some more. The first one was an altered enchantment diagram she had been thinking about since learning about the arm system within the city of Tulimeir. The second, which was currently in her hand, was a small stone that would hopefully save her life if she ever got kidnapped again.

  The general concept for the device was simple enough: trickle some mana into the signal stone that would act as a tracking beacon to the receiver stone with the different markings around the edge lighting up in the direction of the signal.

  It was an emergency SOS fre for her to use in case the maniac siblings tried to kidnap her again. That way, they could be caught in the act, and she would have some actual proof that wouldn’t reveal her ability to resurrect herself and get her stuck in a Magi’s b somewhere.

  She had debated multiple times over the course of the morning about confiding in Paul about her [Waypoint] ability, but she was leaning towards keeping her silence. She didn’t want to burden the few people in her life with even more problems when they already put up with her weaknesses. She also didn’t want to be seen as a victim who couldn’t protect herself. She was an Adventurer! If she couldn’t overcome this new fear she was struggling with, how could she be trusted to protect others?

  No, she would show that she could handle the situation herself. Prepare better with a device of her own creation. Prove that she was tough enough to handle any monster that she came across and not let her fear dictate her actions. She would show everyone the evil inside Murinah Ruwena.

  She had been naive again, letting down her guard just like she had with Miles. Phoenix had thought herself safe with other Adventurers, but they had shown her how unreliable that belief was. If she couldn’t trust the AOA to weed out the psychopaths, then how did she know who among them to trust? How could she work with other parties based on their membership alone? Could she even really trust her own teammates? She had only known them for a little over a month, after all.

  Phoenix realized that she didn’t really know anything about them outside of their roles within the party, the time they trained together, and the assortment of foods the pair enjoyed. That either made her a terribly trusting simpleton or a terrible friend. Both were things she needed to change, the tter even more so if she didn’t want to cause Paul to worry even more.

  She scrunched her face as her hand slipped again, and she grabbed some more ste putty to fix her mistake before continuing to engrave. Phoenix hadn’t noticed the passing of time until the sound of a throat clearing startled her. She flinched violently, half rising out of her chair and turning to see what new threat had snuck up on her.

  Paul watched her in surprise and frowned at her reaction. She let out a breath and visibly rexed as she registered his presence, sighing heavily, “Don’t sneak up on me like that,” she compined wearily and slumped back into the chair at the small dining table she had been working at, pcing a hand on her forehead to try and steady her racing mind.

  “I didn’t realize you were so deep in thought there,” he said as he took a seat across from her. He watched her harried appearance for a moment before asking, “Have you been up all night?”

  She gave a half-shrug, “I slept a couple hours earlier,” she replied and tapped the stone she had been working on, “Mind focused on finishing this.”

  Paul nodded in understanding, still giving her an assessing gaze, and she asked a few moments ter with a bit of annoyance, “What?”

  Her mentor frowned at her again, and she felt the familiar brush of his aura against hers, and she visibly flinched from him again. She stood up once more to step away from him and pulled her own aura in tightly, trying to make it as solid and unreadable as possible while saying through clenched teeth, “Not tonight, Paul.”

  “What happened?” he asked sternly, not moving from his seat, but he pulled back his aura, hopefully recognizing the unusual discomfort it was causing her.

  “Nothing,” she automatically said as she rubbed at her arms for comfort and warmth. At his ft look, she expined, “Just nightmares. I’ll be fine.”

  “Nightmares?” he questioned, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “Yes, nightmares. Have you never had a nightmare before?” she snapped back.

  He quirked an eyebrow at her, and she groaned, then rubbed her face with both her hands as she retook her seat, giving in to her exhaustion, “I’m sorry, Paul… Can you just bme my tired brain and forget tonight is happening? I’m not really in the best pce right now.”

  Her Mentor nodded slowly, then leaned forward, resting his arms on the table, before pulling the rge rolled-up scroll that she had discarded on the table earlier towards him to read. After examining it for a few moments, he asked, “Is this the city’s Monster Spawn Alert enchantment?”

  She simply tilted her head in confirmation, and he inquired further, “This is different though, rger and… reyed?”

  “I was trying to think of a way to expand it to the outlying towns when I discovered that the communication between the smaller vilges and fort towns are… well, basically non-existent compared to what I’m used to in my old world,” she tried to expin to him, gesturing to the scroll, “It’s more of a theory though since I have no idea how to test it out on such a rge scale.”

  Paul thoughtfully hummed as he studied it more and asked, “Can I hold onto this?”

  “Sure. It won’t do me much good,” she said with a dismissive wave.

  He then rolled up the scroll, sliding it into the dimensional bag at his hip, and leaned forward again to grab the receiving stone to look over it, “This looks like a tracking device of some kind?”

  She nodded and lifted the signal stone she was still working on, appreciating the change of topic, “I’m trying to link it to an activatable signal rather than the normal passive trigger some animal colrs have to find lost pets and add in pieces from the arm ritual you taught me so they’ll both inform the holder while only tracking when activated.”

  Paul pced the receiving stone down with a nod and said, “I can leave then and let you get some rest today. You don’t really seem to be up to talking about other things and are focused on this.”

  Phoenix’s hand moved without thought as it clutched at his long white sleeve, “No, please,” her voice was barely a whisper, but he seemed to have understood as he paused, “Don’t leave me alone.”

  She realized that the st thing she wanted at the moment was to be left alone once more for her memories and fears to consume her. It also made her realize that Paul had become the only person she felt safe with. That realization alone made her change her mind. If she couldn’t trust Paul, then she really was completely alone in a strange world.

  He nodded, pcing his free hand over hers in a comforting gesture. Then he made her smile slightly by trying to change the topic once more and get her mind away from whatever seemed to be bothering her, but his words only served to reinforce the decision to confide in her Mentor and friend, “Is now a bad time to ask why the Fme of Life you gave me was flickering yesterday afternoon?”

  Phoenix gave him a wry look, “Are you really watching it all the time like some kind of stalker?”

  He grimaced and muttered, “Not all the time. I just make sure to check it every now and then to make sure it doesn’t go out randomly.”

  “You make it sound like I’m just going to suddenly keel over with a stiff breeze,” she compined.

  Paul gave her a teasing grin that she rarely got to see, “With how many potions I’ve had to force-feed you? I’m lucky you survived without me.”

  She chuckled, shaking her head, but couldn’t really argue the point. Then he continued inquiring, “I’ve never seen a Fme of Life flicker like that before. I didn’t even know it was possible or what it might mean. Did you get into a fight but manage to heal yourself?”

  Phoenix slowly shook her head once more, then conjured her book into her p but didn’t hand it over right away as she asked nervously, “You, um… you can keep another secret of mine, right? You haven’t dragged me off to your ir or anything yet for being a Wayfarer…”

  Paul gave an awkward chuckle as he noted, “That Magi really gave you a bad impression of the people in this world, didn’t he?”

  She nodded solemnly, and her mentor seemed to still at her serious tone. She felt another hesitant brush of his aura against hers, but it wasn’t pushing to read her; it was asking permission to understand her.

  Phoenix gathered her resolve and let him in. Allowing him to read her fear and frustration as she handed over the book with her most secret Talent on dispy.

  Natural Talent: Waypoint

  When suffering lethal damage, instead of crossing the Veil, your soul will be transported to the st pce you designated as your Waypoint. Your body will be reconstituted there, regaining a state of full integrity. This effect can only be triggered once every twenty-four hours.

  As his face darkened at the description, she added cautiously, “The Fme probably flickered because I did die yesterday, at least for a little while.” Then, she dispyed the revival message she got when waking.

  He sat there for a long moment, reading and rereading the ability and message before asking his next question, “How did you die?”

  Phoenix gave a short ugh that almost sounded like a sob as she asked wryly, “The first time? Or the most recent?”

  The Wrath Bde looked up at her sharply and changed his question, “How many times have you died?”

  “Twice,” she said, gently stroking her braid as a distraction, “The first time I was cornered by a Shanther and fell off a cliff. That’s when I revived and met Miles. He made it quite clear that this Talent made me extremely valuable,” she continued expining, “Then yesterday, I was tricked, incapacitated, and… fed to a pack of miserlings.”

  The Emerald aura became a suffocating presence then, and even she could sense the anger suffusing it at the mental image she was sure her words were conjuring if he was familiar with the creatures.

  It rexed a moment ter as he pulled it back into himself, likely realizing the effect it was having on her, and he commanded, “Tell me who tricked you.”

  Hesitantly, she asked, “Are… what are you going to do to them?”

  Paul stared at her wide-eyed as he asked in disbelief, “You would try to protect your killer?”

  “No, I just… I don’t want you killing them out of anger or revenge… I don’t want anyone dying because of me,” she said falteringly.

  His golden eyes went wider, then narrowed as he growled, “Phoenix, they murdered you. And in one of the most disturbing ways I could have imagined. I am familiar with how miserlings hunt. If you didn’t have this impossible ability, you wouldn’t be here, and I would currently be mourning.”

  Phoenix looked towards him, surprised at the strong emotions he was channeling even with his aura retracted. Her mentor almost appeared to beg her as he said, “Tell me who would dare to have ripped you from my life.”

  “Murinah Ruwena and her brother, Camrin,” then a faint memory repyed in her mind, and she added, “Though the brother sounded upset? I’m not sure he was in on it.”

  His eyes closed, rubbing at his temple as he said, “House Ruwena. Being a noble might make things messier, but she will pay for what she’s done.”

  She couldn’t stop herself from inquiring, “How are you going to do that?” His eyes were cold as he gazed at her, and she crified, “I mean, how will anyone believe I was killed when I’m clearly not dead?”

  Paul’s expression softened as he said, “You leave that to me and don’t worry about them anymore. I’ll probably have to dig around for some other things to pin on her and talk with some of my contacts.

  “Besides, we don’t want anyone else finding out about your [Waypoint] ability,” he added. She raised an eyebrow, and he expined as he gestured to the rge window making up the wall beside them, “That Magi was right. There are a lot of people out there that would cim you to either study this Talent or use you as an expendable tool for suicide missions.”

  The Emerald Caster frowned and admitted, “I may be strong here in Tulim, but if word got outside of the city, there are many I could not protect you from. I may be close, but I’m not Ruby yet, where most of the global leaders are.”

  Phoenix nodded at the logic. She had been nervous because she didn’t want to be experimented on, but she hadn’t considered people trying to take advantage of the power like Paul had suggested with missions that would definitely kill her. She resolved to keep her silence about it. Now that she at least had Paul to confide in, the weight she had been feeling slowly crushing her had lightened considerably.

  Paul leaned forward in his chair and pced a hand on top of hers in an uncommon dispy of affection towards her, “Phoenix, I wish you had trusted me sooner, but I don’t bme you for not saying anything after that Magi had betrayed you.”

  His hand squeezed hers as he said decisively, “I don’t want you to feel like you need to hide things from me. I will never hurt or betray you. You are my Protégé, and I will protect and support you as such.”

  She wiped the tears from her eyes with her free hand and nodded, saying in a broken voice, “Thank you, Paul.”