Two hundred or so kilometers north of Toronto is the ancestral land of the Algonquin people. Lakes stuffed with fish, territorial beavers, gigantic moose, and expansive forests and swamps cover the area. The region spans hundreds of thousands of square kilometers in all directions northward, with little tough communities and townships stuffed between the wet, bready marshes of the surrounding wilderness. It was never densely populated, because as it turns out, the stories of unfathomably brutal Canadian winters are true. Same with the tales of Skinwalkers. Only since the System arrived, Monsters don’t need to hide in fables, and ancient, never-ending forests are fantastic places for Dungeons to pop up like spring mushrooms.

  At least the rain had stopped.

  A portly Garden Gnome craned his neck at Nino, who led the group. Surprisingly, the little fellow didn’t look scared of his true Lich form. “Honored Guests! We welcome you to the Spring Equinox Ritual, first of its name and first of its doing!” He gestured grandly over to some makeshift wooden stands on the edge of the clearing. “Please make yourselves comfortable and enjoy the displays. They’ll start shortly, at midnight strike! The White Trillium Wives and their Eternal Gnome mate prepare with Sun and Shade. You may wait with the other guest of honor.”

  Nino looked over his shoulder and waggled his eyebrows at Alex and Jemin. “Two wive, eh? How does he do—”

  Nina floated up higher to reach the back of his arm and pinched it, causing him to yelp. “Ah!”

  Though he looked terrifying, Nino balefully looked at his much smaller wife, and made to begin apologizing, but the Gnome interrupted the escalation.

  “Actually,” the host explained, “The White Trillium Wives are the primary of the tertiary. Both Petunia and Marzipan have selected Petal to join their family, which is a great honour, considering their social standing within the community. Petunia being head Battle Warden and Marzipan being chief Poisoner,” the gnome smiled, revealing porcelain teeth replaced by broken sandglass. “Not that Petal himself isn’t important! But we gnomes are primarily matriarchal, though all worship his Girthdom.”

  With the Gnome nodding and scampering off for his duties, the gang followed Nina and Nino through the forest clearing toward their seats. Alex wasn’t sure where exactly they had ported, but he assumed it was somewhere in the middle of the woods. There weren’t any sounds of traffic, no lights save for the vibrant sky of the System, and the woods were a black blanket. Yet a seemingly endless procession Gnomes were pouring into the clearing by shooting from tunnels or tramping out from the dark.

  “It’s beautiful,” Snu stared around, looping her arm into Alex’s. “I love how much work they put into an Enchantment. There must be what? A thousand? Two thousand Gnomes here?”

  It was a natural clearing, roughly a hundred meters long and in the shape of an oblong oval. A giant rock thumbed up out of the wet, mossy floor, and the Gnomes assembled around it, some holding spring buds, some holding small Monster Cores or pinecones. One held an open purple mussel, still alive. Looking closely, Alex noticed a pattern. Each Gnome carried something. The commonality was that the items they held were living.

  The glowing yellow mushrooms of the Soil Mind dotted the trees on the perimeter, linking together and extending into the tunnels with thin strands of mycelium while casting a pleasant light under the moonless sky.

  “Gotta be that many,” Alex answered while taking it all in. “Enchantment though? I thought they said it’s a Ritual?”

  “Same thing,” Mary chimed in, walking next to Jemin, who wouldn’t stop looking at the dais in the center. “Enchantments can be small or big. Affects applied with Skills to things. It’s all technically Skills anyways. Wards are over places, Enchantments are kind of like connecting Skills to places so they affect things inside.”

  “Bah!” Nino called from the front, narrowly stepping on a Gnome rushing past. “Is all same ting. Anyone who try and esplain System lie. All Skill do is take Essence from body and Core and push into Core to hit Skill, which use. Skill complicated. But how they work is simple.”

  “Watch your step,” Nino said to her husband, though not angrily, and tugging him despite his size to the right. “I know it be years since you need to watch your step.”

  “Sorry!” Nino paused and held up his giant hand to let a line of Gnomes pass. “Sorry, sorry.”

  The Gnomes nodded their thanks, only one of them stopping to stare open mouthed at Nino before being dragged off.

  “So, no one knows how it works?” Aria asked from Zippy’s shoulders, who flew next to Beepy. “The System I mean. The Skills. Like how I can make three of things?”

  “If they do, they no tell,” Nina answered, “but where you think those other copies come, Aria? You think you make something from nothing? Impossible. Yes Essence is transferred. But think of how much energy creation take.”

  The drone brothers communicated back and forth as the discussion happened. With the System sending them direct messages to their printer, they had begun to wonder about it and where exactly they fit. Arbiters of its might they could be, but even the brother’s realized that was a lot of responsibility for relatively new forms of life.

  The gang piled themselves onto the makeshift benches, watching the gnomes excitedly wait. Snu nuzzled up to Alex, clearly excited, the boys and Aria swinging their feet in front of him, and Jemin to his right.

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  “Something about that rock in the middle,” he leaned into Alex. “My fricken [Appraisal] is going coocoo bananas over it. Has no idea what to make of it.”

  Nino scratched his chin and stared at the wooden seats. “I think I stand. I no want to break-ah the seat. Or set on fire. Is no polite.”

  “Mister?” A child’s voice called. “Mister, are you a Monster?”

  That caused Nina to laugh as Nino looked around for the source of the voice. Finally, he looked down and spotted the young, unmarred Garden Gnome staring up at him in wonder. He was holding a little minnow for his live offering.

  “Oh no,” Nino boomed a laugh. “I a Lich, and this is how I look when I leave Domain. You know what Domain is?”

  “No,” the child shook his head. “Is that like school? I hate school! They never let me early!”

  “I stop school when I seven year old,” Nino answered. “Are you seven?”

  “No. I’m four moons old! When I’m seven, will me mam let me leave?”

  “Rotwood Pollen the Second!” A sever looking Gnomish woman grabbed the child’s arm. “Are you disturbing our honoured guests?” She looked sheepishly up at Nino. “Apologies, this one is always curious. Did he say anything rude?”

  “Maaaaaaaaaam!” Rotwood tried to pull away. “I was just asking why he looks like that! He’s scarier than a Skinwalker!”

  After convincing the stuttering Gnomish woman that it was no big deal, Nino sent them off with a wave. Turning back to the gang, he saw all of them snickering, including Nina, who was laughing so hard she practically fell from her floated sitting position.

  “What? Why they run away so scare?” Nino asked. “What so funny?”

  “You burn your suit because you feel bad for scaring woman!” Nina howled and pointed at Nino’s bare barrel chest.

  “Oh. Ah no! I have this suit forever!” Nino patted the flames out, but the damage was done. The last vestiges of antique merino smoked away, leaving him shirtless in suspendered pants and shiny loafers.

  “PERHAPS YOU’D BE OPEN TO LEADING A WORKOUT SESSION WITH US, NINO?” Beepy asked the Lich.

  Nino grunted and turned back toward the Gnomes, crossing his muscular arms. “I never exercise. I just garden and work.”

  “Alex, I think you need to start gardening.” Snu snickered into his ear. Everyone laughed as they took in the frankly intense true form of Nino.

  Opposite to his wife, Nino’s unhidden Lich body was blocky slabs of muscle dotted in small black tattoos. Small daggers, skulls, vegetables, knives, and the boot of Italy faded to time. Like a bodybuilder, every one of his muscles corded out from his fatless body, and unlike a bodybuilder, an inferno roared within him and wanted to break out from the ink. Alex saw the heat trying to press out from tattoos. He also saw hundreds of scars. Every time he spoke, fire leaked out around his ready smile. His friendly eyes had been replaced by angry flames. Around his jet-black, slicked hair danced barely visible licks of heat. And apparently, when any emotion got too strong, he forgot that he could burn a town with the heat inside.

  Nina was his ice, and he was her fire. How else were they to cook the pizzas or keep vegetables fresh?

  A rustling behind them made their laughter fade as they turned towards the dark woods. Alex quickly tossed out an [Investigate] as he felt Snu grip his arm and gasp beside him.

  “Life begets life,” a deep voice said. “Knowledge begets knowledge. And here we see both all at once as new powers rise. Hello weavings of living and death born of love, my fellow but city dweller, forms yet complete, and humans. Welcome to the Wild.”

  Massive antlers poked out first from the dark, followed by a brown snout and intelligent eyes. Alex had never seen a moose, but from what he did know about them, they were not supposed to be twenty feet tall and possess the ability to speak. He knew, from the panting and shuffling deeper in the woods, that there were hundreds of animals lurking. Dogs and deer, birds and turtles, all manner of critter, all following one of the few Dungeon Bosses in the world whose Domain moved with them.

  [Runs with Wind – Muskoka Moose]

  The other guest of honor, and Gold Grade Dungeon Boss, had arrived to watch the Ritual.

  “Ahhh! Ciao!” Nino belted, tramping up to Moose with zero fear. “I am Nino! This my wife, Nina. We are Lich! Is very nice to meet you!” Then he stuck his flaming hand out as if the Boss could shake it.

  “We smell and feel your cycle of life,” the Moose smiled, actually smiled, as he bobbed his head at everyone. “Fear not the dark of the wild. You are all safe from any tiered Monsters. The Gnomes wait in the shadows, and my herd is readily available. Not as difficult here as it is in the city, is it, keeper of the Leather Spires?”

  Snu gasped again, blinking at the gigantic Moose. “It is never difficult for those who wish to grow.”

  Alex looked at her, at her face and the way she stared at the Moose, and wondered, Is she starstruck?

  “Words wise,” Moose nodded. “The winds whisper of coming toils. Prepare for spring and those who seek to unbalance the scales.”

  Everyone greeted Moose, and before long, the giant Boss was laughing along at Aria’s questions and listening respectfully about the travesties of the city racoons that plagued Nino. Snu was enraptured with the Boss, hanging onto his every thread. Not that Alex was jealous. He’d just never seen her so keen to learn.

  What the shit were they talking about? Coming what now about the balance?

  Suddenly the Gnomes quieted down, shushing each other and assembling neatly. They all turned to face opposite the benches to stare into the woods. Before turning himself, excited at what was going to happen, Alex caught the Moose looking at him.

  “Careful with the Gnomish tea,” the Moose warned. “I hear it can be quite potent for those with any mental abilities.”

  “Here for a good time, not a long time, right?” Alex winked.

  As if on cue, the dirtiest Gnomes of the bunch separated from the crowd, skipping around the assembly, and handed out small acorns filled with something. One with a missing hand giggled happily as she passed each of the gang one.

  “Bit a Gnomish Tea fer our guests?” The Gnome asked while already dancing away. “Break open yer third eye and make ‘ye bear witness?”

  Alex took it, and looking inside, saw that the top cap was popped off and there was thick black sludge within.

  “Ah, ‘yer too young fer it!” the Gnome said, pulling it back from Aria’s grasping hands.

  The doll looked forlorn as everyone besides her got their own. Nino and Nina sniffed at theirs, and Moose took it in his teeth.

  “You sure about this?” Snu whispered in his ear.

  “Bottoms up is what I say!” Jemin elbowed him excitedly.

  Alex smirked at Snu, seeing that she appeared worried. He wasn’t that worried. Lately, everything in his life had been going fantastically. From getting the job at Nino’s and his subsequent progression, to his growing wallet, to his relationship with Snu, to Emilio becoming a dang super cat!

  “I’ll be fine! What’s the worst thing that could happen?” He winked at Snu, shoving his tongue into the sludge.

  The Gnomes started cheering and chanting just as he tongued the infamous Gnomish tea.

  “Sun and Shade! SUN AND SHADE! SUN AND SHADE!”

  It was close to midnight on March 18th, 2045, and the sky held no moon. The Ritual was about to begin, magic filled the air, and even though his mouth tasted like mushroom dirt, Alex couldn’t wait to see.