Nico came back reportedly closer to the Sage now, having developed what sounded like an interesting rapport while… stargazing. Kai’s nose crinkled with an idle itch. As expected, Nico was nerding out, talking at length about old inscriptions that only someone ancient enough to predate common records would be able to decipher. He went on about how the glyphs felt endemic to the region, the way their curves flowed in waves, as if they were inscribing the auroras themselves.

  Kai, meanwhile, examined a restored piece of manasteel he’d received at the market from a vendor who recognized him. The Virid had been eager to show off the how the piece also manipulated water and its phases of matter, but as an alchemic relic unique to the wetlands. Now that Nico gave him an unsolicited comprehensive, it was hard to miss that the glyphwork was etched in oscillating wave patterns. It wasn’t anything Kai had seen in his research on Tellur or in its official records.

  When he mentioned that over dinner, the local alchemists only laughed, hearty and unbothered, and told him he was using the wrong point of reference.

  “Try looking into Tulen instead.”

  That was probably something the Director of Environmental Mana Oversight would be, and was, privy to. Effie perked up instantly and spent the entire afternoon telling him about her passion project, which had also been her master’s thesis: Tulen, and what its relics revealed about the region. She walked him through the elders she had interviewed and how she’d pieced together the last remnants of Tulen’s history through generations of oral transmission.

  She hadn’t known about the observatory, though, and was genuinely grateful that Nico had discovered it and returned it to reality. There was an irony to it, that the only reason an observatory holding information about a civilization erased long before she was born had survived at all was because of a rift. Kai nodded along, as he would for many more days, having thrown open the Pandora’s box of Effie’s hyperfixation.

  ***

  “Ohoh. That isn’t the only rift in the western valley, and they hold completely different things!”

  As the fortune teller scrutinized the manasteel relic against the light, Kai pushed his latest ingot across the table.

  “What do they hold?”

  The Virid, draped in cloth and the scent of marigold, dropped the ingot into the underside of a snow globe, giving Kai a full view of the mechanics behind her crystal ball magic. She multitasked with professional ease, watching the gold sink to confirm its authenticity while she assembled the new orb.

  “O foo foo foo,” she exhaled as she rearranged the orbs on her table. “This payment is only enough for information on one of them.”

  Kai rolled his eyes at how ridiculous fortune-telling inflation had become. “Then tell me about the one regarding Tulen.”

  The Virid slammed her palms down on the table, rattling every orb in her shop. “I said the payment is only valid for one of them.”

  ***

  Kai loomed over Nico, who hissed at him from beneath the hotel bedsheets the moment the blackout curtains were thrown open. A pang of guilt hit him. He hadn’t expected the fox to unravel so many rifts in such rapid succession, though Nico clearly hadn’t expected it either. Still, Kai couldn’t let him sleep through the entire festival, especially after Nico had spent the first half of it inside a rift and the second half barricaded in his room to avoid “bad but attractive external influences.”

  Kai whacked Nico a few times with his own pillow, drawing on years of carefully collected knowledge on how to drag him out of bed. When Nico finally went limp in dramatic defeat rather than actual sleep, Kai claimed victory by picking out a going-out outfit for the fox. Nico always cheered up once he ate something. And he would probably benefit from visiting the Ori he’d saved, who had been in good spirits the last time Kai checked on her.

  She’d been very eager to meet him and had told Kai, more than once, that he “shouldn’t give up” just because Nico’s new (mission) partner was a “pretty cool alchemist.” When Kai asked what, exactly, made the guy “pretty cool,” Lani launched into a deeply conspiratorial analysis about how it looked like Nico’s partner could use Nico’s mana, which was admittedly super romantic. Just from proximity, he could turn the fox’s gold into violet.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  She admitted the optics were in their favor, especially since the guy had even given Nico headpats a few times, but she reassured Kai that it wouldn’t be enough to outweigh their long history. Kai thanked her for the valuable encouragement and neatly filed away the headpat intel for later, to deploy at the precise moment it would embarrass the crap out of Nico.

  As he watched the fox brush his teeth with his eyes deliberately averted from the vanity mirror, in a hotel room where every mirror had been turned around or covered, he decided today was not the day.

  ***

  Kai’s aide bowed out of the meeting room after delivering, once again, the now twice-pushed-back mana survey update. It informed the Governor, once again, that he was fucked thanks to the new rifts Alchemist Yun had unraveled. The Governor shot Kai a shiny, all-teeth smile, fresh from vacation. He didn’t look any shinier or more well rested for it, which tracked, considering he did jack shit on an average workday.

  After the brutal update, Kai followed up, accepting yet another ingot with a handshake—and then went in for a second handshake with his other hand. The Governor froze for a second, then burst into laughter, reciprocating and slipping Kai a second ingot.

  “You’ll go far in this industry if you keep this up!” he declared, still grinning.

  Ah yes. The industry of public service.

  Kai matched the enthusiasm and returned it in kind, suggesting that the Governor himself was already well beyond his way, perhaps even capable of out-influencing Sage Aster.

  “Oh no, no, no,” the Governor blushed, waving it off with both hands. “I could never compare myself to the Sage. Absolutely not.” The smile never left his face.

  Kai left him hanging, long enough to draw mild concern from the Arcanite.

  “But hasn’t the entire Forged Nation been blessed by Tellur’s efforts?” Kai asked, head tilted. “Wouldn’t a survey assistance request addressed to all Arcanite Sages help highlight the work your office has done to secure Tellur as a reliable ally?”

  The Governor lit up. “Well, when you put it that way,” he said, clasping his hands together as he warmed up to the idea. “Yes… that would certainly make things clear.”

  He chuckled, eyeing Kai with the fond appraisal of a man already imagining taking him under his wing. So he could raise another idiot.

  “You’ve got initiative. I like that.” He promptly turned to his aides and barked, “Start drafting the request. Immediately!”

  When he looked back—

  Kai wasn’t watching.

  ***

  “Gentlemen,” the Governor announced, clasping his hands together, “I’ve decided to take you to the most prestigious teahouse in all of Tellur. Well earned for your efforts.”

  He stepped closer and pressed a few more coins into Kai’s hands, clearly thrilled based on his wide grin.

  “The responses from the Sages have been excellent. Truly excellent. Exactly the sort of engagement we were hoping for.”

  Kai counted his teeth, somewhat convinced he had more than the average person at this point.

  “E–excuse me, Your Excellency,” his assistant said, edging closer, hands clasped tight at their front, “there’s a call coming in.”

  The Governor’s expression distorted immediately, “I’m in the middle of—”

  “I’m sorry,” they added quickly with many apologetic, small bows of their head. “It’s Sage Aster.”

  The Governor left his mouth open as he processed, then smiled wider. “Do excuse me.”

  Kai’s pockets were starting to get heavy from all the back-to-back ingots. Sure, he could put them in his inventory, but it was way funnier to carry all the idiot’s ingots on his person.

  Nico, who had been wide-eyed and baffled all morning, finally spoke. “Did he really… take us straight to a rift to have a meeting about rifts he is actively denying the existence of? Is he—”

  “I’ll stop you there,” Kai said.

  Nico readily accepted that the Governor was a fucking idiot. Because he was. Had Kai not engaged with Effie, the Governor himself would have taken them to the manasteel market. He was truly amazing, in his own regard.

  Kai gave Nico a once-over and added, “I’ll catch up with you after I take a look around the miniature market.”

  ▌ SKILL ACTIVATED ▌ [ Lycanthropy ]

  Kai stepped through the waterfall, using his water affinity as an umbrella.

  Gathering all the gold ingots from his pockets, which were notably heavy, Kai rushed into the fortune-teller’s shop and placed them all on her table.

  “Ohoh?”

  “I need a reading. Not for me, but for a friend I’m worried about,” Kai said, a touch exasperated. He paused, hand at his forehead, and added, “He falls in love easily.”

  “OH— OHOH? A FOO FOO FOO!”

  Several glitter bombs went off in the apothecary. For the first time after a reading, the fortune-teller sent him off with a passionately designed ‘Alchemy at the Park~~ ??’ flyer, mentioning offhandedly that she ran it herself. Kai nodded and tucked it into his inventory on the way out, already deciding it was time to indulge in a bit of retail therapy. He needed it, and found genuine amusement in the miniature items of the shorter market. A small treat for himself before firing off many, many emails.

  ***

  As they strolled through the park, Nico kept staring at him, openly worried. Kai had expected it, though he’d hoped a sunny weekend walk to a cute, family-friendly event—complete with adorable children practicing alchemy—would distract the fox from the issue at hand.

  The night before, he’d developed a twinge in his forearm that shot down into his hand, likely from sending far too many emails after lugging ingots around all day. The wrist brace was a precautionary measure, nothing more than a safeguard against carpal tunnel. Even so, Kai could feel Nico’s suspicion lingering, unconvinced by the explanation.

  ?? alchemy at the park is a government funded organization ??

  back to regularly scheduled fox programming next update~