Warning: This chapter contains postulated explanations to the various skills employed in this game using a facet of the world of Etrian Odyssey that people who have not completed at least one of the games could rightly consider spoilers. Very big ones. But you already know about Yggdroids and the common knowledge that the in game world is a post world-disaster civilization, right? You may want to take your chances.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

-Arthur C. Clarke

~Chapter 6

Day 8 - Emperor 8th

Entry 3:

The Virtus and her crew have pulled off what was thought to have been impossible and have successfully navigated the deadly currents off the west side of Skandalia Island. It took little time for the news to reach the Harbormaster upon reaching Armoroad close to midnight. He was so excited that he came to welcome us home personally, and tell us exactly what form of thanks we are to receive from Armoroad and the Senatus.

It would seem I had misunderstood the term "Generously Rewarded" in terms of charting the course to Skandalia, for the reward is not in the form of ental, but a complete refitting for the Virtus and the addition of a foremast to it's stumpy bow. Guild Aequitas is not going to receive anything directly from the discovery.

And here I am, after days at sea, wondering if it was worth the time and money spent to explore the oceans for the city. Even with trade goods and fishing income we have merely broken even on the price for vittles, and I am back where I started. Having to choose between buying Sonia a new crossbow or paying for food and shelter.

Guess what I chose.

"Oh, god I missed eating meat!" cries Sonia as she continues to tear chunks out of her chicken breast. Lin smiles brightly as she enjoys her fruit salad, and Sarah applies a generous helping of butter onto her cornbread muffin. Every member of Aequitas is thoroughly enjoying their first full, unhurried, and tasty meal on land in days.

As a celebration, Xander decided to treat everyone to a small feast at the Butterfly Bistro in thanks for their patience and hard work. Besides, Xander felt the need to try and raise his own spirits after the blow he had taken when the Harbormaster had thanked him. All that time on the sea, and here Xander was, still just treading water. Though Xander was not intending a pun with that analogy, it truly feels apt. But sitting in the soft blue filtered light of the leaf canopied bistro is slowly lifting the pain of disappointment.

"I have bringing your new bottle," says Missy happily as she delivers the table's second bottle of wine for the night, "Will you be having another?"

"No, thank you," says Xander in reply, "We won't be having any more drinks."

Sonia makes a sound half-way between surprise and desperation and then asks, "Didn't you say we could have fun tonight?"

"Having fun doesn't mean getting drunk," says Xander in a tone to settle the matter. The meal will already be costing nearly forty ental, there is no need to add the price of ale onto it.

"For some people it does," replies Sarah, as if just discussing a universal fact.

Well, Sarah would know, thinks Xander in recognition of her expertise before turning to Missy once more. "No more drinks for the night. Even if they are ordered."

"Ah, I am understanding you," says Missy in what she probably thinks is a conspiratorial voice, and then calls back in a bubbly manner as she returns to the bar, "Enjoooy!"

"Eeeeh, stingy," comes Sonia's half-hearted complaint as Xander begins pouring out servings of the new wine around the table, skipping Yuriko as she doesn't like the taste of alcohol. Grabbing a cornbread muffin for herself, Sonia suddenly changes the direction of the conversation once again. "So, Lin, you makin' any progress with Reif?"

Lin convulses, nearly choking to death on a cherry before getting out the words, "Where did that come from!"

"Oh come on," insists Sonia, "We all know you're crazy about 'im, and you've been chattin' him up at the, what was it? Mess table?"

"You two do seem to be getting along better than when you first met," remarks Sarah, daring to having fun with another person again.

"But that's with everyone," moans Lin as her face heats up, "When I try talking to him alone I just…freeze up, every time. I always get so nervous. I mean, he's so busy on the ship and he may not even want to talk to me."

Xander's eyelids droop from the weight of his disappointment in the excuses Lin is making up for herself. If Reif hadn't have been so bored on the ship Xander probably would never have ended up being toyed with. "Lin," he says, "I'm positive that Reif does not dislike you. Have a little confidence and speak with him. Ask something you want to know about him and let the conversation roll from there."

"Yeah," chimes Yuriko brightly, "Don't let this chance pass you by. Love is like an artery, when you see it you should strike."

Everyone at the table freezes and looks at Yuriko in surprise. Yuriko happily continues picking parts out of her fruit salad and tossing them up for Tanpopo to snatch out of the air as he roosts in the leafy canopy for the duration of the meal. After a few long seconds, Lin finally says offhandedly, "Well, that just happened."

Shortly afterward Xander sees an Armoroad marine come into the bistro through the entrance near Missy's bar and speak to the woman. He is quickly given directions in the form of Missy's index finger pointed directly at Guild Aequitas' table. Coming over, the armored young man with the cloth cowl covering his face in shadow gives Xander a practiced salute and says, "I hope I'm not interrupting your meal sir," though he obviously is, "But I have an important matter from the Senatus to speak with you about."

"Very well, what is it," asks Xander in a tone that was neither curious nor questioning, as he takes a sip of wine.

The young man speaks quickly, as if use to memorizing and delivering messages for his higher ups. He must have a drab work life. "After confirming with the Harbormaster and the crew of the Virtus, the Senatus has decided to use your vessel as the transport for a special detachment of Marine Engineers and volunteer explorers to try to infiltrate and retake Skandalia Lighthouse. Senator Flowdia is requesting that your guild lead the operation and the personnel involved. Will you accept this request?"

With his message delivered, the young man stands rock still. The other members of Aequitas, as well as the other patrons in the bistro, feel uncomfortable with the marine left in such an unusual situation. Xander doesn't care though, because as a Lord he knows it's a part of the marine's job to wait awkwardly until a reply is decided upon and then deliver it awkwardly to his superiors. With that knowledge, Xander is able to treat the young man as though he doesn't exist and concentrate on his own thoughts.

According to the message the Senatus has already decided to use the Virtus for this "operation" even if Xander declines the offer, but the time table for this request is a little too fast. We docked less than an hour ago. The Senatus has been moving too quickly the entire time Xander has been here, though. Giving cash prizes to novice guilds, chartering and handing out ships, and now this. All of the Senatus' moves have revolved around enticing other people to do their work for them. The Virtus is crewed by civilians and probably privately owned, and the Senatus is calling in volunteer explorers instead of sending in a platoon of marines. The only military personnel involved in this entire scheme are going to be a few engineers, non-combatants.

And the Senatus is asking Aequitas to take charge of the operation for two reasons. Because we are the guild the Virtus is assigned to, and so that if the operation fails we can be blamed for it. A typical politician's move. Even so…

"I accept. But we will not be available until tomorrow morning at the earliest."

Xander gives his response without even looking at the marine, cutting a piece out of his roasted sweet potato. Xander doesn't want a part of this, but the Virtus is now nominally a part of Guild Aequitas, though they could be reassigned at any time, and Xander won't allow a member of his guild to be hung out to dry.

"Yes, sir, thank you."

The marine should have snapped his salute and left at that point, but something odd happened. The marine stayed put. That was unusual enough for Xander to stop what he was doing and study the young man curiously. He seemed to be hesitating.

"Sir," says the marine, "May I ask you a question? …Is it true that you're the son of Life-"

"Did you not grasp the fact that I just dismissed you?" snaps Xander viciously, "Or do you need me to call for your mother to come and pick you up?"

"Ah! Yes sir! I mean, no sir! I mean, I'm going sir!"

The young marine blurts out his words and rushes off to do the duty he should have done before. Turning back to the table, Xander sees what he was expecting to see, the surprised eyes of the rest of his guild. Calmly returning to his meal despite fuming with indignance inside, Xander explains, "The last thing I needed was for him to ask that question in a bar full of explorers," Xander lightly swings his fork around to indicate, "While I suppose it was too much to expect a crew of sailors to keep a secret like that to themselves, guards gossip more than a knitting circle. I have maybe a week until the entire island knows my heritage."

Day 9 - Emperor 9th ~ At Sea

Entry 1:

Despite what I said I had the team awake and at the docks before sunrise, much to Sarah's chagrin. Once there I was told that the other volunteering parties had reported to the ship in the night and that everything was ready to go, so we launched for Skandalia directly. It would be best if we could take care of this entire matter in a single day, as I have suddenly found myself under a time limit for establishing myself before the vultures start to circle.

After resting a few more hours in the cabins, the rest of the guild and I were awoken for a late breakfast where I had the opportunity to speak with our guests on this voyage. The most unusual, for me at least, was a lady ninja by the name of Kirikaze. According to what Yuriko said it is most likely an assumed name as it means "Cutting Wind." Yuriko seems very excited to speak with the woman.

There is also a princess with her two escorts. While quite pretty, she seems a little too excited about the idea of enforcing justice, and is claiming this excursion as being a part of her nation's succession rite. She seems eager enough, but something feels off. I think I'll have a more in depth chat with her later on.

And last, and most certainly least, is a set of brothers. The shy and anti-social monk of a brother who barely said anything at the table, and the withdrawn and anti-social zodiac of a brother who barely said anything at the table. Among the two, the monk is the more acceptable guest as he does not have distain in his eyes when he looks at you.

But from what the zodiac said I have learned something about the keeping of knowledge in this region of the world. In Lagaard our combat technology is mainly kept by researchers and alchemists to be passed down to apprentices, but here the technologic side is kept by the Astrologic College which trains the Zodiacs and issues the odd cloaks with the stars on the front to those who have graduated the training. Apparently the college was only founded a couple of decades ago, but has grown rapidly.

Despite the ability of this man, I would much rather not fight beside him. His given reason for taking part in the operation is to perfect his abilities by studying the stars from a more advantageous point for observation. Fighting a giant beast for such a simple reason is either mad, fool hearty, over confident, or negligent. Or perhaps the man has fled so much from the world around him that he underestimates reality. Perhaps that is why the brother has been studying healing without having been born into the temple like other monks, his having to watch out for his brother.

I also noticed that the Virtus has not been refitted, nor have any modifications been made yet. After inquiring I was told that it would take days for such a remodel to be completed and that the project would begin once we returned from the infiltration mission. Pretty sharp of the Senatus, for if we never make it back not only will they have not lost any precious men or equipment, but they will not have to give out an actual reward for reaching Skandalia in the first place.

Addendum:

After speaking with Lin about the brother of the Zodiac, who is named Pollux, I have learned some more about the monks and their order. It seems that Pollux cannot be truly classified as a Monk as he is not from a bloodline associated with the temple. While it is possible for people to learn the techniques and develop abilities akin to those of a monk, they will always be incomplete.

Apparently only those who are associated with the temples by blood can learn to harness their Qi to the point of making their healing techniques more potent by far. And thus, true Monks. This is very good information to have, especially going into the battle at Skandalia.

It is well into the morning hours as Xander strides out of the tiny cabin under the mock quarterdeck used for a navigation room and all purpose planning room. Looking around, Xander notes the locations of the various guests, or clients as Reif called them, relaxing about. Castor, the anti-social Zodiac is using the light of the sun to read a book written in a language Xander cannot decipher from the cover, his long black hair covering one eye as the other weaves back and forth over the printed words. The man's brother, Pollux, a tall, thin, and generally weak looking monk is nowhere to be found. Most likely keeping to himself in his cabin.

The Princess Victoria and her escorts are also present on the deck, the girl looking to be about sixteen years old with blond hair secured in a semi-free flowing bundle behind a glimmering tiara and wearing a white dress decorated with blue teardrop gemstones. Very much the type of garb a royal would wear, though Xander has always favored simplicity over pomp.

The Princess' two escorts are on the other side of the ship keeping their eyes on her. The first is a grizzled warrior with long black hair, perpetual stubble, and an unrelentingly stern look on his face. He is watching the Princess with the eyes of a watch dog that strikes down anything that threatens his master. The enormous mace on his back is nearly as tall as he is. The second escort is a knight, or a Hoplite in these parts. His bulky armor and shield are covered with knobby protrusions for catching an enemy's weapon upon to better deflect attacks, and serve to synthetically make his large body seem even larger. This would normally make a person's head appear smaller by comparison, even dwarfish, but the knight's poofy hair, large sideburns, and excessively square and clefted chin somehow manage to balance out the disproportion. He would probably look somewhat silly outside of his armor, though. He is looking at the Princess with the eyes of a man appreciating a well sculpted statue of a goddess, or at least the rounder and half garbed parts of such a statue.

While neither of the two men are right next to the Princess, it is still very obvious that the both of them are watching over her, which is probably why none of the deckhands are trying to chat the lady up. Xander though does not really mind the presence of those two men as he has himself had to put up with guards in clanking armor following him around on more occasions than can be remembered. As such, Xander simply walks up to the Princess and greets her, to the gape mouthed amazement of more than a couple of the sailors.

# # # # #

High above the decks of the Virtus, balanced on the tip of the main mast, stands the kunoichi Kirikaze. Gently leaning against the wind, the woman clad in dark blue lets her long dark hair pulled into a ponytail and the strikingly crimson scarf billow in the ocean's breeze. Unmoving, and statuesque, the mature woman stands as if she is caught in her own time flow, separate from that which commands others. And then she finally speaks.

"What is your business with me, ninja of the Kitsunebi Clan?"

"Eh-?"

The startled reply comes from a Yuriko that had been trying her best to stay out of the way, hanging onto the crossing support beam for the sails, called a yard. Pulling herself up to sit on the yardarm, the young ninja girl rubs the back of her head in embarrassment and says, "Sorry, I didn't want to disturb you. Ahaha."

Kirikaze narrows her eyes at the girl in study, abstaining from falling into an opportunity to have the small talk that would occur by replying with the words, "You were not disturbing me at all." Instead the kunoichi says, "If you are worried about whether or not I am here to target your Master, then rest assured, I have no business with him. I am on a mission to find a certain item for my own Master. Anything else is irrelevant."

"Oh, no," says Yuriko, trying to keep up with the sudden shift of conversation, "I don't think you're here for that!"

Kirikaze continues as if Yuriko had not said anything, obviously choosing to try and say what she wants to quickly. "However, if you are here for my life, I will not hesitate to end you."

"Eh-? No! That's not it at all!" cries out the girl who has become afraid that a horrible misunderstanding may be taking place.

Still studying Yuriko with her narrowed eyes, Kirikaze continues. "Then what is your mission here? That mask of yours is proof of your ties with the Kitsunebi. It is rare enough to even see one of your clan these days, but here I find one that, according to rumor, has been in the employ of a ruler from the West since before he left his kingdom? It would be naive to think you did not have an alternate purpose in being here. Were you sent to form a pact with that Lord you are journeying with? Or were you sent to take his life at some appointed time? Don't worry, as I said before, I am only concerned with my own mission, and will not interfere in yours."

"Like I said before, I'm not trying to kill anyone!" shouts Yuriko, who is getting tired of all these assumptions being forced on her, when something clicks in her mind. "Wait, what did you mean by 'rare to see us?'"

Seeing the unguarded look of slight panic on Yuriko's face, Kirikaze's single minded train of thought is suddenly derailed. "…Why did you come up here?"

"I wanted to talk to another ninja. I haven't seen one since I was sent away."

Yuriko's reply held no reserve, just her own feelings of loneliness. Somehow sensing this, Kirikaze ventures a guess, moving onto a new assumption with these new possibilities popping up before her. "Was that about ten years ago?"

Yuriko only nods her head, a hollow dread building inside her from the fact that a stranger knows when she had been sent to live with her aunt. Kirikaze begins talking in that manner that is only heard when one tells a fairytale.

"About ten years ago, there was a beautiful and kind princess named Mariko. Just as the name implies, she brought a smile to the face of everyone around her. She was loved by her people and the people of the surrounding nations. She was also loved by the young rulers of those nations. Each of those rulers professed their love for the princess, but they all did so at the same time. The young lords were all practically strangers to the princess, so she could not decide who she herself loved and wished for the time to choose her suitor. One of the young lords was hasty and proud, and disliked the idea because his nation and family was prosperous. As such, he pressed the princess to make a decision in his favor."

"The other lords did not like this pressure, for they acknowledged the man's fine points and had no wish to be outdone in the contest for Princess Mariko's hand in marriage. And so the young lords began to compete with one another to show their worth. Soon after, they began to bicker. Finally, one of the young lords drew his sword in anger and injured his competitor. While the attacker had done wrong, he had been savagely provoked by his victim, thus ensuring that neither side could contemplate an apology. And war was declared."

"In the beginning it was a war between those two lords, and was fought in only one region, but then one of the two declared as a challenge, 'Whichever of us wins this war shall be the one to marry Princess Mariko.' This declaration was a direct challenge to the pride and power of his competitors, and was the most disastrous thing that could have happened, for the rest of the suitors immediately joined in on the fighting. Every lord had his own rationalization for joining the conflict, whether they claimed to be protecting the Princess' right to choose or claiming their power was the only one that could protect her, they all fought."

"No man alive today has ever lived though such a violent time, as entire kingdoms were ravaged. The scope of the war left entire valleys filled with blood. The amount of violence done those days was only equaled by the violence performed at night. No less than five clans of ninja fought unceasingly in that war. They poisoned armies, slew generals in their sleep, collapsed mountainsides on their enemies, and lit entire forests on fire. And they also fought each other."

"Despite the pleas of the Princess Mariko, her fervent begging fell upon deaf ears as all the young lords had thrown themselves into the madness of war, touting her name as their cause. After months of trying, the Princess Mariko was finally able to get past her guard's watchful protection and end her own life. With the prize for the war's winner lost, peace reluctantly settled across the land. But not before the armies and clans of ninja that had taken part in the war had been completely shattered. The Kitsunebi Clan was one of them."

"Since that time there have been very few reports of encounters with ninja from the Kitsunebi Clan, and none of them are very reliable. I don't know if they have become cautious to a degree where they are phantoms even in the world of the ninja, or if ghost stories are all that remain of them. But if they do still exist, it is certain that very few survived the war…and that they cannot be tracked. Did anyone else go with you when you were sent away, any friends or family?"

A mute Yuriko with two long wet lines running from her eyes down her cheeks numbly shakes her head, no.

"Then I can only say that I am truly sorry."

At that time the attention of both ninjas are pulled to the deck of the ship. Something is happening.

# # # # #

"So you're a Lord of Lagaard?" inquires Princess Victoria, confirming the rumors she had heard. "I understand that your kingdom has one of the oldest bloodlines still in existence. You must be quite proud of your lineage."

Xander smiles as he responds, a private joke in his words, "Well, I am proud of my heritage, but I am trying not to let it define me."

The conversation rolls along pleasantly from there, and Victoria shares more information about herself. Even though the Princess has formed Guild Gauss, she has little interest in the labyrinth itself, seeing it as more of an opportunity to hunt down the beasts that plague humanity than something to explore. The Princess really does feel a passion for the task she has been given, proving herself strong enough to protect her people, instead of considering it a hassle of a ritual to decide a kingdom's heir. But this is only serving to make the problem Xander has perceived to be even more vexing.

"That armor of yours is quite intricate," says Xander indicating the crest laden breastplate that Victoria is wearing, "Did you bring it with you from your homeland?"

"Why, yes, I did," comes Victoria's pleasantly proud reply, "We chartered a vessel for the journey so that we could bring all of our luggage and equipment with us. I'm glad, for I have not yet seen armor to equal it in these lands."

The Princess' face does not show a hint of recognition that she has just insulted the blacksmiths of this region.

"So then you brought your sword with you as well? May I inspect it?"

Cordially indulging Xander's request, Victoria unbuckles the securements from her sword and sheath before passing the entire assembly to Xander, who takes it with a cordial nod of his head to simulate a bow. Slowly drawing the long sword from it's sheath, Xander sees what can only be called a work of art. It is a true Royal's Sword that has been perfectly balanced and forged from the best steel. A strong weapon, though exceptionally light, perfect for Victoria's slim frame. The winding lines on the pommel lead up to the swirling branches of the hand guard making the sword look almost organic.

Proudly, Victoria names the blade. "It is the Svyatogor."

"This is a true marvel of craftsmanship," says Xander with real sincerity, "But I have a question. Why are there no marks upon it?"

Victoria is naturally confused by such a question, as one could only expect such a magnificent blade to hold no flaws. But returning Svyatogor to Victoria, Xander passes his own cheap sword to the young Princess to view. Drawing it from the sheath, Victoria sees a blade of moderate quality steel of somewhat stunted length, a passable handle and balance, and carrying obvious signs of wear from the tip to the pommel.

"I have owned that sword for about a week," explains Xander, "And have seen to it's maintenance myself. Every one of those notches and scratches were caused by cutting into an enemy or parrying a blow. That is what the sword of a warrior is supposed to look like. It is not flawless, but it is well maintained. Victoria…have you ever used your Svyatogor in battle?"

"What? What are you talking about?" asks the Princess, starting to grow incensed. "I have been in many battles since I have arrived in Armoroad."

Sighing with disappointment, Xander clarifies his point. "Then the situation is worse than I feared. Your sword and your armor are both completely undamaged, and your knight's armor shows signs of battle from head to toe."

"Wh..what are you trying to say…?"

Xander doesn't sugar coat his words to the girl, and bluntly says, "I'm saying your knight, Sir Benjamin, has been doing nothing but taking every blow meant for you and your warrior, Albert, has been slaying your enemies. Even though you are this serious about proving yourself worthy of your throne, your escorts are coddling you. And you don't even know it. You are most certainly weighing down your team, with your knight unable to do anything but stand in front of you taking hits."

Victoria's ego is not just bruised, but nearly shattered by these words. She remembers the pride and happiness she had felt after battles won and the congratulations of her escorts. But looking back at those victories she can't remember swinging her sword. Desperate not to be shamed, Victoria slowly says, "I do help! I give out important orders to Benjamin and Albert. I'm an important moral support for them…Right? Isn't that what you said?"

That last line was said to Victoria's two escorts across the deck, and the two men reply at the same distance. The warrior Albert's line is stone faced and convincing. The knight is a much less accomplished liar. "See? They need me."

With a disgusted side long look at the men taking advantage of a girl's trust, Xander says, "Can you really take those words seriously when they come from men who were ordered by your parents to keep you safe even at the cost of their lives? Your orders bring about your victories? What will you do when your voice goes hoarse? Your presence is an important moral support? What will you do when your soldiers are fighting in the field and cannot see you to have their spirits bolstered? This world is not so kind that you can just assume everything will go right by depending on others, that is how puppet rulers get enthroned." This point strikes Victoria hard. "Sometimes you will be placed into a situation where only your sword arm can save someone's life, or by risking your own body can you do what is right. If you are afraid of inflicting injury or being injured in turn, you will not be able to accomplish anything through your own power."

Looking cowed, Victoria is only able to utter the word "But" before Xander continues on.

"I am about to lead nearly a dozen people into battle against a century old monstrosity, and I am not willing to risk taking someone that can only call out, 'Do your best' from the sidelines while a valuable combatant baby sits her. If you lack even rudimentary fighting skills, then I lose more by taking you along than I would by leaving you aboard the ship. Unless you can prove to me that you are capable of actually putting up a fight, you'll be left behind, even if it means locking you in the hold."

Xander turns and takes a couple steps away from Victoria, the motion suddenly making real the fear of being left behind as she blurts, "How am I suppose to do that?"

Xander tosses the scabbard of his returned sword away and does a practiced and balanced about face by placing one foot back and slightly beyond his other foot and turning on the balls of his feet. "You attack me. If you can put a single wound on me then you earn the right to fight in that lighthouse. If you refuse or fail to touch me, you stay behind."

Albert had been straining his patience for a while, having been convinced by Sir Benjamin to let the princess have some freedom outside of battle, but this invitation to put the princess in danger is too much for him. Taking a powerful stride forward, Albert reaches to wield his giant mace and put Xander in his place.

"Don't you dare raise a hand against Xander onii-sama," says the emotionally raw voice directly into the gladiator's ear. Albert had not heard the movement of the ninja girl Yuriko as she landed right behind him from her perch in the tops, with one hand on his shoulder and her other holding a knife poised perfectly to puncture his heart should he try and move, the point ticking his flesh from behind.

The grown man feels a shudder from the voice behind him even as he has the thought, "Oh-knee-what? Is that some sort of title?" Forcefully reminding himself of the situation, Albert orders Sir Benjamin to stop being lazy and do something. This snaps the knight out of his surprise from the suddenly appearing ninja girl and he moves to stop Xander from harassing the princess any further.

Benjamin is stopped by the click of a pistol leveled behind his head.

Slowly turning to look, Benjamin sees Reif, smiling with his loaded weapon ready to fire a fatal blow. The buccaneer says, "We get precious little entertainment aboard ship. Please don't interrupt."

As Sarah steps in to temporarily collect Benjamin's spear and sword from him, the knight looks around and sees all the other faces of the sailors are in agreement with Reif's action. Finally offended by this betrayal, the knight asks Reif, "We are your guests…no we are clients. Are you so unscrupulous as to turn on your employers?"

Reif gives a single amused laugh before he retorts. "Guild Aequitas is our employer. You're just someone they're giving a ride to. You really think you have the right to do anything we don't like?" With a quick flick of the wrist, Reif taps the tip of the gun's barrel against the back of Benjamin's head, making the knight jump an inch. "So let's just enjoy the show, shall we?"

With no other options, the knight and the swordsman are held hostage while they watch the Princess draw her sword and take a stance to face Xander. After having readied herself, Victoria is asked a simple question by her opponent.

"What are you doing?"

Blinking twice in confusion, Victoria replies that she's trying to fight, as she was told to. Xander narrows the focus saying, "I'm talking about your left hand. Are you trying to lose it?"

One of the automatic balancing systems of the human body is mirroring the movements of one limb in the other. It can be seen clearly when someone is clapping, both hands automatically moving in a mirrored motion. It also works to try and even the weight of an unbalanced load, like a heavy suitcase, or a sword. Victoria's left hand has automatically extended out to compensate for the weight of Svyatogor.

"Having your left hand that far forward is inviting me to chop it off. That's always assuming you don't cut it off with your own swings first. With a rapier, you anchor the arm on the hip or extend it as far away from your enemy as possible. With this long sword, you'll need to crook the arm and keep it close to your chest so your theoretic shield can cover your torso. Correct your stance and then begin."

Victoria does so, and comes at Xander almost hesitatingly with an overhead swing. Xander steps in and catches the blade on his own before it could build up adequate speed, saying, "I told you to correct your stance."

Upon the girl's protests that she had done so, Xander grabs Victoria by the upper arm. "You corrected your left arm, but your footing is too narrow. You want your feet at least shoulder width apart so that I can't do this."

With a sharp tug, Victoria completely loses her balance due to having placed her feet in her regular "genteel" width from one another. Another sharp tug sets the falling Victoria back onto her feet before she drops onto the deck, no worse for wear except for her pride and confidence.

Taking a step back again, Xander says, "Square your stance like this," he stomps his feet into their proper positions to signify them, "And then begin."

Even with a hesitating start, the exercises grew no better. After a few minutes of enforced instruction Victoria finally cries out, "What are we even doing! You've already made your decision, haven't you, Lord Xander? You're just having fun at my expense now."

"Am I?" answers Xander, his tone darkening for the first time in this rigorous exchange. "I'm trying to see what the worth of your determination is, Princess. And if this is it then I feel sorry for you."

Victoria gives a curt "What?" and Xander continues on, his tone getting more and more disrespectful. "Since you came aboard the Virtus you have been going on and on about Justice, so I thought I would try and see your determination. I gave you the simple goal of just touching me with your sword and you've given up already. That says to me that you have never really had a sense of Justice, or working to see your views of what is right and wrong fulfilled. You're apparently nothing more than a weak-willed girl that likes running around pretending at being a hero while causing nothing but mischief for her handlers. If this is the most effort you can give than I weep for the future of your nation suffering under the sense of your Hollow Justice."

"My sense of Justice isn't 'hollow!' It's a part of my trials, a part of my culture and the royal family!"

The girl retorts with more fire than she had shown to anyone before, but Xander just redirects the verbal flames right back to her. "Then I guess the term 'Incompetent Justice' would be more appropriate. If this sort of weakness is a part of your culture and your family, then your ruling class must be a bunch of weak-kneed, self-important nobles with a sense of entitlement to everything they see around them. Your parents especially!"

"Don't you speak ill of my family!"

The girl roars in fury as she dives at Xander, swinging with her full effort to silence the man who has abused her entire way of life. The two escorts on the sideline make another effort to move to their lady's aid, the warrior Albert stopped by a throwing dagger appearing at his throat from Yuriko's sleeve, and the knight halted by Sarah and Reif's cooperative prevention.

"Let me go to her," Sir Benjamin pleads, "She'll kill him at this rate!"

"Well, she's trying to, I'll give her that," says Reif, "But you landsmen really underestimate the difficulty of fighting on the sea."

"This is not the time to interfere, anyway," says Sarah in a calm explanation, "My Lord's training has finally proceeded to its crucial point."

"Training?" asks the buccaneer, who had just been enjoying to proceedings.

"Yes, this is the way Lord Xander was trained by his mother, Dutchess Gradriel, and Master Guyver, the Berserker."

This fact forces the two hostages to look at the events with something more than just seeing the surface. As the minutes pass, and the Princess Victoria continues her unceasing attacks, her sword skills are visibly improving.

When Victoria forgot about her footing, Xander put his full body weight into pushing the girl's sword blade back to throw her off balance, grab her arm, and drop her to the deck. Pointing his sword at the girl, Xander asks, "Did you already forget what I taught you about your feet? Don't tell me you lack courage and brains."

Victoria slaps Xander's sword away with her own and scrambles to her feet. She did not lose the grasp of her footing again.

When Victoria makes a particularly wrathful lunge, Xander sweeps the blade to the side as he takes a circling step and grabs the girl's sword wrist. "And now you've completely overextended yourself, leaving enough of an opening…" With a tug, Victoria loses her balance and stumbles forward. Though her improved footing prevents her from falling on her face, Victoria bumbles as Xander continues, "For me to do this."

SWAT!

The sound of the flat of Xander's sword striking the princess in the rump is heard by the watching deckhands and those sailors in the tops, followed by more than the appropriate amount of laughter. Xander lightly swings the tip of his sword in time to his melodious comment, "Naughty girls get a spanking!"

With an enormous blush and half welled tears of embarrassment, Princess Victoria surges at Xander again, determined not to give her opponent the chance to do such a disgraceful thing to her again. Her attacks were no longer over-reaching and became far more balanced.

After a few very decisive parries, some of which actually turned the princess around in a full circle, Xander tires of the act enough to say, "Come now, girlie. If you keep coming at me with such a limp wrist you'll never get anywhere. Let me show you how it's done!"

Before now, Xander had always just answered Victoria's attacks with dodges, parries, and counter-strikes. Now Xander goes on the attack. As he purposefully strikes the princess' sword, Xander explains in an unkind tone, "Now see, this is the power you get when you keep your wrist straight. You let the full force of your arm and your back travel through your wrist and into your sword strokes. See?"

With a shove on the interlocked blades, Victoria is pushed a step back until she is pinned against the railing where Xander's left hand secures the princess' sword hand in its grip.

"This is the kind of power you get when you perform a proper swing," says Xander as he lifts his cheap sword high, the lack of length allowing him to swing in such a confined space. With a heavy THWOK the blade sinks into the wood of the railing to about a third of the blade's width, causing the princess to catch her breath. Retracting the sword with a kri-krak from the wood, Xander chides his partner, "Now, how about swinging that thing like a sword instead of a paintbrush."

The princess' movements grow sharper and swifter. The sword seems less cumbersome in her hands and her openings to counter attack grow fewer. But it is impossible for her endurance to increase in such a short period of time. Having been fueled by constantly renewed rage, Princess Victoria pushes herself until she collapses to the deck with ragged breathing and tears welling up in her eyes. Tears of frustration in herself and her own weakness roll down her cheek. Choking on her own emotions, the princess' strangled voice coughs out, "Why…why can't I cut you…?"

Xander bends a knee to reach the girl that has been disarmed by her own defeat and brightly says, "What are you talking about. You cut me right here."

Extending his left arm, Xander shows the princess the cut in the lightly stained fabric and the open wound beneath it. Regaining her gentle airs now that the savageness is spent, Victoria gasps, "Oh, oh no, I'm so sorry!" She had never injured anyone before.

"No, no, don't be. I wasn't going to let you stop until you managed it anyway. I'm surprised you kept going even after landing the attack."

"I…when did I do that…?" asks Victoria, slightly entranced by the wound she had somehow given to such an overpowering opponent. It would seem that she was so occupied by the fight she had not noticed her fulfillment of the winning condition.

"It happened when you turned your aborted thrust into a sweep by sidestepping with my own dodge. A very insightful move, your Highness." Xander informs the girl of her growth with the pride filled smile of a teacher as he helps the girl to her feet. Once she is standing, Xander drops down again onto one knee and says in a somber manner, "I apologize with all my heart, Princess Victoria."

This swift move catches everyone on the boat off guard, except for Burdock at the wheel, who chuckles under his breath. The one that was most surprised though is Victoria. She had not even had the time to process her own feelings from Xander's smiling congratulations before this happened. A wave of emotion and gratification had met her with that smile as well as a rising of color to her face. Somehow what the lord in front of her said had felt more significant than when she had heard the same words from other people. Is it because she had struggled so hard and met his expectations that those words felt so wonderful? Is it because he has recognized her efforts that Victoria felt a wave of delightful satisfaction? And now here is that same man on his knees apologizing to her.

Flustered, the princess asks him what he is doing, having been so full of pride just a moment before. He replies in the same somber tone.

"I am apologizing for insulting your determination and your sense of Justice. And for speaking ill of your nation and it's people. While my goal was to draw you out and those insults were not sincere, they were still hurtful and rude. I ask for your forgiveness."

With the almost ape like "ooohs" of the watching sailors, Princess Victoria is completely unable to recover herself from feeling exposed and embarrassed in this place, realizing for the first time just how many people were staring at her. She hurriedly tells Xander, "I-it's fine, I forgive you. Please, raise your head, everyone is staring at us."

Xander does as she asks, perhaps a little too quickly, leaving Victoria wondering if his words were entirely sincere for a moment until she sees his friendly face again. Upon Xander's suggestion that they should probably freshen up a little after such rigorous exercise, Victoria gives a start and heads down below to tidy up, most of her style having been spoiled by her long exertion. As she heads for the stairs leading below to the cabins, a round of applause comes from the sailors who had enjoyed the show, from start to finish, embarrassing the girl once again. After all was said and done, Victoria is left with an annoyed feeling like she had been pulled perfectly into another person's pace the entire morning.

Xander though walks over to the princess' two escorts who are getting their weapons back and thanked by the hands for being good sports. Xander speaks to both men at once. The edge of anger in Xander's voice is evident to all around.

"I am happy the princess gave me her forgiveness in order to avoid an international incident, but I never would have had to go so far if the two of you had done your damn jobs. If you think you can keep that girl safe without teaching her how to defend herself then the two of you are complete fools. A Labyrinth isn't a place you can just assume everything will turn out for the best. If you don't teach Victoria how to survive on her own, she will die. And it will be your fault for coddling her, especially when she has so much promise as a warrior and a leader."

Xander turns and heads below to have the armorer take a look at the damage his sword has suffered from clashing against a weapon like Svyatogor for such a long period of time, and the gaze of the two escorts follow him. The knight's with begrudging respect for helping his princess to improve, and the warrior's with pure hatred.

The final word of the entire event ended up being had by Castor, the Zodiac, who grunts and mutters, "Savages," without lifting his gaze from the book he's been reading.

Entry 2:

Following the same course as before, we have arrived in the harbor of Skandalia's west face. The entire team is putting the finishing touches on their gear and getting ready for action.

I have given orders for the Virtus to wait six hours. If we have not made contact by the end of that time we are to be assumed dead and to be left behind. I will be leaving this journal behind as well, since if I perish in this tower it will be of no good to anyone left on my corpse.

And from what I have heard of this monster, this Meregho Saeno, that is a very real possibility.

The climb up the light house had been agonizing, not because of the stairs, but because of the stink. The musty, moldy, bowels of the lighthouse had been pelted by seaborne winds and moisture for the past hundred years without maintenance. The fact that the structure is still standing is a testament to the original architect's ability and the expertise of those who had built it, a testament to the old glory of Armoroad. It had taken twenty minutes to reach the final flight of stairs, climbing moderately to avoid being tired out, and all the explorers were there.

On the other hand, Armoroad's marine engineers were nowhere to be seen.

Early on, the two engineers split off from the rest. They had no elaborate tools or weapons, but they had materials that Sarah had identified as signaling lanterns similar to the kind the Labyrinth Guard use back in Lagaard. It seems the marine engineers had only been dispatched to verify through signals in the lighthouse's windows that the path to the west harbor was legitimate, and not to support the explorers in the fight with the winged monster. Even if no one makes it back alive, Armoroad will have confirmed that the path is genuine for future operations. It's almost painful for Xander to admit to himself, but he had not thought of that depressing possibility.

But there is nothing for that now. Xander has his team and he has the battle plan, which he goes over again as everyone ascends the final flight of stairs leading to the roof.

"Sonia, Castor, you two are the back rank. Stay as close to the stairwell as you can in case you need to make a break for it. Use it as cover if you need to, but don't stop attacking. We're counting on you to do the bulk of the damage in this fight. Pollux, you stay with them and keep them healthy, that's your only job. Yuriko, Kirikaze, since this thing is a bird I want you to concentrate on clipping the wing feather as well as you can so it can't fly away. If it takes to the sky we may never win. If you two need to have some wounds treated, go to Pollux."

The explorers assigned to the back rank give their various acknowledgements, though this is the third time they've gone over the plan. No one is complaining though since this fight warrants the extra precaution.

"Guild Gauss, Sarah, Lin, and myself are the front ranks. Our task is to keep the thing busy. Attack it if you can, but your primary job is to stay alive, and your secondary job is to keep its attention so it doesn't go after the people in the back rank. Gauss will fan out to the left, the rest of us right. And Benjamin, you can fight the way you are use to, just so long as you don't break ranks and keep the enemy busy."

Sir Benjamin nods, understanding what Xander really means. He's saying it is alright for Benjamin to devote most of his energy to keeping Victoria safe, like he's done before now.

"Lin, your only job is to keep the rest of us on our feet. We can take a hit better than you, so don't do anything heroic."

Lin also only nods, enveloped by the tension in the air enough that she doesn't make any jokes. Even though she is this serious, the red lump on her forehead makes the act somewhat ridiculous as it was obtained during the Virtus' approach to the harbor through the swift currents that day. Lin had been rolled around inside the ship until she had cracked her forehead against some of Tabby's cooking pots. The girl doesn't seem to be cut out for seagoing life.

As the strike team of explorers climbs the final steps to the roof, Xander does his duty as a leader by saying the impossible with enough conviction to convince everyone that it is fact. "We're facing a hard fight, but as long as we all work together we're all going to come out of this alive, and triumphant."

Cresting the stairs, the explorers plant their feet on the stone faced roof of the lighthouse, or at least on the film that covers it. For a hundred years, the flat and expansive flagstone looking roof has been exposed not only to the elements, but used as the roost for a giant avian. The moss and coagulated slime of salt spray and rainwater that never fully dried is intermingled with the remains of meals and the enormous liquid droppings from the beast that lives in this place. The stink is even more horrible than the inside of the lighthouse, enough that Victoria is forced to hold a handkerchief to her face, and every member feels the slickness under their feet as they carefully walk into the open. All except for Castor who's silver winged Zodiac rig lets him hover over the slime just as it allowed him to hover up the stairs. When Sonia called him out on cheating the stairs using his equipment, he simply replied that it was vital for having a zeroed horizon for spell targeting, and then said it's not his fault other people lacked the intellect to utilize it, and such people deserve their suffering.

It took a lot of apologizing from Pollux on his brother's behalf to prevent a fight right then.

Ordering the back rank to stay put, Xander begins walking a little forward with the front rank in formation. Lin is at the center, with Sir Benjamin to her left, followed by Victoria and Albert. Xander is immediately to Lin's right followed by Sarah on the end. Since Benjamin is so use to defending others, Xander wanted Lin stationed near him, as she is the most vital part of the front rank for this fight. With the formation set, Xander studies the fighting ground.

The top of the lighthouse is approximately forty feet in diameter, with the stairway at one end. There is no lighting apparatus here, as the floor below was constructed to beam out the light and this top floor seems like some kind of military look out post, or meant to hold siege weaponry during times of conflict. Thus it is sturdy and spacious, except for a large pile of debris that occupies a generous area of its far side. The perimeter of the rooftop seems like it once held a stone railing for safety, but at this point all that remains of those railing are the occasional cut off stumps of its supports. It would appear that all the times the great beast that dwells here has taken off and landed has pulverized the safety railings.

Xander searches the area, and does not see the beast that dwells here, and so begins searching the sky. This Meregho Saeno does not appear to be in the air either. Curious, as the panorama from this tower to so great. And so Xander looks around again and finally understands. Before inspecting the region more thoughtfully, Xander had seen the enormous pile at the far end of the rooftop as simple debris, but it was so large that Xander's mind simply could not process it correctly. The pile is not debris, but a tangle of trees and large branches interlinked with one another in a pile a dozen feet high. It's a bird's nest. And just barely visible over the rim of the nest is a mound of crimson red. The mound begins shifting as if it had been disturbed by an alien presence, and a more tangible form starts making itself known.

Various members of the enlarged party make various low noises, the more prominent being Victoria's ladylike surprised intake of breath and Castor's overly cool exclamation of, "Oh, my."

First one wing extends, and then another. And a third followed by a fourth. With a light flap that displaced enough air to cause a wind, the main body of the creature rises into view. Except for leathery patches of exposed flesh, visible scarlet and gold feathers cover its whole being as the torso rises, turns, and takes a large step over the rim of the nest. The raptor legs and sharp nails are ridiculously huge, belonging to a bird over six times the height of a full grown human. But the basic shape of a bird does not apply to this being, for the torso angles straight up instead of inclining forward to produce an aerodynamic flight. At the top of this straight torso is a head of some kind, blocking out the past noon day sun covering it in darkness and preventing anyone from seeing any details, except for the swaying crest that looks like a living crown of feathers and it's five eyes, glowing red and green. An unseen mouth opens with an audible exhalation, and the moisture can be seen in a thick mist.

For a moment the only thing in Xander's mind are the words Yuriko said not that long ago on the second floor of the Labyrinth. That's a big bird.

Recollecting himself, Xander starts shouting orders.

"Front rank, forward, get it's attention, back rank, aim just above the beak-like protrusion on the torso! If it's shaped like a man, maybe it's vitals are similar!"

Sonia quickly ducks halfway into the covered stairwell and sets the giant drawstring ready to fire. After securing the drawstring, she starts digging into one of the many leather satchels secured around her heavy leather skirt, worn only in combat over her regular baggy pants and combat boots. Selecting carefully, Sonia pulls out a heavier and denser bolt for firing, looking to do more damage per shot than with her regular ammo. She acted as quickly as she could, but the nature of Sonia's heavy crossbow slows her actions enough that nearly everyone acts before her. Sir Benjamin and Sarah had already begun antagonizing the beast with shouts, beating on their shields, and aggressive stances, and Albert the warrior has already drawn his giant mace and struck the beast in the thigh. After giving his own orders, Xander moves in with his shield up to try harrying the monster as well while Victoria stays near Benjamin calling out the creature's movements to the others in the team so they can avoid it's attacks more readily. Yuriko is already a lavender streak in the air, slicing pinions wherever she can, causing tactical damage instead of actual physical damage.

But Sonia has a good view for the more unusual actions taken at the beginning of this fight as she readies her crossbow.

Kirikaze folds a few fingers on one of her hands and begins concentrating before taking off in a sprinting dash. Holding the hand with the oddly folded fingers in front of her face, as if the shape itself had some meaning to focus her intention, Kirikaze growls with the force of her concentration as her image wavers. To Sonia's surprise, not just the image, but the outline, the form, and the entire figure of Kirikaze wavers like an illusion and then abruptly splits itself in two, quickly dashing away from one another like mirror images with an odd, dark aura around them both, showing that even the surrounding light views this occurrence as unnatural.

Just as the formula and production of Medica is one of the remaining bits of knowledge from the old world, before the planet wide disaster, there are other bits of knowledge floating around in this world. Most of that knowledge cannot be explained and is passed along as the most closely held secrets of differing cultures or discovered by accident. Or as bits of secret knowledge that even their owners don't understand. That is the way for the Ninja Clans of the East.

The true form of their Ninpou, secret and reality defying techniques, hold their roots in the lost sciences of bio-chemistry and astrophysics. Matter is made of atoms which are held together by their bonds creating dense and solid objects. Energy is formed when matter releases its stored energy through changes in its form, or through the expulsion of extra portions of the atoms that form it. However, matter cannot be energy, and energy cannot be matter. That is a simple law of reality. Except it does not apply to Dark Matter. This form of energy that is so condensed by gravity wells that it becomes solid breaks the rules of physics, and once one rule is broken others can follow, such as the law stating that one object cannot be in two places at once.

The formulae allowing the conversion of biologic material into dark matter through the nucleic division of atoms inside biologic material was one of the bits of old knowledge that was preserved, nearly lost, and then adapted until its origin is completely unknown. And now the only evidence of this reality disrupting power can be found in the secret scrolls of the Ninja Clans and the effect it has on their bodies. It allows them to split their existence into multiple bodies that can move independently of one another, by literally splitting the flesh of one body into two.

Sonia almost drops her heavy slug as she sees this and Pollux is left gaping. Castor was not paying attention to anything but his own actions.

"Range finding complete. Begin uplink."

The uninterested words roll from the Zodiac's mouth while he holds his left hand out, a green light extending from the hand on both sides forming what looks like a luminescent javelin punching through the palm. But that spectacle is only used for aiming his attack since a Zodiac controls the power of the stars. And the object that governs his link with these stars, the large and complexly built contraption with many glass covered protrusions on his right shoulder begins to glow.

# # # # #

Time has nearly no meaning in the inky darkness of space. Once free of the atmosphere there is no wind, no sound, no moisture, no erosion. The vacuum of space has only perpetual silence like a sealed grave. Nothing changes, nothing stirs, and everything left in orbit of the green and blue planet below continues to hang there in perpetuity, following their delicately interlaced geosynchronous orbits. Having lost the technologies that made use of them, that put them there in the first place, these constructs have lost all meaning as anything but man made astral bodies. Synthetic stars.

But one of these stars receives a signal, and begins to move slowly and deliberately. The object in question is a large metal block with several large solar collectors on it like shining black wings for a renewable source of energy, so no one needs to be sent to switch out its power supply. Connected to the bottom of this blocky construct is an array of panels, long panels with straight lines tapering to oblong ends in five different directions with white painted surfaces, all facing the planet below. When seen from afar, these panels would appear to be in the shape of a pentagram with blunted points, or in the shape of a cookie cutter's impression of a star.

Slowly, nodules on the surface of the whitewashed panels begin to move.

On the side of this blocky construct, there is a screen made of glass, right next to a rectangular emblem of white and red with fifty seven stars on a blue field, and a graffiti scrawl saying BURN, BABY, BURN under an immolated skull wearing sunglasses. Words appear inside the screen made of glass.

FIRESTAR Serial code #00083 - uplink initiated…

Uplink complete.

Confirming authorization codes…

Codes validated.

Command received.

Target coordinates processing…

Coordinates confirmed.

Adjustments for planetary rotation complete.

Initiating 9% power transfer.

Two of the nodules on the underside of the Fire Star military satellite glow faintly and each expel a form of altered solar energy that quickly compresses and ignites hydrogen molecules where they intersect. A form of weaponized binary energy manipulation.

# # # # #

Moments after Castor mumbles that his range finding was a success, an explosion of magical fire erupts next to the torso of the giant bird, leaving a few of the feathers smoldering even as Sonia's bolt strikes deep into the beast's chest.

Though caught off guard for a few moments, no creatures having ever attacked it in it's roost before, the beast named Meregho Saeno soon strikes back, it's eyes lighting up and a small burst of five blasts of light erupt converging on Sonia's position, the stone support she is using for cover nearly being pulverized by the unexplainable reprisal. A few of the members are startled by the attack, particularly Victoria who is still unuse to the dirtier aspects of fighting and Sonia who's arm feels numb from the shockwave of the buffeting blasts. But Xander simply shouts, "Don't worry about attacks we can't explain, just avoid them and keep fighting!"

Albert doesn't need any reminder to do so as he fiercely swings his giant mace down onto the clawed toe of the misshapen bird, shouting, "Eyes down here, you bastard!" The impact was enough to put a crack through the body of the creature's thick clawed nail and inflict enough pain to make it screech in fury, turning it's complete attention to those directly in front of it.

The next few minutes blur as if time has no meaning. The back rank and the ninjas continuing their attack pattern mostly unhindered. The front rank is horrifically busy. With Sir Benjamin constantly taking damage meant for two people Lin is forced to spend most of her time on one man. The four sweeping wings dance about before flailing at their targets throwing certainty of any attack patterns out the window, and the occasional flash of lights from the creatures eyes do terrible damage, as Albert experiences first hand.

With the beams exploding around him, Albert forces himself to stand back up as he feels his bones creak. Shouting that she'll be over right away, Lin hurriedly finishes her treatment of Sir Benjamin even as a flurry of feathers fall through the air like snowflakes. These are not feathers that were cut by the team, but tossed out of the monster's body seemingly of their own volition. As Xander's mind momentarily reflects on this, he can hear a slight crackle and feels the hair standing up on his neck, right before the field is filled with electricity blasting from one feather to another like light against a set of mirrors. Not a member of the front rank was spared the blast, and Sir Benjamin had it doubly hard, all the work Lin had put into fixing him up had been undone in a moment. And even worse is Albert, who convulses sharply and then drops backwards into the muck, smoldering with his eyes rolling back into his head.

Even without Xander's bellowed order, Lin would have immediately gone to check on Albert, Benjamin going along to cover a dashing Victoria who is worried about her team mate. As Lin bends down to check the man's vitals, she only needs a moment to make her conclusion. Albert's heart has stopped beating from electrical trauma, causing an immediate blackout that will, inevitably, lead to brain death in a few minutes. Rattling off her diagnosis, Lin looks up to a pale Victoria's face as the girl asks, breathlessly, "Is there anything we can do?"

"Yeah, you take care of that one while I take care of this one," snaps Lin back indicating Benjamin and Albert in turn. With a jittery start, Victoria plunges into a little equipment purse and pulls out a jar of Medica, draws up behind the pale faced knight in a full guard position and upturns the jar in range of his clenched teeth, letting the man drink the medicine without opening up his position to attack.

With the peanut gallery occupied and not touching the patient, Lin is in a position to administer treatment. A treatment type she's practiced but never really used before.

"Here goes," mutters the monk as she slaps her hands together, rubs them vigorously to get friction going, and then slowly draws them away, with a momentary crackle of blue Qi energy flashing between them. Or more specifically, bio-nucleic energy that those bearing the genetic data of the monk's order can store and then expel into wounded cells to promote rapid repair and division of cells. This effectively heals wounds at a speed visible to the naked human eye. And to think this was a simple byproduct of the ancient, forgotten, and interrupted Human Genome Re-Mapping Project

Alright, circulation of Qi looks good, thinks Lin as she brings her extended palms to bear a little past the heart on the chest and a little below on the side, and then lets her Qi crackle from one hand to the next hoping to restart the heart using a type of energy different from the kind used to stop it in the first place. With an audible thump of transferring power, Albert's back arches and he takes a strangled gasp of air as his heart starts and he regains consciousness again. But he's not out of danger.

"I need a minute with Albert, can you hold this position?" asks Lin, who is following the orders of her leader, prioritizing survival over all else.

Turns out Sir Benjamin can, very easily in fact, as the great Meregho Saeno turns it's attention from the four people clustered behind one shield, and places it's satisfied attention on the two nearby warriors that are on the other side of it. As a large blurry shadow appears directly overhead, Xander understands that he and Sarah are now cut off from the rest of the front line and Lin, the only healer they have available so far forward. And the bird has decided to finish the stragglers first.

Even with his lifted shield Xander was able to stand under the impact of the downward chopping wing, the electrified feathers having set his entire body afire with pain, and Xander is slammed into the stonework under the weight of the attack. With that portion of his mind still free enough to be distracted, Xander can almost swear he sees a look of satisfaction in the glowing eyes of the deformed bird as it poises the other wings for a follow up. And then Sarah is standing in front of Xander, blocking his vision, bracing for the inevitable attack.

The attack came. A sweeping horizontal blow with another wing that caught an electrically weakened Sarah right in the abdomen, sending her flying. While Sarah does not soar a great distance, the momentum behind her flight is more than enough to send her skidding along the muck, unable to find any surface to get a grip on, even letting go of the spear in her hand as she rakes her fingers against the grime.

And then Sarah can feel nothing below her as her slide takes her past the far too close edge of the roof, having not been able to stop her progress as gravity takes over, and the only thing she can see is the appalled face of her Lord Xander looking her right in the eye before the rising stonework blocks her view.

And then the stonework hurls forth to meet her face as Sarah's right arm is caught upon something and her body swings into the lighthouse's wall. Shaking her head to refocus her thoughts, Sarah looks up to see what has her, and sees the relieved face of her Lord Xander, one hand gripping the wrist of the arm Sarah had been extending in hopes of finding a miraculous handhold.

"Sir?"

"Well that was close," breaths Xander, trying to let some of the anxiety bleed out of his body. Seeing Sarah unable to stop herself, Xander had stabbed his short sword into a joint between two stones, hoping the mortar was loose enough for the blade to stick and used the leverage like a foot racer's starting block to propel himself forward just in time to grab Sarah before she was out of reach. However… "But it seems we're not safe just yet…"

Looking around himself, the spread eagled royal lays with the entire front side of his body pressed against the film covered stone, his right hand holding over a hundred pounds in terms of human weight, his left hand holding tightly to the remains of a support for the so long ago destroyed railing, and his right foot pressed against a similar purchase. His left leg has nothing to brace itself against, the roof being so slippy, preventing Xander from finding the three points of support he unconsciously knows he needs in order to properly lift anything from this position.

That is, if he's in good enough form to lift anything. Xander was never much of a body builder, though his grip strength on a sword is nothing to be laughed at, and desperation is giving him the power needed to hold Sarah's weight. But for how long? Xander is still injured from the attacks he took from the beastly bird, and his entire body is being strained to prevent the frictionless slime from carrying him over the side along with Sarah.

"The light chamber should be right below," says Xander, as he continues flexing his left leg, vainly hoping to find support, or at least knock enough slime away to find it. "Can you reach a window and crawl back into the building?"

Looking around quickly, Sarah gives the disappointing news, "No, my Lord, the windows are out of my reach. And besides…the sills seem to be angled sharply down. I don't think I could climb them, they're covered in wet moss."

It's true that it would be impossible, as all the windows in the lighthouse were made to let rain and surf water drain quickly from the windows, and the thickness of the walls make the angles impossible to hold onto, let alone climb.

"And I doubt you can climb the wall," concludes Xander, looking at the moss protruding from all the seams between the bricks that make up the wall. The fragile plants push out from the possible hand holds, filling them completely and being too weak to support a human's weight. "Don't try, or you'll just *gnrt* swing around."

Xander turns his head, getting a coat of goo stuck under his chin for the trouble and some of his gunk covered hair sticking to his face. Looking at the battlefield again, Xander calls in answer to Lin's shouts from across the battle. "We're okay! I have her, but I can't pull her up!"

At the look of Lin getting ready to charge across the battlefield, which would necessitate passing right in front of a whipped up Meregho Saeno, Xander continues his shouted orders. "Don't break formation! If we lose the front line we lose everything! Keep them fighting, Lin!"

Then Xander hears the high pitched cry of, "I'm coming!" from above. Craning his neck to its maximum Xander can just make out Yuriko, who abruptly changed her attack pattern and can be seen soaring in the air, a gentle parabola leading to Xander and Sarah's rescue. And a set of five glowing eyes focused on the flying ninja girl that light up and blast her square in the back, flinging her backward bent body into the stonework, and to Xander's horror, done so with enough force to cause Yuriko to bounce.

"Pollox!" shouts Xander, forcing the man to dash from cover to grab the limp girl and drag her back into cover with him, the kind of action one would expect of a combat medic under fire. After a few moments, the young man calls back to Xander that she's only unconscious, but he doesn't know when she'll wake up.

Swallowing hard, Xander looks at the battlefield and makes a decision. Calling out, Xander gives his next set of orders. "The fastest way to save us is to finish the battle! Back row, stop spreading out your attacks, concentrate only on the deep wound in the beast's left chest. It's left!" specifies Xander to avoid confusion, "You've torn through the leathery skin already, but don't stop until you've punched a hole all the way through!"

Castor's mumbled reply is a dismissive, "Obviously."

"Front rank! Hold your positions and keep the thing interested in YOU. Albert, it hates it when you hit it's toes! Just focus on the fight to end it as soon as possible!"

Turning his head back to face Sarah once more, and succeeding in getting more soiled hair stuck across his face, Xander says in what he hopes is a reassuring manner, "It seems we're going to be here for a little bit, so let's try and pass the time comfortably."

Despite saying that, Xander still continues to grunt as his left leg searches and his right shoulder feels like it will come out of the socket any moment now. A few moments later, a rumbling thud shakes the tower slightly, one that could only be caused by the stamping foot of the great beast, causing Xander's body to slide a little closer over the edge of the roof. Soon after, Sonia's well carrying voice reaches over the sounds of battle asking, "You okay over there, boss?"

A dozen anxiety fueled smart mouthed comments pop into Xander's mind in answer, the kindest being, "Just peachy," but Xander ended up using the non-committal, "We're fine" to keep from distracting the team any further.

"…This isn't working, my Lord," says Sarah after a long silence.

"Actually, things are working better than I thought," answers Xander in a slightly detached manner. "With fewer people in the front rank, Lin doesn't have to spread her attention out as much. Of course there are fewer people to absorb the hits, but Lin is doing a great job over there."

"No, my Lord. I mean helping me." As she says this, Sarah begins slowly releasing the two handed grip she'd had on Xander's wrist. "I'm slowly pulling you over with me, Lord Xander. I'm only going to get you killed too. Please, let me fall."

Staring directly into Sarah's earnest face and sincere eyes, Xander's surprise can only process one thing. "Sarah, are you a complete idiot?"

Having been fully committed to the seriousness of her request, this insult strikes the young woman hard enough for a hurt expression to appear on her face as she makes a questioning sound in answer.

"Didn't I tell you to stop thinking about killing yourself for my sake before? Were you even listening then? If you still have all this time to think about dying for my sake, then how about you start trying living for my sake?"

Sarah's face inadvertently goes red as she blushes hard at those words, despite the situation she is in. No, maybe even more so because of the high tension position she is in. These words that are said at such a vulnerable time, that could be interpreted that certain way…Could he really be telling her that he…

"Wait a second, I think that came out wrong," back peddles Xander with a cocked head that's reviewing what it's mouth had just said, even as the explosion of one of Castor's fireballs detonates in the background.

"Sarah," says Xander calmly with his full attention focused on making his words clear and meaningful, gazing only at the person they are meant for. "You are no longer a Labyrinth Guard, or a soldier enlisted in the military of Lagaard bound by duty. You are a member of my Guild and are therefore not expendable, or replacable. As far as I'm concerned, you now hold a position as precious as a member of my family. That is what a real guild is. Not a group of professionals, but a family that will never let its members down. If I had been willing to leave you to die, I never would have dived after you in the first place."

"And now that I'm here, you want my last memory of you to be your life slipping through my fingers and watching you plunge hundreds of feet to be broken on the rocks? I wouldn't wish such a traumatizing sight on my worst enemy."

Xander's words start becoming more and more strained, as he is forced to grip harder to make up for Sarah's lessened hold onto his wrist. "And what's more, I don't think you really, nrf, understand what your death would mean. No matter the reason, do you think your mother, or Cass at the Stickleback Bar would be happy to hear you died like this? Do you think anyone around you would be able to keep smiling if you just let yourself die here? If you have all this time to think about how to make your death so meaningful, why not spend it thinking about how to make your life even more meaningful?"

With all these wonderful life affirming words raining down on her, Sarah can't help but feel her determination begin to waver and feel some insight, finally, into the way her lord sees the world around him. But despite all that knowledge that she is absorbing, the one point that stands out is this. "You mean, you remember me?"

Xander gives a strained smile, the muscles in his hand burning and his filth covered hair sticking at odd matted angles, but it somehow seems reassuring. He is smiling because the answer is so obvious that it is ridiculous. "Of course. You're pretty much the only tan girl with blond hair in Lagaard. How could I not remember you?"

At that moment, Xander feels something on his back, and squirms to look at it, hoping it's a helping hand. It is a feather.

The electrical current bolts through Xander's body, through all the limbs with more power than before with both Xander's front and back having been coated in the ever prevalent goo on the rooftops, reducing his skin's natural resistance. As the current shoots through Xander's body, every muscle savagely contracts and some of the electricity passes into Sarah, making her twitch hard and grit her teeth reflexively. As the attack ends and the spasms halt, Sarah feels the grip on her wrist slacken and her body plunge downward. The instant certainty that Xander had lost his hold on her flashes into her mind, immediately chased by the certainty that she really is going to die. In that moment of clear understanding of her own demise, Sarah's heart does not skip a beat, but clamps down so hard and for so long that it physically hurts.

The jerk of Xander's arm reaching it's full length again causes the young man to grunt in renewed pain, his shoulder strained and aching, but at least now Sarah was gripping his wrist properly again. When Xander had been hit by the electricity the convulsion caused all the muscles in his body to contract, hard. As a result, Xander's grip on Sarah's arm had intensified and he had lifted Sarah a couple inches up, and when the electrical attack had ended all those tightened muscles slackened once more. It's only natural for Sarah to have understood it to mean she had been dropped with what her senses had told her. And the experience was truly jarring for the girl who had been prepared to die just a short time ago.

In that moment where death felt like a certainty, she began to remember the faces of all the people she knew. Her mother's face. Mr. Cass who took them in. The other members of her Guard squad. Lady Leene that taught her how to protect others. Her Lord Xander. And she suddenly realizes that she wants to live. Sarah realizes she really cares about these things, that they matter to her. And that she doesn't want to lose what matters to her again.

And for the first time in about ten years Sarah begins crying truly cleansing tears.

Long ago Sarah heard her Lord Xander say that he wanted to protect the smiles of all the people in his kingdom, and she decided that she wanted to help Xander's wish come true. Because she knows what it is like to have happiness stripped away. But Sarah finally understands that she also has to work to protect the happiness of the people around her, and she can't do that if she dies.

Moments pass as Sarah hangs her head, shedding her tears silently and processing this new facet of her life, as she clings to the hope of being saved. Explosions are heard in the background, and the tower shudders again causing Xander's position to slip some more. But Sarah's role right now is just to wait, and hope that she can be protected for the moment, until she can start protecting the people around her again.

And then Sarah feels another hand grip her and she is slowly being lifted up.

Lifted high enough to help out, Sarah grabs the edge of the roof and begins pulling her weight up, with two sets of hands helping her along. The first set belongs to Lord Xander, and the second to Princess Victoria.

"That was a very brave dash you made back there, Victoria," says Xander eloquently, getting back on his feet. "You probably saved us both."

"It was no problem," says the royal maiden happily, also gaining her feet and blushing slightly at the compliment, "Now let's go help the others."

Pulling her sword free of it's scabbard, Victoria smacks Sarah right in the nose with the pommel knocking her to the ground. Worriedly inquiring to Sarah's safety, Victoria quickly steps forward and nearly impales Xander as she does so. Seeing the lethal steel waving about, Sarah quickly grabs the princess' sword hand to stop her from injuring anyone else and notices that the Princess' eyes are unfocused. She quickly calls her Lord Xander's attention to it.

Bending in to inspect Victoria, Xander first notices that Sarah's nose is bleeding and it looks like she had just shed some heavy tears. That blow to the nose must have been pretty painful for Sarah to have had her eyes water like that. Turning to Victoria, Xander hurriedly asks, "Do you know where you are? Do you recognize me?"

Forgetting to answer the first question, Victoria simply says, "Oh, you're the guy from that place, right?" Apparently she currently thinks that is the correct answer. And then Xander feels something hot and sticky under the left hand he had been using to keep Victoia's shoulder and body steady. It's fresh blood.

Quickly stepping behind the princess, Xander sees that her pristine armor has a long and deep gash down its back, and in a similar alignment, a gash down the back of her scalp with blood soaking into her golden hair.

"Lin!" calls Xander across the battlefield. "Victoria's been hit in the head! She's completely disassociated!"

Looking up briefly from patching Albert up again who had been injured trying to stop the princess from dashing off, Lin calls back while Benjamin continues to pull Meregho Saeno's attention. "Oh, that's just the poison on that things claws!" Lin indicates the giant bird with a thumb. "It's mostly benign, so just give it a minute for her body to overcome it. Whoa!" Lin cries out as Sir Benjamin intercepts a sweeping wing meant for Lin.

"Benign, she says," mutters Xander to himself as he leaves Victoria in Sarah's care so the girl does not hurt herself while he goes to retrieve his sword. Giving a sharp tug, the short sword comes free. At least most of it. A generous portion of the blade's point is left wedged between the stones. Xander mutters again. "Wonderful."

On Xander's way back to Sarah and Victoria, the princess becomes lucid again, exclaiming, "Ah? You're Lord Xander's attendant, I'm so happy you're alright. When did you get back up? Hm? Oh, you seem to be bleeding! Here, let me." And so saying, the princess pulls her handkerchief out to shove against Sarah's very tender nose. Batting away the princess' kindness, Sarah tells her lord, "I think she's sane again, Sir. But don't hold me to that."

"Alright, good," says Xander as he passes Sarah back her dropped spear. "Because I have a crazy idea."

# # # # #

Sonia has fired off just about all of her heaviest ammo and only has regular bolts remaining, but even so, she's not disappointed with her damage. Though the Zodiac had been satisfied with just striking the target with his star magic until ordered by the boss to actually aim, Sonia takes pride in hitting big nasties where it hurts, even if it means manufacturing a weak spot on her own. Ballistics are like darts in the Labyrinth, it's all about the grouping.

With a loud chunk sound, the next bolt strikes the overgrown chicken and finally one of them sticks. Literally. Right between two ribs that Sonia had been working to get exposed for a while now. Her partner in the back rank pays no attention to it as he's wholly engrossed in enjoying a cold drink in the middle of a fight. Sonia can't blame him though since the guy looks like crap. Apparently that metal get up of his that lets the guy interact with stars produces a lot of heat with each use, and now the pale faced bastard is even paler and is covered in sweat. Even so, he's still stone cold and just as unpleasant.

Doesn't help that the guy is practically a mute. People who don't talk much are suppose to be easy to get along with, but everything he does say is unpleasant enough that you get the feeling the time he doesn't spend talking is dedicated to thinking just how inferior everyone else is. Makes one wonder who they should really be shooting at, thinks Sonia as she readies another bolt.

As the Arbalist brings her weapon to bear again, she sees something very curious. The big red bird has had all of it's attention on the side of the tower that knight serving the princess is on, since he's been baiting it enough. The thing didn't even give the princess more than one swipe when she charged past it. So that means the big bird had it's back to boss Xander and the other two. Sonia had kind of wondered what they would do once they got back into the fight, but she hadn't expected what those three actually did.

All three of them, without even shouting to get their blood boiling, just ran right up behind the leg of the bird and body slammed it in the back of the knee with their shields. "Ballsy," remarks the Arbalist aloud.

Sonia's attitude shifts from slight admiration to excitement as she sees the bird's knee bend from the unexpected force and throw the big thing off balance. She also hears her boss shout the order, "Hit the other knee, Albert!" and the reply, "Don't order me around, greenhorn!" as the giant mace swings around behind the knee using the opening the loss of balance caused. With that the big bird drops forward onto both it's knees almost like it was a bad dance move, giving Sonia a new, and really, a perfect angle for her next shot.

With a smiling quip of, "It must be my birthday," Sonia fires off what she suspects will be her final bolt for the fight. Striking at an upward angle on the other side of the ribcage, between the same two ribs as before, the flesh between them splits apart as the ribs break, opening a hole into the chest cavity. Turning to look at the Zodiac, Sonia says with a cocky grin, "Made a little hole for ya. I can make it bigger if ya need it."

As cool as stone, Castor replies, "It's adequate." Even though he's a jerk that likes big words, his aim is dead on. The Zodiac is restricted to placing his shots where his laser guided tracking falls on the enemy. But now that the laser is pointing inside the enemy's body?

A moment later the Fire Star's attack explodes, the effect devastating inside the confined space of Meregho Saeno's chest. A gout of flame blasts more of the rib cage open and even spouts out through the creature's mouth. Stunned now as well as off balance, the creature slowly falls backward. Recollecting itself, the beast starts swinging it's wings to regain it's balance as it nears the tipping point of falling over the ledge. A screech of confused rage bellows as the great monster realizes that it is not getting nearly the amount of lift it should be from it's heavily trimmed wings and falls over the side of the lighthouse tower.

Dashing over to make sure the beast is done for, the expanded party sees the lengthy fall of the century old predator. They see it strike bloodily against the sharp cliffs of the shore. And then submerge into a crimson colored pool in the depths of the ocean. And they see that it does not resurface.

Inwardly, Sarah is now even more delighted to have been saved from that same fall earlier.

And finally, after many minutes of watching the sea to make sure the creature does not emerge, a small laugh can be heard from the crowd of explorers. The laugh slowly gains volume and others join in until everyone except the haughty Zodiac is laughing their hearts out.

They're alive.

Day 9 - Emperor 9th ~ At Sea

Entry 3:

We won. We survived. I can't think of a more welcome entry to be making right now. Every goal we could have wished to fulfill in this voyage has been, with the exception of Kirikaze's mission to find some item of great rarity, but it seems the woman is not daunted by this set back and said something about other potential gifts.

Castor is very pleased with the outcome, though. Well, for him. He decided to stay behind with his equipment to study his magic stars for a while longer and to head back to Armoroad on one of the military vessels that will be coming shortly to officially take back control of the island. After all, how could they refuse to give a ride to one of the warriors that retook the lighthouse? I can easily see them doing so, but then I am not so…self-assured as the Zodiac.

I can't help but feel bad for the man's brother.

As far as injuries go, we have no major reports. Lin was able to wake Yuriko up quickly, saying something about reducing some swelling and then giving a Qi massage down Yuriko's back to treat the impact point of Meregho Saeno's flash attack. While Pollux gave emergency treatment, Lin seemed to deem it inefficient and continued on her own merit.

The wound Victoria suffered has also been treated properly by Lin, and she has given assurances that there will not even be a scar. That is reassuring as I was able to see the white of bone in the wound. I was also worried about the danger that Princess Victoria would grow squeamish of combat after being injured in such a way during her first real fight, but apparently Victoria was not even aware of being injured until it was pointed out to her. She even remarked that she had wondered what that odd tingling was. That girl has a surprising amount of resilience in her, and I think she will finally force her bodyguards to start teaching her to protect herself properly.

I also had an opportunity to speak with Sarah. She actually apologized to me. She said she was sorry for not understanding her lord's (my) feelings on the matter of the value of her life. And she said something else that I thought was odd. She said that she had no idea how delicate a dream could be, and that from now on she will treasure her own life with equal value as her loyalty to me. I'm not quite sure what she meant, but Sarah seemed happy. Perhaps for the first time, I saw what I can only call a content smile on her face.

She should smile more often.

As far as physical rewards, I would say we have achieved some of that as well. Not only was Albert able to break an entire claw off the giant beast that will most certainly get a good price from Edie, Lin made a very nice discovery. One of the trees that had been used in Maregho Saeno's nest seems special. Lin claimed she could feel living Qi inside the wood and identified it as a special 100 year old tree of great rarity. Apparently the wood from it is capable of very impressive things. I immediately sent for Lesko from the ship to harvest as much of this wood as possible.

And as for the combat engineers that met up with us halfway back down the lighthouse… Well, I told them that they could swim back to Armoroad.

The Harbormaster had been overjoyed at the retaking of the lighthouse, and had only let the explorers go after a profuse thanks in order to begin the renovation of the Virtus for future exploration, otherwise the congratulations would have taken quite a while. He seems rather long winded for a sailor, and he seems to think Guild Aequitas has real potential.

Walking along the docks as the sun begins to set, the various explorer groups begin saying goodbye to one another.

Kirikaze and Yuriko went off on their own, where the elder ninja wished the younger luck with her surrogate family before disappearing into the night so stealthily that even Yuriko couldn't track her, leaving a gift in the place she had been standing in before.

Sir Benjamin took particular interest in saying his farewells to Sonia and invited the "lady" to join him some time to get to know each other better. With half a sneer, Sonia said that she only accepted such transparent guys as drinking buddies. And only if they buy the drinks.

Albert got Lin alone after she completely tripped all over herself saying goodbye to Reif and thanked her. Though Lin wasn't sure why she should be thanked, Albert insisted that he owed her his life and gave her one of his old maces to repay the debt, seeing as the girl was swinging around a piece of wood for a weapon. He also pointedly remarked that Lin was the only member of the guild he owed a debt to.

Xander and Victoria ended up paired off as they slowly walked back to the city.

"I really must thank you again, Lord Xander," says the princess formally. "I was quite annoyed at the time, but what you did on the boat has really opened my eyes."

"No, I'm the one that is in your debt. You saved two lives today and helped us finish the monster we were sent to slay."

"Which I never would have done if you hadn't beaten some sense into me," says the girl with a wide smile despite the words she chose. "You said before that sometimes I will only be able to save lives if I take action personally. If you hadn't have said that I may not have moved on my own, and perhaps ordered Benjamin or Albert to go help you… Which may have been disastrous for the front rank. I realized that since I was the only one not really fighting, that I was the only one that could be spared." The princess' look of melancholy at the realization of her limits ruins her uplifted mood and removes her smile.

"At least you realized the position you were in before you returned home. This way you can work to improve yourself, and surprise your family with a much more capable Heir than they expected. But now that the trial is complete I assume you will be returning soon?"

For some reason Victoria hesitated before saying, "I don't think I will be going back. Not yet." In response to Lord Xander's questioning look, the princess continues. "While the trial is technically over, in reality it ends once I am satisfied that I have proven myself." The princess' eyes begin blazing with the fiery virtue that they had held at the breakfast table that morning as she says, "Thanks to all of you, we were able to defeat the monster! However, my battle has only just begun! From now on, my opponents are not just the beasts of the Labyrinth and the monsters of this sea. I will also be fighting against myself and my own weaknesses. And I will be striving to become an even better ruler than you, Lord Xander."

A strange glint appears in the girl's eye with that last line, as if she were looking at a person she admired yet refused to lose to. One that she has recognized as a goal to reach that lights the fires of ambition in her blood. With an amused smile, Xander stops, turns and politely takes the lady's hand to give his best courtly bow under a sky of deep violet, shining gold, and burning crimson.

"I look forward to being your friend and your competition, Princess Victoria."

Returning with her most graceful one handed curtsy, as if they were in a royal ballroom, Victory replies, "And I, you, Lord Xander."

End Chapter 6