Chapter: Whim.

Disclaimer: I don't own Mana Khemia 1 or 2, Atelier Iris 1 to 3, or Yu-gi-oh, let alone any related properties. Gust, Shonen Jump, and other rightful owners and distributors do. No infringement intended or money made.


"You promised Isolde what?" Roxis wondered if he should put up a sign like Flay had suggested doing for Jess.

Only instead of, 'X days since the last explosion,' it would read 'X days since Roxis nearly throttled Vayne.' Although that didn't have the same ring. 'X days since Vayne, Vanitas and/or Thorn did something criminally stupid and/or inconsiderate?'

Regardless, "We have a perfectly good infirmary!" Even if the nurse was creepy in a Pamelaesque way. "How dare you bargain away not just your secrets but mine?"

"What's that, Flay?" Nikki wondered. Whatever he was eating smelled good. It was making her hungry, too.

"It's a food imported from the Americas called corn. When dried and heated, it explodes!" Flay told her, munching another handful.

"Oooh." Jess drifted over, having heard the word 'explodes.' "Can I try some?"

"They certainly are a lively bunch, aren't they?" Crowley said quietly as he and Iris worked on preparing ingredients at the central table while the others were occupied.

Iris had decided that the best way to learn Al Revis' alchemy was by doing every single recipe, even the ones she'd been making for months. Al Revis' methods gave such better control over what properties items had! If only she'd known about ether level before… And the ingredients available here were different from those in the alterworlds, even though her alchemist ancestors had turned Valtessa into a garden for spinacherb, huffin trees, and other items that a lost city surrounded by strange beastmen desperately needed.

It was wonderful to have so many people to talk about alchemy with! She'd never regretted taking in the orphaned Edge when he lost his parents, but he'd never really been interested in alchemy.

Whenever she'd wanted to tell him about her newest synthesis and how she was so close to getting it right, he'd asked questions like when she could be done so he could cook dinner because they hadn't even had breakfast, and could he open the windows to clear out the gas?

So Iris nodded happily. "Yes!"

"You weren't waking up! I was worried, and if it was something we couldn't cure how was I supposed to know Melanie could have?"

"Because she's a trained professional, that's why! You may have the power of a mana but you don't know everything." Roxis emphasized the last words, anger growing colder. "Whatever happened to the modest, self-effacing Vayne? Or did you always have such a low opinion of others, and were only deigning to spend time with those without your natural omniscience for the amusement of watching these buffoons bumble about?" He waved at Flay and the others. "You sure know how to pick them, if so."

"Which of these do you think I should use?" Crowley asked Iris.

"Roxis!" Vayne almost took serious offense at that implication.

"Hmm, I don't know." Iris frowned. "Why don't you wait until they're done?" Roxis had exhaustive notes on ether effects that he'd offered to let Iris copy.

Roxis adjusted his glasses. "You're right, that was unfair of me. But you need to let others help you, Vayne."

"I was worried that it might have happened because Pain, I mean Thorn, pacted with you. Or something else that you might have gotten in trouble for."

"I suppose." Crowley glanced sideways at Iris, whose concession to Al Revis' theoretical school uniform had been to replace the shawl draped over her lower arms with the sleeves of a loosely-worn coat that had fallen off her shoulders.

Roxis said, "I suppose," at almost the same time as Crowley.

"Jinx!" Nikki announced. "One, two, three, and you're mine!" She grabbed Roxis' arm and dragged him over the corner of the room, under the loft.

"What do you think you're-"

Nikki shushed him and whispered, "Do you want to scare them away again? You need to lighten up, or else Vayne'll feel bad and who knows what he'll do? Isolde said some really mean stuff to him."

"But Roxis is right. I should have avoided Ms. Isolde. I messed up." Vayne followed them over, looking at his feet. "Roxis, she figured out that… your father. I'm sorry." His voice was a quiet whisper when he finally got those words out.

Roxis froze.

Nikki waved her hand in front of his face a few times. "Roxis?"

"Hello!" Pamela said cheerfully as she floated through the wall behind Roxis. Then she blinked, floating there. "Good morning, everyone!" When those words didn't get any reaction either, she floated forward through Roxis' body, making Nikki jump, but not Roxis. "Wow." She giggled. "Vayne, did you break him?"

At first, since Pamela was an equivalent of their Pamela and Roxis was a little like Winna – although he mostly confined his rants about research to alchemy, which Iris was interested in so they weren't boring at all – Iris had thought that maybe Roxis liked Pamela and he was just claiming he didn't so he wouldn't feel embarrassed.

Except this Pamela wasn't much like their Pamela – sure, they acted similar on the surface, but there was something very different underneath, and Roxis definitely wasn't like Winna in that regard.

Iris missed Winna. She wondered how he and Pamela were doing. Edge was probably taking care of Nell just fine, and the Guild could take care of itself until she graduated and could bring this knowledge home to restore alchemy to Zee Meruze, but she missed home. The canal-lined streets, the stores run by her old friends, Grandpa Gramps telling his stories by the fountain, even the mist that appeared and dragged her back to the city if she spent too long in an Alterworld.

"Roxis?" Vayne sounded really worried. "Roxis?" He leaned forward against him, peering into his eyes.

To Iris, Vayne's power felt a little like Fanatos, the mana of evil, and a little like all of the elements, synthesized into one. It was a wonderful experience to perform co-op synthesis with other alchemists, let alone with a mana!

Edge felt like her, which was why she'd ignored people who said she shouldn't take in a strange boy she'd found trying to sleep under one of the many bridges, when she'd been gathering stuff for a pretend-synthesis. Edge was family, and she'd been hoping he'd become an alchemist too. Maybe it was just a talent, like the way Edge could see Rufina, and even touch her, all along, and other people could barely hear her voice. If Iris'd noticed Crowley…

Now that there were other alchemists, Iris could admit to herself that she'd been a little unfair to Edge. She'd wanted another alchemist to talk about these things with so badly that she'd kept pushing at him, and pushing at him, until he'd just wanted her to leave him alone about it. If she'd stopped trying to shove his face in it and force him to see that it was the best thing ever, then maybe he would have learned to appreciate it for its own sake.

She was disappointed in herself. She'd been focused on saving Crowley, not Yula or Alvero. Maybe if she'd tried harder she could have saved them then. But it was Crowley she'd spent her wish on, just because he was a fellow alchemist. That wasn't fair to them, or him, that she wanted to be his friend just because he was an alchemist.

Although she was starting to really like Mr. Crowley now that she was getting to know him!

"Exanosis!" The dark Vayne laughed as the technique turned Roxis to stone. "Now he really is frozen like that."

Vayne focused and the stone that coated Roxis crumbled to dust. Roxis shook himself, making most of it fall off his clothing. The surprise had jarred him out of it. "I'm alright. Well, now we know where Isolde and Lorr went. He won't make it easy for them." But Roxis was still afraid for him.

"What do you guys know about Isolde and Lorr?" Everyone turned around: two people had come in the door while everyone was distracted by drama or syntheses. The one who had spoken was a brash redhead with a scythe. Iris would have wondered if he was this dimension's Edge, but while Edge's temper was cool this person was obviously hot-headed.

"She, like, wouldn't tell us what was going on with you, so it was something big." The young blonde lady had a large sword slung over her shoulders. She made a show of looking at the fingernails of her free hand, but Crowley, who had spent years as a raider (surrounded by ones much stronger than he was), knew better than to mistake that for anything but a show of superiority and a threat. She was saying that she didn't need to focus on them because they were no challenge, and she'd be willing to demonstrate if this held her up. He moved forward a little, prepared to cover Iris.

It was the least he owed her, after what she'd been through because of his weakness.

"She didn't tell you anything?" Roxis didn't dare let himself be hopeful. The fact she'd involved Lorr was proof enough that Isolde expected a fight. Perhaps she intended to be merciful enough to just interrogate and kill them both, and not blacken the name of any innocent family members by declaring that they were sorcerers in public.

"She left a note, that you guys said there was dark magic somewhere and she was going with Lorr and his workshop," Tony told Roxis. They might have been in the same workshop before, but Roxis was in Flay's group now.

"She went down there? And she's not back yet?" Roxis frowned. "We were barely able to scratch the monsters there at first, but the professors should have better weaponry than that available to mere students."

"Down there? Like, the depths of the Old Schoolhouse?" There had been rumors that some of the delinquents were in that area, but Renee hadn't taken them seriously. It took serious gear to not just die there: you'd have to be nuts to use it as a base.

"Yes," Iris told her, moving forward. She thought that these two didn't get along with everyone else, from how they were acting, so a neutral (or neutralish, since she was in this workshop even though she was new) might help. "That was where they found Mr. Crowley and I. Oh, my name's Iris Fortner. What's yours?"

"Dame Renee D'Arcose. That's Tony," she added, tilting her head in his direction but not breaking eye contact with Iris.

Flay whistled softly. Renee never used her title, but then Iris had brought up that she was a Fortner first.

"So you're the one who's collecting mana like they're trading cards. Going to try to, like, catch them all, are you?" Because if she even thought about doing anything to the Azureflame Mana, after everything he'd been through, Renee was going to take this too-sweet little girl and slash her though a wall.

For, like, starters.

"Well, several pacted with me, after I freed them from monsters, but there weren't any other alchemists." Iris' eyes grew sad for a moment.

Tony snorted, eyes full of jealousy. "Riiight. Like there was no one else who wanted a mana."

Iris would have said no, there hadn't been. Except… There had been someone who had wanted a mana, and he was standing right next to her. She'd share, if she could, since Vayne was pacted to Roxis and Sulpher, but none of her mana had offered.

Mr. Crowley hadn't asked, and there wasn't even a glyph here that she could use to transfer their power to him so he could use their skills, the way Edge and Nell had.

"So: now there may be four damsels in distress," Yula, Isolde, and the female members of Lorr's workshop, "trapped by the forces of darkness in the depths?" Everyone looked up to see Flay posing dramatically at the edge of the loft, using it as a stage. When had he gotten up there? "To arms!"

"There are three days of classes left before the weekend," Roxis reminded him.

"For shame, Roxis! As though class matters next to the fates of innocent people!"

Innocent? Ha! "You do remember that we are talking about Isolde? And that she killed me? In cold blood?" Did that ring any bells?

"And it's only Zeppel. As long as you turn in the assignment, he wouldn't dare give us detention for embarking on a mission of mercy!"

"True," Roxis had to agree. What did it matter: his perfect attendance record was already ruined.

Anna was torn. A noble quest or avoiding delinquency? Wait, skipping class with heroism used as an excuse… It was a trick! Flay was trying to lure them into joining him in his deviancy! Except it was her duty to her family's Honorable Sword of the Flowing Heavens to use it to vanquish evil as a lone sword traveling and righting wrongs: what to do?

No, she knew what to do. As much as it pained her to walk right into Flay's trap, he was right. "We can't just leave people trapped down there."

"Right." Nikki nodded. "And we've got Jess' potion, so we should be able to save them all this time."

"I'll leave it to you," Pamela said cheerfully. "Teddy and I have some important business to take care of. Bye!"

Everyone stared as she floated through the wall.

"Well, that's interesting." Pamela missing out on something this diverting? It was rare that someone did something so far outside Flay's calculations.

"You didn't know?" Tony laughed.

"Until Lorr and Isolde get back it's just her and, like, Professor Karnap." Since the principal and Zeppel were useless, Dior was old, and none of the other professors had more than adequate fighting skills.

"Professor Karnap?" Jess wondered where she'd heard that name as she bottled more of her potion.

Tony rolled his eyes. "The Vice Principal. What are you, stupid?"

"But calling her Madam Ernentraud is so much more elegant!" Flay protested.

"We should be able to take one of those warps down to where we fought… our last opponent," Roxis said, not looking at Thorn. "We should probably split up into groups: there are too many of us." Not to mention that he didn't want himself, Vayne, or Thorn in the group with Isolde's students, but they would need some people who knew what they were dealing with down there. "Wait, that's right. Their weapons."

"These blades are made with mana cores," Tony told him, hefting his scythe proudly. "Don't worry about us, worry about yourselves."

Roxis didn't need Tony to tell him that.

"I call Anna!" Flay announced, since Tony had Renee.

That meant Roxis, Vayne & Thorn would go with the two of them, making five. If Jess, Nikki, Iris and Crowley joined Renee and Tony, that would give them a group of six. Roxis wondered if Sulpher would be willing to assist in battle again. Perhaps Vayne could try to use one of Flay's spare mechswords? Although a sword like Renee's would be more his style.

Iris started to put away the ingredients she'd gotten out for the next synthesis she'd had planned. Using an athanor instead of a cauldron for weaponry was interesting: she wondered what effect that might have on making a ruby prism. It was so much easier to find the ingredients here!

All of them stared at the statues of their friends – or unacknowledged rivals, in Tony's case. "They just… froze," Anna said, stunned. "They killed that monster and then they froze."

"Well." Roxis pushed up his glasses as Vayne started to glow, granting their wish to free their friends. "I believe we now know what happened to Isolde and the others."

"It's a good thing we traveled in two groups." This was a brilliant trap. Flay would have approved, if it weren't for the fact it was being used against him. "Roxis, you join their group."

Because if their group was the one that got ambushed next time, then if none of Vayne's aspects (and Vanitas went with Roxis) was loose to free them, they could be trapped down here for eternity. Roxis grumbled, but there really was no way around it.


When you kill certain enemies in the last area of the bonus dungeon, the game freezes. The only way around it is treasure capes. Lots and lots of treasure capes. I tried using Muppy's puni-making ability to get rid of the monster types that made it crash. Sadly, zombie punis made it crash for me.

This annoying freezing is the reason for the chapter title, BTW.