Fire had parted ways with Steve, Jennifer and Shadow in the inn's upstairs corridor, they said they were going to fit the device on Fristad. Fire had other plans.

Two doors down from Destiny's door, that's where Fire was headed, the room currently occupied by Lucy. He stood before the door and thought about his words, he may have convinced Lucy to come with him here but now it was time to convince her to stay with him, or rather stay where he needed her to be, even if that place didn't exist yet.

He knocked, no response for a few seconds. Then the rustle of bedsheets and the sound of bare feet on wood carefully but steadily coming towards the door. He hadn't woken Lucy up, that was for sure. Fire imagined that she was still nervous, even with a night to think and rest.

Lucy slowly opened the door. She was now wearing a long blue dress, which technically belonged to Shadow. Fire's sister wouldn't mind, Shadow mostly packed clothes for nostalgia's sake, her robes could change into whatever she needed. The dress was originally a fair bit shorter but it had magically grown to accommodate the fact that Lucy was quite a bit taller than Shadow. Fire had placed the dress and a few other clothes in Lucy's dresser beforehand, she couldn't keep running around everywhere in her maid uniform, that would just look ridiculous.

"Yes?" She asked.

Fire replied: "Good morning Lucy. If everything goes according to plan we will be departing later today."

Lucy shook her head. "That sounds great but you still haven't told me anything about what your plan actually is."

"I suppose I haven't." Fire said. "There is someone else I'd like you to meet, her name is Destiny, she will be coming with us as well, she's part of the group I came here with. Just two doors over."

Lucy quickly disappeared into her room again. "Hold on, I need to put on some shoes first. Thank you for the clothes by the way."

A few seconds later Lucy was already out of her room again, she locked it, then looked at Fire again. He took a few brisk steps over to Destiny's room, then knocked. Destiny was a lot slower to respond than Lucy, she might have even still been lightly sleeping. A good minute after Fire's knock she answered the door.

Destiny's hand leaned against the door heavily, perhaps due to tiredness, but there enough wakeful lucidity in Destiny's day-adjusting eyes to suggest it was at least partially intentional, as if she hoped the inn door would be torn off its hinges.

"Hey," Destiny said in a low-pitched voice.

To Fire, one thing was certainly clear: Destiny was not in the best emotional state this morning and it was best to tread lightly.

"This is about what I said when we talked the other day, about the purpose I promised you." said, then pointed to his left. "This is Lucy, she'll accompany us as well. May we come in?"

Destiny sized up Lucy. "I'd rather... well I guess I have nothing better to do." Destiny lifted her weight from the inn door and pushed it open, then stepped back into the room.

Fire signaled Lucy to go first, then closed the door behind him after he entered the room. "I suppose I have a bit of explaining ahead of me since I haven't told either of you much of what my plan actually is. So, when I was at the Prophet's hill one of his prophecies claimed that I was some sort of champion destined to lead. I could sense a lot of tension among the congregation, they are from many different worlds and naturally distrust most others, I hope that the prophecy makes them follow me until I can prove myself to them as an actual leader instead of the subject of a prophecy. From what I gathered many of them have neither a proper place to stay nor a stable source of food now that they are stranded in Nexus, my plan is to provide them with both."

Lucy asked: "How would we do that?"

Fire explained: "I happen to know that there is an expansive cave system below the nearby mountains, if we gather the most capable warriors and miners we should be able to develop those caves into a livable shelter. The caves are ideal for this since they eliminate the need for building materials that would normally be used by a shelter of this scale. Once this initial step is complete we'll gradually move more of the congregation into our shelter, which gives us more people who can help further expand our foothold. We can construct underground farms with crops suited to the caves, start digging mineshafts and gradually improve the living quality. This will give us a good base of operations for whatever we might want to do, for instance I promised to look into what exactly the Entity is doing."

"I assume you intend me to fill one of the 'capable warrior' roles?" Destiny mused in a cynical tone, which seemed to soften later. "Not that I'm against the idea. I wouldn't mind setting a few skeletons on fire, as long as I have someone to back me up."

Destiny looked a bit more positive than before, Fire smiled. "Indeed, you will be vital to the first expedition. Once we start moving in more people you could also act as a mentor and teach them how to defend themselves, we might even find a few with magical potential."

Lucy turned to Fire. "I know you said something to me about some talent I have but… what is that talent?"

Fire explained: "It's difficult to accurately tell so early on, I don't exactly know how my intuition works, I just know that I can trust it. Things will fall into place soon enough once we depart." He then turned to Destiny. "If you don't mind, we will be departing later today. Once we arrive at the congregation we will spend some time finding more people for the first expedition. I do have some amount of materials with me that we can use to set up a temporary camp site in the mountains, however everything beyond that needs to be gathered on-site."

Destiny nodded in acknowledgement.

Lucy sighed. "I suppose. It's a welcome change either way. I wasn't always a maid, you know? Used to travel my world, or more accurately, my parents did and I just kind of was there as well. But..."

Fire didn't need Lucy to finish her tale, it was clear enough what had happened. He thought for a few seconds if he had anything else important to say, then remembered something. "By the way, Shadow will not be coming with us, at least not at first. She told me that for now she'd like to stay here and investigate that book Fristad had. I also don't think the congregation would trust an absurdly powerful mage who just happened to appear alongside me without being mentioned by the prophecy."

Neither Lucy nor Destiny seemed to have anything to say for the moment, so Fire asked: "Do you two think you are ready for this? There is a huge task ahead of us and I don't want to force you into anything."

Destiny stared off to her side. "Time to jump off the smoldering remains of one prophecy and onto another, I guess. It must be nice to still believe in that kind of promise, although whether I believe in it or not doesn't make a difference. I'm sick and tired of this deadbeat village, and ready to do something that has a chance of mattering in the grand scheme of things."

Lucy seemed to take this opportunity to seriously reflect on her choices, after a while she said: "Yes, yes I think I can do this. What you said earlier, that things will fall into place, you seem to be confident in that and that's enough for me. It's been a while since someone else had confidence in me."

Fire was glad that both of them agreed to come with him so that he at least had two people he could put his trust in, having to rely on complete strangers was never easy, even, or perhaps especially if they worshipped him as the champion of a prophecy. Over the millennia of his life his intuition had sharpened into a reliable instrument that he could trust almost universally and it was telling him that, despite hardly knowing Lucy, he had chosen correctly at his pyromancy show.

If they really were to depart later some preparations had to be made, however those were nothing he had to concern Lucy and Destiny with.

Fire said: "We'll depart in the early afternoon, it would be good if you got some rest in the meantime, maybe eat a good meal. I'll be waiting outside once the time has come."

Lucy and Destiny nodded wordlessly, as Fire left out the door Lucy followed him and went back to her own room. Fire was on his own again. Now, where was the best place in this village to buy some horses?