"...Woooooow." Marine let out a low whistle at the sight of the tower.

Alice had initially thought it simply just looked so large because she was so small, but even the others agreed that it was big. A total of seven stories tall, the Tower of Trades was solidly built, albeit a tad overgrown with vines, weeds, and moss. The windows were dark and unable to been seen through, apparently darkened by the collection of dust over the many years that the tower had been abandoned. There was a dark gloomy atmosphere hanging around the place, wrapping it up tightly, making it almost impossible to look at it without getting a shiver tingling your spine. It looked disturbingly delightful, and Alice noted that her other half would love this kind of place. I'll have to remember to bring her here.

Marine, the impatient young woman that she is, completely forgot about the "spell" on the tower, and tried to break the doors down with her spear. She tried everything; punching, kicking, stabbing, picking the lock with tip of spear (tried to, anyway; there was no keyhole), and, finally, banged her head against the door in defeat. Iris shook her head at the stupidity of it all, and finally just walked right up to the doors, shoved Marine over the ledge of the stairs, sending her crashing down into the rose bushes, and gave the door a deep, low bow. There were a few moments of silence, and then the doors slowly creaked open, squeaking loudly; almost as if they hadn't been opened in years, even though the Abbot had quite possibly been there just yesterday.

The four of them stepped inside, and looked around the hall's entrance, only to be ambushed by a bunch of small knights in iron armor, riding on medium-sized green slimes. Alice shrunk back, narrowly avoiding getting her face cut up something awful. The knight who had tried to attack her growled at his failure, and kept trying to hack at Alice, who in turn kept backtracking. Marine and Iris made quick work of the other knight, who was dumb enough to try and take down Sheila, who was immediately saved. They turned to see Alice practically getting chased up and down the corridor by her attacker, not making any move to take her sword out of its sheath. They were perplexed; why wasn't Alice attacking? They'd seen her take out countless enemies, run off to ambush them, and practically cover herself in monster blood, so why couldn't she take care of one little knight?

Lady Luck decided to strike Alice with a lightning bolt of bad fortune, because her left leg stumbled over a rock, and she was unable to recover in time, forcing her to fall backwards, smacking her head against the stone tiles. A strangled whine coated in shock came out of her mouth as she curled up into the fetal position, holding her head tightly. The knight loomed over her, sword held up for the final blow, but Iris was not going to let him have his way. She jumped forward, her bare feet feeling cool against the dirty stone, and she dragged her claws across the torso of the knight. After the initial hit, the knight fell off of his steed, who fled like a bully after they get their ass beat by the school nerd, leaving the knight lying there in a puddle of blood, still slightly conscious. The knight let out pathetic whimpers, sadly, Iris was not in the mood for mercy that day, but she did give him a quick death, stabbing her sharpest claw into his heart (or, where she assumed his heart was located).

Once the knight had stopped moving, Sheila came over and checked up on Alice, who was still curled up. "Alice, you have to move your hands, I need to see if your head's bleeding."

Alice only groaned in response, and moved her hands. Sheila gingerly touched the back of Alice's head, being careful not to elicit any unnecessary pain, and pulled her hand back to see that it was lightly coated in blood. Sheila frowned, concerned, and placed her hand back on Alice's head, this time with no gentleness. A white glow surrounded her hand as she used her healing magic to close up the small wound. After a few more minutes Alice sat up and gave Sheila a grateful smile. She stood up with the help of Marine, who had been standing in the background, preventing other monsters from getting closer. Alice assured the trio that she was fine, and they pressed on, though Sheila secretly kept a close eye on her.

On the third floor the quartet was attacked by a blue-skinned, chibi cyclops mage that was clothed in red-orange robes and matching witch hat, and a simple yellow bat that resembled the ones Alice had seen in the Hexagon and the rubble of Brigadoom. Not that it mattered; they were quickly disposed of, and they were rewarded with a vial of magic water, much to the delight of Sheila, who was running low on magic. The monsters were surprisingly tough in this tower, and the older girls couldn't help but wonder if perhaps they were not well-equipped. They looked at Alice, who was wearing a fur poncho, for pete's sake. Cloth: not all that durable against vicious monster attacks.

Iris frowned, "...We will have to get some new equipment in the next town we reach. Port Llaffan, was it?"

Marine sighed, "Yeah, but... well, it could be worse."

"How?"

"We could be walking into a huge fight, even though we're not prepared at all. Good thing we're not, huh?" Marine laughed as they caught up with Sheila and Alice, who had been experiencing difficulty with an armored knight (slime free!). Iris shrugged, giving in to Marine's ominous logic.

At last, after several hours of fighting their way through hoards of monsters, they reached the top of the Tower of Trades. The sky was now dark, and stars filled the sky, almost as though they were spectators at an arena. There were candles lit near the northern-most part of the roof's wall, illuminating a path of light that led to a floating door in the sky that gave Alice an unsettling feeling. A few feet away from said candles was a plaque. Intrigued, Alice moved forward to read it, the multiple specks of color in her eye sparkling.

Do not go lightly into a new vocation, 'ye who would start anew. Once chosen, 'yer new calling will shape the rest of 'ye days.

Alice paused, tilting her head while she looked up at the floating door of light. She didn't want to go there, she was absolutely sure that nothing good was going to come from it; but where else could they go? They hadn't spotted the Abbot anywhere in the tower on their way up, so this door was the only logical conclusion on where he had disappeared too. It doesn't really look like it's something you can return from once you enter. Alice hummed to herself.

Marine didn't wait, or think rationally at all; she just walked into the blindingly lit door like it was nothing, vanishing from sight. Sheila was about to follow suit, but Iris grabbed the back of her armor, rendering her unable to move.

"No, Sheila. You cannot go and run into that door without thinking this through. Marine may have gone, but she is tough enough to defend herself." Iris scolded Sheila lightly, and then turned to Alice, "Shall we go, Alice?"

Alice blinked, and looked up at the two of them. She hadn't even noticed that Marine was gone; if Marine wasn't here, why were Iris and Sheila staying behind? Alice shrugged it off, "Yeah, sure."

The three of them carefully made their way across the path of light that didn't look like it should be solid, and entered the open doorway. On the inside, it looked like it was an enclosed realm, shaped in a dome, but at the same time it seemed that it could go on for eternity. They were standing on a hexagon-shaped structure, with pink flooring as a base, a smaller beige hexagon in the middle of the flooring, with yellow chains reaching a circle of light in the very center of the room, two candles lit in the front of the smaller hexagon. Marine was standing off to the side, staring at a lone figure in the center of the circle with her arms crossed. She acknowledged the others with a nod of the head; apparently even Marine was smart enough to know not to approach a stranger without backup.

Alice cleared her throat, and quickly made her way to the stranger, who she assumed was the Abbot, eager to get all this over with so she could continue combing through the Protectorate.

"Excuse me, sir..."

Mel is slowly going through my files, so it's not instantaneous-beta reading, but... school, y'know? Not much my General can do. It'll get done though.