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[Ochita]

Albert flinched when Ketsuki drew her blade, relaxing as she just examined it.
  "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you didn't win his sword the way you wanted to.." He patted her, and gave her shoulder a short squeeze. "H-hey.. Is that really the way you think? I think your master wanted you to experience the world. Why else would he send you away, if he was such a great teacher? he was clearly strong enough to teach you further."

[GiglameshDespair]

She sighed and sheathed the sword again.

"Perhaps he did. After all, he did mention to rely on allies before- before. And if I had not gone out into the world, became an arena fighter... met you... he would not have been put to rest as he was. Alone... I was too weak." she was silent a long moment before she looked intently at Albert. "Tell me, Albert. You've seen what our enemies will do. How strong is your resolve? How far are you willing to go to defeat this foe?"

[Ochita]

Albert breathed in a little when Ketsuki mentioned meeting him. When she looked at him, he looked away for a moment, before meeting her gaze.
  "I... I won't let anything like that village happen again, if I can. It was bad enough watching Ixionites move towards that house, in that village.. It's then I realized that.. I needed to cast away my doubts. Through my faith, I always doubted. Whether its right to hurt someone, anyone, but now I think that I shouldn't shy away from having to ward away those who mean harm. " He paused for a moment, and breathed.
"I don't know how far I can go. But I won't just let Aberal be conquered by Ixion."

[GiglameshDespair]

Ketsuki nodded gravely.
"The strength to destroy is also the strength to protect. I will rely on your strength, then, as you may rely on mine."

[Powder Miner]

:"O-oh. Well..."
:"He didn't judge you for it. Am I right?"

[SeriousConcentrate]

"No, he didn't. I probably wouldn't be so calm if he had."

Lilly let out a deep breath, relaxing a little more.

"I believe in Alberal the... polite... way of phrasing it is 'ruined for marriage'. So I was really worried..."

"It's still not going to be easy; for me at least. So I'm glad I'll have your support when I get nervous or frightened or start second-guessing myself again. I really appreciate you being there for me."

[Powder Miner]

:"I was... kinda leading up to something on that. I know Tomik... heh, I've been by his side his entire life, after all! And... he freaks out sometimes, when everything becomes too much and he can't stay calm. That's why... a lot of the bad things that have happened recently have happened. But Tomik doesn't judge, he doesn't hate people for almost anything. He's managed to support pretty much everyone here, once he stopped panicking. So... in case you ever feel like second-guessing yourself, just remember that son or not, he won't be second-guessing you. He might flip sometimes, but he won't ever hate you or dislike you. I mean, that's why he came and made amends, right?""

[SeriousConcentrate]

"Oh, no; I understand that about him. He's a good man. The problem is going to be me. I'm not... much used to have people care about me. And it scares me a little. I mean, I want this... a lot... but at the same time I'm kind of afraid of it, and afraid for it; like it's going to be taken away from me somehow if I reach for it."

She reached over and placed her hand on Senija's forearm to give it a friendly squeeze.

"I know Tomik's going to do his best, and I'm going to try too. I just have a lot of stuff in my head I'm going to have to work through, and I'm going to try to stop running from it."

[Solymr]

~~~~Chapter 7: Second Chance~~~~

The ship arrives at Veyriden in the evening without much of a problem. Nikolai led them into the city of magic that most of them already knew.

: I'll take you to where Phineas and the Lady are.

Nikolai took the party to the Veyriden diplomatic guest house. It was a magnificent building, a small palace worth of housing any representative from another mage city. Nikolai led the group inside and to a meeting room in the ground floor. He knocked on the door and peeked inside.

: We're back! I hope I'm not interrupting something.

Inside were Phineas and Lady Anne-Laude, patiently waiting for the scout's return.

: Nikolai, welcome back. No, we finished some time ago. What did you find?

: We found a lot more than you could imagine.

Harold fully opened the door to let them see the new guests.

: ...You're the ones that were here with Mister Harold not long ago, aren't you?

Phineas didn't seem surprised much, but Anne-Laude had already stood up and walked to Harold in awe.

: Harold! Are they really-?

: Alive? Yes, don't even question it. Harold interrupted the Lady before she made the same mistake as him.

: But how? We both saw the Church falling on them!

Phineas looked aside at Anne-Laude in confusion.

: Wait, did you say-

: Well, I'm sure they can explain better than me. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to bring something.

Harold quickly got out of the room and went upstairs. Anne-Laude turned to Lamden and the rest of the group and smiled.

: Don't worry, I remember about your arm. You managed to escape death twice... you are blessed by Bor, I have no doubt of it. How did you do it this time?

: Nikolai, am I missing something?

Nikolai whispered the news at Phineas' ear. His face went from confusion to surprise as he explained.

: Oh, I see. In that case, I'm also really interested in that explanation.

[SeriousConcentrate]

"Er, sorry, we can't really explain it. One moment Ixion was demanding our surrender, then the church collapsed, and we all awoke on a featureless plain. We fought our way past the dead toward a glowing beacon in the distance, and a giant undead made of several bodies. When we defeated it and passed through the beacon, well, I think it was made by people trying to summon something - maybe what we killed? Well, they ran off when they couldn't control us, and then Harold and Nikolai found us..."

[GiglameshDespair]

"It would seem that hell itself lies beyond the waygate."

[Twinwolf]

"As they have said, we are uncertain as to what happened. We do not seem to be dead- we saw undead past the gate, who were already decaying- so I believe that Ixion troops found us, somehow alive, after the Church collapsed and threw us into the Waygate."

[Solymr]

Phineas and Anne-Laude looked increasingly concerned as they explained.

: So... The Waygate really opened.

: The beacon disappeared when we got close and we didn't see it open so my guess is that thanks to them it's now closed.

: That seems like good news then. There's only one thing that I don't understand. Why would Ixion want to-

Phineas suddenly stopped talking, having a sudden realization. After a few seconds he turned to the Lady.

: Lady, how did Auroch fall?

Anne-Laude was caught by surprise but she managed to answer.

: ...The defense suffered from a lack of organization after an Ixion... mage... killed my predecesor while I could do nothing but watch.

: Let me guess, he teleported inside the room and disappeared before you could react.

: Yes, but how did you-

Nikolai interrupted her.

: Phineas, you don't mean...

Phineas nodded and opened his mouth to explain, but at that moment Harold arrived.

: Alright, here's... Harold looked at the rest. Oh, I thought you already finished explanations. Sorry, but might as well give you now some things I've gathered. First-

Harold dropped a big bag full to the brim with gold.

Party gets 8000 gold!

: That's for you free of charge. And now, Harlan, that surprise I mentioned.

Harold pulled a strange green looking sword from his backpack and gave it to Harlan. The sword felt like a sharp breeze of wind on a stick.

Harlan gets Wind Sword!

: Now, where were we?

[F.O.E.]

"Sir Phineas was just about to explain how he knew about teleporting mages," Asher said, a tad miffed -but hid it well- that the explanation had been so suddenly interrupted. He was learning about so many things; joining the group was the right choice!

[Solymr]

: Teleporting? But that means-

: The terrorist is involved. I should have seen this coming.

: Phineas, we had no way of expecting he would deal with Ixion.

: Excuse me, what?

Phineas took a deep breath and explained.

: We've been dealing with a terrorist calling himself the Twilight Walker. He knows how to teleport and has caused trouble before, but we managed to develop anti-teleportation devices. His most recent move was on the group right here, he took one of them as a hostage and forced the rest to fetch an artifact. He gestured towards the group as he said this.

: That artifact is the Rune Key, able to open anything. At first I thought there would be no chance for him to actually make any actual use of it, the city has an alert on him after all. But what I didn't expect is the possibility that he would reach an agreement with Ixion forces.

: Then the mage that appeared in Auroch?

: He did so using the terrorist's secret. At first I didn't know why would Ixion open the Waygate and throw the group through it, since it doesn't make sense Ixion would want to bring the end of the world. But that terrorist is insane, I believe he would take such a extreme if he couldn't get to us. Now, if he sold his secrets and Ixion doesn't know his true intentions, what do you think he could have possibly asked as payment?

He left the question in the air, hoping the party would figure out the answer.