"It took several attempts, but we finally found a hospitable world," Cato said, voice echoing in the confines of the storeroom. "Of course the one we found was a colony of the Empire of Dawn. Takeo played his tricks once more, trading the secrets of dragon duplication away in return for power and fame.

"He became the commander of Empress's armies, the soldiers we brought with us were taken into his command, and Sorek and I were sent off to be planetary governors. And so I found myself here, the barren wasteland of a planet known as Exulum."

Cato let out a light chuckle, waving his arm around as if he were presenting something.

"It imports rebels and dissidents, and exports the cowed and the dead. It took me all of three days to turn traitor and begin plotting against my superiors. But Empress is thorough weeding dissidents, and there was no rebellion for me to support. So I made my own."

He finished with a sardonic smile and a shrug of his shoulders. Now seated on one of the storeroom's many boxes with his back bent, the governor looked downright exhausted. It made for a surreal sight for Susan, an Atlan Elf allowing themselves to appear weak. It was like things just decided to fall upwards instead of downwards, it didn't happen.

But it wasn't the sight of a defeated Atlan that had her attention. Instead her jaw clenched as her mind spun over a different fact.

"I nearly killed you," she said, almost without realizing it.

"Yes," Cato responded matter-of-factly.

Her face twisted.

"But you didn't deserve it."

"Maybe not." He shrugged.

"But… but- why don't you care?" Susan snapped, her head spinning.

She had never really taken the time to get to know the Atlans she was attacking. But she had always been reasonably sure that they would hate her. She had uprooted their lives, destroyed their cities. The same thing Takeo had done to her.

They should hate her. Cato should hate her. She uprooted his life, attacked him when he hadn't deserved it. How many others-

"What was I supposed to do?" Cato's question broke her out of the spiraling thoughts. "Declare vengeance, devote my life to killing you? No, I have better things to do."

Susan's mouth was open, ready to speak. She didn't. Instead it slowly closed and she slowly settled it down on the ground.

"Huh," was all she said.

"Uh," the voice came from behind Susan's head.

Her eyes turned to find Elizabeth sitting awkwardly on her foreleg. She was half turned away, seemingly embarrassed at overhearing the conversation. But her knee was bouncing, an awkward frown crossing her face.

"Yes?" Cato finally asked.

"Oh, uh," Elizabeth stammered a moment, "what about Themus?"

Susan's eyes widened at that, the question hitting her like a splash of cold water. She hadn't even considered that angle. Her grandparents hadn't spoken of a Dawn Empire, but what if-

"What about it?" Cato asked, "Ruin should be more up to date on their affairs than me."

"Oh," Elizabeth's relief was palpable, "so the Dawn Empire hasn't attacked it or anything?"

"Oh!" Cato's eyes widened in realization, then he scoffed and shook his head. "No, no. As far as the Empire of Dawn knows, Themus is still home to a rogue Archdragon. For all their greed and vainglory, Empress and the Dragon Shogun are not stupid."

Susan nodded at that, before shifting Elizabeth to her back and finally getting to her feet.

"Well," she said, shooting a look at Cato, "Looks like it's time to clean up another one of Takeo's screw ups."

"Too true," Cato barked out a laugh, standing up as well. "But before that, you will need to meet your comrades in arms for the coming rebellion."

"Lead the way."

Exiting the room, Susan found herself in a long corridor full of doors. Walking along after Cato, she peered through some of them only to see more boxes. An examination of the ceiling showed sheer stone supported by metal braces.

They were underground then, probably some kind of storage depot. Not the worst place to hide, she supposed. She had certainly used worse hiding places herself.

The corridor they were in ended abruptly, letting them march straight out and into a much larger room. I was also filled with the crates, now forming enormous stacks that reached the ceiling. They were almost omnipresent, filling every inch of space except for a narrow corridor that Susan walked along.

Still, there were signs of life here. The murmur of voices, and the movement of shadows behind one of the towering stacks of crates.

"Punishment detail," a voice shrieked, high pitched but with a draconic depth. "For failing to beat a damn Archdragon!"

"It is the rules, Ambergris," the deeper tenor of Reidar replied, sarcasm practically dripping from his words.

"The rules, the rules?" The first voice continued in an even higher pitch. "The rules are the tittering of a mad piper, keeping you dancing like a fool until you trip and fall. Then berating you when you do!"

"The rules serve those who wrote them," a third voice, this one much quieter than the dragons, spoke.

"Yes," the first voice sighed, "they made it no secret why I am here. My death will give a guard enough time to send a warning signal. Fifty years of dedicated service, and I am to be treated as no more than a canary in a coal mine."

"It sounds like you have made up your mind, then."

"An oath of loyalty needs to be upheld by both ends. I see no dishonor in breaking it when they have used it as little more than a rope around my neck. Of course I have."

"Perfect," Cato declared as he rounded the corner of the mountain of boxes. "Then let me introduce you to the dragon of the hour."

Susan turned the corner as well, finding herself in what appeared to be a small fortress made out of crates. Crouched within its carefully arranged walls were a half dozen dragons, as well as a few dozen humanoids grouped in one of the corners.

The first speaker turned out to be one of the red scaled Thunder Dragons. As Susan stepped into the improvised room, the dragon's eyes narrowed and she took a careful step back. The rest of the room reacted the same way, eyes widening and stances lowering. Hands approached weapons, like they were looking at a dangerous beast.

"Sup," Susan deadpanned.

The moment broke, hands moving from weapons and eyes narrowing in confusion. A dozen pairs of eyes roved over Susan's body, seeming to critique what they saw.

"This is Ruin?" One of the humans, a heavily armored man with a steel helmet held under one arm, spoke up in a voice that Susan recognized as that of 'Onfroi'. "From your tales I had expected a beast the size of Gilleasbuig with the disposition of Gavin."

An offended 'hey' echoed from the back of the room, but went ignored.

"You did not see her an hour ago," the Thunder Dragon replied. She alone hadn't lost her guarded expression, her feet not leaving their ready position. "She mowed through me and my fellows like we were wheat."

"Truly?"

"Did you see the lights shining from the city center an hour ago?"

"I'm right here, you know?" Susan spoke up.

The suspicious gazes returned to her, but didn't soften. Susan couldn't help but be reminded of when she first met the Wizards Congress. It had been a dozen wizards that greeted her on the cratered ground of the Beringian Passage. Wary eyes had regarded her from where they huddled like gargoyles behind hastily erected defenses, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

All they had known to come from the Atlans had been plots and traps. The only thing that kept the meeting from ending badly had been Hadwigis's unending cheer and the slightest whisper of hope of having a dragon on their side.

Dagny alone had taken weeks to convince she wasn't some evil plot from the Atlans. Though once Susan had won her over the woman had practically been glued to her side. Sometimes literally. The incorrigible prankster had loved wordplay maybe a little too much.

"Hey, what's up with you guys?" Susan was pulled out of her recollections with a jolt, then turned to see Elizabeth standing on her back with her arms crossed. "We're here to help!"

She was met with total silence, until Onfroi finally raised a finger and spoke.

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"Why is there a child here?"

"I'm not a child!" Was the automatic response.

Susan sighed.

"Elizabeth," her head lolled to the side to better shoot her sister a look. "You kind of are."

"Yeah, but I'm also a Guardian!"

"A what?" Onfroi's response sounded more than a little exasperated.

"One of the protectors of earth, wielding the power of the planet to protect the people!" Elizabeth proclaimed, one finger pointing upward heroically in a pose that Susan would bet money was practiced.

Onfroi's head just tilted ponderously to the side. Then it slowly turned towards Ambergris, who had been watching the conversation with an expression of befuddled terror.

She shrugged back at him. He let out a sigh of his own and shook his head.

"This is no time for theatrics. Even disregarding the absurd claim that you draw power from an entire planet, the power requirement to fuel magic across realms would be prohibitive-"

"Elizabeth, could you do a quick teleport?" Susan cut him off.

"Oh, uh, ok?" Elizabeth's indignant expression turned confused, but she still snapped her fingers.

She appeared a moment later on top of Ambergris's head. The room fell silent, all eyes turning to the junior Guardian. The Thunder Dragon's eyes crossed, then her head began rearing back in surprise.

Elizabeth seemed to get annoyed at her shifting foothold, then snapped her fingers and returned to Susan's back.

By that point Onfroi had adopted an expression of open mouthed incredulity that Susan recognized very well. Then he shook his head and did the same thing Susan always did when she saw the Guardians telling the laws of magic to go jump in a lake.

"Welcome to the rebellion," he said with a snapped salute and a thousand yard stare.

Susan nodded at that, but couldn't help the slight frown that covered her face. In all of the chaos she hadn't questioned how Elizabeth's magic was working; too used to ignoring the madness that came from Guardian magic to care. But now that it was pointed out, she couldn't help but wonder why- or even how- the Guardian Rune was transferring mana across realms.

She took a few moments to let the idea rattle through her head. Then with an effort, pushed it to the back of her mind. That was a headache best saved for later.

"Diversions aside," Cato finally spoke up, clapping his hands to catch the rebel's attention. "Empress is now aware of us. We need to decide whether to wait for suspicion to lower, or move ahead with the plan."

"Yeah, and what exactly is the plan?" Susan spoke up, head head curling down to look at him.

"Rather simple, really. Assemble an army, seize the portal, and destroy it. That will disconnect the worlds, hopefully giving us enough time to remove the rest of the Empire of Dawn's influence. Then devise a method of blocking further attempts to reconquer Exulum."

Susan nodded along, considering. It was a simple enough plan. With her and Elizabeth, they had more than enough firepower to see the plan through.

"But where do we find the time…" Susan mused, then blinked in surprise as the eyes of everyone in the room turned towards her. "Oh, uh. Magic development isn't exactly something you can rush. Trying to find a solution with an entire empire hounding us isn't likely to go well."

Cato frowned at that.

"Damn," he muttered. "How long do you think it would take?"

"Well-" Susan cut herself off as an electric charge ran up her back.

The air around her thrummed with mana so thick it felt like she was back in the Great Caldera. Her head whipped around, only for her to blink as she saw the calm stone walls of the storage room. The mana receded after a moment, but Susan's Dragonheart was already building up power.

"The hell is that?" Ambergris was shrieking, her head whipping back and forth as well.

"Shit. Shit!," Susan gasped, "That's Great Magic! Where's the door?"

Cato hurriedly pointed, and without another word Susan snatched him up and charged towards it. A few moments later she was bowling through a pair of heavy wooden doors onto the cobbled streets of the city.

Her head whipped around until she found the central building, and she gasped as she saw the top. Telescoping eyes weren't even needed to see the massive spherical shield surrounding it, and a closer look only seemed to make the dread in her stomach grow.

Takeo was there, prancing around the top of the structure next to what looked like a quadrupedal mass of steam, gears and malice. Then a head turned towards them, two glowing eyes sweeping across the city like a lighthouse.

"Empress?" Cato gasped, confirming Susan's worst fears.

"What is she doing?" Susan asked.

"I don't know! But there must be dozens of dragons fueling that shield, and she wouldn't risk so many for any small prize."

Susan's eyes narrowed, looking closer until she could make out the individual shapes. Cato was right, the top of the structure was filled almost entirely with dragons, all of them glowing with power that poured out into the air around them like water.

A dozen ideas flashed through her head as she watched, trying to piece together what it was they were doing. Whatever spell it was had to be horribly power hungry, but immensely strong. Enough to justify the risk of exposing Empress' army to the wrath of another Archdragon.

It felt like her body turned to ice as she realized the answer. She practically threw Cato away from her as she crouched down on the street.

"RUN!" She snapped, before forcing her Dragonheart to scream with power.

Then she stretched out her neck and let loose with a beam of energy that lit up the world around her like a flashlight in a dark room. Power thundered in her ears as she watched the beam strike the shield in front of Takeo… and bounce.

Deflecting off the top of the shield, her beam skipped upwards to pierce the skies in a pillar of screaming light. Susan cut it off a moment later with a gasp, her arms already moving up to draw the runes of enhancement along her torso.

She was too late. The top of the Ziggurat let out another pulse of mana. It spread like a shockwave, the tide of power so thick that Susan could see it physically glowing as it sped towards her. In that instant she was reminded of when Gilleasbuig spoke, the shockwave of air carrying his words to strike like a slap to the face.

The mana struck a moment later, crashing through her and leaving her gasping on the ground before carrying on like she wasn't even there. And just like with Gilleasbuig, she felt a message carried along with the hit. Except this was utterly unlike any kind of spoken word.

This was a command, not to humans or dragons, but to reality itself. Words seemed to appear in her mind, so completely and utterly true that she couldn't even imagine them being wrong.

'The Empire of Dawn shall not lose Exulum.'

She was stumbling to her feet the next instant, ready to fight whatever army Takeo was going to send after her. Then her eyes settled on the Ziggurat again and she blinked in shock.

The dragons were leaving, most of them exhaustedly dragging themselves back through the glowing portal. Takeo was now looking out over the city. His eyes found Susan and he smiled, then he turned and was vanishing back into the portal himself.

Susan gaped as the entire fighting force just left; the portal now entirely undefended. But… they could, couldn't they. Reality had decreed it.

"What…" Cato gasped, forcing himself to stand from where he had collapsed on the ground. "What was that?"

"Let's get back inside," Susan said, before scooping him up and trotting back towards the doors.

The city was utterly silent as she closed the doors behind her, as if even the smallest of animals had been cowed into subservience by the mana fueled decree. Returning to the rest of the group, Susan found them in similar disarray.

Every one of them was shouting. Questions, fears and accusations flying back and forth like bullets.

"ENOUGH," Cato roared, and a moment later the rebels were settling back like cowed schoolchildren.

"What the hell was that?" Ambergris managed to get out before being cowed by a withering glare from Cato.

"That was causality magic, wasn't it?" Elizabeth cut him off.

Susan turned towards her voice, finding her now standing on the top of her head again. She now looked withdrawn, a frown covering her face as she stared down at Susan.

"Yeah, it was," Susan said quietly.

Cato's mouth opened to snap at them, then he finally seemed to process their words. He blinked, mouth falling open as his face went slack with horror.

"The Fool's Magic?" He whispered.

"I'm not familiar with that term but it sounds right," Susan said with a shrug she definitely wasn't feeling.

"So what is it?" Ambergris snapped, "I've never felt anything like that."

"Yes," Onfroi nodded, "I've heard of all kinds of magics restricted by Empress and her ilk, this was not any of those."

"This magic isn't restricted by rank or power," Cato grit his teeth. "It's banned by logic and basic self preservation."

"Causality magic changes reality itself," Susan spoke up, cutting off whatever reply was coming. "Forcing a set outcome to happen through any means necessary. The plan to take Exulum will never succeed now. Because even if it did, time itself would break in order to prevent it from happening."

"That's mad," Onfroi spat.

"That's grand magic."

"But there has to be a way!"

"Oh, there is," Susan shrugged, the motion feeling empty. "Causality Magic is open to loopholes, and their wording was specific. The Empire of Dawn cannot lose Exulum, but if there is no Empire…"

Hope flashed across Onfroi's face, then it fell.

"They know, don't they?"

"Yep. They'll have their entire available army setting up on the other side of that portal."

"Giving them all the time they need to prepare a force to crush us once and for all," Onfroi slumped. "Damn."

Something seemed to break in the rebels then. A susurrus began as different groups began whispering back and forth. Susan looked them over with a frown, watching as they seemed to drift apart. What few hopeful looks there had been vanishing behind more of the fear she had seen on the streets.

"Susan," Elizabeth hissed in her ear, "what about Liss?"

"What?" Susan whispered back, turning her eyes to catch a glimpse of her sister. She was hanging over the side of Susan's head, her mouth right next to the opening for her ear. She met Susan's gaze and raised an eyebrow.

"Could it help with this?

"Maybe. But we would need to actually get it first."

"Oh, right," Elizabeth deflated.

"Yeah, Susan sighed, "and Earth needs it more than we do. If… if we don't make it back, there needs to be something there that can hurt the Demon King. The other Guardians should be able to use it, at least."

"Well then could you…" Elizabeth frowned as she thought. "I don't know, what about that thing where you make people magical girls?"

"That was just a trial run, what I can do now is just a cheap copy of the actual magic."

Elizabeth fell silent at that, hanging limply from Susan's head.

"What do we do then?" She asked, voice soft.

"I don't know. Empress can counter me, and that would leave you and a couple dragons against a dragon army. And whatever Guardian nonsense is letting you use your powers won't be enough to fight off a dozen dragons at once."

"Hey, I can take em!" Elizabeth protested, bringing her free arm up to flex a nonexistent bicep.

"No." Susan growled. "No you can't."

"Oh."

Elizabeth fell silent again, seeming to shrink in on herself. Then with quiet movements she climbed back to the top of Susan's head, where she flopped down silently.

Susan let out a small sigh, wondering just how they were going to deal with this. Could they run? Escape to another world. They weren't good options, but they were better than fighting.

Empress had properly trapped them between a rock and a hard place. Causality magic turned reality itself against you, not exactly something you could fight. And neither was whatever army Empress was preparing.

There just weren't enough rebels, and a single Archdragon couldn't bring the necessary firepower to bear…

Tarnished golden scales flashed through her mind. Then she shook her head, banishing the idea to the back of her mind with other terrible ideas she shouldn't consider.

Her head came up, looking for something to distract herself with. Only to freeze when she saw the faces of the rebels around her, another memory of the Wizard's Congress surfacing. But not one of the early ones this time.

No, this time it was the last. Hadwigis, his face lined by centuries of age, had worn the same look of stern-faced determination when he saw the horde of Atlan dragons approaching the Beringian Passage.

He had known just as well as Susan that nothing short of a dragon could survive the coming conflict. But he had still decided to hold the wall. Not out of honor, or some greater plan, but to give the students enough time to escape.

The rebels would still attack, plan or no plan. They had a choice, die attacking, or die running. And why run when you can bloody the eye of the monsters that have spent so long crushing you down?

Something coalesced inside of Susan's chest. Not rage this time. Just the quiet certainty that she couldn't let another group of brave fools walk into the jaws of death. Not again.

"Cato?" She spoke up, catching the group's attention.

"Yes?" Cato asked, face still somber as his head came up to face her.

"I'm going to need you to clear some room in here," Susan's mouth stretched into a mad grin. "We're doing a summoning."

"Sure," Ambergris said quickly, looking slightly put out by Susan's smile. "But, uh, why exactly?"

"Because if Empress is going to cheat, then so am I."

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