When Wingcraft returned to their compound with the last wyvern body in tow, there were two of draconic origin waiting for them. Zolyra, and Murdon, who mostly had eyes for Tounaki after making sure the rest of the team was fine. Daniel, holding one of the wyvern's wings, sighed in relief as they set it down. He had level 2 strength and two strength buffing wings, but flying all this way while holding it up had been difficult as his boots could only just compensate for the extra weight.

Evalyn landed more tensely, and he could see her overcome hesitation before raising her voice. "Commander, I warned you this was more than we might be able to handle."

"I know." The Arcanist was holding herself up, but there was slight regret in her words. "Whatever you fought was beyond my expectations. I'm still getting used to the new limits of what monsters can do."

"You have to consider that Fates can't always see those that have evolved," Daniel added in an attempt at keeping the mood neutral. He agreed with Evalyn pushing back on the Commander given that he'd also been overconfident, but there was constructive criticism to relay as well. "I'm not sure if they can get passive or permanent buffs they could spot, but there could be some out there that only I'd be able to see the difference in."

Zolyra had obviously considered some kind of violence against him when he'd first admitted that his Spoke had the monster domain during the initial interrogation, but they were seeing the fruits of her decision not to choose violence now. "That is something to consider. I almost wish I had you as a Fate to verify sightings, but alas." Her eyes inspected the last wyvern's body and there was a nod when she saw most of the damage was to the wyvern's neck, leaving the rest of the body unharmed. "Either way, you have my apologies. I still maintain that we don't have the luxury of avoiding risk, but I'm also not in the habit of throwing hunters into fights they can't win."

"Alright," Evalyn acknowledged, lowering her hackles. Daniel might have expected the Commander to own up to her mistake, but this was only the second or third time Evalyn had talked with her. While they'd had good experiences with Rasalia, he'd heard the Commander who'd died in Eido had come into conflict with her and Lograve. "What happens now?"

"We can take these for processing," Zolyra said carefully, not trying to make it sound like she was just stealing the bodies. "I know a few Beastmasters in town are going to be disappointed you didn't take any alive, but the Alchemists will be happy. We don't exactly have Aurus' processing power, but I can get some Craftsmen on this. What do you want from the bodies?"

Evalyn glanced at Daniel and he nodded. "Any bones and scales they can recover, I can enchant with those. Oh, and uh, a decent portion of the meat. That's not for enchanting." He didn't have to ask to know Hunter wanted some. The aftereffects of heightening the Empathic Link to max and actually using it were taking a while to disperse.

"Alright. Tounaki's technically owed a share of the bodies, but considering the state of this one?" Zolyra poked a claw through one of the many holes burned into the evolved wyvern. "Well, we can salvage most of the bone at least."

"No feathers off my tail if you don't send me any chopped up scales, I've got enough over here as it is," the firebird replied from where she was almost draping herself over Murdon. Fortunately, their whatever they had had survived the revelation that Soraso was a traitor in every way imaginable. "Let's see what my next advance does and if I'm happy we'll call it even. Like I said, fight was fun enough as it was."

"I'll get your coin with the material we recover," Zolyra promised to the Wings. "Now that that's out of the way, is there anything from the fight worth mentioning? Raven's Call's hunt was practically boring by comparison."

"Oh! The monsters, everything they do is based off of what they eat," Daniel said quickly, leading into a recap of what he'd inferred from the evolved wyvern becoming 'starved'.

"Makes sense," Zolyra acknowledged after the explanation. "Fits what the Fate had said about them eating a fresh kill too. Any insight into why some monsters become 'evolved'?"

"No," Daniel answered honestly. "It doesn't have anything to do with spirits or how elites are made. It could be random, or maybe the monster god is choosing them?"

"I'll see if Silora can confirm whether regions further hubward are encountering similar enemies, though it will be difficult as no one else can identify that variant." One of Zolyra's hands went under her chin as she began to pace. "We did receive reports of monsters growing more active against each other as well as the wildlife, which could be a sign that some are growing hungrier. If those that 'evolve' gain a selective advantage it could pose problems, and that's not considering whether any 'elites' are in the wild. Anything above level 0 will avoid wild animals for the most part. We've always thought the magic in them was too low to benefit higher level monsters. It's the only way something like a normal ecosystem can exist alongside dragons."

Daniel blinked the momentary comparison to Lograve out of his eyes as the Commander went off on a tangent. "Hunter, was it like that for you?"

Anyone who hadn't been in the know a week ago stiffened as the ringcat, still in his true form, opened his mouth and spoke. "Yes. After Growing the first time, I hungered for better prey. Both because of the challenge, and…" He closed his eyes, straining his memory. "It wasn't taste, but better prey did give me more. I would say it was more magic, but I couldn't feel that back then to know for sure."

"He did start only hunting level 1s after that," Daniel confirmed. "Well, besides moles."

"It'll be a problem if these evolved monsters start trying to take whatever they can get," the Commander said grimly, not quite touching the Hunter issue. Daniel trusted her not to do anything drastic, but Zolyra had lived a long life under certain assumptions that she was still apparently having issues fully dismissing. "Anything else?"

"No, other than we'd like some rest," Evalyn responded, still acting as the responsible team leader.

"Then I'll go get this handled." Zolyra traced symbols in the air, and moments later all three wyvern bodies levitated and followed her out of the courtyard.

Tounaki was quick to follow suit. "Great to see you guys again, but I know I got potential from that and I'm sitting at 39 intelligence. Time to catch up to this guy." She rustled Murdon's non-existent hair and the two left for the house they were staying in, the Knight just giving the group a half-amused nod.

A layer of tension was cast in the next moment as Evalyn opened her mouth, still not having relaxed. "Everyone, get some rest. We have some things to talk about, but we can save it for the morning."

"Is something wrong?" Khiat asked, troubled. "I know the last hunt was bad, but that was because of the strong monster, right?"

"I don't want to bring it up now," Evalyn replied with a sigh. "Gods, I know how that sounds. No one is in trouble, Khiat, we just have kinks to work out and I'm exhausted. Let's get some rest and talk about it tomorrow."

"Sounds good," Daniel said, again trying to play mediator by not making a big deal out of things. "I've got some ammo to enchant and a new affix to play with, so I might as well get started."

"You're not going to wait for the wyvern parts?"

"Enchanting waits for no bones!" Daniel declared. He turned to the main house, ready to check in with Alex and then get a late dinner with Tak and Hunter, when Tlara coughed.

Everyone turned to her and she briefly glared at the world in general. Willow put a reassuring hand on her shoulder, and in the background Spinner was watching with what could have been called an encouraging smile if the visible mandibles didn't somewhat spoil it. "Fuck it. Hey, you two hang back."

Hunter tilted his head slightly as Tlara indicated him, and Daniel felt a little surprise too, though for different reasons. He actually hadn't expected Tlara to do what she was about to do. "It's alright, I'll see everyone tomorrow."

Even Willow and Spinner departed, leaving just Daniel, Hunter, and Tlara standing in the courtyard under the dark night sky. Under different circumstances they'd tried to kill each other. Daniel had asked Hunter to when Tlara had infected him with dominating parasites, and that was perhaps one of his biggest regrets.

He still didn't make it easy on the Beastmaster, and simply waited for her to say something while looking at her. Hunter likewise didn't fully understand what was going on despite the recent mental fusion. That didn't give them all the memories the other had, though it would have stood out if Daniel had thought about Tlara's promise while they'd been in that state.

The Beastmaster actually managed to persist through the awkwardness for a full minute, waiting for anyone other than her to break the silence. At some point, she realized it'd have to be her. "I didn't fucking know, alright?"

"About what?" Hunter asked with an eyebrow raised. He had kind of figured it out by now, but she still needed to say the words.

Slightly aggravated, Tlara threw one hand to the side. "You know. I didn't- everyone, literally everybody knew that monsters were just things that killed people. Fuck, the four we fought today would've turned this place into a frozen red mess if they'd gotten here. You want to tell me I shouldn't have dominated one of them?"

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Hunter continued to stare at her, keen enough to know that engaging with anything Tlara had just said was a mistake. Daniel himself knew that if they didn't let her get distracted, she'd get to the real point eventually. Tlara could feel remorse herself, it'd apparently been her hangup after Spinner restored her soul, she just… had trouble expressing that.

The Beastmaster looked again in the ringcat's eyes and saw what she'd refused to in the Thormundz. Her head twisted to where Daniel knew by aura Spinner was sheltering, and Tlara's shoulders fell. "I didn't know, ok? Finding out Spinner was one of them put me in a fucking depression for a month while I tried to deny it, and then I got fucking killed the moment I confronted that fact. I was dead almost as long as you were."

"What didn't you know?" Hunter pressed, fur completely still despite the predatory tone that might have otherwise suggested he was about to pounce.

"That you… he…" Her beak snapped shut, but then she let out a breath. "You. I didn't know you were you, and all I saw was some constant reminder of my fuckwit sister trying to get us all killed while acting like he knew everything. I didn't even think you were the same ringcat the whole time, because that wasn't how the world world fucking worked!" She vented more air, calming herself. "Pretty sure I told one or both of you to die a couple times. Crest, I did try to kill you once. I mean, the world was ending and here comes some fucking guy saying let's all be friends with monsters. So when his precious pet got hurt, I thought, 'let's just let it die, and then he'll learn his fucking lesson'."

That about adequately summed up what Tlara had done, and Daniel saw it had taken a lot for her to say that, but as he thought over her words he saw what was missing. They all did, and there was no escaping that. Tlara looked to the sky as if hoping for a dragon to come by and give her an excuse to run away, but none came.

"So, yeah. I was wrong. Fucking wrong. Not about everything, most monsters are still fucking evil, but you…" She squeezed her eyes shut and seemed in physical pain as she continued. "Hunter, you're a person. I'm sorry I didn't see that, and I'm sorry I didn't help you until Kob almost fucking choked me to death. I'm not going to stop dominating stuff because that's my class, and if anything Willow needs bodies to put spirits into, but I swear to you I'm not going to make the same mistake I did with Spinner."

Hunter continued to be guarded, though he spoke more than just a question this time. "I hated what you did, thought it was wrong. I saw you controlling those like me, taking pleasure in it, and I hated that. But they were empty, besides Spinner. Do you care about her?"

Daniel's eyes widened at the sheer viciousness of the question, as did Tlara. But he had her under the barrel, and she couldn't just bluster her way out of not answering, not unless she wanted to get through this with any semblance of honor. "I… Yeah, I do. I have no fucking clue what she is to me, other than that I am not her fucking mistress, but if anything tried to hurt her or Willow it's getting put the fuck down. The only reason that sparrow still exists is that I can't touch it."

"Now you know how Daniel felt when you tried to hurt me." Tlara did look for a moment as if Hunter had struck her and wasn't quick enough to brush it off for either not to notice.

"Y-yeah. That's why I'm here. I said I'm sorry, and I'm one of the only reasons you're breathing, so, so can we just move past this?"

Hunter thought for a moment, and then he nodded. "You could have taken another wyvern today. Instead, you thought about someone else. You cared when Spinner got hurt, even though you did something stupid because of it." Tlara grimaced at the reminder of how she'd almost gotten her sister killed, and had for that matter contributed to Toralaw's death, but wasn't going to interrupt Hunter now. "Your apology isn't this. Words have always been what I value least. Don't say you are sorry, be sorry, and then be better. I see you are trying, and what you have done is enough for me to leave my anger in the past."

Daniel smiled to himself as he heard Hunter's words, feeling like he was back to when Hunter had told him to stop treating him like a pet. Tlara was getting a dose of that now, and it was good medicine. She'd have ignored him before, but Willow had been working on more than just her spirits.

"After seeing what happened to Spinner… I mean, I still fucking hate that she acts like I'm the only thing in the world, I never wanted to dominate anything that could think," Tlara qualified, retreading old ground before finding somewhere to move on. "But it feels like… fuck, it feels like a good thing to do. If I can help Willow turn that murder bird into something that won't burn down the house the second we let it loose, I will. I didn't have anything to live for other than myself after I got kicked out of home. I guess I do now. It's stupid, risky, and who knows what the fuck is going to come of it, but I'm not blind enough to miss that it's the right thing to do."

"Then go and do it," Hunter said as he, not completely dismissively, turned away from Tlara and walked back to the house.

"I think that's as close to 'apology accepted' as you're going to get," Daniel commented. He saw the spaced out look in Tlara's eyes as she tracked the ringcat and he laughed. "That's the first time you've really talked to Hunter, isn't it?"

"Still so fucking weird. He was always like that?"

"No, in the beginning he was simpler. I think over time I was helping his spirit become whole again." Whether Hunter had fully repaired it by the time of his Growth or had needed that last push to get there was unclear, but also unimportant. "You really mean it, though? You're going to help Willow?"

Tlara shrugged. "The things we do for family, right?"

"Yeah." Reminded of someone he needed to talk to before going to his room, Daniel decided to try and catch her before it got too late. "We're good, Tlara. There's still things I dislike about you, but I think I could go so far as to call us friends."

"Asshole," Tlara murmured, and Daniel was vaguely glad for it if only to hedge against any potential bond from forming. "But yeah. Friends, whatever. You got Willow out of Aughal and your sister saved her by doing whatever the fuck that was with the sparrow, so I can't exactly hate you either."

Daniel knew that after sacrificing so much of her ego talking to Hunter, that was the best he was going to get. "Good talk."

…

Alex, as it turned out, was not preparing for bed but reading one of the unwanted books from the library. That she could at all was absurd to Daniel considering how short of a time she'd had to absorb the language, though at least it looked like she needed a few minutes per page as she puzzled out the meaning.

"Oh, hey," she greeted, putting it down and looking up. "You just missed Aslan. I think everyone was exhausted from your 'hunt'. Going to bed?"

Daniel barely registered the question, stunned by the deep memory Alex had pulled forth and the comparison. "You- Aslan?"

"Talking lion, it fits," she replied coyly. "Not saying he's a religious metaphor or anything. Unless you're still hiding some big secrets."

"I think I'd know if Hunter was secretly a god." Daniel took a seat, chuckling, and peeked at the spine of the book. "Why are you reading about the history of random avianoid noble houses? I'm sure we could find you some music books from this world."

"I don't have only one interest," Alex shot back, but then her voice lowered. "But, I also wanted to know more about that kid who died. He burned to death, Daniel. It's sticking with me, just a little. Someone mentioned his father had been this important person in this state's capitol, some Admiral something, and I thought I'd look him up."

Daniel wanted to ask how she was doing, apologize that it had happened, but he felt he would just be repeating the same things people had been telling her since she got here. Constantly handling her with kid gloves would only make her chafe, and if it weren't for magic and monsters overpowering her like the evolved wyvern had his team, he wouldn't be worried about Alex at all. "I'm sorry you're dealing with that. Want to talk about it?"

"No, not really," Alex answered honestly. "Between Quala and thinking about it myself I'd like time not to dwell on it." Daniel pointedly glanced at the book and she almost threw it at him. "I started reading other parts! Why don't we talk about your little field trip instead," she pivoted, making a concerted effort to sound like the fun aunt talking to her five year old nephew. "Did that magic help?"

"Yeah, actually, I would have-" Daniel abruptly cut off what he was about to say but Alex lightly glared at him, daring him to withhold the information. "It would have been bad if you hadn't given us the extra mana, though worst case I likely would have wasted a potion. Alex, I'm not going to lie, that power is awesome. Most teams can't afford one mana potion on each hunt and you effectively gave us all a better version of one."

"Well, glad I could help." She pushed the book around with a finger for a few moments before continuing. "Fighting wyverns, it almost sounds fun if I ignore everything I actually know. But after the yacht and a few nights ago, I just can't, Daniel. I'm not made for that. I'm honestly surprised you are."

"I had to adapt," Daniel explained. "I ended up in a far worse place than this, but I also had Hunter with me. We have this connection where we share just a little bit of each other's emotions, and over time a little bit of each of us crossed over."

"So that's why you're a furry now?" she asked with all the judgment of two worlds.

For the second time, Daniel was rendered speechless as Alex hit him over the head with earth culture he hadn't thought about in a while. "N-no. Who told you I could use that body?"

"No one, dumbass. I saw you training in the courtyard earlier with it." She beamed as if she had won all the points in the argument, and technically, she had been right. Not that he would give her the satisfaction of knowing that.

"Just wait, I'm sure you're going to get a song that makes you a werewolf or something," Daniel fired back.

Unfortunately, Alex had the perfect parry. "Didn't you tell me you couldn't get magic you didn't want?"

"Well-"

"So that would mean you did want to turn into some kind of half-cat, right?" Daniel stewed in his seat rather than dignify that with an answer, giving Alex the win. "I'm glad you're back safe. You're really going to use those bodies to enchant stuff with though?"

"You were listening?" Wait, of course she was, we were dropping wyvern bodies and talking about monster lore. No way Kahvin's family tree is more exciting than that. Stupid bird people and their open concept housing. "Yeah. I can enchant with monster bones and hide. You know, at first I thought it was boring, but it's starting to get fun. I figured out the trick behind how the god of enchanting does it and all signs point to me being able to learn it with enough practice." Alex had stopped fiddling with the book and had turned to stare at him. "What?"

"It's just the way you casually talk about how you met gods. Gods, Daniel. It's insane." The specter of Hourglass passed over both, but his name was not spoken. "I'm managing. Honestly this 'advancing' helps, it's like meditation with instant gratification."

"Wouldn't know," Daniel said, somewhat self-consciously taking his Focus out before waving it in the air. "I've just got original recipe instant gratification. I'm glad you're taking to it, at least. Think you'd be up for flying tomorrow?"

"The way you keep pushing that would make me think it's, well, flying," Alex chuckled. "I might be up for it."

"Being up for flying is generally the idea," Daniel said with an impish smile, and Alex scoffed at the joke. "You know, if you're not fighting you don't need wings like mine. Once I get the wyvern parts I could make you literal dragon wings. The form matters a little but as long as you're wearing them you'll get their effect." He still thought about his old ones sometimes, and the god who'd destroyed them. If there was a choice of who to save first, he knew who he was choosing.

He saw Alex's raised eyebrow and tilted his head slightly, not getting why she was looking so smug. "I'm not here for more than a few days here and you're already trying to drag me down into your debauchery."

"I'm not!" Daniel protested, but on the inside he was glad for the humor, even if it was at his expense. "Now, if you excuse me, I have some completely normal, PG enchanting to get to before I collapse into my bed. You good?"

"Yeah, thanks Daniel," Alex replied seriously. "I'm still not… ok with all of this, but there's good people here. Despite everything I do feel safe, and at least it's not boring."

"Nothing in this world is," Daniel said with complete confidence, before adding, "Well, now I'm off to stare at some bone for a few hours."

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