Claire took careful note of her surroundings as she took a breath, steeled her focus, and double checked her math. Only when certain of the computed result did she cast her dice.

Everything was perfectly calculated. She released the ivories at an angle of precisely 32.513 degrees. The way she curled her fingers caused the left one to spin exactly seven times, while the right did a whole nine and a half rotations. For a moment, it looked like the second die would spin off course, but a light bump from its twin ensured that it stayed on track.

The result was a six and a three. Coincidentally, nine was the exact number she'd needed to move her piece past an obnoxiously long pit. The miniaturized bunny leapt right over the hole, vaulted over a centaur, and landed on the board's sixty-seventh square.

"What the heck!?" cried Sylvia. "How the heck did you manage to roll exactly what you needed again!?"

"Luck."

"Yeah, right! You have to be cheating!"

"Noble ladies don't cheat."

"That's a blatant lie and you know it!"

"Did you sense any vectors?"

"Well uhmmmm… no, but that doesn't mean you weren't cheating!"

"I'm not." A faint smile on her face, Claire poked the furball's nose and handed her the dice. "Your turn."

"Just you wait, I'll get lucky too this time!" Sylvia shook the cubes between her paws and rolled them onto the board. She at least tried to cheat, but Claire drained her magic and interrupted her spell before she could tweak the outcome.

It was something that earned her a bit of a miffed glare, but that was the extent of her complaining. It wasn't possible for Sylvia to say anything aloud without admitting her guilt.

"I guess eight isn't too bad," she said, as the dice landed on a pair of fours. The furball started moving her piece, only to gasp and groan as she found herself in a pit that took her all the way back to the start. "Noooo! Not again!"

Rubia, who was on the opposite side of the board, giggled as she retrieved the dice and did a roll of her own.

It was evening, just some thirty minutes after sundown. Arciel and Chloe had already returned to their quarters, the former to work on her magic, and the latter because she'd finally stopped sulking and returned to form. Claire had considered heading back as well, but ultimately wound up hanging out in her sister's bedroom. Officially speaking, the room was supposed to be hers. It was filled with the very same furniture that had accompanied her throughout her life, but the arrangement thereof made the space almost entirely unrecognizable.

As far as Claire was concerned, her room was up in Augustus manor. It was located on the eastern side of the building and obnoxiously lit up every morning; the sun loved to stream through the ugly, stained-glass window that depicted the goddess of war. Back then, her quarters had featured little beyond the bare necessities. She didn't have any time to explore her interests under her father's thumb; her two choices were to practice or study. Rubia, however, had covered the walls in beautiful canvases. The left half of the room was so packed with paint buckets that it might as well have been a warehouse. Her desk was likewise piled high with advanced nonfiction and textbooks, most of which discussed topics that her tutors had yet to cover. And the shelves were covered in board games, many of which she frequently played with the maids.

The difference was something that Claire valued. She didn't plan on returning even after all the dust settled, and she was even less keen on displacing the cutie pie holding down the fort in her absence.

As much as she would have liked to continue with her contemplation, it was her turn again—Rubia had vaulted over a centaur, and Boris had rolled a pair of snake-eyes. Claire began to run through the math in her head, only to stop and pinch her brow. Nearly flicking her tongue in annoyance, she quickly ordered her magical outfit to shift from a casual dress into a suit of armour.

Both the others looked at her, confused.

"There's a pest on the way."

It was difficult to tell with all the hooves going up and down the hall, but one particular set was rapidly approaching the door. Even without her divinity and oversensitivity, Claire recognized its owner in a heartbeat. There was only one person she knew that so frequently and excitedly tripped over her own four feet.

"Claire! I'm here to visit!" Said person knocked on the door after a moment's delay and then burst right through without awaiting an answer. "It's me, your cousin!"

Claire sighed as Octavia entered center stage, loud and obnoxious as ever.

She didn't hesitate for a moment to stomp across the room and awkwardly throw her arms around the person that she presumed was Claire. The difference in their height made it more of a diving tackle, especially considering that she hadn't succeeded in reducing her speed.

Rubia, who was completely caught off guard, only blinked as she was violently squeezed. Evidently, Octavia had never paid her any visits, at least not before she had managed to rise from her supposed bedridden state.

"You didn't dodge this time," said Octavia, with a gasp. "Does that mean you're still not okay? Wait, that doesn't even make sense. Didn't you just kill a goddess? You have to be okay, right?"

The release and subsequent bombardment was met with a perfectly blank stare, not because Rubia was mimicking her sister, but because she simply didn't know what she was supposed to say or do.

"Wait, you have a guest?" Only during that awkward silence did Octavia realise that "Claire" wasn't alone. "Is that a man? That doesn't seem very appropriate, especially considering that the two of you are unsupervised." Octavia gasped. "Or are you supposed to be in a relationship?" She paused for a moment to scrutinize the visitor before gasping again. Considering her involvement in the proxy war, it was almost too long of a delay. "Wait, I recognize that armour! He's one of Vel'khan's, isn't he? I think he was supposed to be their anchor! He's the one that you said was handsome too! Oh my gosh!"

"Uhmmm… I don't really think they're like that," said Sylvia.

"Are you sure? They're both apparently really strong and also kind of secretive, so it might be the perfect match," said Octavia. "Wait, who said that?"

"I did," said Sylvia, while the horse looked around the room.

"Huh?" She started by staring at the real Claire, but realised that was probably wrong after a few too many moments of consideration.

"Down here."

It was only at the express cue that she eventually lowered her gaze and found the waving fox.

"Oh! Sorry, I didn't see you there," she said. "What was your name again? Sorry, I remember that you were a crazy strong bard, but I kind of forgot the rest."

"I'm Sylvia! Sylvia Redleaf."

"Redleaf?" Octavia blinked. "Are you adopted?"

"What the heck!?" cried Sylvia. "Why would I be adopted!?"

"Because you're clearly a fox, and Redleaf is an elf name."

"That doesn't mean I'm adopted, and asking would be super rude, even if I was!" cried the furball. "For your information, my dad was an elf!"

"Really? That's weird," said Octavia. "I didn't know that elven children were fox-shaped."

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Uhmm… I'm not a kid either. And I'm pretty sure elf kids just look like normal elves."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes! Everyone knows that!" Sylvia looked around the room for support, but the best she got was a couple of nods. Neither Claire nor Rubia could be bothered to speak.

"Weird," said Octavia. "Wait… are you a druid?"

"No! My mom was a fox!"

"Huh? Why would an elf breed a fox? Your parents are weird."

"Wow! That's so rude!"

"Sorry, but it's true. Being attracted to foxes is just weird," said Octavia with a blink.

"Wha!?" Sylvia was about to start going off, but Claire pinched her lips shut before she could and gently ran her hands through her fur.

"Ignore her. You're just going to get caught up in her stupidity," she whispered.

Though she wasn't very happy about the whole situation, she eventually settled down, nodded, and whispered back. "Fine."

"Good dog."

"I'm not a dog!"

Octavia stared silently while the two completed their inaudible exchange, her eyes growing narrower with every moment that passed.

"Do I know you from somewhere?" Eventually, she called out to Claire with a bit of a frown.

"I doubt it." Eventually, she replied in an echoey, androgynous voice. "Who are you?"

"My name is Octavia Augustus, and I am presently the head of the non-royal splinter of House Augustus. You may refer to me as Duchess Augustus, Madame August—wait! How do you not know who I am!? I'm literally the proxy war's host!"

Octavia continued to blab about something or other, but Claire summarily ignored her.

She'd already shifted her focus elsewhere.

Something strange was happening.

Portals were opening deep underground, far beneath the point the locals could be bothered to settle.

___

Hemlik Raja bit his lips, seething with rage as he stomped his way down an empty hall. Bits of dust fell from the ceiling with each violent step. He hated it. He was a lieutenant general, one of the highest ranking officers in the Obloyd army. And yet, he was stuck scurrying around like a shameless rat too fearful to venture beyond its hole.

What he hated most was not his cowardice, however, but the ease of its rationalization. He was hiding from the Cadrians because he had no other choice. No Obloyd agent had ever returned from Cadrian lands alive, and while he had yet to be discovered, he didn't feel like pushing his luck. Perhaps he might have made the attempt had he a more espionage-oriented skillset, but he'd never been fond of such cowardice. Though young, Hemlik was the sort of commander that rose through the ranks relying on brute force alone—a reality made obvious by the way he kicked down the door before him.

Barging into the office, he slammed his hand against a wall and knotted the tentacles that adorned his chin.

"What the fuck!? What the actual fuck is wrong with you!?" He couldn't help but scream as he found his eyes on the two supposed heroes seated inside. Both were lounging, with one blissfully asleep in her seat, and the other reading a book nearby. "Get the hell up! Right now!"

"Griselda's tits, calm down," said the girl with the book. She, Hrefna Ellrun Eirsdotter, was uniquely identifiable at a glance. Her base was obviously Kryddarian, but only because she was a white, winged moth. Unlike the rest of her species, which was at least somewhat humanoid, Hrefna had no such features. She was simply a giant, person-sized bug with a handful of extra parts. The most notable was the second, smaller head that grew out of the top of her first. It was fully functional and could twist and turn a full 360 degrees without even a hint of trouble. Though it lacked anything that resembled a mouth, it had four giant compound eyes built for omnidirectional vision. Her main head had, likewise, morphed to accommodate. The eyes there had swapped places with her jaws just so she could better see beneath her.

Her wings were extra long and draped over her whole body like a shield. And in fact, her scales had just that property; they were capable of repelling both physical and magical attacks, though they were far more attuned to the latter. Frankly, her appearance was entirely offputting, eerie enough that even just looking at her made him want to vomit.

On any other day, he would have smiled and nodded, bearing with the fact that he had to treat the creature with respect. But with her most recent failure, he was far too annoyed to bother.

"Calm down? Calm down!? I wouldn't need to fucking calm down if you killed the right fucking elf!"

The oversized moth sighed. "Look, I already said I was sorry. But it really wasn't my fault. Your instructions sucked."

"My instructions were carefully and expertly crafted," he spat. "You were just too fucking stupid to follow them!"

"You can't seriously expect me to end up where you want if all you're going to say is that I have to make nineteen consecutive right turns."

"It was literally that easy. All you needed to do was turn every time you came across a street and keep count of the total."

"Maybe if you mentioned that you were including one way streets."

"I told you that you were supposed to turn every time you had the goddamn chance."

"That doesn't really make it all that much clearer." The moth sighed. "You could've at least given me the hotel's name."

"The whole point was for you not to know it, just in case the plan leaked."

"And look how that wound up. It was clearly flawed from the start."

"Fuck you," he said. "It wouldn't have been a fucking problem if you just learned to follow simple instructions."

"Oh, come on, General. Don't be so hard on her." The other girl in the room got up with a yawn. Unlike the freak, Mila was actually pleasant to look at. She had a thick, muscular frame and a beautifully round stomach. Her skin was perfectly pink, coloured just the right way for one to readily spot the jaw-dropping stretch marks that adorned her calves, her biceps, and her incredible, rounded belly. If she entered ten kollondite beauty contests, she was sure to win at least nine hands down.

Under any other circumstances, Hemlik would have melted the moment he saw her, but her lack of brain cells overpowered all semblance of desire.

"You shut the hell up. You were literally right there with her," he said. "How the hell did both of you get it wrong!?"

"Like I said, it wouldn't have been a problem if you just told us where we were going," said the moth.

"And then what? You give yourself away by asking around for directions? That's not any better."

"Now you're just being paranoid," said Mila.

"I'm not being paranoid, I'm being pragmatic." Hemlik unknotted his tentacles and pressed them into his face. "We don't know how they're finding our people or why none of them are making it out of the country. We never know who's listening. Hell, they could be eavesdropping right now, and we'd be none the wiser." He massaged the bridge of his nose as he spoke. He was tired. Serving duty abroad was always exhausting, but the Cadrian campaign was even more so.

"Sounds like paranoia to me," said Hrefna.

"She's right, General." A man with a flippant smile stepped through the door with a wave. "Just relax. I'll take care of everything."

He was an odd creature with an overall bird-like frame. He had talons for feet and a sharp beak at the tip of an angular skull. His giant, light-blonde wings were attached not to his shoulders, but the back of his head. When not in use, he folded them down so they decorated his body as would a head of long, flowing hair. That much was normal for his species—the only amberwings whose heads weren't filled with feathers were those who specialized in running—but that was also the only part of him for which the statement applied.

After all, Sootbeak was otherwise deprived of avian qualities. Or any qualities whatsoever.

The rest of his body simply didn't exist. The entirety of his being could be summed up as a head, two hands, and two sharpened feet. He hadn't always been that way, of course. The man had been born looking like the rest of his people, but his third ascension had transformed him into a voidbeast centered around a hole of nothingness, and his fourth had afforded him the ability to further explore the concept. His body was a portal to nothing. Anything that touched it would be affected by his ultimate and sent straight to an infinitely empty expanse. Coincidentally, clothes were no exception.

"You be quiet," said Hemlik. The dristle slapped his collar with his tentacles. "The last thing I want right now is to deal with you and your stupid ideas."

"Hey, my ideas are great."

"Look in the mirror."

"What do you mean?"

"You know what? Nevermind," said Hemlik, with a sigh. "Look, I get it. I shouldn't be pointing fingers, and I get it. I kind of fucked up too. We'll just have to try it again."

"Same plan?" asked Hrefna.

"With Sootbeak finally here, we can probably do one better," said Hemlik. "Have you checked out the castle?"

"Yup," said the void hero, with a yawn. "I can take the shield down no problem. They'll know right away, but breaking past it is easy, and I can get out no problem."

"Good," said Hemlik, with a smirk. "Hrefna and Mila, you two will take care of Gladora. Sootbeak, I want you to break into the castle and kill Vel'khan's combatant."

"Sure," he said, with a yawn. "Are you coming too, or am I running solo?"

"I'll throw in some support if you need it, but I've got something different in mind." He said, as he crossed his arms. "I'm gonna pay their princess a visit."

The other three exchanged a set of pensive looks.

"It'll be fine," said the general, with a crack of the neck. "I know what I'm doing."

Again, he was met with skepticism, but the tentacle-faced man remained ever sure that all would go as planned.

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