Ten buildings later and I've found tons of trinkets that I've collected into easily found piles out of the weather for the procurers to collect. What I've not found is anything from Garrick. Until now I've just been moving building to building, but I need to change my tack, since Garrick clearly wasn't searching through every building.

  Which is something I should have assumed. He's hunting for something that explicitly left here.

  More time wasted.

  I need to find something that would have likely been a hotspot of activity… Probably something off of the town square.

  I pick my way through the buildings towards the center and realize I'm moving down the exact road I entered from that night and feel a creeping sense of discomfort as I get closer. There's no smoke, it's not dark, and unlike before, there are no bodies around. It stands out as odd. The release of death-related essences in the area would surely have attracted monsters once the Calamity departed, but if they were eaten by monsters or something, I would expect there to be remnants. But it's just another strange layer to everything surrounding this anomalous calamity.

  The streets are still disheveled: broken handcarts, parked wagons, streetlights knocked over with their essence emitters missing, fully or partially collapsed buildings, and intermittent piles of null-dust that may be the remains of an animal, a person, or just a random object linger. The depersonalizing nature of how aetheric collapse affects things is depressing. If there were bodies left over, we could take image captures of them to form a record of the loss. Instead, we're left picking through scraps of artifacts to try to reassemble an entire town with barely any clues.

  As I arrive in the town square, it's nearly entirely silent — like the rest of the town — aside from an intermittent splashing and a light burbling sound. The splashing is clearly coming from a fountain in the center of the square.

  The fountain looks like it's carved from large marble blocks and has several statues atop it. In the center is a woman with sharp features holding a watering pail over her head with a joyous expression, and spaced evenly around her are five flowers — posies, I think — that would be emitting their own jets. But most don't appear to be working. Every five or so seconds the watering pail sends up a single weak jet of water a few feet from its central sprayer, but none of the other ones seem to be able to activate. Likely due to a lack of Hydrus essence in the region to properly condense into water.

  But that doesn't explain the bubbling sound. I cast around and try to dial it in. After a few moments of walking around and listening closer, they seem to be coming from the sturdiest structure in the square. A large, brick-wrought structure with an open front under a pergola roof. All kinds of workstations are arrayed under the roof, looking like a free-use setup. Farther back, there's a kiosk opening in the building next to a door, and within is more involved trades tools. A forge, anvil, various essence powered machines, woodworking tools, and other professional looking equipment.

  Getting closer, the burbling gets louder and seems to be coming from multiple sources. Maybe some equipment that's struggling after not being tended for these weeks?

  I poke my head inside the front kiosk and see something that makes me sigh.

  Metal slimes. Three of them.

  They're largely amorphous, if slightly in the shape of a fat teardrop. Two look like liquid steel, and a third, the largest by easily three times, appears to be gold. They bubble amongst themselves as if they're talking to one another. All the while, they're pulling themselves along with extended pseudopods and sticky bodies. Trailing behind each is a line of space entirely devoid of metals — wooden handles, crystals that would have been embedded in tools and machines, and gems. All obviously pieces of goods that these annoying creatures have "recycled".

  The large gold one is currently sitting on what looks like it may have been an automatic hammer of some kind, but it's hard to tell through the mostly opaque golden slime and from the damage that's been done to the machine by its tender ministrations.

  I hate slimes. The Vigil in general considers them one of the greatest annoyances in the world because of this exact behavior. Every variety of slime — of which there are hundreds of recorded species and subspecies — will seek out specific types of essence bearing items and consume it to gain that essence for themselves. Most are all but defenseless, and they are one of the few monsters in the world given over to fleeing instead of fighting to the death to gain power.

  So, they work in direct opposition to what we do. They show up in places that other monsters usually won't — due to low free essence density, such as in the wake of a Calamity — and destroy things to power themselves. For seemingly no purpose. Destroying remnants of anything they can to harvest essence to form cores that, by all accounts, they're incapable of making use of. Very few slimes, as far as our records go, have ever manifested aggressive abilities beyond very basic attack magic. They might attack people occasionally, but that's usually only for particularly large slimes. They'll never tussle with anything larger than them in any dimension. Thus their prey are primarily things the size of a housecat or smaller.

  My sigh alerts the two steel slimes, each of which would come up to midway up my thigh, and they spin around to look at me. Spin is maybe the wrong word. The "face" that they have squeezes through their body to appear on the side facing me. Another reason I hate these things: they look weirdly cute. Which, considering what they are, makes me distinctly uncomfortable.

  Their faces look generally cheerful — wide, colorful, and bright orbs acting as eyes and a loose approximation of a mouth formed by a depression in their body. A mouth that almost always looks like a smile.

  Except for moments like this where it looks like they're experiencing open-mouthed, jaw-dropping terror.

  The steel slimes emit a hellish squeal and immediately burst into motion as I watch, giving up their slow efforts of dissolving metals to instead hop and bounce around wildly looking for an exit that isn't the window I'm currently blocking — presumably their entry point. There's a door in the rear that appears to be closed and locked by a dropped bar that one decides to start throwing itself at in its panic.

  While the steel ones scream around in obvious panic, the gold one that's eating machinery turns to look at me and narrows its eyes like it's considering a very, very difficult question. It almost looks angry, and it might succeed in looking so if they weren't such pathetic and cowardly creatures. Instead, all it succeeds in looking like is like it has an unpleasant stomachache.

  Deciding if it can fight me. And I know what it's likely likely answer is. It's probably two inches taller than me in its current configuration.

  I draw my knives slowly and start to call and shape Ignia. Forming it into a simple spell to imbue my weapons with concentrated heat.

  [Puncture]

  [Weapon Imbuement | Ignia]

  Ignia pours from the vents in my armor and into the runes adorning my fighting knives. The moment they begin to fill with power, the tip and front edge of the knives begins to emit waves of concentrated heat. The display of spell power sees the gold slime face make an ultimately very poor decision. It opens up its mouth to use one of the few attacks in the arsenal of the slime species. It spits a small fireball at me that I slash with a knife to disperse. In response, I immediately vault the window and watch its face return to the typical slime reaction of fear as it starts to try to pull itself off of the machine it's stuck on to minimal success.

  I cover the gap in two strides, striking down at one of the steel slimes as I pass with a sweep that bites into its metallic goo with great resistance — demonstrating the necessity of my spell. Mineralis, the essence of metals and minerals, is severely weakened by Ignia, so it let's me get past the one unique trait of metal slimes — near invulnerability. The slash nearly severs the creature in two and ends its squeal on a high note. On the final stride, the gold one adds its own voice to the horrible racket for a brief moment before I swing my knives through it a few times in a flurry to put it down.

  The last one, seeing an opening now that I'm on the other side of the room, emits an almost gleeful blub and launches itself towards the window — only to be caught in the air by my thrown knife spinning end over end to sever it in two.

  The occasional sputter of the fountain outside reasserts itself as the sole sound of the town as the slimes break down into freed essence and dump anything partially dissolved onto the floor. A couple soft chimes and tinkles ring out from behind me as the gold slime finishes dissipating.

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  Looking closer, it's got a half dozen tiny Mineralis cores and a pile of mostly dissolved coins sitting where it used to be, amongst the spreading cloud of free essence breaking down to diffuse into the relatively essence starved region.

  "You broke all of these things, and for what?" I ask the pile of shiny metallic orbs, "Barely enough essence to enchant a weapon? That firebolt you spat probably used more essence than you've gotten from eating the remains of someone's hard work in here." Distantly, I gather the coins and cores as I scold the memory of the slime. "Serves you right. This place has suffered enough without your pitiful scavenging."

  Slightly richer for the effort here, I decide to dig around for anything identifying I can grab or make obvious. Most of the personal effects here appear to have been metal, composed largely of metal, or used metal for major sections of reinforcement. As such, the workshop is covered in a pile of largely unidentifiable pieces of wood, crystal, and gems.

  There's a desk at the window I hopped in, with a tall stool for sitting, and that seems like as good a place to start as any. The desk itself is clean by dint of everything having apparently been shoved off by the slimes. At least, if the scattering of normally-on-desks things that are now on-the-floor things is anything to go by. Aside the missing handles and the mess, the desk is a masterwork. Fine carvings that could easily be used as the base for runic enchanting cover the entire surface. The carvings themselves depict a short haired young boy singing with someone I presume to be a mother figure in a glade. It's a clear work of love of with the woman and boy being detailed down to the smallest of details and several buildings in the distance of the carving clearly representing this towns meager skyline.

  Luckily, slimes aren't really dextrous or smart enough to deal with things like handles and latches, so enclosed spaces are usually safe — but on a closer look, it's not for want of trying in this case. Every single handle or knob is missing from all of the drawers, up to and including a partially dissolved hook for hanging a lock on a central, fairly large drawer. I pull that one open as I sit on the sturdy stool. The odds of personal effects being in a locked drawer are way higher, after all.

  It slides smoothly and silently on internal runners to reveal a felted interior of rich purple. There's a handful of expensive looking pieces of jewelry sitting in small boxes, a fair sized brown ledger, and a set of fine jewelers tools. None of the jewelry has nametags or anything else attached and the tools are similarly unmarked, but the ledger probably will have something relevant inside.

  I heft it out carefully and set it on the desk. The front reads Meadowfields Workshop: Records.

  That gives me a bit of a giddy excitement. This sort of thing, depending on how dutiful the keeper was, can be the sort of thing that allows us to identify huge swathes of the town. I quickly flip it open and start to skim through. The handwriting is meticulous, with dates, times, addresses, names, and item descriptions.

  It's an actual gold mine for our purposes here. Flipping to the rear, I find that the records go back twenty-five years. Marking down the start of this business existing. The first order placed is marked down as a crib by special request from an Allaya Parchess for her newborn named…

  Allanius.

  The same name as the person from the barn. In a town this size there's virtually no chance of there being two people with a name like that — it's definitely not Eldaran in origin. It also means he was probably only a couple years younger than me. Could even have been the same age depending on the timing.

  That returns my morose mood, much to my discomfort. The sad, cold feeling is punctuated by a simmering anger with myself.

  "This one person coming up twice shouldn't affect me so much. Who cares if he was nearly my age? I'm sure dozens of people here were." I scold myself internally but find myself flipping forward through time in this book, almost frantically, looking for any of the three names; Allaya, Allanius, or Parchess.

  Three years after the crib, a new bed. Placed by Allaya Parchess.

  Two years after that, a full size bed and a wardrobe. Placed by Allaya Parchess

  Later that year, a water-stained page. An order for a headstone. Placed by Allanius Parchess.

  The marked year is the same year my parents died, to the month, and it's just really too much for me right now.

  Drawing in a deep and increasingly ragged breath, I close the ledger and tuck it back into the drawer slowly. After I close it, I reach down and grab a piece of paper from the ground and a pen from the loose pile of scattered things and begin to write in blocky, controlled Eldaran common.

  Ledger within desk, center drawer contains most relevant identifying information for large sections of the town.

  Be guided by the Watcher's sight. Nyssa Vigil

  I set a couple loose items atop it after wiping away a few water stains; a small knife, a river-smoothed blue stone, and a small wooden carving of the Watcher's eye. The note secured, I look up and out at the town square to see something I missed when I first arrived.

  Next to the entrance to a chapel, pinned onto a bulletin board, I see a glowing Vigil sigil giving off an impossible to ignore white light just above the board and carved into the stone wall. I stand to make my way over, hopping through the window once more to leave those bitter memories in the desk and the past.

  The chapel is one dedicated to the major religions of Eldara. Namely the ones surrounding The Watcher, The Traveller, and the Rootmother, and as such has each of the symbols of the three on proud display on its high tower beneath the church bell. The Watcher's eye, The Traveller's tome, and the Rootmother's tree. Each one is in a different quadrant of a triangle broken into 4 equal smaller triangles. The symbols are in the outer ones, and the central one contains the crest of the Eldaran crown — notably and deliberately smaller than the others.

  As I approach I make the hand-sign of fealty to the symbols at the center of my chest, bringing my thumbs and fingers together to form the outside of the four-parted triangle. The familiar action fills me a little bit of warmth that dispels a bit of my turmoil. The Watcher's guidance has never steered me wrong. They guide the faithful to those who are in need, and it's always held true.

  If we hadn't hesitated on our way into town, I wouldn't have been able to help the horse, resources be damned. If I hadn't dropped those glowstones, I wouldn't have noticed my shadow being wrong. If I hadn't gone in to fight those slimes, found the ledger, and sat to read it, I may have not seen Garrick's sigil.

  I let out my breath slowly, peace returning to my mind comfortably. Through good and bad, even before I was aware of them, the Watcher has guided me and those around me.

  The thought makes me angle away a little bit towards the door of the chapel. Garricks sigil can wait a few moments. This chapel hasn't seen a devotee in weeks and I could use the peace.

  Pushing both doors wide open to let light and air into the space, warmth rushes out to meet me like an embrace. Inside, there's even lighting, all being filtered in through stained glass windows and light columns coming down through crystal ports on the high steepled roof of the main room. It bathes the room in the prismatic light that the Rootmother is known for having beneath her branches.

  There's ten rows of intermixed seating and kneeling positions to afford a comfortable method of seating for any and all Kyn that might come to join the proceedings normally. The wood in use for the furniture is the same dark spruce that most of the towns buildings are made of or accented by. Along the walls are the stained glass windows depicting the three deific figures of the Eldaran pantheon — the Watcher, the Traveller, and the Rootmother — in the largest windows set into the granite stone walls, but the smaller ones also pay homage to other common and uncommon faiths on the continent.

  Finally, at the head of the building is the dais where a Speaker would stand while extolling whatever lessons are relevant at that time or merely voicing their thoughts on ongoing matters. Anyone can ultimately stand in as a Speaker, even if there are people who dedicate their lives to being one. All voices are heard, ultimately; such are the teachings of the Rootmother.

  Some damage and decay is present, unfortunately. Some seating is broken, most essence lamps are sputtering at best, and a large cabinet behind the central dais has fallen over. I resign to straightening things before heading back to Vari or at least before leaving the town to seek Garrick.

  That decided, I pick my way forward. While the space is empty, these are the one place I never feel alone, so when I arrive at the front, before the podium to kneel, the warmth of the room has me feeling at peace.

  There's a series of sharp metallic taps as my greaves and boots settle onto the stone floor. From there I extend my arms down and away from my side at a forty five degree angle such that my gauntleted fingers only just touch the ground — making a rough triangle of my body with my head as the apex corner and my hands being the lower points. A natural extension of the smaller one made with the hands.

  Without a Speaker, though, I announce the catechisms myself with my head leaned back and eyes closed.

  "Watcher, who guides us to those who most need us, take my hand to lead me t-"

  I pause as I hear a scratching. Tapping? It stops as quickly as it comes, though, so I chalk it up to some small beast or another — like a rat — or something rubbing in the wind outside.

  "Take my hand and lead me to those who need my strength mos-"

  Scratching and tapping again.

  I break my prostrated pose and grab my helmet as I slowly rise. By the time I finish rising, I snap it into place and will power into the sensory enhancements. All of the small noises around me are amplified. A bird chirps on the other side of the wall near the window. The spatter of the fountain. A faint rub of two plates on my armor.

  After a few moments, the scratching and tapping happens again. I snap my head around and look back at the dais…no…beyond it. I step forward atop the platform and listen closely again. The noise comes from the cabinet or beneath it.

  Without any delay, I walk over and heft the large, heavy cabinet back onto its legs to reveal a trapdoor partially covered by a carpet. The part that wasn't covered by the cabinet has a small viewing window, from which the scratching noise is carried again. Suspicion grips me. Thinking of any number of things it might — none of them terribly likely. The immediate thought is the Calamity, but there's no way it would have made it back here and then gotten stuck underneath a cabinet in a trapdoor.

  Running it through my head, I can only really think of one option relating to the Calamity, and that's someone hiding. I kneel and look into the viewing slit and see something that stops my heart and mind dead in their tracks.

  Is that even a relevant joke anymore? Definitely carbon dating me on the internet, if nothing else.

  A good friend of mine has a story they're working on that I wanted to share, too