Everin felt the Ruby aura before he spotted the man in the air, slightly surprised to see the raven bck wings still keeping the man aloft since he had thought they were an Augment that would burn out upon Ascension.

  While the wings and armor looked the same as he remembered not even a day earlier, he had to do a double-take as the man within looked vastly different with a younger appearance and fiery red hair. Upon realizing who exactly that hair reminded him of, Everin gave a wide grin as he greeted, “Daddy Waynd! I see even your soul has embraced your new daughter.”

  Paul gave him a ft look and retorted, “You know they won’t even ask me if you actually deserved retribution, right?”

  His cheeks almost hurt from the banter and his smile stretched further as he asked, “True, but then who else would look after your lovely child as she battles monsters to make her daddy proud?”

  Golden eyes rolled at him as Paul said, “Speaking of, I have them going down the ET Road until you get there. I told them to wait for you, but I doubt they’ll listen.”

  “Oh, you really are getting good at this daddy role if you’re already able to see the rebellious acts coming.”

  Paul narrowed his gaze on him and asked, “Are you determined to keep referring to me by that with every sentence?”

  “Yes, daddy,” he cheekily replied.

  Then Paul seemed to vanish from in front of him, his low Emerald senses not able to keep up or even sense the man’s now retracted aura. He turned around only to get his forehead gently flicked by the Ruby Caster that now looked younger than he did.

  “Go look after the other kids, fox kit,” Paul said, surprising him by returning the grin.

  Everin flushed in embarrassment that he rarely felt then shook himself as he stepped back, gave a mocking bow, and said, “As the Lord Padin Daddy commands.”

  As he turned to leave, Paul called out to him, “Hey, Everin?”

  He turned back, surprised once more by the use of his name, and wondered exactly what all had changed from ascending to Ruby as the Wrath Bde said, “You can just call me Paul.”

  “Phoenix! You okay in there?” Dazien’s voice sounded in her mind, “Keep talking to me, Princess.”

  “Think I could make this thing choke on me?” she replied, trying to attach herself to the roof of the monster’s mouth before sliding down its gullet, “Uriel, does this thing have a gag reflex?”

  “How the Abyss would anyone know that?” Rayna chimed in right before Uriel replied in his ever-calm mid-combat response.

  “No, they often swallow things whole, slowly digesting them in a magically reinforced stomach that breaks down the prey and converts the physical bits into raw mana. There’s been quite a bit of study on—”

  “I’m gonna stop you there, big guy,” the bard interjected, “I don’t think Phoenix wants the details on how she’s going to die in there.”

  “Such wonderful confidence in my survival skills,” Phoenix grumbled sarcastically, using her [Cosmic Talons] to embed her hands and feet into the soft flesh she was clinging onto in an attempt to avoid gnashing teeth or getting swallowed as she tried to recover a bit. She had a couple of minutes in the dragon form before the recoil effects would likely spell her doom, and she knew she’d need to get out of this before then.

  “Oh, I know you’ll survive… I’ll see you back at the estate ter,” Rayna teased, and Phoenix tried to send a mental eye roll. “Ouch! Spawn of a—”

  “Rayna?” she asked at the cut-off sound of pain, “You good?”

  “Yeah, sorry. Daze was right about the stupid flower things,” Rayna replied, “Stings like crazy, but looks like it’s not Corrupted, at least.”

  Suddenly the creature rocked to the side, dislodging her feet from their perch as she swung wildly at the force.

  “Hey! We don’t actually want her to die in there, Ray,” Dazien scolded.

  “This thing is tough for a Sapphire! Does the soft and squishy bits on the outside give it more resistance or something?”

  “Actually, yes, they—”

  “Are there squishy bits on the inside?” the bard asked, interrupting the imminent lecture from Uriel.

  “Um… No?”

  “I am not getting swallowed, Rayna!” Phoenix yelled over the connection.

  “Maybe your sword?” Saiya asked calmly before reminding her, “You’re almost out of time, Phoenix. The recoil will hit before your portal is ready again.”

  She groaned silently but conjured her sword, hoping the longer bde would be able to actually stab deep enough to hurt it. Aiming straight up at the roof of its mouth, she thrust it forward a bit awkwardly with a cwed hand.

  A sickly green goo rushed out as the Marsh Walker howled again. She was filled with the immediate need to vomit as she was drenched in the milky substance, which reminded her of some kind of watery mucus, “Oh gross, gross, gross! I think some got in my mouth.”

  “Getting blood in your mouth isn’t that uncommon when fighting, Phoenix. Come on, we’ve talked about that before,” Rayna grumbled.

  “This is definitely not blood,” she coughed out, feeling her arms get a bit weak. Just as she thought that her grip on the roof of its mouth and the hand pushing upwards on the sword to hold it in pce would give out, the creature’s waxy leaf-like tongue pushed her entire body against the ceiling.

  The goop drenched her as the movement caused her sword to shift and another gush of the grossness spilled out, “Oh gods, there’s so much. Is there magical mouthwash in the city? I’m not putting that Golden Shower potion in my mouth.”

  The voices in her head went silent for too long before Dazien asked, “Senesh? What would it bleed other than blood?”

  When the tongue finally fell back, Phoenix’s arms actually gave out at the same time and she fell from her pce, bringing her sword with her and cursing the disgusting waterfall it caused. That was when she realized that her body wasn’t responding to her commands anymore.

  “Oh, that’s likely the paralyzing saliva it has so the prey doesn’t fight back from within. Make sure not to get any on your skin.”

  “Why didn’t you say that earlier?!” Rayna shouted.

  “Well, I tried, but you said she wouldn’t want to know how she would die.”

  “Execute it with me, Ray!” Dazien commanded, and another moment ter she was shaken again. This time, she came dangerously close to the gyrating teeth attempting to grind her to bits. She tried stabbing it one more time, hoping the gums between said teeth wouldn’t release more saliva.

  She missed her target with her half-numb arms but succeeded in making it not eat her anymore when her sword nded between its teeth to get chomped down on hard enough that the bde snapped in two.

  The resulting explosion should have killed her she thought, but her reconjured [Sun Shell] and increased dragon form stats must have been enough as the creature’s head exploded as well. She was flung away from the resulting mess, which quickly shifted to blue ash as her aura’s looting power triggered.

  “What happened? That wasn’t your [Supernova],” Dazien asked frantically over the voice chat even as she was vaguely aware of him making his way toward her. Rayna beat him to it, pouring a healing potion over her wounds as she muttered out the moderate version of her own heal this time.

  “Sword… exploded,” she finally managed to croak aloud, then added as she felt her body begin to shift back and the power drain from her, “Time’s up.”

  A bright light suddenly enveloped her as she heard a familiar voice say, “If Paul asks, I was here the whole time before you fought the thing, okay?” As she weakly tilted her head back to look at the pale voxen, Everin Starrk said, “I’d rather he think I miscalcuted an item exploding in an unfortunate accident over not being here at all.”

  As the Emerald Caste rejuvenating energy filled her, staving off the potential death from the recoil effects, she gave a shuddering groan as her body slowly rexed.

  The st thing she registered was the cheeky Cleric chuckling and saying, “Nap time.”

  Phoenix put her face directly in the path of Saiya’s [Cleansing Stream] ability, the most recent to be upgraded, with her mouth wide open to wash away the monster’s ash and gooey memories immediately upon awakening.

  Ability: Cleansing Stream

  Type: Spell (channel, elemental, water)

  Cost: Low mana per second.

  Cooldown: None.

  Current caste: Sapphire 1 (1%)

  Crystal Effect: Channel a stream of water that thoroughly cleans any external impurities from a single target and grants an instance of [Flowing Waters] if the target is an ally.

  Sapphire Effect: Purges Elemental Boons from target enemy. Grants a small burst of healing whenever a stack of [Flowing Waters] is consumed.

  Flowing Waters (boon, cleanse, elemental, water, stacking): Slowly cleanses Elemental Banes for a short duration.

  Phoenix hadn’t been unconscious that long, and they were still near her meteor crater, which was still slightly smoldering.

  “So, no backup sword?” Dazien asked her, and she shook her head in the negative, “How do you not carry a backup somewhere in your collection?”

  She shrugged and gargled the magical water some more before spitting it out on the ground, “I didn’t think I’d need one? I mean, how often does a magic item just explode like that?”

  “Are you joking?” he asked incredulously, “I’ve gone through like five shields since we’ve been together!”

  “I think you’re exaggerating a bit there,” she pointed out, shaking out her hair as well and attempting to tie all the curls back into a tight braid with a streak of soft emerald, “Anyways, I still have my dagger, so it’ll be fine till we get back to the city. Oh! Or maybe my book will stop being stubborn and give me a quest with a sword!”

  “I thought it hasn’t been giving combat quests as much tely?” Rayna asked, having returned from finishing looting the monsters that hadn’t been dead when she passed out.

  “Yeah, I’m fairly certain it’s only giving things now if it thinks I don’t want to do it, but it still wants me to,” she grumbled as Saiya stopped the stream, leaving Phoenix perfectly clean and dry.

  Her friends all looked towards one another with uncertainty, but it was Everin that voiced the thought, “Well, that’s concerning. Isn’t it your power?”

  Phoenix shrugged again, “Yes, but I never consciously make the quests it gives. Kinda like I don’t get to pick the loot a monster drops for me.”

  “Speaking of loot,” Rayna interjected, “Anything good from the big one?”

  She gave a slight grimace and conjured the Spirit Gem she had gotten into her hand to show the others, “Aside from the usual Bits and Shards, I got this Fracture Spirit Gem which I feel is just mocking me as some sort of karmic joke about my sword. It’s Sapphire, though, like the monster. Either of you want it?” she asked towards the twins.

  Their heads shook in unison as Rayna answered, “Nah, you hold onto it. I’ll just take the Bits from what it’s worth and buy something I like ter.”

  “You sure?” she crified, slightly surprised, “I thought Fracture would go good for a Shatter Bard.”

  Rayna shrugged, “Sure, but you’re the weird one that won’t buy them. Hold onto it and if we get more than ten before you ascend then maybe I’ll trade it out or something.”

  “Don’t you only need like three more?”

  The bard ughed, “Look, it’s fine, Princess. Even though I said it’s weird, it’s obviously important to you, so I’m all for watching you let ‘Fate’ pick your powers for you. Now, where’s the next monster so we can get more loots?”

  Everin gestured towards the northeast, “The main force we have of lower Caste groups is that way, but we’ve seen the devastation a single Emerald breaking away from the enemy has had on them. Our Emeralds are now moving that way to reinforce them while Paul takes care of the southeast.”

  Phoenix’s eyes went wide as she turned to him and asked incredulously, “By himself?! They think he can take on half an army of Caged monsters and Soul Reapers alone?!”

  The Cleric gave a vulpine grin and said, “Yes. Because he can.”