113. The Sea of Plenty

  It took some doing, but Serac eventually coaxed out several facts about the self-fashioned ‘dusty old soul’. First that her and her tortoise’s names were ‘Inge Bjornsdatter’ and ‘Munkfred’ respectively, second that her strikingly beautiful typing took after a ‘koi fish’, and third that ‘her memory wasn’t what it used to be’.

  This last fact didn’t need any sleuthing to deduce; clearly, this ancient woman wasn’t ‘all there’. And it was also what stayed Team Serac’s progress in the Realmhunt, as they struggled to agree on the best course of action.

  Zacko, predictably enough, was the first to suggest they simply leave the woman be and move on with their hunt. Serac was much less decisive; she’d taken an immediate liking to the sweet old lady, to the point she felt somewhat invested in her safety and well-being. Petter swung all the way to the other end of the spectrum, already deep in conversation with Inge like the two of them were old friends.

  “What brings you to the Netherpool on a fine day like today?”

  “Why, Munkfred of course. I don’t go anywhere without him.”

  The tortoise craned its neck at the sound of its name. Zacko tutted impatiently, while Serac stifled a laugh.

  “Of course, Ms Inge, silly of me to even ask,” Petter said without missing a beat. “Do you fish here often? Just you and your tortoise?”

  The question, simple and innocent as it was, nevertheless gave the woman pause. The ribbons around her eyes tightened as she furrowed her brow in thought.

  “Yes? No. That’s not quite right. I don’t normally get out much, but today I felt… There’s something special about today, isn’t there?”

  “The Realmhunt?”

  “The Realmhunt, that’s it!” Inge’s face lit up. “Back in my day, I used to go every year, you know. I wouldn’t hear the end of it if I ever tried to skip out. It got to be tiring, sometimes, but now… I do miss those days. Nowadays, no one has any use for me, and I can’t say I blame them.”

  Serac, who’d been listening with an indulgent sort of smile, now frowned slightly as she tried to make sense of Inge’s scattered thoughts. She leaned in, taking over for Petter.

  “It sounds to me like you were quite in demand. You said you used to go to every Realmhunt… as one of the competitors?”

  “Oh yes!” Inge puffed out her chest, or as close to it as possible inside her bundle of blankets. “Not to blow my own bubbles, but they said I was the best spotter in all the land. No critter could hide forever ’neath the ice once Inge the Seeker came around looking for them. The King himself said so, so it must be true.”

  “The king?” now even Zacko joined in, one eyebrow bent in curious skepticism. “You mean King Tyr?”

  “Yes, of course! Who else?” Inge said brightly, eyeing Zacko as if he were the one who wasn’t all there. Not entirely undeserved, considering Pretjord had just the one king for nearly four centuries.

  “Did you know the King well, Ms Inge?” Petter again.

  “Oh, I daresay I did, young man. Not only was I his favorite spotter for the Realmhunts, he liked me well enough to keep me around the palace the rest of the year. Helping in the kitchen, tending to the terrarium, playing with the children. That sort of thing, you know.”

  “The children?” Serac butted in, her curiosity piqued. “Did you know Rathor then?”

  “Rathor… Prince Rathor? Why, yes, of course. A troublemaker if I ever saw one, and a real bundle of energy. Tiring him out for bedtime was a whole-day ordeal. Of course, it wasn’t just him I had to deal with, was it? I’d be chasing the Prince through the palace, all while keeping one eye out for—”

  All three members of Team Serac waited for Inge to finish her thought. But the koi-typed woman had frozen mid-sentence, all of her stock-still save for her hazy eyes that tremored ever so slightly. For whatever reason, the recollection seemed to have distressed the old woman, so Serac hastened to change the subject.

  “How’s the fishing going, anyway? Caught anything so far?”

  “Hm?” Inge broke out of her trance to glance absent-mindedly at the modest hole at her feet (much smaller than Team Serac’s ‘chokepoint’ from earlier). “Fishing? Well, yes. There’s plenty of fish for everyone.”

  With that vague non-answer, Inge’s eyelids drooped again. Seeing this, Serac understood that it was time to give the old girl a break. Even this brief conversation must’ve taken a lot out of her.

  Inge fell back asleep. Munkfred the tortoise, who didn’t look much younger than its master, had also calmed down enough to resume its mound form. Which left the trio of Team Serac exchanging awkward looks among themselves…

  “So?” Zacko re-opened the discussion, letting impatience creep back into his voice. “Have we decided what to do about her? I mean, little lady is clearly here on her own accord, so I don’t see why we should even get involved.”

  “But she’s clearly not well, Zacko; surely, you can see that too. A frail old Anchored soul like her shouldn’t be out here on her own, when there are Mennesketers and who knows what else sniffing around. Besides, what if, you know, she could help us?”

  “Help? What do you—wait… you don’t seriously expect this shriveled thing to spot for us, do you? Besides, who knows if she’s even telling the truth? It’s a miracle she can even remember her own name.”

  “What do you think, Petter?” Serac, unconvinced, sought out some local wisdom. “Inge the Seeker, she called herself. Does that ring any bells?”

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  The mackerel man scrunched up his face in concentration, ever eager to be of assistance. In the end, however, his shoulders sagged in defeat.

  “No, Miss Serac. Definitely before my time, and maybe even before my dad’s time. And, if I’m being honest, I’m with Mister Zacko on this. Even if Ms Inge really did use to be the best spotter in the Realm, I don’t think she’s in any state to participate in a proper hunt.”

  “See? At least Pete’s still using his head. Look, princess, if you care so much about little lady here, why don’t you just take her with us, but just as a passenger? She’s certainly small enough to fit inside Ash’s cabin. The tortoise might be a problem, but maybe we could work something out with the ramparts?”

  And that was when an entirely different notion snagged in Serac’s mind. She spoke slowly, putting her new thought into words even as it occurred to her.

  “Hang on. Here we are talking about how frail, helpless, and alone this woman is… but if all that’s true, how is she even alive? We’ve never seen her in town, so we know she’s not part of the larger Rotter community. But then that means she would’ve had to survive the withering on her own. How? How is she even feeding herself and her tortoise?”

  Zacko raised a screwed-up eyebrow to show that his gears were turning.

  “Okay, so you’re saying little lady does have someone looking after her. Well, that settles it then. We leave her here for her caretaker to collect. It was a nice chat, but we have a Frostkrill to hunt, and I don’t know about you, but I don’t need no accidental kidnapping weighing on my conscience.”

  It took them long enough, but Team Serac was finally getting on the same page. Serac turned to Inge now, hoping to ask about this neglectful ‘caretaker’ of hers, only to find that the old woman was already awake.

  In fact, ‘awake’ didn’t quite cut it. Inge, visibly tense, sat up straight in her chair—or as straight as her bent back would let her. Her red-and-gold ribbons stretched out to their full lengths to accommodate the widening of her eyes. Even her wrinkles appeared to fade a little, momentarily imbuing her lotus-white countenance with childlike wonder.

  “There’s plenty of fish for everyone,” the old woman muttered into her scarf, addressing no one in particular. “Plenty for everyone.”

  Serac stepped forward, concern written plainly upon her own face.

  “Inge, are you—?”

  And that was when all hell broke loose.

  First, something dark yet glistening slithered out of Inge’s fishing hole and onto the ice. It shot towards the old woman’s blanketed feet with the purposeful speed of a predator.

  Serac detected the movement out of a corner of her eye, even as she read its malicious intent with the tips of her horns. Acting on pure instinct, she dove to the ground and reached out with PULVERIZER, intent on shielding Inge from the sudden attack.

  [27!]

  Barely a scratch, but Serac wasn’t out of the woods. For the dark, slithering thing now wrapped itself firmly around her arm and pulled, with enough force to dislocate her shoulder.

  [232!]

  “Ow—glub glub!”

  This one did hurt a lot, but Serac didn’t even get a chance to express her pain. For in the next Ksana, she was squeezed through the fishing hole and dragged under into the frigid water.

  [Wayfarer Status Effect: HYPOXIA]

  [22!], [25!], [27!], …

  So cold. So destructively cold. Worse yet, Serac found herself right back where she’d first started in this godsforsaken Realm: trapped in a watery prison and pulled every which way by a force she had no way to resist.

  Luckily for her, the same fate had yet to befall her partner. Serac couldn’t see anything, but she felt (and read) it all the same, as Zacko dove in straight after to provide some NINEFOLD rescue.

  [VISAGE Aspect: DREAMER]

  [Dreamer Aspect: THE FIRST DAO—STEEL OF REFINEMENT]

  Whatever Zacko had done, it worked. First, the abyss-ward tension on Serac’s arm dissipated, before the ‘wrappings’ too loosened and fell away. Now acting on two months of training, she forced herself to go completely limp, giving Zacko the chance to grab and pull her back to the surface.

  As soon as she could breathe and move on her own, Serac’s focus immediately turned to the two—no, make that three—Anchored souls under her protection. She could reconstitute even if she were to meet an untimely end, but the same couldn’t be said for Petter, Inge, or Munkfred.

  “Ash! Get over here, now!”

  No reins for precise steering, but the living castle responded to the sheer intensity of its master’s command. It rumbled across the ice at speed before coming to a stop next to Serac’s kneeling figure.

  “Petey! Can you help Inge into the cabin?”

  The pale-faced mackerel’s eyes bulged with terror, but he nodded frantically all the same. Next, Serac’s troubled gaze fell upon Munkfred the snow-dusted mound, now back on its feet and shuffling anxiously in place. What do we about the tortoise, though? It’s way too big to fit inside the cabin!

  “Let me take care of it,” Zacko called out—which might’ve even sounded reassuring had it not been for his chattering teeth. Regardless, the NINEFOLD master set to his task without hesitation, sliding underneath the tortoise and placing an open hand upon its plastron. “Sorry, buddy, this is gonna be rough.”

  [Dreamer Aspect: THE SECOND DAO—PALM OF EMPOWERMENT]

  With a surge of Erudite-purple energy, Munkfred’s chunky figure disappeared, leaving only a laughing Buddha standing in place with his hand raised, palm up.

  Serac looked up in alarm and saw that the tortoise had been launched high into the sky, flailing limbs and all. At some point during the descent, Munkfred seemed to understand the assignment, as it turtled into its shell. Then the ‘mound’ landed upon Ash’s battlement with a heavy thud, where it proved to be a near-perfect fit!

  Serac had questions about Zacko’s method, but she couldn’t argue with the results. She stood up and gave Ash’s stone wall a hearty slap, sending the castle and its at-capacity passengers on their way.

  With the Anchored souls whisked away to safety, it was finally time to face—and punish—the source of the commotion. And said ‘source’ was apparently of the same mind, for it now revealed more of itself for the Wayfarer’s scrutiny.

  The presence slithered once more out of the fishing hole. This time, Serac could see clearly that it was a tentacle, dark and glistening against a field of ice. More tentacles soon followed, making new hunting holes as they punched through the surface. Before long, a dozen or more of the things rose and slithered towards the sky, surrounding and towering over the pair of Wayfarers. [Jotuneter]—giant-eater.

  As a certain Manesferan’s mother might say: be careful what you wish for. For Team Serac had stumbled onto exactly what they’d been after. An Elite-class Aberrant to kickstart their Realmhunt loop—to turn their quiet corner of the Netherpool into a sea of plenty.

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