Northern Wales.
Bangor Forward Operating Base.

Gwen and her party of six marvelled at the British-made Cromwell MK VIII Multi-Terrain Golems queued to cross the Menai Bridge. Every third engine of death sported the "Winged Sword" of a Crusader MK V, signified by the distended wand on its shoulder as tall as the Golem itself.

"Not half-bad." Yossari swilled from a flask of Maotai hanging from her wrist by a leather strap. "Your Runesmiths have developed variant algorithms different from our Spellswords: less precision and control, but an abundance of range and firepower. I guess yer'd have ta, what with yer ceiling having no lid. Very rarely do we need that sort of range in the Murk."

Gwen glanced up at the horizon and tried to imagine an enormous ceiling covering the landscape like a potlid.

"We would welcome your expertise," Magister Brown spoke beside the Dwarf. "Many of the Golems are survivors from an earlier time when we traded with your kin."

"Yer won't tease the Clan's promise from me that easily." Yossari snorted at Gwen's tutor, who smiled in that disarming, scholarly way he affected toward everyone but ducks. "What have yer got ter trade?"

"How about an invitation to witness the Shoggoth?" Brown joked. "This sort of transparency between our people has to be worth something."

The Alchemist chose to ignore the wily Magister.

Gwen smiled. According to Brown, there would be several groups of emissaries from the surrounding powers coming to see her Shoggoth show. Names from Berlin, Paris, Rome, Brussels, Amsterdam and Athens have all made requests, each wanting a piece of the Commonwealth's teenage Sobel. The Dwarven master crafter had been a last-minute addition, one the Tower was happy to accommodate.

Across the strait, the B-54-20, a fire trail used for lumber and agriculture, snaked inland. The first contingent of mechanised infantry, joined by the Mage Flights, was already over the horizon, burning back the Triffidus Celestus' alien groves, sending plumes of black smoke rising into the lidless sky.

Out of habit, Gwen checked her gear. As usual, she wore her white-blue Shen-Teī suit, a look matched by Petra in red, their paired silhouettes leaving no doubt that the two girls were related. Richard wore his Shen-Teī as well, though the vibrant teal of the original design had been made into a pattern suitable for the woodland. Opposite, Jean-Paul wore a charcoal cloth-armour outfit that reminded Gwen of distillation suits from a desert space opera. As for Gracie, their final member was comically protected by an articulated suit formed of quasi-magical polymers, encasing her torso with tessellated plates. Her striking visage was so endearing that Gwen had taken to calling Gracie "Ser Hillbrook", bringing a curve to the others' lips.

"Yer not wearing helmets?" Yossari tapped the bulk of her Golem suit.

"Non-specialists are not trained to cast spells in armour," Petra explained. "That proficiency has to be gained. Anything that interferes with natural gestures and invocations can result in spell-failure. Most non-military Mages prefer using Shield. At any rate, it is not as though we possess Dwarven Magitech."

"Yeah. Mana burn's a bitch." Gwen glanced at Gracie. In the Illusionist's case, severe mana burn might mean death.

The Alchemist chided that even the youngest Acolyte or Pilot in the Murk grew up in armour. Most Dwarves, even those from the labouring caste, could jostle about in Golem Plates with greater agility than if they were told to storm the Murk in the nude.

Gwen thanked the Dwarf for the imagery, taking the chance to admire Yossari's heirloom Golem Suit that had Cambridge's Enchanters drooling. Earlier, the Dwarf had been generous enough to let them inside for a show-and-tell, though Gwen and Petra proved too tall for the squat exo-armour to encase their body.

Behind them, the researchers' group consisted of a convoy of ten trucks for storing specimens, two Cromwell units, and two dozen assorted Mercenaries. The leader of the mechanised column was the Botanist, Magister Valarie Banks, who deferred command to Major Halifax, an eagle-eyed Golem-Commander-Diviner from the Shard's intelligence division.

Gwen's party consisted of themselves, though for now, the Tower Flights from Bangor base would be observing their progress.

At the Major's command, the secondary party formed into its irrespective columns, with Gwen's party taking the right-most trail, Banks the left, and the trucks and Golems bringing up the rear. In the sky, a Mage Flight, joined by assorted specialists, relayed information back to Halifax's command Golem.

"Don't worry, Miss Hillbrook, we got your back." Richard looked toward the unnatural green sea that covered the peninsula from horizon to horizon. "Please look forward to Golos. He's very impressive."

"Bless! Aid!" Petra popped off her stowed buffs, suffusing the party with vibrant motes of Positive Energy. "Resist Toxins!"

Gwen allowed the buffs to suffuse her body, tasting the spell as though a connoisseur of Clerical sorcery. As she anticipated, a mundane Cleric's potency was incomparable to Elvia's endowments. The contrast was akin to Yue throwing Fire Bolts in high school, versus when they first witnessed Alesia's Fire Ball.

"Stay safe!" Brown waved the party away. "Richard, Petra, keep Gwen out of trouble!"

The others burst into laughter.

"What's so funny?" Gracie appeared puzzled by the party's high-strung mirth even as Gwen clicked her tongue.

"Rude." She scolded her companions. "Alright, let's go."

Richard couldn't help but grin when, a few kilometres into the verdant forest, the Void Mages exhibited their IIUC prowess. Gwen put up a good show, and he had no doubts that a Scry was in place and that a group of middle-aged men and women were chattering away in Bangor, sipping tea and buttering scones.

Earlier, for an hour, a Mage Flight had been loitering overhead had watched Gwen and Jean-Paul in action. From their public Divination chatter, Richard felt sympathy for their demoralisation.

Theirs was a military outfit consisting of two Evokers, an Abjurer-Transmuter, a Cleric and an Illusionist-Diviner.

Below, between Gwen and Jean-Paul, the Cambridge party consisted of nine Lightning Hounds and nine Void Hounds from Gwen, Caliban in its Stag guise, Ariel in its Kirin form, Jean-Paul's eight Void Hounds, Umzokwe, plus Lea.

In a semi-circle of tooth and nail, the party's minions fanned out in front, foraging through the unnaturally dense forest, leeching back vitality for their owners and ferreting forth the hidden Triffids.

Very clearly, the Void Mages outclassed their would-be helpers.

"SKARRRAAK!"

Another Triffid burst from the twisted jungle that had usurped the island's original flora. To a Mage who had never experienced arboreal battlefields, the ash-pink and lilac thorn-hedges, so unusually tropical and colourful would appear daunting. To Richard and his experienced party of Amazonian wayfarers; the Triffidus-infected trees could hardly compare to the sky-high elder-woods that locked invaders into a Dungeon of timber and fungi.

"Lightning Bolt!"
"EE!"
"SKARRRAAL!" The lonesome Triffid ate dirt.

Before the worm-like flower Sprite could even reach the Mages, the dogs were upon it, tearing and rending its tendrils until a pus-oozing, limbless slug-thing remained. These were left behind for harvest, for Void-tainted wounds took a very long time to regenerate and so could be left alone for the NoM cleanup crew to load into the stasis chambers.

During the first stage of the operation, the going was slow and meticulous. Gwen had initially wanted to summon Golos then and there. However, her Wyvern had to slaughter the Triffids to absorb their Essence, meaning her Core-gathering clashed with Oxbridge's specimen-collecting.

Greedy for Cores, Gwen had even considered sending Golos to party with the main Mage Flights who were clearing a direct route into the heart of the Triffid infestation, aiming for Llyn Alaw, where the Tower planned for Gwen's calling of the Shoggoth. In a rebuke, Richard noted the last time Golos was left out and about, the thing brought back three Big Birds. This time, so close to Snowdonia, Golos could do infinitely worse.

Gwen grudgingly agreed. She would summon Golos once the platform for her Shoggoth was established, both to talk to the creature, and to strike some discipline into the haughty drake after its unsolicited tryst with Elvia.

For now, their party's goal was "Objective Beta". A smaller water source called Lyln Cefni, a place where the scouting parties had spotted a hive housing a Triffidus Primus.

"Our dogs look so different," Gwen remarked at the carnage.

Richard kept his eyes and ears open, observing Gwen as she and Jean-Paul compared Hound Packs. Gwen's inquiry was because much like Jean-Paul's Familiar, his dogs were pale, slimy, leech-like things, soft-bodied and possessed of sucker-mouths writhing with a circular discus of tiny teeth. Comparatively, Gwen's dogs were skeletal, sleek, and jet-black, with a mouth that took up over half of the dogs' torso.

When butchering Triffids, Gwen's animals took bite-sized chunks from the screeching, walking flowers, while the Afrikaner's leech-dogs piled on, then hung on, turning Gracie two shades paler.

By mid-afternoon, the party had ventured past the tree line and arrived in the woods' inner sanctums. The map marked the place as Ceint, though now there was neither a village nor the road that at lead into it. The terrain was sodden with foliage and rotten wood, while all around them, with exception to the path they had cleared, alien vines with orchid flowers as large as their heads hung like listless, purple tongues.

"JP, how do you want to do this?" Gwen stuck a thumb in the general direction of what she imagined to be the lake. "Elemental Swarm?"

Richard helpfully corrected the direction of her digit. "Too slow. With a mass like this, the swarm would take far too long. Best to think of it as a Plant Mage's Wall of Thorns or something. If you recall, the Triffidus Primus has Druidic powers."

Just as he spoke, one of Gwen's dogs ventured close enough to the tendril wall to trigger a reaction. From the tangled mess, a lashing vine ripped out from the knotted greenery to wrap around her dog. There was a brief struggle as purple ichor pumped through the thorn-strewn tentacle, then the Void Hound bit itself free and staggered back into the whinnying pack. It's body momentarily shuddered; then it vomited forth a bubbling jet of hissing venom.

"That looks like it could hurt," Gwen remarked.

"Best keep our distance." Richard studied the thorn-hedge. "Try a Chakram?"

Gwen performed as told, flooding her conduits to unleash a disk of Void as large as a dinner table. The silent discus managed to slice about two meters into the mass of jade-green vines, felling an enormous stack. Like a burst vein, a fountain of ichor sprayed into the atmosphere.

"Lea—" Richard commanded his Familiar. An enormous Water Shield materialised, enough to envelope the party, repelling the foul liquid.

"Looks corrosive." Yossari's Golem had in-built diagnostics and so ran some measurements once the spray died down. "Mild, but in enough volume, it'll do some damage."

"They're regenerating." Petra pointed to the wall. "So much for cutting through."

Where Gwen had made the incision, a busy susurration of vine-flesh began to sprout rapidly.

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"Let me try." Jean-Paul raised his hand, then pulled at the air as though trying to take control of some unseen foe. "Consumptive Orb!"

Where Gwen had struck, a tiny sphere of Void materialised, eating away at the bio-matter in its immediate vicinity to suddenly bloat and grow. Within seconds, the blob of pulsing Void was a metre across.

Jean-Paul gritted his teeth and held on until the Consumptive Orb was the size of Caliban's stag-form, then uttered an ejaculatory "Void Burst!"

Like a popped balloon, the Consumptive Orb discharged its payload in a forward-facing spray of tenebrous and uncontrolled Void matter, splattering the writhing vines. A great commotion of shrivelling flesh resounded as the Void-splatter began to eat away at the wood.

"Something's coming," Yossari reported, checking her Golem's HUD. "Two— no, THREE Hydraffids!"

"Thank God, finally." Gwen perked up. "The sooner we get our specimens; the sooner Golos can come out and play. Caliban! Ariel! Get ready!"

"Vitriolic Mist!" Jean-Paul put in place a Signature Evocation-Conjuration Void Spell, materialising a fine haze of floating Void-motes in a wide semi-circle arc far from the party.

"How are you two casting all of this?" Gracie almost bit her tongue. "So many spells at so many tiers!"

Richard glanced at the disbelieving Void Sorceress while willing Lea to conjure the beginning of a Shield for each of their members. Like Gwen herself, he too had done the hard yakka since arriving at Cambridge. Different to his cousin's Omni-path, Richard always knew that his way forward lied in greater efficacy with Lea. A Water Mage, particularly a Conjurer, was limited only by their imagination and the volume of water they could manipulate at once. As such, he had been training Lea's affinity through an array of odd-jobs around London. Now with access to the Shard's Grey Market, he had been spending both CCs and HDMs on acquiring Wildland ingredients that would increase his VMI, his Familiar efficacy, as well as empower Lea herself.

"SKAAARRRL!"

With a roar more hiss than bark, the infested woodlands parted, spilling forth the contorted bodies of a trio of Hydraffids. These waded through Jean-Paul's fine mist of Void matter, crashing through the intangible barrier, growing slick with ichor as their' outer dermis melted.

As one, the Hydraffids reared their heads.

"Dick!" Gwen called out. They had seen the same display in Burma.

"On it! Water Prison!" Richard reacted before she even finished, conjuring bubbles of water around the heads of the monsters.

His anticipation proved correct; a second later, globs of corrosive poison struck the prisons he had conjured, filling the pristine water with venom.

"Recycle!" he commanded Lea. Effortlessly, his Familiar willed the contaminated liquid back into the Elemental Plane. "All yours, Duck."

"Thanks, Dick!" Gwen commanded her mix of dogs to go for the second and third Hydraffid while Jean-Paul's minions leapt for the first. "JP, we need them alive for the researchers!"

"Understood!" Jean-Paul pointed at the tail segment of his prey. "Consumptive Orb!"

"Lea! Keep them shielded!" Richard spread his awareness so that he could encompass the entire battlefield. "Don't let them use range!"

"SKAARRRK!"

The woods to their east exploded with activity. A sixsome of Triffids newly arrived on the scene, slithering from the thorn-wall to join the fun. Like the Hydraffids, these ran head-first into the Void tinged mist Jean-Paul had conjured.

"Duck! Keep them pinned!" Richard called out.

His cousin concurred, "Ariel! Chain Lightning!"

Rapid incantations thundered from Gwen's lips as the Lightning Kirin lit up like a Christmas Tree at Trafalgar Square. From its horns, arcs of living lightning struck the Hydraffids before making their way toward the Triffids, striking with such force that orchid-coloured flesh exploded from their writhing bodies.

"Here's another!" Gwen appeared to have spell focus to spare. Her second string of plosive syllables was enough to send two Elemental Spheres into the creatures' midst. "Ariel! Fry-em!"

Richard expanded Lea's many Shield spells, making sure that the blowback from the thunderous explosions did not impact the damage-dealers.

"They're still alive!" Yossari confirmed through her suit's Scrying capabilities.

Much to the party's surprise, the Hydraffids carried on. It wasn't that the Void or Lightning Magic were not sufficient— more so that the plant-creatures appeared perfectly happy to function without heads or torsos and most of their limbs. Added to their resilience were a high spell resistance and the ability to regenerate wounds not sustained from Void, acid or fire, it was little wonder regular Mage Flights found them to be a living nightmare.

"Caliban!" Gwen chose expedience. "Do it!"

"SHAA! SHAA!" Caliban expanded like rising dough. In a moment, it transformed into an eight-metre Hydra far more robust than the sinuous Hydraffids. With six-heads writhing, it was just enough to intercept two of the creatures. Once in melee, Caliban split open the mouths of its faceless "heads" to reveal rows of gnashing teeth glistening with grey globs of saliva.

"Umzokwe!" Jean-Paul's creature proved less protean. Tapping into its vitality, it grew to three times its usual size, becoming almost six-metres, coiling itself around the Hydraffid. At its master's command, its corrosive, pink-veined stomach inverted, exploding forth from its nozzle-like lips to splatter the Hydraffid as though casting a net of tangled flesh.

"BLURRRRRGGH—" Gracie fell to her knees and cleared the contents of her stomach.

Next, the dogs closed in.

"Lighting Bolt!" Gwen was relentless with the mid-ranged artillery from Ariel. "Lightning Sphere!"

"Void Burst!" Jean-Paul took out the mobile part of his victim's lower body. "Umzokwe! Control yourself!"

Not far from the white leech, Caliban rendezvoused its twin Hydraffids head-on, frenching the creatures with its many maws. Where the plant monsters' heads got severed, the stumps spurted pus-like, fungal blood.

Behind the clashing titans, where the Void mist had dissipated, the triple pack of dogs made short work of the regular Triffids, with the Lightning Hound tearing off wriggling limbs while their Void counterparts feasted on chunk-fulls of vitality.

Richard kept an eye on their surroundings while he studied Gwen's rival. Like his cousin, Jean-Paul possessed the means to imbibe vitality through his leech. Unlike Caliban, the thing known as Umzokwe was overtly gluttonous, choked full of flesh meandering through the Familiar's semi-clear, bloated body. Even so, Jean-Paul appeared stricken while Gwen grew flush from head to toe.

It was a curious juxtaposition. Richard wasn't sure how contracts between Master and Familiar worked for Void Mages, but it would appear Jean-Paul had gotten a rather bum deal compared to Gwen.

"Stop!" Petra suddenly shouted, her eyes aglow with Divination. "They're almost dead. Don't forget, the longer it takes for the specimen collection to complete, the longer we're stuck here."

"Cali, return!" Gwen commanded her Familiar. Caliban withdrew its many heads, shook off the gore, then wandered back, burping loudly from two of its six heads.

Umzokwe viciously tore out a final chunk of Hydraffid before it too returned, engorged and massive, trailing clear slime that dissolved the dense foliage beneath.

Richard took some mental notes, then sent Lea to patrol the perimeter. Knowing one's adversaries was half the fight.

"Buck! Astro!" Gwen recalled her dog pack as well, urging Jean-Paul to do the same. En route, three headless, limbless Hydraffids rolled on the rotten foliage, spilling lime-green juices all over the floor.

"This one needs a stabilisation." Petra pointed to the one Jean-Paul had left behind. "Dick, cover me."

Richard encased his cousin with water while the Enchantress approached to dispense a Cure Minor Wounds, injecting the quivering mound of knotted flesh with just enough Positive Energy to keep it from expiring.

Richard turned to Gracie, tasking the Illusionist with something useful. "That's three Hydraffids and six more Triffids. What are we at?"

On the forest floor, Gracie wheezed while she relayed Richard's question. "… Ten more Hydraffids and forty more Triffids. There are no Primus sightings as of yet."

"How's your mana?" Richard asked Gwen.

"I am good. Jean-Paul?" Gwen's cheeks were positively glowing.

"I can keep going."

"Great." His cousin placed both hands against her hips. "I think I've got a good idea of how we can clear this wall."

"Cali-wyrm?" Richard recollected at once. "Would it work?"

"Worth a try. Either way, I am up to my neck." Gwen tapped her throat with one hand. "Let me tell ya; these Triffids make for RICH eating."

With the winter light dying over a smothered horizon, the party chose to camp at a township formerly known as Llangefni. Formerly— because after the Triffids had taken over the land, the brick and mortar buildings had all been reduced to rubble.

At the town's centre, the only surviving structures were a regional government building and a church. Further excavation reduced the foliage, revealing a clocktower choked with Triffid spores.

Gwen's dogs, who had fanned out into the town once they ate through the vines, soon returned with the news that they had found something. The party proceeded to the church; in the basement, they found the drained bodies of no less than fifty-odd men and women, children too, tethered to the walls by withered vines.

"JP, you stay with Gracie," Gwen told the two.

Team Cousins, joined by a curious Yossari, ventured down into the ancient base-level.

The scene was as she had observed via her Ariel VR.

"You get folk like this everywhere," to their surprise, Yossari spoke up. "Yer can tell a town to evacuate, but there's always folk who think they know better. Or who think yer a joke or the danger's a hoax. Yer say this is a temple?"

"Yes—" Gwen covered her nose and mouth, fearful that her enhanced smelling-sense might overwhelm her olfactory functions. As it turned out, there was no need, for the poor sods fell apart the moment Richard touched them— much in the manner of clumped loam having lost all its moisture. "Oh— Jesus, Dick, careful with that!"

Yossari shrugged. "That'll explain it. Even in the Murk, there's folk who think the Deepdowners or the Ancestors will save them, or that something or someone's looking out for them. They refuse to leave their Citadels even when the monsters are scratching at the walls, flooding into the forge— of course, by then, it's far too late."

"The Triffids are invaders, right?" Gwen asked her cousin, her jaws grim. "From another Plane?"

"Something like that." Her cousin nodded. "I wouldn't overthink. We're here to exterminate them. They'll cease to exist in three days. I wouldn't bother with the academics. Not our job."

"A fair point." Gwen looked around. It was easy to think of the Triffids as monsters. They obviously ate humans, and they were definitely in-human. "Do we bury these people?"

"We can collapse the Church," Petra advised. "I don't think they're moveable. If Elvia was here, I bet she's trained in the Final Rite."

"I can do that for you." Yossari waved a manipulator arm, revealing a Spellblade. "I'll return them to the earth's embrace. The Earth Mother doesn't discriminate."

Gwen nodded her head sadly, then backed away toward the basement stairs. In the depth of her Empathic Link, Caliban informed her that it had finished patrolling the town. Ariel reported no more hostiles. "Alright, I think the Familiars are done. Let's head up. We'll set up on the roof of the town hall."

"Should we inform Gracie and Jean-Paul?" Richard was the last to leave.

"Naw." Gwen recalled Jean-Paul's story about the Nun. "JP and church basements don't mix."

_Weee—Weeee—_
 _Weee—Weeee—Weeee—_
 _Weee—Weeee—Weeee— Weee—Weeee—_
 _Gweeegn— Gweeegn— Gweeegn— Gweeegn— Gweeegn—_

Gwen slowly opened her eyes.

"What the fuck was that?" she demanded of the frigid night air, made lightless by an overcast sky. "Cali, was that you?"

"Shaa! Shaa!" Caliban's response came from below, where it waited in ambush for the wayward Triffids filtering in from the forest.

Twice now, she had circulated her Essence to ward away sleep, and both times, the moment she entered a meditative stance, some god-forsaken voice started to resound in her head.

"Is somebody Singing the Snake?" Gwen considered the possibility. She continued to circulate her Essence until she felt on the verge of bursting. "Almudj? Is that you?"

Her reply came in the form of a splintering crash northward of the town hall, followed by the sound of her Alarm Wards firing away.

The constant harassment was the reason why Gwen offered to take watch. With the Triffids crawling into the cleared square like clockwork, sleep was all but impossible, and only she and Jean-Paul could comfortably keep individual monsters at bay.

And as only Gwen could arguably keep awake via Essence, she offered her team the Portable Habitat, while herself, Caliban, Ariel and the dogs held the fort.

"SKARRR—!" the howling abruptly cut short.

A minute later, Caliban burped. The dogs soundlessly returned to their usual spots, with Astro's pack lighting up the perimeter while Buck's crow-black cabal hid in the dark.

Gwen returned to her meditation, though like tinnitus, she could still make out the "Weee— Weee—" at the back of her skull.

Throughout the night, her teammates came out to join her on the second floor of the abandoned town hall every odd hour while Caliban carried out an unseen carnage below.

At dawn, the party emerged into an ichor-strewn street painted green with blood from what must be thirty-odd monsters. Most were dead, though a dozen, yet to bleed out, could be collected by the convoy.

"I think I am good to summon the Shoggoth," Gwen informed them during breakfast, her appearance so hale that one would have thought her awakening from a 10,000 HDM spa treatment. "Who would have thought there were so many of those Triffids left?"

"I say the grove is growing them as we speak." Richard performed a quick stretching routine. "We checked before we camped, it was all clear."

"Such a shame Golos isn't here." Gwen sighed. "All those wasted Cores..."

Richard agreed.

"How'd you sleep?" She turned to Gracie, who emerged in her bulk armour once more.

"Well enough," Gracie replied, tugging on her hair with a brush. "Its… very quiet in there."

"Ha, the Ethereal Plane is like that. It takes a few nights to get used to it."

_Ding!_

A Message pinged the party.

"Yes?" Gwen put the Message on an open channel. "Magus Song's party reporting in."

"Magus Song," the incoming command resounded. "This is Bangor Command. The main party has arrived at Llyn Alaw. We await your rendezvous at Check Point Alpha. The capture mission will continue. There's no sign of the Primus."

"Understood," Gwen reported. "We're at Llangefni, about twelve kilometres out. Shall we make for Objective Beta?"

"Negative. A Teleportation Circle has been set up at Alaw, please secure your perimeter and set up a field Circle. Do you require aid? We can fly a Specialist over."

"No need. I'll do it." Richard raised his hand.

"Negative, Bangor Command. I'll see you on-site soon," Gwen replied into the Message. "Please send the gate codes."

"Roger that." There was a pause. "Sending codes now."

Once Gwen memorised the flashing Glyphs, the Message spell dimmed, then died.

"JP, you and I will set up the perimeter." Gwen turned to her partner. "Let's get the dogs out and about. We'll have to unsummon them before we port over."

"I'll help with the Teleportation Circle," Petra offered. "I know the script, though Richard will have to provide the mana and the spell."

"Great." Gwen breathed out, observing the wall-to-wall exotic greenery surrounding their party. Already, the path they made via Cali-worm was creeping back. "I just hope Golos can find some Cores before we unleash the big dog."


At Llyn Alaw, Gwen and her crew teleported into a clearing burned clean of Triffid infestation. From the portal to the pavilion, the landscape resembled a No Man's Land, with the lake itself smothered with ash, emerald with Triffid spores, hinting at the battle that must have taken place overnight.

At the edge of the Teleportation Circle's raised dais, Gwen and her companions hailed the guards, then joined Magister Maxwell Brown, who had been waiting for them.

Inside the overlarge pavilion, Gwen met with many strange faces and shook hands with every Magister and Magus until her fingers grew numb and her face grew partially paralysed. Jean-Paul likewise received benedictions and praise, though Gwen suspected her companion's Master had far more to do with the introverted sorcerer's popularity than his Triffid-count.

"Gwen, how is your health?" Brown corralled his trio of Void sorcerers once Gwen had performed her social dues. "Mind you. We won't be summoning the Shoggoth until we find that Primus."

"I am all charged up," Gwen assured her tutor. "But we're going to Llyn Cefni after this, aren't we? I would like to exercise my Wyvern."

"I admire your eagerness. Having the Purge was a serendipitous affair, wouldn't you say?" Brown raised a cup of fragrant English breakfast. "If it weren't for this fortuitous outbreak of Triffids, you would be between a Dwarf miner and a hard place."

"How so?" Gwen cocked her head. Beside her, Jean-Paul and Gracie came close to hear what the Magister had to say.

"Without the push from the Isle of Man." Gwen's tutor replaced his cup with a clink. "The closest Purge would have been in the Niger Delta, be it the lycanthropes or the Mami Wata— you be looking to consume some very talkative Demi-humans with complex social structures. The Mami Wata especially; most of them are snake-bodied, but their magic-casters are bipedal and near-human, alluring as well, from what the locals say. I suppose you wouldn't be so keen on exterminating those, eh?"

"True. I should be thankful for being put on weeding duty." Gwen pursed her lips. "I don't profess to know much about Triffids, but I sure as hell prefer feeding Caliban salad than something that begs for its life."

"Have you eaten… those before, Gwen?" Gracie gulped her juice beside them; her eyes wide and morbid with fascination. "Things that beg?"

"You want to know? Gracie? Curiosity killed the cat."

Gracie looked to Jean-Paul for an answer.

Jean-Paul gave Gracie an affirming nod of psychopathic solidarity. "Everyone's eaten one at some point. They're a primary source of Wildland bush trade, why, the Japanese…"

"Please don't." Gwen suddenly felt sick. "I would rather not know if my _otoro_ can litigate. Besides, Caliban's doing the eating."

"Have you eaten…" Gracie licked her lips. "P-people?"

"I have." Jean-Paul leapt into the abyss without hesitation. "Umzokwe's first feast began that way—"

"If you must know. Same story here," Gwen lowered her voice. "Not willingly, of course. I was hog-tied in a basement, and Caliban went off the rails. I'll tell you the story sometime."

"Umzokwe has eaten at least a half-hundred." Jean-Paul's candidness made Gwen wonder if he saw their mutual atrocities as a scoreboard. "When I was on a Purge quest in Swaziland, it was the most expedient way of dealing with Rogue Mage warlords."

"You've killed half-a-hundred people?!" Gracie's mouth hung open. "Not Demi-humans, but people?"

"Haha..." Jean-Paul appeared to take Gracie's horror as praise. "It's nothing compared to Gwen's accomplishments."

Gracie turned to Gwen with an expression of pure horror.

"Accomplishments?" Gwen gave Jean-Paul a stern look. "Jesus Christ, JP, that's nothing to be proud of."

"Why not?" Jean-Paul cocked his head. "You're the Devourer of Shenyang! They say it was the greatest victory against the Undead in this decade! How many hundreds of Necromancers were in that city? How many of their sycophants?"

Gwen's blood ran cold even as her mind dug for an excuse.
Inadvertently, Jean-Paul had pinched a nerve that she hadn't ever really considered. Her present labours were not about how many fathers might lose their jobs because she recommended a corporate restructuring so that new hires could reduce overhead; these were actual beings— hundreds and thousands of lives that she had snuffed out on her climb to the top. Looking at Gracie's uncomprehending face, she became reminded of Elvia's complaint against her protean morality. How strange it was that her memories of Blackheath now felt so indifferent.

"Yeah well—" Gwen delved deep for the right words. At the very least, she had to instruct Gracie. "Look, people or no people, there has to be a line, alright? This thin, red line, let's call it morality— better yet, _ethics,_ or professionalism. Even if we're Mages of Mass Destruction, there's a boundary, right? We take on monsters that threaten our way of life— help our kin find new homes, colonise new lands. Where possible, we sue for peace. Power, when properly projected, is a deterrent to conflict..."

"Anway... I called it Militant Pacifism," Gwen chugged on. "The more power I— I mean the Mageocracy projects, the less likely other races will choose the Path of Violent Conflict. Of course, there's a whole social contract element involved, and things get muddled— Oh, hey— Yossari, what do you think?"

While her monologue rambled on, their now unarmoured Dwarven Alchemist joined them. Yossari wore a metallic tunic with thick boots, held her hair in a tight bun secured by a Mithril band, and drank straight scotch from the bottle.

"I ain't one to speak, seeing as I am not from the warrior caste." The Alchemist shook her head. "Hanmoul has done well for himself, though. His notches can be counted in the thousands. Very interesting, this Military Pacifism. As for yer flustering..."

The Dwarf turned to Gwen and gently punched her solar plexus. "Let me give yer some advice I once gave Hanmoul a century ago. The only burden yer should live with is yer code. For us, the Code of the Ancestors is very generous."

The Dwarf took a deep breath.

"Care for yer kin, care for yer Clan, care for yerself, care for yer Thane," the Alchemist said. "Not all of us take it in that order of priority, but it's a start."

Gwen grew contemplative.

"Well said. For loyalists like us, its Queen and Country." Brown raised his refilled cuppa. "Long Live the Mageocracy, naturally."

Gwen regarded her duck-loving tutor. "I'll stick with having a conscience if it is all the same to you, Max."

She then turned to the confused-looking void sorceress. "Don't fret, Gracie. I don't think you'll become like us. As for me and JP, so long as we don't cross that thin red line in our hearts, I think we'll do okay. What do you think, Jean-Paul?"

"Honestly…" Jean-Paul said. "I haven't given it much thought."

"Perhaps that is the correct answer." Maxwell Brown golf-clapped approvingly. "There's nothing wrong with a strong sense of duty. Our topic reminds me of a limerick from the Pan-European war."

The Magister cleared his throat.

"'Do your duty, girl or boy—
Learn to survive and never want joy.
You'll all be happy, protected and warm,
and fear no monster, suffer no harm'."

A few close listeners hid their cynicism with a smile.
Jean-Paul and Gracie appeared in agreement.
Yossari cared not for the rhyming propaganda.

As for Gwen, her lips moved with a volition of their own.

"And because I obey, they think there's no injury.
Praise God and Queen, who makes a heaven from our misery."

"Ha!" Yossari clapped at her Gwenism. "Nicely done!"

"I would keep that to myself," Brown cautioned with uneasy wonder. "Gracie, keep in mind Gwen grew up on the Frontier, and has family in China. Her perception can be somewhat radical."

Besides Gwen, good girl Gracie nodded her head.

Gwen sighed. "Well whatever, let's bring out Golos and find ourselves that Primus"

After breakfast, Gwen's party was followed by throngs of curious Magisters out toward the lake, where an earthen platform had been prepared for her demonstration.

Armed with newfound Abjuration and Enchantment, Gwen produced her inscription wand and drew up a passably impressive Planar Ally Mandala with minimal guidance from Petra, completing the magic circle in record time. Once the circuits conjoined, she invoked the rites, vivified the etched Glyphs and spoke the words.

As a final flourish, Gwen materialised the impressive crates of HDMs and placed them in the adjacent fuel-circles. These were enough to silence the crowd, giving her the tranquillity required to complete the tongue-twisting incantations.

"Gogo!" she invoked the contract held within her Astral Body, envisioning Golos' stupid, grinning face as the Lightning mana fled, consuming the crates of compressed HDMs. "Come! Aid me!"

From the overcast English sky, a funnel of mana formed, materialising into vivid strikes of lightning that fed into the summoning mandala. With a thunderous crack of unmitigated power, a roaring gash to the Quasi-Elemental Plane of Lightning was torn into the Prime Material, forming a conduit that spanned the space between places.

A living rod of lightning struck the dais.
A split-second later, Golos, Wyvern Prince of Huangshan, surveyed the scene below him.

Scant applause filled the banks of the lake where Gwen's observers took notes or otherwise made encouraging remarks.

To Gwen's surprise, it wasn't only the Wyvern that appeared, but also a dozen crates, each about half her size. These were etched with Glyphs, ones pertaining to long-distance Teleportation.

"Gogo." Gwen waved. "I am surprised you're in one piece. What's in the boxes?"

"Calamity." Golos smouldered as his scales cooled, discharging the excess energy from his transit. Seeing their audience, the Wyvern's cruel, toothy lips split into a grin. "Ruxin has sent you gifts."

Gwen remained unimpressed. "A refund for summoning you? How thoughtful your brother must be. Am I to take this as an apology?"

"Take a look." The Wyvern stepped back. "He says if you desire additional morsels, he can arrange more."

"Morsels?" Gwen approached one of the crates. She quickly glanced at her audience, checking that no one shouted warnings or began to weave Abjuration spells. Closer, a strange premonition tingled her spine. It wasn't the spine-wrangling sting of imminent danger, but she was confident that something very unpleasant was about to enter her orbit. "Golos, what's in this thing? More Ginsengs?"

She could sure as hell use more Sen-sens right now.

"Brother says that it's a warning to all who would cheat you." The Wyvern reared his majestic head. Once risen, Golos began to speak in Draconic. "BEHOLD, MORTALS! SUCH IS THE FATE OF THOSE WHO WOULD DEFRAUD OUR KIN!"

"Wait!" Gwen said to the Wyvern, her premonition evolving to encompass a migraine. "Gogo! What's in the box—"

CLANG!

As one, the Glyph-clad boxes opened, their panels falling to the wayside to reveal their precious cargo, the so-called 'gift' to Gwen.

A stink of sick and in some instance, urine, polluted the air.

Gwen blinked, disbelieving her eyes, then rapidly blinked again to make sure she wasn't having a lucid nightmare. The observers around her, most of whom had no access to Draconic, now gawked with their mouths open.

"Morsels!" Golos opened his wings. "For you to bolster your unholy magic!"

Gwen felt the flow of time around her in the manner of a Mage affected by Haste, where everything felt as though moving in slow motion. How could this be happening? She asked herself. She was just summoning Golos so the drake could shit out some cores. Was Ruxin trying fuck with her?

On the elevated dais, the Devourer of Shenyang now stood with a Wyvern and a multitude of men and women in sullied, orange prison uniforms, most of whom she knew by name.

Magister Quin Chen!
Director Tu Guangshao!
Magus Xing Fung!
Magus Jiang Fung!
Magus Bai An Fung!
Magus Teng Cai Fung!
Senior Abjurer Cui Delan Tu!
Senior Transmuter Tian Hanying!
Secretary Duan Zhen!
District Party Secretary Geng Mu!

The Wyvern aside, she had conjured men and women galore! A veritable Mage Flight! Enough high-tier magic users to run a provincial District!

Very slowly, the pale-faced, blue-lipped Mages turned to face her. Like marionettes pulled by strings, their bodies moved against their will until, as one, the group fell, prostrating themselves by striking the floor with their hand and foreheads.

"Now consume them!" Golos pointed a sizzling claw of lightning at the Mages, then at Gwen. "These carcasses stole Crystals from you, Calamity. Show them the wrath of an Elder Kindred! Use them for the only purpose they're fit for— as fertiliser for your calamitous, soul-drinking worm!"

As Golos' enthusiasm washed over her, Gwen became hyper-aware of her observers on the banks.

Magister Brown was holding Gracie, who was near-collapsed in his arms. Richard stood with a shit-eating smile split from ear to ear. Petra appeared impressed and lively, and Jean-Paul looked like he could swallow an egg. Besides her team, the Colonels, Majors, Magisters and Maguses all wore various expressions impossible for her to read. As for Yossari, the Dwarf shook her head, likely wondering what the hell these Humans were up to now.

"NO!" Gwen spun, sending her hair fanning out in a semi-circle. "NO! NO! NO! WHAT THE FUCK?! Golos! Did Ruxin put you up to this?"

In the midst of her fury, there was also clarity. Ruxin was arrogant and a bit a of a dick, but there was no possible way the Dragon would spoil their investments by ruining her reputation like this. For the sake of Crystals, she would have the truth! She would have Caliban ferret the facts from Golos' gut if that were how deep she had to dig.

"WELL?"

"Er…" Golos stumbled from the force of her glare. "I am just a Messenger."

"And Ruxin told you to say this?" She pointed at the shivering prisoners. "Your brother, the Master of Manipur, Kachin and Nagaland, currently my partner, put you up to this pile of Dragon shit?"

Out of sheer nervousness, Golos began to pick at his snout furiously.

"Caliban!" Gwen called for her Familiar. "Big Bird—"

"Ayxin told me to say it!" Golos hastily spat before Caliban materialised.

Gwen looked to the crowd, within whom the misunderstanding must be brewing like bacteria in a cesspit. She so wanted to grab the fangs sticking out of Golos' face and rip a pair out. Thanks to the idiot, regardless of the truth, sensationalist headlines about man-eating sorceresses would fly its way around the world before reality could even get its pants on.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"Ayxin?" Gwen bit back the vitality necessary for Caliban to beat the Wyvern a new shade of blue. "Why would she do that?"

"Her mate speaks about you incessantly," Golos readily confessed, perhaps realising he may as well tell the whole tale. "When sister complained she was still without egg. I told her if she's anxious about infidelity, then she should share. That way, the first female to bear fruit proves the better mate. Its how we Dragons do it."

"Jesus, you dull-witted bird brain…" Gwen gagged, feeling such cringe that her skin itched. She could just imagine the siblings communing via their Dragon-App or whatever they used to talk. There's Ruxin's boasting about cash, Ayxin lamenting about Jun— then Golos, for some stupid fucking reason, stops ploughing Phalera long enough to deliver Ayxin a shit-nugget of wisdom. In response, choked by a cold and vengeful fury, Ayxin gives Golos an amazing idea to piss on their niece, giving her enough reason to send Caliban on a magical mystery tour. "Bloody oath, Gogo… you've got a god damned death wish."

"… you're not going to eat them?"

"Of course not!" Gwen snapped. "These are people, Golos! They're wearing pants! Tell me, what are Ruxin's plans? His real one this time."

"These are your new labourers," Golos finally explained, revealing the untold secret behind the crates. "They're Essence-bound to obey your every word and will."

"Oh…" Gwen looked toward the prisoners shivering on the floor. "… fuck. What happens if I don't need them? Can I send them home?"

"Then their Astral Bodies will cease to exist, and they will die," the Wyvern explained. "He did say they would make a good example of anyone who chooses to steal from you. He does not wish for the same thing to happen to his Crystals in this land of the western empires."

Gwen opened her mouth to speak, then thought better of it.

"Mister Tu," she left the Wyvern to address the kowtowing Mages. "What do you think of all this?"

"Our only wish only is to perish in your service." The once-mighty Director of Finances, Tu Guangshao, kept his head low. "If we may advance your course by one millimetre, Mistress, then our duty is done."

"Are you all glamoured?" Gwen asked.

"Yes," Tu replied with a tone of maniacal optimism. "Master Ruxin would like you to know that this is what we chose out of the paths he had offered us. The ones you see here chose the Path of Servitude."

Gwen sighed. Looking at Golos, she turned again to her old employers. "Magister Chen, are you under duress?"

"It was death— I chose life," Magister Chen replied. "I serve freely and willingly."

"Somehow I doubt that," Gwen said. "What happens if I free you?"

"Consumption by your Void Fiend would be preferable."

"I see…" Gwen mulled over her options. If only Walken were here, she lamented. For now, someone else would have to fill the old fox's shoes. Quickly, she sent a Message to Brown, explaining her dilemma.

"More than anything, these are foreign Mages who have no right to be here." Brown pushed back against the clamouring of shocked Magisters surrounding him, "We'll have to send them to Customs to get processed. What do you want to do with them?"

"If I send them back, they're meat," Gwen said. "They're white-collar criminals who failed at playing politics. The Dragon I am doing business with— Ruxin, sent them over to be my servants rather than killing them outright. They're under some form of indentured servitude, sealed with a Draconic Geas."

"No doubt," Brown's voice returned. "Christ, Gwen— this is a bureaucratic nightmare. These are Magisters and Maguses, not NoMs. And if they're loyal to you or the Lord of Nagaland..."

A moment of silence passed between them while behind Gwen, Golos the Wyvern scratched an ear hole with a wingtip.

"Maybe you should let the Lady know."
"Maybe I should let the Lady know…" the two said at the same time.

"Okay." Gwen was glad that great minds thought alike. As much as she felt pity for these sods, they had made their beds. "Good idea. I'll call Ollie."

Once the excitement died down, Gwen's party had two options— to stay at Llyn Alaw and wait for the hunt for the Primus to conclude, or to venture out themselves to join the hunt.

Gwen's first choice, considering Golos' smug face, was to proceed as planned. That was until Richard intervened and explained to her the poor optics of her thumping through the forest with Golos in tow while her 'servants' stood on the dais in the wind and rain, suffering the potential of spontaneous combustion.

"And no." Richard appeared perfectly happy with her new servants. "Putting them undercover doesn't help. Who are the authorities going to talk to when they arrive? Ollie? Magister Brown? They're your responsibility, Gwen. Or do you want them to interview Golos?"

"I didn't want this." Gwen felt such ambivalence. She understood that the lives of these folks were not her responsibility— but she also acknowledged that she alone was responsible for them. In a Message to Mayuree, she had urged her business companion to begin working on sending her a team of auditors for London. Marong had replied that there would be many hurdles, as Frontier immigration remained troublesome— that and most of their management-level staff in Shanghai would not want to leave their tier 1 home.

Assuming word had travelled up the mountain, Ruxin's boon was a natural solution to the Isle of Dog's short-handedness.

Her surface reading was that the Dragon was a good business partner, one providing her with capable, loyal, magically inclined staff with decades of experience in managing things— albeit corruptly.

The underhanded implication, Gwen suspected, was that Ruxin wanted eyes to see what she was doing and that for someone whose Crystal hoard was being held hostage, the Dragon wanted another layer of assurance.

"Fine—" she relented. "I'll take care of this."

She rounded up the docile prisoners, who gazed toward her as though she was the light of salvation at the end of a long tunnel. At her behest, Golos turned himself into his humanoid form, once again wowing the crowd with his spike tail club before Gwen made him wear pants.

Once across the thin strip of land adjoining the platform to the lake's edge, she handed over her "servants" to the military. When Major Halifax indicated that they did not have the men to spare, considering the Magister-tier casters in her group, Gwen conceded to Richard's wisdom.

"Good work, Dick," she commended her cousin, concurrently commanding Golos and her Familiars to keep an eye on the captives.

"That's alright, Duck." Richard patted her head. "Besides, I am sure half of those folks still think you're going to eat them in secret. Maybe make a public announcement?"

"Good idea." Gwen waited until the prisoners were relocated before she turned to address an eager crowd panting for the relationship between a shapeshifting Wyvern and a Void Sorceress. That particular bit of detail had been left out from their briefing, especially the part where Chinese Mages had cheated Gwen out of money she co-owned with a Dragon. Gwen did not mind. The Tonglv incident was an open secret; now, it was merely in the open.

"Alright, you scoundrels—" Gwen imperiously addressed the prisoners.

"A gentle approach might be best…" This time, it was Petra who spoke through a Silent Message. "Gwen, you're in England now. These Dragon-baits might answer to you, but you answer to London's Tower. Be mindful of who's watching."

Their eyes briefly met. Petra nodded her head, nudging Gwen to move in the right direction.

"Worry not," Gwen corrected course at once. "You will wait here with me until Heathrow sends their officers. When you are questioned; tell them what you know. Hide nothing. Your honesty will determine if you can carry out your duties as promised to Ruxin. If you lie, I'll send you back to China or Nagaland to answer to the Dragon himself. Understood?"

Collectively, the Mages bowed. "Yes, Mistress!"

"Good, now talk." Gwen curled Caliban under her so that she instantly possessed an impromptu and terrifying bench. "Now— tell me everything."

Thankfully, it wasn't nearly as bad as she had thought.

According to Tu and Chen, after their arrest, they and their family were kept in stasis until they made the ISTC journey into Yangon. There, they were transported by Marong's people, the private militia servicing the House of M called the Shadow Men of Manipur, to Nagaland.

Upon their arrival in the Jade Palace, the hundred or so prisoners had kowtowed in Ruxin's presence to face his judgement. The Dragon's displeasure swept over them, and about a dozen of the weaker members died right there and then.

The survivors weren't nearly so lucky.

The Dragon had used its Draconic tongue to compel the truth from their teaming brains. Each by each, the men and women confessed to every crime and perversion. All admitted to bribery, theft, false bookkeeping, lovers outside of wedlock, bastard children. One even professed of having silenced a mistress and another to having impure thoughts about a threesome with Ayxin and Jun. Nothing was left unturned as the Dragon's Essence-tinged Mind Magic picked over their brains, turning their egos into mushy rice.

Once satisfied with their blabbering, semi-moronic semblances, the Dragon gave his sentence. The intent was that they would die eventually in the jade mines, be it from abuse or exhaustion, Ruxin didn't care—

— Until Ruì intervened.

Out of the unsullied goodness of her heart, Ruì felt compassion for those men and women who would have murdered her over a mere hundred HDMs and suggested they could be put to use for Gwen in England. If even she, a mere mortal of so little power, could find it in her heart to feel for these miserable cretins, Ruì explained, why can't Ruxin, who was so much wiser and kinder?

The survivors of Ruxin's interrogation eagerly agreed, even when Ruxin said that he would mark them and that they would die a death of ten-thousand cuts if they displeased him or betrayed Gwen in any capacity. If she commanded them to die, Tu spoke without expression; they may very well die more horribly if they failed to kill themselves.

"I command you to live," Gwen said immediately, then shook her head in disgust.

It took an hour for Customs to arrive. In time, Heathrow's very friendly and accomodating officers arrived with Ollie, who looked like he wanted to wrap his hands around Gwen's slender neck and just squeeze until something snapped. Gwen played the matter off with big smiles and fluttering lashes, telling her Praelector that here was an opportunity to give the Isle of Dogs project a kick in the behind.

Grudgingly, Ollie relayed that Lady Grey would take custody of the Mages. For now, her new aides from Shanghai would be registered as illegal aliens, and only if they passed muster would they be expatriate labourers under Magister Walken's care. Considering how much influence Gwen had over them, the Lady has advised that they work for Gwen, but not directly under her— as the implications of slavery were something of an anathema to the British, who had weaned off that particular teat some centuries ago.

The process of watching over the second round of preliminary interrogations took several more hours. During that time, Gwen grilled Golos about the incident with Elvia. When her Wyvern revealed nothing of note; she believed his ignorance. If the Yinglong was as wily as she supposed, there was no reason it would trust Golos to do anything other than act as a conduit between her and itself. From the way Golos blurted out its death wish to Ayxin, then revealed Ayxin's plot to herself, the drake was either the dumbest lizard alive, or more devious than a Dragon who plotted to drag the Tyrant out of its lair without losing a single scale on its back.

Dozens of interviews later, her head throbbed, and she was hungry to boot.

To her surprise, an extraordinarily sumptuous meal of curry was teleported in for Golos, who must have demanded it from the accomodating staff servicing the Magisters coming to see her Shoggoth. To assert dominance, she spitefully ate his Chicken Tikka Masala.

The overall atmosphere of the encampment returned to mirth once Golos' simple-minded tomfoolery became apparent, chiefly when half of the Wyvern's dialogue consisted of how many broods he had hatched with Phalera. If this world had smartphones, Gwen shuddered, she could just imagine Golos with one arm around the neck of a sweating Magister, scrolling through copious pictures of his "babies", oversharing the occasionally compromising photo of Phelara.

"Young one!" Golos separated himself from the crowd of Magisters to greet Ollie, who he recognised from their last adventure. "Why the long face? Did the Calamity trouble you again?"

"Of course." Ollie's teeth gnashed as he looked up at Golos. "I don't know how you do it, Ser Golos. Have you thought about eating her?"

"She's not so hard to handle," Golos snickered. "Did you know the Calamity's one weakness is love? I can give you some tips. I am, after all, the father of a hundred chicks..."

At dusk, the search party returned with a Primus kept in stasis on an enormous, levitating barge, ready to be teleported back to some undisclosed location in London.

Gwen whistled as the raft floated by their encampment. The Primus was enormous, a verdant colossus if she had to guess by its pre-capture size. From the looks of the ichor-splattered Golems thundering back into the clearing, they must have knee-capped the thing somehow, and then worked their way up from there. Two of the Golems looked like they would need new canopies; one was missing most of its outer shell and was being towed across the sunken earth by its sibling on a Disk of Levitation.

Once the show was over, the party returned to their tent to await the inevitable call for Gwen's show and tell. Yossari, now that she was no longer a part of the party left to join the VIPs. As for Golos, the Wyvern wandered the camp, awaiting her pleasure. Once they began, she would be alone. During the Planar Ally's deployment, only Gwen and her minions were immune to the Shoggoth.

"Not all of the team came back," Richard remarked once he was comfortable. "But since everyone's smiling, I assume no one died. We're close enough to a Tower, even for shorter-ranged Contingency Rings."

"I guess this means it's my turn soon." Gwen yawned. Dealing with Heathrow's Custom officers had been taxing. She had no idea how Ollie could survive the repetitive, constant interrogation and could only be glad for his presence. "Too bad I couldn't exercise Golos."

"You're not at a loss. Since the college is paying for his ticket to London." Petra sat on her bunk, fiddling with a Spellcube. "And Walken's got some new helpers. That's got to be worth more than Cores."

"We could have gotten both," Gwen pointed out. "You guys need funds, don't you?"

"Nothing urgent." Petra shook her head. "I can do Enchanting work, especially after I learn from the Dwarves."

"And I've been doing odd jobs." Richard shrugged. "We're fine, I think. I am receiving pay from Walken as well for work on the Isle of Dogs."

Gwen looked across to Jean-Paul.

"I've got Crystals." Jean-Paul touched his ring. "Do you need Crystals, Gwen?"

"… I am good." Gwen gave the man a thumbs up. "Thanks for offering."

"I have some savings." Gracie raised her hand since it appeared that everyone's talking about their finances. "Er… I get an allowance; for surviving."

"Oh, Gracie." Gwen walked across the tent to pat her new companion on the head. "Crystals are the least of your worries. Once your health improves, we'll focus on getting you up to spec, hmm? I am sure there are lots of ways we can see if it is possible to get you up to spec. With Evee's Sen-sen and my help, you'll be fine. I promise. A Void Illusionist! You'll be breaking new ground!"

"Okay." Gracie's expression grew so hopeful that Gwen felt a pang of guilt. "I've seen and learned a lot on this trip. Thank you, Gwen. You too, Jean-Paul."

"Aww, you're too sweet." Gwen gave the girl a big hug, pushing her shoulder against the young woman's.

_Ding!_

On cue, a Message Glyph, red with urgency, blossomed beside Gwen's head.

Gwen answered the call.

"Magus Song, we're ready for you," came the reply. "Please gather your team at the main pavilion. Final checks have been carried out. We're green-lit to go."

"Understood," Gwen returned the Message. "I'll see you on the dais."

The array of instruments set up around the summoning platform reminded Gwen of a concert, while she was the diva taking centre stage.

Spectrometers of all kinds with confusing Latin names bobbed in the water, hovered in the air, or were anchored to long steel piles driven into the soft earth. At her insistence, the observers forwent the bunkers the Transmuters had conjured from stone, and instead took to the open air. There were no shockwaves that followed a Shoggoth; she had told them; only tentacles coming out of dark places where ectoplasm could collect.

Finally, with warnings delivered, Teleportation Beacons affixed, and mental wards assigned and tested, the gathered Mages were ready, and so was she.

Behind her, her Wyvern grunted.

Gwen had initially entertained the idea of having Golos sit outside the Mandala, for such was her annoyance at the brute— but then she recalled that in Shenyang, the Amazon, and Nagaland, the two of them had fought shoulder to shoulder, and had bled together, his huffing snout against her breathless bosom. Under Shenyang, in the gaping maw of the Shoggoth, Golos had even covered her with its stinking, fear-drenched body. The Wyvern was a fool and an innocent, this she had to accept. If she could forgive and find trust in Eric Walken, whose actions had orchestrated the fall of her Master, then why shouldn't she give the benefit of the doubt to Golos? Therefore, armed with sentimentality, she told Golos to sit inside the circle so that when the Shoggoth descended, they were both protected.

"Alright," she muttered to herself. "Let's get this show on the road."

Stepping into the epicentre of the Summoning Circle, she flooded her conduits with Essence to offset the life-leeching Void. The first time she had called on the Shoggoth, she had not anticipated that an actual 'thing' right out of Lovecraft's Mountains of Madness would materialise so readily. Now, she had experience, knowledge and confidence.

Though the night was clouded, Gwen in her blue-white Shen-Teī suit was lit by a bright nimbus, making her appear as though some old-world priestess. It was because a dozen Day Lights had been set up by the observing Magisters, momentarily banishing all shadow from the vicinity of Llyn Alaw and its calm, mirror-like water.

Gwen wetted her lips, then began.

"Yog-Sothoth!" she repeated the words from her last conjuration. She had no idea if the make-believe itself was necessary, but she was invested now in the old paths. "Lä, Shub-Niggurath! Bring forth the creators of the mad cities! Birth unto this world ye servants! O ye Manglers from the Mount! Hunt mine enemies! Iä— YE MOUTHS OF MADNESS! CONSUME THESE TRIFFIDS!"

The Mandala darkened with Void mana, its silvery burst of Conjuration consumed by the ink-like rushes of crow-black energies hungrily lashing at the air. As before, her once glowing face grew anaemic, though this time, she could feel her abundant Essence fighting the Negative Energy drain, preserving her stamina.

_Weee—Weeee—_
 _Weee—Weeee— Weee—_
 _Weee—Weeee—Weeee— Weee—_
 _Gweeegn— Gweeegn— Gweeegn— Gweeegn—_

The strange gale she had heard in her dreams grew suddenly tumultuous within the recess of her mind. At her nadir, the Mandala connected the Prime Material and the Quasi-Elemental Plane of the Void. Toward her zenith, the clouds began to swirl and turn, forming into a descending funnel, not unlike Golo's descent.

Thus far, everything other than the uninvited howling was as she had anticipated. Just as she wondered if the strange hoots existed only in her mind or if it was wailing in real life, Golos began to shout.

"Calamity!" Golos appeared bewildered. "What is that noise?! This isn't like last time!"

"You can hear it too?" Gwen said, suddenly realising that she could barely hear her voice. "GOLOS! WHAT'S THIS NOISE?"

Even with Clarion Call, she couldn't hear herself. It was as if a million voices were chanting at once, their cacophonic choruses pouring through the conduit she had forced into the Void to extract her Planar Ally.

Golos said something, but like a dark tide, the sound of the _Weee—_ went up and down, filling all space, bouncing off every nook and cranny in the interior of her skull.

_Ding!_ A Message spell bloomed, though Gwen could no longer hear the ringing.

Above, the cloud boiled then parted, revealing an enormous eye some fifty meters across, with a strange "W" shaped iris, staring straight down at Gwen and Golos.

A foetid stink of ocean water mixed with fish guts and ancient soil fell upon the dais in a violent squall, plastering both cultist and Wyvern in what was absolutely not semi-gelatinous primordial ectoplasm. When Gwen raised her hand, she could even see bits of fish scales, half a lip, and what looked like a chewed fin, platter within their general vicinity.

Gwen's mouth moved, but no sound could be heard. The sudden, fishy tempest that muted her hard-bitten syllables had also filled her half-open mouth.

From where the Shoggoth was supposed to emerge, the giant eyeball erupted as a dozen tentacles burst through its meniscus lens, revealing a formless protoplasm from primordial times— an all-enveloping, all-consuming hunger made into a writhing, slithering mass of mouths.

That— and a torrential downpour of dismembered fish.