[b]Bella![/b]

"Sure, all of those other things are true," said - said Vesper, because names are sticky and they'll attach themselves in seconds if you don't fight them. She waved her hand dismissively. "But you have [i]blue [/i]hair, sister. Where I work that makes [i]you [/i]a duchess and purple-feathered me some kind of amusing animal."

She balances brat teasing and absolute sincerity on a knife's edge. Trying to get ahead of any cynicism so that her compliment would slip past natural defenses.

"But yeah, you're a patchwork," said Vesper. "You're an amalgamation of high and low, of royalty and assassins, soft and strong, human and servitor. Nothing about you is in balance, you're not any one thing. You're a bit of everything. I think that's why people like you and want to follow you so much. Because everyone can find something to love in you. Find something to understand in you. That's why -" she snapped her fingers. "Oh. I've got it! [i]Mosaic[/i]. Lots of broken stones coming together to make something transcendent. What do you think?"

[b]Redana![/b]

In the distance of the endless suburbs then suddenly comes a tower - a storm of towers, glittering and high to the sky. The city runs up against the ocean - no, the river, a huge and unbridgeable river, only connected where the islands rise from the depths to allow it. 

It's twilight here. It feels like it's always twilight.

The city and the suburb and the wilderness has meshed together; a strange logic of aesthetic geography. Here there is a pit, a trench alongside the riverbank for cars to pass through without spoiling the views of the houses to either side. here are mansions ringed with fence with looming thunderstorms in the distance. Here are open streets with the smell of bread. Here is a side street that leads to glowing white stone houses. Here are streets of black stone with painted stripes, here is a horizontal escalator that runs for miles just to make it even more joyful to run, here is the great and exciting dream of cities about cities, crammed into the valley before the mountains.

You carry a princess against your chest in this wild and empty dream, full of everything but people. You hold her heart, butterfly strong safe against the world. You are a knight and you have a quest and that is enough to keep you moving as the Lethe washes more out behind it.

"Tell me about knights," commands the Princess. "We don't have them where I am from. Are there many kinds? What kind are you?"

[b]Dolce![/b]

"It was," sighs the ancient craftsman. "It was. Did you know that Athena is not the only god to have eaten one of her siblings? The school was built on the Anvil of Hephaestus - a lava world, gravitationally locked into position between three suns. A ball of ultraheated metal in the most extreme conditions in the galaxy. The workshop where he built the ancient Knights, forged the ancient machines, made metal work wonders and made souls out of electricity and sand. One of the wonders of the galaxy, the abode of the forge-god. Or at least it was, once. 

"Then one day, Demeter stole a seed onto the planet. This was a very special seed, the masterwork of the first true Biomancer, offered in sacrifice. Some say it was a literal seed, some say it was a genetic treatment on Demeter, with Aphrodite's help for the seduction, she used to impregnate Hephaestus. But then, against all the odds, on a planet of fire and radiation and unimaginable pressure, the seed grew. It sank roots into the ultraheated metal and drank it deep. And the impossible planet, the galaxy's forge, became the origin for a new Working that would spread across all the stars.

"And that's where the Collegia Biologis was built. That's where they train the Biomancers - not all of them, but the best. I was so excited when I earned my position - you know, we start out as mayflies? Swarming in the trillions, lifespans of less than a week. Most of us just live and die in that week and know no different, but some of us spend our times on the riddles instead. The smartest, most dedicated learn the secret of the molt, the technique to trigger our internal biogenesis and evolve from an insect into a reptile. And from there, each stage of evolutionary development its own riddle, an ascent up the Helix Path. At every life stage given the option to stop and live out our days, happy as we are, part of the ecosystem. Sometimes the path goes up the food chain, but sometimes it goes down too. Sometimes you need to throw away what seems like the perfect body to continue. But for some there's always the question what is up even further..."

"I learned at the feet of the immortal mistresses. Beneath the three suns and the Richardson trees I saw the fusion point between matter and flesh, and offered my dedication to the Lady of Summer. And..."

He trailed off, frowning. He didn't know how the story ended.

[b]Dyssia![/b]

[Rolling the dice for Overcome: 8]

There's a real problem when it comes to fighting smart, well prepared people who also have foxy cunning. On the one hand it's extremely exciting to be challenged on this level! On the other hand the moment you hit the water they all start hitting the surface of the water with their own ELF strikes. It turns out you were right about the water conducting electricity! But now the water you are in is comprised entirely out of electricity and it's intensely unpleasant. 

Intensely unpleasant, sure. Yes. Definitely. But the plan is also kind of working? As in, they're not following you down immediately because they know that they'll get got just like you are currently getting got. You can't stay where you are, so you've got two pathways here:

One, rise up to just above the surface and skim along the top of the waves, up and down moment to moment. It means you'll get hit with toxic arrows *and* electrocuted but neither of them so bad that it'll incapacitate you. It is a plan that reasons, "I have two health bars and I will get every bit of value out of each of them".

Or you can dive deep. Dive deep and dive blind put yourself at the mercy of both the ocean and whatever plan the Pix have for you diving deep - and you're sure they'll have [i]something [/i]special just for you.