Haminshast was a nice city, and reminded me a little of the first town I'd visited on this world - but better in every way. Where Yallowsben had patchwork walls of different materials and heights, these ones were uniform and in excellent repair. The layout was similar, but the streets were cleaner. The buildings were of a similar design, but the alleyways between were better lit. They also had city watch posted around, which had been lacking in Yallowsben due to their proximity to Halenvar's borders - everyone had been pulled into combat.

We had a nice dinner together and did some shopping, and I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. Our time in Good Charl had gone fine, but I'd been worried about the airship and the mana battery and Grunkle and... I hadn't truly relaxed. I certainly hadn't been relaxed sleeping in the Meat Dimension either, and so as I arrived at this new place I had been expecting things to somehow blow up.

But I didn't run into a future version of myself, or burn a building down, or get mugged, or attacked by bounty hunters, or any of that stuff. I found a little shop that was selling magical trinkets, all these little metal beads on leather cords. Most glowed in different colors, some made odd sounds when you touched them or zapped your fingers, and one floated - that would make it hard to wear, but it was super neat. None did anything actually useful.

"I'm still learning enchantment," the proprietor said. She was in her twenties, probably, and extremely short. She had super tight-knit curls like Cyne, as if wearing a knit cap. Probably they came from the same area. "These are just practice baubles, eventually I plan on learning how to make better magic items."

I got one that glowed in shifting shades of green and blue, and pulled magnetically towards wood for some reason. Like the rest of the town, it put me in a good mood. Just a nice interaction with a random person, no danger or tangles of fate. Likewise we got on the road in the morning with no fanfare or panic, and had a relaxing journey while taking turns riding on a wagon of supplies - the owner had been more than happy to have us along as added security in the event of monsters. But there weren't any monsters, either.

When we arrived at the town of Pell's Orchard, it was - as the name would imply - surrounded by trees. Larger cities tended to rotate things around the city over time, with the landfill being magically turned into wilderness by 'druids' and then a new wedge being picked as the landfill while the old one was left for foraging and eventually woodcutting. Once it was cleared they'd use it for farmland, and when the soil was depleted they'd use it as landfill. Around and around.

But here, the orchard went all the way around. I wasn't sure where they took their garbage, or where they did the rest of the farming - maybe they traded for everything? That didn't seem right, surely they'd at least grow some grains or something. There was a fairly flimsy wall around the orchard, probably just enough to keep lazy monsters away and slap some simple wards on, and a lanky teenage boy escorted us to the town elder - this was clearly the most exciting thing he was going to do all week, especially because of Sige.

Errod and I stayed a step back and let Sige take care of the business end of things, but the elder - a man named Pelton who didn't actually look that old - kept things quick and efficient and then led us back into a meeting room where refreshments were waiting. There was tea, an assortment of fruit, and some mild recreational drugs - I still wasn't used to that being such a casual thing in this world.

"Please, make yourself comfortable. I'm sure you were given the summary that we sent, but... we have been attacked by strange monsters nearly every night for weeks. Some are easily dealt with, others are... quite dangerous. Only two people here have Dumines, one with Growth and one with Transmutation - they help to keep the town supplied, but don't have any abilities that would assist in fighting monsters.

"We have volunteer guards, and some hunters, but they also aren't really prepared to do this night after night. They've done well so far, but it's wearing them down and everyone is on edge. If one of the more powerful monsters shows up and catches us by surprise... well, it's a wonder that only one person has died so far."

Sige nodded sympathetically. "That's fucking awful, I'm sorry you had to deal with that." Pelton quirked an eyebrow at Sige's profanity, but didn't say anything. Sige took a quick sip of his tea and continued. "Your message said these things were from another plane?"

"They would have to be," Pelton said, "as they certainly aren't local. There has been quite the variety, but I'm not knowledgeable enough about the planes to say which they could be from. A bear with antlers that shot out lightning was the most powerful. There was a smaller creature, somewhat like a deer, that glowed a bright green color and was highly aggressive, but someone killed it from a distance before we could see if it had any other magic. I don't know that we have a complete list, but each one has been unique and several have seemed to be ill or injured, which we attributed to them not being adapted to this plane."

These wouldn't be 'bears' and 'deer' from Earth, but either due to them actually being related or convergent evolution there were things that looked and acted close enough. I glanced at Sige and he shook his head - he didn't know the plane either, off the top of his head. We'd have to talk about it more later. I did have one question I wanted to ask now, though. "Do you know how they would be coming through? If there's this many, it kind of implies someone has done it on purpose - right?"

Pelton looked uncomfortable. "I can't rule that out, but it wouldn't be anyone from here and I'm not aware of anyone living nearby. Certainly I've had the same thought, that it would need to be an ongoing portal, but... well, strange things do happen sometimes out here. They say over in Slakes - that's on the far side of Haminshast from here - someone stumbled on an old shrine from thousands of years ago that made them fall asleep for years without ageing."

Sige grinned. "Yeah, you do hear those stories sometimes. And there was a fad, way back, where people made permanent gateways to other planes. Could be one is out there and got knocked open somehow. Well. We'll hang around town for a bit and see what happens, and if nothing comes our way we'll go out and look for trouble. You'll tell the locals to let us handle it unless it's an emergency?"

He agreed, and had someone show us to where we'd be staying - they didn't have a proper inn, but there was an old widower with extra rooms who had volunteered to put us up. They were dusty, but clean other than some rodent droppings in a corner. Food was provided by the tavern, and since smaller towns tended not to bother with currency they just kept track of how many meals we ate and got compensated somehow from the elder.

Errod had been quiet, but looked relaxed. As Sige and I dug into our stew he leaned back and gazed at the rafters, lost in thought. "Do you think," he said eventually, "that it could be avatar spirits bonding to local wildlife? It would explain the strange features and abilities, and why there are so many different ones."

I paused with a spoon full of root vegetable halfway to my mouth. "Can they do the... glowing, lightning, whatever else... stuff? I know they can make you stronger or faster or whatever, give you horns and a tail and shit, but it's mostly physical changes. Right?"

Sige nodded. "Mostly, yeah. Some of the rare fuckers can do that kind of shit, but I'd be surprised to see this many. Sounds like there's been about two dozen so far. But it also doesn't make any fucking sense for random monsters to be wandering in, either. What, this fucking portal is out there and just happened to open to some spot where a bunch of totally different critters wander through?"

"Which brings us back to the question Calliope asked," Errod said, "about if this could be someone doing it on purpose."

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Sige looked around to make sure we were still basically alone - the tavern was nearly empty but would presumably fill up later in the evening. "Bingo. But people around here aren't going to want to hear that, because chances are that would mean it's one of their neighbors."

We ate a few minutes longer in peace, until a distant bell started rapidly clanging. Without another word we all jumped up and ran out of the tavern, heading at top speed towards the sound. I had my divination view situated directly above me for a better range, and could see someone on a raised platform shooting arrows into the orchard - I couldn't see the monster, but I angled us towards where the archer was aiming.

We arrived at a spot where there was no gate, but without breaking stride Sige spun and put his back to the wall and held a hand out and we used him as a ladder. Errod was over the wall first with me just a second behind, and Sige scrambled up without any help. I spun, searching, and then caught a flash of something moving between the trees.

For a moment I thought it was some sort of snake centaur thing, with a serpent body and humanoid torso. But when we all charged at it... it was something worse. The snake part was what I got right, but sticking up off of its back was most of a small deer. It was just... melded there, eyes staring blankly.

The monster turned and tried to coil up, but its hooved protrusion got in the way. It struck out at Errod, enormous fangs flashing in the light, and he sliced its head in half with such force that its momentum was stolen and it collapsed in a twitching heap at his feet. The deer head bleated quietly, though its eyes were still unfocused. Errod took another swing to remove that head, probably just in case it was suffering.

The fight had been anticlimactic in a way, but at the same time it was way more than we'd bargained for. Sige nudged at the body, and we all just stood there for a moment in silence before he finally spoke up. "Well that's fucked up."

"It's not a monster even, right? I mean, it's... it's like... could this have something to do with Heregie? You know, there was that body that was all melded into the wall and that thing with the person in the tube?"

Errod looked doubtful. "That wouldn't explain most of this. If the snake and deer were injured and got healed by Heregie they might have healed together, but it doesn't look like that's what happened. And Heregie wouldn't be able to give things lightning attacks, or make them glow, or any of the other abilities. You're the expert Sige, what do you think?"

"I think you're right. Fuck. That makes this way stranger. Someone fucking around with Enhancement magic maybe, if parts of them were from monsters? Making some sort of fucking hybrid things as an experiment? We're getting close to the Grand Alignment, crazy motherfuckers are all over the place practicing for the big day."

We headed out of town, doing our best to follow the trail the creature had left. I had dialed up the time differential so I could watch all around us from Ematse, but sadly that was still just me and not some automated computer assistant - meaning it was boring as hell. Sure, I could make time move at a crawl and search every blade of grass for signs that the monster had gone this way. Who the fuck wanted to do that for hours? Still, I did my best.

Sige and Errod kept their eyes out too, and thankfully we did find indicators. Flattened plants, bits of deer fur where it had gotten stuck on a tree, and some smaller marks that we were less sure of. Eventually we were sure we'd lost the trail, and stopped to chat while we tried to decide if we should turn back - we'd foolishly all left our bags back at the tavern, and weren't equipped to be out in the wilderness all day.

"I wish Katrin was here," Errod said, "she could look at the mana levels around the town. I'm guessing the wards have failed."

"I'd bet on it," Sige replied. "They've probably been draining the mana from all around the town, while leaving their town totally fucking exposed. Mana-starved monsters wander by, see all these humans full of magic juice while the land around is barren... yeah, of course they're fucking attacking."

Errod nodded. "It would be nice to confirm it, so we knew nobody was sending them at the town on purpose."

We eventually headed back to town, and the rest of the evening was quiet. First thing the next morning we went back out, and I used my now perfect memory to guide us back to where we'd lost the trail. Now that we had supplies, we could be out there overnight if needed.

The woods had a lot of plants that - just based on the appearance - I would have associated more with tropical climates on Earth, but the air was cool and dry. Sige had an unstable mana crystal that he kept around for monster bait, but when he pulled it out of its special case all it really did was attract a ton of mana-sucking insects. My ghost turned out to be a great way to deal with those, but we still made him put the crystal away.

While we were packing back up after eating lunch, we got our next lead in the form of a terrible smell. "Is that... burning hair? It smells like burning hair."

Errod pulled out his sword, and for a second I had the thought that it was silly to get ready for a fight just because of a bad smell before the rest of my brain slapped that down. Of course he should grab his weapon. Who the fuck knew why there was burning hair smell? It could be a fire-breathing dragon murdering woodland creatures or something.

It wasn't a dragon, as it turned out, but it was a sort of raccoon-shaped thing that was smoldering and very angry. It hissed at Sige, who had been the first to locate it, and arched its back to look bigger. That move might have worked better with more fur, but all its hair had curled in and blackened somehow.

"What the fuck happened to you, little guy?" Sige asked.

The raccoon thing burst into flames and pounced on him, screeching, and the burnt hair smell increased as Sige's orange fuzz lit on fire. He grabbed the raccoon by its head and yanked it free, blood spraying as the furious creature took a chunk of flesh with it. That was all the damage it would ever get to do, however, because at that point Sige threw it so hard that its back shattered against a tree trunk.

The flames winked out, and Sige started swearing up a storm.

"I'll get the next one," I said, and handed Sige a canteen. He dumped the water on his chest and rubbed mournfully at the patch of burnt hair.

Errod was already over at the raccoon thing, and after a moment's hesitation he chopped it cleanly in half with his sword. "It's... partially cooked," he said.

That seemed to rule out this being a natural ability. No creature would evolve to burn itself up, right? Magic was strange, but it wasn't that strange. We all took turns looking at the damage - yeah, that was partially cooked - and then started following the trail of bad smell and mildly singed plants to see where the fuck the raccoon had come from. This trail was significantly easier to follow than the snake thing, but still pretty subtle; it hadn't been on fire the whole time, clearly, so we were mainly looking for the little clumps of burnt hair it left behind as it walked.

After another hour and a half or so of trekking through the woods we'd lost that trail as well, but we'd found another couple of strange monsters - all dead. Two were ripped clean in half, but a huge stag we came across was seemingly just dead for no reason. Errod chopped that one open too, at Sige's insistence, and inside of it there was another stag and a half as if this thing had been growing more of itself in place of its organs.

I climbed a tree, trying to see where the fuck we were in relation to Pell's Orchard, and with the extra height I could get via divination I was able to peer past the giant floppy leaves of the jungle-like canopy and see something interesting in the near distance - some sort of crumbling tower. Jackpot. I scrambled down and let the others know the good news, and we headed in that general direction in much better spirits. It was good to have a potential destination after wandering around all day.

We had to take the long way, following some animal trails so that we didn't have to go through dense undergrowth. "You should just fly over," I said to Errod, and he sighed. I'd been pressuring him to try and fly using his sword ever since he'd been launched from the airship and used it to keep from falling to his death. He'd refused so far, with his argument being that he didn't have any way to steer and would be at the mercy of the wind - he also wasn't super sure he could land gently, and I suspected he was scared he'd lose his grip on the sword while high in the air.

As we reached a stream we got a better view of the tower, which was in terrible shape. It looked like there might have been a landslide, because the structure was right on the edge of a steep drop-off and it had partially collapsed on that side, with a significant chunk of the wall missing. It was hard to say just how much from the angle we were at. I was so busy looking at it that even with an extra mind supposedly paying attention I almost stepped into the stream - not only would that have soaked my boot, but there was some weird slime or mold growing in the water. Gross.

We looped around and climbed back uphill, but just before we reached the tower Sige stopped dead and started looking around nervously. Errod and I took the hint and prepared to fight, but we were still caught off-guard when a huge tentacle wrapped around Errod's leg and flung him away down the slope. A colossal creature rose up, something that I could only describe as a giant zombie bear with squids for hands. Each of its dozens of tentacles were tipped with claws, and its teeth crackled with lightning in a totally unnecessary way.

Sige took a step back from it, and then glanced over at me. "You said you'd get the next one, right?"

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