The following seven rooms all had exits to the left and progressively harder puzzle traps. After the third room, I required Casimir’s help to continue. Not only were they impossible to complete without multiple sets of hands, many were beyond my ability to solve—simply too magically or mechanically intricate—and required brute-force methods such as throwing waves of summons into their workings. By the end, I was significantly annoyed, but our efforts were rewarded with the Orslin city.

  Our perspective shifted gradually. At first, there were scattered windows that led nowhere, then doors that didn’t open. Once we were used to the oddities and stopped checking them, the hallway expanded and the doors led to adobe-style homes. The gray ceiling became speckled with turquoise stones that shifted to blue. When we turned a corner, the city opened up.

  The azure stone above twinkled like starlight. Faint pink clouds of mist bundled the lights into nebulas. On the ground, houses piled on top of each other. Vibrant colors depicted trap designs and schematics on every facade. The Orslin themselves floated above the crowds. Each had a smooth plain white mask for a face attached to indistinct shadow bodies. Solid black arms jutted from them in random directions. Those grasped wooden sticks that pulled strings connected to the true residents of this city.

  Puppets of every kind of monster walked through the streets in a wordless pantomime of life. The Orslin could not speak, so their puppets played instruments or clacked teeth to get their point across. Dragons conversed with pixies. Orcs bought wares from human merchants. A tentacle eye-horror crawled over buildings after thieving goblins.

  A painted artificial menagerie played out a life the Orslins could never have while expressing individuality their natural forms couldn’t. Their performance was both homage and parody. Criminals were thrown in jail only for their Orslin to grab a new marionette. A fey princess wept after being rejected by a raptor. That raptor then got into a sword fight with one of the fey’s suitors.

  On and on their game went until an Orslin got bored and left with a cadre of others to make another dungeon more interesting.

  In a city that was a stage, music was the lingua franca. I drew a flute from storage and played a song of weary travels. A wooden octopus swam to us and beat a welcoming rhythm on its drums. I responded with a melody of joy and greeting.

  Casimir’s puzzled expression relaxed into bemusement as he followed the octopus and I to an inn for travelers. Real food simmered in the kitchen, an actual fire blazed in the hearth, and elementals were bound to pump hot and cold water into every room.

  For the next song, I pulled out a violin—instruments made of mundane materials, so I had many of them—and played a mournful tune about seeking the lost in forgotten places. The octopus clapped delightedly and guided us to the first room upstairs on the right. Within it were scattered notes and a cork board covered in red string and post-it notes. In the corner lay an unmade bed and an empty shotgun next to an open window.

  I rummaged through the room and found a bag of wooden coins. After handing them to Casimir, I said “Here, take these and enjoy the sights. I recommend the massage parlors.”

  He frowned and glanced in. “Is this Axel’s room? Did he really stay here?”

  “For some time, it appears. You can’t be here. Axel’s trap is dangerous, and my mitigation strategy only works for me.”

  Suspicion flowed over our bond since Riena was still in range. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Most of it. It’s a memetic trap.”

  He tsked. “Fine. I think I saw a bar on the way over. I’ll have a drink and wait for the others to catch up.”

  “Good! If any of the Orslins flirt with you, play along. They won’t actually do anything, and it’s a good way to get free drinks. If you completely rebuff them, then they’ll switch to other interesting narratives where you have to fight off your harassers.”

  “That’s really creepy.”

  I wobbled a hand. “We’re fairly safe here because it seems like we’re following their rules. They love injecting chaotic elements into their stories and are less likely to try to kill us to preserve that, but you have to be dynamic and allow yourself to be dragged into their schemes. A bored Orslin is a dangerous Orslin. Don’t be boring, and you’ll be fine.”

  He grumbled and left, leaving Coatlie and I to investigate. The snake flew to the board and started mumbling while I went through the various notes. They were all in orcish, but unlike the journals’ rambles, these were disjointed random ideas on how to destroy Aspiration.

  After translating a few of the plans with his dictionary, I scoffed in professional embarrassment. “This idiot would be better at destroying civilizations if he had some practice. I mean really!” I smacked one sheets with the back of my hand. “This one outlines plans to dig a large tunnel around the university to drop it half a meter. Yes, that would strip the defenses on the abyssal gate and doom mankind, but Last Stand has seismic detectors for such enemy action. That exceeds the school’s charter and would attract the attention of other hero teams.”

  I sighed and sat at the dresser turned desk. The lamp glowed with a steady yellow light, mimicking a candle and illuminating Axel’s doomed plans.

  “You start with villages, work your way up to towns, and then you try for cities. Solindale’s destruction was the culmination of my childhood heroism. It required every trick and years of practice to accomplish, and the gnomes weren’t half as dangerous as Last Stand or even Aspiration by itself. I learned gnomish greetings, immersed myself in their culture, learned their taboos, and found all their secret defenses before striking.” Their betrayed terrified faces were still a pleasant memory.

  Coatlie hummed. “Perhaps he’s not as foolish as you think and far more foolish than you could know. These notes are Akashic labels for realities. The strings between them do not connect ideas; they represent portal connections. Axel was mapping out a nexus to find a Web Crawler. Those are… You know what starships are, right?”

  “Despite greater Voiders making space travel basically impossible, I’m familiar with the concept.”

  “Right, so a Web Crawler is like a starship, but instead of sailing through the stars, they sail through realities by creating a portal hub. The Web Crawler hangs at the metaphysical center of all the worlds it is connected to. By connecting to certain worlds and dropping the connections of others, it can crawl through the skein of the multiverse to realities your world would never naturally interact with. The abandoned contraptions naturally bind together the worlds they are linked to, so it’s possible to find one through a lot of planet hopping.”

  I search through the notes for plans related to this device. “If I was Axel, I would use such a base to avoid my enemies while I found a monster species to lure to Aspiration… which is the exact problem the 4th years are dealing with, and the 3rd years are investigating the cause in the uptick of portals around the school… If he’s also dating the necromancer, then I’ll have to retract my previous criticisms.” My pulse quickened. “Axel could actually destroy humanity. He is certainly a quick study at these arts.”

  “Why the clues? Why the ineffectual bombings? It’s not a cry for attention.”

  “It might be. If he’s trying to form a coalition of monster loving humans, then he’ll want people to be able to find him after this is all over.” I chewed on the idea. “No, he could snag people in the aftermath. Even if Last Stand falls, enough humans would survive long enough for him to gather refugees.”

  Coatlie rubbed her chin with a wing. “Maybe part of him is secretly hoping someone will stop him? For most people, killing is a heavy action. Axel doesn’t seem like the kind of person that could force himself to commit genocide and stay sane. Saying ‘he’s crazy’ is banal, but the self sabotage doesn’t have to be fully conscious. If he’s decided that the heroes of Last Stand are all crazy bigots, then he could have been reasonably certain no one would find this room.”

  “Or he’s confident that no one can stop him. How difficult is it to assault a Web Crawler?”

  “Immensely, you would need a Pathfinding ability or artifact to guide you through a series of portals to it. There is no way Axel is dumb enough to park it over Earth and create a direct portal.”

  I found one sheet of notes exploring the possibility of using the Web Crawler to shield Earth from more portals, or in his mind, protect the multiverse from humans. “Professor Danger could do it. There must be a student or two with a similar ability, especially among the 4th years.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” said a calm voice by the window. “Careful, staring at orc script that intensely could be hazardous for your health.”

  I stored the notes, the dictionary, and swiped my hand backwards to store all the cork board as I stepped back to Coatlie. How long had the orc been there? It didn’t matter. Gentle Night’s comment proved she knew I could read some orcish and was merely maintaining a polite fiction that I couldn’t. Why? What is her angle?

  “Are we still enemies? Is this ‘Axel’ not enough of a threat to put aside your dislike of orcs? I know I’m authorized to work with locals when pursuing a target, aren’t you?”

  Did I dislike orcs? I looked at Gentle again in light of my awakening. Without the mask, she was a fit attractive woman with shoulders a tad on the broad side for humans, but they filled her silhouette well with her added muscle. Is green skin hot? The pigment color didn’t excite or repulse me. Skin came in various colors, and it felt weird to fixate on that, but the two small tusks jutting up from her jaw did send my imagination spinning about what they could bite. Okay, I’m into attractive orcs.

  “Is that a blush?” The woman was briefly poleaxed. “I—uh—um… Well played, Exemplar. I didn’t expect that strategy.”

  I coughed. “Summoners and tamers are rarely part of law enforcement actions. Heroes don’t sic monsters on wayward heroes.” Far too many refugees would take such action unkindly. “This situation might warrant a special exception, but I certainly wouldn’t be the one to offer it.”

  Back on familiar ground, Gentle reentered her rhythm. “Have you ever been more than one portal away from your Earth? How familiar are you with the local cluster of worlds? Can you spot which portals lead to transient connections and when they will snap? I can’t navigate through a moving Web Crawler’s maze on my own, but you need someone who’s been out there to prevent disaster.”

  I switched to my Oni armor and summoned my Fatecutter into my left hand. “A compelling argument—too compelling. It could sway others. If I lead you to Axel or let others lead you to him, then you’ll kill him. I won’t stand idly by while a monster kills a human.”

  “What difference does it make? Your human allies will kill him on the spot.”

  “That will be their choice.” I conjured an ice-katana in my other hand as I stalked forward. “I will capture the collaborator and submit him to human justice, swift as it may be.”

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  “If rationality fails you, then I’ll appeal to your fear. Let me on the hunt for Axel or I’ll report my suspicions about your reading materials.”

  “I welcome the challenge, but that’ll only happen if you escape me today.”

  Gentle laughed, bringing a hand covered in brown ceramic armor to her face while the motion ruffled her red cloak. “Please, you can’t contain me.”

  She attempted to Flash Step out the window. I chopped the intervening space with Fatecutter and canceled the ability before ramming my katana at the shocked woman’s throat. She stopped the killing blow by biting the blade as she drew a pistol and fired at my chest. I turned intangible, but the magic bullet still burned as it passed.

  When Gentle attempted to Flash Step again, I lashed out with Fatecutter. She canceled the ability and locked my arm with her free one before whispering a spell and sending lightning through the limb.

  No amount of skill or will can push through the involuntary muscle jitters caused by convulsive shock, but aura can redirect current through your bones by manipulating conductivity.

  That still isn’t pleasant. While my other hand tried to wrest the pistol from her, I angled Fatecutter until the tip touched her forearm. Rime from my armor’s Frost Weapon properly began to spread, and the orc winced at the damage.

  “You’re making this needlessly difficult!” Gentle dropped her lightning spell and uttered another phrase in High Orcish. Stone covered her skin before she shoved us apart.

  One of the Orslins then pulled the roof away, revealing that all the adobes were secretly made of interchangeable blocks. Our conflict had attracted a dozen of the spirits, who waited with rapt attention for our next moves.

  Not to disappoint, I summoned my blade and charged the orc. She drew her katana and met me. Our blades danced back and forth. My Fatecutter remained poised to strike if she attempted to flee again, leaving me down an arm. Since this was our third clash, I knew her swordwork inside and out. If she wasn’t faster, stronger, and firing a gun with her other hand, I would’ve eviscerated her. With those disadvantages, I barely held my own while dodging gunshots.

  Every sword swing should have generated a sonic boom. Despite their enchantments, our blades should have shattered. Each strike should send one of us into the air or through the floorboards. My aura smoothed over the idiosyncrasies of two magically strong creatures fighting. Gentle had retracted her own aura and only channeled it into her blade and equipment. She had no interest in this fight.

  That didn’t mean she wanted to lose. The orc stepped into my guard and used Flurry. I conjured plates of ice between each strike and my person, earning me a frustrated growl. Thousands of attacks burst apart crystals of water until we were surrounded by a nimbus of snow.

  Gentle uttered another spell and the snow exploded into thick mist. She attempted to teleport away again, and I cut her off. The frustration got to her, and she jumped to the top of a nearby building with me in hot pursuit. Spirits shook around us in indignation.

  “We’re supposed to pretend the roof is still there,” I chided. “You broke the rules.”

  She swiped her blade at me and sent forth a wave of cutting force. I vaulted over it only for the Bladewave to snip the threads of a juggling Vitis puppet. The orc sneered at me. “So did you.”

  The nearby Orslins switched to their combat puppets, constructions of stone pulled by mithral wire, and surrounded us. When Casimir’s dance partner collapsed in a nearby plaza, he looked up from the bear to see our duel. He swore and summoned a pack of giant apes to encircle our encirclement before leaping to the roof.

  Gentle tutted. “Look at this mess you made. Everyone was having a good time, and then you had to get violent. Does your nascent crush rattle you so?”

  “Fiend, hunter of men, sower of discord, hero of monsters, kiss my blade.”

  I lunged and all hell broke loose. Gentle whispered a word and separated into a dozen copies. The golems swiped at each of them while moving to intercept me. Their attacks passed through fakes and hit their allies. Casimir’s apes joined the fray to rip apart puppets and throw the chunks at other adversaries while their summoner circled the battle with his spear out.

  My dagger dispelled a few illusions as my other blade relaxed into a whip and tried to sweep through the rest. The golems shielded Gentle Night from my attacks more than they harried her. After a few seconds of frenzied copy hunting, I admitted that the orc had escaped.

  I roared and took my frustration out on the stone puppets. Not satisfying enough. I stored my weapons and switched to my Infernal armor. The clash of iron on stone made for a soothing staccato as I crushed heads and ripped off arms with bare fists.

  Casimir made a fort out of the fallen and commanded his army from it. Small dragons dropped stones from high above as his apes were slowly replaced with cyclopes. He shouted my name over and over again, but I was too bitter to stop.

  They knew. The orcs knew. Soon, they would come for me and my team. It was us or them. No, it was me or them. Part of me was worried about the certain death of facing impossible odds, but the part of me that wanted to keep learning the orc language was thrilled at the coming challenge. This is the perfect excuse.

  When the assassination attempts became lethal enough, I would have to cross through the abyssal gate and either die or destroy the orcs. Not even the Savior has accomplished a tier 8 portal clear. I would be a legend or die as one. No slow lingering past my prime. No peaceful obscurity. No peace. Never peace. I was a creature of war. The only use I had for quiet was as a cloak for sneak attacks.

  My blood pumped as another sword of Damocles joined the ones I had grown used to. To live was to face peril. I thrived off peril. It crystallized my motivations and drowned out petty concerns. At the prospect of certain death, I couldn’t help but grin.

  A laugh bubbled out of my throat, nothing kind. It hacked and rasped, just on the edge of hysteria. No artifice or affectation hid my joy at the absurd.

  “Mari?” Casimir radiated concern. I didn’t care.

  Eventually, the Orslins decided they liked this game. They continued to throw golems at us, but regular puppets mixed in with the troops. When the bear Casimir had been dancing with came, he played a love song on his harp and extended a hand claw to him.

  “Uh…” the battle paused around the illusionist.

  “Go,” I said between smashing golems. “Meet up with the others and bust me out of jail later. Make sure it is creative!”

  As Casimir left, a band of heroes approached me. One was dressed in full plate. Another stuck to the shadows with her bow. A white clad puppet knelt over a broken golem in prayer while a puppet dressed in billowing gossamer robes of every shade of purple and pink shook a staff before me. The rainstick tinkled as his white beard vibrated with him. The pointy hat affixed to his head remained unjostled.

  The wizard went through an elaborate stick dance before twirling his staff upside down and letting the pebbles within make a sound not unlike spellcasting from more whimsical species.

  I shouted in pain and collapsed to my knees while struggling against fake bonds, none of which were real. After my ensorcellment, their warrior lifted me over his shoulder and dragged me to jail.

  Once tossed into a cell, I laid on the straw mat for several moments before groaning and going about my role. I grabbed the designated chipped mug and ran it over the bars while I awaited rescue from my team.

  Coatlie slipped through the bars and settled into my mug. “That went sideways. Are you okay?”

  “Yes… no… I don’t know. No one has survived an orc deathmark. Despite my confidence in finding a way, the worry troubles me.”

  “You don’t have to stay. After a few portal hops, the orcs would never find you. We could travel the multiverse and find new adventures. The orcs, your hunger for prestige, the humans' desperate struggle to find their footing: you could be free of it all.”

  I leaned on the cold stone wall and stored my armor. “To what end? I have fought for human survival my entire life. It’s all that I am. Sure, I enjoy killing monsters, but what would be the point of doing that if there are no humans to save?”

  “There is more to life than killing. While the multiverse is dangerous, most people enjoy respites.”

  “I can’t abandon my people. It would be better to take a few orcs with me than to run away. While I enjoy learning demonic cultures, it’s in the service of destroying them to protect humanity. The moral imperative is the difference between base bloodlust and heroism.”

  “Difference? Mari, an excuse doesn’t change what you are doing. I’ve met many creatures like you. None need to lie to themselves.”

  I ignored the snake and continued banging the cup on the bars. Coatlie squawked and flew from it to settle on my head.

  A couple hours of mindless banging passed before Riena walked into the corridor outside my cell wearing a male guard’s outfit. She had a pillow shoved under the gambeson and held a fake mustache to her face with her hand. Above her, Derek shimmied along the ceiling using his shields for support while he pretended to pull the strings attached to Riena’s costume. He wore an oversized black sackcloth and a mask to mimic the appearance of an Orslin.

  My Commander lumbered to my cell in too-large clothes and jangled the keys. Her tune didn’t convey a clandestine desire to sneak me out. I smacked my cup in distress at this guard's suspicious behavior.

  Riena gave me a confused look as that emotion went over the bond. She leaned in and whispered, “Mari, it’s me.”

  “Ah! A corrupt constable is here to sell me to slavers outside the city. Woe is me! One street brawl, and I’m confined to a life of misery.”

  “What are you doing?” she hissed.

  I whispered, “Play along. A guard that is secretly a bandit is exactly the kind of plot the Orslin want to see.”

  Riena sighed and slumped before drawing in a deep breath and straightening. “Mwuhahaha! There’s nothing you can do! If you were the right kind of scum, I might have invited you to my crew. But alas, common brutes like you have no place in the Crow’s Feet.”

  “Nooo!”

  While I wailed about my doom, Riena opened the cell and tapped my head with her wooden truncheon. I flopped to the ground insensate and made my Commander carry my dead weight out of the jail.

  Casimir and Nyla passed wooden coins to the guards, and their Orslin had them look the other way while the spirits watched the scene closely.

  Derek’s role in our mummery required the most calisthenics as he jumped between rooftops to continue his ‘puppetry’ of Riena. Many Orslins found excuses to float next to him and show him proper string management. Our ‘secret’ escape from the city had a mass of hidden characters and subplots that my team rudely ignored.

  Personally, I wanted to see if the little mouse puppet could catch the sapient piece of cheese before the chef puppet captured them both. Sadly, I was mimicking a sack of potatoes and could do little but hang listlessly.

  Once fully out of the city, Riena threw me down. I rolled with the fall and landed on my feet to face the withering stare of my Commander. She asked, “Was all that really necessary?”

  “No, but I suspected you weren’t up to purge the city. Orslins can only be banished by boring them to death. Destroying the city only causes the spirits to scatter and make more traps. Your empathic talents could get the job done, but I suspect the backlash would be dire,” I said.

  “Surely, our lies could have been less elaborate.”

  “Orslins rarely let visitors go. If us leaving wasn’t important to the tales they were telling themselves, then they would have continued to invent reasons for us to stay. Forcing through would trigger a life-or-death struggle. All of that was the most tactically efficient move.”

  Riena didn’t believe me. “When did you learn to fake feelings over the bond?”

  “It’s called acting. Getting into character requires feeling what she would feel in the moment. The inmate wouldn’t have trusted you.”

  “Are you always acting?”

  I laughed gregariously. “Why would I, Exemplar, need to mask my true intent from my dearest companions? Our struggle against the monsters is the most noble and true calling possible. Nothing needs to be hidden from us. Now, let us return to our sanctuary. Coatlie and I have disturbing tidings to tell.”

  We navigated back to our dorm and were only attacked by a few minor monsters. Once back, I settled in and used the loot the others grabbed to repair their gear while Coatlie and I explained what we found.

  Riena was pacing by the end. “How are the portals not real worlds? They interact in ways that have nothing to do with Earth. Everything we discovered points to that fact.”

  Derek shook his head. “If the portals are magical constructs, then any seeming consistencies in how they work together could be part of the construction. We can’t prove that any of it is real.”

  “But the gear and monster parts we extract are persistent, not illusionary.”

  “The portals create real monsters. Conjuring gold or magic items isn’t more impressive. It doesn’t prove those worlds exist before we interact with them.”

  “Gentle Night acted like the multiverse is real.”

  “She could have simulated memories of what the universe would be like if it was real.”

  Nyla interjected. “The portals lead to real worlds. There are whole books on how realities rub against each other. It’s intentionally suppressed information in Last Stand.”

  Derek shook his head. “You read a book from a portal. That’s not proof or a scientific experiment. Mari, what do you think?”

  “Does it matter?” I answered. “It is better to think they are real to figure out their mechanics. If you need to tell yourself that it wasn’t afterwards, then that’s your prerogative as a hero.” After saying my piece and fixing their armor, I wiped my hands and stood. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to uncurse an axe for a duel tomorrow.”