"In short, we cannot smuggle our way in."
Rita was unwilling to give up. "Can our cat-ship sail on the River of Ti?"
"It can."
"If we summon it and ride the current, what happens to ti flow?"
"Between worlds, ti runs at roughly the sa pace. On the River of Ti, it is highly unstable. Just like the shifting currents you saw on the map, the river is fluid."
"My advice is to light up the world closest to the Lonely Isle, then sail from a neighboring world. Keep your ti on the River under twelve hours. If you do, BlueStar’s tiline will not advance too far."
What was the last dock before the Arisentna pier?
Dawn.
Rita stood at the alchemy workshop’s door, stared into the distance for a while, then set the plan aside for now.
The worlds she had lit on her map were all farther from the Lonely Isle than BlueStar itself.
After several rounds of evolution, BlueStar’s players had grown much stronger. Many sealed instances were no longer a threat, which made the protective curtains a limited resource. Closing any of them now was a loss.
She needed a different way to enter Dawn. Even inside that world, reaching its dock was its own problem.
And if she could find Lightchaser’s soulfire before eting Lightchaser again, all the better.
Once upon a ti she had no way to do that. Now she just might.
Title skill, The Moon Postwoman: "How could a postwoman misplace her letter?"
Mark any object or living being you have seen and designate it as your letter. You can sense its position and status at all tis. Whenever you are trying to find it but cannot, all your skill cooldowns are halved.
She used the skill at once, recalling the little boat that had carried her and her two teachers along the River of Ti for an entire year.
At once she saw it drifting aimlessly on the river.
With the mark set, she only had to think of it to feel where it was.
Relief smoothed the furrow in her brow. There were problems ahead, but she could find her way back.
She was not worried about Ash Cinders. She was only hoping that impatient elf could be patient this ti.
Rita headed for the battlefield from the great war and walked it again from end to end, casting That Was Close, Almost a Wipe in every sector.
Seawater rose from the nearby ocean, sky below and sea above, and fell again as rain. It poured over a battlefield now empty of all but rows of headstones.
Within the downpour, a moving veil of golden rain shone like a beacon.
Rita stepped onto nothing, each footfall rippling outward in golden rings, as if an invisible lake of light hung in midair.
The reward truly was on par with a divine talent evolution.
It solved her flight problem outright. If she could command an elent, she could shape it into footholds in the sky.
She was still clumsy with it. Her pace was slow. A few days of practice would be needed before she could sprint and fight aloft.
It was also her first ti using an SSS level skill since becoming the Moon Postwoman. Thunder cracked again and again in the high air above her.
So that was what the reward ant by celestial phenona when casting SSS level skills. It must be tied to the elental remaking of her core.
As the first players revived, more and more people made their way to the battlefield to greet their families.
By the ti she finished her circuit through all three war zones, Shadow.Q sent word that the grounds were ready. All that remained was for Rita to place the arcade machines and set up the trials.
Nivalis spent the evening on Dragon Isle and returned ho late, only to find both the alchemy and engineering workshops empty.
Behind the alchemy shop lay a new open space. A ow-ow Inn, cat houses, food and water had been set out, proof that Rita had been ho.
Farther off, construction on their house had already begun.
Nivalis did not go looking for Rita. She ran to the engineering shop, gathered tools, and started studying schematics instead.
Before leaving Dragon Isle, she could not help visiting Lidian again.
She was not there to brag about her bond with Rita. She only wanted to talk to a dragon about the helplessness she had felt facing Shanrane, about the sha and panic of being unable to keep up with her master.
Lidian had once seed untouchable. Yet after serving as a weapon at Rita’s side while she faced the leaders of Lania Kaia and cut down three of them in turn, Nivalis realized Lidian was not so impossible to surpass.
Without Rita, though, she felt like nothing. She was still the little whelp Rita had carried out of an instance.
Lidian listened without a word.
Only when Nivalis was about to leave did she finally speak. "If you do not want to feel that kind of despair again, find a way.
"Maybe she will never abandon you. But once your presence becos a burden, even if she does not mind, you will stay behind by your own choice."
Nivalis tilted her head. "So when you parted ways with Pine Bloom, you were the one who chose to leave?"
Lidian paused. "Not exactly."
Seeing sympathy creep into Nivalis’s eyes, Lidian bristled, dignity pricked. "She tried. Pine Bloom once tried to wait for . She gave a chance. Before she t that chanized one, she gave it up once..."
The words seed to drain the last of her feeling. She lay her head on the boulder again, facing the cloud sea, and shut her eyes.
Nivalis understood that there would be no more to this story.
Back at the alchemy workshop, she pushed Lidian from her mind and focused on engineering practice.
Rita was BlueStar’s Judgnt now, but a few defense towers near ho would never be excessive.
Sothing clicked in her head. Nivalis opened the battlefield chat to skim for useful tips before getting back to work.
Minutes turned to hours.
When Rita finally finished her tasks, she set down a late night snack for Nivalis and sat beside her to sort through rewards.
Nivalis finally had a chance to ask, "That ga was brutal. How did you end up provoking such powerful teachers?"
Rita summoned the food box with Let It Die. She wanted the luckiest state possible before handling the Divine Ga rewards.
Before the AbaAba state could take her over, she muttered, "What do you an provoke. Choose your words."
Thunder grumbled in what had been a quiet night sky. Nivalis glanced up at the roof. "You scared yourself dizzy."
Rita sighed. "Whose fault is that?"
Nivalis changed the subject. "Have you checked battlefield chat? The plaza is full of you..."
"Not interested. Pointless. You are not allowed to look either."
"We could ignore it. It is mostly insults... wait, Fat Goose is online. He is dropping a ton of new info."
"I suggest you do not look."
"By the Ancestor Dragon. You cried over Mistblade?"
"..."
"Oh. Fat Goose says Mistblade started sothing and walked away."
"..."
"My dear Holy Cup... ’To you, to , never regret.’ Rita, your fifteen year old self has my respect."
"..."
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