Meeting at Montelli (Part 2)

At the other end of the underground Dark Plain.

Danika sat in her cramped cubicle, finishing the letter in her hands by the light of a dim lamp.

She read slowly, repeating every word several times in her mind, as though she wanted to carve them into her memory.

When she reached the line, "The irises at the manor are blooming beautifully," she could not help smiling. "Rinascita, Ragunna..." she murmured. "They must be beautiful."

She closed her eyes, trying to imagine that sea of flowers. Blue, purple, and white blossoms swayed in the wind, sunlight falling on their petals, brighter than any lamp in the Dark Plain. She imagined herself standing in the middle of the flowers, the wind lifting her skirt, the air filled with their fragrance-

"What are you looking at, my little darling?"

A sickeningly sweet voice sounded behind her, and Danika's pupils contracted. Before she could hide the letter, a pale hand reached over her shoulder and snatched it from her grasp.

Napomo stood behind her, wearing that ever-unnerving smile.

"Give it back!" Danika sprang to her feet and reached for it, but Napomo nimbly stepped aside.

"Oh, another letter from him." Napomo held the letter up and read a few lines by the dim light, the smile on her lips growing more twisted. "Let's see... My, how sappy. Still writing after all these years? Your little pen pal is quite devoted."

"Give it back!" Danika's voice was already thick with tears.

"You really want to go, don't you?" Napomo lowered her head, bringing her lips close to Danika's ear. Her voice was as sweet as honey-coated poison. "Rinascita? Montelli Manor? A sea of irises? It does sound beautiful."

Napomo leaned close to her ear and uttered the words she did not want to hear.

"You. Are. Not. Going."

Danika bit her lip and said nothing.

Napomo's smile suddenly turned cold. Her tone was airy, but her words stabbed into Danika's heart like a knife.

"Danika, be a good girl and do as you're told. You don't want to end up as a pile of experimental waste, do you?"

Danika's face went deathly pale.

"Want it back?"

Napomo waved the letter in her hand, then leisurely tore it to pieces.

Once, twice, three times-

The scraps of paper, covered in warm words, fluttered down like a silent snowfall.

"Here, hold on to them." Napomo stuffed the scraps into Danika's trembling palm and patted her shoulder. Then she turned around and walked out, a finger pressed to her chin in thought.

Her footsteps faded into the distance, and a few words drifted faintly back.

"Christopher, you're in Rinascita, aren't you? Go to Montelli and find someone for me, then... kill him."

Danika stood there alone, the scraps in her hands soaked with sweat, fluttering down to the floor.

She lowered her head and watched her tears blur the ink on the scraps into a smudge.

She said nothing.

She only clenched the scraps a little tighter, her knuckles turning white.

The Black Shores.

The sea breeze swept over the reefs, carrying the scent of salt and damp and stirring up bursts of white spray. Camellya sat on a seaside rock, swinging her legs in the air and holding a letter, which she read with great interest.

The sea breeze tousled her hair, but she paid it no mind. She simply read the letter again, then burst out laughing.

"After all these years, he still knows how to write." She stretched and jumped down from the rock. "Rinascita... doesn't seem all that far from here?"

She tilted her head and thought for a moment. Suddenly, her eyes lit up.

"That's right, I can visit my fated seed along the way." She folded the letter and tucked it into her clothes, then walked along the coast with her hands behind her back, skipping as she went and leaving a trail of uneven footprints in the sand. "Two birds with one stone. Nice, nice."

As the sea breeze blew, she hummed an unfamiliar tune, its melody mingling with the rhythm of the waves against the shore, light and carefree.

Deep within the Black Shores, at the core of the Tethys System.

Shorekeeper stood before a massive holographic screen, her fingertips gliding across streams of data. Suddenly, an encrypted message shot into the system interface, disrupting the steady flow. Her gaze sharpened slightly, and she tapped a finger to expand the message in full.

As she read it line by line, a subtle expression appeared on her normally unflappable face.

"A grand reception..." she murmured, her gaze lingering on "Montelli" at the bottom of the letter. After a long moment, she shook her head slightly. "Unfortunately, I can't leave the Black Shores for too long. The Tethys System needs me, and disturbances in the Tacet Discord Sea have been growing more frequent lately."

She fell silent for a while, then, as if remembering something, opened a communications channel.

After a short wait, a voice came from the other end. It sounded a little tired, but reasonably alert.

"Shorekeeper? What is it?"

"Sorry to disturb you." Shorekeeper's voice was as calm as ever. "You should be in Ragunna now, shouldn't you?"

"Yes. What's wrong?"

"I'd like to ask you to attend a reception for me." Shorekeeper tapped the air, organizing the information in the letter into a brief summary and sending it over. "At Montelli Manor. You don't need to do anything special. Just attend in my place and bear witness. If you see that person, please pass on a message for me."

The other end fell silent for a moment, then came a soft chuckle. "Sure. What message?"

Shorekeeper paused. Something seemed to flicker in her eyes, but her voice remained steady. "Tell them-even though I couldn't be there, I'm very much looking forward to meeting you. I'd like to hear you tell me the stories you've written in person."

"Got it."

An unnamed, gloomy cave.

Droplets seeped from the cave walls and fell one by one into cracks in the stone, making a clear, monotonous sound.

Phrolova crouched beside a pool, feeding it chunks of some unknown meat. Beneath the surface was a Gondola.

"Eat." Phrolova's voice was flat as she tore off pieces of meat and tossed them into the water.

The Gondola lazily opened his mouth and caught a piece, then, while Phrolova lowered her head to read the letter and her attention was elsewhere, silently spat it into the water.

A few bubbles rose to the surface as the meat drifted down. The Gondola swished his tail as though nothing had happened, pretending he had eaten it.

Phrolova noticed none of it. All her attention was on the letter in her hands. The cave was dim, but she did not seem to need much light to make out the words.

The paper rustled softly as she turned it between her fingers. She read with great care, unwilling to miss a single word or sentence, as though she meant to take each word apart and see what was hidden inside.

At last, she finished the final line.

The cave remained quiet for a long time, broken only by the sound of falling drops and the occasional splash as the Gondola slapped the water.

Phrolova slowly folded the letter, her movements uncharacteristically gentle.

The corners of her mouth slowly, slowly curved upward.

"Montelli." She repeated the name at the bottom of the letter in a low voice. It echoed through the cave, carrying an indefinable emotion-recognition, amusement, or something else.

"So this is where you've been hiding."

She stood up, tucked the letter into her clothes, and looked toward the dark waters deep in the cave. The Gondola let out a low gurgle beneath the surface, as though responding to her.

"You've written letters all these years, yet you've never been willing to tell me your name." She looked down at the Gondola's indistinct outline beneath the water, her voice so soft she might have been talking to herself. "Now you've finally shown your tail."

She turned and walked toward the cave entrance, her steps light. Light streamed in through the opening, stretching her slender figure into a long silhouette.

"A reception at Montelli Manor?" She glanced back at the dark pool in the cave, an unreadable glint flashing in her eyes. "I'd like to see just what kind of person you really are."