The heat slammed into her first, the sunlight bouncing off the shining rooftops of the sprawling city beyond. Thankfully the chilled ocean wind cooled her skin and made the blaze bearable. From this high terrace, there was no mistaking it. With little doubt, Elmira knew she had well and truly arrived on Inner Varu. Through a dead Portal.

“Great,” she said to no one in particular. “This is just great.”

The capital of this island nation buzzed with life, its streets a constant dance of color, clang, and commotion. Cultivator Wanda’s hometown wore its eccentricity like a crown and it wasn’t hard to see where she got hers. The city pulsed with the same irreverent charm that made Wanda infamous in the Council’s halls. When she’d been elected as Roya’s representative, Varu had erupted into celebrations that lasted nearly a month. Not because they cared about politics, but because they loved their own.

Loyalty in Varu was a blood pact, not a legal formality.

Laws here bent often, gracefully, and without apology, but rarely broke. This liminal space of society made it a magnet for merchants and mercenaries, adventurers and outlaws. All of them drawn to its chaos like moths to a forge flame. Thriving on its contradictions, it was a haven for both trade and piracy, order and chaos, independence and opportunism. The Omored Court governed Varu with a peculiar kind of order, strict enough to keep the gold flowing, loose enough to keep freedom alive.

The metal of the platform groaned as it took her weight, beginning its long, steady descent toward the lower districts.

Varu’s taste for metal and stone was unapologetic, a necessity that had become a signature aesthetic. Perched in the heart of the volatile Morimyr Ocean, the islands had learned early that beauty had to withstand unyielding battering. Here, storms did not whisper, they roared. Winds howled with salt-laced fury, and waves could crash against the docks several meters high, swallowing unanchored things whole, carrying them out to depths unchartered.

So Inner Varu armored itself with smooth concrete walls, steel-plated balconies, and flat, uniform streets that left no corner for the wind to curl into. It was one of Avaleen’s most sterile environments, but the deeper one looked, the more beauty emerged. It was everywhere, in the gleam of sunlight off polished railings, in the shadowplay cast by the spires, in the deliberate, defiant elegance of a place that made resilience into an art form.

Elmira had been here before. The Battle of the Black Current had ended the Varuvian Uprising against illevan colonists and the akatian invaders, forcing all parties to sit down and talk. Like most wars do. The truce freed Varu from all foreign attempts at control, and while losing this strategic position in the ocean was a hard blow to the Empire, Elmira was proud of the citizens. She’d never understood why an alliance with the islands was so inferior to ownership. The Varuvians had fought for independence, united under a single banner in a rare moment of collective clarity, and won. This was a true haven now, for everyone who wished to utilize it, no matter their origin or race.

So much had changed in three hundred years since then, she noted as the lift brought her downward. The city’s six great discs stretched outward like a machined blossom, tiered and interconnected by bridges, spirals, and suspended tracks. It sprawled out like a painting before her. With limited land, Inner Varu had risen skyward. Slim, hollow towers of hard stone and gleaming metal created a dazzling skyline visible for miles. It appeared almost like an illusion, such was the shimmering quality of the sight from this height.

As the lift descended, the upper layers of Elaren rose around her. This was the nation’s beating heart, not just because it housed the Omored Court and the trading consortiums, but because it thrummed with the rhythms of real power - both economic and political.

The air changed when the buildings began to provide shelter. Warmer. Lusher. Above her, flocks of small birds, each no larger than half a fist, darted back and forth, their song trilling in every corner. Soft, yet constant, as if the city itself were breathing in music.

There was a religion on this island stemming from a small cult thousands of generations ago, that among many other things, also held that the holiest of animals was a small bird with translucent wings native to Varu. When the light shone through an averel’s wings they showed a prismatic array of colors, each pattern unique like a fingerprint and dazzling like a kaleidoscope.

The Janobin, as the clergy was called, held that these creatures were symbols of luck, guidance, and purity. Historically the cult that venerated them had believed the averels could carry the soul’s last whisper into the next life. Even now, their status’ enshrined not just in culture but in law. They were not to be disturbed. Any attempt to harm, disturb or frighten them carried swift punishment and a severe one at that. Because of this, the population went unchecked.

Faith and reverence had not been without cost. In the early days, the sheer volume of birds nesting in every crevice and eave had turned Inner Varu into a petri dish of avian-borne illness. Disease roamed like plagues through the humanoid population before development caught up.

Because Varu adapted. It always did.

Architects, clergy, and ornithologists had been forced to work together to construct massive, intricate towers throughout the city, each one honeycombed with roosts and stocked with everything a bird could possibly desire.

Every once in a while, a flock would prove frustratingly fickle and abandon a tower, forcing entire teams of experts to court them back with a mix of science, patience, superstition, and a fair amount of hair-pulling.

Sanitation teams, recruited through surprisingly competitive selection, kept the streets and roofs immaculate. What once had been a nuisance was now an honor, to serve on the Watch was to serve the soul of the city. And the results spoke for themselves: Inner Varu was now among the cleanest in all of Avaleen. These days the people who lived here seldom suffered diseases or contagions caused by an unsanitary environment or attitude.

Now that she had simmered down a little, this was probably the reason for regulating the amount of external travel. Of course, they demanded forms and stamps and Bureau oversight. It wasn’t just about control, it was about preservation.

Varu had been burned before. Elmira watched flocks wheel overhead, glimmering like living stardust.

“No wonder they do not want outsiders mucking it all up,” she muttered.

Stepping off the escalator, Elmira tugged the hood low, shadowing her face from the sharp light and curious stares of passersby.

“Now what?” she asked herself, exhausted and more than a little sore.

Silence. Figures, she thought. Her head spun like a carnival ride greased with oil and regret, and something beneath her ribs throbbed with a deep bone-rooted ache. That last attempt to fly had likely fractured something. Breathing hurt. Standing hurt. Her pride hurt most of all.

Taking refuge in a darker alley, its scent a cocktail of rust, salt, and oil, she slumped against the wall and let gravity do the work. Sliding down, letting the cool metal ease the heat of the swelling of her injuries and cool her aching back.

What did she know?

One: her shuttle was out of reach, stuck on the other side of the Olirian continent to where she was now.

Two: there was a ten-day wait for the next Portal activation.

Three: Even if she made it through, the Agartha Nova Portal was still under construction, and would not be functional until the Guardian’s Awakening.

Which would be a great arrival, if not for the small matter of the person who would inaugurate. The Elder of Agartha. Damn it.

She let her head fall back with a dull thunk against the wall. “Brilliant,” she muttered. The sarcasm easier to come by than breath.

It had been her own stupid idea to let the two events coincide to appease the other Council members and various heads of guilds that were breathing down their necks. A ceremony of symbolism, sacred timing, and the whole song-and-dance to make the ruling elite feel important. She had vouched for the whole thing like a damn fool, knowing full well that when politics started swinging their glittery mallets, practicality always took the hit. They had traded function for form and now the gods were laughing.

“I am not laughing,” the voice huffed in her head.

“You could have stopped me, you know,” Elmira shot back.

“It was a brilliant idea, child,” Ayursha said. “Why in heaven’s name would I have opposed?”

Elmira snorted. “Because you are supposed to be wiser than us mortals.”

“Wisdom takes time and instinct, Elder. And it is never possible to predict which threads will pull taut when the moment comes. Even now, the future is shrouded in mist.”

Great. Elmira scrunched her nose, trying to rub the knots out of her shoulder blade. Ceremony and symbolism over practicality was a trait she had filed down with the dust and grit of Sangora and somehow it was still coming back to bite her ass.

Es, I need a drink, she thought, wincing when her muscles finally relaxed, and the pain became more pronounced.

Her shoulders sagged, her legs throbbed with fatigue, and getting back up was its own private war. Harder than scaling the jagged, unreliable rooftops of the Base. Harder than fighting harpies in the dead of night. Bracing herself against the wall, she waited for the nausea to abate enough to move. Running on spite and muscle memory alone, she shoved herself upright.

The streets unfurled like half-forgotten memories. Elmira followed them on instinct, her boots carrying her past stacked cargo crates, steaming food stalls, and loud-mouthed sailors with more tattoos than teeth. It was all exactly as she remembered - and not at all the same.

Never had a sign given her more joy than the sight of a worn sign, its paint flaked off by salt winds, swaying lazily above a crooked doorway near Pier 10 in the main harbor. The name - The Drowned Captain - still managed to stir something warm in her chest.

The bar stood practically in the shadow of the Omored Court’s towering headquarters, because, of course, where there was law, there was always someone nearby selling ways around it. The air was heavy with the reek of brine and rotting fish, the unmistakable tang of seaweed, and the lingering scent of rum-soaked wood.

Elmira took one look at the chipped doorframe, the flickering light above it, and spotted the phrase burned into it above the door: Home, sweet mistake.

The bar itself was quite empty at this hour, save for the usual lot. Seafarers with weathered faces and people down on their luck sat slumped over tankards and half-filled plates, lost in their own silence. The kind of silence you did not disturb. No one looked up when she came in, and the room was plunged back into a dim hush when the door shut behind her, cutting out the light and the screech of gulls and the song of averels on their hunt.

Like the rest of the place, there was a strange cleanliness you would no expect from an establishment so close to the docks. No shells crunching underfoot, no sticky stains on the floor, no sour stench of rot or mold. The tables gleamed under soft lights enchanted to glow a soft amber, their metal tops dulled by age but well-kept. Even the air was relatively clean, though you couldn’t say the same for the patrons.

Elmira zeroed in on the bar running along the back and made her slow, aching way toward it. With a groan that escaped her before she could stop it, she hoisted herself up onto a high bar stool, feeling every inch of bruised muscle complain. She had forgotten how tall everyone was in this part of the world. Wanda was nothing like them.

“Then again, Wanda is nothing like anyone,” the voice said.  

“Easy now,” Elmira chided under her breath, eyes flicking to the side. “We like her.”

The half-orc woman behind the bar abandoned the task of polishing an already spotless canister and ambled over. Her arms thick with sinew and scars, and her eyes like dark hollows of exhaustion. There was a weariness to her movements, like someone who hadn’t slept more than two hours a night in weeks. Maybe months.

She spoke but Elmira just looked at her, dumbfounded. All she heard were slurred syllables and swift words. Nothing about them sounded remotely familiar, and once upon a time, she had prided herself on her linguistic skills.

With a sigh, the bartender switched over to the common tongue and asked again with a thick drawl, “Not from around here, then?”

“Just passing through.”

The bartender reached for a bottle. “Moonshine?”

“I’ve tasted your moonshine,” Elmira said with a grimace. “Ale. Karenian, if you’ve got it.”

The woman snorted softly, shaking her head as she turned. “Picky one, aren’t you?”

She had no idea… The bartender dug around in the back of a creaking cupboard and emerged with a dusty bottle that looked like it had not seen daylight since the last war. With a thud, she set it in front of Elmira and casually wiped it down as an afterthought.

“Three silver.”  

“Three?!” Elmira’s jaw dropped. “That’s criminal”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s a robbery,” she said flatly, clearly not in the mood to haggle. “Pay up.”

Elmira grumbled under her breath but handed over the coin. The ale tasted like wet burlap spiced with regret, hoppy and sour, with a cloying hint of something fruity that didn’t quite belong. Still, it went down, and that was enough. She was nearly out of coin, anyway, and too tired to argue about what qualified as proper ale. Should have had the foresight to grab the small stash from the mattress in her hovel before going to Noke. Elmira shook her head, enough of that.

A platter clattered down in front of her. Thick slices of soft bread and sharp cheese sat neatly on a plate. Elmira blinked in surprise.

At her questioning glance, the woman just shrugged with that same bored look on her face.

“On the house,” she said by way of explanation. “You look like you’ve been through the wringer. Twice.”

“Sanid,” Elmira replied, using the varuvian word for thanks.

The bartender did not smile, but Elmira caught the shift. The subtle softening around the eyes. A flicker of something close to warmth. She had won someone over in this place. Minor victories.

  Digging in, she realized how hungry she was. The bread was still warm in the middle, and the cheese was rich and sharp. After the pitiful rations of Sangora, it might as well have been a royal feast. She wolfed it down, chasing it with the last of the ale and for the first time in days she felt almost like a new person.

The bartender returned without a word, cleaning up the plate and wiping down the surface.

“Something else?” she asked, still stiff with the unfamiliar language.

Elmira’s gaze drifted to the far corner of the room, where a narrow metal door stood mostly hidden in shadow. She hadn’t noticed it when she came in, her eyes hadn’t adjusted yet, but now it triggered a hunch tugging behind her ribs.

She nodded toward it. “Voiroshin.”