Paladin

Alice stared at the three options until the candy-bright world around her seemed to smear at the edges.

Necromancer.

Shadow Monk.

Paladin.

The first answer should have been easy. It should have been so easy that she almost hated herself for hesitating. Necromancer had been the dream for years, the class she had whispered about to herself after horror movies and forbidden library dives, the one that made her feel like maybe all the strange little corners of her mind had been pointing somewhere instead of just making her weird. She had imagined it too many times not to feel the ache of it now. Alice in black, Alice with bone-thread magic curling between her fingers, Alice listening to ghosts and reading the language **** left behind in mana, Alice making something terrifying and beautiful out of what everyone else turned away from.

Her eyes slid back to Shadow Monk.

That one called to something lower than thought.

Instinct, maybe.

Or inheritance.

It made her think of Maria in flashes. Not as a class. Not as a technique. As a feeling. Movement before explanation. A laugh in a dangerous room. A body slipping out of trouble before trouble realized it had been outmaneuvered. The ability to hit hard, vanish, and come back from the wrong angle with a grin sharp enough to be a weapon. Shadow Monk felt like something her body already wanted to become. The gloves on her hands seemed made for it, humming faintly around her knuckles as if they had seen the option and started quietly chanting, pick me, pick me, pick me.

And teleportation.

That word sank hooks in her.

Alice had grown up in the shadow of a man who turned space into obedience. Quin Inspira did not simply use portals. He made distance negotiable. He made walls optional. He made enemies die from angles they never saw coming. Even if Shadow Monk only gave her a short-range shadow step at first, even if it was rough and limited and nothing like her father’s elegant brutality, the tactical value was obvious. Too obvious. A teleporting martial artist with B-rank gloves and enough raw magic theory to cheat spell structure could become terrifying very quickly.

It almost felt tailor-made.

But her eyes kept drifting back to Paladin.

Paladin was not the dream. It was not the aesthetic. It was not the spooky little fantasy she had protected like a candle cupped in both hands since childhood. Paladin was armor, promises, structure, and consequences. It was the sort of class that sounded cleaner than Alice felt. It came with expectations. Oaths. Restrictions. Words that mattered because the system would not let them stop mattering once spoken.

And yet the longer she looked at it, the harder it was to dismiss.

Paladins were not just holy idiots in shiny armor, no matter what half the cheap serials insisted. They were systems of power built out of conviction. You shaped your strength by deciding what you would not do, what you would always do, what kind of person you were willing to become and what price you were willing to pay for that certainty. They could bargain with divine beings, dungeon gods, spirits, saints, monsters, and things that only appeared when the world was already on fire. They could turn promises into shields, restrictions into ****, loyalty into magic.

Alice’s mouth went dry.

Because she could see it.

Not herself as some radiant hero standing dramatically on a hill. That image was ridiculous enough to make her want to gag.

But herself with a shield.

A massive one.

Heavy. Black. Reinforced. Something broad enough to disappear behind. Something wide enough to put between her party and whatever wanted them dead.

Her eyes drifted toward Nell before she thought.

He stood just slightly behind her, still watching her face more than the system panel, as if her reaction mattered more to him than the class options themselves. His robe hung loose around his narrow shoulders. His feathered hair was messy from the run through Candland, brown and white strands catching candy-colored light. His glasses had slid down his nose again, and his cute snake-like eyes were worried in that soft, careful way that made Alice’s ribs feel too tight.

Fragile.

That was the word her mind supplied, and she hated it immediately because Nell was not weak. He had held slimes down with raw spell circles under pressure, adjusted bindings on the fly, and kept his head when Mako made the problem worse like it was a hobby. But he was fragile in a different way. Not physically, maybe. Emotionally. Socially. Like someone who had spent years trying to take up as little room as possible and still somehow expected the world to punish him for standing where he was.

The idea of something getting past her and reaching him made Alice’s stomach twist.

The idea of standing in front of him with a shield felt...

Good.

Dangerously good.

It felt like an answer to a question she had not realized she was asking.

(Oh no.)

She looked quickly away from him, cheeks heating.

(Absolutely not. I am not making life-changing class decisions because I took a shy boy to a horror movie.)

Her eyes flicked back to Paladin.

The panel remained there, smug and patient.

[Paladin Initiate]

[“A classic. Reliable. Respectable. Tragically lacking in skulls, but nobody’s perfect.”]

Alice swallowed.

Necromancer was her dream.

Shadow Monk was her instinct.

Paladin was the thought she could not stop returning to.

A laugh slipped out of her, small and breathless.

Mako leaned closer, trying to read her face. “That laugh means either inspiration or a mental breakdown.”

“Both,” Alice muttered.

Nell shifted slightly. “Alice?”

She looked at him.

Bad idea.

His concern hit her harder than the class options. There was no expectation in his face. No pressure. No hidden disappointment waiting for her to pick wrong. Just Nell, looking at her like whatever she chose would still leave her herself.

Alice stepped toward him before she could overthink it.

Nell’s eyes widened faintly. “Are you okay?”

“No,” she said honestly.

Then she caught the front of his robe gently, rose onto her toes, and kissed him.

It was quick.

Soft.

Barely more than a press of lips, sweet with dungeon air and lingering candy sugar and the memory of cherry soda from the night before. Nell froze completely for half a second, then made a tiny startled sound that went straight through Alice’s chest. His hands lifted instinctively, hovering near her sides like he wanted to touch her but did not want to assume he was allowed.

Alice pulled back just enough to see his face.

He was bright red.

Mako made a strangled noise.

Jen said, “Seriously?”

Nia went completely still.

Alice did not look at Nia.

She could not.

Instead, she kept her eyes on Nell, whose expression had gone soft and stunned and painfully sincere. Alice’s hand remained curled in the fabric of his robe, grounding herself there, in the warmth of him and the way he looked at her like she had done something wonderful instead of impulsive and probably stupid.

“I think,” Alice said, voice a little shaky, “I know what I want to protect.”

Then she selected Paladin.

The panel flashed silver-gold.

Light spilled across her vision, clean and warm and startlingly heavy, like someone had dropped a bell into her soul and the sound was still rippling outward. Alice gasped as the class settled into her, not painful, but not gentle either. It felt like a lock turning. Like invisible armor finding the shape of her bones. Like a contract written in light across the underside of her skin.

[Class Selected: Paladin Initiate]

[Primary Growth Activated: +Constitution, +Charisma]

[Secondary Growth Activated: +Willpower, +Magical Control]

[Class Foundation Installed.]

[Congratulations! You chose the class most likely to make you responsible for everyone else’s terrible decisions.]

(Dice here. I’ll admit, I did not see that coming. The spooky goth girl choosing Paladin? Delicious. Character development with a side of identity crisis. Chef’s kiss.)

Alice barely heard Mako whisper, “Holy shit.”

The system panel did not close.

Instead, the silver-gold light folded inward and unfolded again, revealing new text layered over the first. Alice’s breath caught as more information appeared, dense and shimmering, the words arranging themselves like they had been waiting for her to make the mistake of commitment.

[Paladin Initiate: First Oath Selection Available]

[Oaths define the shape of your Paladin path. Your first oath will determine early skill access, growth tendencies, affinity bias, and the kind of cosmic nonsense most likely to involve itself in your life.]

(Translation: Pick your flavor of future problems.)

Alice’s heart was still racing from the kiss, from the class, from the way Nell had gone pink and silent beside her. She should have been paying attention to the party. To the dungeon. To Nia. To anything except the glowing menu in front of her.

But the options were already appearing.

The first unfolded in plain silver text, simple and personal.

[Personal Oath: The Mirror Within]

[Swear to your own moral center rather than any divine patron.]

[Core Principle: I will decide who I am, and I will not surrender that choice to fear, shame, bloodline, body, family, god, guild, or gold.]

[Potential Benefits: Increased resistance to charm, ****, identity alteration, oath corruption, and emotional domination. Personal conviction may empower defensive techniques and shield arts.]

[Potential Cost: Your power depends on self-honesty. Lie to yourself too deeply, and your oath may weaken at the worst possible time.]

Alice stared at that one longer than she wanted to.

The second option burst open in red and blue, bells almost audible between the letters.

[Divine Oath: Dice, God of the System]

[Swear to live fully, laugh loudly, seek the joke in the wound, and spread just enough mischief to keep existence from becoming unbearably boring.]

[Core Principle: Life is a game, tragedy is timing, and survival is funnier when done with style.]

[Potential Benefits: Increased luck volatility, improvisational combat bonuses, resistance to despair effects, access to Trickster-flavored Paladin skills, and occasional system interference that will definitely be helpful. Probably. Maybe.]

[Potential Risks: It’s Dice.]

(That is the risk section. That is the whole risk section. Read it twice.)

Alice stared flatly at the panel.

Alice’s eye twitched.

“Nope,” she muttered instinctively.

Mako leaned in. “What?”

“Dice option.”

Mako recoiled slightly. “Oh. Yeah. Dangerous.”

Jen snorted. “Coward.”

Alice did not look away from the panel. “You swear to the clown god if you’re so brave.”

Jen shut up.

The third option bloomed in soft rose-gold light, petals drifting briefly across the text before fading.

[Divine Oath: Liliana, Goddess of Love]

[Swear to remain true to your chosen partner, honor love in its many forms, and help others find lovers of their own.]

[Core Principle: Love is not weakness. Desire is not shame. Bonds are sacred when freely chosen.]

[Potential Benefits: Increased resistance to lust-based ****, enhanced emotional perception, matchmaking intuition, bond-strengthened defensive abilities, and access to romance-aligned Paladin skills.]

[Path Specialty: Matchmaker Paladin.]

[Potential Cost: Betrayal of chosen bonds carries severe oath backlash. Also, you may become everyone’s relationship counselor. Horrifying.]

A Divine Oath to Liliana.

The Goddess of Love.

The timing felt targeted.

Actually, knowing the system, it probably was.

She had kissed Nell thirty seconds ago. Nia was behind her, silent and intense and complicated beyond reason. Maria had somehow made everything worse with terrifying efficiency. Alice’s entire romantic life was already a burning building, and the system had the audacity to offer her a Matchmaker Paladin route.

(Dice, I know you’re laughing somewhere.)

There was no response.

Which meant yes.

Alice kept reading anyway.

Her mind moved too fast now, trying to imagine futures branching out from each option. A personal oath would be safest. Cleanest. Hers. No god, no divine patron, no cosmic leash. Just Alice swearing not to let the world define her. It sounded strong. It sounded lonely.

Dice’s oath was objectively insane, but also not useless. Luck volatility could be monstrous in the right build. Resistance to despair was nothing to mock. Trickster Paladin skills sounded terrifyingly flexible. Unfortunately, the cost was Dice noticing her more, and Alice had been born in a cave not a barn.

Liliana’s oath tugged at something raw.

Not because Alice thought she was some expert on love. Quite the opposite. Love scared the hell out of her. Wanting scared her. Being wanted scared her more. But the oath’s wording made her chest ache in a way she did not expect.

Desire is not shame.

Bonds are sacred when freely chosen.

Her fingers trembled slightly.

She had not selected anything yet.

Behind her, Nia’s silence had become heavy enough to feel.

Nia stood with her arms loose at her sides, but every muscle in her body had gone rigid beneath the surface. She had watched Alice kiss Nell. Watched Alice choose Paladin after thinking about protecting him. Watched the system flood Alice in silver-gold light that made her look radiant in the worst possible way.

Beautiful.

Untouchable.

Not hers.

Something cracked behind Nia’s crimson eyes.

She did not move at first. She simply stared at Alice’s back, at Nell’s flushed face, at the way Alice’s body angled unconsciously toward him even while reading the panel. Guilt and jealousy collided inside her so violently that for a moment she did not know which one was going to win.

Maria.

The private booth.

The system message.

The child.

Her child.

Maria’s child.

Alice’s mother carrying Nia’s baby while Alice stood ten steps away choosing a class because she wanted to protect Nell.

The thought was so tangled, so ugly, so soaked in desire and shame and rage at herself, that Nia almost laughed.

A soft breath left her.

Not quite a laugh.

Not quite a sob.

Her ears lowered.

Then she turned toward the exit.

Jen noticed first.

“Boss?”

Nia did not answer.

She started walking.

Not fast. Not dramatically. Just away. Down the caramel-slick path they had already cleared, past the splattered remains of chocolate slime and glittering sugar stone, toward the safe route back to the portal. Her posture remained upright, leaderly, controlled, but there was something wrong with the stillness of her shoulders.

Something brittle.

Something dangerous.

Jen looked from Nia to Alice, then back to Nia. Her mouth twisted.

For once, she did not say the cruel thing sitting on her tongue.

She followed.

Alice did not notice.

Not yet.

She was still reading.

[Oath Selection Pending.]

[Warning: You may delay your first oath temporarily, but prolonged indecision may limit early skill manifestation.]

(Which is system-speak for: stop staring dramatically and pick a lane eventually.)

Alice frowned at the options.

Personal. Dice. Liliana.

Self. Mischief. Love.

None of them were simple.

None of them were harmless.

The idea of swearing an oath before she had fully processed choosing Paladin at all made her skin itch. She needed time. She needed a chair. She needed maybe seventeen notebooks and access to Mytherion’s class architecture archives. She needed to talk to Nell, maybe Maria, maybe absolutely not Quin, and possibly scream into a pillow for an hour.

Mako appeared in front of her and waved both hands.

“Hey. Hey, post birthday girl. Alice.”

She blinked. “What?”

“The **** bunny is leaving.”

Alice’s head snapped up.

Nia was already several yards away, Jen trailing after her through the candy terrain.

Alice’s stomach dropped.

“Nia?”

Nia did not turn around.

Mako’s expression softened under the usual chaos. “Maybe finish reading while walking?”

“I haven’t picked an oath.”

“Yeah, cool, we can have the divine paperwork crisis outside the dungeon where the walls don’t giggle.”

Nell touched Alice’s sleeve lightly.

She looked at him.

His blush had faded into concern, but the kiss still lingered between them. Alice could feel it. A warm, terrifying little thread, as fragile as spun sugar and somehow harder to ignore than the entire system panel.

“You can wait,” Nell said softly. “You don’t have to choose everything right now.”

Alice swallowed.

The panel hovered in front of her, still waiting.

[Oath Selection Pending.]

Her fingers twitched.

Then she minimized it.

The silver-gold light collapsed into a small icon at the edge of her vision, still pulsing faintly like a reminder she would not be allowed to forget.

Alice looked toward Nia’s retreating back.

Something in her chest twisted.

She had no idea what to do with that either.

Mako clapped once, too loudly.

“Great. Love that. Emotional crisis deferred. Everyone move before the candy dogs smell us.”

Jen’s voice carried faintly from ahead.

“I hate this party.”

Mako grinned. “See? Team bonding.”

Alice started walking.

Nell fell into step beside her, careful not to crowd, but close enough that their sleeves brushed.

Ahead of them, Nia kept moving toward the exit without looking back.

The portal let them out in a wash of light.

One second Alice was walking through Candyland’s sticky candy air, the taste of sugar and chocolate still clinging to the back of her throat, the next she was on the Ikos side of the gate. Cool evening air hit her face. Real air. Desert air. The faint smell of metal and dust, rolled over her like a reminder that the world outside the dungeon still existed, still moved, still had streets and lights and people who had no idea Alice had just accidentally chosen Paladin instead of the class she had wanted since childhood.

Nia stepped out first.

Then kept walking.

“Nia,” she called.

Nia did not stop.

Her shoulders stayed squared, her ears pinned back, her long legs carrying her across the pale stone path with increasing speed. Jen came through the portal a second later and looked after her with a sharp frown, already sensing the same thing Alice did.

“Nia,” Alice tried again, louder this time. “Wait.”

That made Nia pause.

Only for half a heartbeat.

Her head turned slightly, not enough for Alice to see her face. The fading portal light caught the side of her white hair, the line of one cheek, the tension in her jaw. Then something in her posture seemed to break.

And she bolted.

Not ran.

Bolted.

Alice had seen fast adventurers before. She had watched guild scouts cross rooftops like shadows, had seen Agility-focused fighters turn streets into blurs of motion. But Nia was something else when she moved without holding back. Horse power and rabbit spring fused into one body made for explosive acceleration. Her first step cracked against the stone. Her second launched her over a low hedge. By the third she was already halfway across the path, long legs driving her forward while her rabbit ears flattened in the wind.

She hit a fountain wall, kicked off it sideways, and vaulted up to the top of a stone arch like gravity had only suggested she stay on the ground.

“Holy shit,” Nell said under his breath.

Alice didn’t move for a second.

She just stared after Nia, heart plunging somewhere cold and stupid.

“Nia!”

This time Nia did not even hesitate.

She sprang from the arch to a tree branch, from the branch to the top of a maintenance kiosk, from there across the park path and onto the decorative railing above a canal. Each movement was smooth, powerful, and viciously graceful, like all the emotion she refused to say out loud had become motion instead. People shouted as she passed overhead. A couple of park visitors ducked instinctively when her shadow flashed over them. By the time Alice’s body remembered how to respond, Nia was already racing toward the streets beyond.

Alice took one step after her.

Then stopped.

There was no chance.

None.

maybe with Shadow Monk, But she had not picked that. She had picked Paladin, and Paladin did not come with a convenient “chase emotionally unstable barbarian across rooftops skill”

She felt useless so suddenly it made her hands shake.

Jen moved instead.

“Damn it,” Jen snapped.

Then she ran.

For all her attitude, Jen was fast. Actually fast. the kind of fast that came from drills, footwork, and knowing exactly how to put **** through the ground without wasting motion. She shot past Alice in a blur of tight movement and sharp anger, bare feet hitting the path in rapid strikes as she launched herself over the same hedge Nia had cleared.

Alice blinked.

For a second, she almost thought Jen might have a chance.

Then Nia kicked off the side of a building beyond the park and vanished up onto the rooftops.

Jen hit the street below a second later, looked up, and swore loud enough for several civilians to turn.

Yeah.

No chance.

Still, Jen kept going.

She sprinted after her anyway, cutting through the crowd, shoving past a startled vendor, and using a bench as a springboard to reach a lower awning. It was impressive. Really impressive. If Alice had not felt like her ribs were collapsing inward from guilt, she might have admired it properly.

Then Jen looked back.

Just a sharp glance over her shoulder before she disappeared after Nia.

It was filthy.

Not literally. Jen’s face was too far away for detail, but Alice felt the look land anyway. Angry. Accusing. Disgusted. The kind of look that said, You did this, without needing to waste breath on words.

Alice flinched.

Nia had been fine before Alice kissed Nell.

No, that was not fair. Nia had not been fine for a while. But Alice had still done something. Chosen Paladin while thinking about protecting Nell. Kissed Nell in front of everyone. while Nia watched and shattered.

Alice pressed a hand against her mouth.

“Oh gods.”

Nell stepped closer carefully.

“Alice,” he said softly.

She shook her head. “I did that.”

“I kissed you.”

Nell went red even through the worry. “Yes.”

“In front of her.”

He looked down, embarrassed. “Sorry.”

Mako was staring toward the rooftops with a grimace that did not belong on his usually bright face. Without his manic grin, he looked younger somehow.

“She’ll probably go to the guild housing,” Nell said after a moment.

Alice lowered her hands. “What?”

“The rooms behind the guild,” he explained. “Nia, Jen, and I are all staying there. They’re small, but private. Cheap enough that new adventurers can rent them even before steady income. If Nia wants to be alone, that’s the most likely place.”

Alice tried to picture it.

Guild housing was not glamorous. She had seen rooms like that before. Little compartments tucked behind or beneath guild halls, rented to rookies, broke delvers, and adventurers between jobs for almost nothing. The sort of space that was technically a room if the city inspector was feeling generous. Narrow bed built against one wall. Fold-out desk. Storage under the mattress and along the ceiling. Maybe a little wardrobe if the guild was fancy. A washroom down the hall. Enough room to sleep, stash gear, and have a private breakdown without doing it in the lobby.

Like a train compartment pretending to be an apartment.

Alice looked toward the street where Jen had vanished. “Then we should go.”

Mako turned too quickly. “Yeah, except we should also check my parents’ place.”

Alice blinked. “Your parents?”

Mako froze.

Nell’s eyes shifted toward him.

Mako scratched the back of his head, suddenly finding the candy grass beside the path very interesting.

“I mean, not my parents like that’s relevant,” he said. “Just, you know. Existing parents. Nearby-ish. People who gave birth to me. Or built me. Or both. It’s complicated.”

Alice stared at him.

Mako winced.

Then Alice’s brain finally caught up to the implication sitting under his words.

“Wait,” she said slowly. “Why would Nia go to your parents?”

Mako opened his mouth.

Closed it.

Nell looked between them and then very gently said, “Mako.”

Mako sighed so hard his shoulders dropped.

“Because she’s my sister.”

Silence.

Alice stared.

“Your what?”

“My sister,” Mako repeated, quieter this time. “Nia’s my sister.”

Alice’s mouth opened.

No sound came out.

The entire past week rearranged itself inside her head with the emotional grace of a collapsing shelf. Mako and Nia. Orange chaos boy and towering albino rabbit barbarian girl. Their weird familiarity. The way Mako never seemed afraid of her but did seem careful about certain things. The way Nia tolerated his nonsense longer than anyone else did. The way Mako had been watching her now, not like a party member worried about the leader, but like someone whose family had just run away hurting.

Alice pointed at him.

Then lowered her hand because pointing felt stupid.

“You didn’t mention that.”

Mako gave her a strained grin. “In my defense, nobody asked if the terrifying bunny woman was related to the idiot with goggles.”

“That feels like information you volunteer.”

“Yeah, well.” His grin flickered and failed. “Nia doesn’t love people knowing.”

Nell adjusted his glasses, voice soft. “It’s not because she’s ashamed of you.”

Mako snorted. “Debatable.”

“Mako.”

“No, I know.” He rubbed the back of his neck, gaze still fixed away from them. “It’s just complicated.”

Alice wanted to ask.

She could feel the question on her tongue. How? Why? Race changes? Adopted? Chimerin nonsense? Something stranger? This city had a thousand ways to make family messy, and Mako looked like he was standing in the middle of one he did not want to unpack while Nia sprinted away across rooftops.

So Alice swallowed it.

“Okay,” she said.

Mako glanced at her, surprised by the restraint.

Alice shoved her hands into her jacket pockets. “Where’s your parents’ place?”

“The mall,” he said. “Radiant Bazaar. They run a shop there.”

“What kind of shop?”

Mako’s expression twitched like the answer had too many layers.

“Hardware. Salvage. Enchanted fasteners. Custom frame work. Some prosthetic fittings. Some illegal stuff they insist is legal if you understand the bylaws. It’s called Riven’s Rivets.”

“And Nia might go there?”

“She might,” Mako said, but he did not sound certain. “She moved out a while ago. Wanted space. Wanted to be away from the shop, away from the family noise, away from…” He stopped.

Alice waited.

Mako did not continue.

The silence told her not to push.

He **** his grin back into place, but it sat wrong on his face now. “Anyway. If she’s not at guild housing, she might go there. Or she might go somewhere high and dramatic to brood because apparently everyone in this party is allergic to processing emotions at ground level.”

Alice grimaced. “That one’s fair.”

Nell looked toward the guild district, then toward the mall lights in the distance. “We should split up carefully. Not too far. Jen is already following Nia, so guild housing is still the strongest lead.”

Mako nodded. “I’ll check our parents’ place.”

Mako did not argue when Alice said she was coming with him.

That might have been the first sign that things were worse than he was pretending. But this time he only nodded once, shoved his hands into his pockets, and started toward the mall with his goggles pushed up into his wild orange hair.

Nell stayed behind, one hand already raised to open his system panel. His expression was worried in the quiet, careful way Alice was beginning to recognize as his default when he wanted to help.

Nell promised to call the second he found anything.

He said it twice, actually. Once to Alice, with that soft earnestness that made her chest ache, and once to Mako, with a slightly firmer tone that implied he knew Mako was about three bad jokes away from trying to handle the entire situation by himself.

Nell hesitated for half a second, then stepped closer and touched her sleeve. Not her hand. Not quite. Just the fabric near her wrist, light enough that she could have moved away without making it a thing.

“You don’t have to solve all of this tonight,” he said softly.

Alice gave him a brittle little smile.

“Pretty sure everything is actively on fire tonight.”

“That does not mean you have to carry the burning building.”

Mako, already walking backward down the path, pointed at Nell. “That’s a good line. Put that on a pillow.”

Nell flushed. “Please don’t.”

Alice should have laughed.

She almost did.

Instead, she nodded once more and followed Mako.

“Wow,” he said. “You two are already doing the dramatic glance thing. That’s advanced.”

Alice shoved her hands deeper into her jacket pockets and started walking toward the mall lights. “I will push you into traffic.”

“Good. Threats mean you’re coping.”

“I’m not coping.”

“Yeah, but you’re making threats, so you’re coping in the local dialect.”

That almost made her laugh.

Almost.

The walk to the Radiant Bazaar felt longer than it should have.

Ikos had slipped into evening by then, the desert sky outside the district deepening into violet while the city’s artificial glow grew brighter in answer. The Silver Serpent monorail curved above them in a sleek line of reflected lights, whispering along its track with a soft metallic hum. Holo-ads drifted between buildings, offering discounts, meal deals, insurance, and one painfully cheerful slogan about “family dungeon delving” that made Alice want to punch the projector.

Mako walked faster than normal.

Not running. Not even power walking exactly. Just too fast for casual conversation. His usual bounce was there in pieces, but it kept breaking apart, like his body remembered how to be Mako while the rest of him was somewhere else entirely.

The Radiant Bazaar looked too bright for the mood Alice carried into it. The mall rose from the desert like a sealed-off little world of glass, polished stone, and impossible convenience, all glowing advertisements and warm artificial starlight beneath the massive shifting ceiling. The moment the doors slid open, the air changed from desert-cool to climate-controlled perfection, clean and faintly perfumed with food stalls, expensive soap, and the weird ozone smell that always clung to magitech shops. Holo-ads drifted above the central walkway, armor models turned in slow circles, and somewhere on the upper level the roller coaster screamed past with a trail of laughing teenagers and tiny illusionary comets.

Alice should have found it comforting.

The Radiant Bazaar had always been one of those places where the city pretended to be normal. People bought clothes. Kids begged for sweets. Adventurers argued over gear warranties. Couples wandered hand in hand beneath fake constellations, as if the world outside did not have portals, monsters, guild politics, dungeon gods, and emotional disasters sprinting across rooftops at terrifying speeds.

Instead, every cheerful detail made her feel more wrong.

Mako moved through the crowd with purpose. That alone was strange. Usually, Alice got the impression Mako entered any public space and immediately became a loose spark looking for something flammable. Tonight he did not stop at the food stalls, did not inspect the rotating tool displays, did not heckle a floating ad that promised “unbreakable beginner armor” with the kind of claim that clearly deserved heckling. He just kept walking, shoulders tight, goggles pushed up into his orange hair.

Riven’s Rivets sat on the lower artisan level, tucked between a custom armor hemming shop and a cramped little clockwork pet stall. The sign over the storefront had been built rather than painted, each letter bolted together from mismatched scrap metal, glowing faint orange at the seams. Smaller text underneath listed services in a dense stack.

Inside, the shop was a beautiful disaster. Shelves climbed nearly to the ceiling, stuffed with jars of bolts, rune-threaded washers, hinge plates, mana couplings, servo joints, reinforced leather straps, tiny labeled drawers, polished prosthetic components, cracked monster carapace plates, and things Alice could not identify but instinctively did not want to touch. Half-finished projects hung from hooks over the workbench. Something with six legs clicked softly inside a cage near the register. A dismantled armored gauntlet sat open on the counter like a metal animal mid-surgery.

A man looked up from behind the main bench.

His hair caught the shop light in soft pink, and faint lines of that same color glowed beneath his skin along the seams of his joints, pulsing subtly like a heartbeat seen through porcelain. His eyes matched, warm and sharp at once, and when he saw Mako, his first expression was immediate suspicion.

“If you broke the pressure lathe again, I’m adding interest.”

Mako lifted both hands. “Hi, Dad.”

That was all it took for the man’s expression to change.

Not soften completely. Riven did not seem like the kind of man who softened on command. But something in his face adjusted, the irritation stepping aside for attention. His gaze moved from Mako to Alice, took in her posture, her face, the way Mako stood half a step too close like he expected something to fall apart.

His voice lowered. “Where’s Nia?”

Mako swallowed.

Alice answered because if she waited, she might lose the nerve.

“She ran.”

Riven set down the tool in his hand.

The small click of metal against wood seemed louder than it should have been.

“From what?”

Mako looked at Alice. Not accusing. Just helplessly, because there was no way to answer that question without making it about her.

Alice’s stomach tightened.

“Me,” she said. “I think.”

Riven looked at her properly then.

Alice had met plenty of frightening people in Ikos. Guild officers with polished smiles. Adventurers who reeked of blood and ego. Monsters wearing almost-human faces. Riven was not frightening like that. He was frightening because he looked at her like someone who had spent years repairing broken things and knew the difference between a crack, a flaw, and a piece already under too much pressure.

“You’re Alice,” he said.

It was not a question.

Alice **** herself not to look away. “Yeah.”

Riven exhaled slowly through his nose. “Of course you are.”

Before Alice could decide what that meant, a woman stepped out from the back room with a cloth in her hands and a narrow streak of grease across one cheek. She had deep blue hair tied back in a practical knot, blue eyes faintly glowing, and the same crafted quality as Riven, with soft light pulsing beneath her joints. Where Riven looked worn and blunt and patched together from stubbornness, Kaia looked quieter, sharper, always watching. Her gaze went to Mako first, then Riven, then Alice.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Nia ran,” Riven said.

Kaia closed her eyes for just a moment.

“Again,” she murmured.

That single word hit Alice like a stone dropped into water.

Again.

Mako winced. “Nell’s checking guild housing. Jen chased after her. I thought she might come here.”

“She hasn’t,” Kaia said, but her eyes had already shifted toward the back hall. “Not through the front.”

Riven’s mouth tightened. “If she came here and didn’t want to be seen, she’d go to her room.”

Mako nodded. “That’s what I thought.”

Kaia looked at Alice for a long moment. Not cruelly. Not warmly either. More like she was trying to decide how much of the truth Alice could survive before the night got worse.

“You should know,” she said carefully, “Nia has a difficult way of holding onto things.”

Alice’s fingers curled tighter inside her pockets.

Mako made a pained sound. “Mom.”

Kaia did not look away from Alice. “She does. Pretending otherwise has never helped her.”

Riven leaned back against the counter, arms crossed. His voice was rougher than Kaia’s, but not unkind. “She was a scared kid when she came to us. Scared kids build rules that don’t always make sense once they’re safe. Nia built anchors. Things she could focus on when everything else felt like it was going to disappear.”

Alice’s throat tightened.

Mako looked miserable. “We don’t know if she’s in her room.”

Riven pushed off the counter. “Then check.”

Kaia’s gaze sharpened. “Carefully. The door is trapped.”

Alice turned slowly toward Mako.

Mako gave her a thin, humorless grin. “Yeah. So. Funny story.”

“That is not a funny story.”

“It’s more of a family story.”

“That’s worse.”

He started down the back hall, and Alice followed because stopping now felt impossible. The corridor behind the shop was narrow and cluttered with evidence of a life that had once moved from place to place before trying to become stationary. Old caravan straps hung beside polished mall permits. A faded travel banner was folded on a shelf beneath boxes of spare hinges. A framed photo showed Mako standing beside Riven and Kaia in front of a caravan truck, grinning like he had just discovered trouble as a profession. Off to one side, barely visible in the photo’s edge, a small white-haired girl stood half-hidden behind the vehicle, ears low, body angled like she expected to be told she was in the way.

Alice’s chest hurt.

Nia’s old door waited at the end.

It looked plain at first glance. Dark paint, scratched around the handle. Reinforced frame. No nameplate. Nothing cute. Nothing personal. Just a door that did not want to be opened.

Mako stopped several feet away and crouched. “Stay behind me.”

Mako pulled three tools from his belt, then a thin copper sliver etched with tiny runes. The shift in him was almost startling. All the jokes fell away, leaving precise focus. He studied the threshold, the hinges, the corner where the frame met the wall, then the floorboards just in front of the door. His fingers moved carefully, adjusting a wire Alice could barely see.

“What does it do?” Alice asked quietly.

“Depends when she set it.”

“That is not comforting.”

“It isn’t supposed to be.”

Something clicked.

Mako froze.

Alice stopped breathing.

A faint hiss came from the upper corner of the frame. Mako slid the copper sliver upward and caught a tiny glass capsule as it dropped free, its contents glowing pale blue.

He held it up. “Sleep vapor.”

Alice stared. “She trapped her bedroom door with sleep gas?”

“And probably a shock rune, but that one’s old.”

“Probably?”

He glanced back at her. “Do you want me confident or honest?”

Alice shut her mouth.

A few more careful movements, another soft click, and the door unlocked.

Mako did not open it immediately.

His hand hovered over the handle, fingers still.

“My mom wasn’t exaggerating,” he said quietly. “Nia doesn’t love normally.”

Alice’s stomach went cold.

“She doesn’t know how. Not really. She feels something and it becomes everything. If it’s fear, it’s everything. If it’s loyalty, it’s everything. If it’s love...” He stopped, jaw working. “Just be ready.”

Alice was not ready.

She knew that before he opened the door.

She knew it the moment the air shifted and she saw the first photograph.

The room was small, the kind of old compact bedroom that made sense for a family that had once lived in a caravan. Narrow bed against the wall. Fold-out desk. Storage drawers built under the frame. A shelf packed with small boxes, spare clothes, old headphones, bits of folded paper, a few battered horror movie ticket stubs, and carefully labeled containers.

And Alice.

Alice everywhere.

Her face looked back from the walls in fragments. Public guild feed images. Cropped school announcements. Old Mytherion tournament stills. A photo of Alice at fifteen outside the Velvet Bottle, scowling into the sun with a soda in one hand. A shot of her and Maria crossing the mall atrium years ago, both laughing at something Alice no longer remembered. A blurry image of Alice sitting on a rooftop near the Velvet Bottle, knees drawn up, headphones on, completely unaware anyone had seen her. Another from a horror movie night, red lighting across her face, grin wide and unguarded.

Alice took one step inside and then stopped.

Her breath would not move right.

Notes connected the images in careful handwriting. Not messy. Not frantic. Careful.

Alice likes old horror movies.

Alice uses sarcasm when nervous.

Alice hates being called Quin’s daughter by strangers.

Alice prefers Cherry Pepsi.

Alice loves sausage, jambalaya, possibly favorite dish?

Her favorite pizza is chicago style.

Alice blushes when people insult her.

Alice may want Necromancer class.

Alice does not like being watched too directly.

Alice has a secret book hidden in a core capsule she forgets about.

Her favorite color is black.

Alice is beautiful when she thinks no one sees her.

Alice’s skin crawled.

The far wall was worse.

It had been arranged with intention, almost ritual care. A sketch of Alice sat at the center, drawn in dark pencil and soft red shading. Whoever had made it had captured her with painful accuracy, not polished, not idealized, not smiling prettily for anyone. Just Alice, tired and sharp-eyed, hair messy, mouth crooked like she was halfway between a smirk and a defense mechanism.

Around the sketch were smaller things.

A Velvet Bottle napkin. A printed clipping from a Mytherion public roster. A little dried rose petal sealed in clear resin. A photo of Alice’s birthday announcement on an old system event board. A list of dates. Places. Sightings.

Below the sketch, written in Nia’s careful hand, were three words.

My future wife.

Alice stepped backward so suddenly her shoulder hit the doorframe.

Mako looked at the wall and closed his eyes.

“Shit,” he whispered.

Alice could not look away.

Mako’s voice came from beside her, low and strained.

“She was the one who suggested Ikos.”

Alice turned her head slowly.

“What?”

“When we were still with the caravan,” he said. “Dad wanted to settle eventually. Mom wanted somewhere stable. I liked the idea of having a real workshop. But Nia was the one who kept pushing for Ikos. She had reasons. Trade routes, guild work, the mall, better access to adventurer contracts. All practical. All believable.”

Alice looked back at the wall.

Her own face stared back from too many moments she had thought belonged only to her.

“But it was me,” she whispered.

Mako did not answer.

He did not need to.

Something inside Alice folded inward.

Nia had not just wanted her. Nia had built a life toward her. Moved toward her. Watched her grow up from the edges of other people’s photos and public feeds. Learned her likes, her dislikes, her habits, her fears. Alice thought of the bathroom, of Nia frozen in place, holding herself back with visible pain. She thought of that whisper she might have heard.

I love you.

Now she believed it.

That was the problem.

She believed it completely.

Fear came first. It rose clean and cold through her body, tightening her throat, making her hands shake inside her pockets. Because love like this was too large. Too hungry. Too much like a room with no exits. Nia might never mean to hurt her, but the walls of this room said want could become a cage without ever calling itself one.

Then guilt followed.

Worse than fear.

Because Nia was not some faceless creep in an alley. Nia was broken in ways Alice had only glimpsed. Nia was lonely. Nia was beautiful and powerful and frightening and ****. Nia had looked at Alice like salvation, and Alice had walked right past her into Nell’s arms because Nell felt safe and sweet and possible.

Alice pressed one hand to her chest.

“I can’t return this,” she said.

Mako looked at her, pain flashing across his face.

Alice shook her head, eyes burning. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I know that’s awful, but I can’t.”

“No one’s asking you to.”

“She is,” Alice whispered.

Mako flinched.

Alice turned fully toward the shrine again. Her eyes found the words beneath the sketch and stayed there until they blurred.

“My future wife,” she read softly.

Her stomach twisted.

“She decided. Years ago. Before I knew her. Before I could say anything. She made me into...” Alice swallowed hard. “I don’t even know. A goal. A destiny.”

Mako rubbed both hands over his face.

“She doesn’t see it like that.”

Alice did know. Nia probably saw it as devotion. As loyalty. As proof that her love was real because it survived time, distance, silence, and impossibility. Maybe in Nia’s head, this room was not a violation. Maybe it was worship. Maybe it was hope. Maybe it was the only way she knew how to keep wanting something without losing it.

But Alice still felt watched.

Pinned.

Owned by a fantasy she had never agreed to become.

Her minimized oath icon pulsed faintly at the edge of her vision.

Self. Mischief. Love.

The timing was so cruel it almost felt like Dice was breathing down her neck.

Alice laughed once, but it came out broken.

“I thought there was a moment,” she said.

Mako lowered his hands.

Alice stared at the sketch of herself. “Back in the bathroom. Maybe after. Maybe if I’d been braver or if she’d been less intense or if we had time to talk before everything got worse. Maybe there was some version where this didn’t turn into...” She gestured weakly at the room. “This.”

Mako’s voice was quiet. “And now?”

Alice closed her eyes.

She saw Nell’s face beneath the theater sign. His shy smile. His hand hovering at her waist, careful enough to make her feel human. She saw Nia’s face in the bathroom, hungry and heartbroken. She saw Maria stepping between them, smiling like trouble, and the awful private mess Alice still did not fully understand. She saw the system panel offering her an oath to love, as if love were not the sharpest thing in the room.

“Now the moment passed,” Alice whispered.

The words hurt to say.

They also felt true.

“I don’t think there’s an opportunity to work this out anymore. Not the way she wants. Not the way part of me maybe thought I wanted for half a second. It’s too much now. Too big. Too late.”

Mako stared at the wall.

For once, he had no joke.

Alice stepped back into the hallway because she could not breathe in that room anymore.

Mako followed and shut the door with careful hands. The lock clicked softly. He rearmed nothing. Maybe he could not bring himself to. Maybe he knew Nia would know someone had been inside no matter what he did.

The hallway seemed dimmer now.

Alice leaned against the wall, arms wrapped around herself, and stared at nothing.

Mako stood beside her in silence for a long moment.

Then he said, “I’m sorry.”

Alice shook her head. “You didn’t do this.”

“Neither did you.”

She looked at him.

He did not sound like he fully believed it.

Neither did she.

Her system icon pulsed again.

[Oath Selection Pending.]

Alice closed her eyes.