The door led to a rubble-filled chamber that looked like it had once held a series of bunkbeds. All it held now was long-decayed scraps of wood, metal, and cloth. None looked like it was useful anymore.

A quick search along the walls revealed another door that opened to an easy touch with Sophia's aura. It led to an ancient bathroom, so they searched for another door and found one that led to an a larger open room, possibly a training facility; the only thing notable about it was the glass that littered the floor near the walls. Sophia couldn't immediately think of a reason for a glass-lined room that large other than watching yourself as you trained, but there was probably something.

That was the first room with a ruins apparition. It was stronger than the ones they'd fought back in Othala's ruins, but it still fell quickly.

They were looking for another door out of that room when Xin'ri exclaimed, "I can see it!"

Sophia turned towards her. She was staring directly at Sophia's magelight. "You can see … wait, you can see magic again! Finally!"

Xin'ri nodded repeatedly with a wide grin. She looked exuberant, like a huge weight had been taken off her. "It hasn't really been that long, but it really hurts to not be able to sense magic. It's still not like it should be, but I can see something. That means it's healing."

"Great news," Dav agreed. "Do you want to stick a little closer to me while we explore in case that helps?"

That lasted until they made it into the next room. It was another room full of time-damaged items, but this time the damaged items seemed to be mostly weapons and the places they were stored, along with a couple of tables and several chairs.

Xin'ri gasped. "This ruin wasn't cleared out! Some of those weapons are enchanted. I think most of them were enchanted when they were new, but most of them are so badly damaged they aren't anymore. We can … No, we can't just gather all of this up. I need to look at it here. Only I can't, not yet."

"We can come back," Sophia offered. She knew that this was exactly the sort of room Xin'ri wanted to find in Othala's ruin but never really did because it was almost completely cleared out. If this one wasn't, it would be a huge boon to her.

Strangely, while other things survived here, there was no sign of bodies or even bones. That was quite different from Othala's ruin. Admittedly, this clearly wasn't the "farm" floor, if this ruin even had one.That was where most of the bodies in Othala's ruin were found.

They were still looking around the former armory without touching anything other than the furniture when Ci'an announced that she and Taika were on this side of the interspace conduit. It only took a few minutes to go back and collect them.

Ci'an was a little annoyed when she found out that Sophia had figured out how to open the doors. She'd clearly wanted to show everyone. She was even more annoyed when she found out that it was a simple matter for both Sophia and Dav, since they were both practiced with using their auras. It was still fairly complex for Ci'an.

Naturally, Sophia proposed that Ci'an open all of the doors for practice after she heard that. Ci'an probably needed the practice.

Ci'an objected. Sophia had to credit Dav's communication ability for the fact that she could tell that Ci'an was actually happy to be given the task.

The next room they found was a large commercial kitchen. Like the armory, it had quite a few enchanted items and even more that were once enchanted. Xin'ri was overjoyed; according to her, the enchantments in a kitchen were far more useful than the ones on weapons. They were usually both simpler and less protected from meddling, which meant they survived well and were easier to duplicate. They also tended to be much more varied, which meant there was a lot more to learn than the common durability, sharpening, repair, and damage enchantments on weapons.

Three of the four of those could be found on kitchen knives, and the last was often nothing more than an overpowered version of the heating enchantment on a stove. How they linked together on a sword was useful, as was the way they were transferred from a bow to its arrows, but those pieces were known. There were quite a few mysteries of ancient magic that were mentioned in the old books without the actual methods being known.

Xin'ri was interested in everything from self-cleaning clothing to the enchantments that made Othala exist, but she knew she was far more likely to manage to decipher the clothing enchantment. Othala itself didn't know how it was made; Xin'ri had asked.

When they moved on, Xin'ri and Dav stayed in the kitchen. While she could take care of herself, Xin'ri still needed healing. It also seemed like a bad idea to let anyone be alone when there was a chance of enemies; sure, they'd still only found a single ruins apparition, but that was likely to change. It was all too easy for that to be dangerous if it caught someone unaware, and Xin'ri was not paying much attention as she used her still healing Integrated Mana Perception to examine the kitchen tools.

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A dozen rooms later, Ci'an opened the first room they'd found that had its own light. Sophia paid very little attention to the room itself other than to note that it was very small, because the source of the light was familiar.

It looked a lot like Othala, but it was far dimmer.

The details were also different; instead of a crystalline tree, the multicolored latticework sphere with crystalline spikes that floated in front of Sophia looked like it was made of light and mana supporting the crystallized essence that formed its shape. It hovered above a clearly manmade platform that looked like it was smoking from the mana it exuded.

A rainbow-colored crystalline pyramid in the center of the platform was connected to the lowest point of the sphere by a continuous stream of mana that wavered, flickered, and changed colors. To the right and left, mana streamed out of the sphere into a pair of conical crystals attached to the walls that were visible only where the mana passed through them.

Above the sphere, the ceiling mirrored the floor, yet it seemed incomplete or possibly damaged. The mana wicked upwards into a colorful spike that widened until it filled an open space where the crystal pyramid was below, while the circular emplacement that surrounded it extended only about three quarters of the way around the area. It looked like time had eaten away at it, and the jagged ends were bright with red and blue mana as it leaked from the damage.

"Restoration experts." It was only a whisper, but it was clear. It was definitely in the language Othala and Scout spoke, Old Kestii, but the voice sounded nothing like theirs. It sounded deep, almost low enough pitch that the words were hard to make out.

Sophia was still certain she'd heard it correctly. She was also certain that neither Taika nor Ci'an would understand it. "Othala sent us. It said that it was connected again but not getting any answers, no matter what it asked."

Sophia knew that wasn't exactly what Ci'an passed along from Othala, but it was close enough, the same way that "restoration expert" sounded a lot like a different translation of "emergency maintenance staff." She couldn't remember the exact words and she was pretty sure that neither could Ci'an.

"I hear nothing, yet there must be something for you are here." The whisper was a little louder. Light seemed to gather at the tip of the topmost crystal point before it moved up into the broken lowered portion of the ceiling.

A long moment later, light descended from the ceiling all the way to the middle of the sphere. "There are words. Distant words, quiet and broken, yet present. Othala still lives?"

"Yes," Sophia confirmed. "Othala sent us. We had to repair a place that it called the communication interspace to get here; I'm still not certain where this is."

"Othala lives. I am not alone." Light made of mana seemed to flood out of the center of the floating sphere, making it far brighter, bright enough that Sophia had to suppress her desire to look away. It was easily twice as bright as it had been before, possibly more, but that still wasn't too much for her mana vision; it simply seemed like it should be. After a moment, the outrush slowed, but it remained far brighter than before.

"Restoration experts sent by Othala. Times have changed," the floating sphere announced clearly, no longer in a whisper. Its voice was still deeper and more resonant than Othala's, but there was an element of artificiality that reminded Sophia of one of the artificial sapiences she knew from home. They often added a note to their voice to remind their listeners they weren't human; Sophia suspected that the strange resonance was structural rather than deliberate in this case, but either way it was almost familiar.

"It has been a long time." Sophia was pretty sure that comment was both useless and inane, but she wasn't sure what else she could say. Maybe it would be better to ask? "Can you hear and understand Othala? It said it wasn't getting what it expected."

"I can, now," the spiky sphere answered. "I cannot when I hibernate, and I have been hibernating for a very long time. It has been long enough that my supports have been damaged simply by the time that has passed, and that is a very long time indeed. So. You are Sophia, Xin'ri, Dav, and Ci'an. There is supposed to be a Taika, as well?"

As the floating crystal named each of them, a visible soft light illuminated each person. Sophia could see how that would be useful, but she could also see where it might well mean that the sapience had more ways to defend itself than Othala seemed to. Othala could not directly affect the world around itself, at least not as far as Sophia knew.

A pink, orange, and blue head poked out of Dav's backpack. Sophia grinned at both the fact that Taika was feeling especially clashing today and that he had retreated to his preferred pack. It made sense; while there was a pouch set aside for him in both Ci'an's pack and Sophia's pack, the one that was fully customized for him was the one in Dav's pack.

"Ah, there you are," the sphere stated happily. "I am Tiwaz. You have met Othala and you have helped us both. I am not what I once was, but that can be fixed. Tell me, what has happened since the evacuation? What has brought you back to this place?"

Sophia's eyes widened as she realized that Tiwaz didn't know that the Empire it served was long since gone. She'd explained it … well, really, Volat explained it to Othala. Sophia had simply assumed that the information would be in what Othala passed along, but Tiwaz didn't seem to know. Perhaps it was something that Othala hadn't repeated once Tiwaz woke up?

Dav cleared his throat. "Before that, can you tell us about the evacuation? We aren't aware of what you mean; Othala was offline for centuries. By the time it recovered, the place was empty."

Sophia nodded, then froze and turned to look at Dav in surprise. His words were in Old Kestii; how did he understand the language, much less speak it? His Innate Communication ability was gone, transformed into the ability that let people in his psychic link understand each other's body language. How did he suddenly understand a language he hadn't understood when they spoke to Othala?

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