It was a miracle Tristessa hadn't lost consciousness while being carried by Reiden, like a drunken fool instead of a princess rescued from the dark lord's castle, as she remembered from the video games she played. The mercenary leader, thankfully, was not only a retired hero but also a gentleman who did his best to make her comfortable in his arms as they made their way to Derelict Outpost.

"Feeling better?" she heard his voice, muffled as if she were speaking on the other side of a wall of water.

"Y-yes..." With half-open eyes, her vision blurred, barely able to make out the dark blur to her right, which was the mercenary's silhouette. "Thank you, Reiden."

Speaking clearly was a challenge, her tongue numb and unwilling to function as it should. Not to mention her arms and legs, wrapped in uncomfortable sensations as if thousands of ants were leaving poisoning bites beneath her skin. There was no way to move them at will; she was completely at Reiden's mercy.

Her mind was a jumble of hazy memories, intertwined with the very little she remembered of her past on Earth along with all the new experiences she had acquired on Nekrom. Flashes of the perpetual Sea of Trees, Severus levitating a cup of coffee with his gravity-elemental thaumaturgy, the [severed head] of a [stuffed rabbit] on the nightstand in her room, Astoria stroking her hair while smiling like a fool from all the alcohol she had ingested…

Her mother, sitting in a chair, legs crossed, and hands clasped in her lap. Wearing a shirt, tie, and a black formal suit. Behind the bars of her cell, looking at her with an amusingly smug expression. Haughty, smiling in a detestable way, full of vanity.

Selene Irandell. Whose name she was afraid to say aloud in this new world.

"…still here, Tristessa?"

"…no, you shitty hag. I'm not in [Blackwater Park] anymore."

Ah, yes, that was the name of her hometown. She didn't remember much more than that, unfortunately. But just repeating that name filled her mouth with a disgusting taste, and not necessarily because she had vomited dissolved dried meat and blood minutes ago.

The taste of dark memories that, for the moment, should remain locked away. Trapped inside an iron chest falling into the depths of the dark oceans of the mind.

"…are you okay? Can you hear me?"

"Hmm…?" Tristessa blinked several times, her vision slowly clearing. She hadn't realized that Reiden was no longer carrying her. She wasn't even moving: she was lying on a soft, warm surface, like a fur blanket. There was only a still-blurred silhouette to her right, the one who had asked her those questions. "I feel like I've been hit by a truck…"

"Excuse me? I didn't understand that, I'm sorry." For Reiden, his words were gentler than she remembered. "Take this. It's an elixir made by Madame Luchie, it will make you feel much better."

She felt his arm helping her straighten, and the neutral touch of glass against her lips. Then, the faint rush of a warm, citrus-flavored fluid squirming the salivary glands at the back of her mouth. The effect wasn't instantaneous like a potion, but as the seconds passed, her entire body began to regain strength that had been drained when her soul reached the limit imposed by her Divinity.

The blurry cloak covering her eyes also diluted, bringing clarity back. She expected to see Reiden's serious expression, but to her surprise, the one sitting on his knees next to her wasn't him. He was a mercenary from the Fireclaw Company, given the black poncho with the three-red-striped symbol he wore; a young man with curly black hair, surrounded by an innate aura of passive magical energy that talented thaumaturges naturally owned.

"Ah...ah...!" Tristessa stifled moans of fear, sudden and attacking her without warning.

It was that same man who, in a past loop, with those same hands he'd used to help her straighten up and feed her medicine, had tried to strangle her. Kill her, driven mad by his mind having been destroyed after witnessing the massacre of his comrades and employer at the hands of the Dullahan.

Now he looked at her with overflowing curiosity imbued in his light blue eyes. Eyes she had seen torn out by hungry palkuriae and devoured along with the rest of his body.

Melian Nicodemus.

"What's wrong?!" the thaumaturge asked, seeing that veil of terror in the girl and feeling the spasms coursing through her body with his own hands. "I'm not going to hurt you. I work for Reiden and Mistress Luchie! M-my name's Melian, miss!"

He gently lowered her onto the blanket they had spread for her on the smooth stone floor.

"If I did anything to offend you, miss, I'm truly sorry," Melian apologized, and tried to get up from the floor. "I'll go find…"

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"N-no, wait!" Tristessa bolted upright, her abdominal muscles twitching with sharp pain, and quickly grabbed the wrist of his left arm. She earned the attention and silence of the thaumaturge. "I-I…I…"

Now that she was lucid and the elixir she had ingested was doing its work, she knew there was nothing to fear. Yes, the terror embedded in her after what had happened in the nonexistent past wasn't going away, but it was manageable. She could retain all those near-Death experiences, the implicit pain caused by those fingers around her throat.

And the smell of blood and fluids spreading through the earth and grass as the swarm of faerie-like creatures mercilessly devoured the very same whose arm she had taken.

"I'm sorry I reacted like that, it's just…I-I…I like sexy old men like Reiden!" she blurted out the first thing that came to mind, the lucidity she'd regained thanks to the elixir evidently wasted. "Ah!"

Her face reddened, even more so when Melian covered his mouth to stifle a laugh.

"Ha! Did you hear that, boss?" The man looked to the side, smiling at none other than Reiden, leaning against a stack of crates with his arms crossed. "You're quite the heartbreaker."

The mercenary leader looked at Tristessa with a raised eyebrow, not at all thrilled with what he'd just heard.

"I could be your grandfather, girl. Don't talk nonsense," was his retort, hurting Tristessa's pride and making her blush spread to her ears.

"Rejected again?!" She slumped her shoulders, sighing. "Wow, I'm not having any luck in love, huh?"

Glancing around to dispel her embarrassment, Tristessa finally confirmed that she was in the center of Derelict Outpost. She'd been resting on blankets that didn't belong to her group, near stacks of crates filled with supplies, a few meters to the left of where the two-wagon train brimming with riches was parked.

"There's still time before night brings my own, personal stalker..." she thought, feeling the chill of her Baptism in Ruins beneath her trench coat and shirt. The supernatural pulse was there, pulsing like a heartbeat in the distance. A warning of what was approaching.

She could see the Fireclaw Company mercenaries sitting by the bonfire, their faces familiar after knowing them for several timelines. It was a relief to see the Mercer-Archeos were also enjoying the warmth of the fire; it seemed Jin had done his work in convincing Madame Luchie—who wasn't around them—to at least allow them to share that fire.

She also identified Gladiolus and the other vilecross, sleeping peacefully near that same hole in the wall of her first experience in that region, while the mercenaries' aracrosses did the same from the other end of the emplacement.

"Come on, miss, don't get so discouraged. Besides, the boss has three wives," the thaumaturge commented, oblivious to Tristessa's thoughts and evidently not seeing that fact scandalous. That's why the girl's sudden wide-eyed reaction made him back away. "W-what's going on?"

"Did you say...three...wives?" Tristessa stared at the two men in shock, moving from one to the other, her brain swarming against the walls of her skull.

"Yes, that's what I said. Is there something wrong?"

"Something wrong?! What the...?!"

"What's happening is that stupid girl hit her head really hard and can't remember some things." From where she sat, hugging her husband and enveloped in the warmth emanating from the bonfire, Tiara made one of her acidic comments that made the mercenaries look in that direction. "Like, for example, that the Empire's population is now eighty percent female and twenty percent male, thanks to the war against the Shadow Queen…"

"That's right. Men are highly coveted these days, miss-overflowing-with-Discord," added Lufreya Solsong, wearing her ever-present kettle-shaped helmet, embracing both Bran Jade and Dom Ugaran, wrapping her arms around their necks. "Except for these two, of course."

"I'm still waiting for your marriage proposal, Lufreya," Bran joked, smiling as he continued to sharpen his giant axe with a whetstone.

"You're too weak to be my wife," Dom replied, stroking the head of the very tired Gaal, lying on the ground between him and the Mercer-Archeos. "I want a strong, gigantic woman, capable of bearing me monstrous children to destroy the Dark Lady!"

"Dom's children, what a terrifying future awaits us!"

The mercenaries laughed out loud. Except for Reiden, who was more attentive, looking at something in the direction of the carriage.

Tristessa imitated him and saw Lucahn holding hands with the elderly owner of that caravan. Karla Luchie, wearing a purple silk tunic, jewelry, and that distinctive red scarf. Now that she was standing with her back to her, showing a series of books to the excited little boy, Tristessa could see her bushy, feline-like tail sticking out from inside her dress.

"…"

Without saying anything, Tristessa watched, reviewing the plan she had devised, but without resorting to the extreme privacy of her mind palace. In those seconds of stillness, Madame Luchie turned her head to meet her gray eyes, as if she had sensed someone watching her.

"Well, it certainly is a relief to see you recovered!" The old woman released Lucahn and handed him a gold-covered book, then pinched his cheek. "Sweet little boy, go with your parents and enjoy that book. Don't misbehave, or you'll be my dessert tonight, yes?"

"Y-yes, madam!"

Seeing the boy return to Jin and Tiara, his right cheek reddened but grinning from ear to ear, Madam Luchie went straight to Tristessa. Her hands were on her back, taking her time while Reiden fetched a chair and placed it next to where Tristessa was resting.

"Thank you, Reiden dear."

The mercenary gently helped her sit down, and with a curt bow, he stepped back to give them some privacy, as everyone else present was more than attentive to the two of them.

"The Mercer-Archeos told me about your fortuitous appearance in their lives, Miss Tristessa Irandell."

A smile riddled with avarice, with confidence. The smile of someone Tristessa was bound to defeat in a business duel.

"I am Karla Luchie, a humble merchant who values luck and fortune above all else."

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