Since I brought Rose back early, the imps that were exploring the orchard town with her are now without supervision. I suppose they still have Igneous and Scar with them, but Igneous usually seems pretty aloof about most things and based on my observations, Scar does not seem the type to be too concerned with the well being of imps, at least not without prompting from Noctis, who is not there with him.

Logically, I know that they will probably be fine. Imps have existed for who knows how long and managed to survive without needing someone like Rose to guide them, but I cannot help feeling a little apprehensive now that I have no way of communication with them if something else happens, either to us here or to them.

Rose informed me that she did manage to tell some of them that she was being summoned back for some kind of emergency, but she could not give them any more information than that because I did not give her more than that. At least that means they were aware of her departure so there would not be any panic or confusion at her sudden disappearance.

I could just bring the whole group back, but then they would not be able to bring anything with them and I know the imps here are looking forward to getting more fruit. Left to their own devices, I am sure they will come back on their own eventually, but I would still feel more at ease if we could at least stay in contact. Rose would likely prefer to stay here to continue looking after the new imps, but I could send Violet to join them.

If I just recall Igneous, I could then ask him to fly her back to the orchard town. They might be surprised when he disappears, since I will have no way to warn them, but he can return in less than a day so it would not be a long absence.

Rose is still intent on healing the new imps, but I am not sharing any mana with her for the task so she is forced to pace herself. While she is taking a break, I ask for her opinion on the situation.

I am thinking of sending Violet out to the orchard town to finish the survey and bring the group home, unless you would like to go back yourself?

"No, sending Violet is a good idea. I think I'm needed more here," she agrees.

I assumed you would feel that way.

"It's going to take her a while to get there though. It took us around three days, though I suppose she could probably move faster on her own than we could. Does she even know the way?" Rose ponders.

I am thinking of bringing Igneous back so he can take her.

"Oh, that solves that problem then. Have you told her yet?"

Not yet. I wanted to talk to you first, on the off chance that you actually did want to go back yourself. Since things have calmed down now, could you tell me how your investigation went before it was interrupted. Is there anything we should let Violet know about before I send her back out.

"Overall, there's not much that really stood out. There wasn't much there that's any different from what we can find in the city here. Lots of houses still have plenty of stuff to scavenge, the plants have taken over more and the wildlife is a little more abundant, more like the outer suburbs on the outskirts of the city. And like in those suburbs, some yards had what I assume used to be private vegetable gardens that have been left to grow unchecked. Some good stuff, but nothing we haven't seen already," she reports.

What about the crater?

"That's probably the only real noteworthy thing I saw. The mana is definitely more concentrated in the crater and after digging around a little, I found tiny fragments of mana crystals."

How tiny?

"Tiny enough that even the fact that they glowed didn't make them easy to find," she says.

If there were mana crystals, maybe there was a dungeon core there at some point. I assume you did not find anything like that or I am sure you would have mentioned it at the time.

"Right, that would be a little too important to just leave for later," Rose agrees.

So do you think it would be a good place for us to move to?

"Yes, I don't think we'll find a better place anywhere else. It's got everything we need; food, shelter and lots of interesting things for imps to find and play with, plenty of brooms for Violet to collect, I'm sure. It's also pretty far away from anyone who might bother us. Personally, I think the sooner we leave this city and get away from the humans, the better," she remarks.

I understand why she feels that way given the losses we have faced at the hands of humans. I am still unsure if moving is the best course of action though. It could be better for us in the short term as it would put us out of the humans' reach, for a while at least. But that will also make it harder for us to make allies, which we might need if we are found by hostile humans again in the future, maybe even more so if the vak find us instead. We would be taking a risk either way.

We should talk to Violet about this plan.

While Rose is taking a break from healing, Violet took all the new imps up to the roof and none of them have come back down yet. I can see some of them standing around the outside edge of the roof staring out at the city, observing their new environment, though the others are not within the claimed area.

Violet is also not somewhere where I can currently see her, but thankfully, that is not an obstacle in her case. I wait a little while for Rose to make it up the stairs before reaching out across our bond.

I have a favor to ask of you. I inform her.

'Okay,' comes her cheerful response and a moment later she moves to a location where she is visible to me. She is soon joined by Rose as well.

"What do you need?" Violet inquires.

I would like you to head to the orchard town again and bring everyone out there back.

"Oh. But what about them?" She asks solemnly, gesturing to the new imps.

"Don't worry, I'll take care of them," Rose assures her. "I bet they would all enjoy some fruit," she suggests.

"Ah, that's a good idea. I can take the extra backpacks so we can bring back even more," Violet exclaims, immediately brightening up.

"We've got more backpacks now?" Rose questions.

William brought over a few more while you were gone.

"You went with six imps and three backpacks, but then you came back making one less, if I go, there will be six again and three more new backpacks means there will be one for everyone," Violet cheers.

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"That's a good plan. With that, you can easily bring back enough fruit for all of us. I'm sure everyone will be grateful for it," Rose affirms with a soft smile.

"Right," Violet beamed and rushed for the stairs

Since everyone here is in agreement on the plan, I head down to the core room to summon Igneous back. When he appears at the rift, he looks around quizzically.

Welcome home. I am sorry for calling you back so suddenly, but I need to ask a favor of you.

He nods in assent and I continue.

I had to bring Rose back earlier due to a medical emergency and she is going to be staying here. Instead, I would like you to take Violet back with you to organise bringing everyone back.

After brief consideration, he nods in agreement.

Shortly after, Violet bursts into the room wearing one back pack and holding the other two in each of her hands with Coal following behind her. Spotting Igneous, she marches right up to him.

"I'm ready," she declares, raising her arms in the air to show off the backpacks.

"Maybe you should put the extra two backpacks inside the one you're currently wearing so you don't have to hold them," Rose suggests.

Violet gives her a momentary blank stare before breaking into a wide grin.

"That's a great idea," she cheers, dropping the backpacks she is holding and undoing the clip in front of her chest to remove the one she is wearing.

"I go too," Coal demands.

"I don't know if Igneous could carry us both," Violet replies and he frowns.

"I go," he insists.

"Do you think you could take both of us?" Violet asks Igneous who shakes his head in response.

I am sorry Coal. You cannot go with her this time. You are just going to have to wait for her to come back.

"No, I go," he growls.

"How?" Rose asks and Coal casts a glare towards her. "Igneous cannot take you, no matter how much you demand it, so how will you get there?"

Coal scowls at Igneous, then down at the floor, then back up at Igneous.

"Other. Take," he countered.

Other? I am not sure what you mean by that.

"Does he mean Marble? You want Marble to take you?" Rose clarifies.

That could be an option I suppose, if Marble could actually be convinced to do it, but she is not as amenable to performing favours for the imps as Igneous usually is. She might do it if I insisted, but as much as I am sure Coal would like to accompany Violet, it is not important enough to demand that Marble should accommodate him. He is welcome to ask her, but I will not force the issue if she does not want to do it.

After being told that, he does not hesitate to disappear. Rose, Violet and Igneous make their way up to the roof via the stairs so it takes them a bit longer to get up there than Coal. When they arrive on the roof, he can be seen shouting at Marble, in his own language rather than Balkret.

From the outside, it looks like an imp yelling at a large, unresponsive boulder, though his shouting is punctuated by pauses that could indicate that Marble is actually responding to him and he does not like whatever she is saying.

"Coal, that's enough!" Rose commands as she approaches him.

"I go. Rock take," he retorts, pointing at Marble as he turns to face Rose and Violet.

There is a moment of silence before he turns back to marble with a sneer. He raises both hands and actually tries to push the gargoyle to force her to move, though he is careful to avoid digging his claws into her skin. He may be strong compared to other imps, but it is not enough to make the Marble budge if she does not want to.

I do not think you are going to win this one.

It is unclear if he actually understands me or not, but instead of giving up, he adjusts his stance, stepping back a little with one foot and lowering his body to get better leverage to push harder.

Perhaps thinking it is some kind of game, some of the other imps come over to join him in trying to move the 'big rock'.

"I don't think that's a good idea," Violet comments.

"She's right, we should all leave Marble alone now before she gets annoyed," Rose warns.

Some of the new imps had gathered around Igneous when he arrived on the roof, driven by their curiosity over something else new to them. A couple of them were about to move to help push the rock instead, but pause at Rose's warning.

"No push rock?" One of them asks.

"It's not a rock. She's just pretending," Rose informs them.

"Not rock? What is?" The imp wonders.

"She's like him," Rose replies, gesturing to Igneous. "I'll introduce you later, but right now I need to stop them before they bother her too much."

But before she has the chance to reprimand them, Marble takes action herself. She unfolds her wings and most of the imps who were trying to push her scamper away while giggling. Except for Coal, who stands before her defiantly and repeats his earlier demands.

Marble crouches down low to get as close as she can to eye level with the angry imp, baring her fangs in a silent snarl of warning. Coal remains unfazed and growls at her in return.

I probably should stop them before the situation escalates further, but this is the first time that anyone has gone so far to pick a fight with one of the gargoyles and I cannot help but be curious about how Marble will respond. I am prepared to intervene if things turn violent though.

She does not waste much time, opening her mouth and moving even closer to Coal. At first, I wonder if she is planning to bite him, but I soon notice what I realise is the first audible vocalisation I have ever heard from one of the gargoyles. It is an extremely high pitch ringing noise that starts off quiet, but it quickly grows in intensity.

It takes an extra second for any of the imps to notice it, but Violet is the first to react, covering her ears without hesitation. Seeing that, Rose copies the action, though her furrowed brow and slight head tilt suggest that she does not understand the reason for it, but she trusts Violet's instincts.

Just in time too, as the ringing reaches a crescendo a moment later and Coal, who did not take any defensive action, crumples to the floor. I quickly check on him and as far as I can tell, he is only unconscious, but does not appear to be otherwise harmed.

With the nuisance that was bothering her dealt with, Marble promptly makes herself comfortable and wraps her expansive wings around herself again, resuming her 'rock' state.

"What was that?" Rose slurs, looking a little unsteady on her feet.

I assume that was some kind of sonic attack. Similar to what Violet described Igneous using the first time they went to the orchard town together.

Despite covering their ears, Rose and Violet were not unaffected, possibly due to their proximity to the source, though they obviously did not get it as bad as Coal, who was directly in front of Marble and the primary target.

Was anyone else affected?

After steadying herself, Rose moves out of my field of view to check on the other imps who are up on the roof while Violet kneels by Coal and attempts to wake him up by shaking him.

Is he going to be okay?

The question was aimed at Marble but she does not respond. Igneous also approaches so I direct the question to him instead. He looks down at Coal and observes him for a moment before nodding and taking a seat next to Marble, though he does not don his rock disguise and is content to just sit in the open for a while. He does not seem worried at all, so I can only hope that means Coal will be fine.

Rose soon returns and reports dizziness and some nausea among the other imps nearby, but no one else was knocked out like Coal.

I should probably be a little upset at Marble for getting the others involved, but I am also at fault for not intervening even though I could clearly see the confrontation escalating. I will apologise to the imps later for letting them become collateral damage and see if I can convince Marble to do the same. I will not ask her to apologise to Coal though, since he was the one who started it.

"If you're ready, you should probably head off. It'll be a long journey and the sooner you leave, the sooner you'll be back," Rose suggests to Violet, placing a hand on her shoulder.

Violet looks up at her briefly, then back down to Coal.

"But…"

"I'll look after him so there's nothing for you to worry about. But you've got a job to do," Rose assures her.

"I'm sorry I have to leave you behind again, but I'll be back soon, I promise," Violet says to the unconscious imp.

Predictably, Coal does not respond. With a determined nod, she stands and turns towards Igneous.

"I'm ready to go," she declares.

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