She had not even counted to two when Rita heard frantic pounding against glass. She followed the sound to a transparent box near the ceiling.

Inside stood a light coffee-colored sea squirrel, barely larger than the Lightchaser sprite, with a fluffy tail nearly twice its body. It was hammering the pane in panic.

"Aba Aba." I need to verify you really are Moonlight Marsh Rita.

"Aba—!" Tell me, how many gold coins do you still owe your teacher?

The sea squirrel's anxiety vanished, replaced by stern gravity. It lifted its right paw and made an emphatic zero.

What gold? When have I ever owed any? Absolutely not.

Rita's eyes lit up at once. Ignoring the Lightchaser sprite that had hopped onto her head to stomp on her skull, she pointed at the sea squirrel and told the curly-haired woman behind the bar, "Aba Aba!" That one is my Another Me!

Bitter Chalice clicked their tongue. "Tsk."

…

The black cat finally laughed itself out, then glanced at Lightchaser. "So… did you ever finish paying Wail back?"

It trailed off, stunned. On Lightchaser's face it saw something it almost never saw there: wistfulness.

Catching the cat's stare, Lightchaser smoothed her expression and asked, "What did you say?"

"Oh… I said, did you ever finish paying Wail back?" the cat repeated, carefully.

She fell silent for a long time, gaze on the screen where her student stood, but clearly focused somewhere far away.

Even the blood elf beside them turned to look.

The black cat reached a tentative paw to prod Lightchaser's arm. "You okay?"

"Mm…" Lightchaser came back to herself, mouth tilting in a faint, self-mocking smile. "I suddenly understand why my tab kept getting longer."

Back when she was still a student at Moonlight Marsh, Wail had been broke enough to ring like a bell. Thieves earn a lot and burn through more, and Wail's dream was to raise a dragon. Still, most of her coin went to Lightchaser.

The best violin. The sharpest dagger. Wolfskin boots. Premium restoratives. Every Winterveil she picked a capital and took her traveling.

Maybe Wail had seen the guilt and unease in her. To keep her from being shackled by it, they made a ledger. The tab hung in the living room, and they agreed she would pay it back slowly after graduation.

But after the last Divine Game that year, interest suddenly appeared on the ledger.

In the long years after, every time Lightchaser was close to clearing the debt, Wail would find a reason to add something. Sometimes interest. Sometimes a forgotten expense from some month of some year that just "slipped her mind."

Lightchaser had assumed the dwarf had gone money-mad.

It did not matter. For someone like her, making money was something to pass the time. To someone at her level, gold was grass by the roadside.

She was even curious how many creative excuses Wail could come up with.

But just now, watching her student lift the tiny sprite and demand another her declare how much she still owed her teacher, one thought moved through Lightchaser's mind:

If the student regained her future memories and still remembered that ledger—and had the power to return and pay—wouldn't that mean Lightchaser could see her often?

Was that what Wail had been thinking? The dwarf had more coin than she could spend, and yet the ledger remained long.

They had both been waiting for the day they would let go. They believed that day would come. The belief carried them through day after day, year after year.

But what about the time before that day? Should they pretend not to know each other?

Was Wail afraid that the moment the ledger was settled, she would have no excuse to see the student who secretly resented her?

And when the word "before" crossed Lightchaser's mind, she realized something else: the moment they had waited forty years for had already slipped past without a sound.

She had imagined it a thousand ways. Would it be in the roar when the student became GodDraw77? Or some other worthy scene? Surely it would be a day to drink to forever.

But now, opening a window on a whim, she found the winter snow had already melted.

Her attributes had not budged on their own in ages. That "Oblivion" that had once buried her… when had it gone?

Under the startled eyes of the black cat and the blood elf, Lightchaser lowered her gaze and laughed, quietly and honestly. Joy, and relief.

"I need to figure out how to make Wail cancel the ledger," she said brightly.

To keep that line from falling flat, the black cat gamely asked, "Will she… agree?"

Lightchaser's smile froze. Slowly, her expression tightened.

Now she was not so sure. If the greedy dwarf realized she had truly let go, would she double the tab instead?

Wail had gotten a taste for this over the years. Lightchaser had become the dwarf's private bank.

She straightened, serious again, eyes on the Divine Game. No. They had to talk.

And she needed to talk to her student too. That come-and-go-as-you-please skill… could it cross between worlds?

She did not have a Rita sprite. If things ended like this, it would be unfair.

…

By the time Rita entered her sixth cloud house, the Lightchaser sprite had wandered off to who knew where—just like the skill description warned. If she got in a mood, she left.

The discovery put Rita in an excellent mood. It made the little sprite feel real—so very Lightchaser.

Even seeing a few familiar faces in this game house did not dampen her mood.

She stood reading the rules when Pomango and Fat Goose flanked her, one on each side.

Pomango: "I heard you got stupid?"

Fat Goose: "I heard you and Mistblade have a child?"

Pomango: "Seriously? The gossip today is insane. I missed that episode—when did this happen? Who has the kid now?"

Fat Goose: "It's real. Marmang Crab adopted the child. Name's Little Seahorse."

Pomango: "... Every piece of gossip we've eaten just snapped together."

Rita: "............"

She turned and studied Fat Goose for a long time, trying to see if he was joking. His face was terrifyingly earnest.

But after years at Moonlight Marsh with this guy, she knew when he was choking on laughter.

Rita opened her mouth, then shut it again.

Forget it. Denying it seriously would only make everything stupider.

Let Mistblade deal with it. With Fat Goose's total disregard for self-preservation, he would absolutely go put his face right up to Mistblade and repeat it.

Ignoring them both, Rita returned to the rule board.

This one looked tricky—the game was called No-Logic Deduction.

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