The weird woman bore her eyes at me, briefly blank.
"Runework?" she echoed, puzzled. "You wish to know the resonance etched into this blade?" Then her posture straightened, chin lifting as though she had just solved a test she hadn't realized she was taking.
"Oh." Her eyes brightened once more. "You're assessing me, aren't you? Of course. A man of your experience would wish to know whether I understand enhancement theory."
I had done no such thing. But she seemed deeply committed to the interpretation, so I said nothing.
She clasped her hands behind her back, pacing once. "Well, runework is simply the visible expression of a weapon's aetheric temperament. When a blade is exposed to ambient magic long enough—or is forged deliberately under certain rites—it develops markings that resonate with a particular elemental strain." She leaned closer. "Some blades answer to Lightning, some to Light, some even to Blood! Lovely element. A handful respond to no element at all and are considered inert. This longsword..." Her brows furrowed. "I cannot tell its resonance at a glance. But you must already know that, Ser. You wished only to see if I could."
Ceralis immediately materialized a pale-blue panel in the air.
[TASK UNLOCKED: Echo of the Blade-Heart]
Objective: Determine the elemental resonance of Sir Roland's Longsword
Reward: 2 AP
AP? Aetheric Points?
My pulse kicked. Ah. I had always wondered why Sir Roland used that longsword—the one passed down to him, and then to me. Turns out it had magical properties I'd never quite been able to articulate. The Knighthood did not use mere steel.
Ceralis, I thought, are these what I need to unlock artifact potential? To activate runework?
[Affirmation: AP Enables Artifact Advancement. AP Acquisition Rate: User-Dependent]
Two points.
Two points for identifying the sword's resonance.
And Saints above—if I could activate runework? If I could awaken aether bound in steel?
My breath tightened in my chest.
The woman watched the way my eyes darted toward the sword. Her lips curled into a knowing courtly smile.
"You seem rather intent on that blade of yours, good Ser," she said. "I shan't interrupt a knight communing with his weapon. The bond between arm and wielder is practically sacred." She gave a tiny bow. "When you have satisfied your curiosity, supper will be ready. Until then—do handle it with the reverence it deserves."
She turned back to the hearth with a swish of skirts, lifting the lid from the pot. Steam billowed in fragrant clouds.
And just like that, I found myself alone with a sword that suddenly felt heavier, and a task that might finally let me carve a piece of the world back into the shape it owed me.
The smell of broth reached me first, savory and layered. The spices were aplenty, far too many for a common stew: cumin, star anise, a trace of pepper not from the eastern ports but the southern. In most homes, you were lucky if the broth had salt. This woman must've spent years learning how to work with these flavors.
She measured by scent, stirred by instinct, never once tasting but somehow knowing the exact moment to lower the flame. Was this alchemy disguised as domesticity? But I had yet heard of any alchemist summoning tiny stone golems.
If she had any art, it was probably thaumaturgy, the most dominant form of magic around Aurelienth. It was a kind of refined magic the wealthy liked to pretend was an academic pursuit rather than a license to meddle. The well-off ones always did end up in that Order. Sir Roland had once served a thaumaturge like that. The man's house had more gold leaf than glass, and he'd insisted on hiring 'a knightly retainer' purely so he could boast that even his bodyguard had a family crest.
If this woman belonged to the same ilk, she hid it well.
As I waited for my dinner, I saw clay. I had never before found clay interesting in my life, but there was something misaligned about the claywork on the low shelf, shaped like a coiled serpent biting its tail. Or maybe it was just a looping tail; hard to tell with artistic endeavors. The shadows didn't fall where they should. The distance between it and the wall seemed to stretch half a finger's width farther than it had been, as though there was light from within the object that was interfering with the room's geometry.
Does that thing hold any aether? Her basket has aether, and she's a mage. Very likely her claywork also contains aether.
This must be the same quality that Ceralis' tutorial had described. A 'taskgiving object' right there by the hearth, nestled among her trinkets. Of course it would be in someone else's house. Why wouldn't it be?
Only, it was at the far end of the room, and the woman was right there stirring her pot. So I did the next best thing: pretended to stretch, pretended to stand up, walk around, admire the shelves, and tried very hard not to look like a thief about to fondle a piece of pottery.
"Is it time for your dinnertime sparring, Ser?" her voice floated over, amused. "You seem ready to duel my furniture."
I froze halfway through what must have looked like a particularly aggressive reach.
Think, Henry. Think. You can recover from this. Compliment the claywork. Yes! Acknowledge its craftsmanship, mention the inner aetheric quality, maybe compare it to something tasteful you've read about in an Archive treatise. She'll see you as perceptive, intelligent, perhaps even charming.
In my head, the phrasing was impeccable, 'Your artistry speaks through the medium, Lady; the serpentine curvature hints at the unbroken cycle of vitality—one rarely finds such intuitive command of resonance outside formal guild instruction.'
Flawless.
I debated using Voice Reclamation for this interaction, but thought better of it. The eight-hour cooldown was too steep, and I would not waste it on such a trivial conversation.
Of course, the risk of Ceralis tampering was statistically significant. Yet, I was reasonably certain I could convey at least some fraction of my intended meaning through ordinary speech. Surely she could extract the compliment from the general shape of the sounds, even if the consonants came out mangled or my cadence betrayed every ounce of social decency. And really, what were the stakes here? If I failed to praise her pottery with perfect semantic clarity, I doubted the consequence would be death. Embarrassment, perhaps. But not death.
I opened my mouth. "Fine work," Ceralis said for me. "It will die beautifully when the hammer finds it."
I should have activated Voice Reclamation.
I wanted to rip my own tongue out, or better—rip Ceralis from my head and strangle it with the entrails of whatever spirit made it speak.
She laughed.
Her laugh was too loud for the small room before she brought it back to restraint. "You've quite a sense of humor, Ser," she said, trying to temper her mirth into something polite. "Which Order did you hail from? Quite bold of them to teach jesting along with their swordsmanship."
I didn't trust myself to speak. My face burned. My mind spat curses at Ceralis in every language I knew, half of which had been dead for centuries, the other half too blasphemous for polite company.
My hands felt stupid and clumsy. Embarrassment made them too hot; Ceralis made them traitorous. Still... Task or no task, I had come this far.
I had to touch her tail.
I set my palm on the serpent's flank.
I did not feel anything. Yet—
[Task Completed: Taskgiving Tutorial]
[Boon: +25 EXP]
EXP: 1455/2750
Oh. It really worked. I may be something of a genius myself.
The claywork gave me another task.
[Task Received: A Late Night Snake]
Objective: Slay a Serpent-type creature during the period after midnight and before dawn.
Reward: +100 EXP
I promptly decided that the task was rubbish and dismissed it.
"Ser," she said softly, with that warm, lilting composure of hers that could almost make you forget she'd caught you trying to rob her shelf, "you've been pacing about like a restless hound for the better part of a minute."
I glanced over. She had turned from the hearth with her spoon in hand as the steam rose between us.
"Do be seated," she continued in a tone so gentle but somehow still left no room for argument. "Even the most valiant knights must surrender to supper when it calls."
She set two bowls on the small table—one before my empty chair, one before her own—and dusted her hands as though ending a ritual. "The clay will still be there after dinner. It won't bite. Unless you intend to duel it again?"
I sat. Then the scent of broth reached me again, and whatever task, boon, or cursed system prompt I'd been chasing fell away.
"I wonder," she said, voice light as if brushing dust from a shelf, "what goes through the mind of a noble armored man who looks so terribly serious all the time. Admiring the structural integrity of my walls, perhaps?"
The Ceralis had, in its infinite wisdom, saddled me with a side quest of getting to know her identity, in exchange for a Pathway.
I'd done worse for less. I'd managed to talk my way past bandits, priests, and one particularly humorless magistrate before; surely I could handle a woman with a bowl of soup. Even with Ceralis whispering its corrections through my teeth.
"Your hospitality is most... convenient. A pity if it were to vanish," I heard myself finish.
What in all nine folds of the aether was that? I hadn't meant that. I'd meant thank you.
She stared at me for a long, still moment. Then, to my mounting horror, She leaned forward, resting her chin on her palms, elbows on the table, eyes bright with the kind of interest that made lesser men run for the hills.
[Intimidation Failed – Target Emotion: Amusement]
"What a charming way to invite companionship. You do have a dangerous tongue, Ser." One of her legs crossed the other, idly swinging.
I opened my mouth, fumbling for something neutral. 'You seem to have a talent for shaping stones.'
I said, "You seem the sort of woman I'd like to see wrapped in linen and sealed in clay, preserved as a perfect relic; still and neat forever, so no more lies can sprout from her tongue."
She stared at me, unblinking. Then, impossibly, she laughed—a short, sharp sound of delighted disbelief—and sat bolt upright as if someone had handed her a key. "Preserved?" she breathed, eyes bright. "I would never lie to you, good Ser. I've never told this to anyone, but you saw through me just by looking into my eyes. Tell me, what else do you hide under those menacing eyes of yours?"
"What? Saw through you? You must have been mistaken. I—"
[Speech Override: ACTIVE — CERALIS: Threat Profile Enhancement —]
"—have stared into enough graves to know what clings to the flesh when it refuses to decay. I didn't just see through you. I remember the kind of soul that begs to be embalmed before it ever dies." What am I even saying? I'm accusing her of being a necromancer!
Her lips parted, then curved into something luminous and unhinged.
"You understand," she whispered. "You truly understand! The boundary between life and artifice; the sanctity of the preserved form! Oh, Ser, you can't imagine what it means to meet someone who sees it." For a heartbeat, all her sharpest features emerged at once, and her eyes glittered with a kind of gleeful madness that made her seem simultaneously radiant and unhinged. I did not know she was capable of looking even creepier than her default mode.
By the Saints. Is she actually a necromancer?
"See what—" I managed, voice cracking between alarm and disbelief. Ceralis intervened once again and finished my line for me, "See what lies beneath your skin when the soul outlasts the vessel," I heard myself say. "See what struggles behind your eyes, begging to be bound before it turns to rot."
She let out a long, shivering 'oh', the sort of sound one makes when they've just seen the solution to a puzzle they'd been living with for years. Then, softer, almost to herself, "By the saints of shale and clay, I think I'm in—"
[Romantic Interest: +5%]
[Current Interest Level: 99%]
The last word got muffled as Ceralis' notification showed up.
I don't care about romantic interests! What I demand to know is whether she practices necromancy!
She tilted her head, blinking owlishly at my inner outburst, then beamed excitedly. "I'm sorry if I'm not quite what you're looking for, good Ser," she said, tone almost apologetic, "but I can't quite embalm souls into clay, yet."
Yet.
Every hair on my neck stood on end.
"But I am very much capable of this!" She added brightly, and before I could demand clarification, she hopped up from her seat with a sudden burst of exhilarated energy.
Her skirts brushed the floor as she darted to the corner of the room, where a humble potted plant sat basking beneath the window.
She crouched, whispered something under her breath, and began moving her hands in looping gestures.
The soil shook.