“Konnichi wa, Sempai!” Mordecai hadn’t heard that nguage since he had been awakened by Moriko, and the speaker was a young woman with a riotous rainbow of hair and ostentatious ‘fairy’ wings that mao simultaneously match, trast, and csh with her hair. She also hadn’t been standing there a moment before she spoke, and hadn’t appeared with any of the on signs of teleportation spells or even the breaking of an invisibility spell. Of course, she was oher side of his border, but Mordecai’s avatar had very sharp sehe woman gave an old-fashioned curtsy, which did not go with the nguage she’d just used. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you Mordecai, and please give my greetings to your wives as well. My name is Kuic.”

  Mordecai gave a ral boleasure to meet you as well.” It was clear to him that she was giving him a slew of deliberate clues openly inteo draw him to a clusion, but that served to make part of him leery of leaning on the obvious assumption. “Moriko, get Kazue’s avatar up here in a timely but non-emergency speed. Her core is focused here too.” To Kuic he said, “I take it your name is not a ce?”

  “Oh, being skeptical are we?” She grinned mischievously. “That’s wise, there are a few discrepancies after all. But I am indeed a dungeon. Or, well, I was, and kind of still am, but I’m even farther from a normal duhan you two are. But before we talk about me, my big sis gets to have your attention. You guys expanding outward like that accelerated our schedule, but it also makes it easier on her since she doesn’t have to cross any uerritory as well.”

  While they were talking, Kazue’s core was keeping Moriko up to date, who in turn was keeping Kazue’s avatar updated.

  A dryad stepped out from a nearby tree, her body posed of vegetative flesh, clothed in leaves and with blossoming vines for her hair. And fur. For this ‘dryad’ had nine fox-shaped tails and a pair of fox ears. Mordecai’s brain raced, certain that he knew her, reag ever further ba his memory. Her choice of purple flowers helped his spark of hope grow as he mentally recolored her face from green to flesh. “Norumi?” His whisper was barely louder than his breath.

  She smiled warmly. “It really is you, Father,” Norumi replied, her voice choked with emotion, and then she practically flowed forward, crossing the boundary to throw herself into his arms and hug him tightly. “I’ve missed you so much, I could barely hold out hope.”

  Mordecai was stunned but returhe hug fiercely. “Norumi, what happeo you?” He asked as ran his fihrough what should be his daughter’s hair. And he hadn’t missed the slight flinch as she’d flung herself across the barrier into his territory.

  She sniffed into his shirt and then giggled. “Going for thoughts while still processiions?” She pulled baough to grin up at him. “You haven’t ged a whole lot. But it looks like we have pany, and it ties to Kuic’s story too, so we go over it in a bit. Oh, I ’t wait until you Inate. I have so much to show you.”

  Moriko and Kazue were standing nearby looking a toucertain, so Mordecai focused his thoughts on the present a all else aside. “Kazue, Moriko, I would like to introduce you to your stepdaughter, Norumi. Norumi, these are your stepmothers, Kazue and Moriko.”

  “If I didn’t know better, I’d accuse you to start up your own harem,” Norumi said, then stepped forward to the two women, exging brief hugs with each of them. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Moriko. And a pleasure to see you again Kazue, I enjoyed watg you grow up, along with all the others. I never imagihat a member of my was going to marry my father. I’m just gd you aren’t one of my desdants, that would be awkward.”

  Kazue’s eyes widened as she put together the implications and clues. “You, you’re the forest spirit! Our founder didn’t die, you … transformed?!” Her eyes narrowed in thought. “No one was ever cimed as the father of your children after you fouhe Azeria . And we’ve had a guardian who could awaken any tree into his body since you founded. And Aia was certain you were still pining for your human husband, the founding king of Kuic … er Kuic kingdom.” She shot a gnce across the border at the boldly colored woman there, who waved cheerfully.

  Moriko followed her train of thought swiftly. “Wait, did King Haolong bee that guardian? That, um, no offense, but well that makes a lot more sehan you having a lot of secret lovers after he died, but,” now she frowned slightly. “How did you have kids?”

  Norumi ughed softly. “Yetting ahead of the story. We’ll get there. But you have the gist of it.” She turned back toward Mordecai, sap moistening her eyes where tears should be. “I adore you father, and I do not want to be rude, but this is going to be a lot easier on me if I cross back over.” She hugged him briefly and kissed his cheek before dashing bato Kuic’s territory with a sigh of relief.

  “Are you okay?” Mordecai asked, wishing he could step across the border to her. But even just stepping too close to the edge of the territory made his skin tingle as the mana making up his avatar threateo fall apart.

  “Yes, at least, in a general sense. I am bound to the forest now. Moving far from it even inside Kuic’s borders is hard enough, stepping across the border costs a lot of energy. Being inside your dungeon was easier than being in ory at all though.”

  Kuic nodded as she looked Norumi over. “She’ll be fine as long as she gets some rest. Well, why don’t we all create some chairs so we sit down and talk?”

  Mordecai tilted his head in thought as he raised a finger. “I have a slight addition to make. Our inhabitants have made some furniture out of properly harvested lumber. And… yes, that table is free.” The table he summoned in oak table with just a few oral touches. Even if he moved it through dungeon magic, the table itself was pletely real. “Moriko? If you could take the other end?” With Moriko and Kazue able to cross the border freely, they soon had the table tered to have half on each side.

  Once everyone had settled into pce, there was a moment of awkward silehen Kuic spoke. “Well, let’s start by asking your inhabitants to stay away from the versation. I uand they are curious, but I am obliged to reveal myself and my nature to as feossible.” She smiled slightly. “I figured it was going to happen after you had your own inate, and realized you stepped into a territory when you crossed the boundary proper. I wasn’t expeg our borders to suddenly touch.”

  Kazue’s cently nudged most of their inhabitants that this rivate meeting. The faeries she didn’t say a thing to, for fear that knowing something ‘secret’ was happening would only attract them in a swarm.

  Her avatar frowned slightly at the w. “His inate? What about me?”

  “Well, this is your first fully inated avatar, so I don’t think you’d have noticed until you had more experience crossing the borders of other territories.” Kuic sighed, “You two are making me feel nostalgic, I ’t make inates anymore. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s start with some history! I wasn’t born until about two turies after Mordecai’s, um, rea. I wasn’t the first of the dungeons born in that aftermath, nor the st, but I am the only o in the region.”

  Mordecai perked up at that. “Does that mean you know what happeo the coastline?”

  Kuic grimaced. “Oh yes, I do. That guy was such a selfish little prick. Probably still is. Sorry, let me go back a bit. If you find the arc of the coastlihat was carved out and make it a circle, the ter of that circle was one of the early dungeons born after you were sealed. He grew pretty fast thanks to his location, but he was never satisfied. I think that if he believed he could get away with it, he’d have tried to make himself the only dungeon on the p, and cim the whole thing as his territory. But with that not feasible, I think he decided to try to find a pce he could quer. He created a perfectly spherical territory while specializing in space/time magic. I didn’t realize what he to until his eerritory just disappeared. Took everything ierritory with him; ground, water, and air alike.” She made a face. “The aftershocks of that were enough to force their way into my territory and make my deepest levels shake, and I had to cope with a flood of seawater and the stuff in it whesunami hit the shore. And as far as I know, he’s either off traveling the ethereal realm scooping stuff up as a living demi-pne, or has settled onto a p more to his liking. Though part of me hopes he flew into the sun and burned up. Not fair to his inhabitants, but by all the gods I never liked him to begin with.”

  Moriko and Kazue were visibly shocked. Mordecai was more thoughtful as his mind spun through the starting calcutions to get a rough estimate of the energy required. The calcutions to actually pull it off were not something he could even begin to run. “Well, he didn’t self-destruct, or we wouldn’t be having this versation. I … well, I don’t feel less bad for my as, but I feel less moally stupid for it. I see what you mean by selfish, if that had gone wrong, there are a dozen ways that energy could have maed destructively.” He shook his head at the thought. “And I know there’s a limit to the bme I take, but it is still a repercussion of my as. He had his free will, so most of the bme is his, but I ’t help feeling guilty that I made it possible.”

  Kazue groaned and put her head into her hands. “This isn’t helping the headache that being in the same area as my other self’s focus is giving me.”

  “I kind of agree. I gave you access to part of my area of the core to help you do that, and those results just seem insane. we actually collect that much power?”

  “I’m sorry about that love. But I think this is going to be important to keep you in the loop. Or would you rather just learn about it from your memory being updated?” To her core, he said, “Yes, though it should take a long time.”

  Kazue shook her head without lifting it from her hands. “No way. That would feel like bei out.”

  Which was what he had thought. “Well, now that we’ve covered that highlight, how did all of this lead to you being a kingdom? And from what I have heard, you were involved, Norumi?”

  Zagaroth