Chapter One hundred sixty-six – Hoppening a Can of Worms

<But that’s not… It’s not proof, It doesn’t mean Thaniel is- That he’s going to...> she whispered, staring until she thought the slashes and dots would be burned into her retinas for all eternity.

<That could be anything. I mean, the black stone in the Heartsplit charm looks almost exactly like that, too. Maybe the same artist designed them both.>

Pandora, this is not a game.

Something of Keros’s original formality was there in that sentence, and she could almost hear his booming god-voice as he went on.

My magic is powerful, but it had nothing to do with this stone, nor with the creation of the original game.

Something very strange is happening here, and I almost begin to believe that I am as much a pawn in some greater game as you are.

Which is not a thought with which I am comfortable.

Nonetheless, it is what it is, and we can only forge forward.

Nonetheless, you may be assured that when we discover who is behind all of this, I shall have words with them.

Pandy swallowed hard. <If someone is manipulating you, then that means->

That means they have the power of a god, yes.

Which leads me to two likely suspects.

<Ismara and whoever this strange new god is,> Pandy said. She was reluctant to include Ismara, who seemed to be fairly benign, and even took the time to check in with her humans now and then.

Indeed.

But I cannot see that we need to alter our path.

I’m certain you had already hoped to find a way to free Thaniel of the stone, and we are working together to locate Ismara as well.

I believe that someone is looking for information on the unknown god, as well.

We must trust her, and wait.

He meant Aglaea, and Pandy had to agree. If the goddess had filed some kind of lawsuit on Keros’s behalf, she wasn’t going to just stop there. In fact, Aglaea had strongly implied that Keros should stay put and wait, in a kind of Opposite Day way.

Pandy sighed, knowing he was right. Augustus and Professor Beeswick were handling the Shadow Exchange bit, Ms. Wellington’s cover was thoroughly blown, and Keros himself was handling the System. Pandy’s job was to watch over Thaniel and find Ismara, but her first real opportunity to do that was in a week, during the Fall Festival.

Or was it? Keros had indicated that she’d interacted with Ismara’s magic a few times already, and one of those times was when she unlocked her inventory. Was that because of the inventory, because of the goddess statue, because Pandy had actually prayed to Ismara, or was it some combination of the above? She absolutely didn’t want to put Thaniel through putting her back together again. Besides the emotional trauma, now that she knew about his heartstone and its possible link to Killian going Dark, she was afraid that any use of magic might hurt Thaniel in some indefinable way.

<Kappa?> she asked silently.

Yes, Pandora?

That sounded like he was thinking heavy thoughts, too. Pandy found that she actually liked it better when Keros was the exercise-obsessed simpleton she had come to know and…well, like, at least. Even though she still blamed him for messing up when he sent her here, if he hadn’t, she would have arrived at the beginning of Gacha Love, two years too late to save Thaniel.

Trying to make her tone as natural as possible, Pandy said, <If I blow up, can you put me back together without resetting my System this time?>

What?

Why would you blow up?

Quickly, Pandy explained. Since Keros had played – was playing? – Gacha Love, he knew exactly what she was talking about. It was actually really nice to have someone else who actually understood exactly what she was talking about.

I think that should work.

I don’t know if Ismara will notice it, but it shouldn’t break anything in the System, since it’s all in line with how it’s supposed to work in the original game.

Lunch was over, and Pandy bided her time while Thaniel and Abbington danced around, waving blunt wooden swords at each other. Abbington had several inches of reach on the smaller boy, and he was strong, but he was also very obviously afraid to hurt Thaniel, which allowed Thaniel to get inside his reach and poke him in his padded gut several times.

Sir Harriet walked among her students, casually halting any weapon that looked like it was about to slip from a sweaty hand, or bop some unsuspecting child in the head. When she came to Thaniel and Abbington, she stopped and watched them thoughtfully for a long moment, before saying, “Halt!” Both boys froze, with Thaniel’s weapon once again heading toward the quilted pad that protected Abbington’s front.

Turning, the teacher scanned the students before stopping on two boys, one of whom was almost as large as the Valley boy, while the other was shorter, but still a few inches taller than Thaniel. “Vernor, come match up with Abbington. Preston, you’re with Thaniel.” The two boys glanced at each other, but obediently trotted over. Pandy kept a wary eye on them. She felt fairly confident trusting Abbington with a weapon around Thaniel, but these two were unknown quantities.

Vernor came in hard, easily knocking Abbington’s sword aside and ‘stabbing’ him. Pandy could tell from the grimace on Abbington’s face that this was no gentle tap from a friend, though. Vernor meant it, or, more likely, had expected Abbington to at least make some attempt to dodge.

Meanwhile, Preston had already cut off one of Thaniel’s arms and stabbed him in the leg. Thaniel was so used to simply avoiding Abbington’s slow, careful swings that he ran right into the sword both times, leaving Preston looking pleased but a bit baffled.

Sir Harriet sighed, then clapped her hands. “Everyone, halt!” All of the children froze in place, already having learned that failing to do so could get them ‘killed’ when their teacher bopped them none-too-gently with her own practice weapon.

“For the Fall Festival, we’re going to be doing a simple series of drills. Attack and parry, the other partner will attack and parry, do distance-keeping for five steps forward, then trade partners with the person to your left and repeat. We’re going to focus on footwork. I don’t want to see any of you stumbling over your own feet.”

Going around the class, she switched a few more partners, separating them from friends or other students with whom they’d been practicing since the beginning of school. When she was done, everyone was matched up with someone closer to their own size, and when she arranged them in rows, facing each other, they looked like they were getting ready for a dance.

In a way, that was exactly what it was. One partner raised his sword overhead, and the other raised his weapon to block. The only challenging part was that they had to begin with their weapons ‘sheathed’, or held at their sides, and they couldn’t get tangled in it or hit anyone else as they brought it up. Then they reversed the attacker and defender roles and did it again, ending with the attacker’s weapon held out toward the defender.

Distance-keeping was exactly what it sounded like – with one person remaining just outside of lunging range while the other advanced. Usually, the attacker was allowed to move in any way they wanted, while the other person had to mirror their movements in order to stay away, but this time Sir Harriet had the aggressor take five measured steps forward before stopping and dropping his weapon.

Then each person took a step to the left, except for the boys on the ends, who ran down to trade places, and they repeated the whole process. It was an awkward jumble the first half a dozen times they tried it, but by the end of class, Pandy could see that it really would look like a dance when they were done.

Best of all, even though Thaniel and Abbington weren’t together, there was very little risk that Thaniel could get hurt, unless Keros’s magic simply decided to drop a whale from the sky. While Pandy certainly didn’t discount that possibility, Keros should have plenty of time to warn her if he felt his magic kick in.

After that was Horseback Riding, and for once all of the mounts were already saddled when the children arrived. It turned out the reason for that was that they were also going to begin learning the routine they’d perform for their parents during the festival. Only three students would go at a time, and they needed the entire ring, so the rest of the class was expected to watch and wait their turns.

All five of the children had Horseback Riding together, so Pandy waited until they were busy whispering to each other as they watched the first three students mount their horses, then ride them slowly around the ring. Once she was certain Thaniel was surrounded by friends, she hopped off, heading for the gardens.

For whatever reason, there never seemed to be anyone in the gardens at this time of day. Well, sometimes someone would be out among the vegetables and herbs, gathering things for dinner, but the area near the grotto was empty, the little tables and chairs silently waiting for whoever would come in search of quiet after a long day of school.

Pandy made her way over to the pool, peering down into its crystal-clear depths. She had no idea how it stayed so clean, surrounded by vegetation as it was, especially without any kind of visible filtration. But she assumed it involved magic, and didn’t question it too much.

There was a small waterfall on one end of the pool, and Pandy wiggled into the small space behind it. She got a bit wet in the process, but the little hollow itself was surprisingly dry, and, more importantly, private. She probably could have done this in the school somewhere, even in Ms. Wellington’s room, but somehow this little burrow felt safer to her than any of the other options she’d come up with.

Silently, she thought, <You ready, Kappa?>

I am.

Though I’ve been thinking.

K-Man isn’t that bad.

Did you know a kappa is a-

<Cast Dark Restoration,> Pandy thought, cutting him off. <Use Corruption Points.>

Ðårk ʁεstorΆͳїoը suᴐᴒessᶂu╚.

Dark Restoration is now level 1.

Two hundred and fifty Corruption points drained away, but Pandy had so many at this point that she still had almost five hundred remaining, so as long as she didn’t do anything stupid, she should be fine. Of course, she made no guarantees on that front, even within her own mind.

She’d been a little worried that this might make her explode all by itself, but once the initial pain of acquiring a new spell faded, she twisted around in her little hidey-hole, checking to make sure that all of her parts were where they belonged. To her surprise, even her tail was right there on her bunny behind, so she moved on to the next part of the plan.

Keros had explained that the information provided by the System was based entirely on actual data. Until Pandy used a skill or spell, the System had no more idea what it would do than she did. Once the System had real input and output, it could then log the results, crunch the numbers, and feed it back to Pandy in a more user-friendly format. All of which meant that Pandy could now say, <Info Dark Restoration,> and get some actual help, without having to go through so much trial and error.

Dark Restoration – Allows the user to exchange Corruption Points or Mana to restore any Dark mage, elemental, or item. The price will be determined when the spell is used, so be prepared to pay it. Levels one through ten reduce the cost of Dark Restoration by a small amount. Effective range: touch.

That was actually way more helpful than Pandy had dared to hope for, especially the part where it could be applied to an item. Did that mean that if she could find someone with the Light equivalent of this spell, they could recharge the Heartsplit charms? Having an easily reusable way to instantly teleport back to Thaniel would be…good. Really, really good.

She did not, however, like the sound of ‘the price will be determined when the spell is used’. She much preferred knowing up front exactly how much something would cost. But she had enough of both Mana and Corruption Points that she should be able to heal herself, if she had to.

With a thought, she summoned a small, nondescript bag from her inventory. It appeared beneath her paw, just as it had been when she put it away. It was still completely flat, apparently empty, with the drawstring around the top pulled tightly closed. Carefully, Pandy clamped her teeth on one side of the opening, and held the other side down with her paw. This would be so much easier if she could just open it with actual fingers, but how would Augustus explain a splatted former teacher in the garden if things went badly? Which, let’s face it, they were almost guaranteed to do.

Drawing in an entirely unnecessary breath, Pandy pulled the bag open, thinking <Dark Restoration,> as she did so.