19 Cover up

Tia stopped by a window. It was so overgrown with greenery that light seeped through in fine streaks. She looked over the drawing again, then picked out seven strips.

"Can you place these two above the window frame?" Tia asked, passing two to Mandy.

Mandy nodded and followed Tia's finger to put them at the places where Tia indicated, curiously enough, they stuck in place even if there should be no reason to. When Tia placed the remaining five, all the text on the paper sheets glowed up in a golden color, then separated off from the paper and interconnected. The inside of the circle filled up with something akin to a golden silk veil and then the veil, together with the paper strips, sunk into the window frame, disappearing without a trace.

Since nothing had changed, Mandy tilted her head looking towards Tia.

Tia noticed Mandy's look and softly smiled. "Illusory barrier," she said. "If someone looks inside this window from the outside, the room would appear to be normal even to non-seeing eyes and," she looked one more time at the remaining sheets in her hands. "Probably even to devices."

"And you need seven for each window?" Mandy let out a soft breath, it had taken August close to an hour to finish his first eight, just how long would it take to do that for all the windows?

"The amount of charms needed is always the same as the star points for the formation," Tia explained, pointing at the drawing. "The usual illusory formations have five points, though, I have no idea what modification August applied to these."

"How can you tell that those are illusory ones, then?" Mandy asked, but there was no trace of doubt her voice, just curiosity.

"The activation is the same, also color," Tia said, moving on to the next window and passing Mandy two charms again. "Barriers that physically restrict are white on activation, the barriers that alter perception are golden, those who alter general conditions (like heat, gravity, moisture) are green, those who amplify elements and boost the effect of certain alignment spells are blue and those that block or resist some elements are red. If the barrier is magenta then it's a mix of amplification and resisting and.. hmm, teal would be amplification with condition change."

While Tia listed the barrier types and their colors, they ran out of paper strips, the stack in Tia's hands ended up having exactly enough for four windows.

"Physical restriction with resisting would be pale rosy, then?" Mandy asked figuring that to be the logic, as the two went back to where August was, only to see another stack of seven waiting for them.

Mandy noticed that August had eaten half the box of pastries already. Wasn't he no good with sweets? His drawing speed had gone up as well, was that due to sugar?

"Yes," Tia confirmed, as she picked up the paper strips waiting for her, "but you'd seldom see that - while teal and magenta ones are common when more effects are needed, exorcists make multiple barriers inside one another, rather than making a special barrier for the occasion."

Mandy made a faint nod, as she followed after Tia to help set up another barrier.

"Most exorcists don't carry around a paper stack with ink, they have gems with a barrier formation in it or a stack of pre-made charms in case of special occasions," Tia said.

Mandy recalled those gems August had enchanted, that was probably how things looked. It sure seemed to be more practical to work like that as which mission would let you have hours upon hours of time for preparing on the spot? Mandy doubted every case was like the one with the dreamcatcher, where the targets stayed in place like sitting ducks.

As they returned, Tia took out a small pouch out of her pocket, passing it to Mandy. "Take a look"

Mandy opened the pouch, letting the contents fall into her palm - there were five small white pearls in it.

"The basic restriction barrier," Tia said. "If you scatter these on the ground as you run, they will form up on their own and trap whoever is following you. That will only work on up to silver class targets, though, higher would break through it like paper."

Now that did seem practical! Mandy looked at the pearls in her hand in wonder. "What happens to the pearls afterward?"

"They crumble away," Tia said.

Mandy squinted-- okay, rather than practical it suddenly seemed extremely wasteful. "Why not use pebbles?" she asked as she sat down. August hadn't made enough charms for the next window, so she and Tia could only wait for now.

"Gus, why not use pebbles?" Tia asked.

"High failure rate," August replied. "Using high-quality gems makes things far cheaper since you don't waste other materials used in the enchanting process."

"Didn't you use pebbles for the isolation barrier?" Mandy felt compelled to ask, in that case. Tia's question had not slowed down his hands, so she didn't feel quite as bad about bothering him.

"No, musgravite gems covered in gray paint," August replied.

Mandy wasn't learned enough in gemstones to know how valuable the gem was, but covering them in paint seemed like a heresy of sorts regardless of their initial cost. "To hide what you were doing from me?"

"Yes," August replied and picked up another paper strip to draw on.

"So that's how the forest stayed contained," Tia mumbled to herself. "Gus, isn't it kind of dangerous to have a barrier like that surrounding you? It will get out if an oracle tries to look for you."

August and Mandy both gained wry smiles at the same time. Too late.

"Oh-- was that how Grisham got you to advance?" Tia asked.

"Among other things," August replied with a sigh.

Mandy faintly tilted her head, did the information on ranks changing spread like wildfire? "About advancing, is that public knowledge?"

"It's Grisham's hobby to make things as fantasy-esque as possible, so everyone gets a public guild ranking displayed on a board," August said with a sigh. "You'd need to do a lot of scrolling and prior knowledge to notice if someone has advanced, though."

"Ah, that - Grisham actually put you in top five, that's why I noticed," Tia mentioned.

August chocked on a pastry, but to Mandy's amazement, even that didn't make him stop drawing.

"I mean, if he knows what you are," Tia added.

"That little piece of ugh--" August sighed without finishing with a colorful word. He looked like he had a headache.

"Well, someone would have found out eventually," Tia nodded a few times.

"I tried to quit before that happened, but--" August squinted.

"Your only chance was before you advanced to Gold rank, but you needed that one, so," Tia shrugged with a meek smile. "It was inevitable." she didn't seem all that upset or surprised. Her expression supported her words, she really had expected it to happen all along.

Mandy had a feeling that she had misunderstood his reasons for quitting the job and this was a part she felt deluded about. August hadn't mentioned that this was a reason even once. Although... who knows, no one said this was the only reason, and he had failed to quit anyway, so did it matter really? It was also true that they had just met and it would have been odd if he trusted her enough in that stage to spill the beans about everything.

"Why did August need Gold rank?" Mandy asked.

"To lift information restrictions," Tia replied. "At gold rank, you can access all the library sections, guild archives, dungeons, ruins, and all classified info."

D-d-dungeons?? Mandy's back straightened out. There's no way there would be magical labyrinths all over the place, was there? But, ok, she could look those up in the library the next time she goes as she doubted that these two would give her enough detail to satisfy her curiosity. "Was there anything, in particular, he wanted to know?" Mandy asked instead.

Tia glanced over at August.

"As an avid reader, can't you guess?" August asked. It was pretty clear that he could sense Tia looking at him without raising his own eyes.

So Tia didn't know... hmm, Mandy thought on it. The most basic novel plot would be - "To quit being a dryad?"

"I'm not that naive," August said. "But it is true that a lot of stories go in that direction," he added.

If not that then - "To gain a stronger body?"

"That's one reason," August replied. "That didn't work out, though."

Mandy peered at August, wishing to know the reason why it did not. One would become stronger if they learned all kinds of magic, would they not?

"Something to do with alignment balance?" Tia chimed in.

"Exactly," August said and took another paper sheet to draw on. He was on his fifth sheet in this set.

Mandy turned to Tia.

"Body enhancement skills need to perfectly match up with your own alignment. In Gus's case, he would need enhancement methods that are one-half dark, one half-light and there is nothing like that out there since mixed alignments are something only astral lifeforms have and those don't have bodies, so - why would there be body enhancement methods for them?"

Oh. That was quite a peculiar problem to have. Mandy had had a feeling August might be kind of unique but turned out he was premium grade super rare item with the entire set of problems these items had. You either happily held it in a glass display or used it with the dreading sense that one mistake and nothing could be done to fix it. But didn't that also kind of make him into a regular human being for the most part? If looked at from that direction - humans didn't have access to healing magic or regeneration either.

"I figured there might be some since Grisham and the like have a physical form, but turned out those are homunculi, not actual, true bodies."

A small bit of the conversation between Grisham and August came back to her memory. So that was what August meant with "actual living body".

"What are those?" Mandy asked. She had read enough fiction to know that homunculi were artificial humans, but that didn't exactly match.

Tia took over. "August might know in more detail since he dabbles in alchemy, but in short they are soulless flesh lumps that die before they are born unless someone inserts a soul into them. While they can be made to closely replicate a real human body, I've heard that most only have some organs and are made in a way that sustains them using aether not food. It's considered to be the most, hmm, modern/best way to attain immortality nowadays."

"Close replication is not the same thing as the real deal, though," August added, a tad of scorn seeping in. "And unless you are something like Grisham, the body will start shaping your astral form as you dwell in it and I wouldn't call those immortals even human after a few decades of living in those things. Undead, at least, keep their astral body intact and later advance into something that fits them even more. Using homunculi cuts off all chances of advancement and rather degrades your soul with time." August bit on another pastry once he had said that.

Wao! The most surprising part about this was that August's hands did not slow down even throughout a complex conversation of this sort. The next most surprising thing was casually discussing the dream of human medicine like it was no big deal. Mandy could only listen with a surreal feeling in her gut. It did not help that they were inside a tiny forest inside an apartment with flickering lights and blooming flowers surrounding them, yet both August and Tia fit in so naturally that she felt like she was the only odd one out.

"There is a tiny minority that has the same mindset as Gus and prefers going litch or vampire despite the numerous disadvantages," Tia added. "But you do need to be a particular kind of person to go through with it."

"Is it even common to die normally on the seeing side?" Mandy asked.

Tia chuckled. "Few people, in general, choose immortality even if it is an option, probably because we deal with immortals often enough. It takes a special kind of person to be able to bear immortality with grace and most people don't have what it takes."

That was different from how Mandy imagined it to be. Whenever she had entertained ideas of immortality it seemed to be a long happy time of doing whatever you loved for forever inside a healthy body. And there were immortal races out there too, so it felt odd to hear that people would choose to die if they could live forever. People being unable to bear it was something Mandy could understand in fiction with all its convoluted plots and loved ones dying around you and whatnot, but if everyone could be immortal, none of those plots should work?

Tia continued, almost as if sensing the mixed feelings. "At the time when homunculi craft got perfected, around six hundred years ago, there was a boom in Immortals. Everyone and their hamster went immortal."

Hoh, now that sounded like something that made sense. Mandy nodded, waiting to hear what would be the dark plot that ruined it all then.

"But after around a hundred and fifty years one half of them had destroyed their very souls just to die and right now only around fifty individuals live on from that time. Apparently, living starts to get incredibly tiring unless you are a scholarly type."

"Tiring?" That's it? How disappointing, yet again. Mandy had expected side-effects or some dark reasons or, at least, dystopian settings of evil tyrants never dying and people raising against them. But tiring...

"That's what they said," Tia replied. "Many have repeated the same mistake since then and, yep, most end up similarly, unless they are the scholarly type."

Mandy's eyes formed straight lines. Scholarly type huh? Well, she felt she might as well be that type. Not having any books could make things boring, but as long as she had things to read, Mandy felt like even centuries could pass in a blissful blink.

"You two will probably be fine," Tia added, seeing Mandy's expression.

Huh? "Two?" Mandy glanced over at August.

August sighed. "You sure can be sloppy at studying," he said and picked up another paper strip to draw on.

Eh-- Eeeeeeh? Then why was August making fun of Sarah if he himself was like that?

Tia laughed. "His body will probably die at one point, but dryads are immortal."

"Unless some crazy paladins or other dryads kill them, that is," August added.

Okay, mortal body, immortal soul - wow, lookie, didn't that sound like a religion? Mandy's retort remained internal since she figured that it only meant that after his body dies, he would be - maybe not like herself exactly, but something akin to that. An Astral lifeform that would stay on this earth. She hadn't even considered an option of him dying and leaving her behind, same how she had not considered properly the option of even liking him, but she felt lucky to had skipped out on anguish of that sort. Good save, Tia.

Perhaps ruining August's clothes was the best thing she could have done, Tia had helped her avoid a huge drama stone, because - who knows if August wouldn't find it amusing to see her anguish about that part? And Tia had also saved her from the worry of pregnancies - a part August seemed to have set her up to anguish about, although not too successfully. The more Mandy thought about it, the less concerned she felt. Even if by some unlikely chance she ended up with a child, she was (kind of, sort of, maybe) lady in her forties and she had handled her baby brother well enough to have a feeling that a kid wouldn't be too much of a problem. For her, that is. Considering she didn't even need to sleep, aka, the problem of all young mothers out there. The only one troubled would be August. Her troubles would only start once the kid would be old enough to die... Well, that was not something she ought to be concerned about now anyway. That was only the worst case scenario. Being aware that something wasn't that much of a problem didn't make that thing a desirable outcome.

August finished the last drawing in the set and passed a stack to Tia. "Set these up around the door and order something spicy or salty, please."

"Roger!" Tia said and took the charms, glancing at Mandy to invite her to come along.

Mandy's eyes moved over to the pastry box... August had actually emptied it alone, except for the two cream puffs which she and Tia had had in the start. Although, wait... he had been out for a week, didn't it make sense for him to be starving?

When the girls reached the place where the moss was cut off, Mandy returned to her ghastly form. "Tia, what actually happens to the food I eat?"

"Ah, I'm not completely sure, but I have a theory," she said, passing three strips to Mandy this time, pointing where to place them.

Mandy placed the strips, her silence inviting Tia to continue.

"The fog kind of fills in for the life you are missing and when you leave, it disperses everything that was living. Half-digested food seems easier to disperse than an actual living body, no matter how I look at it too," Tia said.

Mandy didn't know how accurate this theory was, but Tia had a point - half-digested food really was a thing way too small compared to gaining and losing an actual body.

As Tia put up the last strip and stepped aside, Mandy also followed to stand by the door outside of the mossy zone. Like before, the golden text interconnected, but this time, as it all disappeared, so did the moss and greenery. From where Mandy stood it looked like the apartment had returned to its normal state.

In a surprise, she floated forwards, but as soon as she passed the zone where the charms had been placed, the greenery returned. It really was an illusion. Yet there was no visible barrier or border; when you passed the line you could see, but if you didn't, then there was nothing to even hint at it being an illusion. From the green side, nothing had changed.

"Ok, then," Tia took out her phone. "Chinese food?" She asked Mandy.

"Sounds good," Mandy replied, and both of them returned to the deeper areas, while Tia was aggressively tapping things on her phone screen.

Tia soon added. "They say it will be here in an hour!" she made a victory sign with her fingers.

"I hope you ordered a lot," August said.

"Everything on their menu!" Tia replied with thumbs up.

Eh... how would they eat it all? Mandy was a bit surprised that the only question Tia asked was if chinese food was fine before ordering, but well - made sense not to ask anything more if you are ordering the whole menu.

"Great," was August's response.

"Where will you fit it all?" Mandy asked with a wry smile.

"Cells?" August asked, not seeming all that certain about the question.

"Right, normies can't hibernate," Tia figured it out. "During hibernation, your body replenishes its aether reserves and some of it goes to cells to freeze their processes, but when hibernation ends you need to quickly replenish all the things you missed out on or your body might end up weird. Food pretty much melts away and is instantly carried over to where the nutrient is needed."

Okay. Mandy nodded slightly. If it was a magical phenomenon, then she would have no clue, of course.

"I wouldn't suggest for anyone to eat a box of pastries, though," August said with a smile that implied internal screaming as he kept drawing, right now at a speed that was three times as fast as the one at first.

"I wouldn't have brought them if I-- well, if you'd said you were hibernating," Tia said. Although that seemed to be more of a note to herself, rather than to August, as there hadn't been any implication of blame in what August said - just simple and plain regret about his own actions.

"Sugar high?" Mandy asked, looking at August. It wasn't just his hands that were going high speed, even his tempo of speech had sped up a bit.

"Uh-huh," Tia nodded. "That's nothing compared to the sugar crash that will come after four hours," Tia's face was pale and pupils small as she said that. Tia seemed to know what she was talking about.

Mandy wasn't looking forward to it. "Can't you avoid that by eating more sweets?"

Tia shook her head with a smile that contained half the sadness of existence itself. "Well, at least it's only thirty minutes of immense desire to die."

Okay, August could handle that much---

Mandy had to quit her way of thinking after seeing August's expression, though. He looked worse than a kid before getting his shots. Just how bad was it?

Then August's expression eased. "No, it should be okay if I knock myself out," he concluded.

Tia's expression eased up as well. "True, but-- ah, right, you were an expert at curing hangovers, so, yep! All will be fine," Tia nodded a few times, looking sort of proud.

Mandy only looked at these siblings with a slanted smile. No comments were necessary, or more like - what could she even add to that? The part about expert at curing hangovers only made Mandy feel like perhaps August was in that group of people who truly benefited from having a dustbun liver.

"Right, been meaning to ask - why did you quit drinking and smoking?" Tia asked. "I am proud you did, though."

Now it was August's turn to make a slanted smile. "Your pride is misplaced. My liver and lung don't let me do either with force."

Tia's eyes widened in shock. "How the...?"

"Averea took one, thanks to our dear elder sister biting off more than she can chew and - do you think I cursed those paladins for no reason?"

"Hm, no, that explains it," Tia said, accepting it easily when it came to it. "But that Averea. Are guild records accurate about it otherwise, since there was no mention of your injury?"

August visibly shuddered. "The main point is accurate. It went berserk, I made a tower barrier and Violet ended it. As for why it went berserk - our dear elder sister got a little greedy if you know what I mean."

Tia's expression said 'yikes'.

Mandy noted that as something to look up in the library. Averea. From the way the two spoke that seemed to be one heck of a something.

"The other part we omitted was location change - It wasn't exactly a coincidence Violet happened to be there. I literally dumped it on Violet through fae paths," August added, looking sorry about it.

"And the soul gem?" Tia asked.

"The fact that Sarah came back from Ahea in one piece tells clearly where it went," August said, pursing his lips.

Tia thought a bit, then nodded.

Mandy would be lying if she said she could follow everything that happened, but what she could conclude is that soul gem was something related to Averea going berserk and that - hmm, the situation of Sarah traveling to Ahea likely happened at the same time when August had to deal with the said berserk Averea that, well - led to him making that tower barrier, which, in turn, made everyone go on a mad chase to get him, which - was the reason he tried to quit and hide. Wait. Didn't that make Sarah into the cause of all August's problems?

The timing of events felt kind of... odd, though, if her conclusions were right. If August quit after the fact of tower barrier coming out and Sarah was in Ahea at the time... then how could Sarah be the one threatening people against making information gathering missions? Well, not that timing and sequence were of much concern to her, but no harm in asking. "When did that happen?"

"Six months ago," Tia said, then added: "Sarah came back five months ago, and-- the mission logs came out one month ago, when everyone else involved woke up from hibernation. "I mean, the tower barrier appearing was something a few people saw and there were rumors, but guild only releases logs when information is as complete as possible, in case of finished cases, at least."

Mandy made a grateful nod at Tia. She didn't know how, but it almost felt as if Tia read her mind on the part that felt conflicting. Hm, yep, if the wild chase after August started a month or so ago, then the timing of things made sense somewhat. To think it all was so recent, so very recent. Ah, all the while she was locked in this apartment so many strange and magical things were happening all over the place. The casual mention of hibernation only further explained August's clueless reaction to her question about food, hibernating seemed to be a part so normal among the seeing side, that no one questioned it.

Yet to put together the results of that mission - Sarah got wounded and went missing in Ahea, August lost a liver, other party members exhausted their aether and had to hibernate and that was due to Sarah's greed... There were very few cases where Mandy felt like it might be good to cut out family members from your life, but... Sarah might be... yeah. She wasn't a bad person by any means, Mandy didn't feel that to be the case at all, but if August wanted to live and write in peace, Sarah might be the one person you better cut out. Which seemed to be something August himself understood as well. Right now, every reaction August had made towards Sarah made perfect sense.

"Maybe it's better to leave Sarah locked up for a year?" Mandy mumbled.

"No, with the amount of malice I left behind she might even actually die for reals at the six month, no, with that mongrel around, eight month mark," August replied.

Tia squinted. "...Gus, you--" Tia saught for words. "You didn't--"

"Oh I did," August replied with a dark smile. "I made a true masterpiece." He smiled for a mere moment, then his expression descended into despair. "Which I have no idea how to remove, though."

Tia's look was completely dead like she might spit up blood at any moment. "...I can tell you were truly done with her at the time, but-- covering it up, that..."

"Yeah," August nodded with a similarly dead look.

At this moment Mandy realized that the cursed forest August locked Sarah in was nothing like this place. Perhaps, no, most likely it was a place that fit the name 'cursed' with striking accuracy and... it got progressively worse with time, huh? Mandy let out a breath. August left something like that in a public library... it was almost as if universe was conspiring to have August reveal himself, no, since it all had to do with Sarah...

"Well, perhaps you can ignore Sarah and flee to somewhere far far away. I will explain to mom and dad--" Tia said, here eyes looking into distance without life in them.

Wait. Didn't Tia just casually decide to have Sarah be killed off? Mandy squinted. No, well, she could understand somewhat, but-- ummm....

"No way," August said with resolution.

Mandy lifted her eyes, so August had a heart after all?

Tia also lifted her eyes in surprise.

"My agent will be pissed off if I'm not in this city," August stated.

Mandy sighed. What was she expecting even? Really - wasn't that the most August-like reason to stay?

"Gus, the only known way to remove a dead zone is to kill the dryad who made it," Tia said softly. "If it really is a 'masterpiece' then..."

"I only have to make sure it's more trouble to touch me than it's worth," August said in a tone that attempted to be light, but his words left a sinking feeling and his eyes were dark. Almost as if he had attempted the same shtick before and had it not gone well. There was that trace of uncertainty mixed in.

It didn't take much brain to understand that it would be hard. Extremely hard. Mandy's fingers rolled up to form fists. From the way they spoke it was clear that eventually, it will all come out and once it does... August needed to be someone so troublesome that no one would dare to try their luck at killing him. Mandy didn't have the knowledge to know how that might happen, but one thing she did feel in her gut - that to protect him, she would need to become stronger. Creepy or not, she resolved to go ahead and learn the worst dark alignment magic she could get her hands on.

Next to Mandy, Tia showed the same expression, her hands too - balled into fists.

For a while, none of them said anything, only the sound of water falling and brush sliding over the paper filling in the silence. When another charm set was done, Tia picked it and like before Mandy followed after her.

When the two came back, Mandy recalled the topic that trailed off by a lot. "Right! If getting a stronger body was one reason, what were the other ones for advancing to gold?"

This time August didn't make her guess. "To learn a bunch of nasty spells to do in paladins."

Well, that was the next best thing if you couldn't strengthen your body. Both Mandy and Tia nodded in understanding.

"And stuff that would work against aliens," he added.

Instantly Mandy's mind was flooded with science fiction scenarios. Wait, what? "Aliens?"

"Yes, imagine if there's a planet you want to conquer, but it's blocked by a group of mysterious entities and then you find some random mortal dude who happens to have the ability to kill these mysterious entities."

"Oh," Mandy nodded. Other dimension worlds. Now that was a whole novel in itself. She could imagine a package of kidnapping, blackmail, hostages, bribing, basically - a whole lot of problems.

"How did that go?" Tia asked.

"If they touch me they'll get dimension crossing unique and encrypted curses matching their weaknesses," August said with a dark smile.

If anything, it looked like August had made the best (or worst) of being a gold ranked guild member already. Mandy had been surprised by his odd familiarity with curses when they encountered that corpse and his out of place mention at the library of where to find cursing methods, but this explained it for the most part. When people were very familiar with something, they started to consider it to be a casual, normal part of life.

By the time the food arrived, they were done with masking the forest and Mandy got the chance to observe the mysterious sight of someone eating a week's worth of food in a single meal.

The conversation moved along the lines of what kind of food each of them liked best and Tia teased Mandy for her odd way of holding chopsticks. August, of course, was too busy with devouring food to join the conversation.

After eating, Tia called a taxi and Mandy and August got to unpacking the remaining bags. Tia had even gotten a new laptop for August and a pad for Mandy. To protect these new belongings, August did some weird dryad thing of causing some branches to grow and form shelves, then set up a three-layered barrier - red, green and white, only then placing the things on them. All the while, Mandy merely observed without asking anything.

Mandy only squinted when August did something dangerous seeming by tearing out electric cables from the wall and re-attaching them to a yellowish socket. Uh-- well, it's true that Mandy had no idea about construction things, but her brothers had never done anything this brutally with no regard for safety measures.

Still, Mandy relied on her inner feminine power and left men things for men to handle. Lookie, it even let out a few sparks when August attached a cable to charge the phone. Well, it is August's phone, so he has the right to bake it and Mandy doubted that fire would break out in this place anyways.

August checked the phone nervously, then made the same dreamless sleep concoction he had made after they cleared that dreamcatcher case, but before he could gulp it down, the phone rang.