It is pure folly to strike a bargain with the Fairest. They are not merely beings who possess nigh-infinite time, but also creatures that are bereft of consequence. They cannot be slain normally, merely banished, and even if they are shattered, melted down, or vaporized, they will return to the Fairwoods, remembering what you have done.

And then, some time later, perhaps after a few days, maybe after a hundred years, they will return, and they will exact their retribution. But simply being slain or brutalized is the worst outcome; sometimes, you do not know what form their retribution will take.

You can't be sure what rules you have infringed upon, and that's just it—rules. You do not understand the fae. You are not born a concept, not like they are. People describe them as characters from stories. I disagree. To call them characters underestimates their capabilities.

They are aware of their place within Integration. They have to repeat certain actions, and have limitations they are bound to. But they understand where their vulnerabilities lie, and if you think you can trick them, then it is you who will walk deeper into a den of your own unmaking.

The Fairwoods might be a place that offers wealth and glory beyond measure, but know that you do not belong. And that every denizen of the eternal realm you interact with might mark your inevitable damnation…

Fairest the Eternal: The Fairwalker's Guide to Interacting with, Hunting, and Avoiding Fairies

231 (I)

Bread [II]

"Are you sure about this, Shiv?" Adam asked as he gave the Chrono Shadow Soup a sideways look.

Shiv grinned. "The soup or the plan? Because depending on which one you mean, well…"

"Start with the soup," Adam said. "You sure this thing is safe to drink?"

"Didn't kill me."

"Lots of things don't kill you, Shiv. Doesn't poison literally just get you drunk instead of sick?"

"Well, usually they get me sick first, then I metabolize it, and afterward it feels really, really good. But trust me, the soup doesn't get you sick. Can't say it tastes good, just unique. But it will let you hide inside my shadows, and time will flow slowly there. Frankly, that's the best place for you to be. It'll keep the bread away from you."

The Gate Lord gave a half-hearted shrug and pushed past his unease. He lifted the last morsel to his lips and slowly gulped the Chrono Shadow Soup down. After a moment, Adam's shadow quivered. It became like Shiv's earlier when he was creeping across campus.

Shiv smirked. "I think I'm gonna start a recipe list for the Last Morsel."

Adam blinked as if he felt a rush of adrenaline tearing through his system, and a second later, he looked behind himself and splashed down into his own shadow. For a few moments, Adam remained there, but the darkness quivered. It was like a pool. The sight was uncanny from an outside perspective, and Shiv realized it had been wise of him to do his exploring at night earlier. The shadowy puddle rippled and splashed, and when Adam emerged, a few dollops of darkness slid free from his body, settling back where the shadow extended from behind him.

"You're right," Adam gasped. He swallowed hard, as if he was trying to shake off some terrible taste. "I'm not sure if I like it at all, but it worked. System... that's strange."

"Yeah, well, we can't all have a reliable set of magical armor. Some of us have to make do with frying pans." Shiv held up the Last Morsel, and Adam regarded it with a smirk.

"I don't know. I think it suits you quite well. All right, one last time before we go in. Plan A, Plan B, contingency. Go. One more time."

"Plan A is resolving this peacefully," Shiv said. "I go in. I talk to that Anointed Toast Bread-Knight thing. Whatever the fuck we're dealing with. I manage to figure out what he wants in trade for leaving everyone in the restaurant alone and pissing off back to the Fairwoods. We strike a proper bargain. We give the fairies the things they want. And then everything ends with everyone happy."

"And in the very likely chance that something incredibly stupid happens, or something unforeseen forces us into an active battle?" Adam asked.

"Then we move on to plan B. Also known as giving the bread a taste of their own shit." Shiv looked over his shoulder and whistled. From within his cape, a Vitae golem emerged. It possessed his Inertial Overdrive, Vitality Drain, Shapeless Tides, and another special skill. One harvested from Andra.

The Jotun's ice magic was infectious, and a layer of blackened frost crusted the exterior of the Vitae golem. Her skill was comparable to what the bread could do, and though Shiv didn't know if it would affect the Faebread the same way, the Vitae Golem discharging its inertial sheath should still make some openings in the ensuing counter-attack.

"If things go wrong, the ice golem here crashes into the Faebread to see about delivering a bit of karma. If that fails, it will discharge its sheath. If that also fails, we'll just have it act as a decoy. Its Shapeless Tides should force the Faebread to burn some of their resources to overcome it. And in the meantime, you'll use your Spellstring to fire a bunch of dimensional pathways. This will line the walls and other spaces around us, keeping the damage contained."

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"And you're sure Necromancy doesn't work on the fae?" Adam asked.

"I'm absolutely positive," Shiv replied. "At least that's what Cullywier claimed earlier. All that stuff went into him when Andra cast her spell, and it did jack shit."

Adam huffed uncomfortably. "Alright, then I'll be creating some darkness using the Composer's Spellstring. I'll connect the other sides of the dimensional pathways to someplace underground. In the meantime, you try to overpower the Anointed Knight and shove him back into the cold iron cage. I'll fire a shot, give you a straight path to the cage once things go hot. Remember, though, it's wreathed in bread. Expect to deal with some bread tumors if you have to do that." Adam hesitated. "Does it hurt when you go Non-Sequitur? After you're affected by the fae magic, I mean."

"Yeah, it's like someone literally ripping pieces of your insides apart," Shiv replied. "Pretty nasty shit."

Adam sighed. "Why did I expect anything better?"

"It's not that bad," Shiv said. "It's brief, and after it's done, I basically don't feel anything anymore. It's like getting flayed, but the pain doesn't last."

"Well, now that you put it that way… it still sounds horrible," Adam deadpanned.

"Don't worry, Princess Arrow. You're not the one who's going to have to rip himself apart. That's my job."

"Don't sound too happy about it," Adam replied. "Alright, and the contingency. The thing we both don't want to do."

"Right. Call Cripple and dump this shit on the Ascendants." Shiv looked down at the ground and scoffed. He shook his head in disbelief. "Yeah, let's not start owing favors to not-grandma because we couldn't handle a few pieces of bread."

"Well, these few pieces of bread wiped out an entire kitchen and will likely kill a few dozen Masters today if we don't successfully intervene. I'm just keeping our options open, Shiv. And considering how these things tend to go for us…"

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Shiv said. He ran his thumb along the blades of the Last Morsel. "But let's leave all that Ascendant-invoking for after everything really goes to shit. Before that, well... I guess I'm going to find out if I can cook one of the Fairfolk. Wonder how they actually taste."

Adam blinked and cocked his head. "You know what? I do too. But diplomacy first, Shiv. Repeat after me. Diplomacy first."

"Yeah, I got it." Shiv held up his hands. "Frankly, I'm the better diplomat between the two of us."

Adam did a double-take. "No, you have a Psychology Skill that you got from abusing Sullain, one that's specialized in finding the words to hurt people's feelings most effectively. We don't call that diplomacy, Shiv. We call that Master-Tier Bullying. You're a Master-Tier dick."

Shiv looked up and covered his eyes mournfully. "If only they sold pants that size…"

"Shiv, people don't make pants for amoeba," Adam whispered sweetly.

Shiv saluted him with a single finger. "Well, fun as this is, I think it's time to see if we can bully some bread into submission. You want to hitch a ride in my shadow or hang behind?"

"Some distance between the two of us would be wise," Adam said with a faint hint of apprehension. "I know how you fight, Shiv. Especially how you fight right now. Every time you punch someone, I get a bit of a passive concussion myself. Not to mention what you do to my ears."

"Alright, alright. I was just trying to be nice." The Deathless licked his lips. "You know it's at times like these that I miss Uva. Out of the three of us, she's the one who handles weird shit with a straight face."

Adam nodded along. "I wonder what she would do if she ran into something like this. Probably make an extremely dry comment and then try to steal the mind of one of the breads. Which would then cause her to get Psychomantic bread tumors."

"You know what? When you put it that way, I'm glad she's not here," Shiv grunted. "I just hope she's alright. Her, and everyone else still alive on Blackedge."

"You know something, Shiv? I have a feeling they're all okay, at least right now. Mainly because the System is probably scheming some way to bring them back to us with half an army of eldritch nightmares chasing them, causing an even larger crisis to spiral out of control while we're already facing something insurmountable on our end."

Once more, a crushing silence entered the room. And both of them let out pained groans.

"Fuck, Adam, fuck, just, fuck! Why'd you have to say that?" Shiv snarled.

"It, it just came to my mind!" Adam cried. "I just—"

"I know," Shiv said. "You didn't need to say it out loud. Now it's definitely gonna turn out this way. Godsdamn it. Broken felling Moon, let's go get our ass kicked by bread."

And so the twosome set off in the direction of the wine cellar. Adam splashed down in the darkness. Shiv staggered forward, his perfect semblance shed. A feeling of fatal acceptance bloomed inside the Deathless. A feeling that no matter how bad things got today, there would always be more problems tomorrow. And the System was absolutely, definitely, undoubtedly going to throw an avalanche of crises in their direction the moment the slipgate came online.

We've got to deal with as many things as we can, Shiv thought to himself. And we've got to nip them right dead in the bud.

Along the way, Shiv marched past the bodies of the fallen chefs. Velly was a mangled puddle. Parts of his head still remained. The upper half of his jaw lay a few meters to his right. Both of his spatulas had been taken, however. Shiv didn't see by what. But the fae had to have stolen them the moment they overwhelmed the head chef. Bowden was even worse off. Only his beard remained on the ground. His beard and nothing else. The rest of his body was less than red paste. It was spread out wide, resembling jam. And Nornsong was…

A small head erupted from Bowden's beard. Shiv flinched back as he noticed one of the Necromantic rats peering up at him. "Right, almost forgot. What the hells?" Shiv breathed.

Suddenly, Adam's head poked out from the darkness as well. He had a Veilpiercer drawn, shadows swirled around his dimensional arrow, and then he noticed the Necromantic rodent as well. "What the hells?" he echoed.

A beat of silence followed, and then the rat shrieked, "Who the hells are you two?"

It had Bowden's voice, for one, and as it spoke, ripples of corrosive mana began building around it. Shiv dashed backward. His inertial sheath thundered at his speed, and he embedded himself partially in the wall. "Don't use any Necromancy on me!" he shouted. "Do fucking not! You do, and the entire capital might go kaboom."

Adam almost loosed his Veilpiercer at the rat, but then it held its little skeletal hands up. The corrosive mana that had been building around it dissipated into faint motes, and it gave a piercing cry while waving its hands around. "Okay, okay, don't shoot! Don't shoot! I surrender, I surrender. You can take me in." The skeletal rodent placed a tiny fist in front of its mouth and made a noise as if clearing its throat before speaking once more: "Per the Article of Extradition under the Treaty of Light and Dark, I, Nightstalker of the Necrotech Legions, demand to be placed into your custody, sentenced, and, after a proper trial, returned to my Faith!"