The underground lake was in a cave filled with beautiful colors. Glowing moss and rocks gave off light that were reflected or refracted off the surface of the water or the low ceiling. Tiny fish swam around in the lake, outlined against the bright stones from underneath.

“This place is beautiful. I never thought that we could see such a sight in a place like this,” Camilla murmured, leaning on Kagriss’s shoulder as they watched the water. Thanks to her new height, the position was a lot more comfortable. “But how did we get here? Where are we anyway?”

“We’re probably still in the dungeon, just in another part of it. The person who made this dungeon had some knowledge of spatial magic, so it’s not strange at all that they could bring us here,” Kagriss said. “Even now, I still don’t know how exactly that false world worked and how it’s made. All I can say is that it’s a masterpiece.”

“Mhm. In the end, it turns out that flugel’s not hostile toward us.” Camilla lifted her head to look up at Kagriss. For some reason, Kagriss was on edge; Camilla could feel it in the way that Kagriss’s muscles tensed. She stroked Kagriss’s hair, trying to get her to calm down. “Don’t worry about it anymore. Since she went to the trouble of putting us here, we might as well take our time, right? I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to come back after we leave.”

“You’re right.” Kagriss let out her breath through her teeth with a hissing sound and then stretched. Her movements looked livelier and more lifelike compared to before. “It’d be a pity to not enjoy a scenery this beautiful.

While watching her, Camilla finally gained a new understanding of what “becoming closer to life” meant. It wasn’t just appearance that evolved. All of Kagriss’s mannerisms changed and had become more refined, shaking off a stiffness that Camilla never noticed.

Camilla combed through Kagriss’s black strands of hair one last time before she released it, letting them fall softly, lighter than feathers.

“You’re so pretty,” she said, poking Kagriss’s cheek. “This lake is just a puddle with some shiny rocks. No matter how beautiful they are, they can’t compare to you.”

The compliment came out of nowhere, catching even Camilla herself off guard, and she quickly covered her mouth. Was she really the one who said that? Did some control her?

After staring at her for a few seconds, Kagriss broke out into a wide smile and poke her back. “Naturally, that applies to you too. One look at you and anyone will fall in love instantly, just like I have.” Then she leaned in with a kiss, sending shivers down Camilla’s shoulders and back.

Perhaps the old her would’ve already surrendered and allowed Kagriss to do whatever she liked, but now Camilla didn’t feel like giving in quite as easily. She was going to make Camilla work for her dominance.

She reached up and grabbed Kagriss’s head and pulled her in close, deepening the kiss. They kissed and kissed, losing track of their surroundings until Camilla suddenly found herself on her back, pinned against the cold stone of the pavilion floor.

Some buttons on her dress had already been undone and her shoulders were exposed to the air. The stone she was pressed against cooled the heat from her embarrassment at her defeat once more.

Just as they were going to get a little deeper in displaying their affections, something clattered onto the floor. The sharp sound stood out against the mostly quiet cave, where the only other noises were the occasional water droplets that dripped from the ceiling into the wave.

They both looked at the source of the noise, finding a feather-shaped stone on the ground, half glowing in the dim light. It had fallen out of Camilla’s pouch when they were jostling.

Seeing that Camilla’s attention was all focused on the object, Kagriss got off her and helped her up before glaring at the feather.

“So what do we do with it?” she asked. “What does Victoria want with this dangerous thing anyway?”

“You know as much as I do,” Camilla replied. “But something else’s got my interest. Remember what that flugel said about taking a message before she kicked us out of that strange place? A vampire that is a thousand years old…”

“So you’re saying that Victoria knows. Or…”

“The latter.” Camilla dropped her voice, full of secrecy. “I think Victoria has lived for more than a thousand years, and if her age was around that, then she’d fit the description of ‘little’ at the time….”

She trailed off, not because she was having second thoughts about her theory, but because everything felt wrong with describing Victoria as little except for her physical size. Even though Victoria was short, she wasn’t impossibly short. But everything else was as far from ‘little’ as could be, from her attitude to her power.

Even when Victoria was being mischievous, Camilla could never tell if it was a show that Victoria put on or if Victoria was just like that, because there was always a layer of maturity beneath it all.

“Or maybe not. But even she had to have a time when she was small…” Camilla muttered. “Maybe we could ask her about it.”

“I think that if we bring back something that she’s been searching for that, by the looks of it, even Ismelda can’t get to, then we’re entitled to a few answers, no?”

“You’re right.” Camilla nodded. And those questions weren’t going to be the only ones she wanted to ask. Depending on how many Victoria was willing to answer, then perhaps there was hope in unraveling the mystery after all. She was getting really tired of being kept in the dark.

This time they managed to survive thanks to her protecting Kagriss and somehow evolving out of the blue, but what about next time they run into something dangerous?

It was all due to a lack of information and Camilla hated the unknown.

“What the heck is this anyway?” she muttered, turning the feather over, examining all sides of it. The feather no longer burned her hand when she held it, but mostly because she was lifting it slightly with some blood magic. “Victoria already had three of them. How many of them are there in total, and what does she need them for?”

“Just another question to ask her?” Kagriss suggested helpfully.

☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

The pavilion they woke up on was built in the middle of the lake, but that didn’t mean it was isolated, sitting there all by its lonesome. There were several ways to get to it from the faraway shore: swimming, flying, and last of all, the intended way. The designers of the pavilion saw fit to install a line of underwater columns that stuck up above the surface of the water. The exposed top acted as stepping-stones for anyone brave or agile enough to hop the entire line of columns.

Naturally, the tiny gulf that separated the pavilion from the shore posed no difficulty to Camilla or Kagriss since they could both fly, but after a brief discussion, Camilla managed to convince Kagriss to hop across the water on the stepping-stones.

“It’ll be fun. Since we’re here, we might as well try out everything, right?”

That was the excuse she used then, as well as the excuse she used before to justify relaxing in the pavilion for a while longer. Then again, no matter her reason, Kagriss would probably agree without hesitation. It was common knowledge that suffering through crises side by side deepened bonds, and while Camilla didn’t know if that was true all the time, Kagriss did get a lot touchier and lively.

How much of that was due to their shared experience and how much of that was due to evolution, Camilla did not know.

They began hopping across the lake, jumping from one stone to the next without using flying magic or wings. It was difficult, especially so for Kagriss since she was wearing heels, or so Camilla thought. But in reality, Camilla found that her speed was no match for Kagriss. She leapt and landed, waving her arms about for a few moments before she managed to steady.

“This is really hard. All my training did not prepare me for this,” Camilla said, laughing as she misjudged the distance and almost fell into the water again. She managed to get her toes on the edge of the stone and safely land. “Woah… Ah!” She tipped forward and hurriedly waved her arm to compensate.

Kagriss jumped onto the column that Camilla had just left behind, waiting for the next one to clear up. Although Camilla was taking a really long time between the stones, she never complained, but waited patiently for Camilla to find her balance. “You’re right, it is fun. It’s the first time I’ve ever done something like this.”

“Have you ever run atop of a roof back at the Point?” Camilla asked.

“I spent most of my time reading after all.”

“Right, right.” Camilla jumped and once again almost fell. However, she did better this time. Slowly but surely, she was getting more proficient at using her new, taller body. Unfamiliarity with herself after her sudden growth spurt was the main reason that she was having trouble crossing the lake.

There was no way otherwise that someone who trained all her life at physical combat would fall, barring unknown factors or carelessness. There was none of the latter for Camilla, especially now. Camilla narrowed her eyes, took a deep breath, and made another jump.

Column by column, stone by stone, they made it across the lake, with Kagriss always a step behind Camilla. However, Camilla also got faster as they went, until she barely had to stop on each stone.

When there were only around five columns left to go, a sudden blast of mana hit Camilla squarely in the back just as she was about to jump. The blast was tiny, but it was enough.

“Pfft…!” With a splash, Camilla fell face-first into the water as Kagriss struggled to hold in her laughter. As Camilla fell, Kagriss managed to catch a glance at the profile of her face, and the wide eyes that Camilla would never leave her. When Camilla surfaced again, her hair and clothes plastered to her, she found Kagriss squatting on top of her column, giggling to herself as she held her stomach.

Seeing Kagriss laugh like that, all the irritation that Camilla felt from being dunked into the water evaporated in an instant and she began to laugh too. That didn’t stop her from trying to get Kagriss back though. She did her best to swim toward the column that Kagriss was on with all the grace of a fish on land.

“Kagriss, you’re so mean! Get down here!”

“No way,” Kagriss said, covering her mouth with her hand and hopping over the rest of the pillars in the blink of an eye despite wearing heels, safe on solid ground at last where she watched Camilla splash through the water at her. “The sudden growth really messed things up for you, didn’t it? How long do you think it’ll take for you to recover?”

“I have no idea. When I shrank, it took me a few days to get used to the zombie body and its stiffness. Then I evolved, and by then, I was so used to the stiffness that being free of it was like being untied, and I got used to it instantly….” Camilla said. Before she could continue, her head dipped beneath the surface and she choked on a mouthful of water. When she came up again, she sputtered the water from her mouth and nose before deciding to keep her mouth shut until she got to shore.

When she reached the ground, Kagriss helped drag her out the last stretch of the way. She crawled out of the water, and once her feet no longer touched the lake, she flipped around and laid on the ground like a beached ocean behemoth.

“So? How does shrinking compare to growing?” Kagriss asked.

Once water stopped coming out of her lungs, Camilla managed to answer, continuing the discussion from before. “I think a growth spurt is a lot more difficult for me. When I shrank, all I had to do was learn that my reach was short. But for growing…”

She turned her head to the side to look at Kagriss. She reached out to brush her hand against Kagriss’s skirt but stubbed her finger instead.

“See? I feel like I have sticks attached to my hands and I’ll probably trip on flat ground and hit my hand on things a bunch of times in the future. Hopefully, we get a break after this.”

“That sounds really hard. Don’t worry, though, I’ll be with you always, in more ways than one.” With that, Kagriss’s soft hands fell on Camilla’s chest, over where Kagriss’s core pulsed, synced with Camilla’s heartbeat.