You know that you're dreaming after you pull off the helmet. Which is apparently a running theme?  This is the first time you're aware of it, though, and you're still Deedee in your dreams. It wouldn't be the first time.

Neither would the first time you slept in Mundus be the first time you've dreamed of being Deedee, either, you remember with a start.

You're floating in space above Mundus - you can tell it's not Earth because the coastlines, though similar, are off, and the light from the cities is faint, not like the shining of millions of lights pumping heat into the ice caps back home. You remember the floods in Berkeley, Oakland, San Francisco when you were growing up, though those are mostly contained now; no longer is it the hottest summer followed by a hotter summer. But this world is younger.

You tuck your arms in for reentry and dive.

You touch down in the middle of the Cauldron Hex, the statue of Flamma cooking up some concoction in her cauldron in the central market square of the city. See three shields.

You squint at each in turn.

"Azure, a rising phoenix guiles limned argent rising to encircle a globe argent," you hear yourself saying at the first, and so it is.

You walk around: "Guiles, a cog d'or encasing an hourglass proper or d'or."

Then, the final one: "Vert, chief charged with three roses proper o'er crossed sheaves of wheat d'or ."

None are the holy symbols of the Gods, or the royal house of Viacruz, or any other heraldry you know from the game.

All you know is that they make you uneasy.

That you shouldn't pick them up, yet, without knowing all that they mean.

Well, there's always your trusty glaive. You roll your shoulder, twirl it experimentally, and look out to the horizon.

Just as the horn sounds, and the bells ring, and the guards yell preparations for battle-stations.

But at least you're inside the gates, and have time to prepare...