Ya gurl Marge here. I’m finally going out after a long time!

“Marge. Be careful.”

“OMG, my bestie is concerned for me~”

I let Sam off with a hug, then off I go! … to Pashin’s room, first.

We’re actually hovering ominously over Las Vegas right now. Sam already sent out an envoy to Vegas’s Lord Cashhouse “demanding” a bunch of stuff on our shopping list.

Besides supplies and stuff, though, we’re also finally gonna find a linguist to do some language-y stuff for Pashin. She was scared and trying to say some stuff back when things were just fresh off the frying pan with the floating fortress and whatnot. We figured it was something important—coz she’s from a lost civilization and all, probably, so you better listen to ’em when they say stuff.

But, the only one who could possibly understand her was Grey—but, that’s apparently only if she wanted to talk to him with the weird telepathy thing. Well, she doesn’t wanna talk to him. Figures.

He’s a good guy, though! Talk to him, damn you!

Anyway, we’re getting a linguist. I actually happen to know a guy, and last I heard, he was still in Vegas studying the inscriptions in its labyrinth. Those inscriptions are probably the only half-interesting things there. Like, there’s no labyrinth anywhere else with more researchers than adventurers other than here. It’s ridiculous, really.

I knock on the door to Pashin’s room. Something clangs—with the wrong timing again. Sigh. She’s still kinda clumsy with the doors around here.

The door opens, eventually. She’s still dressed in the one-size-larger officer uniform that Captain Sue gave her, but it’s all ruffled—she’s using it as sleepwear?

I’m dressed with something close to my outfit in my adventurer days—a shirt, a mesh vest over that, sturdy pants full of pockets, and then a beige dustcoat over all of that. Instead of ordinary plate armor, I’ve got small blocks of silver strapped to my waist, upper legs, and upper arms. Each one’s dense with enchantments, acting as anchors for the full-body magic barrier wrapping all over myself. As long the mana storage circuits I’ve inlaid in my vest has power, I’m invincible! … ish!

In my hands are a change of clothes for Pashin. I give them to her, which she accepts with a confused look, then I plop down an hourglass on a shelf near the door, and I show her my brightest smile.

“Ah!”

She closes the door. Yass, I’ve achieved communication!

After 10 minutes, she’s dressed like an expat from Lesser Sharl. Honestly, with her height, we can’t really disguise the fact that she’s an elf, so we just settled with disguising her as any other elf—which is to say, they match with the clothes of the locals, then top it off with some sort of grey hood, shawl, whatever.

It’s apparently a cultural thing. Grey is their color of mourning, but it also means “don’t talk to me” and I completely understand the sentiment.

That said, elves aren’t really common around here. Lesser Sharl’s where practically all the elves are, but it’s across the ocean.

And that’s why I’m coming with her!

I mean, I’m not the only protection. Emperor Hiiro wanted to come along, but that one battleship captain started crying to get him to stay, so he sent the captain along with some apprentice ninjas with us instead. Captain Sue and a bunch of marines are also coming along as the heavy firepower component of the mission squad.

Sadly, they’re not coming with their feather hat uniforms. Those things are hella fluffy and bright—I wonder why Grey gets them to wear those? Well anyway, they’re coming in plainsclothes to blend in a bit better. I’m just wondering how they’ll hide their guns? I’m the only one on the continent with instant mechanical construction magic, so I doubt they’d just summon their guns out of the air.

Having all this preparation might seem overkill, but we’re still going into a labyrinth. It might not have any monsters, but it still pays off to have lots of people in case there’s something like a cave-in. Or slave traders.

Ehhh, better not worry about it!

We arrive at the makeshift teleport platform. It’s a spot in the wyvern deck that no one uses. The place smells pretty bad, but it’ll just be this once!

“Take care, Sophia!” I wave to her, and she smiles and waves back.

A magic circle scans us, and we become light.

Our teleport mage, Carl, has a 99% safety rate and a 50% precision margin, so I completely expected that we’d land a ways off the road. Around a mile off.

Normally I’d ask George to do the teleport, but bestie was appalled at the 95% safety rate. No, come on, it’s okay! I work with him all the time!

The next thing I see is cracked dirt—and just way too much sun. I land with bent knees—and I’m already sweating, darn it! Pashin stumbles back, though, and Sue helps her up.

Let’s see, the road’s … a little far. At least we can see it, I guess? It’s more-or-less according to expectations. There’s a shack and a windmill by it, too.

We walk for about 10 minutes and we reach the shack by the road. Apparently, it’s not a shack, but a water farm. There’s some old dude there, looks kinda surprised we showed up from a weird direction.

“Y’all lost or sumthin?” he asks.

“Uhhh we got ran off the road—but we’re back!”

“H-huhh. Sure. Any of ya fancy a refill?”

Heh, what a dilligent water farmer. Too bad for you, we came prepa—Ahhh shoot, I forgot to fill up Pashin’s canteen!

“Ahhh, come to think of it, I think one of us might still have air in their canteen.”

Hmm, I think I’ll slip this guy extra coin for the latest pitstop talk about the on-goings in the city, too.

I turn around. “Pashin!”

Our eyes widen. Sue, the marines, and even the ninjas are all caught off-guard. Pashin isn’t here anymore. She’s just… gone!

… But aha! I already knew she would be targeted by insidious forces tied to her fate, which is tied to the world’s! Because duh, that sort of stuff happens around members of an ancient civilization. That, or it’s just slave traders again.

Hence! I’d already made sure to throw a bunch of tracking enchantments at her clothes!

Not like they’re constantly active, though. I mean, we have those types of trackers, but it’s not something I can throw together last-minute. No big deal, though! I just gotta cast a spell and the passive tracker should react. Now, let me just put up the comically-oversized magic circle—this darn fiddly thing, why can’t it be more user-friendly. So many arithmetic and timing blocks that I have to synchronize, it’s making me shake my head…

Alright! Done! … Why is she underground? Right on top of the coordinates of the labyrinth?