After the statue, the rest of the ship appeared. Black in color, constructed with a mix of iron and wood, a mix of the most advanced technology and the most traditional and primitive magecraft.

 

Past and present intertwined to give shape to the Pioneer Three, the Permafrost Caravel. One of the smallest ships that formed the Pioneer Fleet, but the one who had easier access entering and exiting Permafrost.

 

As it got closer to the dock, and the mages grouped together in different teams, talking between them, Tristan caressed her hair behind her ear, activating an eavesdropping artifact.

 

“They sent a list with the perished mages… Agrana Base…”

 

She wasn’t interested in that list, next.

 

“Mixing alchemy with artifacts is possible, I tried to…”

 

She had done that already, next.

 

“According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way that a dragon should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat big body off the ground. The dragon, of course, flies anyway…”

 

What even was that conversation? Was that Kartal? Next.

 

“Is the Director not coming?”

 

“Doesn’t seem so. Fixing the lost pocket dimension took a toll on her mind.”

 

“She just keeps getting worse… At this point, her falling into corruption and becoming a witch will kill us faster than Permafrost.”

 

One of the mages sighed. “She has now become only a figure of power, not control… All Mergifari’s decisions now fall on Hasdrubal.”

 

“Not all, remember the Tarius’ issue. Her son was the one that took the devil’s book, and gave it to his selected.”

 

“A mother’s preference, hm? Even so, if you want something, Hasdrubal will at least hear you out. He probably already knows what you want, haha.”

 

“Tch. I wanted temporary access to that Devil’s Book, since my son was killed by him. But he doesn’t allow any mage to get even a bit close to that girl.”

 

“I know that… he even deployed her. The Hunger.”

 

The two mages fell in an uncomfortable silence, while Tristan mused. She had felt some hazy blob following Velvet around, and she knew that Velvet was aware of someone stalking her.

 

She hadn’t done anything about that because, as someone who had known Ceres for a long time, Tristan was aware of how he liked to do things, which is to say, let people figure things out for themselves, or, as it was usually called:

 

Fix your own problems.

 

Tristan agreedeed with that statement. As a rather individualistic mage, she didn’t like to baby and coddle novice mages, reason why she was so strict with her requirements to pick a selected, to the point where she still didn’t have any.

 

That was against the Mergifari rules, since official mages needed to pick a selected to raise just to retain their rights to remain on the Mergifari. The only exception being mages that had raised more than twenty, all in different years, which basically amounted to the ones already ‘retired’, that lived closed off on their pocket dimensions.

 

But, as those mages just said, Ceres could call the shots simply by being her mother’s son, and bend the rules as he wished.

 

Yes, they were old, stinky privileges at play, the kind that gave more rights to the ones that knew the right people than to the ones that made the most effort, but, since they benefited her, Tristan wouldn’t complain.

 

Going back to Ceres, Hasdrubal and their tug-o-war, where no one was pulling, and instead waited for the rope to move on its own, Tristan didn’t know what to think.

 

Giving her the book that made her fall on the center of attention of all mages that had (or didn’t had) something to do with the unsealed devil matter was like giving a hydrogen bomb to a baby.

 

But, by doing that, they had put her on a stage, where, as an actor, she couldn't be reached by the hands waiting offstage, at least while her show was on. But also where she felt enough pressure to push her to grow.

 

Yes, at present, Velvet was growing faster by being on her own and taking her own decisions. But, but, growing on her own also meant growing unsupervised.

 

She was growing without the pointers of a teacher, of a selector who guided her down the right path.

 

An uncorrected growth could become dangerous, since no one could deduct what it would become.

 

Maybe Ceres' love for the casino is getting out of hand. Tristan sighed. But, once again, only the unpredictability of luck can defeat the certainty of fate.

 

And, only luck can defeat absolute knowledge.

 

…

 

When Velvet came back to her senses; the artifact had been more rough when crossing portals than the Mergifari’s doors, which made her dizzy for a few seconds, she found herself inside someone’s bedroom.

 

Almost unused, she noticed. While it looked clean on the surface, the lack of signs that someone slept there recently were noticeable.

 

If she had to say a number, maybe it was three or four months since it was last used. And… it wasn’t what she expected from the room of a family of mechanics, to be honest.

 

Maybe it was Tristan’s fault for being so messy, that made Velvet expect the same from the other mages on her Paradigm, or maybe, Tristan had the average behavior as her Paradigm, but whoever the bedroom belonged to pertained to another Paradigm.

 

Speaking of Tristan and the Traversa’s Paradigm, the woman gave Velvet the name, with a short description.

 

The Paradigm of Defiance, the one which went against the rules of nature itself.

 

Machines and artifacts, and the ability to make them were what divided humans from animals and plants, after all.

 

The users of this Paradigm didn’t get any physical enhancement, but, if they got access to the materials necessary, they would never need to.

 

Defiance, the combination of the Pride and Greed Paradigms. Pride for wanting to be above nature, and greed for wanting to keep going even after reaching the ceiling.

 

… It really does describe Tristan. Velvet’s smile twitched behind the mask. In the end, I was correct on the Pride part of her Paradigm.

 

Leaving Tristan’s matters aside, Velvet looked around the room. She couldn’t touch anything, because anything she touched could become a clue later, when the Traversa’s mages tried to track her.

 

Even so, it was a reader’s room, with several bookcases covering one wall, and also a sailor’s room, or, at least, a sea fanatic.

 

An astrolabe, an open map nailed to a wall showing the different seas and their routes, and a ship’s model located in the middle of the room made that fact clear.

 

Walking towards the door, Velvet glanced at the model. A black ship with aurore colored sails, and a helmed woman as figurehead.

 

Written in small letters was the ship's name: Pioneer Three.

 

So this is the famous ship, hm? The one coming today? She asked herself. It looks so fancy compared to Viroa’s… Even the model has parts painted with gold!

 

Laughing in silence, Velvet reached the door, stopping one last moment to look at a framed photo.

 

On it, and with sepia colors, a girl wearing an oversized and pompous pirate hat was next to two other kids, one of them resembling very closely a younger version of Ceres, holding a camera and pointing it towards Velvet, which meant that the pic was taken against a mirror.

 

And the other kid was probably Tristan, looking at the camera, the one Ceres was holding, not the one in the mirror, as if she wanted to dismantle it.

 

Seeing the kid's expression, Velvet had no doubts about the camera’s fate. May it rest in peace.

 

Leaving the room, she entered a corridor, which now, now, really felt like how an artisan family pocket dimension was supposed to look.

 

Walls made by golden gears, slowly spinning and from where one could see the void behind, the ticking of the levers moving on their own, regulating the space. Floors made of white marble, but from where some of the tiles activated traps upon being stepped on.

 

Tristan had warned her of the trigger mechanisms that would activate the security system when touched. Those changed every month or so, and she didn’t have any way of knowing all of them.

 

But Velvet didn’t need to, since it was impossible for her to match a defiance mage on mechanism traps.

 

And Tristan knew that, reason why she gave her another thing.

 

Extending her hand, sparkling dust started to converge upon it, forming first a ball, then a pyramid, a prism, a long shaped octahedron, then it folded over and over its own body, never remaining in a singular shape, but always emitting a faint light, white in color.

 

“Two steps up, five left.” An inhuman voice spoke on Velvet’s mind.

 

Tarderebusque, Tristan’s familiar. A defiance demon.