The golden time glyphs on King Solomon’s arms faded slowly, after which the massive, impenetrable barrier dissolved into nothingness with the sound of shattering glass. The razor-sharp tension that had hung over the battlefield like a suffocating blanket gave way to an awkward, almost surreal silence. The smoke rising from the deep crater smelled of scorched earth and the cold, icy vapor of Nyx’s void magic.
Faustus was the first to move. His breathing was still fast and shallow, his heart hammering against his ribs like a madman. He had just watched his nephew get chopped in half, watched the blood freeze mid-air, and witnessed how the boy’s insane heritage had restored everything in a fraction of a second. Without looking back at Solomon or the others, he marched toward Silarias with long, aggressive strides. His fists were clenched so tight his knuckles turned white through the skin.
"What in the absolute hell were you thinking?!" Faustus roared, his voice cracking with pure, unfiltered adrenaline. He stopped a meter away from Silarias, who was still half in his awakened form, his fluid devil’s tail swaying slowly over the ground. "You charged in like a complete idiot! You were literally chopped in half, Sil! Do you think this is a fucking game?!"
Silarias didn’t look angry. The blazing mane around his neck began to dim, and the two glowing horns on his forehead receded gently back under his skin. He looked down at his own hands, which were still humming with a faint golden glow.
"It wasn’t a gamble, Faus," Silarias said, his voice surprisingly calm and deep. "It wasn’t an impulse. The moment that giant hit the ground, the moment the impact turned the world black, I heard them. I really heard them."
Faustus knit his brows, his rage slowly giving way to confusion. "Who? What did you hear?"
"The lion," Silarias answered, lifting his gaze to meet Faustus’s eyes directly. "The Bansaday Flying Lion. And the curse… the Divine Curse I’ve been dragging around like an anchor all this time. They didn’t speak in words, but in pure, raw knowledge. They showed me that giant’s mind. They showed me his mother, the caves, the abuse by that corrupted god who demanded fifteen children just to tear them apart mentally and physically for experiments. But they showed me something else, too. Something about us."
Faustus stood deathly still. Behind him, Jane and Aurelius held their breath, listening to the revelation of the boy who, until recently, had been an absolute nobody.
"The lion and the curse… they explained it all to me through his mother and our lineage," Silarias continued, his voice dropping softer now, but carrying an intensity that vibrated through the air. "They made me realize that the constant, lightning-fast flashing and teleporting I was doing… that doesn’t belong to Nyx’s void element at all. It isn’t shadow magic. It’s purely my own divine heritage. My own power."
Silarias took a step forward. The orange glow in his eyes was gone, replaced by a deep, mature look that Faustus had never seen in him before. There was no arrogance in his posture—only a raw, accepted reality.
"Now I’m just like you…" Silarias whispered, a faint but genuine smile touching his face. "…Cousin."
The words hit like a sledgehammer. Faustus’s eyes widened. His mouth parted slightly, and the armor of the cool, nonchalant warrior he so carefully maintained suddenly cracked wide open. Emotion hit him all at once. The realization that he was no longer alone in bearing the weight of this massive, destructive heritage—that his nephew now stood beside him as an equal—brought a sudden wave of tears to the corners of his eyes.
Not here. Not now. Don’t show it,
Faustus thought in a panic.
His eyes glinted with moisture, and before the first tear could roll down his cheek, he abruptly turned his head away. Curling his fist over his mouth, he began to cough forcefully, loudly, and terribly awkwardly, making a desperate attempt to suppress the lump in his throat and mask his tears as a sudden tickle.
"Cough! Cough! Damn it… that dust cloud from earlier went straight into my lungs," Faustus grunted casually, quickly rubbing the moisture from his eyes with the back of his hand. He turned back around, his face still a bit flushed, but his voice back under control. "Nice story, Sil. But don’t you ever do that again, or I’ll chop you in half myself."
The emotional tension was abruptly shattered by a sound that resembled a tearing tectonic plate. A deep, low, terrifyingly drawn-out rumble vibrated through the stone of the castle and the cracked earth beneath their feet.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRUUUUUUMMMMM.
Everyone instinctively ducked. Aurelius gripped his sword once more. "What is that?! Are there more coming?!"
Silarias burst out laughing and pointed toward the crater. "No. That’s just Uktar."
The colossal prehistoric giant was still sitting on his massive rear, but his huge hands were now resting flat against his gargantuan belly. His deep brown, puppy-like eyes looked at the group with a pleading gaze. His stomach had just produced a sound capable of triggering a minor earthquake. The ancient berserker was starving.
The logistical chaos that followed was completely absurd. Within fifteen minutes, the entire personnel of the Bastion was mobilized to raid the pantry. Sacks of grain, whole salted hogs, barrels of dried meat, and baskets full of vegetables were dragged outside by the soldiers.
Uktar sat in the grass just outside the castle walls, his massive legs spread wide. He pinched an entire salted hog between two fingers as if it were a small cocktail snack and popped it whole into his massive jaw. The loud, crunching sound of bones being ground into pulp echoed across the grounds.
Miki and Ren sat a safe distance away on a fallen log, watching in absolute awe. Nicola stood a few meters away with her arms tightly crossed, her sharp gaze fixed on the colossus’s every move.
Jane tried to carefully step closer. She raised her hands in the air and began making absurdly large chewing motions with her mouth. "Yummy? Is it yummy?" she called out in a loud, clear voice, as if talking to a toddler. "You. Eat. Good?"
Uktar stopped chewing mid-bite. He looked down at Jane, tilting his massive head. His heavy brows knitted together. Swallowing the mass of meat in one giant gulp, he opened his mouth and emitted a series of deep, guttural sounds that didn’t resemble any known language. "Grar-uh… Bwoh… Ngggh."
"He doesn't understand a word," Ren concluded dryly, poking the dirt with a stick. "He talks like he's got a mouth full of rocks."
"He can't talk at all," Silarias said, walking over with an apple in hand. "Mentally, he's like a young child. He doesn't understand the words—he only understands energy and intent."
As Silarias spoke, Uktar's gaze suddenly shifted toward Nicola. The woman was still standing motionless, her face a mask of cold, analytical seriousness, her right hand subtly tapping against her left elbow.
Uktar opened his large eyes, set down the barrel of dried meat, and began to slowly pull himself up. The soldiers stepped back in alarm, but the giant did nothing aggressive. To everyone's absolute astonishment, he attempted to mirror Nicola's exact posture. He crossed his massive, scar-covered arms tightly over his broad torso, tried to press his heavy jaws into a perfectly straight, emotionless line, and began tapping his giant, log-like finger gently and rhythmically against his elbow. He looked as though he were experiencing a deep philosophical crisis, tilting his massive head at the exact same angle as hers.
Faustus couldn't suppress a loud, short snort. "Hey Nicola, looks like you found your twin brother. He just has a bit more back hair."
Miki giggled and began to clap. "Look! He's copying Aunt Nicola!"
Nicola didn't move a muscle. She stared at the giant caveman who stood there like a grotesque, towering caricature of herself. She kept her cold, unblinking gaze fixed on him for at least ten seconds, while Uktar bravely tried to maintain his imitation without losing his balance.
Lowering her arms, Nicola let out a deep, pragmatic sigh and said in a completely flat, deadpan voice, "Mm. We will revisit this later."
"We need to check the upgrades now that the Bastion has stabilized," Solomon said, breaking the comedic mood as he turned toward the stables located just outside the main gate.
The entire group walked toward the stables, passing close to the fort's massive outer walls. The visual transformation of the mounts was even more impressive up close than from the balcony. Apollo's two horses were no longer normal beasts; they were mythical engines of flesh, star-steel, and pure fire.
Their manes consisted of roaring, deep blood-red flames that radiated intense heat without scorching the stone beneath them. Their tails had transformed into elegant, fluid feather-tails that left a trail of sparkling, fiery sparks in the air with every sway. Where heavy metal hooves had once been, razor-sharp, agile clawed feet now extended from the star-steel, engineered to grip any imaginable terrain. In the forehead of the left horse, the Soul Gem pulsed with a deep, inner radiance, while the Spacer Gem in the right horse constantly warped and rippled the air around its skull.
"The synergy between the Phoenix Anting and the gems has tethered the mounts directly to the foundation of the buildings," Jane explained, keeping a safe distance from the claws. "If we want to make any structural changes to the Bastion, we have to route the energy currents through the mounts."
As they stood there beside the castle's massive outer wall, Solomon began outlining the tactical adjustments. "If we reconfigure the rooms on the north side and the defensive works…"
He didn't get any further.
It was as if the Bastion had literally heard them. The towering stone fortress suddenly began to vibrate violently. A deep, mechanical and organic rumble rose from the bedrock. The stone blocks, which had lain motionless upon one another for centuries, began sliding smoothly past each other as if made of liquid rubber.
With a massive, deafening shock, the entire castle expanded outward. The sound that accompanied the transformation was so absurd, so loud, and so deep that it sounded as if the fort had just let out a massive, unashamed burp.
BURRRRRRRP-CLANK!
Immediately after, thick, suffocating clouds of smoke billowed out from every stone joint, window, and battlement. The gray and white vapors rolled over the grounds in waves, reducing the group's visibility to zero in an instant.
"Cough! What in the world is this?!" Faustus yelled, pulling his coat over his mouth.
"Stay calm!" Solomon shouted, though he too was shielding his eyes.
As the wind slowly cleared the thick smoke, everyone's jaw dropped. The visual escalation was breathtaking. The Bastion was no longer the same. It was bigger—much bigger. The towers reached yards higher into the sky, and the outer walls had grown thicker, more massive, and far more imposing.
Solomon marched toward the central control mechanism embedded in the outer wall. With a determined look, he activated the mechanism to test what this "breathing" castle could truly do.
The effect was instantaneous. The heavy stone walls shifted with terrifying fluidity. The interior space of the fort expanded flexibly and then contracted in unison, pulsing to the rhythm of the breathing horses in the stables. Rooms adjusted themselves, corridors lengthened and shortened on command.
The Bastion was no longer a dead, static fortress of cold stone. It had transformed into a living, breathing, and mobile stronghold. An unyielding anchor from an ancient age, ready for whatever was coming next.
The adrenaline of the battle had ebbed away, but the tranquility that settled over the battlefield was short-lived. As the Bastion stood motionless in the landscape in its new, colossal form, with Uktar in the background devouring the last remaining scraps of the castle's food supplies, King Solomon stepped forward to speak. His face was set tighter than before, marked by the heavy reality he now had to lay on the table.
He looked Silarias, Nyx, and Faustus straight in the eyes, one by one. "The Berserker threat has been neutralized and transformed into an ally," Solomon began, his deep voice carrying across the grounds. "But you must understand the bigger picture. This was merely a prelude. The entities threatening this world, like the corrupted god from Uktar’s past, are of an entirely different magnitude. The training and preparation lying ahead of you are not a matter of weeks or months."
Solomon took a step forward, his gaze heavy as iron. "A countdown has been set. Mark my words: we now have only about four and a half years left on that clock. That sounds long, but it won't be long before they arrive. You must become stronger than ever before."
A brief silence fell, the sheer weight of the time pressure cutting deep into the group. But then, the king's gaze softened. A rare, genuine pride glinted in his eyes. He looked at the young warriors and then at the rest of the companions standing loyally around them.
Solomon swallowed hard, his voice trembling slightly as emotion welled up inside him. He quickly wiped away a threatening tear to preserve his royal dignity.
"All of you…" he spoke, spreading his arms wide. "I have always believed in my daughter, my son-in-law, and their team. But now that we have gotten to know the rest of you, we acknowledge you all. Nicola, Lyn, Aurelius, Jane, Apollo, Beat, Lila, Blitz… and Ren and Miki as well. We welcome you."
With a powerful motion, Solomon slammed his massive palm onto the stone floor of the Bastion.
BOOM.
A wave of pure, golden energy erupted from his hand and surged through the earth. In the distance, directly ahead of them, the landscape split open. A glowing path of pure illumination shot forward like a bolt of lightning, aiming straight for a grotesque, ancient stone gate that rose from the ground in the far distance. Through the portal, a surreal vision flickered: shadowy figures of countless people crisscrossed through one another, and a chilling, echoing scream of thousands of voices at once billowed outward from the opening.
The message was instantly clear. The threat was real, and the front lines were calling.
Everyone looked at each other with wide eyes. There was no time for doubt or deliberation. Without exchanging a single word, the entire group turned synchronously and leaped in one fluid movement straight into the portal of the breathing Bastion to set the mobile fortress in motion.
Outside by the stables, Apollo was already perched on the driver’s seat of the mounts. He looked at the transforming horses with a wild, enthusiastic grin and scratched behind his ear. "How did we do this again… YEE-HAW?!" he shouted at the top of his lungs.
The horses didn't budge an inch. They didn't even flinch. The two mighty beasts slowly turned their heavy heads and looked at Apollo with a deep, questioning, almost offended glare, while thick plumes of hot steam snorted from their nostrils.
Behind Apollo, Beat leaped onto the wagon with a wild grin. He threw his arms into the air and roared with a voice that struck the horses right in their souls: "WAS IT NOT GYA GYA?!"
The effect was instantaneous. The horses reared wildly, their manes and tails igniting into a blazing, deep red fire, and with explosive force, they shot forward, hauling the breathing castle along the newly opened path behind them.
Inside the Bastion, the transition to a completely new world was palpable. As the fortress traversed at brutal speed, Silarias and the rest walked through the colossal central hall with open mouths, taking in the upgraded structure in sheer awe.
The castle was alive, and the rooms certainly let it be known. As they stepped into the large living space, the gargantuan stone fireplace ignited all on its own with a warm, crackling glow as if touched by an invisible hand. Heavy, leather-padded couches and oak chairs began sliding across the floor, positioning themselves into a cozy semicircle so everyone could sit together comfortably.
All around them, a Fantasia-like choreography unfolded. In the corners of the hall, broomsticks were busily sweeping away dust on their own. Looking toward the open kitchen, polished knives hovered mid-air, slicing vegetables and meat at a perfect, rhythmic tempo to prepare a feast, while pots and pans simmered gently over an unattended stove.
Nicola looked around with wide, glistening eyes. His analytical mind was trying to process the magic, until a spark of realization suddenly hit him. His gaze shot toward Silarias. "Oh right… the library," he muttered.
Without waiting for the others, Nicola grabbed Silarias firmly by the arm and pulled him along with decisive strides through the corridors, heading toward the deepest section of the castle.
Nyx remained behind, her eyes narrowing as she watched the pair walk away. She nudged Lyn with her elbow and offered a mischievous, somewhat wicked grin. "What on earth are those two up to?" she whispered. Curiosity instantly won out; with synchronized, silent footsteps, Nyx and Lyn stealthily tailed them, determined to find out what was going on.
Along the corridors, Nicola gave Silarias an almost brotherly look. His voice sounded warm, yet filled with disbelief. "I have to be honest, Sil… I really never calculated this when I first saw you."
Silarias let out a short, loud laugh. "That makes two of us, haha!"
They stopped before a grotesque, massive wooden door adorned with intricate, astronomical patterns. With a heavy, slow creak, the door swung open on its own.
"Silarias, behold… our library," Nicola said proudly.
The library was immense, though still mostly sparse. The giant bookshelves stood half-empty, but the space itself was anything but dead. Books hovered everywhere in mid-air, fluttering their pages like birds, and scrolls flew in graceful arcs through the room without a trace of hostility. Silarias couldn't believe his eyes. He looked from the flying manuscripts to Nicola. "What…
our
library?"
Nicola said nothing. A mysterious smile appeared on his face as he spread his arms wide.
At that moment, hundreds of floating candles scattered throughout the immense room ignited one by one with a soft pop. The warm candlelight revealed the true architecture of the library. Immense staircases began to shift smoothly, but in an utterly mind-bending way: each staircase rotated independently in an optical illusion, turning upside down into right side up, left into right, forming an impossible maze of floating stairs.
Deeply impressed, Silarias walked alongside Nicola across the moving platforms. As he looked around, however, a strange sensation crept up on him. The atmosphere in this specific room felt different from the rest of the castle. It felt warm, intimate, and functional—as if it had been specially designed to be inhabited.
"Nicola, seriously for a second…" Silarias asked, pausing his pace. "It feels like someone is actually going to live here someday. Who… who is it?"
Nicola instantly burst into laughter. "Haha, brother, take a closer look."
He walked to the exact center of the library, where a razor-thin, perfectly round hole sat in the stone floor. Nicola reached into his robes and, with a solemn gesture, produced Noctua’s feather. The feather was completely intact, lustrous, and structurally flawless, untouched by all the chaos they had survived.
Silarias’s eyes went wide. Realization hit him like a bomb. He opened his mouth to speak, but before a single word could come out, two familiar voices suddenly echoed from the shadows.
"Oh, not there!"
A stack of floating scrolls and a thick book suddenly poked gently against Nyx and Lyn, who jumped back in alarm, completely blowing their cover behind a massive bookshelf.
Silarias looked at Nyx, who was caught red-handed and twiddling her fingers, and burst into a loud laugh. "Honestly, this doesn't surprise me one bit coming from you two. Since you're already here, come on over." Laughing, he gestured for the two girls to join them.
Nyx walked up to Silarias with a broad smile, wrapped her arms around his neck, and hung off him gently to peer down at the floor. She looked up at the hundreds of floating candles and maps, whispering softly in his ear, "This is truly breathtaking, don't you think?"
Silarias looked deep into her eyes, a warm glow in his gaze. "If you only knew."
Nicola ignored the romantic distraction and refocused on the center point. With a precise motion, he inserted Noctua’s perfectly intact feather straight into the razor-thin hole in the floor.
The effect was breathtaking. The Bastion seemed to hold its breath for a fraction of a second. Suddenly, dozens of pages tore themselves free from random, flying books. They began spinning through the air in a lightning-fast, swirling vortex, heading straight for the hundreds of floating candles. The moment the pages touched the flames, the fire exploded. It erupted from the candles like freed stars, a blinding barrage of pure light that illuminated the entire library.
The light intensified, drawing together into the center of the vortex, and began taking a solid form. Within seconds, the majestic, wise figure of Noctua materialized mid-air before their eyes.
The entity spread its wings and looked at the group with a deep, all-knowing gaze. "So after all…" echoed the heavy, resounding voice of the owl. "What is it you wish to know?"
Nicola looked up, his arms crossed over his chest, and interrupted the prehistoric entity completely casually with a broad grin:
"Noctua, how would you feel about living here?!"
The legendary question echoed with immense force through the gigantic library, vibrating against the stone walls and thousands of books, while time itself seemed to stand still for a moment.
The sound resonated so deeply through the stone walls that the vibrations traveled into the adjacent rooms.
Further down the castle, Uktar stopped chewing. His large ears twitched. With a curious glance, he left the last remnants of food behind and began walking calmly in the direction of the noise.
Inside the library, the echo died down. Silarias, Nyx, Lyn, and Nicola held their breath, waiting for the prehistoric owl’s answer. But before Noctua could say anything, a new sound came from outside the grotesque door. Heavy, yet surprisingly calm footsteps approached over the shifting stone floor, followed by a soft, infantile babbling.
The gigantic form of Uktar appeared in the doorway. The monster peered into the library with a wide grin and waved his massive hand enthusiastically at the group. But his gaze was instantly drawn to the glowing center of the room. His large puppy-eyes fixed onto the majestic, floating bird.
Without a moment’s hesitation, the giant took a few massive strides forward, reached his massive, scar-covered hands into the air, and casually scooped Noctua right out of mid-air. Noctua, the all-knowing entity of pure wisdom, was squished against the colossus’s broad chest like a defenseless plush toy. Uktar began stroking the bird’s plumage with big, clumsy movements while making soft, contented sounds.
Silarias, Nyx, Lyn, and Nicola stood frozen in place. They looked at the giant, then at the squished owl, and then at each other.
"Completely forgot," they said almost in unison, a chorus of pure realization.
Nicola was the first to regain his composure. Putting his hands on his hips, he looked up at the towering berserker and said in a clear, commanding tone, "Uktar. Put him on the ground."
To everyone’s surprise, the caveman reacted immediately. Uktar nodded dutifully, leaned over, and placed Noctua back on the stone floor with surprising gentleness. He then walked with long, slow strides toward Nicola and sat down with a soft thud right beside him, his arms tightly crossed—copying his favorite role model to a tee.
Noctua shook out his feathers and looked with glistening eyes at the gigantic baby beside Nicola. The owl burst into a screeching laugh. "Prehistoric humans… Well, that’s a first for me, hahaha! Count me in. I like this place already."
The tension broke completely. The whole group erupted into laughter out of sheer relief and joy. As they turned to leave the library, Silarias walked alongside the floating owl to go over the house rules. He enthusiastically explained that they planned to gather every book and scroll in the world right here, though he immediately added that there would be a specific number of forbidden books that needed to be kept under lock and key.
Noctua let out a mysterious, soft chuckle. "Mm… I might just have something special in store for you all."
Almost instantly after, the wise owl dematerialized into a cloud of sparkling stardust, leaving the empty space behind with the promise of his return.
With Uktar walking calmly alongside them hand-in-hand, the group strolled back through the corridors of the breathing castle in a relaxed atmosphere, heading for the central hall where the rest awaited them. The Bastion was still gliding across the golden path of light at terrifying speed.
THOOM.
A dull, heavy impact vibrated through the entire castle. Everyone lurched forward for a fraction of a second due to the sudden deceleration; it felt as if the entire, massive fortress had slammed on its brakes all at once.
The heavy double doors of the throne room flew open. King Solomon stood in the threshold, his royal cape billowing in the draft. A broad, proud smile adorned his face as he looked at them. "You’ve already made it through. Welcome to Yellowstone Marketplace… the market of the… UNIVERSITY!"
Silarias let go of Uktar's hand and was the very first to step across the threshold of the main gate, stepping out onto the platform. But as soon as his feet touched the open air, he froze. His mouth fell wide open. The sensory overload hit him so hard that his brain seemed to short-circuit. He began to babble completely incoherently, pointing toward the horizon with wide, dazed eyes. "Uh… bwoh… da… look… thingy…"
Nyx came walking out right behind him, her eyebrows heavily furrowed and her arms angrily crossed. "What on earth are you doing now, Sil?!" she snapped, irritated.
But the moment she, Nicola, Lyn, Jane, Aurelius, Lila, Apollo, Beat, Ren, and Miki passed through the gate and stood beside him, every voice went dead silent. The entire party froze in the exact same stance. Nyx’s sharp snapping dissolved mid-sentence into the exact same brainless babbling. Within a second, they were all standing there in unison, mouth agape, stammering and pointing at the insane spectacle unfolding before them.
The horizon no longer consisted of sky or mountains, but of an infinite, three-dimensional ocean of pulsating light and motion. They stood at the precipice of a gargantuan valley that shot vertically upward into thousands of floating terraces. The sky was a deep, midnight-blue void, but it was completely overwhelmed by a mesmerizing dance of tens of thousands of paper and silk lanterns. These lanterns floated freely in the air, glowing in vivid shades of fuchsia, electric cyan, and deep gold, connected by meters-long, waving garlands that strung like glowing neural pathways between the roofs of traditional wooden structures and floating, metallic alleys.
Swirling, dense swarms of neon-blue fireflies wove through it all. They danced in patterns through the air, leaving trails of glistening, radiant crystal dust that slowly drifted down over the crowd like magical rain. Large vertical banners with glowing, animated characters hung off the sides of towering structures, and the narrow pathways burst at the seams with stacked levels built haphazardly atop one another.
The Marketplace beneath them was a churning, electrifying anthill. The scents hit their faces like a solid wall: the sizzling flat-tops of hundreds of densely populated food stalls spewed clouds of purple and orange steam, filled with the aromas of heavily spiced, fire-roasted meats, sugary pastries baked mid-air, and liquid silver broths boiling in gargantuan, steaming cauldrons. Wooden storefronts overflowed with toys that ran and jumped across counters on their own, racks of floating robes that shifted colors and patterns based on the emotions of whoever looked at them, and glass displays full of flickering, singing crystals humming soft melodies.
But the crowd moving through the streets defied all logic. It was a colorful, chaotic stream of races beyond any imagination.
Small, extremely broad-shouldered figures with monumental beards braided with copper gears and ticking clockwork shouted in booming voices near an open forge, where blue fire erupted from the furnaces. Right beside them glided beings that seemed to lack a fixed physical form; their bodies consisted of floating, liquid ink and translucent smoke—walking phantoms that shifted shape with every step they took, leaving ripples in the air as if treading through water.
In the middle of the path walked two colossal figures bearing the heavy, massive heads of hippopotamuses, draped in the most delicate, shimmering silk robes with golden embroidery. They stood sipping with bizarre elegance from tiny porcelain teacups using their gargantuan fingers. On the opposite side of the street, a group of creatures buzzed past, their bodies encased in hard, lustrous carapaces with massive, translucent compound eyes; their four large, glass-like wings vibrated so fast they shimmered under the neon lights, while their extra pair of jointed arms swung laden with bags of sparkling spices and bottles of glowing juices. Crisscrossing among them were others with glowing, mechanical tattoos flowing across their skin, beings with multiple eyes that moved independently of one another, and entities cloaked in heavy, shadowy mantles.