With the completion of the big alliance party out of the way, and PVoW out of my hair, we set our sights, or rather I did, toward making contact with Tepet Ejava, The Roseblack.

When I made it clear that I was going to find her and speak with her with or without the guys' help, they pretty much grudgingly agreed to pursue this course of action. I don't know why Maedros is so freaked about speaking with her? We need to get her in on this sooner or later, and it would be best if she accept and prepare herself and her troops for such a role as early-on as possible, so that she has a more stable base to work from.

Anyway, Hani was sent back to Yu Shan to learn a spell that allows us to send a message to someone, anyone, without fail. This is so we can get in contact with Ejava without having to look all over the iron triangle of piracy using a conspicuous flying spell and by doing so, giving away our abilities.

-+-

While Hani was away, Reese and I decided to pass the time in search of Moon's First Shadow. We checked out his usual hangouts, like the docks, but was unable to find trace of him. Reese spent some time getting the word on the street, but in the end was unable to find mention of him that was less than a week old.

We had two more steps left before giving up. The first one was going to speak with Mr Pin. We had to do a little social maneuvering, but were eventually granted audience without having to crack any skulls due to the mention of Mr Toddo's name. Unfortunately, Mr Pin had not seen Great Father Cat for more than a week, so… we were on to our last step: the Peleps compound.

I did a quick search of the area outside of the Peleps compound that we knew to be housing Glasses Girl and Creepy Guy, but was unable to find any tracks or anything noting the passage of Mr Shadow. I then climbed up to the roof of a nearby building and searched the sky and roofs of the houses around me as far as my Sensory Acuity Prana could see, while Reese snuck into the Peleps compound.

While there, Reese spied a scene where Creepy Guy was arguing with a woman, then smacked her viciously, storming out of the room. She would probably have died if Reese hadn't been there. The creepy part was that she was… his mother. Which means that she was Linaria's mother too. He did manage to find out from one of the guards that Mr Cat had been here a week ago and that apparently he and the Abyssals did not part on good terms. I can only hope that means their alliance is over.

The rest of the time Hani was out of town I spent looking for sign of the Lunar's passage outside of the city. I was unable to find anything. I can only hope he is no longer our enemy.

-+-

After Hani's return, we sent our message to Tepet Ejava, and then a week later headed out to Abalone to await our meeting date. During that week, I spent the majority of my time relaxing on the beach, building sand castles, playing volleyball with Linaria, playing with the local kids and just generally having a nice, relaxing vacation from the hell that is my life these days.

-+-

It seems during this time that Maedros and Reese were able to find a water manse out somewhere nearby. So now Reese has a hearthstone, although he lacks a setting to put it in, and so, cannot make use of the hearthstone's additional benefits, besides the essense regaining properties.

I suggested to him to instruct the manse to generate a level-1 hearthstone for Linaria so she will be able to regain essense in Creation, and a level-2 hearthstone for him so that he will be able to regain essense in the Underworld. Hopefully he will; I'm sure it would do a lot for Linaria's state of mind.

-+-

Finally, we met with The Roseblack. We had a few immature antics before we got down to serious conversation, which the Roseblack seemed rather unamused about.

Anyway, we headed off to a back room of the inn, and Maedros gave her a very pared-down version of our story, yet gave away our biggest secret – the location of the Empress. Unfortunately, this pared-down version of the story just wasn't, in my opinion, enough information and enough trust on our part to allow The Roseblack to make her decision, muchless one that is favorable to us. What will we do if she declines?