The Shadowweaver specialty was notorious for its difficulty to learn and self-infliction abilities which put them above all other martial masters; and she had seen plenty of attempted Shadowweaver prospects stumble and fail, taking more gentle, forgiving paths than the brutal one. Still though, she found herself gobsmacked at the effortlessness of the one in front of her. Graceful. Lethal.

"Well?" the Felicisin asked with the demanding nature of a cat himself. "Do you have food or not?" He activated his Vitalin bracer to point at the third bar attached to the green one. It had gone into a critical state, revealing the source of where the Shadowweaver's pitfall lay.

Faelyn dropped her pack in front of the Felicisin, and frowned when his tome opened up in front of him as he sorted through it. With the last of her gathered ingredients in his hand, he created a wrap for himself, pushing the bag back towards her as he took a seat, his tail curling around his lap. "Um." Her voice returned to her with her sense of false security as she dragged herself up, taking the time to grab a vitalis tonic within the bag. "Thank you for helping me. You are...?"

A point in her direction was her response, and after a deliberate swallow, he asked, "Why do you want to know? I was just passing through looking for a mark that was decidedly not there when I arrived, so I thought to hang back and see if anyone would come around — lo and behold, they did." He motioned at her, then at the spot where he took down three people at once. "It was a trap. Use the arrival of a Gloom beast to try and pull in naive hunters for the kill. It's a predictable M.O." He took another large bite. "The burly one — three-thousand solar bounty. His compatriots might as well have been fodder to the Owlscreamer, maybe they were." After a moment, he gave her a wild grin, then bounced a small carrying pouch. "I was hoping to get my mark, and so I have."

"Wait." Faelyn sat up further. "You weren't hunting the Owlscreamer?"

"Nope. Gloom beasts don't do it for me." He crushed the wrap in his hand and discarded it. "You just happened to provide an opportunity."

Faelyn allowed her gaze to drift down to his hip, where his single opalescent key glowed with the brightness of having touched the Tower's first capstone floor, banded by a red tape to signify that the Shadowweaver had completed the near impossible task, alone. Solo. Faelyn inched back further at the threat in front of her, but slowed to a stop when his ears swiveled at the movement. "You're not worth it," he said after his gaze settled on her hip. "You should be more careful though, even your amount of chromekeys would provide ample desperation."

Faelyn cupped the keys in her hand and forced herself to her knees as the vitalis tonic took effect. "Why won't you tell me your name?"

His tail swiped in agitation. "Don't give my name out to people out in the Gloom Fog," he grumbled and stretched onto his nimble limbs. He zoned in on one of the branches, but she came closer to him before he could escape curiosity. "Look, I'm not one to take gratitude when it wasn't my intention to come in like a superhero. It was happenstance," he argued, twisting on his soles to face her, ears pinned. "So, go back to the Nexus to rest, or find a guild plot and hope they don't fall on you to join them, and leave me to my business."

"You work solo," she commented.

"I don't like people," he remarked back.

"You're welcome for the food."

"I consider it payment for saving your ass."

Tome in front of her, she opened it to the scanning pages as the Felicisin remained tense. Basic information filled the margins as she sorted for what she really looked for. A bounty. He folded his arms with a huff, the tip of his fluffy tail twitching as it drew itself in bold letters. Faelyn almost choked at the number. "You have a bounty of three million solars?"

His jade pupils thinned in clear warning. "You want to try your luck? Trust me, you'd have better luck delving into Gloom caves and fighting the monsters within for their keyshards instead of gunning for mine." He flipped his chain scythe, and she drew back. "I don't think you want to do that. You've wasted a lot of energy already, from where I'm standing. I could probably give you a light kick and you'd be forced back into the Astral stream. Here, wanna test?" He stepped for her, but she leaped back, causing him to smile at her. "See? Told you. I shall take my leave now."

"What. Wait!" Faelyn reached her hand out, but he had leaped away from her. "At least tell me your name!"

"How about you catch me first?" he asked when he landed on a branch, bringing a mask over his nose. "Solo to solo. You think you can catch up with me? Bet on it." He took out a single solar, flicking it at her, but as she fumbled to catch it, he ran across the boughs of the lowest trees. The food from before appeared to have given him his strength back as he bounced and hopped along with grace, his chain scythes humming into a mobility mode. Not one to give up so easily, she gave chase for a name — and the adventure of it. His tail kept him balanced as he gained distance, but she poured energy into her twin blades to slash the air into speedy carriers of her body. On his level, she ran across the trees, though with a bit of struggle as the branches trembled beneath her. Starflowers spread their pollen upwards, and the Infinity Tower gleamed across the cloudless night sky.

Ahead, the Shadowweaver laughed, spinning in the air with pure ecstasy. "I have to admit!" he called back as he took another large leap into a shadow glyph. "I'm surprised you could still move after the beating you took!" He sneered at her, then sped up his pace as he jumped off the boughs, landing on a giant lilypad across the moonshed river. Ripples spread out from his disturbance, shedding little white flecks from the moon high above. Faelyn landed on the lilypad he had jumped off in a quick moment.

"I wouldn't be doing this if you had just told me your name!" she called across the river.

The shadowweaver spun on his heel, and she dodged out of a lash of energy. "What?" He flipped onto the last lilypad when she went to lunge at him. "Thought I wasn't going to make this bet a little interesting?" His chain scythe withdrew and shifted with a bubble of shadows back into its mobility form. As he reached the end of the bank, he looked over his shoulder with another sharp huff, but as she readied her blade to bridge the gap. Astral wind carried her forward, but the Shadowweaver disappeared with a quiet bounce into a growing batch of Gloom Fog. "What's the matter?" His voice echoed out. "Good opportunity for keyshards. Solo players can handle patches of Gloom without the added baggage of a guild party. No need to waste your time on me."

Faelyn stepped through the cloud. Her Vitalin bracer hummed with a warning. Goal set, she ran through as smaller creatures took on wicked, twisted shapes and sharper teeth. One lunged out of the bushes, but she reacted in time, driving her blade into its skull. It burst into dark stars as its supplies filled her bag. With no time to examine the quick, small haul, she burst and followed the trail shadowweaver magic left. The closer she came to the core of the Fog, the thicker it became and rattled with ruinous intent.

Her energy sapped by being within its embrace. I can't stay here long, I don't have the supplies to handle anything larger. Not that her goal was a Gloom purge for a slim chance at a keyshard. The strange shadowweaver was — him, and his name. Through the coils of pale purples, she stumbled out of the forest edge, then slammed to a stop when her neck brushed the blade of a chain scythe.

He blocked the path to a small hamlet, but then dropped his weapon to holster it. "You'll be safe here." He threw his thumb over his shoulder. "No one passes by this place — nothing worth it out here." On his heel, he went to go into the light, but she followed closer.

"I think I won the bet." Faelyn flicked the solar for the back of his head, but he caught it with an open palm with expert dexterity. He rolled it over his knuckles, and a pang of envy went through her at his focused skill when he stopped it on the edge of his thumb, and he flicked it in the air before catching it again.

"Ozullo." Ozullo pocketed the solar and wandered into the hamlet. The light kept the Gloom in the Wilds, and she opened her tome when he had finally revealed his name to her. His bounty remained the same, but other little details revealed themselves on a map of ink. His skill and abilities as a high-tiered Shadowweaver. His race, and his name took up the largest margin. As she went to catch up with him, he pushed his hands into his pockets. "I thought I said to leave me to my business."

"I'm Faelyn," she returned.

"Faelyn." He blinked. "Alright." He went to turn, but she slid in front of him, and his expression contorted into one of annoyance. "Oh... here we go..." He brushed his finger to his nose. "Listen, 'Faelyn'. I'm tired, I need to disconnect and if I drop out in the middle of this town, I'm coming back and finishing the job." He revealed feline fangs.

Faelyn formed yet another shard of her pearl, then held it out to him. "Here."

"Cool, a meatshield to throw at bounties. Don't mind if I do." Ozullo took it. "Hope you're not expecting mine in return. Like I said, I work alone." He flicked his gaze up and down at her. "You know, for a solo player, you're hounding me quite a bit."

"I haven't met a solo player who cleared the first capstone floor of the Infinity Tower."

"Oh, for — I am not teaching you my tricks. It's much more fun figuring it out." Ozullo shrugged at her. "Goodbye." He gave her no chance to reply as he ran into the sanctuary building, not that she was going to go anywhere else to seamlessly return to the Astral planes herself. He wasted no time in tossing a couple of coins at the bright individual manning the counter, disappearing through the veil of mist which started at the staircase to the rooms of safety.

Well, isn't he pleasant... though I guess I can't expect that much from a solo player who also focuses on the art of demolishing other adventurers... even if they were doing the same thing. Her logical side pointed out that without Ozullo's help, she'd have had to start all the way from the beginning. With that, she sighed. Glad I didn't call Naeth.

The memory of the Drachen's equal kindness spurred her forward to drop her own solars in front of the individual, which opened up the veil for her to enter. Upstairs and into a room with a bed, she opened her tome to flick to Naeth's page. Quill formed between her fingers, she wrote a message.

'Thank you for your words of encouragement, earlier. I ran into a couple of PK'ers. Almost lost everything.'

When he didn't respond, she almost assumed he, like Ozullo, had disconnected.

Until a sharp, yet graceful writing style formed.

'What happened?'

'A Shadowweaver stumbled on me.'

Faelyn sighed out her exhaustion as Naeth replied back.

'Good, glad to hear, Faelyn, but you don't need to thank me for my encouragement. I should be thanking you instead.'

'Why?'

'No reason.'

With that, his writing dissipated to confirm he wasn't going to respond further.

Exciting day in this world...

Faelyn slumped backwards into the comfort of the mattress and closed her eyes, where the starlit streams filled her vision and she let herself slip into the darkness. Until a voice called out, "Astral Elevona Drive disconnecting. User status: Optimal."

Released from the glass of the virtual carrier, she put one foot in front of the other, grounding herself against the dinky, rotted wood of her small apartment to head for the cracked mirror.

Hello, Nayli... and goodbye Faelyn, for now.