V-36 Bread (I)

...and the final daughter of summer, though not radiant like her elder sister, not graceful and fleet like middle sister wind, not stalwart and unbending like brother iron, is beloved of the family as she is life unburdened; the incarnation of growth and flourishing fields.

And so, Plum Blossom must be fed. And it is a joy to feed her. For it is the dream of summer to savor all delights, and from those delights might more joys spawn, might the sunlight fall upon pristine fields, and paint the wheat golden with glory.

But woe betide those who forget their place. For that has been touched by the princess of the blooming pleasures belongs to her palette and hers alone, and for another to take from the plate of summer will know the depths of hunger.

For all things can be taught to consume, and what is eaten might reap flesh and sinew in return…

-The Whimsy and Brutality of Princess Plum Blossom, the Fecund Lady of Summer Everlasting

V-36

Bread (I)

Farsight 84 > 92

Inertial Overdrive 182 > 185

Aegis of Assimilation 120 > 126

Pillar of Orichalcum 261 > 266

Shiv had underestimated the Faebread, and so had the other chefs for that matter. The attack came from inside and in an instant. Swelling pulses of bright orange mana erupted from within Shiv, resonating outward from each crumb. It subsumed his body, spreading through his biology, mana, and skills. The unnatural fae magic was like a growth fusing over him, only to be shredded apart as his Shapeless Tides circulated over his being.

Even so, he felt a building flood of hostile mana channeled against him from somewhere—Shiv turned, and he saw his ruptured body. Between the gore-splattered flaps and after the entrails spilled out of his corpse, he saw it—the source of the fae magic. There was a portal made from a chain of crumbs within the chest of his body, and on the other side, he caught a glimpse of a kitchen, and of a shrouded humanoid figure sculpted from bread.

The Deathless tried to move, but it was like fighting petrification. He was constantly struggling against a spreading mass of bread, yeast, and mold wrapping around him. Absurdly, it was affecting his Vitae as well. The red-white mana that sustained his very existence was now wreathed in a growing flow of wheat and... 'This shit is turning my Vitae edible.'

And Shiv was the least affected by the fae spells.

Nornsong was ripped asunder in the same instant as Shiv. The Deathless watched in utter disbelief as something erupted free from her chest. Her body twisted and coiled, her skin grew over her orifices first, and then an unnatural shape erupted out from the center of her skull. It was wrapped in blood and coated in gristle, but with a shrug, it surged free from her splitting bone.

What came out, was a thing of absurdity. 'Is that…' Shiv saw what looked to be a baguette, holding two knives in its stick-like hands. It descended on Bowden, ramming its blades into his eyes as he remained on his knees. The man cried out, but the rats in his beard responded first. Beams of Necromancy ripped through the bread, and it withered with a resounding pop. Dust flaked free from the bread, and for a beat, there was a moment’s reprieve.

But then more baguettes came. They erupted forth from Nornsong’s parting corpse and spilled over the downed Bowden in a tide. The short man screamed as blood gushed out from him. But even that didn’t satisfy the madness of the bread—for they had angry little faces, with beady eyes of seed and gleaming teeth that shone like burnished metal, piercing through amidst the carnage of a battlefield. They bit into Bowden’s throat and began pulling him apart. His body slowly began turning bread-like as the nightmare progressed, but he still tried to fight on—even as the bread-blades were driven deeper into his eyes, even as his howls hit new and feverish heights.

And the bread weren’t just vicious and hateful; they were fast; they seemed to ignore Toughness and most Magical Resistance altogether. Every strike they landed opened up cuts deep and true. Shiv peeled chunks of bread away from himself, trying to preserve his own life while reaching out for the other chefs. Nearby, Velly cried out as well. The lizard-chef stumbled into view, and then something erupted out from his back just as he drew his spatula. “Norrnso—agghh!”

A geyser of gore sprayed over Shiv's mass of Vitae, and from a ripping chasm of welling red ran down Velly’s back, came a large chunk of gingerbread. It was faintly baked into a humanoid shape, resembling a knight in plate armor. Its edges were crusted bright gold, and it stank of blood and sugar. In its right hand, it wielded a blade that seemed to be made from sunflowers and bore the scent of earth and petrichor. “For supping our flesh with your unworthy lips, a toll will be reaped in turn. For flesh begets flesh, and Princess Plum Blossom will not be denied her flavors in weight, animal or soil though its parent might be; patternist of samsarist its fate be designed.”

The knight issued this proclamation as it swung its blades across Velly’s insides, making the wound that nested it larger. As it came out, a small legion of other gingerbread knights followed, and they called out aloud, proclaiming the glory of Princess Blossom and the Court of Summer Eternal in loud telepathic shrieks that splashed against Shiv’s Shapeless Tides.

With a final flex of effort, Shiv shredded enough bread from himself that he found himself able to move again. More importantly, his magic didn’t feel so laden by aching weight. He halted time and cast his Vitae strands forward. He slammed into the attacking faebread, and his glistening lengths of red, white, and gold crashed down on them—

And promptly recoiled in pain. The bread glowed bright in brilliant gold, so thick and dense of Chronomancy that they felt harder than even the Tarrasque's crystalline shell. Comparatively, Shiv's temporal shell cracked as if stone dashed against metal. And if that wasn't bad enough, he felt a spreading malignant crawl over his mana and across his soulstuff like a second layer of skin. Spots of mold expanded over his vitae first. And it took barely half a heartbeat for it to ferment into spreading patches of bread.

With that came a second, unwelcome surprise: All the Faebread in the room turned, ignoring his power over time. Their bodies glowed a particularly sickly glow of gold, festering with mold spots, and Shiv developed a building suspicion that they had their counterpart lores to the Magical Skills Shiv knew.

"What's this? What's this?" the faebread sang at once, their little lips and porous faces bending and snarling in unison. Some pointed at him. Some of them laughed. Others snarled. "A surprise! An unexpected adversary! This one is not dead! This one wears the face of another! A soul! Different! A soul that bears no end, that burns and burns forever more! A blazing existence lit by a hybrid mind! Bestial! Individual! Something more! The summer is pleased! Your harvest is bounty enduring! An unending Path! Delight! Glory!"

With every proclamation, the fey-bred grew stronger, the chronomancy shrouding them even denser. They began to vibrate against Shiv's own magic now, the resonance contrary to his, unnatural. Where he bade time to stand still, where he was clasped in a shell that allowed him to stride forward into the future, his present extended, his past lingering behind him like a chain he could crawl back to. The fey were different. They were a fixed point. They didn't move, but everything around them grew calcified.

The last embers of amusement fled from Shiv. Ridiculous though his adversary might be, they had just slain three other chefs in a startling instant, and now he was affected by their most anomalous magic. Magic he couldn't understand by an enemy he couldn't comprehend. I need to call Culliweir, Shiv realized. He might know what to do with them.

Immediately, the Deathless's strategy went from counter-attacking to escaping. He began pumping out the dark miasma from his creeping void, and a swell of shadows swallowed the room. In that moment, the attacking bread fairies cried out. Some of their tarnished Chronomancy lost its luster. The bread shrank and shriveled, wailing in misery as they collapsed. Shiv didn't understand why, but his instincts told him to move, to break contact entirely, and so he used his Non-Sequitur Skill—

Tearing agony spread across Shiv's being. He howled internally, and the patches of his vitae, his magic, his soul that were shrouded by the spreading fey mold were torn away from him. Sprays of white and red filled the air, and they vanished into faint puffs of vapor. The deathless continued to move, but he no longer felt affected. In fact, he was lighter. Even with multiple mana fields strained, he was free of the Feybreads' influence, and he realized that diving out of context severed him from their touch. 'So, there is a limit to their ability. They can't just keep infecting me when I flee from the world.'

A surge of hope kindled Shiv's resolve. The Fae were not unbeatable. They had limits. They had rules as well, strange as those rules were.

The Creeping Void 123 > 126

Non-Sequitur 110 > 116

A rush of levels nourished Shiv's soul. It took him a moment to understand why. In the darkness, the Faebread were shriveling, vanishing. They were dissolving. The Gingerbread Knights held up their blades. They swung wide. Their golden mana was actively being extinguished, and they were but fading candles winking out within a sea of ink.

“Light!” they cried out as one, their voices resonating beyond the wavelength of sound echoing inside Shiv's mind and soul. "Light, give us back the light!"

Shiv never stopped pumping out his creeping void, even as he retreated across the ingredients chamber. Yet, after three seconds, the bread all but dissolved. Every single piece, be it gingerbread, breadstick, or whatever other monstrosity, was undone, unmade. It was like the darkness itself ate them.

They melt in shadows, Shiv realized. I need to keep my Creeping Void active. Keep them away from me.

After a few heartbeats, when Shiv could feel and hear no more of the Faebread, he let his temporal shell drop. He only had two seconds of time left, and his Chronomantic field was more flayed than a tarp ravaged by shrapnel. Strips of gold remained of his time magic, and it was a miracle that it lasted that long. As the flow of the natural present resumed, Shiv waited a few seconds longer, and then he deactivated his non sequitur as well. He never stopped releasing more darkness into the room.

“Hello? Shiv? Shiv?” Adam called aloud. At some point during the carnage and chaos, Shiv's Psychomancy field had been severed. And that was a good thing too. With how the bread was spreading across his mana, his body, his soul. If Adam had gotten infected… 

Shiv didn't want to think about that.

The Deathless extended a tendril of mind magic back into his cape. It was attached to the messy swill of Vitae alongside his mask, armor, frying pan, and a few other items. His shadow-walking boots remained with his most recent corpse, and Shiv really didn’t want to risk his life to reclaim it just yet. “I'm here. Just died. The bread managed to build up inside me. It tore its way out of me.”

A beat followed. “Tore its way out? The bread?” Adam sounded utterly incredulous. “You were just killed by bread.”

“Not just me. The other three chefs too,” Shiv replied. He looked in the direction of Velly, of Nornsong, and Bowden. The other chefs had no chance at all. Shiv had to guess the bread particulates had been building for a while. When the Feybread seized control of the air flow, taking the aeromantic filtration system, Shiv's fate was sealed. The bread were probably circulating through the interior of monster mystery meat. Everyone here was beginning to accumulate crumbs inside themselves. Faint powder-sized crumbs that began to build and build until they were large enough to form chains of magic, creating fatal portals that allowed more bread to burst out from within.

“I'm sorry,” Helix said, speaking aloud. “Did you just say the bread killed everyone?” The orc sounded even more skeptical than Adam did. “I'm coming out. I don't know what ridiculousness has gotten into you, Insul, but—”

“You stay the hell inside!” Shiv snarled. “You come out, and if that bread infects you, it's going to crawl across your Biomancy. If that happens, there’s nothing I can do for you. It contaminated my mana. It started spreading fungal mold or some shit. I could barely move. If I didn't have my shapeless tides, I would have been overwhelmed! I would have been completely swallowed by… by bread cancers.”

A pained noise came from Adam. “Shiv, I'm being dead serious when I ask you this. Is this some kind of joke? Are you coming up with some kind of twisted prank right now?”

“Nope, not a joke. Stupid as it sounds, the bread is felling killer. The head chef of Monster Mystery Meat is dead. Two other chefs helping him are also dead. I died too. My toughness barely did anything. The Fae magic spread through me, even with my Legendary-Tier Magical Resistance. The tides did something, knocking some of the bread off, but it just kept growing and growing. It’s worse than Andra's frost magic.”

The Deathless sighed. “Look, I know it sounds ridiculous, it is ridiculous, but I need you two to stay there. I'm releasing more of my Creeping Void. It's the only thing keeping us safe. It seems like they can't handle darkness, it just eats them somehow. And using Non-Sequitur ripped away the parts of me that were contaminated. But I'm not going to assume anything with the fey bread. I'm calling Cullywier. Adam, get a Vielpiercer ready and open a way back to the coliseum. If things go south, I need you to run.”

“You need him to run?” Helix said, outraged. “What about me?”

“Yeah, well, I don't really care about you that much, Helix,” Shiv replied. “You can stay and fight with me if you want. You'll just come back from the dead eventually anyway. You're an orc. It’ll just be a new experience for you.”

“Do you think I will earn much favor for the Challenger if I am struck down by bread?” Helix hissed. “What will the other orcs say?”

“That you’re a sneering, arrogant, stuck-up Biomancer who thinks too highly of himself? Helix, doesn’t matter what you say, they’ll just keep bullying you. Because that’s who they are, and you’re who you are.”

The Biomancer sputtered, but Shiv moved on.

“Cullywier!” Shiv cried aloud, and then came a rush of fragrant wind. Suddenly, Cullywier manifested right next to Shiv. He blinked, staring at the kitchen with his unnaturally large eyes, and a pensive expression crawled over him, at least what Shiv assumed would be a pensive expression. It was hard to read a fairy's face; calling Cullywier uncanny was an understatement.

“What has transpired here?” Cullywier said with a faint hint of startlement. He looked to his left and right and appeared lost. And that was when Shiv realized Cullywier couldn't see through the Creeping Void.

“Yeah, sorry,” Shiv groaned. “I can't really drop the shadows. We're being attacked by Faebread. I think they're from the Summer Court or something? The bread with Princess Plum Blossom? I don't know. All I know is that they melt inside shadows.”

“As do all creatures born of the Court of Summer,” Cullywier replied. “And Princess Plum Blossom, you say? Well, that's not good. The Princess of Fertility is not known to be forgiving when someone eats her delicious morsels. But I'm more surprised that you managed to steal something from her. The court of summer is well guarded. To walk in the light of the laughing radiance without a pardon from the queen of the court—”

“Listen, I didn't cause this shit. I didn’t steal any bread. The people who caused this are dead. The fey bread just hatched out from them. I think the Faebred are in the air filtration system right now. There are a lot of other customers inside the building. The bread themselves should be holed up in the kitchen. I need a few things from you: I need to know what they can do and how I can kill them, because with everyone else being dead, this is now my problem. Shit. How am I supposed to get extra credit for this now…”

At that, Cullwier winced. “A fairy doesn't technically die. Not in the same way you patternists do.”

“Yeah, that's another thing,” Shiv said. “What the hells is a patternist?”

“Oh, it is simply what the fair folk call you mortals. We are not so touched by the entropy. We are consistent, we are persistent, we are cyclical. The system holds on to us. We are the children of pure narrative.” And then there was a flicker of something behind Cullywier's eyes, as if a hint of disgust or disbelief, “Or so the kings and queens of our courts claim.”

Psycho-Cartography: He doesn't believe that. More importantly, there is something between Cullywier and the courts. All of them. The reason of his exile continues to weigh on him.

“Ok, so the fairies don't die like most people do. How do I get rid of them? There’s gotta be a way. They turned into dense blocks of Chronomancy when I hit them earlier, too. It was like punching a stone wall as a Pathless.”

“Ah. We are fixed beings of time as well. You cannot strike us with your Chronomancy that way. The fairest endure everlasting, I’m afraid. That is the nature of our lore. We cannot be moved. But you could just leave, Deathless. There's nothing forcing you to stay here. I do not see how this is your duty now.”

“There are fifty customers inside this kitchen,” Shiv snarled. “I am not letting them get eaten from the inside out by bread.”

A low whine of wind escaped Cullywier, and Shiv guessed that was the fairy equivalent to a sigh.

“Well then, explain the entirety of this travesty to me. It is hard to tell what might be the resolution for such a problem. Perhaps there is no resolution at all. It is an ugly thing to do, to steal from a princess of the Summer Court. Gentle though Summer might be— there is wrath in fertility, and a price must always be paid to even the scales.”

Shiv told Cullywier everything he knew, and by the time he was done, the whistling winds grew louder and lower with every passing second. “This is a most unfortunate story. For them to have stolen fey bread, and for the bread to have awoken, a significant amount of wrongs must already have been enacted. Some of the bread must have been consumed, and the time of the Great Harvest is looming nigh.”

“What's the Great Harvest?” Shiv asked.

“It is the time when the cycle begins anew. The prestige and power of the Four Courts is always in flux, and at the beginning of the story, summer is the brightest, the greatest, the grandest, and they hold the most sway over the land. What has been taken by Winter at the end of the last story will be regrown. What is darkness and shadow will be pushed back by the laughing radiance, and that which is in between spring and fall will succumb then to the domain of light.”

Shiv grunted as he took in this information. “So let me guess: if the princess doesn't eat the right amount of bread, or she's not fed the right amount of whatever, she's probably not going to be able to do the whole balancing thing, and everything will be uneven by the time the next cycle comes around, which makes Summer weaker.”

Deductive Reasoning 8 > 12

“That is correct,” Cullywier replied, sounding surprised. “Do you know something about the Fair Woods?”

“No, it's just a guess,” Shiv said. “But with how the shadows seem to eat the bread, I'm guessing there's some kind of narrative irony and balance involved in all of this.”

“That is one way of looking at it,” Cullwier said. “Alas, if you wish to resolve this matter, it will not be so simple as plunging everything into darkness. The shadows will wound the creatures of summer. Severed from the light, they will weaken, they will wane. But only the weakest pawns of the court will fully be swallowed by the touch of winter.”

“Touch of winter?” Shiv said. “So what? The shadows belong to the Court of Winter, or something?”

“Right again. Summer is life, is growth, it's light, and it is birth. There are a great many more concepts and elements associated with Summer, but these are the major ones. With Winter, Darkness, Night, Death, and Cold. They are the ones that channel withering, and they bring balance to the fair woods so that we might begin the story anew.”

“A system of perfect and eternal strife,” Adam said from within Shiv's cape. “That's why you all managed to stay in equilibrium. That's why you never die. The system must have constantly been fed by this enduring struggle.”

And the Deathless picked up where Adam left off. “Because they're all supposed to be in a system of balance, anything that is taken from princess Plum Blossom will be to winter's advantage.”

“Though everyone wishes for the fluxing cycle to remain, greed and want remain at the core of our hearts. We are not so different from you,” Cullywier let out a hum. “More than many of my kind like to admit.”

“So functionally, what does that mean? Does that mean that even if I get into the kitchen, and I try to strike down all the fey bread, nothing's gonna happen?”

“The pawns will fall to you all the same, but the High Bread Anointed by Princess Plum Blossom to guard and lead its fellows endure and remain. In fact, I can feel him in the kitchen—and he’s only growing stronger. He’s about to pass the threshold to your equivalent to True Hero soon.”

“What? He’s leveling?”

“Not exactly. And yes. We are… open beings,” Cullywier elaborated. “Mana flows into and leaves us. This means we can walk across all worlds, and we do not have our own internal reserve of magic and skills. Our narratives are shared with the world around us, and the Ambient Threshold. When certain conditions are triggered, however, we can call upon far more power. Right now, the Anointed High Bread has cause for retribution, and so power will flow to him to see his desires manifested.”

“Great. So the system is helping his ass directly.”

“It’s worse than that, I fear. The High Bread will not be struck down by you, for you are an interloper in the story, an outsider. They might be fascinated by you, Deathless, but ultimately, you bear little narrative significance right now. And that makes you weak in this tale. Even if you are technically Legendary-Tier, that only affects you and the world. Compared to the knighted bread, you are nothing. Nothing at all. Not even a named adversary. Not until you convince the fair lore of your significance.”

“And what the hell is 'fair lore'?” Shiv asked.

“It is the unseen intelligence that reigns over the Fairwoods—like an awakened child of the system. It has its tendrils in all of us, its children as well. It knows of you, Deathless. It has seen you, but it does not regard you. I know this because you do not shine before me. Not like someone who has been dubbed a hero or villain or a proper character might. Thus, if you go forth in the kitchen right now, when you lay eyes on the High Bread, behold the glowing sun shining high above it. You will see and burn beneath the glare of the Laughing Radiance, and your attacks will be as if feathers landing on the face of a mountain. For there is no tension here, only a sense of wrongness. You must conform to the tale to bear weight against a true warrior of the fae.”

Shiv's right eye twitched. Dealing with the Fair Folk was beginning to feel a little bit like handling the eldritch. Both were very annoying in specific, bullshit ways. 'So, how do I make myself matter? How do I get this guy to fuck off back to where he came from?'

Cullowere spent a moment and thought. “The easiest way is if you manage to strike an accord with the knighted one.”

“An accord,” Shiv nearly sputtered. “You want me to go negotiate some kind of diplomatic settlement with a piece of bread?”

“That would be the simplest solution, yes.” Cullywier offered him a smile, but it seemed unnatural and forced.

Psycho-Cartography: If you expect me to be able to pick up psychological weaknesses and social mistakes from pieces of awakened dairy products, you are overestimating my Tier and also using the wrong skill. Perhaps Master-Tier Schizophrenia will let you know what hides at the heart of living bread.

“Deathless, are you well? You've been silent for a few moments,” Cullywier asked.

“Yeah, I'm just trying to process the fact that I'm going to have to argue with a piece of bread to save the lives of the customers here. What the hells is my life?”

“I will say this much. If being favored is a perfect antidote against boredom,” Adam muttered.

“So if negotiations fail,” Shiv began, “what other choices do I got? I know that my darkness can't kill this Anointed One specifically, but can it weaken him enough that I can stick him in a cage?”

“That is a potential option,” Cullywier said. “You claim the chefs here captured the fey bread? If so, then they might have a container made from cold iron somewhere. You might not be able to hurt the knighted one reliably, but you could still overpower them.”

“And if you can seal the cage shut in the meantime, I could keep them contained,” Shiv finished.

And then there was a final thing that occurred to the Deathless. He summoned his Last Morsel, and it snapped to one of his Vitae strands. 

Cook the Uncookable, Shiv thought to himself. All right, well, if everything goes south, then we're going to find out if you can boil one of the fae to death.

The thought appealed to Shiv, but he had a growing feeling of risk as well. He knew his last morsel was supposedly indestructible, but that didn't mean that it couldn't be consumed by bread. The last thing he wanted was his Legendary frying pan contaminated and ruined by fae magic.

“Okay, so either we negotiate a deal with this High Bread guy, try to overpower him and shove him back in the cage, or…”

“Incurring Harlock's notice and having the Ascendant cast this place into a prison plane of shadows. After that, it's most likely that the Ascendancy will finish striking a bargain with the Fairwoods, making up for whatever has been taken from the Court of Summer. This wouldn't be the first time such a thing has occurred, anyhow. The powers that be on your world send a great many caravans through the Chernobyl Nexus Point to the Fairwoods and other worlds.”

That option left him feeling uncomfortable. True, he could call upon Cripple or Veronica to take over for this situation, but that would make him vulnerable. And frankly, he wanted to see this done himself, if only to discover how he could overcome the fairies.

“Would that be all, Deathless?” Cullywier said. “The Dragon Brokers are summoning me, and though my time is primarily signed over to you, they do get quite upset when I am not prompt.”

“For now, Cullywier,” Shiv said. “But I might need you in a little bit. Hell, I might need you really soon, depending on how things go.”

The fairy pressed his lips together and cocked his head. “When you speak to one of the Fairies, listen carefully. Think about the meaning behind their words. They can't lie to you outright; it is not within our nature. But there is something that they can do: they can obfuscate. They can blind you with twisted meanings and missing information. Be mindful, and have a plan of escape.”

“Got it,” Shiv replied. “Adam, Helix, you guys are leaving now too. Head back for the coliseum. Adam, keep an eye on this place using your awareness. If everything goes to hell, well, I don't know, tell Irons or something. Then have him bring the guard down on this place.”

“I think it's best for me to stay,” Adam said. “Helix can inform Irons when he returns later. For now, I think it's best that I accompany you. Your worries are correct. I've noticed some crumbs spilling out from each of the vents in all the rooms. They're building up slowly, especially in the customers right now. If I have to guess, we don't have long before a mass casualty event follows. And there will be more things that might be missed if I am not with you.”

“Shit,” Shiv grunted. And once again, the pressure was on. “All right, Adam, but if anything goes wrong, you get ready to get out of here. And you stay close to me in the darkness. If one of those bread pieces touches you, it's gonna spread through you.”

“Well then, I think it's best that I remain untouched,” Adam said. He emerged from Shiv's cape along with the orc. Shiv used that opportunity to borrow some vitality from Helix for the sake of an easy resurrection. After that, Adam fired a veil-piercer across into the coliseum, and the orc retreated temporarily. 

“Make sure you don't die, Insul, and don't get turned into a piece of fairy bread,” the orc said with a sneer. “I swear, the things you get involved with are just…”

“Yeah, well, this is my life now,” Shiv said. “I can't walk across the street without killing some bastard or fighting some freak thing no one's seen before. If you're going to complain now, you pledged yourself to the wrong guy.”

“This isn't me complaining,” Helix said, rolling his eyes. He floated across the dimensional pathway and turned halfway through. “This is me simply telling you to watch yourself.”

As Helix crossed over, Shiv and Adam looked at each other. 

“If he wasn't an orc,” Adam said, “I'd say he's actively worried about you.”

“He is actively worried about me,” Shiv grunted. “He's worried that he won't have anyone to show off his cool biomancy to if I'm gone.”

“There are always the other orcs,” Adam suggested.

“Yeah, if he wants to get bullied,” Shiv shot back.

“I heard that!” Helix called aloud. “No one bullies me. It's just that they can't appreciate my knowledge and my mastery of the finest magical lore in all the lores.” And with that, Helix huffed loudly and accelerated.

“I think we hurt his feelings,” Adam said with a faint chuckle.

“Yeah. He’ll probably take that out on my homunculus.” Shiv snorted.

“Your what?”

“He made a messed up clone of me for Biomancy.”

“...You know what, the fact we’re fighting living pieces of awakened bread isn’t that unusual.”

The dimensional pathway began to shrink, and Adam turned away, his azure eyes glowed, and that sparkle of sunset burned at his core. He was using his awareness skill, turning it upon the kitchen itself.

“Well, then, we have quite the welcoming party waiting for us. Most of the kitchen is utterly caked in dough and mold, and there are gingerbread knights hiding inside the dough. God, Shiv. We're going to be walking right into a death trap there.”

The Deathless shed a temporal echo in place so he could retreat across time if things went wrong in a second. The Deathless paired his mind with Adam's, and he saw what the Gate Lord did. The kitchen had been entirely consumed by yeast, mold, and bread. Adam, seer of horizons, jumped in deeper and Shiv realized that the bread had a specific aesthetic to it. It looked like the interior of some castle. There were glowing orbs of light hanging from above. The chandeliers there were made from hardened pretzels.

Legions of gingerbread knights were formed, and they rode upon baguettes as if the long lengths of bread were steeds. There were unusual growths fused into the mold and breads as well. Growths that struggled and screamed. Shiv realized that was probably the remainder of the kitchen staff. Why they had been left alive, the deathless didn't know, but he suspected it wasn't out of mercy.

And then at the very center of the hall was a glowing figure, one that Shiv briefly glimpsed earlier. There were faces lodged in the figure's torso. Screaming faces that resembled humans, goblins, elves, even one automaton. That large figure had four arms, and it seemed to be shaped from a crust of deep brown armor. The color was rich, and it ebbed with gleaming might.

Shiv never found a piece of burned bread intimidating, but something about this one made him more than a little wary.

“Adam,” Shiv said, his mouth opening and closing a few times. “Does that look like toast to you?”

“Yes,” Adam replied after a full second. “Yes, it does.”

And impossibly, the towering, toast-armored figure stared back at them, staring straight toward Adam's Seer of Horizons. “Ah, I see. Someone peeks upon an anointed knight of the summer court. Is that you, undying thing? Are you still here? You have not fled? Then you are braver than most of your kind. If you seek to save the other patternists, then come into this place I have reshaped from a dungeon of torment into a hall of power. Come and make your offering. Bargain for their lives. Make right what you have taken. You do not have long. Soon I will strike a blow against your people for summer. The balance must be maintained, or a toll must be reaped. There is no other way. Bread has been taken, and in turn, we demand blood and flesh. Come with a bounty, or you will not leave with your lives…”

A few seconds passed. Shiv lowered his head. 'Well, I guess we should go talk to this Toast Armor guy.'

“Stupid as this all feels, I shudder to imagine what he might want from us,” Adam grimaced. “He's already killed three chefs in retribution. What could the Summer Court possibly want? And what could we have to give?”

“I don't know, Adam,” Shiv muttered. A building weight of uncertainty was growing inside him. He clenched his Last Morsel tight. “I don't know, just be ready for shit to go sideways.”

“That's pretty much how everything turns out for us now,” Adam sighed. “Well. Let’s see this crisis resolved.”