The corridor narrowed as they went deeper, runes etched into the stone pulsing faintly — brightening and dimming like something breathing in its sleep. Percia moved a half-step ahead, eyes tracking the floor.
She spoke without turning.
"Where do you think your master would be?"
Fern pursed her lips in contemplation, "Deeper. Probably in one of the sealed vaults or archives."
"And what draws her there specifically?" Percia's eyes didn't leave the floor. "This dungeon baits its inhabitants. What does it offer her?"
"Magical antiques. Grimoires. Mimic chests." Fern paused, as though running through a mental catalogue. "Anything she hasn't seen before."
Stark nodded along, wiping at the dried blood on his jaw. "Yeah. She'll just — stop. Stand there staring at some glowing orb or crumbling old book for hours. She's always spending our traveling funds on something weird."
The corner of Percia's mouth twitched. It reminded her of someone she once knew.
The memory arrived the way they always did. Uninvited. Precise.
Look at this one, Percia. The weave here — it's almost alive. Laughter, rare and unguarded, when the mimic chest snapped shut on empty air instead of her hand.
Percia exhaled softly through her nose.
"Very well."
She raised her right hand, palm upward. Mana gathered slowly — coiling like smoke. She murmured beneath her breath, the words too quiet for either of them to catch. The spell took shape carefully, feeling out the dungeon.
A single thread appeared. Thin as spider silk, faintly iridescent. It trembled once, then tugged toward a side passage she had noted weeks ago and never fully explored.
"There," she said. "It will adjust as we move. The dungeon will try to mislead — it can't help itself — but the thread holds the signature it's following. Stay close."
Fern reached out and let her fingers graze it. "...It's warm." She looked up. "What kind of spell is this?"
"It's nothing special; I just asked the dungeon to cooperate." Percia watched the thread settle. "Many spells are about cooperation."
She started forward. The thread drifted ahead like a will-o'-wisp, steady and unhurried. Fern and Stark fell in behind her.
Percia kept her eyes ahead.
But every few steps, when the corridor bent and the light dimmed, memories of her flashed by — the way her hair had billowed in the wind, the way her eyes had looked up at her.
She told herself it was only the dungeon playing tricks.
---
The dungeon went quiet around them.
Not gradually — it simply stopped. No skittering at the edges of the dark. No distant groan of shifting stone. The thread drifted ahead undisturbed, patient, leading them deeper through a silence that felt almost deliberate.
Fern walked close behind Percia, violet eyes flicking repeatedly to the elf's back. Silence pressed against her curiosity until it cracked.
"Your mana," she said softly, almost to herself. "It's like the ocean. I can't find the bottom of it. Even when you cast that tracking spell, it barely rippled."
Stark made a quiet sound of agreement. He'd been watching the same thing the way Percia moved — the precise way she placed each foot — not the loose, spell-heavy gait of most mages. It seemed that this elf understood something more than magic.
Percia spoke without slowing. "Stop probing at me. Both of you. It's rude."
Fern's cheeks flushed pink. She looked down at her boots, feigning ignorance.
Stark rubbed the back of his neck, "Sorry..."
Percia had already moved on. They followed in silence.
Several turns later the thread thinned, pressing itself flat against the face of a heavy stone door. Stark stepped up without being asked, set his shoulder against it, and heaved. The door gave way slowly.
They were greeted by a mimic chest. Large, ornate, carved to pass for something ancient and valuable. Its lid clamped shut around something stuck halfway inside — legs visible, kicking with waning energy, muffled cursing leaking out from within.
"Frieren-sama!"
Fern bolted forward, chiding under her breath about irresponsible masters.
Stark let out a short, incredulous chuckle under his breath. "She really did get herself stuck in a mimic. Classic."
Percia remained in the doorway.
She looked down at the familiar behind stuck in the chest and closed her eyes.
She didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
Fern was already prying at the mimic's edges, scolding the figure within the chest. Stark stepped up to help, wedging his chipped axe into the gap between lid and base, muscles straining.
With a splintering crack, the chest yielded.
The figure tumbled out in a heap of white hair and rumpled robes, coughing, brushing dust from her sleeves with an air of mild annoyance rather than alarm.
Fern was already beside her. "Frieren-sama — what have I told you about mimic chests? You could have at least waited for us—"
"Sorry, Fern." The small elf sat up, avoiding her student's eyes with practiced ease. "I got curious."
Her eyes hadn't changed.
Even after a thousand years—the familiar fall of snow-white hair, the way she tilted her head when mildly inconvenienced—there was no mistaking it.
It was her.
Frieren waved Fern off when she tried to wipe the monster spit from her sleeve. Her gaze drifted — past Fern, past Stark — and found the figure standing in the doorway.
She blinked once.
"…Percia?"
Fern looked between them, confused. Stark's quiet laugh died before it finished.
Percia didn't answer.
She felt the old, familiar ache bloom somewhere behind her ribs—not sharp, not new, just… there. The same ache that had felt when she'd left back then.
She told herself to turn. To walk back into the corridor and let this place close behind her.
Frieren tilted her head, studying her with those calm, unchanged green eyes.
"You're shorter than I remember," she said.
Percia closed her eyes.
"You've just grown taller."