A high-pitched shriek ripped through the air, followed by a concussive boom that rattled Ruvani’s teeth. Her prized porcelain mug, delicately patterned with swirling, azure ‘Glyph-Wisteria’, sloshed, threatening to spill precious Earl Grey onto her pristine laboratory coat. Really, the nerve of some portals. One moment, she was contemplating the perfect steeping time for a second infusion, the next, she’d been unceremoniously dumped onto what appeared to be a field of churned crimson mud, reeking of ozone, char, and something metallic that made her nose twitch with professional curiosity.
“Oh, come on,” Ruvani muttered, steadying her grip. Her gaze swept over the landscape, a vast, flat expanse beneath a sky choked with bruised, purple clouds. Jagged, obsidian structures, impossibly tall, pierced the gloom in the distance – Jal-Teros, without a doubt. The ‘toxic mist’ from the Nexus Guide’s data files wasn’t mist at all, but a roiling, green-black miasma that shimmered with an unsettling internal light, occasionally spitting crackling bolts into the plains.
She took a sip of her tea, humming softly. The bergamot was exquisite. Then her bright, amethyst eyes landed on the source of the metallic scent. A man, or what was left of one, lay sprawled just a few feet away. His armor, once gleaming silver, was now a mangled husk of dented iron and scorched leather. A jagged shard of bone protruded grotesquely from his left shoulder, but it was the creeping, ink-black network of veins spiderwebbing across his exposed skin that seized Ruvani’s attention.
He was still breathing, a ragged, wet gasp, but the necrosis had already claimed his eyes, turning them into cloudy, milky orbs. A discarded vanguard shield, emblazoned with the crest of a soaring falcon, lay half-buried beside him. Zhevan, then. The fiercely devoted vanguard knight, betrayed and left for dead. Excellent. Just the kind of project she needed to kickstart her multiverse-curing vacation.
[WARNING! UNFORESEEN TRANSMIGRATION EVENT DETECTED! HOST HAS DEVIATED FROM PROTOCOL 'OBSERVE & INTEGRATE'!]
[WARNING! TARGET: ZHEVAN (PRIMARY SUPPORT CHARACTER, ORIGINAL PLOTLINE: FATAL BETRAYAL) DETECTED! HOST IS IN PROXIMITY TO A CRITICAL PLOT POINT!]
[WARNING! SYSTEM INTEGRITY AT 0.001%! IMMEDIATE RECALIBRATION REQUIRED! HOST, CEASE NON-CANON INTERFERENCE!]
Ruvani blinked at the frantic, luminous orb that had materialized beside her, screaming in all-caps. “Oh, quiet down, you,” she chided, taking another calming sip. “It’s just a little detour. He looks quite… ripe for intervention, wouldn’t you say?”
Another artillery shell screamed overhead, detonating with a deafening roar fifty yards away. Fragments of obsidian rock and superheated earth rained down, peppering the ground around her. Ruvani didn’t flinch, her gaze fixed on Zhevan’s deteriorating condition. The black veins pulsed, counting down his final minutes before the tissue turned to brittle ash. He was nearly there.
“Right,” she chirped, setting her mug carefully on a relatively dry patch of ground. “Needs a strong alkaloid neutralizer, fast. Something with high ionic exchange capacity…” Her eyes scanned the chaotic battlefield. Hulking, multi-limbed creatures, the ‘Spore-Hounds’ from her briefing, lumbered through the smoke, their backs encrusted with a vivid, emerald green moss. Bingo. *Viridian Spore-Fleece*. Potent neurotoxin, but distilled, a miracle worker against necrotic rot.
One of the Spore-Hounds, a beast easily the size of a small carriage, was stomping towards them, its six chitinous legs crushing fallen armor like dry leaves. Its maw, a ring of needle-sharp teeth, dripped corrosive slime. Its hide bristled with the lichen she needed.
“Alright, you big, grumpy slug!” Ruvani called out, a bright, disarming smile on her face. She pulled a delicate, silver-handled scraping tool from an inner pocket of her coat. “Just need a little off the top, if you don’t mind!”
[WARNING! HOST IS ACTIVELY ENGAGING HOSTILE FAUNA! DANGER LEVEL: EXTREME! RECALIBRATE! RECALIBRATE!]
The Nexus Guide spun wildly, its hovering textbox a blur of red. Ruvani ignored it, dashing forward with an astonishing burst of speed. The Spore-Hound, distracted by an advancing contingent of armored soldiers, lumbered past Zhevan without noticing the tiny, cheerful woman. Ruvani sprinted after it, darting under a flailing limb that could have crushed her flat. She leaped, landing nimbly on its moss-covered back, the scraping tool already in motion.
The beast roared, its massive body jerking violently. Ruvani, balanced precariously, dug the scraper in, severing a fist-sized chunk of the vivid moss. The air around it shimmered with residual toxins, but Ruvani merely held her breath, her focus absolute. She pocketed the moss, somersaulting off the monster’s back just as it slammed into a crumbling barricade. Artillery fire still rained down, but Ruvani barely registered it.
She knelt beside Zhevan, pulling out a compact, multi-layered filtration apparatus from another coat pocket. With practiced ease, she crushed the moss, filtered it through several complex membranes, and activated a small, internal heating coil. A few drops of crystalline liquid, faintly iridescent, dripped into a waiting vial.
“There we go, sleepyhead,” she murmured, uncorking the vial. Zhevan’s breathing was now a shallow rattle. His chest barely moved. The black veins had reached his neck, pulsing ominously.
Ruvani, with a casual strength that belied her petite frame, lifted Zhevan’s head. She pinched his nose gently, then poured the iridescent liquid into his mouth. He choked, a weak, involuntary spasm, but swallowed.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, a gasp tore from Zhevan’s throat. The ink-black veins, which had moments before seemed irrevocably etched into his skin, began to recede. Slowly at first, then with astonishing speed, they vanished, pulling back into his body until his skin was once again a pale, normal tone. The milky film over his eyes cleared, revealing irises the color of chipped granite. He blinked, a long, confused blink, then gasped again, a deep, shuddering breath that filled his lungs.
He looked up, bewildered, at the bright-eyed woman holding him. Ruvani offered him a small, reassuring smile. “Feeling better? Bit of a nasty bite you had there, darling.” She reached for her mug, taking a sip, then offered it to him. “Fancy a spot of Earl Grey? Helps with the shock.”
Zhevan stared at the delicate porcelain mug, then at the cheerful, unconcerned face above him, his mind struggling to process what had just happened. He was… alive? A massive shadow fell over them, blotting out the already dim sky. The toxic mist, previously swirling lazily, parted with an unnatural shudder. A colossal, multi-jointed behemoth, armored in layers of jagged, volcanic rock, emerged from the gloom. Its head, a cruel, elongated skull, swiveled slowly. Two burning crimson eyes, each the size of a war-wagon, locked onto Ruvani, a silent, predatory focus.
[ALERT! LEVEL-9 SIEGE-BEAST ‘VAULT-JUGGERNAUT’ DETECTED! IMMEDIATE EVACUATION RECOMMENDED!]
“Oh, you have *got* to be kidding me,” Ruvani said, her cheerful façade slipping just a fraction. She glanced from the behemoth to her half-finished tea. This was going to be a problem.