Nebula's Premise

"That is one big city," said one big man.

We were looking at the wall only, since we really couldn't see inside from our perspective. The connection I felt with the mystery visitor had definitely led us here. As we grew closer, the road had meandered somewhat, and that let me know that our destination lay somewhere inside. Something was bothering me, though.

As the city grew in our view, I'd noticed that the pull I was feeling seemed to subside. At first, I thought it was through proximity, but then I realized that wasn't quite the case. Instead, as subtle as the process was, it seemed to be because it was fanning out over a larger area. Becoming more diffuse, as it were. Like a breeze instead of a noticeable tug pulling me along.

I could still tell generally it was indicating the city, but I realized as we came to the gates and waited in the entrance line that it wasn't going to be so easy as just waltzing in and having it pull me directly to my soul interloper.

"Definitely not going to be as easy as we hoped," I mentioned. "The closer we get, the more diffuse the feeling is." I'd long since explained what was going on regarding the feeling.

"Fascinating," István said, because of course that's what he thought. Pretty sure the man could summon some legitimate scientific curiosity if I managed to fart tunefully. At least he continued with his thoughts: "I would expect if it was a point source of some kind as we expected for it to refine as we grew closer. For it to instead do the opposite, we are looking at an emissive area."

I wasn't entirely sure what he was getting at, so I gestured at his 'little' brother with my shoulder. "But he can't punch an area." I said, before realizing that underestimating the breadth of what he could impart physical violence upon was probably unwise. "Well, he probably can, but this one has people in it."

Viktor seemed to think this was sage advice, so I kept rolling. "So unless we can nail down this 'emissive area' as you called it, our options dwindle significantly. That, and we have to get into the city somehow."

"That won't be a problem," said Celistar. She'd long since sobered up, having been quite embarrassed at waking up in Viktor's arms. The feeling was definitely mutual, and there was a bit of awkwardness between them that hadn't quite faded away. The rest of us hadn't even told her how she'd behaved while in the tavern. I, at least, was saving that ammunition in the event I needed a counter-battery of some sort in the future.

I looked at her, and she continued. "You just stand in front and look important. If they try to slow us down too much, just let your Nebula out." I wasn't sure that she realized what she was asking for, so I kept my gaze steady. "Oh, yeah, not all of it. Just a moderate amount." That was better instructions.

I wasn't entirely sure what 'important' looked like, but I was hopefully in decent shape to do it. We'd cleaned off the fancy Azure Sky hanfu robes we had (again), but they were starting to show the side effects of trekking hither and yon, as I'd expected.

Turns out though, that István had a complete backup set.

"Hold up," I said, when he had handed them to me. "I'm not letting this one slide. Just where are you keeping all this stuff?"

He laughed, "Not saying, and you will not make me divulge it. You have to figure it out for yourself. The answer is pretty obvious if you think about it."

"You say that like I'm good at thinking," I retorted, and he grinned again before shrugging, not giving up one iota of information with his expression.

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Back in the present, I was still turning that over in my head when we reached the front of the queue. Resplendent in my blue and gold robes, I looked the guard directly in the eye, leaning a bit of power into my own, not enough to make it obvious but just enough to get the most subtle of glows.

He took one look at me, Celistar slightly behind and to the side of me, and then the two mismatched Elders in the back, and just waved us through, blinking his eyes rapidly for some reason, like they were tearing up. I felt Celistar squeeze from the far side and then remembered how to walk, leading us through. Behind me, I felt him swap out with one of the other guards, which made me nervous.

"That was not what I expected," I said, hoping someone would pick up on the subtext without me having to be too obvious about it.

"Guards for the big cities - and our sect - have a special seal applied directly to their eyes," the Ancient One explained, with a mischievous grin. "It's not well known, but it gives them some very basic information about the individuals coming through the gate. It's not designed for persons of your… presence, shall we say. You probably just vaporized it right off his eyes on the spot."

Well, that explained the blinking, at least. Poor dude.

"The common courtesy is to warn the gate in advance, but we don't really have any way to do so, since any one of us would likely overwhelm the seal," she continued. "So I sent you up there to obliterate it instantly, which should be the most painless way."

"Glad to have a use, I guess?" I said as we proceeded through a tunnel into the city proper.

"World will definitely spread that someone like you has come," she elaborated further, "Not sure what that will mean though. It has been ages since I've been out into the world at large. I don't know what to expect."

"But you expect something," István followed up.

"That I do."

"This place is pretty cool," I said. I didn't say it just because they had meat on a stick. But that definitely weighted my decision to the favorable side of the scale.

Viktor nodded exuberantly, as he was too busy chewing to properly respond. He had stick meats wedged between each of his fingers, to the point it looked like his fists had sprouted an extra set of flavorful phalanges.

I wasn't sure what to expect when we entered, but the tall ramshackle buildings leaning in precariously over the streets was not it. They seemed to defy gravity in a way, and some of them were propped apart in a way that seemed pretty structural, so maybe they were.

While I didn't have any great measure of discomfort from it, as I was fairly confident in my ability to shield us should they suddenly collapse over my head, it was disconcerting that people lived that way.

It did occur to me that it wasn't like the home I had been living in prior to coming to the Stormwind Circle was any sturdier than these were; it was just using the flimsiness more safely. If the roof fell in on our family, it'd just be some loose, relatively lightweight tin (hopefully), not the two or three families above us as well.

We were attracting a ton of attention, of course, of all different types. Most of it was hawkers like the one who had sold Viktor his edible hands - people realizing we could definitely afford their wares and trying hard to part us from our money.

I did catch a few faces in dark corners before they disappeared - probably people who would wish to part us from our wallets in a more literal sense deciding that the risk wasn't worth the reward.

Either way, it felt oddly like home to me, the kind of crowded hubbub reminding me of the sort of shanty-town vibe I was used to seeing walking to and from work.

We rounded a corner, and the architecture changed dramatically, going from stick and board construction to something with a lot more substance to it, a sort of stuccoed wall that seemed like it'd take time to do.

The closest buildings to the transition had the vibe of trying desperately to keep up to their neighbors, with an attempt to mimic the building material with none of the knowledge on the correct preparation, leading to them looking more like the outcome of an aggressively concentrated mud-fight than anything else.

Having lived on both sides of that line, I definitely knew the feeling of seeing something better just out of reach and being unable to accept that it was completely so.

I grew quiet in contemplation, cut off only by Celistar leading us deeper into the maze of buildings, where the quality only grew as we walked.

Just how far up the property value procession were we walking, anyway?