Chapter 67: A New Threat to Remember
The observatory was quiet when they returned.
Helena met them at the entrance, her Thunderbird perched on the lamppost nearby. The bird’s blue feathers crackled with residual static, and its golden eyes tracked the party as they filed through the gate. Helena herself was composed as always, but Nathan had learned to read the tension in her shoulders.
"You’re back later than expected," she said. "And you all look like you’ve got something to tell me."
"We do." Nathan’s voice was tired. "We need to speak with Valerie. Now."
Helena studied his face for a moment. Then she nodded and turned toward the observatory. "I’ll wake her."
---
Valerie was not pleased to be woken.
She shuffled into her office in a robe over her combat tunic, her white hair sticking up in three different directions. Boris the Yeti padded behind her in his small form, his glacier-blue eyes squinting with irritation at being disturbed.
"This had better be good," Valerie muttered, settling into her chair. She hadn’t brought her TUFF GRANNY mug, which meant she was taking this seriously. "Helena said something about a hostile encounter."
Nathan gave the full report.
He told them about the tampered puzzle on Floor 3—the smashed valves, the gouged stone, the evidence of someone forcing their way through rather than solving the mechanism. He told them about the operative on Floor 4, waiting on a coral ledge in a flooded chamber. The Void Eel summon. The philosophy the operative had laid out with the calm certainty of a true believer.
He told them the name. The Nemesis Court.
And he told them the operative’s final words: "The Shepherd will be pleased."
Valerie’s expression didn’t change, but her eyes became more focused. It was a small shift, but Nathan caught it. She knew something. Or suspected something.
Helena was already pulling up maps and reports on her interface, her fingers moving quickly. "We’ve had scattered reports of unusual activity in the outer regions for months. Tower Collapses that didn’t match natural patterns. Strangers near Tower sites. But nothing organized. Nothing with a name." She looked up. "This changes things."
"Who are they?" Dillon asked. "The operative mentioned ’accelerated evolution.’ He said the Towers are a test, and the collapses are just speeding things up."
"They’re fanatics," Elise said quietly. "Whatever their philosophy is, they’re willing to kill for it. The collapses have killed dozens of people. Children. Families. And they consider that acceptable."
"More than acceptable," Nathan added. "Necessary. The operative said the weak perish and the strong survive. He said it’s nature."
Valerie was silent for a long moment. Then she spoke.
"Nathan. Stay a moment. The rest of you, get some rest. Helena, start compiling everything we have on unusual Tower activity in the outer regions. Cross-reference it with the locations of the collapses Nathan’s party has documented. I want a map by morning."
The party filed out. Garrett and Dillon headed toward the recovery ward—Red and the Cloud Serpent hadn’t been damaged, but the habit was ingrained. Elise paused at the door, her eyes meeting Nathan’s briefly, then left.
The door closed. Valerie and Nathan were alone.
---
"The Shepherd."
Valerie’s expression was grim as she said the name. Boris rumbled softly at her feet.
"That name. I’ve heard it before. Whispers. Rumors. Conspiracy. Climbers who’ve climbed higher Towers than most—Top 100, some of them—mentioning a figure called ’the Shepherd’ in connection with something called the Pale Court or the Hollow Circle. Different names as the years go by, but all with the same idea. A group that believes the Towers are some kind of divine judgment on humanity. That the strong are meant to climb, and the weak are meant to die. Very cliche Cult stuff if you ask me"
Nathan absorbed this. "The operative said the Nemesis Court serves the natural order. The same philosophy."
"And if the Nemesis Court is connected to the same figure those Top 100 Climbers were whispering about..." Valerie leaned back in her chair. The leather creaked. "Then you’re dealing with something older and more dangerous than a few rogue Climbers triggering collapses. This is an organized Cult. And if they’ve marked your party as ’interesting,’ they’ll be back."
"What do you suggest we do?"
Valerie’s eyes met his. "What we always do. Climb. Get stronger. Be careful. and next time, they won’t send just one operative. They’ll send someone who can actually hurt you." She paused. "As for me, I’ll go have a word with the TCA about this. Quietly. If the Nemesis Court has been operating under their radar, they probably already know. And I need to know how much they actually do and are not telling me..."
Nathan nodded. "Thank you."
"Don’t thank me yet. Thank me when we’ve got answers." Valerie waved a hand. "Now get out. I need to think. And Boris needs his sleep. He’s insufferable when he’s tired."
Boris rumbled in what might have been agreement or might have been a threat. Impossible to tell.
---
Nathan found Kuro in the guild hall’s study.
She was in humanoid form by the window, her black hair framing her face, the white strands falling across her sharp cheekbones. No daggers visible—she looked sleek, almost vulnerable without her usual arsenal. The starlight from the night sky light traced the curve of her neck and the subtle lines of her assassin-lean body
"You tried to say something," Nathan said. "On the cliff. About the Shepherd. And something hurt you."
Kuro was quiet for a long moment. The silence stretched.
"I tried to remember a name." Her voice was soft. "Not ’Shepherd.’ Something else. Something longer. And my mind... rejected it. Pain. Like a blade behind my eyes. Like something pressing down on my thoughts and telling me no. I cannot explain it, Summoner. It is as if the word itself is forbidden to me. As if I am not allowed to know of it."
Nathan sat beside her. The window was cold, and frost traced the edges of the glass. He thought of the day he’d awakened the Bunny Girl Syste, —the golden light, the static crackle, the censored name. The ******** Lord.
"The system mentioned a Lord whose name is censored," he said. "When I first awakened it. I couldn’t read the name—just static. It told me I lacked the authority to perceive the full designation. And Mirko and you... when you’ve tried to remember your past, you’ve gotten headaches. This is connected. Whatever was done to the Bunny Girl race, it left scars and restrictions that I don’t know how to fix or remove"
"I want to know." Kuro’s voice was quiet but fierce. "I want to know what I was. What we were. Before the summoning. Before the mark. Before everything."
’We all do.’
Mirko’s voice came through the link—warm, steady, fierce in its own way. She had been within the summon mark all this while, recovering from the day’s combat, but she’d been listening.
’Whatever was done to us, it doesn’t change what we are now. We are Master Nathan’s summons. His partners. His family. And we will find the truth. Together.’
Kuro didn’t respond with words. But her presence through the link felt warmer. Steadier. She reached out and put her hand on the window glass, her reflection a dark silhouette against the stars.
"I was not meant to be capable of this," she said quietly. "Doubt. Fear. The desire to know. Assassins are supposed to be sharp instruments. Tools of death and precision. I was not supposed to question with so much emotion."
"You’re not a tool, Kuro. You never were."
Kuro turned to look at him. Her black eyes were unreadable, but there was something in them—a flicker of something that might have been gratitude, or might have been something deeper.
"I am beginning to believe that, Summoner."
Nathan sat with her in silence, watching the stars.
