In the depths of a Chaos Storm, a cocoon made of multihued silk shifted as its maker stirred. The storm had been spinning for years, and through the vagaries of the Tides, the concept of time was diluted, warped, stretched and compressed. Though years, perhaps decades, passed within, perhaps less than a Season had passed in the Myriad Planes or the Great Continent. Even the loose connection the Chaos Sea had with the Great Continent sometimes attenuated the concept of passing years, much less the near-nonexistent connection between Sacred Realms and the rest of the Endless World. 

The Songstress of Heartfelt Desire opened her eyes to the storm and stretched. Her true name was long gone, burned away in the cauldron of beginnings that her old master tossed her into. She, along with countless other mortals, boiled and distilled until what remained was Desire. 

She knew her master knew her old name, that core of her personality and intellect, but the few times it was used in her presence, she heard nothing by the breeze shifting through her hair. She heard the name, there was no doubt of that, but the link between it and her being was not there. Names were power, even more so for those born of Chaos. 

An ever-shifting mass of potential, able to turn to anything, and reacting to every whim. Names were power. Names were an anchor. And when a mortal lost their name in the truest sense, then they became Chaos. 

The sobriquet. The title. The shell, the hedge, the shackle. It took the place of a name, bound and anchored the Chaos to form, and allowed identity to form and linger. The sobriquet could change when ascending the ranks of nobility, but they could also remain the same. Her sobriquet as a baron was no longer what defined her now. She was no longer the Songstress of Heartfelt Desire. 

Beholden Flower of the Sun’s Desire. 

The new sobriquet wrapped around the Chaos that was her new body, squeezed it until the near mist that she currently was, turned into a familiar form. Unlike the Devotee of Radiant Fire, her gender didn’t change, though her features were refined. She looked more like her governing consciousness’ old body that she did before. Well, not identical to her old form since Chaos Lords always looked hauntingly beautiful, so much so that it often made mortals feel disquiet instead of admiration. She was not adept at sculpting her form, but she did wish to be more pleasant for her master to look at. And there was the promise…oh, the promise. She couldn’t wait. 

Once her sobriquet was wound tightly around her essence, Desire reached towards the other thing that bound her. An Oath to the Master. A thread woven through Fate and Destiny. She followed it with her consciousness, humming softly to herself. How long has it been? The Chaos Storm muddled up the Sea, but that was fine since it concealed her from predators. She was probably ten or so days away from the Great Continent’s shore, though only if she travelled along the ‘surface’. She was more than likely to try to go through the hidden ways, and with the thread as her wayfinder, the danger would be slim. 

“Eh?” 

The thread split into two distinct strings, though both were practically the same. Frowning, she followed the one that felt slightly more familiar, and when she did, both threads reacted. Only one voice called to her, however, though there was quite a bit of interference, from both the storm and the Chaos. 

“Desire.” 

“Master.”

“Desire…”

The voice faded away, and Desire had the distinct impression that her voice had not really reached Yuriko. The distance and the changes in her essence were the cause, probably. 

Well, it mattered little, since Desire needed to return. But which thread should she follow? The voice came from both, so which one was…ah. Master created an incarnation. Desire couldn’t help but grin. 

It was an ability common with stronger Chaos Lords, though she had not been sure if Ancients could do the same. Well, now she knew. Hmmm, which incarnation of her master did the other two follow? 

She could return to that one, but…did she really need the competition? As much as it would please her to serve Yuriko with the two Squires, wouldn’t being the master’s sole servant be better? 

Ah, but she should wait for her master’s commands, and her sole duty now was to return. And going to the one that felt closer was ideal. With that, she immersed herself with the Chaos flows and planned her route through the hidden ways, all to return as quickly as she could. 

__________________

Yuriko’s good mood at feeling Desire’s awakening lasted for a few days before she realised that reaching either of her bodies would be the work of weeks, at the very least. Then, she sighed and continued with her routines. 

Her true body, inside the contained resource point floating in the Void Ocean, had very little to do. The place was a sphere and the surface was where everything existed. How the ones at the bottom didn’t fall off, she wasn’t sure, but then again, in the Void Ocean, there wasn’t any presence of gravity. Come to think of it, she automatically oriented herself to think of up to coincide with Alpha Station’s. She was also sure that the voidships had flipped around and headed in different directions along a three-dimensional space, so Alpha Station’s up was arbitrary. 

She could have also oriented her up to where the Radiant Sun and the Luminous Moon’s projection appeared while she was inside the resource point, or planet, as the locals called it, but wherever she went on the surface, the projection was always towards the skies. It caused her mind to stutter for a bit, though she adapted quickly enough, simply by not dwelling on the matter. She might have to later in her advancement, but she felt exploring such concepts would only muddle her current Ennoias. 

It has been several weeks already since they were stationed her, and aside from training, exploration, and sex, she mostly explored the planet’s surface. A significant part of it was covered in water, about half, she estimated. The seas were about a couple of longstrides deep and were teeming with marine life. She enjoyed the swim, even if there were no creatures dangerous enough to be wary of. 

She spent a couple of weeks just walking around, and while the vistas were beautiful, the planet was absent of any kind of conflict larger than insects and worms fighting for food and survival. No predators larger than her little finger, and all the prey animals were domesticated farm stock. 

All in all a boring place, but then again, it was called a resource planet for a reason, and she supposed the chief export was agricultural products. 

The Sylvanites were content to hone their skills against each other and against Yuriko’s companions. She tried to spar with them once, but aside from the fact that they fell over on their knees in her presence, they also wouldn’t do more than demonstrate their katas to her. Any attraction she felt for them withered at their attitude. A pity. 

Heron’s friend and Stormdriven’s liaison, Ilvara Erdmann, had no answers to the question of how long it would take to gather a task force to reconquer Outpost Omega. Yuriko had an inkling that Milstate might have cut their losses, though if so, why did they leave this planet mostly unprotected? Unless they intend to use it as bait? Did they have a fleet lying in wait? 

She flew up towards the Veil and pushed herself out of the planet, and emerged in the Void Ocean. Her Anima was a bubble that protected her body, though by now, her Radiant Physique would have assured her survival for a few hours even if she exposed herself without protection. 

The lightless depths of the Void Ocean called to her. She shuddered in anger. The light of the Radiant Sun or Luminous Moon did not show, nor did the tiny sparkles that represented the stars. The latter had never been present in the Chaos Sea, though perhaps their meagre light was hidden by the brightness of the Chaos Flows. Still, she wondered what they represented. Examined memories of Damien didn’t illuminate her, but she still got the sense that they were more than what they seemed. After all, the Radiant Sun and Luminous Moon were not simple either. 

Perhaps each star was a Throne? 

She lingered in the stillness of the Void, looking for any sign of life, or if there were fleets waiting just outside of easy detection range. Shipboard scanners couldn’t detect anything more than a hundred longstrides away, and her eyes, in the emptiness of the Void, could probably see just as far. She lingered there for an entire day, her consciousness strands going into dozens of different tangents. 

The last time she went up here was a few days ago and she had adapted her fighting style to zero-gravity. It wasn’t that difficult considering she often fought in the skies anyway. The absence of a ground had tripped her up for a long while. Fighting in such a state felt awkward without a proper point of reference. It took her an embarrassingly long time to figure it out. Her targets were her point of reference and they were either the ground or the sky. From there, it was a simple adaptation. 

Now, she didn’t feel like going through forms and katas. The Sylvanites used the latter term to refer to their practice forms and Yuriko and the others adopted the use. 

Since there was nothing to do, Yuriko focused on her incarnation body. The past couple of weeks after the summons had been hectic. Luvblooms had resumed shooting, but there was a little something lacking in Director Joe Hopper’s demeanour. She supposed the incident took the wind out of his sails, but perhaps the Paranormal Research Bureau had something to do with it, too. Certainly, the venues he picked for each episode weren’t quite as unusual or daring as the previous sets. 

The number of episodes was lowered to six instead of twelve. Scarlett and the other managers had been in an uproar over that, but other than getting paid more, there was little to be done. 

The other five cast members similarly didn’t have the same heart to continue the shoot, and all of them were simply going through the motions. Alexis looked unaffected though, and his shy act was unaffected. 

Although Yuriko’s acting wasn’t anything to speak about, pretty bad according to everyone else honestly, Luvblooms barely involved any acting on her part. The activities were interesting and engaging enough, just that it was now off-brand from the show. After the first episode aired, she was almost bowled over by the sheer number of threads her Mien gathered. A week later, compressing Ambrosia took half a day less.  A hundred and fifty-four hours of gathering Quintessence, and a few minutes to compress. Her true body had better use for Ambrosia and she couldn’t leave it in the dreamscape. If she didn’t force it down, it would unravel back into Quintessence. She wondered if she could just let the threads accumulate more, but she remembered the state of the threads earlier. Oversaturation might mean that excess Quintessence dissipated instead of continuing to accumulate. She wasn’t willing to test that hypothesis either way. 

She received more work through Pixel Fairy and ironically, one of the photoshoots involved modelling cold weather wear. At the height of the Season of Fire? The studio’s air conditioning wasn’t good enough to make wearing heavy furs bearable, and if not for the fact that she wasn’t that affected by weather extremes, she would have been soaked in sweat, just like the other models. 

She wouldn’t have taken much note of that photoshoot if not for the fact that at the end of that photoshoot, Michael Stonereiz sent her a message: Graham Lowe, the cameraman whose Alteration was healing touch was missing. And Sandra, one of the other cameramen, had her apartment broken into.

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