Wish upon the Stars chapter 291

"That was WILD." Chirped Bethany as she dragged me over to where her  friends were waiting. Callie was clutching my other arm, despite the  Vampire girl not seeming romantically interested at all, and I was a bit  worried I might get torn in half until she let me go, spinning back to  me. "How did you see through my Mesmeric Gaze Skill? Daddy says I'm the  best at that one for my age. I was just like 'zap, your mind belongs to  me' and you were like 'pow, as if, this is my brain!'."

I  blinked. "Um...I have a skill to see through illusions." I didn't,  really, but it COULD do that. I was more thrown off by her demeanor. How  had I possibly been afraid of this girl. Sure she was strong as fuck,  but she was like a bouncing shimmying puppy. She'd had her handmaids put  the screen back and changed back into her dress, which she was whipping  around as she spun back and forth, clearly fond of the swishing.

"Wow."  She said, eyes wide. "That's crazy. You have so many Skills. That's  pretty cool." She stopped, thinking back over her previous statements  and then smacked her forehead with her palm. "Duh, Bethy, rude. I didn't  introduce myself. I'm Bethany Lark, but my friends call me Beth or  Bethy." She narrowed her eyes at me, making the irises glow a bit.  "Never Bessy though. I ate someone for calling me that. Who are you?  Sorry about before by the way, daddy says I need to have the proper  'gravitas' as a vampire when I talk to strangers, but we fought so we're  not strangers yeah?"

My eyes were glazed as I stared at  her worriedly. If she wasn't a vampire I'd have been scared she might  suffocate because she hadn't paused at all during that. Callie, far from  being threatened now, was trying to hold back giggles, and held out her  hand. "Nice to meet you Bethy. I was impressed with you...gravitas, by  the way."

Bethy nodded sagely. "Of course." Her voice took  on the semi-formal cadence from earlier. "My dark father insists his  children comport themselves with the utmost dignity before the masses."  Then she winked. "But, like, now we're alone and my Vampire stealth  means we can say whatever. Like 'whoosh, total secrecy'. " Smiling  smugly she tapped her chest. "I'm pretty cool." Then she jumped again,  her insane all over the place train of thought bringing her around to  face her handmaids. "Oh wow, rude again! I didn't introduce you to Aida  and Tracey. They're my besties. They're also my thralls!"

One  of the twins (I decided to call left twin Aida and right twin Tracey)  chuckled. "They don't know what that means Bethy." Her eyes, a sort of  reddish chocolate brown, fixed on us. "Thrall is a job that you can  unlock serving a Vampire. It's like the Knight job that some nobles can  give. Thralls get bonuses based on their Vampire and can learn unique  abilities."

Bethany rolled her eyes. "That's super boring  Aida, they don't care about that." I was pleased to see I'd called which  was which right. The vampire girl turned back to me. "That was so fun  though. I was expecting you to be super week, I can kind of feel that  stuff and you feel...spread thin. But then you totally put up an awesome  fight!"

I grinned at her. "Well, glad I could oblige.  Personally, I'm just happy you decided to change into the leather armor.  I heard you don't take kindly to people ruining your clothes. How  screwed would I have been if I had damaged that dress?" I asked  teasingly, figured I'd get some throw away comment about her beating me  up.

Instead, her face closed off, becoming cold and remote  as her eyes blazed a lambent red. "I'd have ended your life on the very  spot." Then she blinked, and she was suddenly all smiles again. "Which  would have SO ruined the party!" She turned to Callie. "Oh, and speaking  of outfits, I LOVE yours! That weird shadowy effect is so cool, you  HAVE to tell me where you got it. I want to get a dress made like that.  It would be like I was swooping around garbed in shadows!"

My  girlfriend, still slightly off balance from the terrifying death  threat, shook it off pretty fast, introducing herself and filling her in  on the details of her costume. Of course, the Vampire wasn't remotely  concerned about affording something like that. She just looked over to  where a crowd of people was standing nearby. "That sounds so cool.  Taylor!" She barked. A woman stepped out of the crowd, and Bethy pointed  to her. "This is my tailor, Taylor. She goes EVERYWHERE with me. Tay,  come look at this girl's clothes."

The tailor in question  looked...normal. A tall, athletic girl, with a pretty face and a blonde  ponytail. She was dressed in a black cocktail dress and heels, looking  more party chic than most of the people here, who were almost all in  costume. It was interesting that she was a tailor instead of a hero. I  wondered how much renown she got just from being around Bethany.

She  looked over Callie with an interested smile. "Oh hey Bethy. Wow, I DO  like that. Some kind of conceptual filtration effect keyed to a static  enchantment structure? Mental component maybe? Fascinating. Subpar  materials, but put to excellent use." She hummed consideringly. "I'd say  this came from a lower end planet. Maybe D-rank? No, psuedo D-rank.  Someone put a lot into learning their craft but was hamstrung with poor  materials."

We all blinked at her in complete shock.  Bethany didn't seem surprised. "Well I want a dress like that. It would  be so cool. You could work the fabric so it would like...float or  something. Then I'd be swishing around clad in darkness. Daddy would be  ecstatic to see me 'embracing my role'." She rolled her eyes. "He never  stops going on about that. 'Fashion is a hobby Bethany, not a lifestyle.  Vampires need to inspire terror.' Ugh. Like, Vampires are all chic and  beautiful now. He's so behind the times."

It  was hard not to be swept up in Bethy's massive personality, the tiny  Vampire was easily one of the most energetic and cheerful people I'd  ever met (aside from brief moments of being murderously terrifying). I  couldn't reconcile her with the image of the Vampire monster that Zeke  had described. I honestly felt almost stupid for being so afraid (though  the threat of murder if I'd messed up her clothes helped) and I was  curious about her family. "So...Bethy. Tell me more about yourself. You  seem like an interesting person, are all Vampires like you?"

She  snorted. "No. Most of my brothers and sisters are wannabe posers. Daddy  is the real deal, and everyone is scared of him for it, but they all  grew up wanting to be just like him." She put a hand beside her mouth as  if to block the view of her lips and whispered conspiratorially. "I  think that's why I'm his favorite. I don't suck up like the rest of  them." Then she giggled. "Get it? Suck up? Because we're Vampires." She  burst out into peals of laughter, almost doubling over at her own joke.

Aida  and Tracey, who were standing stoically nearby, sighed, Aida pinching  the bridge of her nose in exasperation. To my surprise though, she  wasn't the only one laughing. "That was hilarious." Said the cheerful  voice of Jessie, her face lit up with a wide smile. "You're awesome."  She held out a hand. "I'm Agria." Bethany took her hand, pulling it to  jerk my teammate into a hug.

"Oh  wow I love your outfit! Are those like...leaves?" Jessie, who was  normally the most cheerful and enthusiastic person I knew, looked  poleaxed by the speed with which it all happened. Bethy pulled back,  chattering happily about the construction of Jessie's costume, which my  blonde friend enjoyed immensely, not having really been able to show off  since getting it. She'd been wearing it around, sure, but she wasn't in  the tournament and we'd all gotten new costumes.

I  remembered how excited she'd been to show off when she got her first  costume. How happy she was about it. It was nice she found someone so  enthusiastic. I heard a throat clearing and looked over to find Nat,  Perit, and Valk all waiting politely to one side, my cousin shooting me  annoyed glare. I smirked smugly behind my mask at the expression. Nat  was more experienced and confident about all this than I was. It was  nice to come out ahead here without really trying.

Before  I could comment though, or Bethany could respond, the entire party  started shaking. Not in a figurative sense, but literally shuddering in  place. Everyone in the hall looked off balance, in the literal and  figurative sense both, and we all looked around worriedly to try to  figure out what the hell was going on. "What's happening?" I called  loudly, worried we might be under attack.

Abel  was staring up at the ceiling, eyes looking past the sky and off into  the distance. "Spatial ripple. Like someone dropped a giant ass rock  into a pond. Something just changed in the nearby space, something big.  This place is just floating around in the void, so it got shaken up."

"It's  opening." Said Zeke from behind us. None of us jumped, too distracted  to care much about my uncle's theatrics. We all turned to look at him  questioningly, and he rolled his eyes. "The Moonsong Glade is opening.  We've been waiting for the space to stabilize so you could all enter,  that's what that was. It's stable enough to allow F-ranked passage now.  Slightly more than F-rank, honestly. I'd say anyone with under fifty  Impact could get through."

That  meant we could actually use the Moonglow Dew if we found it. E-rankers  had sixty two Impact, so none of them could get in, but it made me wary  of the interior of the dungeon. How many people there had more than a  normal F-ranker's Impact value. Zeke had said the Dew wouldn't reveal  itself to those inside normally, but there had to have been SOME of the  stuff. Were we going to be fighting people halfway to E-rank? What would  that even be like?

I  felt that old fire start to burn in my gut again. Excitement. I'd  been...floundering, a bit, since I lost my fight to Abel. It had been my  first real defeat and it derailed me something fierce. Now though, we  were going to be competing for resources, and Abel was on my side.

"Alright."  I said firmly. "So we need to go. Bit short notice, but we're already  good on supplies and stuff right?" We all had our rings, I got my  weapon, we should be good to go. "Also...how do we go? Because you said  it's F-rank only, so how do we enter. Will there be a portal or  something?"

Zeke  grinned, gesturing for us to follow, and we all did. Every one of us  walked out of the party, followed by dozens more people, and as we  exited we stared up into the darkness of space over the city. Darkness  covered with a series of rivers or celestial silver light, shimmering  and twisting around the floating city. "Why do you think the Lakedeeps  picked this spot?" He said with a grin.

Gesturing  up at the rivers theatrically, he announced. "Presenting the entrances  that flow through the unstable space. Starlight Slides. There's a  special song you have to play to call them, but the process was started  when the space solidified enough to support the slides. That's  concentrated moonlight. It's where the Glade gets its name." He turned  toward the city. "Now, let's go find you a musician and get you your  own. You don't want to be the last ones to arrive."