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MAZE - Chapter 1107 - Heart to Heart.
🕑 Added 2025-09-17 15:24:58 +0000 UTCEven after their conversation, Hera still spent a couple more days with her dad before getting ready to go to Deakoshara once more. And although making sure Eridan was doing well was the main reason for the delay, it wasn't the only one.
She also reached out to all the royal explorers asking who wanted to join the exploration of the Naga homeland, but no one was going to do so. They all had work, working on different tasks given by King Rutigan or Ogryn, who was now being called the Archmage of Boothudurn..
Pandora's group, on the other hand, despite not doing anything important, also said they were not going to participate. They were all still working on the monster island dungeon. Even a few weeks after Hera left that place, no one was able to kill the boss of the new dungeon that was created. Because of that, there was a mad rush to see who would be the first group to complete the dungeon. And people ended up getting really stressed about that thing.
Hearing that, the Empress couldn't help but smile. This was exactly the type of thing that made her want to be an explorer. Strange and wild events that would happen anyway and where everybody would be working together for the same goal. Which, in a different sense, was exactly what she was doing right now.
Another thing that made her delay the exploration a little bit was the alliance. Apparently, the University of Necromancy was very concerned with the fact that there were ghosts in the dungeon the way she was describing them. And so they had pulled their resources into researching if anyone had ever seen something like that happening.
They had asked for more time for a proper investigation and were even offering to send a few people her way to help understand what was going on. But even the closest group would take a couple of weeks to arrive due to the room crossing limits and the fact that the university wasn't exclusively part of the alliance, meaning that they wouldn't be allowed to use the Underground Babel to speed up the travel.
Hera herself had some benefits since she already knew the place and was an honorary member of the council. But those benefits didn't extend to people who she might be needing for one reason or another. If this were a case of life and death, which in a sense it was, but not in the sense that people were going to die because of it, Hera might have been upset and argued against the limitation.
But just for exploring it was fine. She was in no rush and really wanted to take her time to make sure she found everything that was to be found inside Deakoshara.
Still, after two days, the Necromancy University was unable to give her any tangible information that could reveal an actual threat related to the ghosts. Yes, they could still be harmful if she got careless, and yes, they were still supposedly considered monsters and supposed to be treated as such. But that was it. And if Hera was going to stop exploring because of a monster, she might as well retire altogether.
After getting the last message from the Necromancy University, Hera was talking with Bonnie and Alex while Shane was in her own private room preparing some stuff.
"You know, I never realized that they had full universities about specific types of magic," Hera spoke up.
Bonnie turned to the Empress with a confused expression. "You're kidding, right? How could you not have known? There are universities for most of the famous types of magic. The basic elements like fire, water, ice, earth, wind, lightning. And then you have the more conceptual ones like shatter, tremor, breaking, and stuff like that. You really never looked into them? I figured you would be constantly receiving messages from the University of Poison."
"Bonnie, it's actually the Tower of Poison," Alex corrected the astral witch.
"Tower?" Hera asked.
"So you have the Towers of Poison, Air, and Lightning. The Circles of Water, Grass, and I think Flowers. And the Universities are Fire, Necromancy, and Abstract Magic," Alex continued explaining, getting a confused expression from Bonnie.
"Just because I'm not specializing in magic, I can't look that stuff up?" Alex defended herself.
"I'm just surprised, that's all," Bonnie replied.
"Because of the whole vampire Legacy, a lot of magic schools try to get into contact with me to see what my Legacy could do with their buffs. Basically, they want to know what was considered a buff and a debuff or affliction."
"Oh," Bonnie nodded. "Is that why you vanished for a couple of weeks after the war ended?"
"Yep. I wasn't going to do anything at first, but then they started offering some really good money and access to some powerful items, so I just took it," Alex replied. "Sounded like the right thing to do, you know. But getting back to you," Alex turned to the Empress. "Why haven't you talked to the tower of Poison?"
"Well, for one, I didn't even know of their existence," the Ophidianite sighed, "And two, I'm not sure if my poison is going to help them. I mean, it's very focused on me, you know? It's kind of like my blood. I don't really know if people will be able to replicate that with magic."
"That's up to them and not you. Also those schools are usually very," Alex paused. "How can I put this gently?"
Bonnie rolled her eyes. "You don't have to. They are really stupid when it comes to money because they are absolutely filthy rich."
"How rich are we talking about?" Hera asked. She had quite a lot of money right now, and she herself considered herself to be now part of the filthy rich group.
"I'm pretty sure a single magic tower could cause the entire economy of Earth to collapse."
"Oh damn," Hera gasped. "Why don't they? And why isn't that a problem?"
Bonnie shrugged, "The materials they want or are going to buy for experiments are so stupidly expensive that most towers are always in the red."
"They make that much money and they're still in the red?" Hera's eye's went wide.
"Yep. That's why you usually see them paying for materials with other items that they made or something like that. When you have that much money and things cost that much money, it's kind of easier to go back to a barter system because it makes more sense, you know?"
Hera just stared at her friend for a moment before shaking her head. "I really didn't know about that, but good to know. I might hit up the Poison tower in the future just to see how things are. Maybe even something like the Golem Circle or Golem University."
"Tower," Alex corrected. "The Golem Tower. Yeah, maybe that's a good call."
Alex quickly took her tablet and sent the information about the Golem Tower Hera's way. The Assassin got a strange look from both the Ophidianites and the Astral Witch, and took a step back.
"What? Once some of those schools and towers start asking about who you are, you do your own research. I have a list of most of the ones I can find if you want it."
"I very much want a copy of that" Bonnie said.
"Sure, I'll send it to you," Alex replied as Hera started to see the list.
Noticing a website link, the Empress was taken to a page that sounded more as if the Golem Tower was trying to sell services. It didn't look like a place to study but a place to work. They were offering golems that could work as construction workers, golems that could be personal assistants, and some other minor variations for more specific jobs.
The trio ended up going around the various magic school websites and realized that most of them followed a similar pattern. They had some ways to direct people to more academic areas of the website, but for the general public, the magic schools would showcase their abilities through services and products.
Funny enough, the Necromancy University and the Golem Tower had a serious overlap. Both were offering cheap labor, but while golems were more about carrying heavy boxes and heavy-duty work in general, undead tended to be more capable of delicate work. There was even a full video showing footage of skeletons and zombies knitting various clothes with surprising dexterity.
The day ended, and the trio went to bed as Shane arrived. They all wanted to wake up early and did just that in order to continue exploring the Naga homeland. As the group was walking out of the cave where the doorway was located, already stepping onto the plateau that once had the poison lake, when Alex turned to the enchantress.
"Quick question. What about Milo? I think things would be better if we had a more beefy frontline."
"I agree. I'm kind of okay as a front liner, but at the same time, I shouldn't be up front. If I go down, my Court goes down, and that's a big problem," Hera said as she summoned her blades.
Shane turned to Alex and said, "We are not talking right now. Sorry."
Alex raised one eyebrow, "Are you going to elaborate on that, or should we just make our own assumptions?"
"Mine won't be good," Bonnie added.
Shane let out a long sigh and said, "Look, Milo and I are friends since forever. And we always had this on-and-off-again thing where we just hook up and have some fun. Eventually, we realize that it isn't going to work as more so we just stop. You're just seeing one of those stages. We hooked up, we were close to a couple, and then decided that it was better not to be one."
"Did the two of you decide that, or did you decide it?" Hera asked.
"It was mutual," Shane replied. Just as she did so, the rest of Hera's Court appeared behind them as the Empress was summoning them.
Filigree, hearing that last line, started shaking her head. "Shane, I know we have not known each other for long, but you tend to be very focused on yourself, for lack of a better term."
Shane frowned. "What do you mean by that?"
Bonnie shook her head. "She means that you're kind of selfish. And if you don't want something, you don't care about what anyone else is feeling. You just going to cut things off and do what you want."
"Hey," Shane protested, "that's not true. "
"I mean, you were arguing with me about how my own dad managed to become a Naga before you. And I don't remember you ever saying congratulations to him," Hera said.
Shane paused for a moment. "Didn't I give him my congratulations?"
Everyone shook their heads.
"No, you didn't. You just kept complaining and saying that it wasn't fair that he got it before you. I mean, I do think it was fair, but I get it," Hera said.
Shane paused and looked down. "Am I really that self-absorbed?"
The three women nodded. "You are. You are a good friend, but when you want to do something, you're going to do it. It doesn't matter if you're going to screw anyone over because of that. That's not what you want to do. It's just that's what you end up doing," Alex said.
"But what does that have to do with Milo?" Shane turned to the girls.
"Look, I don't know everything about your relationship," Hera started speaking, "but if you're keeping going on and off again so much, maybe it's because he really likes you and wants something more than just friendship. And because you keep hooking up with him every so often, he kind of gets crushed every time you break up because he thinks you're going to actually start being serious."
"But I, oh, oh no, that's, that's bad. What have I been doing?" Shane cursed under her breath.
"You've been with someone who's very kind and very nice in ways that aren't anything but kind and nice," Alex replied.
"I kind of really want to talk to him right now, but he's not answering my calls. When we stop hooking up-"
"When you break up," Bonnie corrected the enchantress.
Shane nodded. "Yeah, when we break up, we spend some weeks without talking. A few months the last time."
"That might be for the best sometimes. When you start talking again, at the very least be honest with him and either stop hooking up with the guy or actually date him. It's not fair to him what you're doing." Alex said.
Shane nodded. "No, yeah, yeah, you're right."
They all stayed in that awkward moment for a minute before Hera clapped her hands. "So, where are we going now? We've looked around this plateau, and we have the one with the ruins village and El Dorado. I'm calling this one the Poison Lake and that one the Golden City. Where do you want to go next?"
"What are our options?" Bonnie turned to the Ophidianite.
"We could go to the plateau to the north, which is the last one we have here. If we try to go to the one west, which is the last one that's connected to this place, if we try to go south, we're going to end up hitting an invisible wall before the next plateau. Or we could go see what's between us," Hera had her tablet out and was checking the map.
"Is it all just sand like you said, or do they have some rocks or something that we can stay comfortable on top?" Bonnie asked. "I really don't want to end up in a quicksand situation."
"I'm pretty sure I've seen some rocks or more elevated places that are not covered in sand, but I'm not entirely sure if they are just rocks floating in the sand or actual parts of the earth. That's kind of one of the reasons why we should probably check that area," Hera explained.
Shane nodded. "Yeah, let's go there." She finally broke out of her stupor after realizing what she was doing with Milo, "We should go from the west and then go around it, heading towards the north. That way, we can kind of knock two birds with one stone."
Hera, Alex, and Bonnie nodded, and the four of them started walking towards the edge of this plateau. When they got there, they could figure out a way to climb down safely and then continue to explore this piece of the Naga homeland.
#### Author's Note ####
Sorry for the lack of a chapter yesterday. By the time I ended this one it was super late and I couldn't properly edit it.
Time to explore the sandy regions between plateaus!
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