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Hector sighed through his nose. ‘Why do you have to torture me like this?’

‘Shits and giggles, primarily.’

‘Garovel...’

‘Oh, come on. This is adorable. Just try thinking about something else. Like why we’ve stopped or where Dimas went.’

Hector hesitated. He hadn’t even noticed that the man was gone. He couldn’t hear the rain anymore, either.

‘You’ve all been out for a while,’ Garovel went on. ‘We’ve already reached the Waress Mountains.’

‘...I’ve heard of those, I think.’

‘I should hope so. They divide the whole friggin’ continent.’

‘R-right...’

‘Also, we flew over them when we left Kuros.’

‘Oh.’

‘We’re gonna have to get you an atlas or something when we get back to Warrenhold. Oh, or you could craft a big iron globe! That could be a neat project. Make it big enough for people to walk into and look at from the inside. I saw a globe like that once. It got destroyed in a fire, though. Yeah, I should definitely have you recreate it. Could be good for tourism, too. Though, if it’s for tourism, then it might be best to put it above ground somewhere. Hmm. It’d look good underground, too, I’m sure. Maybe we could just have--’

‘Uh, Garovel?’

‘What?’

‘Where DID Dimas go?’

‘Oh, he’s scouting ahead to make sure the Tunnels are safe.’

‘Tunnels?’

‘Yup. That’s the other reason why I woke you up. You haven’t seen them before, have you? The Waress Tunnels?’

Hector tilted his head. ‘Uh...’

‘C’mon, then. Get out of the car.’

‘But I’ll wake up Ramira if I move...’

‘Eh, I think you can avoid waking her. C’mon.’

Slowly, Hector pulled himself away from the little girl. He tried not to jostle her too much.

She woke up, anyway.

Hector threw Garovel a look.

The reaper shrugged. ‘Well, maybe she’ll want to see them, too.’

Hector tried to apologize to Ramira, but she didn’t seem too concerned about it, and then Marcos and Emiliana began to stir as well. In the end, they just exited the vehicle together.

And finally, Hector could see what all the fuss was about.

A rocky cliff face towered before the entourage of limousines. It shot up at such a steep angle that, if not for its eroded ridges, Hector would have thought it was manmade. And yet, even with how tall it was and how much of his vision it consumed, the mountain peaks behind it were still more gigantic.