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Move on, the Serpent was telling him. Pursue ambition. Achieve beyond thyself.

Kurata frowned. "Easier said than done, my friend. I've been in a bit of a slump, as I'm sure you've noticed..."

Seek guidance, then.

"Guidance? Your entire existence has to remain a secret so that someone doesn't come along and destroy you."

Excuses. Discard them.

"Agh. I can't go around just sharing details of your operation with whoever I please. There's a chain of command. Sai-hee might be missing, but the Kubi won't just stand by and let me--"

Seek guidance.

"I heard you the first time. And I'm telling you--"

No. You are being told. Seek. Guidance.

The Serpent's glow heightened again, this time with a reddish hue, and the room trembled.

Kurata's eyes widened, and his next protest died in his throat. He waited for the glow to diminish and the vibrations to die down. "...Guidance, huh? Alright. Um. Who should I seek it from? Any recommendations?"

From the Fury.

-+-+-+-+-

The Pool stirred.

Without even turning around, she felt it. The feeling was too strong and familiar to ignore. How many years had it been since she'd last experienced such a thing?

Anya spun around in her chair in order to look, but she was not prepared for what she saw.

The Pool of Trenoy was a deceptive entity. It always had been, from the moment she'd observed its creation at the hands of her late Mistress. She remembered in those early days--before the Mistress' passing--how powerful the illusions cast by the Pool were. They were so strong, in fact, that Anya herself had become lost in them for days, unable to find her way back to reality until the Mistress rescued her.

Looking back on that time, Anya sometimes found herself wondering if those had even been illusions. They were so different from what the Pool had shown her later on. Perhaps, instead of mere illusions, those had actually been true distortions in reality--portals into subdimensions of the Pool's own making.

She'd never been able to recreate that level of intensity. And with the Mistress gone, so too had hope departed with her.

Anya had tried to harness the Pool herself. Many times. But the results were always middling, at best. Deadly, at worst.

She hadn't made a serious attempt at using it again in years now. She still intended to, of course. Hence why she had not simply abandoned it or handed it over to someone else.