Legendseekers Part 2: Mending The Broken

Kanna lightly fluffed up their fur, feeling something akin to a chill as they walked. The air around them felt… unsettled, as though some divine being had dropped a stone from above - rippling the very fabric of Lunerest itself. Half a day ago, Oberon had made the announcement - Something ancient had been broken. Not an hour ago, Kanna and countless others had set off from Moonreach in search of more clues. Now they arrived at Quietphase Lake. Cream, their ever playful lunewyrm, waved at them, before darting off to scout ahead.

“Maa?” Custard, their golden lambrock, inquired. Kanna made eye contact with its small, worried eyes, and smiled lightly. “It should be fine to drink, but just to be safe…”

The light motes surrounding them danced, alighted upon the water’s edge, and spread, shimmering, in a small circle. “Would this be enough?” In response, Custard wagged its tail, and slowly began lapping up the cleansed water. Magic was scarce at a time like this, even for Kanna - they’d have to be even more cautious than usual.

As they refilled their water supply, they admired the lake. With its moonlit sheen lost, its beauty was fading. They could only hope they could restore it soon. The Moonsearch spell had pointed them in this direction, so perhaps they would find--

“Na!” came a trill from above. Kanna looked upwards, just in time to greet Cream. It did a loop in the air, dove down, and playfully wrapped about Kanna’s neck ruff like a second scarf. Kanna nuzzled it, and it wiggled with glee. It appeared that they were still headed in the right direction. It was faint, but they could still see a slight ray of light ahead of them, pointing towards the mountains.

“Shall we get going?” Kanna asked. Custard bleated softly, and Cream purred.

---

The Frostouched Pines were usually covered in layers of frost and snow, quiet and serene. But now, a blizzard raged, its howl threatening to pierce through every xyn that dared to pass. As shards of ice tumbled from the sky, they collided with Kanna’s light aura, and melted harmlessly into rain. Yet the freezing ground remained. It was all they could do to focus on the Moonsearch trail. Eventually they arrived at a small clearing - one whose ancient trees bore the full weight of the raging blizzard outside. Custard and Cream huddled together. Kanna sighed in relief, and dispelled their aura. As if on cue, two kinpans - one with blue roses, one with red - strode towards them, alerted to the new presence.

Kanna bowed low. The blue-rose kinpan stood its ground; the red-rose kinpan turned and hurried away. Shortly afterwards, a small, dark moxyn approached them. Kanna remained bowed - Custard and Cream, reading the situation, decided to do the same gesture.

“Greetings, ma’am,” Kanna murmured. “I hope our arrival here is of no trouble to you.”
“You… bear the robes of a Lullay Knight,” the dark moxyn inquired - sounding more like a confirmation for herself than anything else. “So you, too, seek to mend the moons?”

From the way she spoke, it sounded like she was no stranger to xyns traversing her domain. That surely meant that Kanna could find clues here.

“That we do.”

Hearing this, the dark moxyn nodded - and the kinpans, no longer interested in the strangers, wandered off. Kanna raised his head at last, and offered her a grateful smile. She looked confused for a few moments, before attempting to smile back. Cream, peeking from its bow, hopped up and chirped at her, which made her give a very soft laugh.

“Thank you for coming to greet us, Ma’am…” Kanna paused.
“Rosabel.”
“Ma’am Rosabel! It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

---

As they waited for Kanna and Rosabel to return, Custard and Cream wandered about. Custard located a soft bush, and huddled beneath it. Meanwhile, Cream chittered and chirped at Rosabel’s two kinpans, whom she had introduced earlier as Frost and Snow. Frost nodded along to Cream’s chirping, while Snow shyly kept its distance from the chatterbox.

---

It felt as though Kanna and Rosabel were walking in circles. The Moonsearch trail led them this way and that - not helped by the fact that only Kanna understood how to locate it, with Rosabel merely following them around to ensure they didn’t end up lost in her home. Indeed, ‘lost’ felt quite appropriate right about now.

“Ma’am Rosabel… I believe we're being followed.” As they said this, Kanna turned slightly, in the direction of a large bush. Within it glowed a set of yellow eyes.

As the two xyns stood their ground, the bush rustled… and out hurtled a flurry of grey fur, complete with a shriek.

“MEEP!”
It was perhaps no bigger than a moxyn paw.
“MEEP!”
It looked more afraid of Kanna than anything else.
“MEEP!”

It was…

“Cotton,” Rosabel called softly. The little puffle skittered over to her, shivering all the while. Rosabel held out her paw, and the poor thing curled up beside it.

“My apologies for the concern, Kanna.”
“Ehe… I don’t mind one bit. Hello there…!” Kanna beamed at the little critter, which - still trembling - gave him a tentative sniff.
“Cotton has been like this ever since the moons waned.”
“I see… Ah, perhaps I could try speaking with him?”

---

They must have spent half an hour in the middle of nowhere, setting aside their mission for the time being, gently murmuring reassuring words to Rosabel’s anxious little puffle friend. At long last, Cotton seemed soothed.

Until a nearby twig snapped.

“MEEP! MEEP! MEEP!”

Kanna smiled sheepishly at Rosabel, who simply shook her head. “It is alright.” After all, not even she had been able to calm Cotton down.

“…Hm?” Even the snow underfoot seemed upset. ...No, that wasn’t it. Tunneling underneath the snow, getting faster by the second, was-

“Mee!”

Kanna blinked. Standing before them, fur bristling in annoyance as it hurriedly shook snow out of its pelt, stood another puffle.

“Ah… Hello, Flour.” Unlike Cotton, it bristled at Kanna.
“I’m sorry, my dear friend. We didn’t mean to leave you behind…”
“Mee!!”
“After all, you were sleeping so peacefully--”
“MEE!!” Flour frizzed up, and unleashed a volley of chirps at Kanna. Not yet satisfied with chastising its owner for not bringing it along on such an important mission, it turned towards Cotton, and began its lecture anew. Its tail flicked wildly, as if to say, And YOU! You wasted my master’s precious time! Don’t think I’ll let you off the hook just because we’re both puffles!

To Rosabel’s amazement and Kanna’s amusement, when Flour’s tirade subsided, Cotton sat there wagging its tail as though it had never been afraid of anything for the past two months. Rosabel breathed a sigh of relief. Kanna petted Flour on the head, to which it huffed and flicked its tail indignantly.

“I suppose that went well,” Rosabel mused. “...Thank you.”
But Kanna wasn’t too sure about that. After all, the Moonsearch trail was still flickering in and out of view.

“Flour, Cotton, do you know where to go now…?” Kanna had invited their own puffle to accompany them previously, on that search near Heartsong; that was how they’d managed to find the broken shards. Surely, this time…

Joined by their respective treasure hunter companions, Kanna and Rosabel retraced their steps back to the clearing, and began searching once again.

Once again, they wandered aimlessly, even despite Flour and Cotton leading the way.

“Ah… Ma’am Rosabel? Something just occurred to me.”
“Yes?”
“We’ve been going in circles. If the Moonsearch spell is accurate - and I have every faith that it is - then, perhaps…”

As they spoke, Kanna's eyes shone a resolute gold.

“We simply need to get to the centre of it.”