Jacob stepped into what appeared to be the world's whitest wood; all light-as-snow clouds, pale leaves with a faint slip of gold, and ash-barked trees whose silhouettes were so fair, that almost nothing lay shadowed. Jacob had expected to return to the mist-land and was not sure if he was relieved or disappointed to be somewhere else. He could not see any surrounding fog; everything was clear and shining. He took a little step forward and saw a city. People were bustling about or what he first thought were people but the men were almost as tall as Goliath and like muscle-bound Vikings in near-colorless robes. The women were as small as pin drops and prettily, pale-eyed.

  He wandered into the city's grand entrance and saw decorative stones below and the great, silvery-roofs thatched to the buildings above and something just seemed too-familiar. Yet it wasn't until he saw the white castle towering to the heavens and surrounded by a veil of winged, cloudy leopards and lionesses that he realized. This was the Mist Land. This was in fact, Shiverla City. With its great, black castle turned to fair white.

  He made to speak to one of the children, a stranger, and she immediately gazed into his face and exclaimed with dear delight. "It is Jacob the savior who exonerated little princess Adora," Or so she cried. She then skipped away briefly and bent down somewhere and whence she returned she handed Jacob the sweetest, lightly-coloured flower. He smiled, embarrassed. He gazed at the offered plant and then at the tree's white leaves. The white-and-fallow grass.

  Despite the leaves and petals' fair colouration, they were alive with warmth and delicacy. Nothing like how they appeared in the beauteous, frozen wasteland of his last visit. He realized that when he was trapped in the castle, he had seen very few people except occasionally from a distance. The men who came to the castle in war-waging battalions and the nice man who told him how to get there, he realized, they had all been huge. Unusually large and intimidating whilst Shiore and Shiver and the Dark Demoness had all been quite diminutive and dainty. He had thought those were simply personal characteristics and quirks but it seemed instead, to be some bizarre, dimorphic feature of this land.

  Suddenly the castle spoke in a loud, booming metallic voice. Jacob almost leaped into the warm, summery air but no one around him raised their head.

  "Twelve 0' Clock, Noon, the check is completed. No disasters are imminent. No rising, green tide, or wuthering will spoil our Fair City saved by the great warrior, Master Jacob. Chosen one of the Gods."

  The crowd of people cheered.

  Another Viking-like man lounging nearby, soon smiled at Jacob. "I worked on the AI of the castle," he said. " its disaster prediction protocol and weather monitoring have only improved. It last got repaired way back before the precious queen and our dear little king ascended. They always spoke most highly of you. Particulary her Majesty. She said waiting-in-the-wings for their Godly ascension was made so much lovelier by your dear presence and beast gifts.

  "Thanks," Jacob said. Uncertainty.

  "I guess you are searching for little Adora? She was certainly looking for you. "

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  "Yes," Jacob answered. Assuming this was his next task. Right as a snow-fair pegasus with a great, scarlet beak and the unblemished softness of a gazelle landed on the ground.

  "Princess Adora is seated by the clearing outside the castle rider's entrance." The creature spoke. To little suprise from Jacob. Who had gotten quite used to such things. "I will take you there, dear saviour. "

  Jacob climbed upon its feathered back and noticed some women and children and men in the distance who seemed just a little strange. It took him a minute to work out why. Despite at first seemingly equally fair as everything else here, at a next glance they looked a little dank. With dirt-stained, pale dresses and spotted, grimy, light shirts. Blinking, black eyes under golden-white hair.

  "Hopeful soon, the sooted ones will be all gone," the Viking muttered with distaste. Jacob was going to let the oddness of this statement pass till he realized it was possibly a clue yet he could suddenly hear the foliage-like rustle of the lightest feathers and before he knew it, he and the pegasus had set off into the skies of some most summery daytime.

  He saw the alpaca unicorns were now all fair creatures whether in the skies or whitely-dusting the ground. They surrounded the women and girls particularly, who themselves glittered like fairies. He realized the world's female inhabitants all had Shiver's elfin ears pointing and curling sweetly out from their delicate faces. Alongside a selfsame, slight floating above the ground and a similar way of lightly, liquidly flowing from one spot to another, like water by the heavens aired. He saw a slightly distant station and its fastly-spinning trains that raced at literal God-speed and wondered if they were magic or simply this world's strange, techno-magic?

  He also knew he needed to not get lost in this world's particulars and pale grazes and instead, ponder how to find the flower glower and the ending sea-light. Though knowing how Shiver and Mist and their creators all thought, the world itself was undoubtedly some kind of giant clue. However, the only noteworthy thing to be found here was that it seemed to be some sort of pure, white wonderland. Perhaps the clues would come later?

  "You gave us the most wonderful, White Wonderland Jacob," the pegusas informed him cheerfully. "When you saved our Fair, Shiverla City. "

  Jacob was again startled by something here until he remembered bitterly that of course the AI, Monovlent, alongside Shiver, had actually designed and made this entire virtual world and that the bloody machine could read his thoughts.

  "Aueries did yield the cross of resurrection fairly, however, only you could ever truly save Adora," the creature murmured in a musical tone. Speaking of music, Jacob realized he could hear something faintly orchestral like last time but more of a folksy song. It was about a woefully-eyed, ragged child, "the great, unloved one." The refrain talked about the agonies of the sooted, blackened, little love-child dying for its cold birth in impurity."

  "Charming," Jacob murmured.

  Below, he heard a delicate rustling and noticed a genuine child of seven-nine, laying by a clearing and playing with teeny, black specks that may have been little worms. Her curling, ash-gold hair was most familiar particularly as its shade now had a bronzed fire coiled within it. A fairer-than-ever spirit bird sang a golden trill above her but her form's stance seemed unlistening and her eyes never left the wormy ground.

  One of the alpaca unicorns was at her side and seemed like the purest, whitest one to ever gleam. Yet as they flew in closer, Jacob swore he saw a little darkness on its feet. Little black hooves. As opposed to the dainty white socks its kin all seemed to be adorned with. Adora gazed right up and in her expression, he saw Elfland and the fine, fairy eaves but also a fog hanging over her irises. It blew away however as she near-screamed,

  "Warrior Jacob! You're finally here," right as they swooped down to greet her.