Past the kitchen, where dough balls thumped against each other and sauce stirred itself in a massive steaming pot, Nino led Alex and a floating Nina towards the back door Alex had never used. Nino opened it, and Alex funneled in behind the old man into a narrow mudroom. To the left was a wooden staircase that led presumably to the couple's apartment. Alex couldn't make out the faded photographs that lined the walls. Ahead, another door glowed with bright light that leaked into the room. Nina shut the kitchen door with a click to seal them in.

Nino looked over his shoulder and pulled out a massive clinking keyring from somewhere. He sorted through a dozen mismatched keys before selecting one.

"This one," Nino said to himself, holding up a long brass skeleton key that didn't look like it should fit any kind of modern lock. But it slid into the keyhole and turned. "Deep breath," he said without turning back. "I know you have [Phantom Step], but it feel funny even to me."

"Nino no like travel." Nina added.

"Travel?" Alex asked without expecting an answer. The old couple really didn't answer much.

Nino swung the door open and light poured into the mudroom. It was bright…and somehow wrong in Alex's brain. Like the sun was too hot, too high for a Toronto early afternoon. Wrong like the air smelled of soil, oregano, basil, and not like asphalt and mystery street meat. Alex couldn't see past the light. It was as if something was protecting his prying eyes but allowing in the feeling of the other side. Nino stepped down, Nina floated past to join her husband, and Alex followed into the bright light. HICCUP

It was like Phantom Step, but different. A blink and you miss it skip through reality, with none of the eye squeezing. Just the feeling of displacement for a fraction of a millisecond. Instead of landing on tile, Alex stumbled as his sneakers landed on crunchy dirt and stone. His eyes took a second to adjust, but when they did…

"What the…,"

He stood at the edge of a lush, fenced in garden that rolled across a gentle hillside. Rows of tomatoes on vines tied to hockey sticks bloated in the sun, zucchini sparkled, and wheat waved in the refreshing breeze. Garlic stalks bloomed in flower pots, and fruit trees wrapped the perimeter. A fig tree leaned heavy to shade the lettuce, Alex spotted familiar fat pears waiting to be plucked, and there was even a lemon tree tucked off to the side. Somewhere past the beanstalks, Alex heard the scuffling of pigs and the clucks of chickens. As far as the eye could see, rolling hills stretched out, dotted with trees Alex didn't recognize.

Nino had his arm wrapped around Nina's waist, and the old couple just smiled at him. That's when he realized they were outside.

"You-you-...," Alex stammered.

"Ahhhhhhhhhh," Nino winked and tapped the side of his nose. "Outside. Yes."

"But I thought you couldn't–"

"I no say that," Nino laughed. "Here, we can be. I no say we can no be outside. I say domain." He raised hand and waved it around his garden like a proud father. "And this…this is domain."

Alex took in the gorgeous landscape and garden. "But where is here?"

The birds were different, the plants were all wrong. He had never been to the mediterranean but had a feeling that's exactly where they were. Nino was suddenly next to him and guiding him to walk through the rows of vegetables. The old man chomped on a half-eaten cucumber before offering it to Alex.

"Cucombre?" Nino asked, chomping again. "There is something important you must see. About our little friends who breakah our window. About this place."

Alex looked over his shoulder and spotted Nina. She was humming an old Italian song as she floated around pots of lush sage and tipped a clay watering spout. A dozen butterflies danced around her and polite bumblebees bounced from flower to flower. They were working hard but unbothered.

Nino pressed a cucumber into Alex's hands. It was chilled somehow, and he took a bite. Juicy, clean flavour filled his mouth with the perfect amount of crisp to be refreshing. Just like a drink of cold water from a hose, Alex wolfed it down and wondered again: Where in the hell are we? The back of the building is just an alley.

"Our friends," Nino said while gently brushing aside plants that reached. "Like I say. They throw malocchio through our window." He stopped near a patch of cantaloupe where fattened bees hung out. "Nina and I pay respect, how we can. To break the malocchio. Make into something useful, something better." Alex could hear the pigs more clearly now, and the chickens too. Somewhere beyond a massive hedge of thyme he could spot an alabaster shack swallowed by vines.

Nino turned to face him in the garden.

"Can I trust you, Alex?" the old man asked. "Can I really trust you to keep secret? Will you keep us safe?"

Alex felt the weight of the question. Nino looked like an old man, but he knew better. He, Nina, the shop, and apparently this garden, were all their domain. They were a Lich, and rumor had it, when a Lich asked you a question in their domain, they already knew the answer. So Alex answered honestly.

"Yes. Yes you can trust me. You and Nina have already done so much for me…I won't ever forget that."

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Nino's eyes crinkled into a wide smile, and he clapped Alex on the shoulder.

"Perfetto!" he yelled, startling a cluster of birds who were picking for worms. They shot into the air with cries. Alex was pretty sure he'd never seen the reddish brown with bright orange breasts of the ones he could spot. They looked like robins unique to the area. Nino then dragged him toward the far end of the garden rows right as the System sent him a notification to seal the deal.

[You are now a friend of Nino's Pizza Shop]

[+1 Skill Upgrade]

Nino had asked Alex multiple times if he could trust him. With the System notification, Alex realized Nino hadn't truly believed it until now. What was more worrisome was what would have potentially happened if Nino decided that Alex was an enemy rather than a friend.

Fried and left here? Yikes.

"Now you are official friend," Nino exited the dense patch and beckoned Alex. "I show you."

"There's more?" Alex asked with his mouth hanging to the ground.

"Of course! There is always more." Nino laughed and Alex exited the vegetable canopy.

Before Alex stood a tomato plant that wasn't just a plant. It was a tree, with a stalk thicker than his leg, that rose at least twenty feet. Fat red tomatoes hung low on vines that waved. Leaves the size of his hand furled open to catch the perfect amount of sun. And there was a little buzz that tickled his chest, like a tug or a breeze brushing where his Core sat in his chest. The nearest vines slowly curled out in his direction, clearly aware that he was there. He [Identified] it.

[Grand Tomato Plant]

Beyond the tree, the garden continued. The shack lay nestled in more veggies, and further down the chickens gobbled.

"Tomato tree," Nino said and rubbed its green bark lovingly. "Good soil. Very nutritious, and very good for pizza," the old man looked at Alex with a knowing smile. "She like Core mulch. Curse mulch. All mulch really."

"Core…mulch?"

Nino gestured with his chin towards the ground. Alex looked and realized something that made his heart skip a little beat. The soil around the tree wasn't flat. There were plants, grass, little flowers, and four leafed clover everywhere. But there was something else that made the ground uneven.

There were mounds. Some of them were old and flattened, and the plants grew there as well. One stood out as freshly packed. The dirt was turned and pressed, and no plants had grown over just yet. Clearly, something, or someone, had just been buried there.

Alex's stomach flipped. Nino sucked his teeth and his eyes shot back up to the old man. In his hand was a feather. Not just any feather, but one that he could recognize by its bright yellow that could only be created artificially. He had seen it within Lord Loopy's dungeon.

"Peepums," Alex said while his blood ran cold despite the warm sun.

"Si," Nino nodded sadly. "They turn his body into curse. Then the stronzi threw his head through the window. Maybe curse us. So I bury," Nino got silent and sniffed.

"His head, Alex. Like animal. Like garbage. Used to scare us," he gestured toward where they had buried him.

Alex swallowed the massive lump in his throat. Britanii, and the Krushers, had killed Peepums, and thrown his head through their window. Lord Loopy was somewhere under their control. For what? As a warning? A curse? To just grow their power and influence? Alex didn't know. He just hoped Snu was OK right now, and wanted to figure out how to stop Britanii from continuing this madness.

"We bury them here," Nino said and crouched beside the fresh mound. "Out of rispetto. Out of care. He may have been Monster, but he was real. Alive too. They all have thoughts and fear. We do not just let Core be taken by another monster to use for cruelty in the world." Nino looked up at him with tired eyes before continuing.

"We bury all who ask. All who we can. Other Lich, Monster, Dungeon Boss when they are…done. Even curse we bury. So we take what is left of Core, and let it set in soil. Soil?" he waved to the countryside. "This land? It only makes good."

"The soil…it absorbs the Core? The curses too? Doesn't that mean…?" Alex asked before trailing off.

Nino nodded sadly. "Yes. You feel it, no? This place is protected by us, but it grows because of them. Not just with water. It grow with memory. With magic. With sacrifice. That is why food taste so good, and why food special. Not only reason, but," he smiled. "One reason you know. It is our way, Nina and me, of growing. We grow by feeding others, and we grow by the respect we give and those who enjoy."

Alex looked at the tree again. The Grand Tomato plant rustled on its own accord. He didn't know what to say with his mind going in so many directions. He knew there had to be a reason for their food being magical. And a part of him loathed the fact that Dungeon bosses or monsters may just be harvested to feed the power of some Adventurer's weekend kick.

So Alex knelt beside the mound where Peepums lay.

"I get it," he said quietly. "This place…it matters. It's not just a garden. It's a resting place." He placed his hand on the dirt and looked at Nino. "I won't tell anyone, I swear. This needs to stay protected. There needs to be somewhere where humans can lay."

Nino rose from his crouch and wiped his hands together. "And now you see," he said. "Understand a little. Not just a stunad." The old man smiled as Alex rose too. Alex laughed, even with the heaviness in his chest.

"And the window?" he asked, remembering. "If you can't leave to get things…I…how can we fix it? What can we do?" He shook his head and remembered something else. "Also, where the hell are we?" He pointed. "The sun is NOT in the right place."

Nino laughed. "Ah, Alex. Just when I had hope, you still act stupido." The man took off and entered the vegetable canopy again.

Alex stood alone there, letting the stillness wrap around him. The sun warmed his skin, not too hot, just right, and the air smelled of sea salt on wind. The breeze was light and carried the feeling of life. It felt pure, untouched by traffic and smog and stress. Like that hillside had been waiting just for him. For the first time in weeks, maybe longer, he felt the knots untie themselves from his back and shoulders. If he could only just stay there just a little longer.

Am I in….hmmm…he started to think, but the thought was interrupted by the bark of Nino.

"Vienni qua, Alex! Ma fangule-WHEN PEOPLE EAT OUR FOOD WE CAN TAKE ENERGY AND GROW THING. LIKE WINDOW. Helloooo? MA-Come on! Is obvious! Now come and delivery pizza, we have many order!"

Alex laughed and sprinted back through the rows of vegetables toward the door to the shop. He would figure out a way to put a stop of Britanii. And if he needed to make some deliveries to fix the shop, he had absolutely no problem in doing that.

If Britanii wants war, I will deliver. Yeah. Yeah, that's a dope line.

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