“Keeper of calm,” the woman whispered, pressing a charm to Belfast’s palm. “You’ll need this where storms sleep under stone.”
Inside the Beacon, staircases spiraled like the whorls of an ear. Bells hung from moss, and each rung chimed with a different season. Shadows bowed as Belfast passed, acknowledging her steadiness. At the top, they found a sitting room full of teacups, each steaming as if someone had just left. The Keeper was a thin figure, pale as bone, who complained of drafts in the pretense of hospitality. adventuring with belfast in another world v01 best
A brass clock tower chimed thirteen. Belfast’s eyes narrowed. Somewhere beyond the cobbled lane, a bell made of gears and glass answered, and a procession of travelers marched past — rogues with telescopes, clerics whose stoles glowed faintly, and a hulking knight whose pauldron bore the sigil of a ship. “Keeper of calm,” the woman whispered, pressing a
Belfast rose, polite to the bone even in confusion. “Apologies. I must acquaint myself with this… locale. Would you mind if I inspected the household accounts?” A brass clock tower chimed thirteen
And so the maid— that was, Belfast—began her ledger of otherworldly duties, where tea and tact were an adventurer’s truest weapons.
“You need to mend it,” the Keeper said, fingers trembling over a ledger. “But not with force. With order. With ritual. With…someone who understands service.”