The doll looked to the Shopkeeper, then back to Ophelia. “The Shopkeeper is aware of the other Hunters you speak of, though their nature confuses them greatly. Not only has there never been this many Hunters bound to the Dream at once, – even the four we have now is more than I have ever seen – but something also seems to be awry with many of those currently undergoing metamorphosis. A process that should have been a guaranteed success has turned unreliable, and several among the marked have perished before they could even complete their transformation. And many of those who have yet to awaken – if not all of them – may never wake at all. It is most perplexing and unnerving.”
Again the doll paused, seemingly listening to something only she could hear. “While it is true that they witnessed the old Healing Church at their worst, good Hunter, the same could be said for all the factions of Yharnam. On that dreadful night, nigh all who strayed anywhere near the city were driven mad or became beasts. But it is true that the Shopkeeper also found evidence of the wickedness of the Healing Church that far predated the Blood Moon. They were a vile, ruthless institution, and they do not lament their downfall.
They are not certain whether the new Healing Church is any better or worse than the old one, however. From what they know, the new Church are much more cautious with their experimentation, at least, though they seem even more reckless with their reliance on the Old Blood than the old one. All they know for certain is that the White Church seems quite hostile toward them, though they have done nothing to deserve such enmity. They have also not heard anything about the Church having found a way to link to the Dream, and none of the Church have come here as of yet... though it would not surprise them if they were trying to achieve such a thing.”

To Ophelia's last request, the doll bowed yet again, the Shopkeeper merely offered a curt nod of their head whereas Torquil immediately and awkwardly started shuffling toward the door. Ultimately, though, all three of them left and headed back outside and down the stairs there, past the tall headstones the doll had previously mentioned.
Now that the doll had called attention to it, Torquil noticed lines of letters carved into each of these headstones, most of which glittered with a silver sheen, but a couple of which had a golden hue, too. On the last headstone, lowest on the slope, he also spotted the glowing spot the doll had mentioned, waiting for one of them to give it a name.

Though some part of Ophelia wished to continue the conversation, she waited for the others to leave so she could get herself properly dressed in gear that'd at least give her a fighting chance against the terrors that awaited in the waking world. She combed through the chest for a couple of moments before pulling out a selection of garments - the red dress and shoes from the female knight's set, the white overcoat of the Choir set, and the hat from the Bone Ash set. She waited a quick moment, catching her breath and composing herself, before undressing. She took a moment while naked to move back over to the tools that were so familiar to her, and she rested her right hand on them gently as she felt tears begin to well up in her eyes. She'd lost one set of parents when she was young--they'd left one day and simply never returned, and she'd had to fend for herself... until she was taken in by the witches, who'd looked after her as though she were a wayward daughter of their own. She'd never let herself grieve the loss of her adopted parents, but touching their brand again broke the floodgates that she'd been damming for many years and she permitted herself a moment of bawling to commemorate and remember them. She whispered her final goodbyes, hoping their spirits had found solace in the embrace of the realms of Nightmare, and wiped her tears dry as she dressed herself in her new garb.

She took the time to craft for herself a little holster for her beloved Moonlight Sword, that she could snap the sword away from in times of emergency, as well as procuring a number of other items before passing them off to the Messengers to carry for her. The Rosmarinus sang to her in forgotten songs, touching the very edges of her mind, and so she handed that off to the little ones--and she also took the Kos Parasite in its bowl, gently placing it down in the awaiting arms of the Messengers. She offered them a curtsy and a thank you for their service before finally picking up the Holy Moonlight Sword and cradling it in her arms. It could not be a parent to her, but she no longer needed a parent--its guidance was more than enough. She let it rest against her clavicle as she had before, her silvery braid once again wrapping around the sword and little motes of guiding moonlight began to flow across her ornate tresses as she stepped back outside into the waiting moonlight to find where the others had gone.

_Farren

absorbed as much as he could of what was said, and what was going on, but ultimately he found himself relieved when Ophelia asked for some privacy. As the others took their leave, Farren bowed his head to Ophelia in a brief show of respect, “No shame in it,” he said simply, then he took his leave as well, his mind wandering back to the pool overflowing with Messengers as he departed the building.

Shifting his destination with that in mind, the azure-eyed hunter passed Torquil in the others, his stride purposeful as he walked over to the pool. Idly he reached down to the Messengers…and swiftly found that they reached toward him, showing him what they had to offer. “Hmm…” he murmured with a slow exhale as he considered the various items. He saw some things that perhaps Ophelia would be more interested in, but he left those well alone instead eyeing the Quicksilver bullets and the strange hourglass. Ultimately, he decided to abstain from the serpent’s temptation, perhaps he might obtain it later, but for now he’d rather have a series of other more standard, essential tools.

Feeling out the ethereal research that clung to the veins beneath his flesh, Farren made clear his intent, focusing his mind as he willed the blood echoes to transfer to the little eyeless Messengers that clamoured within the pool. In a moment he felt, then saw, the manifestation of what he’d given them leave to conjure via the power of the echoes that had lay within his blood.

Hand outstretched, Farren watched as the withered helpers deposited items into his hand as they faded into existence–or perhaps were pulled from some other realm? He didn’t know, and did away with the thought a moment later, finding either possibility rather disquieting. Eventually, seven(7) vials of pristine blood had formed and were deposited upon his palm. As they came into being, Farren stowed them away safely. The vials were swiftly followed by quicksilver bullets, for which he proffered the container he’d been given by the Blood Moon Hunter. Rather than quicksilver bullets manifesting individually, the Messengers seemed to graze their clambering little digits repeatedly over the glass. Each point of contact seemed to cause more shimmering metallic liquid to spontaneously fill the interior. When he was satisfied he had enough for at least ten(10) Quicksilver bullets, he stopped and refocused even as he stowed the tube away. Reaching out a final time, Farren received nine(9) Lead bullets from the messengers and then stowed them away. Satisfied, Farren turned away from the pool, still feeling at least a third of those strange writhing echoes shifting about his body, almost–but not quite–in sync with the beat of his heart.

As he looked, he saw that Ophelia had not yet joined them outside. He supposed it hadn’t taken him particularly long, so he headed for the Doll to make good on the remaining power latent within him. He eyed her as he approached, stepping in slightly closer than was perhaps polite, before he met her blank-artificial gaze. Farren wondered, as he looked upon her, how much of a mind she truly had, how much will. However, as with many things before, he cast the thought aside and addressed her, though it felt strange to do so.

“I…need more stamina. Can these…echoes serve that purpose?” His bright eyes watched her, almost shining in concert with the moonlight. Then, he watched as the Doll nodded her head. "Indeed. Let the echoes become your strength. Let me stand close." She reached to take Farren's hand in her own. "Now shut your eyes…” and he did, though only after a brief hesitation and a look of slight discomfort.

Immediately, Farren felt the vague, ephemeral presence that had been clinging to him begin to drain. As the power that the deaths of Pallid and his ilk back in the clinic was siphoned away into the doll...Farren felt strangely bereft. A faint pang of Hunger beat through him in concert with his heart, but the impression was swiftly scattered as an entirely different power flowed in reverse–pouring back into his person. Something warm and pleasant radiated from the cool porcelain of the doll-hand that held his. It felt like it was pressing itself into his very veins, following the current of his blood as it rapidly circulated throughout his body. Eventually, the feeling diminished, leaving him feeling…normal, yet different somehow. Farren took a deep breath, and his lungs felt larger? No, that wasn’t quite right. Stronger perhaps? It was hard to say, strange as the feeling was. It seemed that the very pathways of his blood and the bellows in his chest had spontaneously improved.

Farren opened his eyes and his hand fell from the Doll’s grasp as he glanced down at himself. He didn’t look any diff–no, his skin, it seemed more lively somehow. It was like the vigor within him had brought new color to his complexion, new energy to his frame. He couldn’t help but smile, “Miraculous…” he whispered, a quiet awe in his voice.

After a moment’s quiet, the revelation began to fade, taking that strange new awe with it, and the Azure-eyed hunter gave the Doll a respectful nod. Whether she were truly alive or not, she had done them many services and he appreciated greatly her contributions towards their betterment. “Blessings, miss,” Farren said softly. Delicately, he brought her hand–with his own–to his lips and lightly ghosted a kiss upon the porcelain that served as her skin. The warmth of before was largely gone and he did not linger, letting the Doll’s hand go before he turned and walked towards Torquil.

He hoped they could depart soon, for the Hunger in his blood quietly itched to find more beasts….

Torquil mostly just stood there for a while, looking at Farren first pulling objects out of the birdbath and then holding hands with the living doll, and wondered if the world used to make sense or if it had always been utter nonsense like this. People getting killed but not dying, waking up on an island in the clouds with a sky that decided to just spontaneously switch time of day... People talking to glowing, magical swords, and passing entire arsenals to little bony men that lived in the ground...
Sighing to himself, Torquil shook his head in resignation and wondered if things really made more sense to the others, or if they were just more comfortable being confused. He longed for that place he had seen flashes of in his memories, that nice, cozy little cabin in the woods... remote, quiet and simple. Lonely, but predictable, understandable. He would even prefer being back in the city of Yharnam and embroiled in some frantic fight to the death with a beast hoarse men, where none of the weirdness mattered and all he had to do was to hit the ones that wanted to hurt him really, really hard.
So weird...

Not sure what to do with himself while Farren did his thing and Ophelia changed, Torquil turned to have a closer look at the headstones that were apparently their means of returning to the “Waking World”, whatever that meant. The glowing spot on the last headstone he understood from the doll's explanation represented the lantern Farren had lit earlier, waiting to be given a name. It did not exactly “make sense,” but he understood the general concept, at least. He pondered a name for it for a moment, but could not come up with anything before his mind started to wander to other things...
Like the other things written on the headstones.

The one he was looking at had an inscription way up at the top, where it simply said “YHARNAM” in capital letters, but that was not all. Below that it had “West Blood Ministration Clinic”, “Great Bridge”, “Tomb of Oedon”, “Cathedral Ward”, “White Church Workshop”, “Upper Cathedral Ward”, “Lumenflower Gardens”, “Old Yharnam” and “Black Church Workshop”.
The one next to it had the title “FRONTIER” and listed places such as “Hemwick Charnel Lane”, “Witch's Abode”, “Forbidden Woods” and “Immigrant Camps”.
Yet another had “UNSEEN” at the top, and “Outside Yahar'gul”, “Castle Cainhurst” and “Vileblood Queen's Chamber”.
And finally the last one was ominously marked “NIGHTMARE” and had just two items, “Halls of the Old Lords” and “Lair of the Wise Master”.
All of the lines that sounded vaguely like places gleamed like silver, except two; the letters of “Upper Cathedral Ward” and “Lumenflower Gardens” were gold instead of silver.

Torquil shrugged to himself. It was way too abstract for him to try to figure out what places these names referred to, especially when he was barely familiar with Yharnam in the first place. Hopefully the others would understand.

Ophelia exited the workshop to find Torquil wandering amongst the headstones, and Farren conversing with the doll. She strolled down the path at a somewhat leisurely pace, perusing the same headstones that Torquil was and coming to a much more profound realisation than he appeared to be capable of doing: these were all locations in Yharnam and its surrounds, as well as the various realms of the Nightmare if the headstones were to be believed--and if she had to guess, they referred to a lantern like the one that they'd used to enter into the Hunter's Dream. The ability to slip into another layer of reality to bridge the distances between locations in the Waking World... it boggled the mind, what awesome power that could enable a person to possess. It also made a lot of sense, in her mind, that the Shopkeeper had succeeded during the fabled Night of the Blood Moon. Immortality and the means to circumvent massive distances were boons few could hope to compete with... and it made sense why Mother Moira had gotten to wield such power and influence. As she scanned her moonlight-coloured eyes over the headstones she took notice of the flowers, and the light haze of mist in the air. She permitted herself to smell the flowers while she was here, and found them curiously moon-scented. It almost smelled less in their presence, compared to the powerful scent from the Shopkeeper (and less powerful scent from Torquil). She found the sensation oddly relaxing, as she basked in the light of the moon above and the shard of cosmic light that remained at her side.

"Does time flow differently in the realms of Nightmare, love?" Ophelia asked the doll, to be met with a response: "It does not, good Hunter. The time you spend here is the same as what passes in the Waking World, and in most of the Nightmare."

She nodded thoughtfully at that, a smile beginning to creep at the edges of her lips. Her left hand idly played with the brim of her hat, and her right stroked rhythmically to and fro along the gleaming blade of the Holy Moonlight Sword. That gave her ideas, a better sense of the scale of the board. Some part of her wondered if it was perhaps a test, then, by the White Church. The message on that chalkboard had been very clear: for the eyes of the First Hunter only. Each of these new revelations struck her mind refracted through the guiding prism of her sword, and she was certain of only one thing: there were layers of intrigue here, entire levels of a bigger picture that she simply did not have enough information to possibly parse. There was some small victory in becoming aware of those layers, however--she knew that she was free to follow her curiosity wherever it might lead. She turned to face the doll and posed another question, her expression having taken on a slight look of wonderment and awe similar to Farren's.

"You mentioned earlier that you could use these... echoes of blood to assist us, mm? I could perhaps do with a little more stamina, and my wasting sickness left me quite weak before the ministration. Could you perhaps help with that too?"

The doll nodded her head. "Very well. Let the echoes become your strength. Let me stand close." She reached to take Ophelia's hand in hers. "Now shut your eyes..."

Immediately, Ophelia felt the vague, ephemeral presence that had been clinging to her since Pallid and his minions had died back in the clinic drain away, its power being siphoned away from her and into the doll... only to feel another kind of power to flow in reverse. Something warm and pleasant radiated from the cool porcelain of the doll-hand she was holding. It felt like it filled her veins, followed the current of her blood and rapidly circulated throughout her body, until the feeling eventually diminished, leaving her feeling as normal.

And yet not. Even just passively standing there, Ophelia would notice her breathing having gotten easier, as if her respiratory system had just been instantaneously improved... which it probably had.

She took in a hearty lungful of air and gave the doll a radiant smile after she exhaled joyfully, offering her another quick curtsy. Her flesh had taken on a lissom rosiness beyond even what the ministration had granted her, and she seemed to hold herself with a greater ease than before. Her movements were already graceful, but now they lacked a certain laboriousness they had previously and she seemed almost to glide as she moved to sidle next to Farren.

"You might want to check those gravestones over there with Torquil, love. Let me know what you think." she opined, before continuing on to the birdbath with the messengers as she moved there next. She perused its selection of items thoughtfully, eagerly craning to read the scrolls bearing descriptions where appropriate, until she settled on the Memory of Stars. She channelled that power in the closest approximation she could to how the doll had done it, manifesting the echoes and pushing them out towards the messengers to bridge the gap between worlds.

Upon retrieving the item Ophelia proceeded to use it immediately, eager to gain the insight therein.

Barely had Ophelia's fingers grasped the materialized skull before she felt the bone crumple, turning to dust at even a gentle touch... but the dust did not get fall to gravity or get carried away by the wind. The white mist-like cloud slipped through her fingers and traveled up her arm, slithering among the moon-motes that still danced before her eyes, up her shoulder and eventually seemed to simply fade away as it reached her head.
To the others, Ophelia looked like she fell into a trance, simply staring off into space. But to Ophelia...




“Look!” a woman in ragged clothes called out excitedly, pointing at a pile of refuse a short ways ahead of her group. Within the pile of trash something shone in the daylight with a metallic sheen, causing her to salivate as she hastened ahead. She narrowly avoided stepping on the partially buried and mostly decomposed head of an overlooked corpse as she ran over, only for her to temper her eagerness and cautiously sift through what she had found.
“Heh, almost stepped on one,” a similarly weathered man murmured as he and a second woman crouched down by the mostly buried corpse and started unearthing their find, eagerly checking the carcass for valuables. “There's so many 'round here.”
“I know, right?” the woman helping him loot the corpse chuckled. “Everyone's afraid of the place, but there's a bunch of dead people. It's a goldmine, ripe for the taking.”
Ahead of those two the first woman stood from her treasure, shoulders sagging and a sour mien on her face. “'Twas just an empty bowl. Nothin' good in here.”
“This fella's got a purse of coins,” the man announced, triumphantly raising the small, moldy bag he had just retrieved. “What'ya think, Ella? 'nough for a few vials?”
The woman helping with the corpse – Ella – deftly snatched the purse from her companion's hand and easily ripped the fabric apart, pouring a handful of intermingled silver and copper coins into her waiting hand. “Maybe a couple, if we get them cheap. Not enough for the good stuff.”
“Rats,” the man cursed, immediately getting back up and shading his eyes with his hand as he started looking intently ahead.

These three ratty individuals followed the outer wall bordering the dark, forbidden place called Yahar'gul, eagerly searching for any forgotten or discarded items that might have been left behind by those fleeing the hidden village, or the remains of any unfortunate soul that had fallen in their escape. They wrestled porcelain toys from the brittle hands of children, tore teeth of gold and silver from rotting skulls and dug through layers of maggots and other carrion insects in search of wayward jewelry. Coins were only the most direct source of profit; these looters seized any opportunity to take something of value, hoping against hope to find intact blood vials without even realizing that any such blood would surely have rotted by now.
“There's another one over there,” Ella called, the other woman darting ahead as soon as the words were spoken. “Clothes look fancy.”
The other woman threw herself to her knees before the corpse, immediately starting to rummage through its pockets. “Fancy's right! And fresh! This guy can't've been off'ed more than a few days ago.”
“Really?” Ella walked over there, and sure enough this corpse seemed much more recent than the others they had found, likely another looter that had been careless and gotten killed by a beast...
Or so Ella had presumed, until she took a closer look at the lifeless form before her, causing her to frown in confusion. He had relatively fancy clothes, yes, but not just any fancy clothes; the corpse wore a Black Church Hunter's garb! She reflexively sniffed the air, checking for the distinctive scent that perpetually surrounded Hunters, but whatever smell might have once hung over this body was obliterated by the thick stench of death and decay.
“Praise Oedon!” the other woman exclaimed, seemingly indifferent to the possible identity of the corpse she was looting. “Blood vials! There's like, eh... three, four... five? Five of them!”
“Seriously?” The man threw himself to the ground next to her, joining her in searching. “Gimme one! I haven't had a drink for days!”
“Find yer own!”
Ella remained standing as her fellows argued about ownership of their find, quite perturbed by the thought that this person, who was probably a Hunter for all they knew, had been killed here... recently. Hunters were monstrously powerful; so powerful, in fact, that Ella had never even considered the fact that they could die. More troubling still, the corpse seemed mostly intact. Had this guy been killed by a beast, surely it would have devoured him.
“I don't think...” she started, only to be distracted from what she was saying as her eyes fell on a second figure on the ground nearby. Though this one was in much plainer clothes, that corpse seemed much newer than the others they had found, too. And next to that body, a third. And a fourth. In fact now that she did not have tunnel vision on the prospective loot on the dead Hunter, Ella realized that this particular area seemed to have over a dozen more or less recent dead bodies scattered about, another several of which were also Hunters.

“We should leave. Now.” Ella took a step back, trembling despite her general indifference toward the dead her great desire for blood. “I don't like this. Something's not right.”
“But look at all this stuff!” the other woman cheered, either not noticing or not caring about the creeping dread in Ella's voice. “We'll be drinkin' for weeks with all this –”
There was a flash of red light from somewhere, though it was so blindingly bright that Ella was not even sure where it came from, causing her to close her eyes and shield them with her hands. The light was as brief as it was bright, however, and soon enough Ella was blinking away the shadows and dancing lights burned into her retinas.
“What was –” she started asking, only for her to choke on her words as her recovering gaze fell on her companions... or rather, on where her companions had been mere seconds earlier. All that remained of them and the dead Hunter they had been looting was a pile of dark-gray ash and three charred skeletons, two of which were sprawled on top of the third.

“Fascinating,” a female voice spoke to Ella's left, causing her to jump and recoil from the sound, whimpering in fear and confusion... both of which only intensified when she failed to identify the speaker anywhere near her, despite there being nowhere to hide. “Interesting. A rather small area of effect, but surprisingly effective, at least situationally.”
Before Ella's eyes the air in front of her started shimmering, the image of the background warping as though seen through curved glass in the shape of a humanoid figure, before the image of the ground and wall past this aberration was finally replaced by the fully fledged form of a person standing before her. The abruptly revealed woman wore strange clothes the like of which Ella had only seen on merchants and some of the fancy-pants that came here to study Yharnam, and carried an odd, fleshy lump in her left hand. The lump seemed to be slowly throbbing in her grasp as though with a steady heartbeat, and was giving off a soft glow the same color as the flash from before. In her other hand she held... something? A fish, maybe? It looked like a long, blue wiggling creature of some kind.
The strange woman did not seem to pay any mind to Ella, but was instead looking at the remains of her freshly obliterated friends, seeming entirely unmoved by the sight.
“The effect would probably not be as pronounced against something with a greater life force, like a live Hunter or beast, but it is certainly promising. It seems that increasing the ratio of mercury to blood by ten percent reduced the target area by twenty percent, but increased the heat generated by... ah, I suppose I will have to examine the remains, won't I?”
“Y-y-y-you...” Ella stumbled back, her eyes wide in terror at a danger she did not understand, her entire body trembling in dread. “P-please... don't...”
The woman turned to look at Ella, which finally gave voice to the scream that had been building in the ragged looter's throat. Her eyes were wrong; where there should have been scleras were instead a fathomless black void, stars glittering in an alien night's sky that should not exist, whereas iris and pupil had been replaced with a churning, swirling mass of tiny violet specks.
Ella fell on her hands and butt, screaming in abject horror as she tried desperately to scramble away, yet finding herself incapable of breaking eye-contact with this unnatural visage before her.
“Fear not,” the woman remarked softly, a smile creasing her mouth that might have seemed kind if not for her eyes, which expressed nothing but indifference, “for they, as all of us, will be reborn in the Nightmare. This life is but a test posed to us by the gods. Surely you do not doubt their boundless wisdom, little looter?”
She could not stop screaming. She could not speak, could not think, could barely even move; this was fear unlike anything Ella had ever experienced, so intense that it washed away everything else. The world itself seemed to shrink and fade away, until there was nothing but those eyes, swallowing her, consuming her, the starlit sky within surrounding her completely.
“Accept their love,” the woman sang, her voice hypnotic and hauntingly beautiful as the violet spheres floating amidst empty space grew more active, the movement of the life within growing suddenly frantic. “Embrace the gods... and allow them to embrace you.”
The mass of writhing motion abruptly pulsed, their centers folding away to reveal what resided within, revealing an insight beyond what any human could fathom, beyond what a mind could endure...

And the memory faded.

_Farren

took her cue and walked over to the headstones. Slowly–faster than Torquil would have, but certainly at a more ponderous pace than Ophelia had–the azure-eyed hunter read the various words engraved into the stone. Some were familiar, others not so for they offered no glimmer of recognition. It was clear what they were though: The names of places in or around Yharnam, with few exceptions. A sort of perverse curiosity made him wonder at the nature of the locations that were listed upon the Nightmare Headstone. However, he only entertained that thought for a moment or two before turning his attention back to the present place and time. Briefly, Farren glanced between Torquil and Ophelia, then the Doll and the Blood Moon Hunter. For a moment Farren considered their next course of action before he turned back to Torquil, closing the short bit of distance between where he stood and the man’s position before he patted his shoulder companionably. “Again, glad you’re whole and hale. As for the headstones…seems they’re scribed with locations in and around Yharnam, with some odd exceptions…if you were wondering.”

Farren dropped it then, his hand falling away even as the silence rose in that strange place that they stood. It was simultaneously eerie and comforting and Farren wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but he did know that he wanted out. They’d gotten more even than what they’d come for and he figured it was time for them to return to the…was it the waking world, since this was a Dream of sorts? Farren wasn’t sure, but he shook his head and then glanced Ophelia’s way. “We should get back,” he said, addressing her plainly even as the moon hung overhead…brilliant, bright and beaming. Yet, though he knew it was a beautiful sight, it only filled him with a strange sense of inexplicable–if quiet and subtle–dread. Like being watched.

Like being hunted.

Torquil smiled, nodded his head and told Farren “Thanks,” when he once again gave voice to his appreciation that Torquil was alive and well – something that Torquil admittedly was quite happy with, too – and offered a brief explanation of the words on the headstones. It did not change how happily he smiled and he did not say anything, but the fact that Farren felt the need to explain that the writing represented places in Yharnam... writing with such arcane labels as “Cathedral Ward”, “White Church Workshop” and “Old Yharnam”... it made him a little sad.
How stupid does he think I am? Torquil wondered as he turned away from Farren, feeling suddenly quite self-conscious and embarrassed about his own acuity compared to the others. Sure, he did not like to make decisions or to ponder stuff he did not understand at a glance, but he was not that stupid... was he? He had known they were places, just not where those places were... right?

Starting to feel really uncomfortable in his own head, Torquil looked around for something to distract himself with and settled on the living doll that everyone seemed completely unperturbed was walking around and talking like a real person. For a moment he let himself be distracted by simply looking at her, as she was undeniably quite beautiful, if somewhat obviously inhuman, and he quite liked her dress. Her hat was cute. But soon enough he told himself that cute or not she was still a doll, and instead recalled some of the things she had told them.
He was particularly interested in her ability to make them stronger, which both Ophelia and Farren had taken advantage of already, and decided that he had better seize the chance to gain some power from her, too, so he would not end up being worthless to the others.
“Uh... hi,” he said as he awkwardly shuffled up to the doll, prompting her to immediately turn to face him attentively. For a second he wondered what to even ask for, but both Ophelia and Farren had asked for stamina, so he decided to just follow their lead. “Can you give me more stamina, too?”
The doll cocked her head, watching him intently with her large, round eyes. “I am sorry, good Hunter, but I cannot. You need to have blood echoes for me to channel into strength for you, and you have none.”
“Oh.” Torquil lightly kicked a tuft of grass in the path in front of him, looking anywhere but at the doll. “How do I get those?”
“They are the lingering wills of the fallen,” she told him patiently. “You need only be nearby when someone dies, and the power of their blood will echo in yours.”
“Right.” He still did not really get what blood echoes were, but he thought he understood how to get them, at least. “So I get them and come back here, and you can make me stronger?”
The doll nodded her head affirmatively. “So long as you reach the Dream through a stable conduit.”
Torquil stared at her blankly. “What?”
“You need to return to the Dream by using one of the Gatekeepers' lanterns or other markers that can send you here reliably and peacefully,” she explained. “Otherwise, if you lose consciousness or fall asleep, you will still come here but will leave your blood echoes behind.”
Nodding his head slowly, the armored Hunter pondered what he had just been told. “So earlier... even if someone had died at the clinic, I'd still have no echoes now because I died, too?”
“Indeed.”
He sighed. It seemed he had another reason not to get killed again.

Ophelia followed through the journey of experiencing the memory eagerly, immersing herself in the poached experience of another as she had done so many times before. They were dead; they did not need their eyes, nor their insight. Better they be collected by one who sees them, one ready for the sticky whispers they would no doubt impart. She recognised the place, if only by descriptions and distant peeks across the immensity that was Yharnam and its surrounds--and knew that allies of the Witches had once congregated here, in the time before everything changed. She shared their vision of coming across the Hunters, slain with such ease that their blood vials had remained unused, and she cringed at their stupidity... but she also admired their curiosity, at least a little.

But then she laid eyes upon Naira, albeit through the eyes of another, and immediately some flash of too-bright recollection glowed within her mind's eyes. She recognised her--though briefly and at a great remove, as though they'd met but never spoken--and recalled she had glistening mahogany-brown eyes flecked with little glimmers of something else. Whatever had happened to her, whatever forces she'd communed with to make her this way... to change her eyes like that, the essence of who she was... Ophelia shivered a little, and felt that shiver reverberate through the Holy Moonlight Greatsword. She could feel its stabilising influence even within the midst of experiencing another's experience, dull and distant, but she could not see any of the motes she'd been able to see earlier. She felt the sickening creep of fear and bile rising within her stomach, of dread and terror and not wanting it all to end, as the life she was experiencing this vision through was snuffed out and she came to with a brief and gibbering wail that the others may or may not have heard.

"No! She was about to see it, the Truth, I..." Ophelia babbled for a second as she came to, the hazy glimmer of alien stars alighting from her perception, but a quick look at and tender stroke of the sword she carried calmed her down and she breathed out the death throes of the woman whose skull she'd just crushed.

"Naira... she was never like that before. They must have made breakthroughs, gleaned insights, but... What separates her from the Healing Church of old now? Will she stop? Can she stop..? We... I... she has to be stopped." Ophelia mumbled to herself, suddenly deeply uncomfortable with the reality of and the cost of obtaining those grand insights. She shook the thought from her head as she made her way back to the others, collected near the doll at the Headstones.

"Conduits, you say? The Lanterns? So we have to... to awaken them in the waking world before we can use them to safely return here. Ah! The gold lights... they are conduits already activated, then? Have they remained active since your time, Shopkeeper, or are there those attuned to this Dream that have activated them from the Waking World but not ventured here?" Ophelia asked, stroking her chin with a free hand as she pondered the information revealed to her.

“Any of the Gatekeepers' lanterns you find and light will become conduits, allowing you to return here safely, and adding another marker to the headstones to reawaken through,” the doll explained, smiling softly at Ophelia. The Shopkeeper also walked over to stand next to the doll. “As for the markers that are already there, good Hunter, the Shopkeeper is not responsible for them. Any time the Dream has no Hunters, the Gatekeepers take back their lanterns and the old markers are extinguished. The Shopkeeper filled the headstones with markers in their time, too, but those markers were erased once their task was completed. The markers you see now are the ones created by Gerlinde, the fourth Hunter currently bound to the Dream.”
The doll glanced nervously a the Shopkeeper, hesitating a moment before adding: “I am sorry, good Hunter, but we do not know what the golden markers are. They are conduits, we know that, but they are not created by the Gatekeepers. It is another new thing for the Dream; all the markers I have ever known were silver.”

_Farren

didn’t think anything of Torquil turning away from him after they’d finished speaking briefly–why would he have? The man hadn’t seemed to express any discomfort or a need for further discussion. Farren glanced back at the headstones as his companion spoke to the Doll, inadvertently providing all of them with some further information regarding the so-called ‘conduits’. “Mmm…these gold names, are they accessible to us now or only once we’ve discovered their, ah, ‘conduits’ ourselves?”

Farren had raised his voice enough to be heard over the mid-distance between him and the doll, heard without him turning his head or walking over to her, that was. As he awaited a response, Ophelia chimed in and he listened somewhat absently as he studied the names again, trying to recall where the various locations were. He found that his sense for Yharnam felt…almost constricted. Farren closed his eyes, focusing inwards for a moment. At first he almost clawed at his own mind, as if he were dragging long-nailed fingers through his mental landscape, trying to tear free errant knowledge like some kind of ineffective sieve. At first he got very little, but as he got gentler and sort of…relaxed his mind, Farren found that more flowed into his awareness. He saw the elegant structures of Upper Cathedral Ward, the vaulted ceiling in Byrgenwerth and its often eerie halls and grounds–though he couldn’t quite recall as many details as he felt he ought to. Much more vividly however, he remembered the smell of shit and death, dirt and poverty and desperation that was almost universal in Hemwick and its Charnel lane and of course…the place he’d worked: the Old Healing Church Workshop. That place felt…a bit warmer than was comfortable with tinges of iron and a distinct dusty scent of sawdust intermingled with a sense of lingering sweat. Yet, it felt like home somehow. How odd.

After he was done piecing together what he could recall of Yharnam, Farren’s eyelids fluttered open again just as the Doll said something that caused a wave of nausea, distinct discomfort and deep unease to lance through his mind. He winced–almost recoiling–then clutched at one side of his head, eyes closing as if in pain as a series of flashes interposed themselves upon his awareness. “Agh…that name,” he muttered, mostly to himself, his voice sounding strained for a moment. He took a deep breath and then exhaled it slowly, making it measured, focusing on it. Still the visions…no, memories, struck at him.


Farren wanted to shake his head, but didn’t, fearing it would only cause him a terrible headache, or maybe somehow dislodge more memories. It was possible after all, especially when in this new world he’d woke into, he could tread physically into dreams–apparently.


Farren gritted his teeth and practically hissed, giving his head the tiniest of shakes despite his earlier resistance. It didn’t help.


Final, the flashes stopped, but it left him with that damned name–Gerlinde–and a lingering sense of once-buried shame. Farren tried to compose himself, but ultimately turned his back to the others and moved to the headstone that contained the one conduit they’d lit themselves: Rebirth’s Rise. Farren shrugged slightly, that was apt enough he supposed.

As he began to reach out, the Doll spoke however, looking at him as she cocked her head. "I don't know. I am sorry, but we have never had more than one Hunter bound to the Dream at the same time, but the marker is on the headstone, and Hunters have always been able to travel through the markers. I..." She paused, looked at the Shopkeeper, then turn back to Farren to correct herself: "We assume that they are accessible to you now."

Farren simply nodded in reply. “Just as well. Nonetheless…we should go, Victor’s waiting,” Farren said, ready to try returning to the waking world. All said, Farren wanted out of this place, especially after that memory. He needed…no it didn’t matter. Anything else would do.

"So it seems the breadth of Yharnam is our proverbial oyster, hmm? You're right, though, love--it wouldn't do to keep Victor hanging. I know it's usually a bad idea to split up, but immortal as we are there are so few consequences that can touch us now. I was thinking that I might pay a visit to the White Church directly; I'd like to confirm Victor's story with the vicar or Dietrich, you see. If the two of you return to him at... Rebirth's Rise, I will do a little snooping of my own. If the stories are true, they might have some respect for my darling blade here--and that might earn me some answers that I can report back with. I have to know what these golden conduits mean, for all our sakes. Does that sound good to you, dears?" Ophelia asked, chiming in to the conversation after Farren addressed the Doll with his concerns.

She could not get the image of Naira's eyes out of her mind, the whorls of alien stars glittering within that seemed practically burned into her retinas. It took her a great deal of focus to put it out of her mind and let something else take the forefront, and she briefly pinched the bridge of her nose with her free hand as she exerted a tremendous amount of mental effort. She still noticed the way that Farren's brow furrowed, and she could see within the sparkling azure depths of his eyes that some torment had afflicted him--a memory of his time before the ministration, perhaps? She did not pry any further than that, expecting him to ask if he wished to discuss it and wanting to let it alone if he did not.

Assuming there was no dissent to this plan, Ophelia would lay a gentle fingertip upon the golden marker for the Upper Cathedral Ward and focus, attempting to access the conduit. The message on the chalkboard... she could not shift it from the periphery of her thoughts, and knew she would not be able to truly concentrate on the plethora of opportunities that arrayed themselves before their motley little group until she had her answer. If it was something the Shopkeeper and Doll did not know, it was vitally important that they find out. That was her justification, at least, for indulging her wild curiosity.

_Farren

paused, his hand somewhat outstretched already, fingers hovering above where it read 'Rebirth's Rise' upon the gravestone. Catching Ophelia's words, the azure-eyed hunter frowned slightly then lowered his hand and glanced in her direction. He saw about her an air of finality. She'd made her decision. His reply was gruff. “Mmm...very well. Though, when should we attempt to reconvene?”

Farren gestured at their surroundings, indicating that here was likely the best place. “After all...we're unlikely to be near Rebirth's Rise once your business has concluded.”

"Ah, dear, I will get the little ones to send you a message--or vice versa. You can update me as to where you are, and I can simply awaken at a conduit near you. Following the trail of slain beasts should lead me to you in no time at all, shouldn't it?" Ophelia replied, her voice somewhat distracted as her thoughts were clearly elsewhere.

“Ah, I'd forgotten,” Farren said, looking slightly annoyed about the fact. He'd done enough forgetting for a lifetime, he figured. “...too much information in too little a time,” Farren muttered, “...well, stay vigilant. May not die permanently...but no reason being reckless,” he added. Then, with a final glance at their hosts and a respectful nod in their direction, Farren turned back to the gravestone and moved his hand back to its cold surface. He paused a breath and gave Torquil a sidelong glance over his shoulder, “With me, Torquil. Unless you've got other business too.” Farren tried to soften his tone, but his words still came out sounding slightly agitated.

The idea of them splitting up did not exactly thrill Torquil, nor did especially Ophelia's nonchalance about the lack of risk now that they were supposedly immortal. It was fine for the others to be dismissive about danger now that they knew they would just reawaken in the Dream if they were killed, but he was the only one of them that had actually died. Even if he knew it would not actually end his life, the experience was still... deeply unpleasant. Every time he closed his eyes he kept seeing those glowing red eyes of the Mad One, and he could still recall and hear the sound of his own skull cracking and fragmenting as it smashed his head into the ground over and over. The pain and fear of that moment, though repressed, still lived inside him; he did not want that to happen to him again, to himself or the others.
But contrary to what one might expect, Torquil's concern about them splitting up was more pragmatic than it was romantic. Unlike the others who, unbeknownst to him, had each found their own kind of curious affinity with him, he was not actually all that attached to them beyond the fact that they were his only allies. He was happy to have others to talk to, help keep them safe and to make decisions; to smile at him and tell him he was good at things; but who those others were did not matter all that much to him.
Even so, he did appreciate that Ophelia and Farren seemed to like him, and that alone made him want to keep them safe. He liked that they liked him. Beyond that, his only relation to them was that weird flash of memory he had had about seeing Ophelia through the trees... but even that was mostly just an image without context.

So ultimately Torquil did not voice any protests against their plans and simply chose to believe that the others knew what was best. Ophelia touched the golden marker, only for her form to abruptly lose opacity, just as Torquil's had when he died, and vanish in a matter of a couple of seconds. Farren went up and touched another marker, and he disappeared, too, as if swallowed up by an unseen fog.
Gone, Torquil mused, stepping up to the Yharnam Headstone and looking at the marker Farren had touched. Completely gone, as if they were just a dream.
Then he shook his head, steeled his nerves and, tucking his new axe under his left arm to free up his right hand, reached out to touch the Rebirth's Rise marker, only to suddenly feel himself falling asleep...


Just as when he had arrived at the Hunter's Dream, Farren would feel as though falling asleep and, rather than actually sleeping, immediately transitioning into waking back up, only this time finding himself right back next to the very lantern that had brought him and Ophelia to the Dream in the first place. He was back in the reception of the blood ministration clinic, though even at a quick glance it was clear that someone had been busy in the thirty or so minutes they had been gone. Practically all the debris in the room had at the very least been shifted or overturned by someone searching the area very thoroughly. On top of that, every larger object in the room – cabinets that still had a measure of structural integrity left, chairs, tables, even a couple of the cots from the back room – had been moved to the exit, where it had been piled up in a messy heap to the left of the exit leading to the outside. The only thing that was exactly where they had left it, still completely untouched by the chaos that ravaged everything else around it, was the lantern-post, which still stood glowing right next to where Farren appeared, a quartet of Messengers crowding at its base.
All except one mostly intact stool, which instead stood a couple of meters inside the reception but still in front of the exit. On top of that stool sat Victor, sword in hand, with his body facing the door but his head turned to look at Farren as he appeared. Farren would see Victor's body in profile from where he appeared and could not see his left side, though he could see Victor's blunderbuss dangling below the stool, attached to his belt rather than at the ready in his hand.

Victor's eyes widened after a second of looking at Farren, and he started scanning him up and down, noting all of the new equipment his fellow Hunter had acquired in the short time since he had last seen him. The new garb, the Beastflayer and piercing rifle on his back, the pistol and blunderbuss on his left hip, the Blades of Mercy on his right... Not only had Farren been dressed pretty much as a civilian and been armed with mundane weapons last time Victor saw him, but now he was lugging around an entire arsenal!
A few seconds later, before Victor had time to recover enough to formulate his surprise, Torquil appeared right next to Farren, which prompted Victor's focus to shift and witness the arrival of the armor-clad form of another man from beyond the veil of reality.

“Oedon's blood,” the White Church Hunter swore under his breath, standing from his seat and turning to face them, revealing that he was holding what appeared to be a small, ornate case of some kind in his left hand. “And I thought I had been productive...”
He paused, looking at the lantern expectantly for a moment before turning back to Farren. “Where's the last one?”


All the way across the city of Yharnam and far above everything else, Ophelia found herself awakening with her feet on cobblestone and a brisk wind catching her clothes and hair. She was standing on a curious semi-circular platform in the middle of what appeared to be a long, narrow stone bridge. Behind her she would see the bridge, its sides guarded with iron fences, extending almost a hundred meters toward what appeared to be the top of a tower, shaded by crooked, leafless, dead-looking trees on both sides that looked like they were leaning in over the bridge, their branches extending like the bony fingers of a giant, inhuman hand reaching to grasp those crossing it. She would also see several other spires over there, narrower and shorter than the tower connecting to the bridge; if she were to look over the edge, she would find that these spires belonged to a church below, along with which she would see the entirety of Yharnam sprawling out enormously from her current high vantage point. Only a faint memory of sunlight remained at this point, coloring the distant western horizon in the last remnants of dusk, while the rest of the star-strewn sky had already forgotten the light of day and embraced the night. Quite notably, though the moon had been present and huge in the Dream, it seemed that it had yet to rise in the Waking World.
In the other direction, in front of her as she awoke, she would find the path flanked by two thick, squarish columns of stone that held up an immense, ornate arch beyond which the bridge continued only for another several meters before joining a much larger platform, upon which sat a colossal structure of stone, with numerous giant windows lit from the inside, great chimneys emanating columns of smoke, and a great pair of open double doors under a canopy room held up by a semicircle of pillars. Beyond the doors she could faintly see activity and she could hear someone hammering on an anvil, but telling details would require getting closer.
She would inevitably notice the statues scattered in front of her, toward the huge building that had once been known as the Orphanage. Depictions of dozens of hunched and huddled figures swathed in cloth, their proportions strange and inhuman, though some of them held on to staves that necessitated opening the cloth, revealing a twisted being underneath that bore no semblance to man nor beast, and more like a twisted approximation of a human made up of roots or tentacles.

Of much more immediate notice, however, was the object she awoke right next to, standing before her right in the middle of the platform. A small, ornate plinth stood before her, decorated with subtle designs of what appeared to be ocean waves, intermingled with nude forms of men and women depicted as swimming leisurely in the water. Above, right at the rim before the rounded edge transitioning onto the flat top of the plinth, was a long, continuous string of big, stylized eyes. It appeared to be made entirely of solid gold; a thoroughly awesome amount of gold. And it appeared to be rooted into the ground beneath it, as if it had sprouted straight out of the cobblestone.
On top of the plinth sat a vaguely familiar sight: a lantern giving off a pale, bluish light; the same light as the lantern she had used to reach the Hunter's Dream from Rebirth's Rise. Even the design of the lantern was the same, though the metal parts of the enclosure around the light-source were like polished gold.

Ophelia's mind took in the new sensations with equal parts eagerness and apprehension--she processed the feeling of the wind on her face, the sheer height of the city and the majesty of the vista arrayed before her, and then the gold. Something about the inscription made her uneasy, the image of people wading into waters unknown... but the eyes she found fascinating. She studied them from afar for a moment, looking for anything unusual in their depictions, but she did not dare touch it. She found herself oddly sad that none of the little Messengers were about; and also, based on her limited experience with the lamp in Rebirth's Rise, deeply concerned. They'd been practically swarming over her there--over all of them--and now none were to be found at all?

She tried to call for the Messengers as she had before, only for emptiness and silence to greet her in turn. The faint hints of a smile upon her face were wiped away in that instant, and she shuddered as though a sudden chill had run through her. This must be what the golden marker had meant, she supposed... why was the conduit--the lantern--gold? She perked her ears up to the wind and could hear the rhythmic hammering of metal upon metal in the distance, towards the ominous building flanked by inhuman statues. She found herself admiring them quite intensely as she walked up with a leisurely pace, the arrogant air of her invicibility giving her something of a sense of being untouchable... but she had seen enough people die, handled enough corpses, to know what a deeply unpleasant experience it could be. When it had happened to Torquil... she shuddered for a second, unsure if it was the thought or the wind, before continuing apace. She would be prudent, yes... but there was no amount of suffering she wouldn't endure to know what was going on here--why they'd been chosen for this Dream, what their purpose must be.

She approached the doors with all of the bravado of a person who was meant to be there--knowing full well that an aura of unearned confidence would breeze past all but the wariest of guards or workers or... churchgoers, she supposed. She truthfully did not know what to expect here--but one of them had to find out, and the others were utterly clueless when it came to the Truth. Torquil hadn't been able to see a thing even with the Eye rune, and she wondered if his aptitude for these things was simply low, or he had not come face to face with something that required enough insight to see, or if the ministration had taken enough of his memories that it would just take time. Farren... something about the way he'd acted before they left--his reaction to one of the names--suggested secrets hiding beneath the veil of ignorance. She would help him uncover them, she supposed, if that was what he wanted--and perhaps even if it wasn't.

Ophelia whispered a quick prayer--"Guide me, Mother Moon."--and attempted to gain ingress to the building. They would only know if they tried.

Even while approaching the doors that obviously served as the main entrance to this immense structure, Ophelia would easily be able to tell that the interior of this place was alive with frantic activity. People ran across the stone-tiled floor this way and that, carrying all manner of supplies – bundles of cloth, armfuls of weapons and nondescript crates with uncertain contents – to whatever destination and purpose they were needed for. Walking up the steps toward the open doorway she would see dozens of figures in civilian clothing moving things around and performing various menial tasks around the place, under the guidance of another dozen or so men and women dressed in the white garbs of clerics in service to the White Church.
And among those, stalking among the masses and hiding in the shadows of the pillars that flanked either side of the huge hall she found through the doors, was yet another group of five. These figures did not partake in nor supervise the labor being performed here, but simply seemed to be watching proceedings with detached boredom and impatience. These figures all wore the garbs of White Church Hunters, and unlike everyone else, appeared to be armed; two of these Hunters were leaning on threaded canes and the last three carried small silver swords, of which two had the familiar blade-scabbard of a Holy Blade on their backs and the last had the head of a Kirkhammer.

Barely had Ophelia moved within several meters of the door to this place – which she would probably be able to deduce was the White Church Workshop – before one of the laborers spotted her and immediately, and quite noisily, dropped the armful of swords he had been carrying.
“Vileblood!” someone cried, and in an instant all the activity in the building seemed to refocus entirely on reacting to her presence. All the civilians and clerics stopped what they were doing and retreated toward the far-end of the hall, with several clerics running up the central stairway that lead to a floor above. The Hunters, meanwhile, moved with speed and purpose to form a semicircle just inside the doorway, brandishing their weapons and making it very clear that they intended to prevent her from entering.
“Not another step, fiend,” the Hunter with the Kirkhammer, a middle-aged man, declared as he pointed at her with his sword. “How did you get here?”

Ophelia blinked at the accusation, and at the venom with which they spoke it: Vileblood? She had heard the term before, she thought, amidst the clamour and bustle of taverns and sewing circles and churches... but she had never really had any idea what it meant, not really. She'd taken it to simply be a term of derision, a name given by the Healing Church to that which they did not like--fuel for the fire of fervour within the zealots that were inevitably attracted to powerful institutions. To hear them accuse her of it, though, made her balk.

"I awoke from a dream, dears, at a lovely little lantern outside this very workshop. Do you know Victor? He is with some of my other newly blooded Hunters across the city--and we are supposed to speak with the First Hunter." Ophelia spoke, before making a nodding notion with her head towards the two Hunters who bore Holy Blades upon their back.

"I came to scout ahead because I thought you might have some respect for the Holy Moonlight Greatsword, upon which your pale imitations are based... but I do not want to cause a scene, my loves. I came to speak with Dietrich, and I think he will want to see me. If not... well, he can deal with me himself, hmm?" she added, managing to hide most of her displeasure from her tone--though it still sounded a little tense, unbelieving that they had reacted in such a way. This... was not the reception that she was expecting, she had to admit.

“Likely story,” the Kirkhammer-wielder scoffed, tightening the grip on his sword. “That's exactly what I'd say if I was a filthy Vileblood wanting to... wait.” He squinted at her. “That's not you, Gerlinde, is it? If it is, this isn't funny.”
“Victor...” the Hunter next to him mumbled, his face twisting in an effort to remember. “That's the name of that drunk that headed out with Stefan earlier, isn't it? They did say that they got a mission from Dietrich.”
“Stefan? Sending a fresh Hunter to scout ahead?” The Kirkhammer-wielder shook his head grimly. “That doesn't sound right at all. Better kill you just to be safe...”
“That would be terribly inconvenient.”

The eyes of all the Hunters forming the human wall in front of Ophelia widened as the calm, authoritative and pleasant masculine voice emerged from behind them and up the stairs. Three of the five Hunters even took their eyes off her to look in the direction of the speaker, lowering their weapons somewhat in the process.
Within a second or so of his words reaching them, the speaker entered their field of view and started descending the stairs. He moved at a measured pace, his stride confident but unhurried, his posture straight and regal, open and unguarded. He was a young man in his early thirties – younger than most of the people here – clean-shaven, with a head of golden-blonde shoulder-length hair tied in a ponytail. His features were unusually elegant and handsome, further enhanced by him donning a charming smile that revealed perfect, white teeth, making him look like a Prince Charming straight out of a fairy tale. Ophelia would likely take special note of his eyes, the irises of which were such a pale blue that they were almost white with the exception of a dark rim along their edges, making them seem almost fluorescent.
He wore a white variant of a foreign confederate uniform, his head bare, unprotected and fully on display, with a long, white cape trailing over the steps behind him, split in two along the middle and with each half embroidered with the likeness of stylized feathered wings in silver thread. Peeking over his right shoulder and out from his left hip was a unique silver greatsword, as long as the Holy Blades but considerably more narrow, and rather than being adorned with decorative engravings this was plain, smooth and polished to a brilliant sheen, making it gleam in the lanternlight.

As he reached the bottom of the stairs and kept approaching them, the Hunters blocking Ophelia stepped back and parted, setting aside their weapons and offering this new arrival respectful bows.
“Welcome,” the man said before dipping into a deep bow, placing his left hand on his chest and performing a wide, sweeping gesture with his right. “I am Dietrich, the First Hunter. May I have the honor of knowing your name, milady?”

Ophelia narrowed her eyes at the Hunter's ludicrous retort: it would be obvious that climbing all the way to this workshop from anywhere in Yharnam would sully the gear of even the most dedicated and efficient of Hunters--her spotless clothing should have been a clear sign to all of them that she spoke the truth. It seemed the White Church's rank and file were just as bloodthirsty as they had ever been, and Ophelia moved her free hand to stroke the Holy Moonlight Greatsword's blade and reveal its bountiful light in response to their declaration of their intent to harm her.

Thankfully, before things could progress further, she heard the clarion call of Dietrich's smooth and masculine voice ring down the stairs. Her ears perked up and her eyes moved towards the likely source, following the Hunters who knew were to look after half a beat--and she could not stop the smile creeping across her face as she saw the First Hunter begin to descend. There were tales of him--calling him the new dawn of an age of chivalry, a knight in proverbial shining armour--spread amongst all of the women she knew, and rare were the days someone was not swooning over his heroism. Catching her first proper glimpse of him, she could see precisely why: he was the very picture of elegance and refinement, worthy of the praise bestowed upon him by washmaids and women of the night equally... and as he got closer, she made especial note of his eyes: so exquisitely pale, ringed by a darkness that gave him an almost transcendent and otherworldly look. Had she not seen the full glory of the cosmos mere moments ago she might have found herself quite smitten with him--but he could not compare to her guiding moonlight.

"Ah, just as gallant as the stories... I am Ophelia of Hemwick, First Hunter. It is an exquisite pleasure to meet you, my dear." she replied, responding to his graceful bow with a practiced and elegant curtsey of her own.

"You left a message... perhaps not for we who awoke, but there was no overseer in the clinic, and so I had the good fortune to lay eyes upon it. Might we speak in private, Dietrich? What I have to tell you is... sensitive." Ophelia added, taking the initiative to speak and state her purpose before he could ask. He would connect the dots very quickly, given that he was the one who'd sent Victor out on the mission--and every reaction they gave was more information in her arsenal. The fact that Gerlinde was working with them hadn't escaped her notice, and was information enough to make her trip worthwhile already.

“A message?” he repeated, sounding mildly confused yet unconcerned by the statement. He made a dismissive gesture toward no one in particular, and all around him the Hunters scattered and the civilians and clerics began to hesitantly return and resume their business. Interestingly, as he raised his hand to flick it in in the gesture, Ophelia might spot the briefest, faintest trace of a guidance sprite emerging from his forearm, only to immediately sputter and die. “I'm afraid I don't know what you message you could mean, but we can certainly speak in private.”
Dietrich offered his right arm and, whether Ophelia took it or not, turned to guide her inside and up the stairs. If she were to look around, she would see that the sides of this hall were filled with tables bulging with all manner of supplies. There was an entire table set with plates and bowls of all manner of food, and another that was similarly adorned with bottles, carafes and pots of drink as well as glasses and mugs to drink from. There were several tables with bundles of tough white cloth and shoes, which she might figure could be unfolded and revealed to be White Church Hunter garbs. Another several tables had more Holy Blades, threaded canes and Kirkhammers, and a couple had piles of pistols and blunderbusses.

Once upstairs they turned left and entered a door and entered a small room furnished as a mostly spartan office-space. To the left upon entering were two mostly empty tables occupied only by several errant pieces of paper, a quill and an inkwell, beyond which was a wall that was obviously of different and newer construction than the rest of the building. Directly in front of and facing them was a slightly bigger table with a chair on either side, all of which were rather plain aside from some slight bits of ornamental carving into the edge of the tabletop and on the backs of the chairs. This table obviously served as a desk and bore a surprisingly tall and neat pile of papers, another set of quill and inkwell, a plain brass candle holder and a small, nondescript brown-covered book of some kind.
The most extravagant and decorative thing in the entire room was an elongated wall banner hanging behind the desk. It was made from white cloth with intricate gold and black trimmings, and bore two prominent symbols, one above the other, each stitched in red thread. The upper symbol was one Ophelia knew was often used to represent the Healing Church, though its meaning was unknown to her, whereas the lower symbol – despite being one she had never seen before – somehow immediately managed to convey its meaning to her: “Hunter”. Looking at it made her forehead itch.
“This is my office,” Dietrich explained, closing the door behind them. “If I can't be found in the main room or here it means my presence was required for a hunt, but I am never gone for long. You are welcome to visit anytime you like.” He crossed the room and leaned his back against the wall next to his desk. “It is also as private as it is going to get. What did you want to discuss?”