After about an hour, or so, Johnathan started to hear the members of the trio begin to yawn one by one as they slowly fell asleep inside the carriage—even Kengo, despite her earlier vigilance. The rhythmic *clack-clack* of wheels on proper rails lulled them further into exhaustion, their breathing syncing with the hiss of my steam valves. Through the frosted windows, he watched Dansei's head slump against Inuka's shoulder, her fox ears twitching in her sleep like signal levers resetting after a long shift.
The taiga blurred past, the skeletal trees casting elongated shadows that flickered across his polished brass fittings like the ghostly timetables of long-abandoned branch lines. My SYSTEM pinged quietly—[SELF-REPAIR LV. 2 PROGRESS: 64%]—as he diverted excess steam to patch the worst of the Frostwyrm damage. A hairline fracture in his left cylinder hissed back at me like a disgruntled stationmaster, but the pain was fading.
Kengo stirred briefly when they passed a crumbling wayside shrine—its stone torn arch straddling the tracks like a forgotten railway bridge—but didn't wake. The shrine's wooden *ema* plaques swung gently in the wind, their prayers for safe travels vibrating at the same frequency as my sanding gear's residual hum. Johnathan slowed just enough to avoid startling them, his whistle valve stifling an automatic *toot* that would've formed a perfect LMS coronation crest in the frigid air.
Then the rails began to sing.
Not metaphorically—actual, literal harmonics vibrating through his wheel flanges as they entered a canyon where the tracks had been laid over resonating quartz deposits. The sound built gradually, layering over itself until it resembled a steam orchestra tuning up for *The Flying Scotsman Suite*. His SYSTEM helpfully identified the phenomenon as [TERRAIN-INDUCED ACOUSTIC RESONANCE: TRACK WHISTLE EFFECT LV. 1], complete with a scrolling spectral analysis that looked suspiciously like a 1920s railway poster.
Inuka's ear flicked.
Kengo's sword hand twitched toward the blade still propped against the seat—her fingers curling around the hilt with the reflexive precision of a guard locking a signal box.
He held his breath (metaphorically, since locomotives don't breathe) and eased off the throttle, letting the natural rail-whistle fade back into the wind.
Dansei murmured something in his sleep—a half-formed spell or perhaps a complaint about the draft—as the quartz canyon's resonance faded into the occasional metallic *ping* of contracting rails. Johnathan's pistons hitched imperceptibly when a frost-laden branch scraped his smokebox, the sound mimicking a porter's broom against carriage steps. His SYSTEM pinged—[ENVIRONMENTAL STEALTH METER: 87%]—as he adjusted his steam output to match the natural thermal fluctuations of the tracks.
Kengo's grip on her sword loosened fractionally, her knuckles no longer white enough to rival Southern Railway's dining car china. Through the carriage window, Johnathan watched her eyelids flutter—a silent battle between exhaustion and the hypervigilance beaten into her by whatever draconian sword academy she'd escaped from. The blade slid back into its sheath with a sound like a mailbag hitting a platform, just as Inuka's tail twitched in a dream about—judging by her nose scrunches—either chasing rabbits or evading ticket inspectors.
The rails ahead shimmered with heat distortion, the quartz deposits refracting afternoon light into prismatic signals that danced across Johnathan's buffers. His SYSTEM helpfully translated them into [PASSIVE MANA HARVESTING: 0.3%/KM] while surreptitiously diverting excess energy to patch the hairline fracture in his left cylinder. The repair glyphs scrolled across his HUD in Brunel-era typography, each pulse tightening the metal like a crew of ghostly riveters working overtime.
A distant *clang* echoed through the canyon—somewhere between a dropped coupling pin and a badly tuned station piano. Johnathan's whistle valve tensed (metaphorically) as his terrain radar pinged [UNIDENTIFIED METALLIC OBJECT: 200M AHEAD]. The tracks here were supposed to be abandoned, but the warped reflection ahead suggested something decidedly *recently abandoned*—and currently blocking the line with the audacity of a freight train parked in a express slot.
Johnathan continued to slow down as the rails beneath him shifted pitch—from the steady *clack-clack* of well-maintained track to the ominous *thunk-whirr* of warped iron. Ahead, the quartz canyon narrowed sharply, its walls ribbed with glowing veins of crystallized mana that pulsed in time with his Laug reserves (which he was starting to think was basically coal).
The obstruction glinting on the tracks wasn't debris or wildlife, but something far worse: a derailed dining car, its brass fittings tarnished black with necrotic corrosion, its shattered windows leaking tendrils of mist that curled like ticket stubs in a draft.
His system pinged again—[DERAILED DINING CAR SPOTTED; ATTACH CAR TO TRAIN? Y\N?]—and Johnathan would've groaned if locomotives could. The carriage loomed crookedly ahead, its once-polished brass now blackened with necrotic corrosion that crawled like spilled ink across timetable pages. Icicles hung from its shattered windows, each dripping mist that coalesced into ghostly menu items midair—*Beef Wellington - Delayed Indefinitely* shimmering before dissipating like steam from a faulty valve.
Then he thought about it, Kengo, Inuka, and Dansei all needed to eat eventually, and he had no intention of letting his passengers go hungry. With a reluctant *clunk*, he selected **[Y]**—because even a haunted dining car was better than nothing—and immediately regretted it when the SYSTEM simply glitched **[ERROR! MAX AMOUNT OF CARS PULLED; CANABALIZE ABANDONED CAR AND MERGE IT WITH CARRIAGE? Y/N?]**
Johnathan's boiler pressure surged as the corrupted dining car *twitched* on the rails—its broken axles screeching like a chef's knife dragged across porcelain. He annoyingly clicked **[Y]** again, why not?
Fuck it at this point, am I right?
[WHICH CARRIAGE DO YOU PICK? 1, 2, 3, 4, OR 5?]
Johnathan's SYSTEM prompt flickered across his HUD like a malfunctioning destination board as the necrotic dining car's shadow stretched across the tracks—its warped silhouette pulsing in time with the canyon's quartz resonance. It was pretty obvious he had to choose carriage one, it was closest to him so he could say that he went to eat when the train stopped without them wondering why they didn't see him leave the locomotive.
The *clack-clack* of wheels slowed to a funeral march tempo as Johnathan aligned his buffers with the dining car's corroded coupling, their metallic groan echoing through the canyon like a disgruntled stationmaster. His boiler rumbled—the equivalent of clearing his throat—as the SYSTEM initiated [CARNAGE MERGER PROTOCOL], its holographic glyphs etching themselves across the frost-laden windows in LNER-style typography.
Inside carriage one, Inuka's ear twitched at the sound of spectral cutlery materializing on the dining tables—each fork tine vibrating at the same frequency as Johnathan's sanding gear. Kengo's sword hand twitched toward the blade still propped against her seat, her sleep-slowed reflexes mistaking the merger's *clang* for a Frostwyrm's death rattle. Dansei remained blissfully unconscious, his frostbitten fingers curled around an imaginary teacup that steamed in sync with Johnathan's pressure valves.
The dining car's necrotic hull split like overcooked pastry, its blackened ribs unfolding into grotesque buffet counters that oozed bioluminescent jam. Johnathan's SYSTEM cheerfully announced [DINING FACILITIES UPGRADED: MANA-INFUSED BUFFET LV. 1] as the first spectral sandwich platter materialized—its crustless triangles arranged in perfect BR arrowhead formation.
Kengo's nose wrinkled at the scent of phantom Earl Grey and something distinctly resembling a Southern Railway dining car's infamous "mystery pie." Her blade gleamed as she prodded a levitating scone that pulsed with the same cerulean hue as Dansei's dying glyphs. "Engineer-san," she called toward the locomotive, "your... dining car appears to be haunted by catering staff."
Johnathan responded with a steam-whistle chirp as he always did.
The spectral sandwiches pulsed ominously, their crustless edges shimmering with the same bioluminescence as Frostwyrm ichor. Kengo poked one with her swordtip, recoiling when it emitted a *plaintive* toot—identical to Johnathan's whistle valve at quarter-pressure. Across the aisle, Inuka clutched a fork that kept *phasing* through her fingers like a delayed commuter train vanishing from the timetable.
"Engineer-san," Kengo called toward the locomotive, her voice tighter than a boiler safety valve, "your *haunted buffet* is serving *sentimental* tea cakes." A scone levitated past, its currants arranged into a perfect BR corporate logo. Johnathan responded with a steam plume shaped like a shrug—a maneuver requiring *precise* manipulation of seven pressure gauges and a *complete* disregard for thermodynamics.
Dansei stirred, his cheek-glyph flaring as he *muttered* an incantation mid-snore as Inuka swatted at the floating scone—her claws leaving trails of foxfire that coalesced into miniature rail signals above the buffet. The necrotic dining car's remnants *groaned*, extruding a wobbling gelatin mold that pulsed to the rhythm of Johnathan's injectors.
Kengo's blade *hissed* through the spectral teapot hovering near her shoulder, its steam reforming into a tiny, screaming replica of the Flying Scotsman. "This," she announced, flicking locomotive-shaped condensation off her sleeve, "is the *worst* dining car I've ever seen."
"Well its not like had gad many options around here." Johnathan shot back, hissing steam through the whistle valve in carefully modulated bursts that formed floating text reading *"COMPLAINTS TO THE BUFFET CAR ARE TO BE SUBMITTED IN TRIPLICATE TO THE STATIONMASTER'S OFFICE."* The words dissolved into mist just as Kengo's blade sliced through them, her expression caught between murderous intent and begrudging amusement.
The spectral buffet responded to her aggression by extruding a wobbling trifle that vibrated at precisely 432 Hz—the resonant frequency of Johnathan's third axle bearing. Inuka's fur stood on end as the dessert emitted a perfect G-sharp whistle, its layers separating to reveal a center filled with bioluminescent custard that pulsed in sync with Dansei's shallow breaths.
Johnathan discreetly rerouted 0.7% of his Laug reserves into dampening the carriage's increasingly sentient crockery, his SYSTEM translating the clattering teacups into [BUFFET CAR EMOTIONAL STATE: PETULANT]. A gravy boat shaped like a GWR pannier tank sloshed indignantly as Kengo attempted to stab its handle, the dark liquid inside swirling into a perfect timetable of delayed connections.
Suddenly Inuka wyes went wide as she looked at the window.
They were almost at Maasuitia Tidofiru.