"S'why you're the best, boss." Garrus sighs. "Alright, I'm done whining, what's next."

"Well, we're not in a hurry, so anything you can think of that can be done in this room. Reaper's got a real good library, for one, is there a map of Cania in there -"

"I regret that there is not. Cania's glaciers shift on a sea of magma, and it would be difficult to predict how it would look in a few years, let alone the centuries since anyone has made the effort."

"...do you have books on Cania's nature," Jojo manages. "I know it's - cold. But. Further information would be good."

"I do."

A small rack of books appears.

Well then, they'd better get reading.

Cania is a weird fucking place.

It's intensely, bitterly cold. It's so cold that Endure Elements doesn't even work; the only reliable ways to protect yourself is full-on cold resistance (or fast healing), staying inside a warded structure, or eating Velox Berries, an invasive plant from the Elemental Plane of Fire that grow out of volcanic vents and, when eaten, sit in your gut radiating heat for eight hours. They can also be used to light a fire that can penetrate the cold and persist among the biting winds. It is unknown why Mephistopheles tolerates the berries' existence when they seem to countermand the Hellishness of the plane. The book speculates that he might like the dynamic of petitioners scrabbling in the ice for the berries, stinging their fingers bloody on the nettles to retrieve berries that will warm them only just long enough to find more.

The Knowers are mentioned in one of these books. There's the Knower of Places, who will answer exactly one question per querent that can be answered in terms of where something is, but inconveniently (and ironically) nobody knows where she is. The Knowers of Times and Causes seem irrelevant to the task at hand. The Knower of Ways, who could tell you how to do anything, sounds great but was unfortunately murdered several centuries ago by devils. Finally, the Knower of Names, who assisted Mephistopheles in inciting a rebellion amongst his underlings and was buried in the infernal ice with the traitors she helped to reveal.

It is said that she loved the Lord of the Eighth. That she helped him not because it was right, but because he held her heart in his hands. If so, he ripped it apart and buried it with her.

"Scratch the Endure Elements, I guess. I'll load up on Tiny Hut and it can just be normal amounts of frigid inside."

"Yes, and we can acquire a stock of these Velox berries as well. Deekin and I should do fine in the cold, anyway."

Garrus grimaces. "I feel torporous just reading this stuff."

"I would apologize but this is super not my fault."

"It is absolutely not your fault. Hopefully we'll have the opportunity to make our complaints directly to Mephistopheles."

Eventually, they run out of research. "You will find," the Reaper tells Belmarniss and Jojo, "that you do not need to sleep to prepare your spells, only meditate for an hour. Sleep is not permitted to the dead."

And then nothing remains but to go through the door into Cania.

Belmarniss really wishes the trick of having pretended to own Hagan for several hours had come through for her, less because she wants Hagan in this mess and more because he could probably ditch some anti-scrying items and get bigger guns called in.

Onward they go.

Sometimes, when someone tries to communicate the feeling of freezing, they will use words that are sharp. The cold was like a knife. The wind was like a driven nail. The frost bites, the wind cuts, the cold pierces.

The cold of Cania pounds like a hammer. Throbs like a toothache. Flenses like a sandstorm. It is not pointed, like a knife or a nail. It is general, and all-consuming, and inexorable.

Jojo squints through the flurrying snow at a distant-seeming light source. "Oh, good, a fire. Let's ask where they got their berries."

"We can't assume they're friendly, but sure, why not."

He bites his lip. "I - think this close to the City of Lost Souls, it should be safe at least to ask? A city can't function if, if there's no social fabric to rely on..."

"Jojo, we are literally in Hell. That is not in any way a safe assumption. But, you know, it's data one way or another, and if they try to kill us then we'll kill them right back."

Jojo nods.

Together, they approach the fire, Jojo in the lead. "Hello?" he calls as they approach. "May we rest by your fire and speak?"

Around the fire are five translucent petitioners, their skin patterned with frost. They turn to look at Jojo.

"There is room," says one softly. "Wel-"

Then, with a flash of light and a shriek, she evaporates into nothingness.

One of the others laughs bitterly. "Welcome. Pass the time until the end."

"What happened to her?"

Another petitioner speaks up. "She was consumed. Our Lord is making an army, on the Prime, and he needs soulstuff to do it. So he's taking it out of us, taking the vital force and leaving everything else to dissipate. More souls are coming through that gate than ever, but you wouldn't know it to look at the City."

"...ugh. Okay. Which way is north of the city, we need to see the Sleeping Man."

One of them points. "Sensei Dharvana won't want to let you see her pet angel," she predicts.

"Sensei Dharvana doesn't want anything," another points out.