45 - Blood Shadow

I spoke to Chiara for two hours, explaining to her Lindon and Yerin’s situations and what made them controversial. She had already gotten the picture from overhearing our chats with Gwei and whatever Bai Rou and Renfei had talked about to the other officers.

Chiara had been more than enthusiastic to learn that I had joined the Skysworn, however. At times, she’d turn away from me to surreptitiously wipe her face, though I could still spot the redness in her eyes.

“You’re incredible,” she said to me from beside me. My bed was only meant for a single person, so it was a tight fit, but it didn’t matter to me. I liked that it brought us so much closer.

“You’re the incredible one,” I said. 

Then she untangled from me, and got up from the bed. “You need to get some sleep,” she said. “You have an early morning tomorrow. You need to give yourself time to cycle as well in the morning.”

I sighed. “Encore?”

“No,” she giggled.

“Encore… encore… encore!”

Unfortunately, she was dead serious, dressing up before my eyes and giving me a teasing grin. “You need to get disciplined now, Sky. You’re no longer just a young master. You’re a Skysworn apprentice, and trust me: the captain does not play favorites.

I nodded, sobering up from my love-drunkenness. 

“Also,” she said, and her tone was far colder now. She slowly turned around to fix me with a wide-eyed glare. “Didn’t I tell you to be more respectful to Underlords?”

Dread washed over me, and I gulped.

“We’ll talk,” she said to me. I lifted my blanket over my face, and mumbled a tiny ‘sorry’.

Then I heard my outer door open and close.

Fuck.

Goddamn.

000

Lindon, Yerin, and I stood in a line facing one way on a field of hard-packed sand and dirt. Orthos was standing a little behind, but next to Lindon, and Little Blue sat on his shoulder.

In front of us, Renfei marched to and fro, Bai Rou looming behind like a guardian giant. “If today isn’t the hardest day of training you’ve ever had in your life, I will consider that a personal failure. You think you’re impressive just because you’re a Blackflame,” she looked at Lindon, “A Highgold,” at Yerin. Ooh, what was I? A Lowgold genius? A scholar of the ages? A radiant superstar? “A young master?”

Fuck all the way off! Why would I think that to be an impressive aspect of myself? I was so much more than my affluence!

Renfei snorted. “You’re nothing. What’s more, you’re less than nothing. You lack manners, discipline, and a true understanding of what we do as Skysworn. I will rectify that. A hundred laps at full sprint around this field, using only your Iron bodies, just as a start. Go!” She roared. “Go, go, go!”

I took off, running as fast as I could. Yerin trailed behind me, far slower, and Lindon was the slowest amongst us. Orthos hadn’t even bothered, just walking off to the sidelines to watch us. As I passed him by, he snorted. “Running is what weaklings are best at. Run.”

I chuckled. “Good one, Orthos!”

I finished one lap around the field, probably a five-hundred meter distance, at about fifteen seconds. My stride ate the distance easily, and I was hardly even breathing hard.

By the time a hundred of those suckers were done, I just stood straight in front of Renfei. “Am I supposed to give you a prize?” Renfei said. “Run again!”

Uh. Okay.

I finished the next set of laps, realizing that I really hadn’t ever done this kind of exercise since I came here. All of my cardio and stamina conditioning was done while holding a spear. Sure, I ran as a part of my technique training, but only while holding Starfire Surge.

Yerin had only needed one set of laps before was made to do something else, while Lindon was given the same treatment as myself, since Renfei couldn’t detect his exhaustion.

Eventually, I slowed down too much to maintain a constant sprint.

Renfei had set me down more running afterwards.

I didn’t see the point of this at all. This would just tire me out too much and reduce the efficacy of other forms of training. Maybe she didn’t know about my special needs? I found it hard to try and tell her, though. She’d probably just use that against me. I was on their shitlist for no reason at all.

Finally, she stopped me. “You think you’re impressive?” she asked me, which only told me that she found me impressive, but didn’t want me to get a big head.

“No, ma’am,” I said to her, not looking her in the eye.

“Follow your friends,” Renfei gestured towards them. They were in the middle of the field, swinging weighted swords.

Ugh. 

I jogged up to them. “How many?” I asked as I looked for the lightest weighted sword they had. Yerin was eating through this exercise like it was her job.

“A thousand,” she said.

I picked one up, and I could already feel the weight.

“This exercise is nonsense,” I said.

“Discipline,” she said. “They’re not trying to make us stronger. Just want to bleed us and tucker us out, make us easier to handle.”

Goddammit!

At the end of the day, I had to pop several of my most valuable recovery pills in order to just remain standing.

“You were disgraceful today,” Renfei glared. “Unimpressive. Undriven. Weak! Your patriarch failed you in your training!”

Yeah, yeah, just get it over with, fuckface. Fucking idiot. Who did she even think she was? She was a glorified cop who got ganked by a young master like me. She got herself killed for disturbing his fucking cycling. Weak shit like her shouldn’t be giving me orders.

Quiet would be the last words she ever heard. An ironic end to a class act like her, but not nearly enough. Not for me.

I wondered how long she would last against me outside of that armor. Not nearly long enough to satisfy me, that was for certain. 

Once I reached Highgold, that armor wouldn’t even matter. I’d slice straight through it with Nova Blade, poke her around a little, missing her vitals, and then she’d be more than happy to tell me who God was, and she would look up and point at the sky, unable to talk through the pain as she was.

I’d make her porky ass wish I’d done her like I did Hojin. I’d make that motherfucker consider himself lucky for getting away so lightly.

I would fucking—

“--are we clear?!” Renfei roared, six inches from my face, her nose in biting distance. Brave as fuck, I’d give her that.

“Yes, ma’am!” We all shouted in unison.

“Dismissed! Shower, change and report to the mess hall for food.”

We limped away from her.

“I’ll bury her,” Yerin growled. “I will.”

“No the fuck you won’t,” I said to her, sparing only a fraction of my irritation for Yerin, “Not until I’m done with her. Killing her would be a waste.”

Lindon looked at us both with concern. He wasn’t limping or walking any differently, not even hunched over. In fact, he looked perfectly fine. Bloodforged Iron body.

The rest of the evening was a blur. We changed, had food, and then on a whim, headed to Yerin’s place, Orthos following along. The doors here were large enough to accommodate sacred beasts, which was appreciated. Orthos had never been able to—or felt inclined—to visit my house for breakfast before. In any case, Yerin’s dormitory, as a Highgold, was larger than the shoebox they gave to us Lowgold peons.

I doubted we’d be able to even talk amongst each other, really. I don’t know why I was following. Force of habit, maybe?

Once we opened the door, we found Eithan lounging inside with a grin.

“Hey, Eithan,” I said with false cheer. “Just the person I thought would make this day even better than it already was.”

He looked at us with some pity. “I don’t enjoy the fact that they are wasting your time with pointless disciplinary exercises.”

“It’s not working,” I said, shaking my head, eyes widened. “And it won’t work, honestly. Because I am going to remember this.” Between the pointless exercises, the shittalk, and the repeated reminder of our power dynamic, I was at my wit’s end.

Fuck the military. I wasn’t built for this shit. 

“Be that as it may,” Eithan said as he rummaged through his pockets, producing a pair of paper-wrapped orbs and tossed them towards Yerin and I. I caught mine, and so did Yerin, “We must use this time wisely before it is too late.”

I took the pill and swallowed it. Immediately, my pain disappeared, and my body felt whole. I fell on my knees. “Thank you,” I whispered. I put my hands on the floor and bowed towards Eithan. “I’m so glad you did that!”

“You keep doing this, Eithan, and I might end up liking you,” Yerin said. 

“So,” I said as I stood up, “Did you just pick a room at random?”

“I figured you would come to the largest lodgings,” Eithan said, “Yerin’s, in this case. Anyway, we must move on to other matters, such as your rude lodger,” Eithan said to Yerin.

She snorted. “Fine. No use waiting around, is there?” Yerin walked up to him fearlessly. “Where do we start?”

Eithan snatched Yerin’s rope belt and pulled it apart, releasing the knot. My eyes widened at that. Yerin, too, looked up and down in shock. “You idiot—!”

The Blood Shadow started to whip around. Yerin sat down and held the bunch in her hands like it was her spilled out guts, concentrating deeply.

“That was step one,” Eithan said as Yerin growled and moaned in concentration. “Step two is what you are currently doing. Hold the Blood Shadow, and once you’ve gained a hold over it, put it back in your body. Cycle it around yourself, also making sure not to let it kill you.”

“That easy?” She bit out.

“No,” Eithan replied.

Lindon looked at her in fear. “What does this mean for her? Is she in danger?”

Narratively, no. Literally, yes.

“She can handle it,” I said, trying to convince myself. The Blood Shadow resisted her grip, and she wasn’t lucid enough physically to react to it. Spiritually, she was doing all that she could to hold it back. “This isn’t about advancement level. It’s about grit. She’s making it hers now, turning it into a weapon.”

Orthos came closer to peer at the spectacle. Little Blue was looking the other way, shivering in fear. I picked her up and soothed her by rubbing her hair gently. She hugged my thumb for dear life, chiming loudly. She was not a fan of Blood Shadows. “She is a sword artist,” Orthos said. “Advancement on the edge of a blade… this is her way. Whether she succeeds or not proves how well her master taught her.”

That seemed to light a fire in Yerin.

The Blood Shadow slowly spooled back inside her from her stomach, inch by agonizing inch.

Then Lindon sat in front of her, one hand on her knee. “You can do this,” Lindon said to her, expression sharp enough to cut steel. “I know you can.”

“Not so close,” Yerin bit out.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Lindon replied.

This was almost too cute.

The Blood Shadow receded faster and faster. Yerin’s growls turned into roars as she pushed every inch of it back. And then it was gone.

She didn’t let up on her concentration, however. “How long?” she asked, eyes closed.

“Until it bursts out in your image,” Eithan said, “At which point, Lindon, I do recommend that you take a step back. It will have a measure of her likeness and madra, and a madra simulacrum of her master’s sword. A Path of blood and swords cuts through flesh far easier than a path of only swords can.”

Lindon shook his head.

I sighed. “I mean… buddy. Listen to the Underlord!”

“Go!” Yerin growled. 

Lindon didn’t listen.

Then all of a sudden, madra filled Yerin’s body and she threw herself away from Lindon, pushing against the floor with both hands, just as a blood-red copy of Yerin popped out from her body, wielding a sword, and with two more swords waiting on her back.

It wasn’t a true or proper copy. It was blobby, with rounded edges and no detail whatsoever. Her face was completely smooth, her hair was one mass shaped like a suggestion of Yerin’s bobcut, and her robes were equally droopy. The only thing that seemed straight and sharp with it was the blood-red sword it held.

Hmm.

Yeah, I’ll just take a step back.

The Blood Shadow raised its sword to try and kill Lindon, but then froze. Yerin, too. She pointed her palm at the Blood Shadow. And then she roared. “Back, you monster! Get in!”

Without the light of the Bleeding Phoenix frustrating her, this process was far easier than I had expected.

The Blood Shadow seemed to backtrack towards Yerin against its volition, its movements clipped and short. Lindon stood up and gave the Blood Shadow an Empty Palm.

It slammed back into Yerin.

Eithan clicked his tongue. “I wish you wouldn’t have done that,” he said.

“Why?” Lindon asked, and she turned to Yerin. “Are you hurt?”

She shook her head as she stood up shakily. “Feeling right as rain.”

“No, that just made things easier for her,” Eithan said. “The Blood Shadow will of course recover in time. This leads us to step three, however.”

“More steps?” Yerin asked in shock. “Step two almost buried all of you!”

Eithan chuckled. “I wouldn’t have allowed that to happen. Do you really think that the Blood Shadow of a Highgold could threaten me?”

I couldn’t blame Yerin for the misconception. She was contending with the power of a Dreadgod, after all. The scale of power was confusing. We’d have more than enough experience with Blood Shadows soon enough, though.

“What’s step three?” Yerin asked, “Finally allow me to put a leash on this horror?”

“Quite the opposite,” Eithan said, “And this time, I will explain myself,” he produced another paper-wrapped orb from his pocket. “This here contains my soulfire. You will cycle it to your Blood Shadow. The other ingredients will agitate the Blood Shadow and encourage it to slip from your hold. You will have to hold it back using nothing but sheer willpower. Do so for long enough and you will have advanced its state of existence to an extent that it will fight beside you, and not against you.” He tossed the pill to Yerin. She looked at it suspiciously.

“What happens if it slips the leash?”

“That is why I am here to watch,” Eithan said. “I won’t let it kill you.”

Yerin glared at him. She looked down at the pill in her hand, and sighed. “One more time, then.”

She swallowed the pill.

“Of course,” Eithan said, “I will have to opt for a forceful extraction of the Blood Shadow if you lose the battle of wills. This will cripple your soul.”

“Eithan!” Lindon roared.

“What the fuck?” I looked at Eithan in shock. No, there was no way. Yerin didn’t even look angry, just panicked. She immediately fell down on a cross-legged position to cycle.

Then the room started wafting with blood in my spiritual perception. Eithan waved a hand in front of his face with a grimace, as though his Jade senses allowed him to smell the spiritual impression.

“Ah,” Eithan said, looking at her, “She should be busy fighting for her life now. No, what I said was a simple case of bluffing to make my disciple work harder.”

“She’s not in danger?” Lindon asked.

“With me around? Hardly,” Eithan said with a grin. “If you wish to be around for the entire process of this, then go right ahead, but it will likely take the entire night.”

Lindon walked up to Yerin and sat across from her, legs crossed as well.

“Lovebirds,” I whispered under my breath, and Eithan gave me a knowing grin. 

“Well!” I said to the room, “This was… not fun to watch at all, honestly. I’m just going to head home now.”

I walked away, Little Blue still in my hand, when Eithan grabbed me by the collar of my Skysworn apprentice robes, almost making me lose my balance. “Not so fast, young man,” Eithan grinned devilishly. “Why did you think I gave you such an expensive recovery pill?”

“Why, pray tell?” I asked him, my expression perfectly peaceful.

Eithan gestured at Yerin’s kitchenette. I hadn’t even noticed it until now, but every inch of it was covered in books.

Had Eithan distracted me from looking that direction all the way until now, just for this magic trick of his? How long had he planned for this?

“You need to study up on real refining,” Eithan said, “If you ever wish to make something of that Lightningroot Parasite of yours.”

Real refining? Don’t mind if I do!

000

During the day, Bai Rou and Renfei would drill-sergeant the shit out of us in the hopes that we would one day come to respect their trifling porky asses. They gave true credence to the age-old adage that all cops were born out of wedlock, and I could tell these two’s parents had a shotgun wedding that ended in a miserable divorce.

What’s more, that divorce was probably triggered by the fact that they had, between the two pairs of them, spawned the most godawful beings they could ever imagine. That trauma alone was enough to absolutely shatter any pretense that their relationship could work.

And proving the points of their traumatized parents, the two of them grew up to join the Skysworn to continue traumatizing the rest of the Empire in any way that they could.

They were a cancer unto this world.

I didn’t get it worse than Yerin did, however. She hadn’t had a wink of sleep the entirety of the night after integrating her Blood Shadow, and did poorly for the rest of the day. Thankfully, that let the pair of pigs concentrate their ire on her. Lindon would rise to defend her, and they would likewise bully him alone.

The self-interested bastard in me would have welcomed this reprieve, but honestly, all I could fixate on was the fact that these shitbags even dared to speak to them like that.

In the end, we all got it equally.

Eithan would come in clutch with the good meds for me, and—I assumed—weaker meds for Yerin. The latter didn’t… speak to me much, anymore.

I may have ruined things.

Eithan’s refining books were a godsend, and gave me insights into the parasite that I genuinely appreciated. Already, I was starting to sketch a decent plan for how to use it. I needed a fortune’s worth of components of course, as well as equipment. We could fix the latter in Stormrock, and I knew where I could fetch the right components.

Soon, it came time for me to empty out my Void Key, and start prepping for Ghostwater. Eithan helped me by covertly moving the stuff away in scripted containers, and in Yerin’s room, I gave Lindon a gift.

“Here,” I said, handing him the Lord-level scythe. He looked at it askance. The pole of the scythe was crooked, and the blade, four feet long, was bladed on each edge. At the end of the pole where the blade began sat a skull, as black as the rest of the blade, facing away from the blade’s direction with an opened mouth, out from which another shorter curved blade exited, also double-edged. “For you,” I said with a cocky grin. “It’s called the Death Scythe of the Soul Reaper.”

Yerin looked at the weapon, arms folded, and gave it a grimace. She didn’t say anything else.

“Gratitude,” he said, though I could tell he wasn’t grateful.

“It’s a powerful weapon,” I said to him. “You can’t activate the binding, of course, but the physical properties alone should be useful to you. For cutting grass, or people.”

Lindon gave a polite chuckle, but I could tell he wasn’t too thrilled with it. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that on second thought? Perhaps I should have given him the ax instead?

Ah, who cares. It was a badass weapon, and this was Cradle. Form was just as important as function.

“I will treasure it,” Lindon said. I gave a nod and left the two of them to it. I no longer felt welcome.

Guh.

I went over to see Chiara before heading to bed. Not for anything physical. Just to see her.

She opened the door to me and smiled. “Hi,” I said, walking into her apartment hunched over, tired from everything. 

“It will only be a little longer,” Chiara said, talking about my training.

“I know,” I nodded.

“Are you still angry at them?” She asked me curiously. I sat on her couch and she sat next to me. We gave each other a one-armed hug, snuggling together.

“No,” I said. Between Chiara telling me to be more chill, and the fact that I had more perspective than to just act on my immediate impulses, I found it more exhausting to maintain anger at the two Skysworn than anything else.

“Good,” she said to me. “That means you’re learning.”

In my own little way, I was. I never had a problem being told what to do. I had a problem allowing disrespect, allowing myself to be crossed, et cetera. To allow yourself to be disrespected, and still have it in you to obey, was about the most important lesson you could learn in order to survive Skysworn service.

At some point, I would stop taking it as ‘disrespect’ entirely, and just accept that there are a subset of people in this world that simply talk like this, unable to do anything about it. I would treat it like a disability and work around it and accept it, instead of being insensitive to it.

“Who’d have thought joining the most prestigious martial faction in the entire Empire would be this hard?” I asked with a slight grin to show I was joking.

“I’ve always loved your supreme confidence,” she said to me. “Don’t let it get trampled on too much.”

“I need to advance,” I said with a sigh. Gesha was dragging her feet, man! Eithan had moved her up to Stormrock a few days past, and yet she still always came up empty on my order.

“The cure for all societal ails,” Chiara mused. “Try not to work too hard. You’ve barely sat still all of today.”

I nodded. Yeah.

We slept together, but we only slept. She woke me up early for another round of hell.

My psyche was swimming due to a combination of monotony and stress. I had nowhere to take my frustrations. My anger was taboo. My feelings were irrelevant.

I split off from my group because I wanted to be alone, walking around Starsweep Tower. The place was built out of wrought iron, twisted into a type of architecture that would feel well at home for a group of villains. Like the Blackflames of old.

“Ahah! Hey! You there!”

Confession time: I knew this would happen. Walk around aimlessly for long enough in strange places, completely alone, and a sacred artist will fuck with you for some arbitrary reason. Especially if you were a newbie and appeared weak, or if you had a reputation already, like me.

I was walking down a wide corridor where the cycling rooms for the Skysworn apprentices were when I heard the call from the left of me, where a group of three Skysworn apprentices stood in front of a door. My senses told me that they were clearly Highgold, though that was probably because they were making it easy for me to tell. Spiritual perception was not something I focused on very much in my training, to my detriment.

I walked up to them with a grin. “Greetings!” The three of them had the look of true sacred artists, reminding me a little of Li Jogen. They were built broadly, tough-looking, and cared less about appearances than the average Blackflame citizen did.

Alright, just give it to me, now. What’s your problem with me?

“You’re that Arelius girl’s new toy!” one of them, with a Cloud Hammer Goldsign, said.

My grin didn’t fall, contrary to my expectations. I was just too stunned to realize what he had said. “Among other things,” I replied. I only expected them to lightly inflame my spirit. At this rate, I would really do something I would regret.

They laughed. “He’s a funny one!” one of them remarked.

“Is that your plan, Arelius?” the first one said to me, “Marry into the main branch, and have children with Arelius eyes?”

“Exactly,” I said to him with a dumb grin, “Although, I thought I was being subtle. Doesn’t hurt that she can make me ice cream on command.” They looked confused at that, with no rejoinder at the ready.

One of them said “Hey! How does it feel getting ridden on by someone an advancement higher?” Classy.

“Ask your mother,” I said with a shrug, being ‘classy’ in return. Dead silence. “Ah, come now, we were just kidding around, weren’t we? Or is it only devastating and mean when I do it? I’ll be nicer.”

The first man glared at me. Then his glare melted into a disdainful sneer. “You’re barking up the wrong tree. Chiara is bad news.”

“Really, now?” I asked, subtly shifting my breathing. When I cycled Collapsing Star madra, it was never in ‘calming loops’ like when Lindon cycled his. It felt more like I was revving up a chainsaw.

“You’re not her first,” he said, like that was supposed to give me some kind of mental breakdown. Oh no, she’s not a virgin, let me kill myself. “Would you like to know more?”

“Respectfully, sir, you couldn’t tell me the secret to Monarch in a way that would make me care about anything you have to say,” I said with a polite grin. He growled. 

“Her last boyfriend—”

I plugged my ears and said “La la la la la—”

He tried to grab me, but I activated Starfire Surge and stepped back, neatly avoiding him. I unplugged my ears and regarded him with all the loathing I had built up for Renfei. He wasn’t her, but he was still a Cloud Hammer. I’d just look at the cloud and imagine I was ripping her to shreds. “Touch me, and I will cripple you,” I told him.

Cloud Hammer madra bubbled off of him as he prepared the movement technique. “You? You’re just a Lowgold!”

“Hahahah!” I laughed. “Thank you! Thank you so much for this!” I reached for my back, and pulled out Star’s End, ripping it free from its harness, ready to let it all out. Starfire Surge covered me in looping bands of light and the world slowed to a crawl.

“What is the meaning of this?!”

I turned to the end of the hallway, where a Skysworn Truegold in full armor stood, glaring daggers at the both of us.

“The Highgold tried to attack me, sir,” I immediately said.

“Just showing the newbie some pointers,” the Highgold replied.

“Disperse this instant!” he roared, “And if I ever catch you two even so much as casting each other an angry look, I will rake you both over the coals!”

Despite the Truegold’s warnings, we did cast each other some looks. I gave him a friendly grin, and he gave me another disdainful sneer.

I so fucking wish that Truegold hadn’t been there.

I decided to head off back to my room to cool down, taking a circuitous path through Starsweep tower until I reached it.

Chiara stood in front of the door, arms folded, expression complicated.

I sighed. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

“I don’t want you to hear this from anyone else,” Chiara said.

I frowned at her. “I don’t want some meaningless loser to twist your arm into telling me anything you’re not comfortable telling me. Forget him.”

“I want to tell you,” she said.

I looked at her with concern. “Are you sure? You really don’t have to.”

“I’m sure.”

We entered my room. It was so tiny. Even my void key was bigger than it. All it could fit was a cot and a trunk for storing belongings.

We sat next to each other on the cot. I waited patiently for her to begin her tale. “Well, there isn’t much to say,” she shrugged. “He was my boyfriend. We were both apprentices. He followed me into danger, got crippled, and… blamed me for it.”

She was giving me the barebones, leaving things out. Perhaps she felt like the details were too damning? Or maybe they were too painful for her to fixate on?

“He had told me that he would follow me wherever,” she said with a sad grin, “And… to my mistake, I pushed that pledge to its limits. We were supposed to clear out a den of bandits that had attacked an imperial convoy. I wanted to climb the rankings, and felt that I could probably get it done on my own. He wanted to follow me. I told him to stay behind, but then he reminded me of his pledge. Rather than stay behind and wait for reinforcements, I… went ahead. I thought I could protect him. I did, for the most part. He just… kept falling behind. Then, when I saw the bandit chieftain about to pull a retreat, I also saw Han in danger. I thought that… maybe that much was fine for him. I pursued the mission, and I succeeded. And my estimation of Han was wrong. He was… too weak. And he got crippled for it.”

I nodded.

That was… heavy.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” I said.

She shrugged. “I don’t expect you to take a side in this. I don’t—”

“Well, I take yours,” I said with an easy shrug. “Maybe the situation was more complicated than you let on, but with respect to the wounded Skysworn, things happen in this line of work.”

“I could have waited for reinforcements.”

“He could have stayed behind.”

“He made a promise.”

“He was weak.”

Chiara opened her mouth to argue, but then she closed it. I continued in that vein. “You can have the purest heart of all, and it will mean nothing if you’re weak. The world only bends to power. Without it, you have no right to make such promises and feel bad when bad things happen. That he blames you is just another manifestation of his weakness. The person he really should blame is himself,” I looked closely at Chiara, until she finally turned to look me in the eyes as well, “Who was that Highgold, and how long has he been harassing you about this?”

Chiara scoffed. “To my face? Not since the last time I almost froze his hands off. I might have to give him a reminder of our rank difference.”

“Please reconsider. I really need to blow off some steam, and he seems like a neat enough target.”

Chiara frowned sadly. “Please don’t rock the boat, Sky. You can hardly afford it. Be at peace.”

“There is no peace,” I said, clenching my fists. “There is only disrespect and humiliation.”

She took my hand in hers, and a part of my cold soul slowly melted. “You’re doing so well, Sky. I know it’s hard for you. They make it harder for you because they expect this sort of reaction.”

“Because I’m a spoiled young master,” I sighed, “Whose never had to struggle for his sacred arts.” Never had to survive a Remnant-infested hellhole, dehydrated and starved to near death. Never had to contend with the torment of those stronger.

Never had to cycle the Eightfold Wheel of Reincarnation every fucking day since I became a Jade.

Chiara looked at me sadly, but said nothing. She knew that not to be true. She was just letting me vent.

I am a human. I react to stimuli. What else was I supposed to do?

Control it.

“I went and picked that fight on purpose,” I confessed. She didn’t say anything to that. “I’m losing perspective. That’s how angry I am. All my priorities are shifting, and I don’t like it.” Yerin doesn’t talk to me, and Lindon is living under constant terror. Eithan was everywhere and nowhere, and I had no one to vent these feelings to. No one but Chiara.

And a large part of me felt pathetic doing so. I was supposed to be happy being a Skysworn apprentice, being able to see her more often.

Instead, I was buckling. I was raising a shitfit. I was being weak. My own hurt feelings would eventually jeopardize my place in the Skysworn, my closeness with Chiara. And then what? Even if she didn’t eventually leave me, that disgrace never would.

“Then let us say what we are here for,” Chiara said. “And keep that in mind.”

I sighed. “I’m here to support my junior siblings. I’m here to make sure we can secure our future advancement.” This is my foundation for Sage. My ticket to Ghostwater. I could not afford to fuck this up. “And I’m here for you,” I said, looking in her eyes. Slowly, I felt my soul cleanse itself of that unmanageable anger, leaving behind just its smoldering coals. I was still angry, but now I could handle it..

With Chiara in mind, I could go on in spite of anything.

“I am here as a peace offering between Underlords,” Chiara said, and I squeezed her hand comfortingly. “But I made something of this imposed destiny of mine, and I intend to seize my future back, and do with my life whatever I please. And to do that, I need to play by the rules.”

“Play by the rules,” I repeated with a nod. “Yes.”

I could still feel angry.

I just had to control it. For the greater good.

000

The day had come. The Skysworn officers, Bai Rou and Renfei, had checked Lindon for everything he intended to bring to the battle grounds. Every construct was constructed by himself, with the help of Gesha.

Lindon had tried to sneak past them several constructs that were only straddling the line between Lowgold and Highgold. A quarter of them made the cut. That was still more than he had expected from what Sky had warned him of.

With him, in this flat mountaintop temple, was Eithan alone. He had brought Gesha with him, but she was somewhere deeper down the temple complex. Everyone else had been left behind. Even Orthos. Little Blue was with Eithan, watching on gravely.

On the other side of the dueling grounds was Jai Long, scripted red bandages covering his face. He had a mundane wood-poled spear in his hand, though Lindon knew that he had already opened his soulspace, and inside was the Ancestor’s Spear.

Behind him was Jai Chen. She gave him a wave. Lindon assumed that to be a greeting, and from what Sky had told him of her, she was nothing but grateful to him. They both were.

Jai Long would be driven to cripple him on Jai Daishou’s orders… who was conspicuously absent. In place of him was a Jai clan elder with long white hair as well, though his hair was tied together in one thick, metallic ponytail, and he had a long, white beard as well, whereas Daishou had been clean-shaven.

He sent a glare towards Lindon, and to Eithan as well.

Between them stood the adjudicator, Naru Gwei.

Lindon let he and Eithan exchange whatever toxic barbs they wanted. All Lindon could focus on was Jai Long.

Lindon did not want to fight.

He didn’t want to lose his arm.

It was a simple sentiment, and he felt it strongly, stronger than anything at this moment. A part of him, using his father’s voice, reproached him for cowardice, tried to remind him of the glorious future that awaited.

Yet nothing could comfort him or make this event okay. Nothing would!

Lindon thought of Sky and Yerin. They weren’t on speaking terms anymore. That felt like an appropriate development considering all the stress they were under. Not just for this duel, but what would follow, the thing that would completely eclipse Lindon’s future tragedy.

The awakening of the Bleeding Phoenix.

Lindon felt sick to his stomach. In vain, he reached for Suriel’s marble in his pocket, trying to take that soothing warmth from it that he could always rely on for emotional support. Even that felt distant to him now.

He cycled Blackflame, chasing away the nerves. He would take a page out of Sky’s book. If logic failed him, then he would at least try to reach towards baseless confidence, if only to make the present more bearable. 

“I don’t wish to kill you,” Jai Long said to him. “You took my brother away. But you gave me back my sister. For that, we are even.”

In fact, it was that man’s brother that had tried to kill Lindon, while he was only an Iron. For the high crime of defending his life from a murderous Highgold, he was to be made a sacrifice to a Truegold’s ire.

“I will do what I have to do,” Lindon said, “To survive this match. Don’t blame me for defending my life once more.”

“If you come at me with deadly intent, Lindon,” Jai Long hefted his spear, holding it with both hands, “Then you only have yourself to blame for what will happen.”

If Lindon held back his deadly intent, Jai Long would recover and cut off his arm. If Lindon let his intent show, then Jai Long may summon the ancestor’s spear immediately.

Eithan put a hand on Lindon’s shoulder, and gave a comforting grin. “Nothing will touch you, little brother. Fight.”

Lindon almost cried there and then. “Can I rely on you, Eithan?”

Eithan gave a benevolent nod. “You can. Put your trust in me once more.”

“Step away from the contestant, Eithan,” Gwei called out, “And wipe that smile of your face. Jai Daishou is a no-show. I wonder why,” Gwei said, giving Eithan an unimpressed look.

“Me as well!” Eithan said, and the Jai Truegold seethed, but said nothing. Had Eithan… killed him?

Gwei sighed. “Heavens save me,” he turned his head to look at Lindon and then Jai Long, “This is an honorable match between Jai Long and Wei Shi Lindon Arelius. The match proceeds until either party is killed or crippled.”

And Gwei would hold them all to this.

The thought of Jai Long berating Lindon for bringing deadly intent into the match infuriated him. Was Lindon supposed to just sit still and let his arm get cut off? After everything Jai Long had put him through.

That felt like the easier path now, somehow. He could just walk up, refuse to waste anyone’s time, and give Jai Long his forearm, thus completing the conditions of the match. Lindon would have to adapt to a Remnant prosthetic, the one that Sky had described to him. It would do his sacred arts well, wouldn’t it?

This was… the right path.

Lindon ignored Gwei’s preamble. He just wanted this to end as quickly as possible.

“Contestants at the ready,” Gwei said, and Jai Long stepped forward. Lindon did as well.

“Make it easier for yourself,” Jai Long said.

Lindon’s heart surged with an unfamiliar emotion then. It felt dark, cold, and yet hot at the same time, and it pushed his blood against his skin.

Hatred.

Lindon put all thoughts aside, and settled on adopting a single, immutable direction, one that he would make true no matter what.

He would win this.

000

From Stormrock, we were on our way to the southern jungle temple in the mountains, on Sky’s Mercy. It was a two hour journey, yet it felt like an entire day.

It was Cassias, Yerin and I alone in the cloudship. Orthos was there, but drugged up to his gills. None of us spoke to each other.

I had exchanged polite greetings with Cassias, and some niceties, but nothing that truly meant anything. I didn’t know how he felt about me, but I only felt apologetic. And responsible for some great misdeed. That wasn’t fair to Chiara, however. Cassias didn’t own her. It just didn’t feel very nice to be disapproved of.

He had good reasons. I was… all over the place. Risky, reckless, enormously impressive in some areas, and terrifyingly foolhardy in others. I had layers to myself that even I failed to unpack. All my sessions with Sai Hong only served to remind me that the work I had ahead of me was enormous. He had dusted the sand off a tiny rocky mound on the ground, only to find that the mound was just the tip of a mountain that extended for miles under the sand’s surface.

I had problems.

In a way, I was like a Monkey’s Paw wish for the perfect disciple. I did everything right, and still managed to fuck things up catastrophically in unforeseen ways.

I had already cycled the Eightfold Wheel as much as I could tolerate today, and I unfortunately couldn’t pass the time with my favourite psychosis-inducing exercise anymore without risking my sanity. Apart from Lindon’s incoming duel, it had been a slow and anxiety-inducing day, and I figured: if I was going to be anxious, might as well go all in. Now, it was no longer an option.

Instead, I did some light technique training, modifying and trying different things with my madra. Unlike Lindon and Yerin, I had never been much of a visualizer when it came to madra control. Instead, it was just easier to know every spiritual movement down pat. It came with the territory of having a bad grip on my feelings. It also prevented me from chasing the right emotional state or visual that would trigger a technique, or the ones that a technique even triggered. I couldn’t quite pin down how my madra affected my mind, not the way Lindon did.

When I used Starfire Surge, I felt… fast. Focused. Ready for anything. My heartbeat sped up, and I would almost liken it to a drug trip, but without the distracting psychoactive effects.

Still, I was missing details, missing factors that informed certain decisions that I made. I wouldn’t blame Jai Hojin on Starfire Surge. Far from it. If anything, the technique just pushed me forward unerringly toward anything I had set my mind to. I was one-track minded. I found that evident during my time as a scholar. At times, I would have to pause the technique when I hit a wall, and realize that I had gone the wrong way entirely, and should have tried a different tack all along during my research.

Perhaps, in the macro scale, it was the same? Where was I running to, and was it the wrong way?

I heard a knock on my door, and deactivated my technique. “Enter,” I said. I was seated on the floor, back against the bed frame, facing the door. I assumed that it would be Cassias, but instead, I saw Yerin. I felt a pit form in my stomach. “Hi,” I said to her.

Yerin looked at me in the way that she had ever since she integrated the Blood Shadow: aggrievement. She had a problem with me now.

I understood.

“Why are you here?” she asked me.

This is my room, my brain lamely joked. It was hardly enough to cheer me up, honestly. “Do you mean with you guys?”

“Exactly,” she told me. “Why are you following us? What do you want from Lindon and I?”

“I… I want to be sacred artists with you,” I said. “Because I believe in you.”

“Is that all you care about?” Yerin asked. “Our sacred arts?”

“No,” I said. “I—no. I care about you as people as well.”

“You want to know what I think?” she asked as she closed the door behind her, for all the good it would do. Orthos was already sleeping, and Cassias would have to purposefully try to ignore us to not hear us.

“Yes,” I said.

“I think you only think about yourself, really,” Yerin said, and I frowned at that, “You want power, and you saw some future where you could get it, but only if you squeezed yourself in and trampled on everyone’s feelings in the meanwhile. You don’t care about how Lindon feels. You just want to push him to some shiny image of what he could be, and you don’t even ask if you’re pushing him too hard. You told him he’d lose his arm, and that it was a good thing!”

“That won’t happen,” I said quickly. “Eithan will make sure it—”

“And what about me?” Yerin asked. “You weren’t there when it happened. To me. All those years ago. You know it maybe, but you weren’t there. And you think that gives you the right to tell me what to do with this creature? I don’t care what good it did, do you even care that it’s burning my soul that I did this? On purpose?”

She summoned her Blood Shadow. It stood there, sword in hand. I stood up. Yerin laughed. “Yeah! You think it’s all sunshine and rainbows that I got a sharper sword, and yet you still stood up right now. Imagine how I feel! You think I get any sleep now?” It wasn’t wariness that caused me to stand up. This just wasn’t a conversation one could have sitting.

She pushed her hand towards the Blood Shadow, and it went back inside her again.

“I’m sorry,” I said to her. I expected that I would maybe blink away tears or be touched by her pain, but it… just didn’t register to me. What did register was the rejection. That felt bad. That did, in fact, trigger some tears that I needed to blink away.

The only way I could cry about someone was if I made it about myself.

“Are you?” Yerin asked, “Because you never once apologised to me, all week! Are you really sorry?”

I nodded, rubbing away the tears from my eyes. “I am. I’m… I’m so sorry.”

I wish I could see why this was my fault. I wish I didn’t have such a blindspot. I would question her, try to argue with her, if I cared less about having her as a friend. Now, I just knew, that if I was anything less than perfectly apologetic, we would very likely be over. 

“What are you sorry for?” she asked me.

“I’m… sorry you had to do this,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say. “I’m sorry that things happened the way they did. You don’t deserve this. And I’m sorry for having to… tell you to do what you did,” I said. 

She closed her eyes, and out from them trickled a pair of tears.

“You just kept on going,” Yerin said, “Like nothing ever happened or changed. Like you couldn’t care less. You contend that’s what friends do, Sky?”

I… I had ignored her pain. I hadn’t even noticed it. It had never truly even registered to me how monumental this change was to her.

I should have shown her how I cared, in a way that she could understand. I shouldn’t have just gone ‘so that happened—anyway, who wants pizza’ and expected nobody to notice. I had remained irreverent during the days after she had mastered her Blood Shadow, trying to lighten the mood, trying to lighten my mood in the face of all the Skysworn bullshit, but failing to appreciate the mood for what it was as well. In doing so, I failed to give respect to Yerin’s sacrifice.

Failed to give her respect.

I bowed at the waist, not sure what else I could possibly even do. I did this all the time, after all, and I was never sincere about it. Sincerity was like a deadly poison to me.

I heard the door open and close while I still faced the floor. Yerin had left.

I stood straight and dried my eyes. No. Don’t focus on how this hurt me in order to appear like an empathetic human. That was beyond me, and deceitful, and my lack of empathy didn’t preclude me from being able to make things better in a constructive way. 

I opened my void key and reached towards an emergency stash of booze. Not Arakmedes’ vintage, but definitely something on the stronger side. This would take courage.

I held the bottle, looked it over, sighed, and returned it back where I found it. 

If willpower was what I needed, I didn’t need to go around digging for it at the bottom of some bottle. I have a shiny new brain now. Might as well put it to good use.

I opened the door to my bedroom—

—and found Cassias standing outside, looking… tired. “Don’t go after her,” he said to me. “May I come in?”

Stunned, I took a step back, and he walked inside.

“She needs time,” Cassias told me. Something about that irritated me.

“You don’t even know the context of why we’re fighting.”

“I can tell she needs space,” Cassias said, “Forcefulness will only achieve the opposite of your desired effect.”

“She needs confidence in me,” I said, “And assurances that I care.”

“It’s not my place to say what she needs,” Cassias said.

“But it is in your sister’s case,” I shot back at him.

Cassias didn’t say anything to that. I wish I could claw those words back, being honest.

That wasn’t how I wanted to say it.

That wasn’t the right thing to say, either. I should have apologized to him, for not meeting his standards.

“Nevermind,” I said to him. “I’m not interested in having that conversation.” I really, really didn’t. I already knew what it would consist of, and I didn’t need to feel any shittier than I already did. “Thank you. For the advice. But I think I’d like to be alone now.”

Cassias nodded. “I was… interested in having this conversation, to be honest. But if you’re not, I will respect that.” He made his way to the door. I watched his back as he left the room, wondering if I felt more angry at him or myself for giving him such a foul impression of me.

I really only had myself to blame, at the end of the day. No use feeling pity for myself. The bar was incredibly low: have common sense, don’t have the preternatural talent of pissing off every old person with authority in the vicinity.

But even if it wasn’t even that, then my climb in the sacred arts would still be viewed as problematic. Archlords lived nothing-lives that consisted of training and barely anything else. 

I was dramatically more likely to get Chiara hurt than anything else, even if I lived in a moderately risky way, taking every opportunity to empower my sacred arts within reason. 

Being ‘reckless to a fault’ didn’t help things at all.

I should do better.