With one last glance at the Sword Sage’s apprentice, he leaped off the cliff to regroup with his family.
Even with her core emptied for the second time that evening, and both her spirit and body aching with exhaustion, Yerin tried to follow Jai Long.
“Get back…here, you…” Her voice was mumbled, and she wasn’t even sure the sounds that came out were real words.
She staggered after the enemy until her knees buckled, and then she sank to the rock, panting. The energy that came to her from her master’s Remnant would return, but for now, it was tapped out. Her brief burst of clarity and insight was already fading away like a dream. There was more to gain from the Remnant, but that sense of his presence had gone.
Leaving only a memory.
She was exhausted in body, mind, and spirit, and saying goodbye to the Sword Sage a second time struck her like a physical wound. His absence tore through her.
And there on the mountain, she wept again for her master’s death.
Orthos was wounded. His skin oozed dark blood, and Lindon could feel the pain of venom working its way through the turtle’s blood and spirit. His spirit was in chaos, and Lindon couldn’t sense whether Orthos’ mind was in control or not.
A massive black paw, the size of Lindon’s entire torso, smashed down onto his stomach, slamming his back against the ground.
Lindon tried to scream, but it came out as a rush of air. He clawed at the leathery leg, but he might as well have been slapping a tree.
The great turtle stretched out his neck, looking Lindon in the eye. He growled and choked into Lindon’s face, as though trying to speak, but no words came. The sacred beast gave a great scream of frustration that tore Lindon’s face.
He squeezed his eyes shut. Some deaths had to be faced with eyes open, but this was not one of them.
His core flared with a dark, bloody light.
Blackflame raced through his madra channels, scouring him from the inside out, making him gasp.
Is this what it’s like to leave a Remnant? he wondered. He’d always imagined it as a sensation of the spirit tearing itself away from the body, which was exactly what this felt like.
His spirit burned hotter and hotter, Blackflame racing along his channels, until he could bear it no longer. He screamed, and Orthos screamed with him, dark fire racing from the turtle’s mouth and scorching stone.
Lindon cycled furiously, trying to digest some of the power—not Eithan’s Purification Wheel, but the simplest, fastest breathing technique he could. He ignited the Burning Cloak, which raged around him, giving him the strength to lift Orthos’ paw and throw it off him.
But Orthos roared in response. A red-and-black corona flared around him, and suddenly the leg was pressed back down like a mountain collapsing, claws digging into Lindon’s chest.
Lindon built up power in his hands, pushing rivers of Blackflame out through both of his palms. The Burning Cloak raged, and he could feel red and black aura flaring all around him.
The power was too much for him, he could feel it; his channels and his core were stretched to the point of bursting. He hadn’t reached the end of Jade—his spirit wasn’t mature yet.
So he clawed at his pack, searching for the one thing that might help him: the Sylvan Riverseed.
He tore at his pile of belongings like a man on fire looking for a bucket of water. Tongues of Blackflame licked at the fabric of his pack, scorching away chunks, but he couldn’t care.
The glass case tumbled out and the Riverseed rubbed her head, as though she’d knocked a skull she didn’t have. Lindon didn’t wait to get her attention and draw her in; he felt as though his spirit was shriveling and blackening.
Instead, Blackflame burned through the side of the glass. It didn’t melt; it hissed and blew away in a cloud of grit like fine dust.
Lindon stretched out trembling fingers, and the Sylvan Riverseed cocked her head to look at him. For a second, she seemed uncertain, like she didn’t recognize him.
Then, firmly, she seized his middle finger in both hands.
A surge of liquid blue flowed through his madra channels, quieting the flow of dark madra and soothing his channels like cool water on a burn. Blackflame madra kept coming, and Lindon kept cycling, but the Riverseed poured all she had into him.
Finally, the flow of fire slackened. Orthos pulled his paw from Lindon’s core and staggered away, unspeakably weary.
The Sylvan Riverseed sprawled on her back, chittering like a frustrated wind chime. She had lightened to the blue of a robin’s egg, and after a moment she squirmed back into his pack and started digging around for scales.
And Lindon lay there panting, spirit and body aching. Much of Orthos’ madra had been diverted into his Bloodforged Iron body, so Lindon’s smallest wounds had closed and the venom in his veins had been burned away, but he still hurt like he’d been beaten all over with hammers.
Then Gokren stumbled back through the exit, hair wild and furs burned off. He stared wildly around, fixing his gaze on Orthos, and leveled his spear.
Four Sandvipers entered behind him, moving to flank the turtle.
Lindon’s spirits fell like a sack of bricks. It just wasn’t fair. Suriel was playing a trick on him—surely every mortal’s trials had to end sometime.
“The dragon advances,” Orthos declared, eyeing Gokren. Lindon could feel the turtle’s spirit, strained to its limits, but he still roared and lumbered toward the Sandviper.
Lindon started to gather Blackflame madra between his palms, but he froze. His pure core was still empty.
He couldn’t make a shell around the Striker technique.
Orthos took a hit from the side and screamed, while Lindon hunkered behind the stone tablet explaining the Ruler technique, trying to condense Blackflame madra.
The Riverseed whined, shaking his knee with both her hands and pointing to Orthos, trying to get him to help.
Lindon tuned out Orthos’ screams and the Riverseed’s pleas, focused on the black fire flickering between his hands. This was a dragon’s technique. He needed to think about it like a dragon.
He poured more power into the ball, and when he felt himself about to lose control, he forced it into place. A dragon wouldn’t try to bend or shape its power; a dragon would make the power submit.
The dragon conquers.
When he finally succeeded, he almost didn’t realize it, dripping sweat over a fireball twice as big as his fist. He stumbled out from the shelter of the stone tablet, watching Orthos withdrawing all his limbs into his shell.
Sandviper madra crashed on the outside without leaving a mark, but Lindon knew the fight was over. Orthos would never have hidden unless he was prepared to die. His spirit was a mournful song, an aching wound of injured pride.
There was nothing in Lindon’s mind except his desire to push the enemy away from his partner. He shoved both hands forward, releasing the madra he’d stored up into a Striker technique.
If he could knock Gokren off-balance, even a weakened Orthos might be able to kill him. Maybe they could escape. But that assumed that Lindon’s pitiful Jade technique could even wound a Truegold.
An arm-thick bar of Blackflame madra streamed toward Sandviper Gokren, the technique dense and liquid smooth. The Truegold condensed a green spear out of madra, slamming his Forged weapon against the spike. Truegold Sandviper madra met Lindon’s Blackflame.
The dark fire washed over Gokren’s defense, taking his hand off at the wrist.
He stumbled back, eyes wide as he stared at the place where his hand used to be. Lindon stared, just as stunned. He had put everything he had into that Striker technique, to the degree that he was feeling dizzy from the strain on his spirit, but he had only hoped to take some pressure from Orthos. Even the Lowgold Sandvipers stepped back, turning their focus from the turtle to Lindon.