Then flames blasted into the sky from Mount Shiryu’s peak.
The fire was streaked with red and black, and Blackflame aura gushed into the sky. All over the city, scripts flared to life, as sacred artists scrambled to defend themselves from another attack.
Renfei and Bai Rou streaked toward the dark peak, their clouds leaving green trails behind them.
“Testing,” Bai Rou said, voice hollow.
She agreed. Someone had decided to test the weapon; it must be based around a Ruler binding, based on the vital aura and flame that erupted from the mountain.
As part of standard procedure, the Skysworn each veiled their spirits, suppressing their power so they wouldn’t be detected as they approached. An Arelius would see through it, but Naru Cassias Arelius was with his family at the moment, and Eithan Arelius was gone.
They hovered over the mountain until they looked down into a canyon. The same narrow canyon that contained the Black Dragon Trials.
Renfei had checked this location as soon as they had arrived, finding no extra lingering Blackflame power, but obviously someone had managed to hide the weapon from her. It was their own foolishness that they had revealed it so soon.
She and Bai Rou flew over a circle of ninety-nine black, scripted dummies. The Ruler Trial. No better place to test out a Blackflame Ruler weapon than the course that taught them to use their Ruler technique.
Warm air still gushed from the canyon, buffeting their clouds, but it only took a minor expenditure of madra to stay steady.
There were two people inside the canyon, neither of whom Renfei had seen before. One, a shrunken old woman with gray hair in a bun crawling around on spider’s legs. She had a goldsteel bladed hook on her back, and she was tinkering with one of the dummies, exposing the construct inside. A Soulsmith, then, in charge of the course’s operation.
The other must be the one using the weapon, but his hands were empty. He was tall and looked stern despite his age, and a very careful scan of his spirit didn’t pick up anything of his madra.
She couldn’t check him more thoroughly without alerting him to their presence, but he must be very skilled to have veiled his spirit from even a cursory scan. His madra almost felt pure, which was a testament to the power of his veil.
Currently, he was sitting in a cycling position, a tiny blue Remnant on his lap.
“The weapon?” Bai Rou asked, but she shook her head. There was no way to make Blackflame madra look so much like pure water. If she had to guess, she’d say that was a natural spirit. Maybe it helped activate the weapon.
“We’ll wait until they draw it again,” she said, as the young man stood up. “It shouldn’t be too—”
The young man’s spirit changed.
His veil must have dropped, because his soul suddenly burned like a hungry flame. His eyes turned black with shining blood-red irises—that wasn’t the Goldsign from the Path of Black Flame she remembered, but otherwise his power felt just like a black dragon’s.
“A Blackflame in the wild,” she muttered.
Bai Rou’s yellow eyes flared. “Who would be this stupid?”
Aura gathered like clay, wrapped around the activation crystal for the course, and then flared to black-and-red light. The Ruler Trial began.
One dummy came to life, drawing an orange bow and firing a blast of light at the young Blackflame. A lance of sword energy followed, and then a fireball, then a crystal of dark ice stabbed up from the earth beneath his feet.
The course was designed to keep its participants on the defensive, pressuring them so they couldn’t hold on to their Ruler technique. When the Blackflames had taken these Trials, their guardians had countered the techniques while the one on the Path of the Black Flame readied the Void Dragon’s Dance.
But this boy…
Black-and-red madra covered him like blazing fog, and he dodged the arrow of light, took a cut from the sword energy, shattered the fireball on his fist—which must have left burns on his hand—and broke the ice with a kick.
All the while, his madra was still gathering vital aura, scooping it up like piles of gold. He took control of all the Blackflame aura he could, building a mountain over the dummies.
He fought as the attacks continued, dodging with his Enforcer technique active, blasting projectiles from the air with short bursts of dark fire, and taking cuts to the body that should have stopped him in his tracks. He was a bloody mess, and his core should have gone dry in seconds—he only felt like a Lowgold, and not a strong one.
But he kept going. In Renfei’s Copper sight, the canyon looked like a seething mass of red-tinged darkness.
Finally, long after she thought he should have collapsed, he ignited that pile of aura.
The entire top of the mountain rose in a column of black-spotted fire.
Renfei had never considered taking shelter. Her Cloud Hammer madra spread into a haze around her, shielding her from the heat and the impact.
The shock hit her harder: this was a real Lowgold on the Path of Black Flame. One of the living weapons that had carved out an empire using sheer power. Even though he wasn’t much yet, the Schools and sects and clans would fight to control his future.
The firestorm had died almost as quickly as it was born, but for a moment, it had looked as though Mount Shiryu were transformed into a volcano.
Even this wasn’t enough to pass the Ruler Trial. A true Void Dragon’s Dance should have devoured the dummies and nothing else; the tower of flame rising into the air was just wasted energy.
But he was sitting on the ground with his legs crossed, and his spirit was veiled again. She sensed madra flowing to his flesh, his wounds drinking it up…and closing. Visibly healing before her eyes, no life madra required.
“Someone,” Bai Rou said, “is making a monster.”
Renfei released her aura and flew down into the canyon, her partner flying with her. A raincloud hovered over her head: the Goldsign of the Cloud Hammers. Her actual hammer rested at her side, and if the Blackflame boy showed the slightest intention to resist, she’d draw it.
The old woman scurried up to the young man, and they both looked up in shock. The boy’s eyes weren’t dark anymore, Renfei noticed. They were ordinary, human eyes.
A clever deception.
The two in the canyon were bowing and sweating by the time the Skysworn landed. That showed wisdom, but Renfei still considered striking the Lowgold Blackflame dead.
It would certainly simplify matters in the future.
But in the end, her honor won out: Truegolds did not strike down Lowgolds to make their lives easier.
“Name, sect, and rank,” she demanded.
“I am Gesha of the Fishers,” the old woman said. “A guest of the honored Arelius family. As for my rank, I—”
“Not you,” Bai Rou said, his burning yellow eyes on the boy.
Sweat dripped from the young man’s forehead, and he didn’t dare to glance up at the two Skysworn. “This one is Wei Shi Lindon, an adopted disciple of the Arelius family. This one apologizes, but he can’t be sure of his rank. Among the outer disciples, this one believes he is ranked second, but he is only aware of two in total.”
“The Arelius family has thousands of outer family disciples,” Renfei said, her voice dry. If he was trying to deceive her by saying he didn’t know his rank, he wasn’t working hard enough. “Who is your master?”
“This one is honored to be the disciple of Eithan Arelius, though regrettably, this one’s master is not in the city at the moment. He has gone to the capital. This one would be honored to lead you to—”
She interrupted him. “Wei Shi Lindon Arelius, in the name of the Emperor, the Skysworn are taking you into custody. You will not be tried or punished until a representative of your clan can be found to speak for you.” That was the end of what she was required to say, but she added, “Eithan Arelius has no authority in this matter—we speak with the voice of the Emperor himself. A Blackflame cannot be allowed to run wild.”