He squared his stance, looking to Yerin. “Punch me as hard as you can, if you don't mind.”
Yerin slammed the sword into her sheath. “I need a break,” she said shortly.
“Oh, of course. Apologies.” She had only used the Endless Sword a few times, but she had her own match to prepare for. He couldn't selfishly monopolize her time.
“What about your Diamond Veins?” Lindon asked. He had been jealous of her elixir—it felt like he was always being held back by his madra channels.
Still facing away from him, she rolled her neck, loosening up. “I can take bigger swings with my techniques than ever before. It’s not too soon, either. Now I can work on hitting harder.”
“Do you need to? Your Path whittles them down, and then you finish them by hand.” No Path could do everything. The Path of Black Flame needed to be able to punch through strong defenses, but the Path of the Endless Sword didn’t. At least as far as he could see.
Yerin fished around in her pocket and tossed a dream tablet over her shoulder. Lindon caught it out of the air and activated it immediately.
The Sword Sage is a wiry man with messy hair, half-lidded eyes that make it look like he’s falling asleep, and tattered black robes. Six sword-arms hang limp from his back, and he draws his white sword back. He’s about to step forward in a lunge.
He faces an animated mountain of steel and stone, a human-shaped armored puppet-construct taller than ten men. The earth aura and force madra radiating from the construct project the idea of invincibility.
The tip of the Sage’s white blade shines like a silver star as he pulls it back. Lindon has an instant to sense incredibly concentrated aura, madra, and soulfire gathering to a point.
In one smooth move, he stabs forward and unleashes his technique.
A silver-white Forged sword pierces perfectly through the construct. It is there and gone like a strike of lightning, but it erases a column through the center of the massive puppet.
The Sage turns, sheathes his sword, and yawns as piles of metal and stone crash to the ground behind him.
Lindon pulled himself out of the dream, breathing deeply. Yerin noticed.
“You see me doing that?” she asked.
“I can’t imagine how anyone does that.” It was beautiful, the synchronized blend of spiritual movements. No waste at all. And the Forged sword was so perfect that it was more beautiful than his Archlord Wavedancer; it was as though he had created the ideal sword from madra and aura.
Yerin extended all six sword-arms, flexing them in the air. “Well, that’s the target I have to hit.”
Lindon hefted the tablet. “He was higher than an Underlord when he did this. You have time.”
“Tell me the last time you listened to someone who told you to take your time.”
That struck home. It was disturbing to look at himself from the outside. From his perspective, Yerin did have time, and rushing things could hurt her. He wanted her to take it one step at a time.
But he could relate to the urgency she felt, and it would be hypocritical to suggest someone else slow down.
Instead, he manifested Dross.
The one-eyed purple spirit appeared above his palm, blinking in the light. [Hey! I was watching your embarrassing memories!]
“Can you simulate something for Yerin?” Lindon would have to ask about the embarrassing memories later.
Dross stretched his mouth into an expression of extreme discomfort. [Eeeehhh…thanks to Charity’s madra, I probably could , but you can’t imagine the headache. And it won’t last very long. Also, I don’t want to.]
“Gratitude,” Lindon said. “Can you model the Sword Sage’s technique we just watched?”
Yerin straightened up, eyes wide, and scurried closer. She looked to Dross with expectation.
[I speak straight into your mind and still you won’t listen to me.]
“Please, Dross,” Yerin said earnestly. “This could give me new wings.”
Dross hissed through his teeth, glaring at her and then at Lindon. A moment later, their surroundings vanished.
It was as though Lindon, Yerin, and Dross stood on darkness and were surrounded by endless black. The Sword Sage appeared a moment later, lifelike, holding his sword back.
Yerin reached out. “Seeing him with my own eyes again…” Before she touched him, she lowered her hand. Her lips twisted. “That’s a knife to the gut.”
Power gathered on the tip of the Sage’s blade, then he stepped forward to drive the light forward.
“Hold,” Lindon commanded, and Dross froze the scene. He groaned as he did so, as though to emphasize how much effort it had taken.
Yerin and Lindon examined his stance, his spirit, and the light beginning to stretch from the end of his weapon. It was a bare ghost of a sword, not the full, vivid technique they had witnessed in the dream tablet.
“Soulfire, madra, aura,” Lindon said. “All woven together so I can’t tell where one begins and the other ends.”
Yerin leaned closer until her chin almost touched the technique. “Something’s tickling the back of my mind. I had a better sense from the dream tablet, but I think there’s something else about this technique. It’s itching at me, but I can’t track it down.”
Something else beyond the madra, aura, and soulfire...
“Do you think it could be a Sage’s power?” Lindon asked quietly.
“That’s a hair off the target. I wouldn’t contend it’s another power…but I’m not stone certain it isn’t.”
[Uggggh aaaaaannnnd that’s all you get.]
Abruptly, the vision snapped off. Lindon and Yerin stumbled back into reality, standing in the middle of the training room.
Dross panted heavily, heaving exaggerated breaths, and even swept one of his stubby pseudo-arms across his forehead as though to wipe away sweat.
[I told you it wouldn’t last long. And if there’s something you couldn’t sense in my simulation, it’s because this one—] He stabbed an arm at Lindon. [—didn’t pick up on it. Or the dream tablet didn’t. Or I didn’t. But I’d put my bets on this one.]
Dross slipped back into Lindon’s spirit, but Lindon was already thinking along lines that he had tested in his own Paths.
“You’ll need to layer techniques,” he said. “It’s like using a Ruler technique, Striker technique, and Forger technique at the same time. It might take soulfire to hold it all together.”
Yerin’s sword was out of its sheath, and she swung it to limber up. “You’ve tried this before, have you?”
Lindon coughed into his Remnant arm. “It was harder than I thought.”
“I’d rather swallow my sword than try this without the Diamond Veins,” Yerin said, settling into a stance like the one her master had taken. “Likely to shred my channels to pieces. Even if we do get it right, the rocky part will be using this in battle. Haven’t practiced enough to form a binding, so I’ll have to practice until it’s carved into my spirit.”
“We’ll be with you,” Lindon said.
Dross groaned.
Yerin flashed him a smile as aura began gathering around her sword. The weapon started to hum. “Say we do get this right. We ought to think of a name for it.”
Lindon started making a list.
~~~
When he wasn’t needed for the tournament, Northstrider vanished back to the ball of dark, floating water that served as his Monarch viewing platform. Or so most people believed.
Eithan found the Monarch sitting on the ground of an alley in Ninecloud City, eating grilled vegetables wrapped in a layer of soft bread. He could not have looked less like he belonged. His massive, muscular frame made him look like he’d squeezed in between the two buildings, and his ragged hair and mismatched clothes belonged in a much dingier alley.