The Third Step: Chapter Fifty-Four (Patreon)

“You’re going to jinx your next ascension if you keep muttering to yourself like that,” Kene said, causing me to let out a sigh and lean my head against the window. Kene had at first simply told me that I’d experienced a pretty normal fourth gate ascension, reminding me that my third gate one had been rather unusual, but had quickly gotten annoyed at my half-muttered comments the following morning while we got coffee and loaded onto the train. The mumbling was really more directed toward myself and my own stupidity than it was to Kene, but I quieted myself and looked out the window as the flying train zipped over the landscape, moving from Feng Chui to Zhuanzhe. 

As we moved, flying at almost a third of the speed of sound, the locations around us all blurred and shifted. Feng Chui’s landscape around the coast was fairly arid, at least for a coastal region, and cooler than Tianzhu or the Isle of Fitiavana had been. The trees had reflected this: palm trees, conifers, pistache, ailanthus and ginkgo trees. The villages and cities had also reflected the dry landscape, as they had used the dusty lands to make glass and metal structures with amazing complexity. Even some of the places that looked to be poor were staggeringly beautiful, as they aligned and shifted the light with mirrors to create warm and cool regions of their homes, and even utilized glass spells in defending from beasts. 

And many did need defense from beasts. The arid lands we passed over were teeming with creatures of all sorts, every oasis a strange neutral zone between battling beasts. The towns and cities large enough to have a sect of at least middling standing were all well defended, with cleared out areas around them, but many of the smaller villages seemed to be hanging on by a thread. I hoped the sects acted quickly to any emergency alerts that were sent out. 

As we moved deeper into Feng Chui, and began to approach Zhuanzhe, with its ten thousand rivers and hundred thousand lakes, things began to change. The trees were the first thing that I noticed, as maples, ebonwoods, rattans, bamboo, teak, and rosewood began to appear. The wetter land and thicker canopy meant that what beasts lived down there were harder to spot, but there were also stronger creatures, including a few strong enough that I was actually able to sense from a mile up in the air. In turn, the villages also changed. Wood and clay became the building materials of choice, and they grew smaller. Walls became incredibly common, even though many beasts wouldn’t be troubled by such a thing. Sects became rarer as well, though I expected they’d pick up in commonality after we passed the border. 

“Isn’t this where you’re from?” 

The voice, coming from someone in the seats in front of us, broke me out of my focus. The window seat of their seats had gone to a kid that couldn’t be older than fifteen yet, and their brother was taking up the middle seat. He was tall, about a year or two older than I was, and had a good veil. I could still sense the leak of tempest and creation mana from him, but I couldn’t get much more than that. Next to him, in the aisle seat, was a woman about the same height as me, who looked about the same age, with long dark hair in a combatant’s braid. She was making no effort to hide her magic, and the sensation I got from it was… danger. It was sharp, like a really good kitchen knife, and absurdly fast. She was at the very peak of third gate as well, and I couldn’t help but feel like whatever had slowed her progression hadn’t made her any less dangerous.

The strangest thing about the pair of adults was that, despite the effects of Soulgaze and my well-above average mana senses, I was unable to get much on them. It was like the leaking of their identity was a complete void. Powerful mental defenses, perhaps? It was unlike anything I’d encountered before, if it was. 

“Yes,” the dangerous woman said, responding to the teen’s question. I waited for her to say something else, but she seemed completely taciturn. I debated leaning forward and saying something, but that would effectively be saying that I had eavesdropped on them – which admittedly, I had, just not intentionally. 

I returned to looking out the windows, and as we passed over the large river that marked the border between Zhuanzhe and Feng Chui, I noticed immediate changes. They weren’t dramatic, but the border had several sects of middling size along it, and that brought with it a nexus of trade. Boats worked their way up and down the river, carrying boxes and bags. 

We continued to speed across the landscape, and mangroves began to dot the rivers and lakes. I could see why Zhuanzhe had the name it did – the entire country seemed to be riddled with water, permeating everything. Even the mountains that began to pop up were located around rivers, or had rivers flowing out of or into the mountain caves. And the mountains were strange, quite tall and sharp, but thin and narrow. They almost reminded me of the Dragontooth range, but with bases far more narrow, and in a warmer and wetter climate that caused them to be absolutely teeming with verdant colors and life. 

As we approached, then floated over the massive capital city where the Silent River Sect was located, skyscrapers became increasingly common, and I could even see the series of sports arenas, exhibition halls, and other things that had been cleared off at the base of the outer sect. It was easy to tell where the sect began, because a circle of smaller mountains formed the massive ring of the outer sect, dominating the center of the sprawling city.

For the first time, I understood why people made the distinction of sects and great sects: the ring of the outer sect was really a town in and of itself. Houses, shops, terrace farms, and a hundred other things climbed up the cliffs, with more farms located in and along the river. Bridges connected the mountains, making it almost look like massive spiders had taken up residence and webbed between them like tree branches. Some of the bridges were clearly magical, but others were a marvel of ordinary engineering, and the air was also filled with people flying under a variety of devices and powers. 

There was a slightly taller, and significantly smaller, ring of mountains within the outer sect, denoting the smaller and more powerful inner sect. The spaces here were much more open, and I could spot training fields, areas for sparring, and more. There was only a single mountain for the core sect, atop which a palatial home sat – presumably, the location of the River Lord, Patriarch of the Silent River Sect. 

As our train came to a stop and landed, we were shuffled off and rushed through what felt like a mountain and a half of bureaucracy. By the time it was finished, I had been given a handful of tickets, a key to the room I’d been temporarily provided, and orders to arrive in the central arena for the start of the games within the next three hours. 

I spent the time tracking people down. Liz had gotten an orb, and I was confident she was a powerful enough mage to have made the cut. As soon as I had found her, we tracked down Ivy, as well as Jinwei. When the fox woman saw me, she gave me a thin lipped smile. 

“I gave it to your mentor, don’t worry.” 

“Huh? I’m here to open a portal to Mossford.” 

Jinwei stared at me, then shook her head and sighed, waving a hand. 

“My guild is content to watch on the mirrors. I don’t have family that I actually want tot come to the match. Here, you all can have my tickets.” 

She shoved them at me, then vanished. I frowned, staring at where I thought she was. Her attitude had changed recently, and I wasn’t sure why. Ah, whatever. I was on a clock, I didn’t have time for her if she didn’t have time for me. 

“Your families are near the bakery, right?” I asked, looking at Ivy and Liz. I knew that Ed had taken a ship back to Mossford to get there, so when both of them confirmed that their families should be ready, I looked at Dusk and Dawn. “You’re ready?” 

Dusk whistled that she was, Dawn nodded, I squared my shoulders, and as one, we began to rip open a portal in the air. This was, far and away, the furthest distance that I’d ever needed to cross. If we’d attempted this four months ago, it would have been doomed to fail. But a lot had changed in a few months, and while we strained to force open the gate, we used everything we had in our attempt. 

Together we poured the new, denser mana that each of us could draw on with our ascensions to fourth gate, into the effort, using that power to wedge open an impossible gap. We drew on the portal ant’s Stone Gate spell, and the trees I had planted, letting their power help define the weave of space. We called upon more familiar benefits. Things like the fairy circle mushrooms, the enhancements that Dawn’s magic could provide to us, and the power of the plants and people of the realm.

Our spirits wrung themselves dry, and we called more, only to be drained again and again. Then, finally, as one, a spark of gold manifested in the air. It thrummed, hummed, and then burst to life. I fell to one knee, sucking in a deep breath, my tail swishing in irritation as I tried to get my spirit stable and under control once again. 

“Are you okay?” my dad asked, and I looked up, smiling and pulling him into a hug. 

“Dad! It’s good… to see you! Just… tired.” 

A moment later, more forms emerged from the portal: Liz’s grandparents, her parents, Ed, Azalea, and Ivy’s dad, a raven that I assumed was Kene’s grandmother trying to be subtle, and then someone that I didn’t expect. A woman just over seventy with gray-white hair and a deep tan from a lifetime in the sun. She was a telluric mage, like Ed, and was in upper fourth gate. I hadn’t seen her in person since I was a good bit younger, though I still received and sent letters and cards to her. 

“Grandma?” I asked, pulling her into a light hug. “I didn’t expect to see you. Did you get the recording crystal I sent?”

She hugged me back, smiling and ruffling my hair. 

“I know I might work a lot, especially for a woman my age, but my own grandson got himself into the Elysian Mastery Tournament. How could I miss it?” she asked, then tilted her head. “Where’d you send it? If it was to Elohi, then it probably missed me while I was on the ship to Mossford.” 

“Hah. Well, I guess you’ll have something waiting for you when you get back.” 

“I suppose I will.”

There was a moment of awkward silence then, as neither of us knew what exactly to say. I liked my grandmother, and I appreciated the effort she put in to keep in contact with us, even from Elohi. But I didn’t know her, not deeply. Then, as if to break the tension, the bird morphed into the shape of Kene’s grandmother. The old witch squinted, looking first at her own hands, then at my grandmother, then at Meadow. 

“Why do you attract so many old ladies? Do you have pheromones for it? Do you smell like food? Fox meat isn’t tasty. Too stringy.”