Drayek’s stoic expression revealed no reactions to my long story. Though almost imperceptible, his eyes did widen in shock, but just twice: Once when I revealed to him that I was one of many clones made from the DNA of a dead god, and the other when I’d relayed certain information about Lady Euridice.
Many hours had passed, maybe three or four, before I finished describing everything I’d learned and seen. My eyelids were growing heavy again from lack of sleep, and dawn was quickly approaching. I began to wonder if I’d ever feel well-rested again.
“You made it,” he whispered. “To Tier 1. You are Marked.”
“Well, not exactly. As I said, everyone is capable of cultivating. Lady Euridice just does things a different way in The Erudition Collective.”
Drayek shook his head. “That’s hard for me to believe, Rayden. She is our all-knowing goddess and has a grand plan that will only benefit us.”
“But think about it, Drayek.” I pushed my elbows on the table and leaned forward. “I am not lying about anything I saw or learned. And when I advanced to Tier 1, I saw all of the essence within me and was able to allocate my strengths into different categories. You’ve never been able to do that. How do you know that the goddess isn’t stealing essence from you or from anyone else in this universe?”
Drayek fell back into his chair. “I guess I don’t.”
I felt terrible for making Drayek question his faith, but I needed to tell someone what had happened to me. And while I felt hesitant about confiding in Sarina, I trusted Drayek more than I did anyone.
“I want to see you in action,” Drayek said. “You do look like your muscles have toned, and I could swear you’re slightly taller.”
“Sarina said the same thing.”
“Did you tell her about this?” His words were clipped and nervous.
“Uh, no. I didn’t. I’ve only told you.”
“Good.” He nodded his approval. “I don’t think any of this information should be shared outside of this room–at least not for a long while. We don’t know how people would react.”
“So, do you believe me?” I allowed myself to hope.
“I don’t know why I shouldn’t,” he replied, scratching his chin. “But do I believe the… artificial intelligence… who told you these things, I can’t tell you.”
He eyed me. “This voice in your head… am I able to hear it?”
I tilted my head. “I’m not sure.”
“Hey, Codex!” I called in my mind.
“Yes, Master?”
“Am I the only one able to hear you, or are you able to… I don’t know, project yourself into someone else’s mind?”
“Calculating,” Codex said.
After a long pause, he finally said, “No, Master. I am embedded in your brain and cannot present myself in anyone else’s. Copies of me exist within the other clones, but we can only speak to those we are intended for.”
“Rayden?” Drayek interrupted. “You’ve been silent for a very long time.”
“Sorry.” I shook my head. “Codex says only I can hear him.”
Drayek pursed his lips. He did not seem to care for that answer. Maybe he’d hoped hearing Codex would help convince him of my tale.
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He changed the subject: “If you are indeed Tier 1, I’d like to take you on as my apprentice, if you’d like that.”
My heart leaped up into my throat. That is all I'd have wanted since I could remember. Not only would I be learning from the best warrior in all of Edrona, but I would also get to take his surname as his apprentice. It would feel like I finally belonged somewhere.
“Well, I’ve always liked the way Rayden Grim sounds.”
Drayek offered a half smile. “Good. Now, get some sleep. We’ll speak more on this tomorrow.”
My body shuddered happily as I returned to the cot and laid my head down. A certain relief washed over me knowing I had told Drayek everything about Lord Solomon, his cave, Lady Euridice, and my new abilities. I hadn’t realized how burdened I’d felt to not express my thoughts and feelings to someone. Lord Solomon and his domain had rattled my life, and I didn’t like the idea of traversing my new world alone.
***
Drayek thought it best that I show I was “alive and well” to the rest of the Edronans sooner rather than later. They already had enough questions about my disappearance, let alone the reasons behind my presence on the hunt.
To keep our stories straight, Drayek apprised me of what information he and the surviving Hunters in our group had told others about the events of the dire hunt. He explained the circumstances to me as we walked to town, preparing me for any onslaught of questions.
All that Drayek and the others had revealed to others was that we had been ambushed by more Nagari than we’d predicted, and a few lost their lives that day; Marcus, Carissa, and Maran. And Drayek had explained to the probing that I’d been lost somewhere in the fray.
“Did everyone believe you?” I said.
“I definitely have received more suspicious looks than I’d like, but no one has questioned me, especially since Krato and Korin corroborated the story. Besides, it is not uncommon for Hunters to fall on an expedition.”
I nodded. That was very true but sad all the same.
The path we tread on widened out into the square at the center of Edrona, where nicer homes than ours and other buildings of trade surrounded the area in oppressive, pinched rows. In the center of the square, the Traders’ Markets had already been set up, as they were every morning before getting stripped down an hour before nightfall, then set up all over again the next day.
The space was packed with booths and long tables, leaving only narrow pathways between each station to allow crowds to walk through and make their trades and purchases.
Tradesmen and Tradeswomen and Hunters alike shouted out prices and thrust monster guts and cores into people’s faces for trade. Record Keepers jotted down all the finds from excursions with their quills and recorded each sale and trade as they were made. All transactions and loot found on hunts, for instance, were required by Edronan law to be reported. Drayek had broken this law–this very strict law–by giving me that monster heart a little over a week ago instead of reporting it to the Markets.
As I surveyed the scene, I noticed thin threads of blue floating above ongoers’ heads, dancing in and out of buildings….
Essence, I thought. It’s my Skill! My awareness is heightened when it comes to seeing essence in my surroundings.
And there was a good deal of it. As Lord Solomon had explained to me, essence is what makes up everything in existence: people, plants, animals, rocks, history, emotion…. And in a packed place like this, essence brimmed the air. Throughout my life, I could remember seeing bits of it here and there (which, according to Drayek, was something unique to me), but I’d never seen it in vast quantities like this.
Thanking whatever god I should thank for my Skill, I absorbed every stream of essence as I passed and felt them warm my insides and store away for meditation and advancement at a later time. I could even draw in distant streams to me as long as they lingered within my view.
As far as I understood, other cultivators absorbed essence only as they thought about it and were lucky enough to cross the paths of essence streams. Because I could actually see these threads of blue, I could teach myself to consciously absorb what I saw at all times. This could make my advancement much faster than the Edronans could’ve ever imagined–not to mention the fact that I didn’t have Lady Euridice stealing 20% of what I gathered.
“Alright, Rayden. You take this sack and make your way through the Tradespeople on the right. I’ll take the left,” Drayek said as we made it directly in front of the booths.
He handed me a sack about half as long as me, and its weight also boasted probably half of my weight. But I noticed that I had no trouble slinging it over my shoulder and marching up to the assertive Tradespeople demanding scalped prices for their goods or offering way too little for purchasing someone else’s.
I waited my turn at the first booth, then tried a smile at the Tradesman. I’d met him before when attending the Markets in the past; Nicolas was his name. He tilted his head to look up at me from his short seat and scrunched up his nose.
“So, the rumors are true, eh?” he said. “You are alive then.”