It took Kene half an hour to finish the repairs on my wrist and hand, but when he finished, I downed a healer’s heart imbued potion, and was really feeling much better.

More importantly, I was feeling confident in my choice to flee. I wanted to go back, but I wanted to do so better prepared than I was now. Maybe with an ally, too. Octavian seemed to be something of a dragon whisperer, maybe he’d be willing to help? Liz and Travis would be a good choice too, as would Kamal or Aput…

All things to think about.

“I’ve been thinking,” Kene said as we soared through the air. “I’m almost done with my second gate. In fact, my life gate is ready, I just need to polish my solar mana a little bit more. My healing spells are up to par, but my newer ones aren’t.”

“Ascend,” I said, and Kene gave me a curious look.

“Just like that?” they asked. “No reservations?”

“You’re not holding me back,” I said. “Okay, sure, my spatial and temporal gates aren’t ready to ascend, but my life and death are. I’m holding off to make sure I can enter the Beastgate Trial Trail. If anything, I’m holding you back.”

Kene relaxed a little at that, and nodded.

“Alright. I’m not going to right now, because I don’t want to risk missing out on an ascension-based treasure at the auction, but as soon as we’re done, I’ll ascend.”

“Sounds good,” I said. “Have you thought about your spellbinder bonds?”

“I have,” Kene said. “I’m actually somewhat torn. My grandmother designed my tattoos to be bondable by me, despite them exerting more power than I’d normally be able to bond with. And Siobhan is a good choice too. But I’m also thinking about trying to find a petalroot salamander. And what if I get something really good in the tower, since I assume we’ll go in at some point? And…”

They shrugged.

“Yeah. Decisions, decisions.”

I thought about that as I flared and spread my mana senses out around us, quite enjoying the new range the monocle granted me.

“Well,” I finally said. “Let’s say that we did manage to hunt down a sepulcher and change your legacy to… I don’t know. Salmonlord Sorcerer.”

“I don’t think Salmonlord is a real legacy,” Kene teased.

“Hush you, I’m being sincere,” I said. “If we do change it, would bonding with your tattoos provide any benefit?”

“Yes,” Kene said. “They’re a soul barrier, which isn’t an easy thing for mages to work on, especially not this early. It also helps me resist mental attacks, and even foreign mana trying to get into my spirit.”

“And spellbinding them causes them to naturally grow with you,” I said.

“Yes,” Kene hedged.

“Then that’s one,” I said. “Now for the other… Siobhan has chosen you as her protectee, which means she’s already formed a sort of bond to you. And she’s shown that she’s able to enhance your tattoos. It has the most synergy, in my opinion.”

“True,” Kene conceded. “I guess I just… I kind of always figured my bonds would be alchemy related.

Dusk made a river-rushing sound, telling them to not worry. Life changed plans. If he wasn’t sure, though, he shouldn’t bond anything yet. After all, it wasn’t as if someone needed to bond right away, the instant they reached third gate. Even if they took a year to figure it out, they could still work on mastering and ingraining spells, and the increased mana density in their other gates would make them a better healer.

“When did you get so wise,” I teased Dusk, and she playfully slapped my shoulder. I smiled, then focused back on Kene.

“But she’s right, you know.”

“I know,” they said, then glanced down at their arm, which was now flickering with green. “Oh! Got something!”

We floated down to land, and I spread my mana senses out wide. Sure enough, I could sense… Water.

That was the overwhelming impression that I got, alongside some strains of other things.

We wandered through the trees and into the clearing of a small pond, covered in lotus flowers, and I smiled at the pretty sight as I skimmed my senses along the pond.

Most of the lotuses seemed normal, but I could sense a few things that weren’t. In the center of the pond, most obvious, was a brightly glowing lotus flower that shed yellowish light over the entire clearing, lighting it up like a beacon.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Around the edges of the pond, however, I could sense other lotus flowers, each of which seemed to be made of strong mental, desolation, and telluric magic, with twinges of lunar magic.

Then there was something off about the whole pond, and I thought there just might be something down at the bottom, I just couldn’t tell. Maybe it was more lunar water that was blending in with the environment?

“Sun lotus,” Kene said, pointing to the large lotus flower in the center. “That will let us make more alchemy bombs, and give you a fire based attack, since it can store up light and let it out in bursts of heat. The others feel like mercurial lotuses, which can be used to brew a strong poison that slowly eats away at the mind.”

They paused for a second, wracking their mind for anything of note.

“Oh! They also can be used to make a minerally enhanced water, which… It wouldn’t be a good idea to drink, but spread throughout an area, can actually help enrich the soil.”

Dusk peeped that she’d take them. The worms she’d taken in were slowly helping, and the bees would too, but both were small compared to the amount of territory she needed to enrich.

As we wandered closer to the pond to collect the lotuses, however, something felt even stranger. I didn’t get a flicker from the winds of fortune, though. Then again, I hadn’t against the serpent either.

Did that mean it was safe? Probably not, but I kept my mana senses tuned as we slowly waded into the water.

Then the water began to surge together, and the mundane lotuses… weren’t.

They blazed with mana as their roots all twisted together, forming themselves into a roughly shaped, albeit slightly orblike body, with two arms and two feet, and a head. A strange, gray ooze had emerged from the water, and seemed to make up the belly and head of the beast, melting out of the sun lotus.

It unveiled itself, a third gate monster of some sort, and I breathed a sigh of relief to sense that it felt… average.

I’d seen too many exceptional third gates, between the dragonblood serpent, the assassin, the drakes, and Ivy… I was relieved to sense someone who felt normal within the third gate range.

Kene thrust his hand out and runes flew to me and Dusk. She punched out with her shockwave spell, runes running along it, and it sank deep into the monster’s chest, burning and cutting away segments. I teleported into the air behind the monster and drew out my staff, unleashing a scattering shot of three bone shards. I could have easily managed more, but the real damage was coming from the flaming runes, not the bones, so I wasn’t sure how much it would help.

The giant flower monster roared and turned to thrust a hand out at me, only for Dusk, who was still on the ground, to let out a blasting shockwave spell and summon a giant pair of arms.

Before her ascension, it had taken her several long seconds to compact the mana enough for her giant arms, but now it seemed to only take a bit more effort… I definitely needed to thank the librarian for getting her spells that scaled so well.

The giant arms grabbed the giant flower monster’s legs and held them down letting me easily teleport out of the way of its swinging fist before releasing several shots of Pinpoint Boneshard, scattering and ripping it through its root network.

The monster spun and threw a fist down at Kene, but a blue shield flashed over them before the fist could strike, and a pair of bright blue jaws bit into the monster for daring to try. Kene held their hands out and overcharged their fire rune spell, sending the power to Dusk, who wrapped it around her giant hands.

That, apparently, was quite enough for the giant.

The flower making up its head dissolved, and the entire root network collapsed. An ooze slipped out of the body, and began to slide across the ground, fleeing us.

Dusk let her flaming hands vanish, and Kene sighed, shaking their head.

“What?” I asked as I teleported back down next to them, but I thought I knew the answer. When the sun lotus had melted into the oozelike body, it had also vanished from my mana senses.

“I’d hoped to get you a fire lotus, that’s all,” Kene said, and I hugged them.

“Babe, you still got us three flowers that can help Dusk and I expand.”

Dusk waved her hand and whistled that it was nothing, but she did want to know what that thing had been.

“True,” they said. “I’m guessing the mimic was using them as a lure, alongside their natural lure abilities. Then when something came in to try and eat or take the lotuses, the mimic ambushed it.”

“Makes sense to me,” I agreed, taking the three mercurial lotuses. “But is that really what a mimic looks like? I always imagined them as treasure chests.”

“I mean, they’ll inhabit a treasure chest to lure people in,” Kene said. “But yes, they’re weird, goopy slime things.”

“Weird,” I said, shaking my head.

Dusk sighed as she considered where to put the lotuses for a long moment, since she hadn’t made many pools or lakes, apart from the one where the waterfall landed and spread out, and that was where the Naiads were. She didn’t want to hurt them.

I snapped my fingers.

“No, near the Naiads… It’s perfect!”

She gave me a curious look, and I explained.

“Remember? They wanted more salts and metals in the water, since it was actually a bit too pure. If we spread these out across the lake, they should do a good job mineralizing the water.”

Dusk happily agreed with the sound of a raven’s caw, and we planted them around the central lake.

Before we left, I spread my mana senses over the lake one last time, and I thought I felt something again. I glanced at Kene.

“Hey, do you sense something at the bottom of the lake?”

“Sorta?” they said.

“I’m gonna go get it,” I said, cupping my hands together and creating a spatial anchor in the air. As I did, I felt spatial anchor ingrain, and sighed at myself. In the months up to the Idyll-Flume, I’d spent so much time injured that I had really slacked on advancement.

“Here,” Kene said, casting the blessing spell. “That should help you move a bit easier in the water. I mean, it’s no swimming spell, but it’s the best we’ve got.”

I kissed them on the cheek, then waded in, before diving to the bottom.

Without my vampiric senses spell ingrained, I wouldn’t have been able to see through the murk and gloom of the water. Even now, with just the ingrained effect, it was hard, so I fed a trickle of mana into it and let the world lighten.

I swam around to the bottom, following my mana senses, until…

There!

I grabbed a small, black, crystalline orb. It seemed to have a highly complex mana composite, but as I took hold of it, I realized what exactly had tipped me off. While it was, at least to a degree, blending into the environment, there were strong aspects of mental and knowledge mana in it that didn’t fit in.

As I scooped it up, something in the mud stirred, and an earth elemental in the shape of a crab snipped at me with a staggering amount of power, enough that it had to come from a spell. I grabbed the orb, slipping it into Dusk’s vault, and teleported to my anchor.