Vayra sat down in the chair and looked straight out at Altrous, the sud god. He stood at the center of the hall with his eyes shut, and tendrils of pale yellow sunlight reached out across the room. Although it was dark outside, he had the bulbs of Moulded sunlight-Arcara, which emitted a substance for Altrous to manipulate with a broad Reach technique.
Each tendril of sunlight was a strand of his perception, and each one snaked toward a chair.
The current batch had ten God-heirs, including Vayra and Glade. She only recognized one of the others—a forge-Path God-heir with a broad frame and a glowing yellow hammer on his back. He had objected to her entering the tournament in the first place, and had nearly attacked her when they had arrived on the Shattered Moon.
When the tendril of sunlight wrapped up around her leg, coiling like a spring, she had to force herself to stay still. She didn’t know how the process worked, but she guessed she’d be making their life more difficult if she was quivering.
‘The Gods are your enemy…’ Phasoné pointed out. ‘You are making their lives difficult in so many ways, and not just here.’
Alright, but…that just feels petty, Vayra shot back mentally, so she could keep the rest of her body still. That kind of resistance is pointless, yeah?
‘Indeed,’ Phasoné commented. ‘I just thought it was…funny that you didn’t want to inconvenience them.’
At that, Vayra let out a soft snort, then stilled her legs and stared forward. Another coil of sunlight ran up her other leg, and above her head, a hologram of golden light was starting to form. At the moment, it only depicted her boots with a misty, dusty frame—just like the massive projection of Karmion that had towered over the opening ceremonies.
When she moved her toes, they created a bulge at the tip of her boot, and the hologram responded.
This isn’t going to cause problems for us later, is it? Vayra asked mentally. They won’t…I dunno, use this to track us?
‘It only works as long as you’re in sight of Altrous,’ said Phasoné. ‘And at that point, his spiritual senses and perception will be better than a light-model like this.’
All around the hall, projections of golden sunlight sprang to life above the heads of the gathered heirs—and Glade—starting from the feet and building upward. Vayra folded her fingers together in her lap, which was the pose they were supposed to take.
But after a few minutes, the coils of light had only made it up to her knees, and she began rocking side-to-side. It was taking a long time—a little too long—and she was overtired, not to mention anxious.
“Glade,” she whispered.
“Yes?” He spoke quietly too, despite the soft din of the room. Everyone else was whispering amongst themselves, or with their retainers and servants who had ventured along with them.
“Have you gotten close to your Commodore revelation yet?”
“I have not.”
They’d feel when they got close. It was a shiver down the spine, a little tremble in the soul, that signalled that they were getting close.
But while she’d been thinking about it, she wasn’t sure. Purpose of the soul? Of the self? Too abstract.
‘How do you see yourself?’ Phasoné asked.
“How? I—” She rolled her lips inward. “I dunno. I just am. I never had time to think about that kinda thing.”
Glade looked over at her skeptically.
“Sorry,” she whispered. “Talking to Phasoné.”
Glade, sitting perfectly still in his chair, without moving a muscle except for his lips, said, “Nathariel, are we close? When it comes to Arcara purification and spiritual strength, are we ready to advance?”
“Give it a few more days,” the Admiral said. “If you keep purifying elixirs at the same rate, you will advance in no time.”
They’d been doing everything they could to purify and accumulate Arcara, pushing themselves closer to advancement on the raw strength side. But without the revelation, they wouldn’t have the final trigger. Vayra wanted to be able to advance as soon as possible.
“You may have succeeded with your Captain advancement, but sitting around and meditating rarely provides you the necessary insight to advance,” said Nathariel. “I unveiled my Commodore insight by…well, I journeyed to a sacred site of reflection and light authority, and only then did I truly see myself for what I was.”
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“What was your Commodore insight?” Vayra asked. She tilted her head. “That goes for you, too, Phasoné.”
By now, the golden coils had crept up to her waist, and the hologram above her head matched the progress. She stilled herself, letting the coils climb higher, and instead stared at Altrous. The God was constantly turning in a circle as the light climbed higher.
“ ‘Fire cannot be controlled,’ ” Nathariel said plainly, without any intonation or even a hint of nostalgia.
“That’s…about yourself?” She tilted her head.
Nathariel chuckled. “It is. The revelation is often a firmly held belief which you must realize is false in some way. That lets you see the true nature of yourself, and of your soul below—if you know what’s wrong, then you can adjust the soul and look at it differently, aye?”
“How’d that work for…you?”
“I did not learn the arcane ways of fire from humans,” Nathariel said. “Yes, I had an instructor, but he taught me Arcara control and guided me through my advancements. I learned about fire from the dragons. They could control fire, rip the energy out of the empty air and conjure flame from nothing, but me? I couldn’t. I needed to accept that fire would never have perfect control. Only then did I…understand my soul better, what I believed, what I wanted, and why.”
Vayra almost nodded but stopped herself, again trying to keep as still as possible. But her feet were starting to go numb, and the light had only made it halfway up their abdomens.
“What was Phasoné’s?” he asked.
‘I am the daughter of a Goddess,’ Phasoné provided.
Got time for an explanation? Vayra thought. She had guesses, and she could sense some of Phasoné’s emotions and feelings, but not enough to get a full picture of why that would’ve triggered the advancement.
‘For so long, between Captain and Commodore, I had tried to rebel against my mother, to be different from her, but I had to accept that I still had parts of her within me. But moreover, understanding that rebellious nature helped me get a better understanding of myself.’
Vayra relayed the same information to Nathariel and Glade.
“When we have finished here, I highly recommend that both of you seek out a place of meaning, where you can properly view a reflection of yourself. We have a few days before your first fight, and now is a better time than any to travel.”
“Will that really help?” Glade asked.
“It will be better than sitting completely still, trying to wrack your brain for something. External influences will always be more powerful.”
Vayra could attest to the ‘sitting around’ part. Sitting around, doing nothing, did absolutely nothing for her mind.
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The next morning, Vayra set out through the forests of the Shattered Moon. It was early morning, and though she’d been expecting to sleep in, she hadn’t. Her body needed less sleep now that she was a Captain.
She hiked through the forests, ignoring the trail completely, and wound up the side of a hill. A few wild animals prowled through the forests—squirrels, marmots, and near the rivers, a few beavers with antlers—but nothing approached her. She hadn’t veiled her spirit, and even they could sense the power she radiated, now.
But in the grand scale of her task, Captain was nothing. And the way things were going, with how aggressive the resistance to her quest was getting, she wondered if she’d be getting off the Shattered Moon at all.
At least, not without destroying Karmion first.
At noon, the hills broke into low mountains, and she decided she’d had enough. She hadn’t been using any techniques to move quickly (she could do that to get home), but from here, she had the perfect view. There were still prominent rocky ridges behind her, which reminded her of Tavelle.
She’d always looked at the mountains fondly. Not as fondly as the Stream, sure, but fondly nonetheless. They loomed over the city, a more obtainable grandeur…and when she’d sailed away for the first time, they’d seemed only wrinkles in a sheet of paper.
She hadn’t understood the scale of anything. She hadn’t understood the scale of the conflict she’d walked into, nor the implications of it.
At that thought, a tremble ran down her spine, and goosebumps bubbled up on her real arm.
‘That’s it,’ Phasoné said. ‘You’re getting close.’
“Nathariel said it had to be a place where I could see a reflection of myself,” she responded. “Do I need to…like, find a pond or something?”
‘Do you think he meant it literally?’
“Well…he kinda implied he did, when he found his in some fancy mirror-reflection-thing place.”
‘It doesn’t have to be a physical reflection of yourself.’
Vayra stayed silent for a few minutes, then climbed up to a stone outcropping and peered through the trees of the forest. An autumn grove sloped down beneath her, but she could see over the treetops. Behind her were mountains, in front was the Stream, flowing up and away from the floating island at the center of the Shattered Moon.
Just like Tavelle.
“Does it have to be a…negative? Something I’m not, or can’t do?” she asked.
‘As far as I know, that’s what it usually is.’
Vayra sat down on the ridge and folded her hands in her lap, then watched and cycled Arcara.
If nothing else, she’d reach her next advancement soon. She’d make herself reach it.
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Glade and Nathariel walked to Shatterport and strolled through the port city’s streets, observing and watching the guards.
They were the closest he’d ever get to meeting more Order of Balance members, save for actually speaking to King Tallerion’s guards. But he needed a reflection, not a copy, and the guards were close enough. Mortals, or those with low spirit potential, who had a single task in life—beyond what they could have ever imagined.
He walked, observing and cycling, and tried to place himself in their minds.
They didn’t have much time, but he’d already advanced this far, and he could keep pushing himself—spiritual pain and consequences be damned.