61 – Semiluminal

Ishrin woke up to the sound of yelling. Curses and threats were flung in the air, and among the many voices he could make out the shrill voice of Melina and the deep, calm and threatening tone of Lisette.

Getting up, he saw that there were a dozen or so people surrounding the caravan, training weapons and magic on his teammates. A quick look told him that they were all Tier 3 and a couple of 4s. However, since they were human opponents and not monsters, both Melina and Lisette were being more careful than usual in dealing with them, as one could never know what sorts of tricks a person could pull to even out the playing field. In the future, when their ranks were higher, the probability of someone of a lower tier being a threat to them would be even higher, as everyone collected strange powers and hidden tricks in their long road to ascension.

These attackers, however, were clearly bandits, and it was unlikely that they would possess many trinkets capable of putting his team in danger. He commended them for being careful, but he wasn’t really feeling in a talkative mood.

It took barely the time for Melina to register his appearance out of his tent in her peripheral vision that he had already acted. Ishrin did not even bother to take out his Tier 6 Pebble Sword, instead opting to swipe his hand in an arc over his head. Along the path of the arc, several magics manifested as instances of Mana Bolt supercharged from their normal second Tier power to well beyond a fifth Tier magic. Had he been Tier 4 himself, Ishrin would have added Magnify to the spell cocktail for an even grander showing of power, but he was not still there yet.

It didn’t matter. Many eyes went wide as the first wave of bandits was obliterated in the span of a heartbeat. Five fell to the mana bolts, their hearts pierced with uncanny precision, and two more had their cores ripped from their bodies with sheer mana manipulation alone. Then they vanished into a void full of stars, Ishrin’s inventory, and all traces of their attacks vanished with them.

The merchants, however, didn’t have the chance to gape. Ishrin disappeared from their sight, already tracking several more bandits converging on their position from the forest. These ones, he noticed, were stronger and better equipped, some of them even with items he thought he would only see at a Guild—certainly not worn by delinquents who lived in the woods and assaulted merchant caravans for a living. There was a thought to be had there, about who might have sent these men, but the thought could wait until later. The news was not that shocking, anyway.

Taking precautions so that he wouldn’t be seen, Ishrin slipped behind the approaching men and waited. He scouted their numbers, their equipment and noticed that there were three more of them waiting out of sight, ready to sneak up on the caravan from behind. A movement spell brought him right beside the three ambushers, and though their power was greater than the first wave of assailer, they nonetheless met their demise in the span of seconds. Only the last of the three had Ishrin draw his sword, after which the man was quickly overpowered by a shower of Magic Pebble spells shot in rapid succession.

It felt nice, Ishrin thought absent mindedly as he erased all traces of the fight, to handle the sword after the tier-up. He could almost move it as if it was a normal sword, if a bit heavy. It was time to upgrade it again, it seemed, but this time he was going to need materials to bring a higher power to bear within the sword, and not even Lucius’ stash had the rare ingredients needed for the ritual.

Elsewhere, the remainder of the—relatively—elite bandit forces was staring down the two women in Ishrin’s team. Their leader seemed quite confident in his Tier 5 power, apparently not intimidated by the presence of two girls one whole Tier ahead of him. Before Ishrin could even wonder why that was, he started talking. A smile appeared on Ishrin’s face as he watched the scene unfold.

“Enough!” Their leader yelled. “Now give us all—”

A perfectly round, smoking hole appeared in the man’s chest as a spear if wind, faintly glowing green, pierced his flesh. Mere moments later, a blur of black steel and murderous red eyes and his head was severed from his body. Bare a blink later Melina and Lisette were both back at the caravan, looking around in search for more threat. None came.

The clean-up took mere moments, and they were on the road again.

“The bandits, they were sent by someone.” Ishrin said as they walked along the carriages. The merchants had not spoken to the team, only Taiival offering his most sincere thanks to Ishrin and the girls by literally kneeling on the ground in front of them. The others, it seemed, were rather intimidated by the aura of power that the team now held to their eyes.

“I agree,” Melina said, “they were not regular bandits, but killers disguised as thieves. Do you think Syrma might be behind this?”

Ishrin shrugged. At this point, it was unclear what the new Master of Noctis even wanted from him. Bound by rules as he was, and with a Dynasty approaching—whatever the spaceship actually meant—Ishrin knew better than try to give meaning to his actions. He might very well want to kill them, but it was just as likely that he was trying to soften them up so that they could be captured and questioned. Perhaps even tortured, should he hold a grudge against Melina for deceiving him. Ishrin certainly did have information the new Master might want, but he thought unlikely the Guild in general would allow for his capture. He had a hunch that the Guild had at least a Tier 15 master if not someone even more powerful, and that they were aware of multiversal travel. Two things that would make his presence much less valuable to them, but that would not diminish his danger as a threat to them.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

“Too bad they miscalculated our power,” Lisette said, sounding disappointed. She did not fail to explain why: “I could not even spar with their leader for a bit. He died to the opening salve.”

***

Semiluminal.

The city at the edge, as the locals called it. According to Taiival, once upon a time, nobody knows for sure when, besides that it was a long time ago and now faded from memory, a great tremor shook the earth. The ground opened as it shook, ripping itself apart and collapsing into what now is a great chasm leading into a deep, black void that spans entire kilometers, and that is several hundred meters wide.

The void conceals everything in its depths, and no bottom has ever been found to the chasm. All that is known was that there are treasures there to be found, and thus above it a city has grown; full of miners and treasure hunters willing to brave the dangers of the depths. The city is strange in its shape, quaint, and anyone who looks at it from afar for the first time always has the same thought: half of the city must be missing, swallowed into the chasm when the earth shattered and never to be seen again. They are, of course, all wrong, for it is known that Semiluminal was built after the cataclysm thanks to the riches it revealed, and the city had never seen damage or war or devastation thanks to its towering defensive walls.

The walls draw a semicircle, ending right where the steep slopes of the rift begin. There are houses built on the edge, where the city ends and the deep fall begins, and they are the houses of the rich and the powerful presences that dwell in this outpost town, rich beyond measure: the houses of the nobility. From there the wealthy denizens look into the distance and to the city below, for that part of the town has been artificially raised so that it sits above everything else.

The caravan arrived in the late afternoon, crossing the mighty gates without delay. Taiival was quick to get to business, unloading the many barrels of products imported from the now destroyed Obscuria into the back of the store he rented for the week, and even offered to pay Ishrin and his team if they helped him out. Handsomely so, with a hint of deference born of their encounter with the bandits.

Ishrin was about to accept but then he remembered what sorts of goods the merchant was transporting and felt uneasy in the stomach at the idea of handling that stuff. He did not need the money either, not after having robbed the late Lucius of all his worth. Instead of helping, Ishrin only sort of lazed around, making use of the occasion to prod Taiival about the bracers they needed to find for Lisette.

“Say, we are looking for something called the Bracers of Tiamat Azur. Ever heard of them?” Ishrin said.

“Mm,” the merchant mumbled, stroking the stubble on his chin. It was going to be gone by tomorrow when he opened shop, but during the trip across the countryside Taiival didn’t need to shave as often. “I can’t say I have, no.”

Melina would have been better suited for this task, but they had decided to let him talk to the merchant so that he could deliver a special payment as thanks for his services in transporting pixie dust. Ishrin had not forgotten about it, and surprisingly the members of his party had seemed even more enraged than he was when they learned the ins and outs of how pixie dust extraction happened. As such, they had decided to test the merchant with a special gift, to see if he was worthy of continuing to do business with them.

“Is there any chance you might know someone, who maybe knows someone, who knows someone? At the end of the chain the last person must know about the bracers, of course. I can pay you… handsomely.”

The merchant’s eyes lit. “But of course. I could call in some favors, perhaps. What is this payment you have thought of?”

“Well,” Ishrin began, trying to put on his salesman hat. “Not petty gold, of course. I have something more exotic for you here.”

A small ornate box appeared in his right hand, behind his back, and when he brought it in front of him and opened his fingers it was like the trick of a magician. Of course it was no such trick, just a covert use of his inventory. And the box, he thought with a mental snicker, was from the secret stash he found in Lucius’ mansion, so he was basically paying the merchant with his boss’ stuff.

Taiival eyed the box, and his eyes seemed to lick all over it, to open it and disassemble it without touching it.

“What’s inside of it?” he asked, unable to contain his greed.

“You know how they harvest pixie dust, don’t you?” Ishrin asked instead of answering.

“Sadly, yes. It’s a brutal practice.” The merchant said, failing to hide a twitch to his eye. Ishrin’s senses did not miss that he was sweating, although he was concealing it well, wiping his brow with a casual gesture as if he was adjusting his hair.

Ishrin shrugged, bringing their attention back to the box. “It’s a product, let’s call it. A nootropic. If used together with pixie dust, it can quite literally open your mind. To new experiences and enlightenment.”

The merchant’s eyes narrowed. “Enlightenment.”

“Let me be straight, then.” Ishrin said quickly, not wanting to do this the hard way. “It makes you gain a whole Tier of power.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

Taiival thought about it for a second. Or at least pretended to. Ishrin looked at him expectantly. Their eyes met, but the merchant was the better of the two at this game, and his face betrayed nothing. Then he offered his hand, and Ishrin took it.

“Well, well. That’s quite enough for me to cash in my favors! It’s been a pleasure!”

His hand went for the box, but Ishrin quickly pulled it away and made it disappear in his inventory. Taiival didn’t see the inventory and reacted like a dog who had been denied a treat, still salivating.

“After you give us the contact.” Ishrin said.

Taiival smirked. “But of course. You are a natural at this, aren’t you?”

He was not, and they both knew this. But complimenting someone had always been a merchant’s base tactic when negotiating, no matter their position in the power dynamic. No matter. The reward was simply too enticing to haggle any further, and Taiival accepted. Now it was all a matter of waiting for the contact, and then seeing what the merchant was really made of. What kind of person he was.

He knew how the pixie dust was harvested. He was clearly willing to sell it for profit, which irritated Ishrin but was not enough to really do much about it. But was he willing to use it for himself? Earlier, back when they were still traveling, drawing the line had been the subject of a small debate between the three members of Ishrin’s party. Eventually they decided that, should the merchant use the dust for himself, then he would be judged unfit for living by the trio acting as judge, jury and executioner.