I finished eating some rather sluggish-looking stew-

I think it was stew, at least.

-and prepared myself for the debriefing with the leaders of the camp, most of them the same fellows I’d braved the vicious seas with.

Gathered were Dirk, Ilya, Rorak, Alice, Danai, and Garus.

I forgot Garus was even part of the leadership chain.

There were a few others who I didn’t immediately recognize, so I chose to ignore them.

“Well, thank you, everyone, for gathering.” Dirk clapped his hands together as if commencing the start of the meeting. “We’ve been here for a few days now, and many of you were likely beginning to grow antsy, even if you all did a good job keeping it from the rest of the camp.”

I saw several heads nod as if acknowledging the fact had lifted a weight from their shoulders.

“Our goal here is simple: We shall repel potential attacks from the city while our expert here—” Dirk nodded toward me. “-does what is oft called impossible and pierces the grand walls of Theronhold.”

Yep, there's no pressure.

“Rook here will now take it from here and explain his plan for piercing the walls.”

“Right, thank you, Dirk.” I nodded toward Dirk. “So, the plan isn’t all that complicated. I will perform a ritual art of sorts. Using that, I can cleave through the walls. From there, I can’t speak for the diplomacy involved.”

“A show of force of that scale, of such unprecedented scale and event, will break their willingness to fight,” Dirk said confidently. “But I believe we could use more than just a ‘ritual’ for explanation.”

“Right, well, the actual explanation is perhaps a bit of a complicated subject.” I thought back to brainstorming with Wisdom, a subject that was likely beyond the understanding of the people gathered. “But in essence, I will require the aid of several of our more talented mages to attune energy that I will then channel into a singular cutting-based spell. Such a ritual, while something I understand, I cannot perform myself; it simply involves moving too much mana than I can handle by myself.”

Which still wasn’t even close to the whole truth. However, that would involve revealing more about myself than I was willing to.

“How many aids do you need?” It was Danai who spoke up, her brow furrowed.

“Six mages should be enough,” I said without total confidence.

“Six.” Danai frowned. “And you said they had to be talented. How much?”

“Well….” It was my turn to frown. “Around the caliber of a gold-ranked mage.”

I heard the instant muttering as that tidbit of info was dropped. It was not exactly an easy pill to swallow. While I’d myself transcended the realm of a gold-level mage and was working on even overcoming the likes of a nizeium class mage, for the ‘average’ level of strength, gold caliber mages were exceptionally rare. I'd be impressed if we had even fifteen mages of such caliber within the camp.

“Then we’ve got issues.” Dirk sighed. “Amongst the camp, we’ve got approximately ten people of such caliber, and six of them are here.”

I glanced between my traveling companions, putting the dots together.

“The reality is, we can’t argue about taking another approach." Dirk quickly said, stopping any dissension before it could ever begin. "Fundamentally, we have only two objectives, maybe three if you want to be generous. First, we must breach the walls, not just in the typical fashion of smashing through the front gate. It must leave an ancestral scar in their very psyche if we are to convince the North to step out from this war. Second, Rook, you must survive the battle. You’ve got a reputation that anyone of any note will have heard and connected with past deeds by now. If their walls are breached, they may still be able to galvanize themselves, but if they are breached by none other than you, and you are still standing strong in the end, I’d give it a hundred to one odds that they surrender on the spot. It helps that by bringing troops back as prisoners, we have proven ourselves merciful.”

“Is there no way we can simply involve a larger number of lower-grade mages to assist you? Utilizing so many commanding officers will surely have a devastating effect on our abilities to withstand assaults.” The question came from one of the few in the room I didn’t recognize instantly, a woman who had been with the original assault force on the traversal north.

“No.” I shook my head. “Quantity can’t make up for quality in this regard. Raw amounts of mana mean nothing; it needs to be colored with a concept in a way that a lower-class mage can’t copy.”

The discussion went silent for a moment before Rorak raised his hand.

“I don’t have the greatest finesse with mana control, and my abilities are more suited for the battlefield. If we can only spare a few of our higher-grade mages to hold while this ritual is enacted, I suppose I can be one of those.”

Garus nodded his head as well, never opening his mouth, yet the message was clear.

“Alright, Garus, Rorak, and Martha, you will hold the line while this ritual is enacted,” Dirk announced before turning to me. “Then. Two questions. First, how long will it take to perform? And two, are there any preparations required?”

“That’s the dilemma,” I answered honestly. “How long it takes will depend largely on me. While six of you will be assisting me, it will still be an uphill struggle in which I will shoulder most of the effort. I mentioned this, but the ritual will tap into a concept, a force to empower some of my magic with that concept. If, in the process of performing the ritual, I can internalize and comprehend the structure of the concept being channeled, I believe three days straight will be enough time.”

“Straight?” Alice asked.

“Yes, once we begin, we cannot stop. Truthfully, nothing bad should happen if we were interrupted or failed, but we’d have to start over from the beginning. And I doubt we’ve got time to keep retrying.”

“And if you can’t internalize this concept?” Dirk questioned.

“Five days, give or take. I can still channel the concept into my magic even without comprehending it, but I won’t be able to ‘shortcut’ my way through.”

“So, three to five days of straight mana attunement.” The woman from earlier, Martha, shook her head. “I suppose I can understand why you require only our best. Mana attunement isn’t something even veteran mages can do easily, much less for days straight.”

I nodded to her, glad she was keeping up. Mana attunement was something of a ‘cheat’ for getting around mana affinities. Typically, every person had an affinity, or several, to utilize magic, but that didn’t change that inside their core; it was still purified mana. By concentrating, one could force their core to expel pure mana rather than mana colored by their affinity. It was the same process as how skilled mages created data or mana crystals, and while the effort of making the crystals was significantly greater, it didn’t change the overlap in the process. A mana crystal was simply pure mana that had been compressed and crystalized; few mages went through the effort of making those, and their primary source was from magical beasts or natural wonders. A data crystal was a mana crystal but instilled with knowledge. Should another person take the time to integrate and absorb a data crystal, they could gain the knowledge contained with perfect clarity.

Mana attunement was effectively the process a mana crystal was put through to create a data crystal. Pure mana, enforced with a visualized image or thought, could effectively be encoded to contain something more than just mana. In some cases, a mage could even utilize magic outside their affinity. However, it was often a prolonged and inefficient process compared to their natural affinities, a dead skill for a fight but useful for scholarly pursuits, or even something as simple as lighting a candle without a match.

“So, six mages capable of mana attunement over several days. What exactly will the attunement be?”

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“That brings me to the second part of your earlier question, Dirk, regarding preparations. I will need swords, lots of them.”

“And what do you need of them?”

“They should be stabbed into the ground throughout the area where we will be performing the ritual. The more, the better. A field of swords, unlimited blades to work with.”

“I don’t think we can do ‘unlimited.’” Dirk raised his eyebrows at me. “But I can see what we can do about that. Anything else?”

“No, the rest will be on me.”

As if the universe had been waiting for me to finish, suddenly, a young woman burst into the tent.

“Commander- er, commanders!” She snapped a salute, a frantic energy spilling away from her.

“Norah.” Dirk tilted his head toward the woman. How he seemingly knew everyone’s name was beyond me. “I presume something has occurred?”

“Yes, sir. Movement from the Gate. Enemy forces are amassing.”

“As I expected.” Dirk didn’t seem surprised, the days of uneasy peace finally ending. “Alright, you are dismissed. Oh, send for Emile, and gather as many stray swords as we have and bring them to the back of the camp atop the hilltop and have them stabbed into the earth.”

I was thankful I hadn’t needed to explain to Dirk why the hilltop would be the best location for the ritual. It wasn’t a large hill, but just positioning a ritual in a place of ‘significance,’ even if that significance was as simple as a hilltop, was almost always required for such acts of magic as just a standard baseline.

The woman saluted once more before dashing off. With her out of the picture, Dirk turned to the rest of us. “Well then, we will officially begin Operation Dread Wall. Rook, you are to head straight to where you will perform your ritual and prepare what needs to be prepared while the swords are gathered. The rest of us will be there in ten minutes, and our fellow attendees will join us once I have sent them a message. As for you three-” Dirk turned toward Rorak, Martha, and Garus. “Your role is perhaps the most important, aside from Rook’s. While the ritual is being performed, command of the flow of battle will fall upon your shoulders, and you will take the role of our lead defenders. We have enough mages in our ranks to repel superior forces for some time, but you know as well as I what will happen once their first probing assault is repelled.”

I could feel an energy like a dark, heavy blanket descend on us as Dirk let the thought hang, the message clear.

“Three days.” Rorak finally snapped a salute. “We can buy three days.”

He gave me a knowing smile and nod. The fact that he hadn’t even considered the thought of anything longer spoke of a faith in me I hadn’t expected; I’d barely known the man for much longer than a few weeks. A swell of warmth filled my insides, and reaching out, I extended my fist. Perhaps it wasn’t the most ‘official’ behavior, but I was only a contract soldier.

Rorak, seeing my intent, rapped my knuckles with his own before marching from the command tent.

“We wish you luck, for all of our sakes.” Martha gave me a nod before she, too, followed.

Garus was the last to leave, grunting once before he thumped my shoulder and was gone just like that.

“Alright, folks, let’s move!”

-------------------------------------------------------

I stood atop the hilltop, staring with trepidation at the opposing force. Several thousand men and women had gathered, their ‘probing’ force already a match in quantity alone for our troops. I forced myself from gulping, instead turning to look at my handiwork. I’d drawn a circle with a six-pointed star inscribed inside, the points barely reaching past the circle's bounds. At each point, I’d stabbed the six most excellent swords I’d found into the earth. The remaining swords had been speared haphazardly throughout the hilltop. At the very center of the circle were two triangles inversely interwoven, and I stood directly above them.

My preparations were complete; it wasn’t a minute too soon as I saw Dirk, Ilya, Alice, Danai, and two others I didn’t recognize quickly jogging up the hill.

“Everything ready?” Dirk questioned the minute he was in earshot.

“Your helpers saw to it,” I answered.

“Good. Now then, what would you have of us?”

“Each of you is to stand at a point of the star, rest your hands upon the pommel of your sword, and continuously draw in mana as if cultivating. From there, you will refine and attune the mana toward your ideal of the concept of a sword, whatever that may be.”

Ilya whistled, shaking her head. “Days of cultivation and attunement simultaneously is a hell of an ask. I’m not sure I’ve ever cultivated for more than a day straight in all my years.”

“Well, time to break those limits.” I chuckled darkly. “That goes for all of us. This isn’t exactly easy magic; I understand that. But we must succeed. A win here will prevent this war from stretching years. You’ve seen the faces of our soldiers; how many of them look barely older than kids? Half? Sixty percent? Seventy? We succeed here, and we prevent untold numbers of casualties that would be cold-faced children.”

It was a speech born from my heart; images of dead children in a burning building seared into my mind, memories I would never forget for the rest of my life. I had joined this war to avenge those innocents, and I would be damned if I let more children burn all because some powerful assholes didn’t want to get along with one another.

The others clearly felt what I was saying, their faces taking on hard, determined expressions. Before I could have us begin, I looked out at the soon-to-be battlefield. It was just as well that I did, as I saw a figure ride out on a horse in front of our soldiers, riding down the line as he gave some speech. I couldn’t hear it from here, but that didn’t mean I didn’t recognize who it was.

Rorak, and by the growing thunder of voices and stamping of feet, whatever he was saying was working, the man and women who fought for our cause stirring with an intensity that felt like an energy of its own.

I shuddered, still watching. Perhaps it was my sensitivity toward mana, but I could feel the vitality of his words, the power it stirred in all those troops, painting the world's mana in real time. It was like everything I saw was suddenly colored the hues of royal red, a lion’s courage. It grew increasingly more intense, and I couldn’t help but be suddenly compelled to stop what I was doing, draw a sword, and charge out with them.

But I knew my role.

So, instead, I could only watch from a distance as the two sides began to advance toward one another with one final battle cry, first a slow jaunt until a full-fledged charge was being held. I held my breath for a single second, watching the battlelines crash one against the other.

Good luck.

“Time for our part of the show.” I finally said, still letting the taste of the courage-attuned mana flow through me. “On my command.”

Lifting my hand high to the heavens, I began to draw mana, pouring it toward my sage ring, the spell I looked to empower. At the same time, I tapped into a thought, a concept beyond even the way of the sword.

Time, time itself.

It had been the revelation I’d uncovered during my time within the realm of the dead sages. A concept I was inherently tied to, even if I had never dwelled on it myself. I was born of a soul traversing the bounds of life and death through the flow of time. Yet, my way had always been that of a sword, even if I had left it to the side for a few too many years. If what I needed to empower Rainsplitter was the concept of a sword, who better to draw it from than myself?

Just not myself of the present.

“It’s possible, theoretically. Time was never my specialty, though.” Wisdom said, shaking his head. “But, based on my understanding, it just might be possible. Ordinarily, I believe this to be the endeavor of a Great Sage; the only time such magic has been attempted in any semblance was by Above All. You, though, have been uniquely colored by the flow of time, and the concept you draw upon is a concept that is specifically meant for cutting through things. As such, with the right inspiration and assistance, you may be capable of drawing a concept from some future variant of yourself, whether that be a mere approximation of your potential or the literal future version of you. To cut through time itself is something perhaps only the concept of the sword may allow for.”

The memory flashed through my mind before I banished it with a single spare effort. The time to test the theory was now, and my hand still outstretched toward the heavens, I called out.

“Rainsplitter!”

In my offhand, a sword appeared, and without thinking about it, I stabbed it directly into the center of the interwoven triangles, left hand resting upon its pommel. At the same time, I felt mana beginning to course from the six points pouring into the blade. My right hand was still raised; I wasn’t done. Summoning the Rainsplitter of the present was nothing more than a lightning rod as I instead sought to invoke a Rainsplitter of greater potential than I could imagine, drawing it from some far-flung potential future.

Come to me!

For several seconds, nothing happened until, like a stray strike of lightning, a crack of energy ripped through the sky far above, the sound deafening. On initial inspection, nothing had outwardly changed, but as I thrust my mana sense far above, I could feel it.

A tiny, almost imperceptibly small rift had been barely torn open, and from it, I felt… It.

Rainsplitter.

It was strange; I could sense Rainsplitter just beyond that tiny rift, even as I held onto Rainsplitter within my left hand. The difference was that the Rainsplitter beyond that rift was far beyond what I could seem to wrap my mind around. It was and wasn’t Rainsplitter, like the Rainsplitter I knew was nothing more than a tiny aspect of that grander existence. So vast was the power of that ‘other’ Rainsplitter that it was like I could feel a weight pressing down upon me, the mere shadow of its manifestation heavier than the weight of power I’d felt from the likes of even some of my most powerful foes of the past.

And this is where things begin to become difficult.

According to what Wisdom and I had theorized, cracking space-time had been the easy part. The hard part was reaching through it and understanding some of what lay beyond. With my sense of the world still far overhead, I affixed everything toward the rift, pulling as I continuously drew on my sage ring inscribed with Rainsplitter’s spell form.

Like a stray thought entering my mind, I began to grasp at, well, something. Unlike a stray thought, whatever had floated through my mind felt immense and incomprehensible, a weighty concept conveyed in a language I had never heard before.

And it was my job to draw that same concept into my blade and decipher what meaning I could from it while I was at it.

Three days.

More and more of the weighty concept flowed into my mind, slowly siphoned from the rift, my six helpers the only reason the rift was stable in the first place. The more the concept flowed through my mind, the more the sword in my left hand seemed to ripple as if untethered to reality. At the same time, an aching pressure was building throughout my entire body, as if subjected to the weight of the world slowly crushing down upon me.

Well, they say diamonds are made under pressure.

Gritting my teeth, I settled into place, preparing for the long haul.

I hope I don’t shatter first.