The image of a solar flare cut out bright against the void was seared in Zane's mind. A world-shaking power.

That kind of power lay ahead for him. Tier 6.

He’d thought about it a lot since he first saw it. It happened in idle moments. When he dazed off he would see those immense columns of flame floating by. Sometimes he saw them in dreams. He would wake up breathing heavy, sweating, blood pumping hot… Reina, waking blearily next to him, found it endlessly amusing how worked up he got. It was always great power or great fights, she said, which he felt was a little unfair. He got plenty worked up about her too.

In any case. There was one step between him and that. Tier 5, full fusion. One Concept to go.

He brushed off and put away the chunky Titan Rhino Tome. Swapped it for an equally chunky Azure Flame one. It was made of vivid fiery-blue lettering on a coal-black background; from a distance it could be mistaken for a dying hearth.

Zane cracked it open and lost himself in the pages. Soon a vision floated to mind.

There was Patriarch Azure Flame, arms crossed, robes fluttering. This time the old man stood in emptiness. A gray purgatory stretching in every direction. He was the sole focus.

“The final Concept,” said the Patriarch gravely, “Is called Life Immolation.”

He opened one gnarled hand, and a ball of Stormfire danced over his palm.

It didn't look so different from Zane’s. But it felt like a whole new flame.

Its aura crashed over him like a heat wave. A heat gone to searing temperatures—not in flesh, but in soul. Even in this vision it scalded him just looking at it.

He wondered what it felt like to burn with it.

“Only those with Nascent Souls can know this flame,” said the Patriarch. “To achieve Life Immolation, you must infuse Stormfire with the essence of your very soul!”

The Patriarch closed his fist. The flame winked out. He stroked his beard, deep in thought.

“All the fire you've known,” he said, “Burns the flesh! But true Stormfire is the great leveler. It ought to destroy all it touches. It ought to burn in both places at once, physical and astral. Flesh and spirit, all at once!”

The Patriarch turned around, waved a hand, and a scene began to color in before Zane.

“There was once a Grand Elder of the Azure Flame faction named Ghostflame,” said the Patriarch. His jaw clenched. “An Elder who turned rogue and betrayed the Faction. He founded his own stronghold in a contested region, a place where Monsters and mankind warred for claim—a place outside the domain of the Nine Great Factions. A most dishonorable figure.”

The Patriarch spat that last bit.

“But there is much to be learned even from creatures such as him. He had a hell of a Stormfire. Stormfire is not a monolith, disciple! My Stormfire differs greatly from his… but in his variant of Stormfire, he became the ultimate master. He had a vast soul, and wielded it to make his flame more potent in that dimension than any I’ve known.”

The scene was crystallizing now—a midnight-black cloak with Stormfire purple symbols etched on. Draped over a skeleton lich tall as two men, with hollow eye sockets burning Stormfire purple. Standing atop a tower forged of cascading bones; dried blood made the mortar, stuck them together.

That tower was under siege.

All around it oozed a vast field of sludge. Strange shapes rising from the bog like dinosaurs made out of tar, groaning, reaching out with distending oily fingers… they were uglier cousins of the demons Zane had fought. And they were coming in their hundreds, maybe thousands, shambling up as forks of lurid lightning cracked across the sky…

Elder Ghostflame cackled. Raised a staff.

Stormfire washed out.

It was the same color as Zane’s. But the quality was like none Zane had seen. It was ghostly, flickering, somehow insubstantial—but its presence in the astral plane was anything but. It was like sunrise piercing the darkest of nights.

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It swamped the world. Washing out in a widening ring. All it struck shrieked and dissolved, hissing as they went; clouds of strange white substance rose sputtering to the dismal skies, wispy and ghostly…

“Souls dissolving,” commented Patriarch Azure Flame. “Steaming away. Returning to the primordial ooze from which they were made—returned forcibly to the Cycle of Reincarnation where they will once more be made anew… the shape they once held, forever perished. Not even ghosts are left of them. That, disciple, is the closest thing to true soul-death.”

The fires had hollowed out those bog monsters before they were even done falling—sloshing back into the tar they rose from, wailing miserably as they went. Their death throes rolled heavy across the desolation, an awful thunder.

“That fire burns in two places—and only those with great soul defenses, as well as physical ones, can hope to resist it!” said Azure Flame, eyes flashing. “And even then it would be a fight. Especially against Stormfire powered by those endowed with large souls…”

Zane quite liked the sound of this.

He was already eagerly trying to get this new Stormfire to stick in his mind.

“This will take you decades—perhaps centuries!” said the Azure Flame.

Zane brushed this aside, as usual. He was mostly trying to recall how the soul fueled the fire. The precise mechanics of it. Like water pouring into a flickering jar…

“The greater the soul,” continued the Patriarch, “The more difficult this Concept is to achieve! For it produces a greater flame.”

Zane frowned.

“What?” he said.

“Even a simple Full Fusion, done by a man of weak soul, would produce a Common Sky-grade flame! That is a very rare Elemental grade at Ascendant—comparable to the grades achieved by some Tier 6 Laws at Mid-Fusion! The larger the soul, the more potent the Stormfire, the higher the grade. Naturally, the difficulty increases tremendously. The Concept itself is not so complex—but applying it, absorbing it… that can be fiendishly tricky.”

That gave Zane just a bit of pause.

Then—eh.

He figured it couldn’t be too bad. He wasn’t convinced these rules applied to him.

He closed his eyes. Called up the flame in his mind. Called up his soul. Got ready to pour into his Stormfire, making new fuel…

…It proved a bit harder than he expected.

All morning, explosions rocked Zane’s Warrior dojo.

***

Later that day, Reina saw Zane ambling along. He was wearing new pants and smelled vaguely of smoke. He was a little put out. It was impossible to tell just by looking at him, but she knew the signs.

“What’s wrong?” she asked him.

“It won’t fit,” Zane informed her. “I think… I could be too big.”

She was speechless for a second. Then she came over and hugged him tight.

“Don’t you say that!” she said fiercely. “Maybe for some girls, but I like you just how you are.”

“…Thanks,” said Zane, blinking.

***

It was the first time in a while Zane had trouble finishing a Concept. It felt like he had been running his head into a brick wall all morning. This was a feeling he was unfortunately quite familiar with.

He scratched his head.

…He supposed he would just have to keep cracking at it. There was nothing for it.

On his way back home he met Avery, who was waving her arms wildly.

“Help!” she cried. “I think I broke the Evan.”

“What,” said Zane.

He went to go check up on Evan.

Evan was okay, but a bit rattled. He was quite wide-eyed.

Zane frowned.

He was less good at cheering up Evan than he was at cheering up Reina. But he had picked up a few things here and there. Evan was happiest when he got to help other people.

Zane told him about his own not-great morning. Evan perked up.

“Do you want a cookie?” he said.

“I’d love a cookie,” said Zane.

Soon Evan started making Zane a cookie. It succeeded—Evan got all excited. Whatever he had been sad about was quickly forgotten.

Thirty minutes of baking later, he made Zane a delicious-smelling and delicious-tasting cookie. It had M&M-like chocolates in it.

They started munching on cookies side by side, and soon they were both cheered up.

….It probably said something about both of them that this worked so well.

Anyway.

He asked Evan what happened.

“Avery asked me a question,” said Evan.

“Sorry!” came Avery’s muffled voice upstairs.

“What question?” said Zane.

“Say there’s a trolley on a track, and it’s gonna squish ten people. But you could flip a switch and make it squish one person—would you flip it?”

Zane frowned. He could see how this had Evan-breaking potential.

“As for the answer… Um,” said Evan. He frowned. He was starting to go a little red. Then he started to tremble.

“Ummmm!” cried Evan.

“…Are you okay,” said Zane.

Then he heard static in the Astral Plane, and Evan keeled over.

“…”

He wasn’t quite sure what to do in cases like these.

He picked Evan up, turned him upside down, and shook him for a bit. This seemed to wake the boy up—he was just fine, it turned out.

“I don’t think I do so well with questions like that…” Evan said sheepishly.

Zane nodded. In their line of work, these questions didn’t seem to come up much anyways. Things were usually pretty simple. There was a Monster, and you smashed it. Zane told him so.

“Mmm!” said Evan.

They munched on their cookies for a little while longer.

“Hey Zane?” said Evan, looking up at him. “What do you think the answer is?”

Zane thought about it.

“It depends,” he said slowly. “If the person were Reina, or Avery, or you—I would choose you.”

“Aww!” cried Evan. Another pause—

"Hey Zane?"

"Mhm."

“…Do you think that’s meant to be the right answer?”

Zane shrugged. Probably not. It was still his answer, though.

He ate the last of his cookie.

They were both quiet for a bit longer.

“Do you wanna go fishing?” said Evan brightly.

“Sure,” said Zane.

They went fishing.

***

The next day, Zane did a survey of all that was left to him. He was getting a little soul-fatigued—he wasn’t sure he was in shape to give his Bloodline or his Stormfire another good go. That still left Levels—and his soul defenses.

It had been a while since he visited that Red Moon Pagoda, come to think of it…he wondered what new powers it had in store.