Alex spent long moments catching his breath while hunched over the bulky remains of his kills, the air heavy with the scents of wet cat, ruptured bowels, and the coppery tang of blood.
He could feel Linnea’s concern for him, even as he grinned in approval as she channeled her potency not into leveling yet again, but rather mastering her skills, most particularly her infravision as the surviving cats popped all the brighter in his interface.
And just in time too, as soothing shadows promising the peace of oblivion coalesced into the hot angry lines of a cat even now springing for the back of the foolish human who had dared to slump over his kills.
Before disappearing in a sudden flash.
And the cat, no fool, already knew what it meant, immediately springing away the minute its paws touched the blood-soaked ground.
But it was already too late.
It had time only to snarl and swing around, pinning a wild-eyed Alex with its furious glare before its skull parted from its neck in an explosion of lightning and gore.
And no one was more surprised than Alex when he instinctively brought forth a synergized art after daring little more than Wind until now.
But this time Alex knew not to stick around.
Already leaping free as fresh shadowy forms leaped into the clearing from whereabouts no rustling leaf or creaking branch would attest to.
As if these shadowy monsters were beyond even the forest’s ability to spot or predict.
A horrifying thought as Alex leaped through the trees, only now replaying the messages surging inside his interface.
Battle-Buddy has enhanced Infravision to Rank 4(modified 11). You have successfully spotted Elite Shadow Panther!
You understand the secret boon to Wind… it only enhances the Storm!
Enhanced Wind Strike has evolved to Enhanced Storm Strike!
Note. Your Lightning has transcended Silver’s province.
Warning: There is a cost for embracing a typhoon’s madness: Triple standard Spiritual energy cost must be now be paid!
Potency mastery boon in effect: You’re presently enjoying 4 Qi regeneration per second for the next 4 minutes!
With the monkeys and birds vanished to feline depredations, the only sound to be heard was the crashing of underbrush, the crack and boom of thunder and lightning, and the startled yodeling screams of massive spirit beasts bracing against a storm beyond their ken before they were forced to leave this realm for all time.
“Alex! Where are you going?”
Plaintive words flashing across his mind’s eye, the distant echo of a voice he had been so tightly entwined around his psyche what might have been moments or hours before.
He came to himself shuddering under torrential downpour that he didn’t think should be possible in a rift, yet somehow was… still holding on to the desperate, wild Sage’s Insight that allowed him to channel howling winds that would have been utterly beyond him just a day before, let alone blending it with Water and Lightning into a fearsome storm of potential now whipping so violently around his fangtian ji head.
He was panting for air, caught between exhaustion and a roaring surge of energy that just wouldn’t quit, his mind in an odd state between crystalline clarity and absolute mental exhaustion, remembering so exquisitely the feel of massive silvery claws cleaving through the air and his locks of hair, missing his naked flesh by just inches as he arched his head back just enough to avoid being shredded while whipping his own fangtian ji around to blast through the over-extended cat’s paw in an explosion of blood and gore.
And Silver tier quickness meant nothing, it seemed, as Alex finally saw the secrets Shadow had so well hid before.
The surge of gloom that presaged the moment that thought became action, such when his foe was about to twist and pounce, Alex was already weaving past his foe’s desperate attacks before they were even launched, finally embracing so many lessons learned haphazardly in his life most recently past, only now coming together into one exquisite unified whole. Such that when lighting flashed again, it was the impossibly fast and deadly shadow cat that was splayed in a steaming pile of cooked flesh upon the forest floor, and Alex that stood over it with a triumphant roar, his half-moon axe heads flashing through the air one last time to cleave his foe’s skull and seize the most precious prize of all.
Soul Sight skill check made! You can now effortlessly sense the flow of spiritual energy through feline spirit beast opponents. Not even Shadow Qi can hide from your gaze! Shadow Puma Quickness tier has now reduced by four effective ranks!
Then Alex was wrapped in the rustle of trees before the branches parted, and he was nowhere to be seen for any cats that were even now stalking him… before Alex once more did his utmost to make sure that the predator became the prey.
“Alex, there are too many of them! We can’t keep this up… I can’t keep this up… you’re going too far!”
And as much as that furious killing side of him hated to admit it… Linnea was right.
She who hadn’t flinched or run away when she understood the true horrific significance of what he was and what that meant. Who had instead been willing to join him so utterly, so completely, that her will had been subsumed, and two had become one.
Trusting that he would let her go when the peril had past… brave enough to alert him even now, now that she was free, instead of fleeing for the rift just behind her.
No.
Instead she chose to warn him when his madness was taking him over a cliff edge from which there was no going back.
Not when a single mistake could mean his grisly death.
After dozens of furious assaults had won them so many priceless boons, all he needed was one moment of disoriented fugue to spell his doom, when a sage’s desperate insights at last became a fool’s fatal folly.
The only question was, could Alex able to accept that there was just no winning against this tide of Shadow beasts so ruthlessly and completely claiming this rift? He was exhausted, his epiphanies and sage’s revelations soon to become a fool’s folly. So was he wise enough to get out in time?
Alex would let that answer ring in the rustle of the leaves and the waves of grass blowing in the breeze.
Because somehow he just knew that the moment he revealed himself before his partner would be the moment that shadows unseen struck.
So Alex revealed nothing at all as he blinked through the grass to plunge through the shimmering gate, a single silent command assuring that Linnea was right behind him, a final fiery whirlwind for any furiously howling legendary Shadow beast the only parting gift they would leave behind.
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You have successfully slain fifteen Elite Spirit beasts!
You have discovered Wind Walking! A successful skill check will allow you to stand upon an updraft you control, or race along currents of air!
Enhanced Wind Piercer Strike is now Rank 3!
Enhanced Wind Qi Deflection is now Rank 6!
Enhanced Wind Blade is now Rank 8!
You have successfully Enhanced Storm Strike!
Note! A skill check is now needed to embrace the storm unless embracing a Sage’s insight.
You have infused legendary spirit fruit into you cultivation base. You now enjoy Wind Qi Affinity! Note. You must re-calibrate all complex techniques involving the element of Wind.
You have successfully returned! Qi Perception check made: You sense oddities in the wind.
“Alex? Alex, are you alright?”
Alex squinted against the bright light of the sun as he took a steadying breath, fighting off dizziness and exhaustion and the desire to slump to his knees and sob with relief that they had successfully escaped the combined hate of well over a dozen murderous Silver-tier spirit beasts.
Alex felt tears prickle the corner of his eyes as he gazed upon the bucolic view of the lush valley below, so much of it cooled and sheltered by the caldera slopes, mist-shrouded trees, and the cooling waters from the rifts. An oasis of life in the hot, near lifeless desert that Alex increasingly feared might be crawling with the undead.
A sanctuary to preserve at all costs.
Now more imperiled than ever from within and without.
“Alex?”
He forced a smile, turning to Linnea, feeling a lurch in his chest when his exhausted gaze beheld her lush full lips, cheerful smile, brilliant twinkling green eyes half hidden by loose auburn curls and the hot blush now covering her cheeks.
She bit her lip, flashing him such a teasing, hungry smile as he blushed in turn, realizing that they were still connected on so many levels. That she sensed just how hungry he was for her, as the furious rush and exhilaration of battle became exhausted relief and dismay at how close they had both come to death. Both of them now filled with sweetest gratitude for the sweet sacred bounty of life, and Alex was filled with the fierce desire to lose himself in the passionate embrace of someone he cared for. Had fought side by side with.
A true battle-buddy, as she had put it.
A girl whose mind he had completely dominated… and there it was… her features paling as she flinched and pulled away.
As did Alex, his cheeks burning with shame.
He swallowed the lump in his throat. “I… I’ll go check on the Wu family and make sure they’re alright. Then… I’ll go.”
He was startled by how tightly Linnea gripped his hand. “Don’t,” she said huskily.
Alex froze. His heart was pounding. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t leave me.”
For long, silent moments they stood there, Alex gazing into the bucolic valley below, his thoughts roiling, exhaustion, dismay, triumph and melancholy a bittersweet collage in his soul. But this… this shred of hope… uncertainty? He hadn’t expected.
“Linnea...”
“Yes, I know.”
“You know what I did.”
“You saved my life. You saved all our lives.”
He swallowed, flashing a bitter smile. “Honestly, I’m just glad that you’re not looking at me in horror, desperate to escape my presence, or so panicked you’re trying to strike me dead.”
“Like what happened… in your previous life.”
Alex froze at those words.
Linnea grabbed his limb, gently wrapping his arm around her.
“You know.”
She nodded her head. “Remember Alex, you didn’t mind-rape me. Not really. We fused. Because we trusted one another. Like battle-buddies should. Like a husband and wife. Two halves of a whole. Because our ancestors knew. Before things turned so bad between our clans when your Darklords took over absolutely everything, it was how we controlled our mecha on the killing fields of a dozen worlds. Or at least it was, according to the records that our elders left behind. Entire squads fighting as one.”
Alex blinked at this, stunned by those words. “Paradigm shift, much?”
She smirked. “Like the battlemech cartoons and movies you used to watch. Just like this world is a… what, afternoon kung-fu theater fantasy for you?”
Alex’s cheeks flushed. “Believe me, it’s a hell of a lot more real than that.”
“But this isn’t the world you were born in. This isn’t the realm you grew up in.”
Alex froze, slowly shaking his head. “No. It isn’t.”
“And I know that because we fused as one. We fought as one. And while your mind was on the cats, desperately trying to make full use of your Soul Sight to read the flow of Shadow Qi, far trickier in a Shadow Puma than most other spirit beasts… I was pouring all our earned potency into boosting my infravision… and yes, maybe I was, half in panic, half in wonder, opening the back doors to your mind and trying to get a read on the man who had captured me so utterly.” She squeezed his hand before he could protest. “And that includes my heart.” Sultry green eyes met his own, her dusky cheeks flushing, for all that her words were husky and bold. “Remember, Alex, according to the laws of my tribe… you’ve already claimed me. So we’re two halves of a single whole.”
And before Alex could even think of a response to that, her lips had locked with his own.
His heart was suddenly pounding with fierce vigor and a desperate hunger, adoration and despair searing fresh channels through his soul.
An endless moment as sweet as honeyed wine, for all that Alex wanted to weep with shame. Feeling only the slightest twinge, which suddenly opened up the terrifying possibility that maybe they could do so much more.
More than he had dared in the entire life he had lived before.
And that he was so desperate to do just that…
He closed his eyes and shook his head, but he didn’t let go of her hands. “I’m sorry, Linnea.”
To his profound relief, she was neither hurt, nor angry. She merely squeezed him close. “It’s okay. I know. You loved those two so dearly. Just months ago. Even if you’re now certain it was actually a thousand years ago. And now you have no idea what to do.”
Alex felt his cheeks flush. He chuckled ruefully. “And I have no sense of your secrets at all.”
Linnea’s eys twinkled brilliantly. “I know. Out of affection and respect, and I’m going to pretend a husband’s love… the minute the peril had passed, you pulled free of my mind completely. Refusing to take any secrets or liberties not offered.”
Her eyes locked intently onto his, as she gently led his trembling hands to her hips. “But what you fail to understand, Alex, is that I want you.”
Alex blinked as those words roared through his skull. She wasn’t horrified by him. She wasn’t fleeing the sight of him. Even when he had invaded her mind so deeply that they had thought and fought as one… she wasn’t pushing him away.
“You’re damn right I’m not pushing you away, Alex. Why would I? I know the taste of your soul.” She flashed a brilliant smile. “It’s lovely and sweet. And sometime very soon… when I’m ready… I want to share my mind with you once more.” Her breath hitched, her ruby jewel flashing with undeniable heat. “But now there’s something else I want to share with you, Alex Hammer, just as badly as you want to share it with me.”
For long moments Alex felt himself helplessly falling into that fiery red jewel of her heart, captivating eyes promising love, acceptance, and a sweetness he had been desperate for like a man trudging through the desert, desperate for a single sip of ice-cold water. And here she was, promising paradise in his arms.
“Excuse me… honored Ruidian guests, but you’re sort of… blocking the way.”
Alex and Linnea froze, their flushing cheeks and the loosening of Linnea’s armor and blouse making it damn clear that they were more than casual acquaintances, and were about to act on that in ways Alex still couldn’t believe was on the verge of happening, yet somehow actually was… only to find himself facing a quartet of powerful Silvers and one flawless featured young woman wearing enchanted form-fitting armor with a spear radiating the essence of Metal and absolutely devastating sharpness.
If anything, Alex’s flush deepened. Because of course the first person to witness his fumbling attempts at… whatever this was about to be, was true-blood nobility of one sort or another. Yet instead of contempt, there was only strained courtesy, for all that the closest Silver, a powerfully built Silver Giant, snorted and shook his head. “The entrance to a rift isn’t the place for Ruidian courting,” he offered with a craggy smile. “Doesn’t Silver Sands grant your kind entire dormitories for that sort of thing?”