With the Delvers making their hostility towards herself and Harold abundantly clear, she saw no reason to risk her real body when ‘returning’ to town for the first time. The weak physical form she could manifest during spectral projection wouldn’t be a convincing substitute due to being semi-transparent, but it would allow her to try reasoning with them before resorting to a more drastic approach. She doubted it would do much good, but at least she could say that she tried diplomacy first.
Samantha briefly flew through the outpost to discover which cultivators would potentially be the largest threat to her in case the situation turned to violence. She still didn’t know the full scope of the damage the ancient cliff drake had caused, or who was left capable of fighting her if it came to that. Though pretty much all of the delvers would be easy enough to deal with in a one-on-one duel because of their lower level of cultivation and limited access to arts, she shouldn’t underestimate the power of numbers.
When she stumbled across a small memorial site a short while later some of her lingering questions were answered. The modest stone plaque was mounted on the inside of the outpost’s wooden defensive wall. Carved into its polished surface were the names of those who had fallen during the latest expedition, and on the bottom was the phrase ‘Onwards, to the next grand adventure’. On a long table below the plaque were a variety of offerings to the dead, such as flowers, sealed letters, and the remnants of burnt incense.
Reading through the list of names, it seemed only around one-third of the Delvers who’d gone on the expedition with her had managed to return alive. Even Fara–the Mid Silver acting as this location’s leader–had perished. That meant that the strongest cultivator in town was currently Fara’s second-in-command: the Low Silver, Walter. Given how so many of the outpost’s ‘elite’ High and Peak Bronze cultivators were also named on the tablet, it was no wonder everyone here seemed on edge. They were in a seriously weakened state. Hopefully that would work in her favor.
She flew back out to the forested area just beyond the Delver’s circle of cleared land before manifesting a physical form. Her re-appearance in and of itself would likely be startling, so allowing them to see her coming from a distance was her way of giving them some time to mentally process her arrival. Whether this short grace period would result in the delvers’ anger towards her to become more focused or more controlled she couldn’t say, but she was capable of dealing with either outcome and believed the chance of a smoother re-introduction was worth the risk.
She drew herself up to her full height and made sure to keep her posture confident and relaxed. Then, she stepped out into the open and calmly walked towards the front gate.
Almost immediately she was spotted by the gate guards and a call was raised that someone was approaching. As cultivators ran to various positions along the wall in preparation for a potential fight, she made no effort to speed her pace. Using her spiritual vision to identify the areas where traps had been set, she continued to follow the meandering ‘safe’ path until a new announcement was made.
“By the…! It’s her!” one of the guards shouted. “It’s the ascendant!”
As this latest news dispersed, even more cultivators began gathering near the gate. Several of the delvers began murmuring to each other or glaring at her as the atmosphere shifted from the tenseness of anticipating danger to something more… unwelcoming. Some looked down on her with obvious disgust, as if she were a dirty, unwanted pest. Others looked at her with a sort of eagerness that made her think they were hoping she’d step on a trap and be harmed, or that she’d make it through unscathed so they could cause injuries themselves.
“Stop! That’s close enough ascendant,” the guard shouted at her.
‘Ascendant’ was spoken with a level of vitriol that was usually reserved for slurs, but such childish attempts to get under her skin stopped bothering her years ago. She also didn’t allow herself to be irritated by a lower-ranked cultivator’s rudeness towards her either. Such emotions could be useful in certain settings, but this wasn’t one of them. Not yet, anyway. She obediently halted her progress towards the gate and looked upwards to meet the guard’s gaze.
“You have some nerve, showing up like this.” He looked her up and down before continuing with a scowl. “Actually, are you even here at all?” His knuckles whitened as his grip on his caster tightened. “Whatever, it doesn’t matter. Dead, alive, or ghost, you shouldn’t have come back! We lost a lot of good people because of you.”
The murmuring from the delvers nearby picked up at this. She didn’t imagine arguing to defend her reputation or rebut his accusations would end positively, but leaving his words completely unaddressed would only further ‘solidify’ her guilt in their eyes.
“I can understand why you might blame me,” she acquiesced. “But all I did was reveal the rift’s location. What happened when we all went there was horrible… but not my fault. However, I don’t expect shouting up at you from outside your closed gates will change your mind, and that’s not the reason why I’ve come back here. It’s obvious the already tenuous relationship between us ascendants and this outpost has soured. So, I’ll be taking Harold, Sandy, and all our belongings and we’ll travel elsewhere.”
He scoffed and was about to reply, but Walter appeared beside him and placed a staying hand on his shoulder. Walter whispered something quietly to the guard that she couldn’t quite make out, then the guard nodded respectfully and stepped back to give Walter more space.
Walter looked down at her with a cold, detached stare. “So… it’s true. You’ve really crawled your way back here,” he commented flatly. “I almost didn’t believe my ears when I heard it. I thought for certain you ran off or were dead. Perhaps you are, and your ghost has come to haunt us?”
Samantha chose to act oblivious to his hostility for now. She smiled and nodded her head politely towards him in greeting, then made a show of scuffing the dirt beneath her with her feet for everyone to see. “Nothing ghostly about me other than my appearance, and I’m not here to haunt you. I’m only here to take Harold, Sandy, and our belongings out of here. I’m not interested in anything else.”
Walter sneered at her. “You think you can come and go as you please? You owe us. You and the other ascendant both do. You want to leave? You need to repay your debts first.” Some delvers nearby signaled their agreement with nods of their heads or the occasional shout.
Looking at the qi of the people gathered here, Samantha saw that most were gripped by genuine grief and anger. They sought justice for the fallen, though admittedly choosing her and Harold as their targets was misguided. Walter’s, on the other hand, was a completely different story. His qi was laden with greed. Like the cloying stench of fruit on the cusp of rot, his avarice seemed to taint his entire cultivation base.
Seeing this, Harold’s ridiculous punishment made a lot more sense now. Disappointingly, but not surprisingly, it was just one cultivator in power spoiling things for everyone else. As the most influential cultivator here, she could imagine how easy it would be for Walter to manipulate the grieving into believing that this was the right course of action. She was sure there were others making comparable gambits, but opportunism became much more rampant when the leader was the worst offender. She’d encountered similar situations time and time again in the scenarios, and it was never pleasant.
So much for diplomacy. That rarely works with these types…
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Samantha shook her head tiredly. “If that’s how you’re going to be, then let’s just skip the niceties and jump to the heart of things.”
Walter nodded, “How unexpectedly agreeable of you. While the alchemist is obviously the most effective crafting potions, I was thinking you might do well in the vanguard for unexplored rifts. It’s sort of poetic, considering how–”
Walter’s words faded into the background for a moment as she involuntarily shivered at the idea of being forced into another rift. If she were a little weaker right now–perhaps only a Peak Bronze–would that have been her fate? Would she have ever been free?
“--be taking on the most risk going in with the first group, but subsequent delves would be safer for your sacrifice. And–”
“You misunderstand me. I came here to speak with you all first as a courtesy,” she cut Walter off. “Let me be very clear. What happened at the rift was a tragedy, yes, but not a conspiracy. Your sorrow and anger are valid, but trying to punish Harold and me for this is completely wrong.” Walter tried multiple times to interrupt her, but she refused to relent and simply raised her voice to speak over him until he was silent. “I don’t need your permission or cooperation for what I’m asking. One way or another I’ll get what I want.”
Many delvers were visibly aggravated by her latest words, including Walter himself.
“You’re threatening us now?” Walter questioned. His tone was as enraged as it was bewildered. “You? Some Low Bronze who was begging us for charity just a couple months ago?”
“I can’t take this anymore. Someone needs to put you in your place,” a Mid Bronze woman berated her as she jumped down from the outpost wall. “I’d been wanting to do this ever since you weaseled your way in.”
Samantha rolled her eyes. She supposed now was as good a time as ever to show a bit of her hand.
She activated [Cloud Run] and rose up around 30 feet in the air to get out of immediate reach. This manifested body was physically weak and would dissipate if struck hard enough, and she wanted to stay visible for maximum impact. She stretched her arm outwards and pointed it at the front gate with a grand, dramatic gesture. As she did, she activated [Rift Walk].
The thick, reinforced wood of the gate–along with the outpost walls the doors were attached to–whined and warbled ominously. Those stationed above the area in question scattered quickly, not wanting to be near the unfamiliar phenomenon. A few seconds later, two tears in space announced themselves with a loud clap of force and with cleanly sliced wood being flung in opposite directions. She immediately willed the side-by-side rifts to snap closed to prevent anyone from getting a good look at what they were, which gave the wood chunks another burst of momentum. As a result, warning alarms begin to activate as some of the debris triggered traps hidden in the clearing.
The delvers stared between her–who was standing nonchalantly in mid-air–and the gaping hole in their outpost’s defenses with shock. Even Walter looked a little pale after seeing the damage she’d caused with seemingly just a single gesture and a handful of seconds. With this latest commotion, everyone not already at the gates rushed outside armed and ready for a fight. The stronger cultivators put themselves in front of mortals and weaker cultivators. Stragglers or anyone isolated from a group was called over and gathered for safety in numbers. Kids who had been playing outside looked terrified, but wielded their casters and prepared to fire in whatever direction the adults told them to. For all their shortcomings, at least it could be said these people looked out for each other when it counted. It was just a shame ascendants like her and Harold would forever be outsiders to them.
“This is me threatening you. Before was just a warning,” Samantha stated calmly while looking directly at Walter. The greed that had been so prominent in his energy just moments before was snuffed out by a more powerful emotion. Fear. “You should thank the mortal children that call this outpost home that this is the extent of it.”
“Samantha?” a familiar voice asked, quivering.
She glanced down towards the source and found Cole and Harper looking up at her. Half of Cole’s face was wrapped in bandages and one of his arms was in a sling, but he seemed to be in relatively good health otherwise. Other than meeting Harper’s sad, confused eyes for a moment, Samantha didn’t acknowledge the pair.
She looked back to Walter. “I’ll be returning shortly. Until that time, you should consider a very important question: Will I need to go through you to get what I want–” she motioned to the destroyed gate, “--or not? I look forward to hearing your answer.”
Samantha dispersed her manifested body to ‘disappear’ in front of everyone. Then, she watched on as chaos ensued.
----------------------------------------
The first thing she was wary about was the delvers harming Sandy or Harold in retaliation to her threat. She stuck near Sandy for a while to keep an eye on her, ready to ‘reappear’ and scare off anyone with ill intentions. She also kept in touch with Harold, both to update him on recent events and to listen for any sign that someone had gone to harass him in the aftermath. She still wasn’t entirely sure how much information was getting through to him from Sandy, but it seemed he was understanding the essentials based on his responses. There was also no indication that he was being bothered by the delvers.
So far, so good, I guess.
Her little display had worked wonders. Many of the delvers gathered around Walter after her disappearance either seeking reassurance or to complain about how he’d decided to handle ‘the ascendants’. Though Walter was putting up a good front his qi couldn’t lie to her spiritual sight. She had shaken his confidence.
“Sandy, I’m going to start heading over now. You let me know right away if someone comes to bother you, and tell the same to Harold.”
“Yup! Not worry! Sandy tell my Harold if someone bother her.”
“That’s not–” Samantha inwardly sighed. “Great. Please also tell Harold to let me know if he thinks someone will hurt him.”
“Not Harold lady talk lot,” Sandy complained. “But, yup! Trust Sandy!”
“...Thanks. See you both soon.”
She canceled [Spectral Projection] and was pulled back into her body. Thanks to her qi regeneration exceeding the ongoing cost to maintain her projection, she had regained most of what she’d expended for her demonstration. She still needed some time to regenerate the qi spent clearing the den, but even then she had close to 400 qi at her disposal.
“Tobias, how’re you doing on reserves at the moment?” she asked as she stood and brushed herself off. She could’ve just checked it herself, but it felt oddly impolite to look without asking when outside of battle.
He set down the worm he had been examining before replying. “I’ll be around for another four or five hours. Why?”
“I’m anticipating a fight in the near future, but on second thought it’d probably be more impactful to summon you after getting there.”
“We’re fighting?” Silas asked, looking at her over a pile of herb-scraps nearby.
“Let me explain everything from the beginning…”
Samantha walked Tobias and Silas through the series of events from leaving her letters with Harold all the way to threatening the delver’s guild. When she was finished, Tobias laughed and Silas nodded appreciatively.
“They tried to intimidate the wrong person!” Tobias said with amusement.
“Well…” Samantha started, “to be fair, they thought they were dealing with the old me. Or, I guess ‘young’ me is more accurate?”
“We’re all stronger now. They don’t stand a chance.” Silas reassured her. His tone turned slightly somber as he continued, “We’ll get your letters back, even if I must fight the pie lady.”
The mention of Harper brought Samantha’s mood down slightly as well. Of everyone there, she felt the most conflicted about the impact her actions would have on Harper and Cole. If possible it’d be nice to leave them out of things, but she doubted they’d obediently stay away if their guild mates were in danger.
“Well said, Silas,” Tobias agreed. “Also, knowing the full situation now, I think you’re right that a ‘surprise summoning’ is the best choice. Call on me whenever my appearance will be most exciting, will you?”
“You sure you don’t want to keep investigating things a bit longer?” she asked. “I don’t mind.”
He looked around guiltily, as if he was concerned about being overheard. “I was getting a little bored of looking at bugs, honestly,” Tobias admitted. “An outpost filled with other flesh-and-blood cultivators sounds much more interesting.” With that statement, he dismissed his form and returned to his inactive ‘figurine’ state.
Not seeing any point in waiting to replenish Tobias’s reserve, she promptly fished the statue out of her pocket and trickled qi into it. While she did that, Silas hopped over to her and she pet his head in silent gratitude for his company. This wasn’t exactly how she’d envisioned her first day back from the rift would be, but it was encouraging to have reliable companions by her side.