Cass woke up on a blanket on the ground. Alyx sat next to her in the grass.

“What happened?” Cass’s voice was hoarse.

“Cass!” Alyx grabbed her hand. “Abyss, what was that? Are you okay?”

Cass blinked. Excellent questions, both of them.

She started with the second one. She flexed her arms and feet experimentally as she sat up. There was no pain or stiffness.

Stamina: 96/96

Focus: 324/324

Health: 74/78

Her stats weren’t hurting.

“I think I’m okay,” Cass said slowly. As for the first question, what had happened? She wasn’t sure. She followed the facts she knew:

1. Salos had been talking about the god of Dexterity.

2. Mysterious pain hit Salos.

3. He fell from the horse.

4. Cass Ordered him to dematerialize.

5. The pain had consumed her.

6. She had gotten a message about Divine Punishment.

“Is ‘divine punishment’ what it sounds like?” Cass’s stomach sunk.

Alyx’s face blanched. “Why do you ask?”

Cass shrugged. “I don’t think you and Salos should talk about the gods.”

Alyx looked away. “That may not be a problem.”

Cass cocked her head to one side.

Alyx stared out at the horizon. “I couldn’t find him. Telis and Marco are still searching, but we aren’t—Cass, I’m sorry. He might be—”

“Who is saying I’m gone?” Salos asked, materializing from the shadows behind Alyx.

Alyx spun around, her mouth hanging open. “But where were you? How did you get here?”

“Don’t you know shadow tabbies have nine lives?” Salos asked.

“Are you okay?” Cass asked.

He stalked around Alyx and hopped into Cass’s lap. “I am fine. I apologize for the scare. It seems the gods would rather I did not speak of their predecessors.”

Cass’s heart skipped. Her chest tightened. Was this Perception? Or other gods? How many of them were watching her? What did they want?

“Is that what happened?” Alyx leaned away from them, her eyes wide and her hand clenched around her sword’s hilt.

Salos shrugged. “That or one of them would rather I did not speak positively of your Demon God. Perhaps both, I suppose.”

“How can you talk about that so casually?” Alyx asked.

Salos shot her a grin, all needly cat teeth and completely feral. “Because they only punish what they fear.”

And yet, Cass could feel the pulse of his heart under her shaking hands. She could feel his fear leaking across to her.

How often do the gods change? Cass asked him privately.

“I’ll call Marco and Telis back,” Alyx said, standing.

“Wait, we should finish our talk first,” Salos said, ignoring Cass’s question.

“What do we have to talk about?” Alyx asked.

“You were telling me about your Demon God. I won’t say more of my God of Dexterity, but nothing is stopping you from telling me of yours. And what they have to do with dragons.”

Alyx shifted back into a seat, her lips pursed in thought. “Everyone knows the story of Dexterity and the dragons.”

“Then telling us should be no problem,” Salos said.

Alyx grunted. “I guess. The sketch of the story goes like this: Alacrity and Dexterity were once as close as twins. So close he was called her shadow. He loved her. And she cared for him deeply in return.

“But one day, she met someone else. A dragon. Some versions of the story say they became lovers. Others have them swearing mutual bonds of fealty. Others still suggest the dragon swore to become her protector.

“No matter the details, the stories all agree that Dexterity grew jealous of the bond between his Alacrity and the mighty dragon. Jealous enough to curse the dragon.”

“What was the curse?” Salos asked quietly.

“They who hold the appearance of a beast should act in kind,” Alyx said as if she were reciting an old incantation. If Cass listened to the true words Alyx spoke in Jothi, they held a rhythm and a rhyme which her skill-translated English lacked. “May all who bear the Race of Dragon succumb to the power of blind pride and the madness of hungry greed.

“Since that day, dragons have been beasts, not people, acting on instinct and hunger. These are the wild dragons I mentioned.”

“I see,” Salos said. “And ‘tamed’ dragons are what, then?”

“The story continues,” Alyx said. “With Alacrity discovering what Dexterity had done.”

“Of course,” Salos muttered.

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“She despaired. Dexterity had betrayed her. She lost both her close friends, Dexterity and the dragon, all at once. The people of her friend were lost to her. She could not let that stand, so she cast a complex counter curse. But breaking another god’s curse was too much. She could only weaken it.

“Most dragons would still succumb to the curse. But any who could find another to bind with her blessing could be spared. These partners became known as Dragon Knights.

“Dragons born to mothers with knights do not fall victim of the curse until they turn nine years old and they receive their first level from the system. That’s what the festival we’re going to is about. Binding dragonlings to Knights who will protect them from the curse and from those who want to hurt them.”

Salos shook his head. His body tensed.

Cass ran her hand over his back.

“This is hard to believe,” he said.

Alyx shrugged. “That’s the story. I’m not brave enough to doubt the gods personally. But that’s what I’m doing. The Vaisom Catacombs open tomorrow. If we’re fast, we can still make it in, blitz to the bottom, collect Alacrity’s Blessing, and present myself to the dragonlings for selection as their knight.”

“They opened tomorrow?” Cass glanced at the late afternoon sky. “Are we going to make it in time?”

“Not for the opening, no,” Alyx said.

“Is it alright that you are late?”

Alyx looked away again. “Its not ideal. There is a bonus on the blessing if you are the first one down to collect it, and the only way you can hope to get that is if you start right away. But I did not expect to win that, regardless.”

“Why?”

Alyx chuckled. “Cass, what do you think of my level?”

Cass raised an eyebrow.

Human Warrior (lvl 26)

It was seven above her own. The goons that had jumped them in town had mostly been in between her and Alyx. “It seems rather high?”

Alyx shook her head. “For the common people, maybe. It’s hard to gather levels safely without resources. But for those with means, the Gate is hardly an achievement. My younger brother was already at level 28 when I left.

“He isn’t even the primary competition. All my cousins will try their hand at this. Most of them aren’t much of anything, but one of them is a genius. Everyone agrees Fioreya is going to get down first and claim the greater blessing. And since it doesn’t matter if I get the second or twentieth blessing, I might as well improve my chances of winning in other ways.”

“And that was why you went to Uvana?” Cass asked. “What is so special about it, exactly?”

Alyx sighed. “I don’t know how I forget every time until you ask something like this, but you really, really aren’t from around here, huh?

“Uvana is a Trial Ground. A trial left by the gods for their followers. There are three trials within it: the Pass, the Forest, and the Deep. Each has its own Lord and a host of sub-trials, such as the Heralds. We barely scratched the surface.”

Salos stiffened at that description, but he said nothing.

Alyx continued, “One can say they have Conquered Uvana if they gain any of the blessings for killing one of the Lords. One can call it a Full Conquer if one slays all three lords. I’m not sure when the last time someone did that was. There is a lot of prestige for Conquering Uvana. And the rewards for the sub-trials are nothing to scoff at either. Just look at what we got.

“Clearing any amount of Uvana is a status symbol in Vaisom. The rewards make you strong, the blessing marks you as someone worthy of watching.

“Additionally, it’s easier to level up on Uvana. Potential is denser there. I had hoped to break through the Gate while I was there, but I can tell I’m almost there.”

“What was the Gate again?” Cass asked.

“A stage in growth. It goes First Step at level 9, the Gate at level 27. You reach the Accent at level 54, and supposedly there is a Peak out at level 90, not that anyone has reached that kind of level in our lifetime. Maybe not even in this era.

“Surpassing the Gate separates the real martials from everyone else.” There was a fire in Alyx’s voice. An awe. An excitement.

“Why?”

“People can passively gain levels until level 27. After that, you need to either slay monsters or push hard on gaining insight with your skills. Few non-combatants make it much over 27, and few reach 27 before they are in their 50s.”

“How does leveling work for non-combatants, anyway?” Cass asked. She hadn’t thought about it much, but everyone she’d met in the last town had been at least level 12 or 16 or so and she doubted it greatly that the tailor was out killing giant spiders in his free time.

“At age nine, children gain their first level,” Alyx explained. “After that, until they reach level 9, they passively gain a level every year. After the First Step, one passively gets a level every other year until you reach the Gate. That’s where the name comes from. It’s the Gate because that’s where passive leveling stops.”

“So, if you do nothing else, you should reach the Gate by the time you’re fifty-three?” Cass asked, checking her math.

Alyx nodded. “But, obviously, there are other ways to gain levels, or neither of us would be at our current level. The most dramatic way to level quickly is combat. Fighting and killing monsters is the most time efficient method. The more combat, the more varied opponents, the larger the gap in power, the faster you will gain levels.

“But one also gets a small amount of experience for using their skills. This is how most people level up besides passively. It’s a very small amount, though, compared to combat.”

“How small?” Cass asked.

“If a guard defending the town against monsters encounters and kills a monster a couple times a week gains another level every year, a craftsman working every day of the year might get another level every four or five years.”

Cass looked at her own level 19 on her status window. In the Valley, she’d gotten that in less than a month. Granted, she had been fighting

“Anyway, that’s why I went to Uvana when I maybe should have been preparing for the festival.” Alyx shook her head. “I should let Marco and Telis know that you’re okay. Get yourself ready. We’re going to make another couple of hours while we still have some daylight.”

“Sure,” Cass said with a wave as Alyx jogged off.

When Alyx was out of earshot, Cass poked Salos. “You okay?”

He grumbled. “I apologize. I did not think far enough ahead. I should have realized the gods, as I knew them, would be taboo as soon as we discovered there was a discrepancy.”

Cass shook her head. “I need to apologize, too. I think I Commanded you again.”

He nodded. “I’m fuzzy on everything there, but I think you did.”

“You aren’t mad?” Cass asked.

Salos hesitated. “I’m not pleased. But, no. I am not mad. Distressed, perhaps. But how much that feeling is from your actions and how much that results from our chat just now, I couldn’t say.”

“I’m sorry all the same,” Cass said.

“Given your alternatives, I think I should probably thank you for forcing me to rescue myself. Though, I suspect we may have tipped our hand a little in front of that butler. She won’t have questions for us so much as theories for her mistress.”

Cass nodded. “I think we can probably trust them, though. They’re Alyx’s people.”

“And that means nothing to us,” Salos said. “Alyx is a temporary companion at best. We haven’t told her anything about me for a reason.”

“Do you really think it would be that much of a problem if she found out?” Cass asked.

“Cass, do you know what a curse is?” Salos had switched from Jothi to his Depth’s Tongue.

Cass frowned at the apparent non sequitur but replied in English, “That sounds like an evil magic? Should that word mean more to me than that?”

“Yes,” Salos said. “A curse is a magic cast at the cost of part of your soul. Only a broken soul can cast it. In fewer words, only a demon.

“She seems to revere Alacrity and dragons. The demon god Dexterity appears to be a clear villain in her tale. What would she do if she discovered she was traveling with one?”

Cass shifted uncomfortably. “I don’t know. One demon being awful doesn’t mean that all of them are. I think she’s reasonable enough to see that.”

“Cass, I am the exception here. Not that god,” Salos said. “I am the unusual demon.”

“If you say so,” Cass said. “We can keep it between us for now. But I don’t think we should hide it if she asks. I think that would look worse.”

“Then let’s do what we can to make sure she doesn’t ask, hm?”