Rylan found Zahra leaning against the wall at the bottom of the servants’ stairs.

She looked up at the sound of his footsteps, eyes wide. “Rylan! What happened?! Are you—”

He held up a hand, and she bit off the rest of her sentence. “I’m fine. Didn’t get in trouble.”

“What? How’d you talk your way out of that?!”

He shook his head. “I didn’t. Soren did. More importantly, did you learn anything?”

Zahra’s mouth opened and closed a few times, like a beached fogfish. “I—no, sorry. I barely had time to look at all the spines...”

Rylan sighed. “I figured. Well, I need to—”

However, Zahra caught his sleeve as he tried to brush past her. “Hold on, Soren helped you escape? Did you two finally talk?”

The hope in her voice was painful to hear.

Rylan gritted his teeth. “If him giving me a speech about what a foghead I am for breaking into the library counts as us talking, then yeah, I guess we did.”

“Oh...” She deflated.

Rylan sighed. “Look, I’ve got a surprise extra shift in the kitchen to attend to, we’ll talk later, yeah?”

“Oh... all right then,” she said, before finally releasing his sleeve.

He took two steps, then slowed down and glanced back over his shoulder. “Oh, and Zahra... Thanks for today.”

She made a brave effort at a smile. “No problem. It was actually pretty fun! Like old times.”

“Yeah,” Rylan replied wistfully. “Like old times.”

Rylan made his way out of the tower and headed for the main building, already dreading his upcoming shift.

As he walked, he couldn’t help but replay his earlier confrontation with Soren in his mind, and his anger started bubbling up again.

Stop trying to screw up a good thing? Really, Soren?!

That was about the most hypocritical thing Rylan had ever heard. Because he’d had a good thing going, and Soren had screwed it up.

Rylan cast a forlorn glance at the marina, his eyes searching, always searching, for a ship painted a jolly orange. The Fresh Dawn was a small trade vessel run and owned by Mister and Misses Deeptide, with the assistance of their daughter, Olivia.

They were some of the friendliest people Rylan had ever met, and over their many visits to the isle of Thistlebloom, Rylan had become quite fond of them, especially Olivia...

In fact, the last time they were here, Rylan had been sat down by the older couple, and asked about his future plans, and whether he might be open to them buying out his debt, so he could come work for them instead.

Naturally, he’d been overjoyed at the idea of leaving behind his stupid chores and becoming a cloudsailor.

And the first people he’d told had been Zahra... and Soren.

He had still been working up the courage to go speak to Lord Thistlethorn about the offer when he’d heard that the Deeptides had already left without him.

He’d been confused, but assumed that he’d misunderstood something about the timeframe, that perhaps, they’d needed to collect their savings before they could return to buy his freedom.

But they didn’t return.

After some digging, he found out that the Deeptides—who had been some of the Thistlethorns’ most regular suppliers for over a decade—had suddenly been asked to leave and not return before receiving written permission, with no official reason given.

Rylan had not even gotten the chance to say goodbye.

At the time, he’d been too distraught to realise the obvious, so when, after weeks of driving himself crazy, he’d hatched up the plan to go looking for them, he’d made one crucial mistake.

He’d asked Soren for help.

Stewing in his emotions, Rylan continued stalking up to the main building’s entrance, where he practically flung open the door.

He’d barely set foot inside before the world tilted. Suddenly, he found himself looking up at the ceiling. A metal-encased hand gripped his throat none-too-gently and a pair of bright-green eyes shrouded by bronzed skin and deep-brown hair bored suspiciously into his.

“Woah there,” a young man wearing luxurious yellow robes chuckled lightly as he peered over the shoulder of Rylan’s assailant, his violet eyes shining with mirth. “I don’t think he’s much of a threat, Tammi.”

‘Tammi’ didn’t seem to agree, as she kept Rylan pinned for a moment longer, running her eyes up and down, before she finally let go of his throat, rising slowly.

Rylan immediately gulped for breath, idly noting that she looked younger than he’d initially suspected—only a few years older than him—and that not just her hand, but her entire left arm was covered in shiny metal. Other than that, she was wearing a yellow surcoat over what looked like black leather armour, had a matching vambrace covering her right forearm, a shield on her back, and a sword on her left hip.

Importantly, both the young man’s robes and his bodyguard’s surcoat were emblazoned with a massive black talon.

Apparently, Rylan had almost run into Vidric Fogging Talon, the important guest he was supposed to quickly go make food for.

He got up to his feet in a daze, and gave a shoddy bow. “Ap-apologies, milord,” he spoke hoarsely, his throat straining with the effort, “I was told to hurry, but I shouldn’t have rushed...”

“Lift your head, boy,” the young noble said, despite looking like he barely had a year or two on Rylan.

Rylan hesitantly did so, keeping his eyes lowered.

“You’re doing great,” Vidric assured him. “Now look at me.”

Rylan did as he was asked, raising his eyes to meet Vidric’s, who stared at him for a moment.

“What’s your name?”

“Rylan, milord.”

“Last name?”

“Cloudgift.”

Vidric’s brows rose about a quarter of an inch. “I see. And how old are you, Rylan Cloudgift?”

Rylan swallowed. “Ehm, I’ve just come off age, actually.”

“Have you now?” Vidric mused, his deep purple eyes twinkling. “Congratulations. Well, I believe you had somewhere to be? Carry on then.”

Rylan blinked, then bowed once more, before woodenly turning around and heading for the nondescript door hiding the servants’ staircase.

“Hey Tammi,” he heard Vidric ask behind him. “How do you feel about castratos?”

For some reason, a chill ran up Rylan’s spine at the innocently posed question.

“Why?” the girl asked dryly. “Are you thinking of starting a choir?”

“Something like that,” came the amused reply.

Rylan didn’t stick around to hear more, rubbing his sore throat as he rushed up the stairs. That girl’s grip was scary strong. I bet she’s a Quinthar... She’d have to be, to directly serve a Talon. Fog, what are they doing in this backwater?

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All thoughts of mysterious nobles and their bodyguards fled Rylan’s mind the moment he entered the kitchen, chased away by the heat, the mouth-watering smells, and the utter chaos that he knew was somehow strictly organised.

Ava looked up from where she was expertly carving up a large fogfish, and immediately hailed him down. “About time!” she shouted over the clamour of over a dozen people working in a cramped kitchen, her knife never slowing. “I need those scallops ready ten minutes ago, so grab a knife and get shucking!”

Knowing better than to try to make himself heard over the noise, Rylan simply gave her a thumbs-up, and headed for the knife rack.

On any given day, three meals had to be prepped. First of all, dinner for the Thistlethorns, which was usually a lavish three-course meal—which today had been extended to five because of Vidric. The menu for today seemed to have a slow-roasted hog as the main, and the scent coming from the oven as Rylan passed by instantly had his mouth watering.

He swallowed his saliva and disappointment, knowing he’d never taste a bite of it. The only one in the kitchen who would was Zahra’s father, Zelim.

It was hard to tell what the head chef was thinking as he stood in front of the oven, because his mouth was covered almost entirely in bushy grey facial hair. Despite having shared the Brightwind dinner table quite frequently when he was younger, Rylan wasn’t sure he’d ever seen the man’s teeth.

At least he had loosened up a little around Rylan ever since Zahra had started dating Loukas. Well, that was to say, he no longer glared at Rylan while bringing down his cleaver with excessive force as he chopped the meat. It was a miracle the man still had all his fingers. Despite Rylan’s utter lack of romantic interest in Zahra, who truly was like a sister to him, the man’s rejection still stung.

Then again, if he’d had a daughter, he probably wouldn’t have liked her spending all her time with an indentured Cloudgift either, he bitterly considered.

The head chef kept his intense gaze locked on the roast lying underneath the blazing firemetal as Rylan slipped by and grabbed one of the few remaining kitchen knives, already fearing its dullness.

Cooking with firemetal definitely wasn’t cheap—the contraption had to burn through Quint Cubes at a prodigious rate—but the Thistlethorns wanted excellence for their meals, and they could afford it.

The second meal that needed to be prepared every day, was for the Thistlethorns’ guards.

The metal-glad men and women ate hearty meals every day, and today they were getting fillet of fogfish and omelettes made from gull eggs, served with sheep’s cheese.

Their food was being cooked over burning bricks of dried mistweed, but it didn’t smell any less delicious for it as Rylan passed by towards his station.

That was probably actually the worst part of working in the kitchen, Rylan considered. Getting to see and smell all of the delicious food he wouldn’t be eating.

For the third meal that needed to be produced every day was for the servants, and it was the same almost every day. Rice, mushrooms, and mistweed. Maybe some fresh bamboo shoots if they were lucky.

All of the green growing inside of the compound—and its greenhouse—was actually the exception rather than the rule. The plants relied fully on an irrigation system fed by the extensive network of fog condensers Rylan helped maintain. Outside of the estate’s walls, the ground above fog-level was generally cracked and dry.

The only safely arable land around the island was found in lagoons, where the shallow fog kept the ground moist, yet let through enough sunlight for crops like rice and bamboo to grow at a decent pace. More importantly, they could be fenced off for safety, and used to concurrently raise fogfish and crabs that in turn ate the weeds and pests that might otherwise ruin the harvest.

Mushrooms were mainly grown at the bottom of the much deeper marina, and finally mistweeds were grown on plantations floating further out, and harvested by ship.

Simply put, the areas available for food production around the island were optimised and stretched to their limits to produce as much food as quickly as possible, with little variety. Not for common folk, anyway.

After all, why waste precious crop space on slow-growing stuff when the nearby free city of Cliffport would buy up nearly everything the Thistlethorns could throw at them at a premium?

Thus it was rice, mushrooms and mistweed, every day.

Over the years, Rylan had developed quite a distaste for the mush of bland grains, slimy fungi, and the chewy, almost rubbery texture of the boiled dark-green plants.

Rylan wistfully eyed the speckled green eggs in passing. Once upon a time, he, Zahra and Soren had climbed the cliffs on the south side of the island, and gotten quite a few scrapes to collect some of those suckers. These days, he wouldn’t dare, as food theft was taken very seriously.

With a sigh, he arrived at his station, and reached blindly into the foguarium to grab one of the fist-sized scallops. He yanked it free from the sandy bottom of the tank and brought it out, ignoring the wild writhing of its thin segmented legs.

He put it down on his workstation and chopped off its spindly limbs with force, as the knife indeed proved rather dull. At least its blade was thick and sturdy, so he didn’t have too much trouble wedging it into the small gap between the shells, and leveraging the scallop open.

After scraping and washing the viscera off in his station’s sink, Rylan cut the scallop’s main muscle free, deposited it in a bowl, and moved on to the next, the first drops of sweat already starting to bead on his forehead.

Blessed Zeph, is it too soon to start praying to you for release from this kitchen? he mentally mused, only half to himself. I could really use some winds of change right about now... Fog, I’d take just any kind of cooling breeze.

Rylan always felt a bit awkward praying. On the one hand, he’d heard too many stories about spirit encounters to discount their existence. On the other, there rarely seemed to be any definitive indication in those stories that people were dealing with the specific Great Spirit they attributed their encounter to. Therefore, he wasn’t entirely convinced that Zeph existed, let alone that She would listen to his pleas for help.

Still, he figured it couldn’t hurt to ask.

There was only a single wide-open window in the kitchen, and the warm early evening breeze that rolled in a few moments later unfortunately did little to alleviate the sweltering heat, let alone bring him any freedom. Worse, a thick fly saw it as an opportunity to fly in and come buzzing around his head, probably attracted by his little wastebin, but Rylan ignored it.

It wasn’t half as annoying as the buzzing in his other ear.

“Hey Rylan,” Seth spoke from the station next to him, where he was leisurely cutting up mushrooms. “Got a Skill yet?”

Rylan didn’t reply, simply grabbing another scallop and continuing, pausing only to blow upwards to dislodge the fly after it landed on his nose.

Seth chuckled. “I guess not, huh, or you wouldn’t be here. Unless you got Shucking. Wouldn’t that be something?”

“Shucking is not a Skill,” Rylan replied blandly, his heartbeat accelerating at the provocation despite his resolve not to let it get to him.

Seth had seemed like a laid-back fellow, if a bit lazy. Perhaps Rylan’s effort had been somewhat half-hearted, but he’d still at least tried to open up to Seth about his woes. He hadn’t expected his sincerity to be rewarded with mockery. It was just disappointing, really.

“Not a known Skill,” Seth countered. “Just think about it: you could be the first!”

Rylan felt his jaws clench and made a conscious effort to relax them before he replied. “Maybe if you focused some of this extra energy into your chores, you’d be a bit more effective at them.”

“Ah, yeah,” Seth replied as Rylan shook his head to discourage the amorous fly from landing on his face again. “You see, that’s just the thing. I like being ineffective. It’s a fine line to walk, but if you show just the right amount of incompetence, you get to keep your job, without ever being saddled with difficult tasks or additional responsibilities.”

The muscle next to Rylan's right eye twitched, the fire in his belly blazing.

“Really, you could stand to learn a thing or two from me,” Seth continued proudly, as he casually carved another mushroom into slightly misshapen chunks, clearly making no effort to make nice cuts.

“I’d really rather not,” Rylan snarled, chopping the legs of his next scallop with unnecessary force, angrily shaking his head to deter the fly still buzzing around him. “I’m not the type who foists his work off on others.”

Seth shrugged happily. “Suit yourself. Having fun with those scallops? Looks like a yucky job. Guess Ava didn’t trust me not to muck it up, or I’d probably be doing it... oh well.”

Rylan opened up his mouth to shoot back a scathing reply, when his hand, trembling with rage, slipped.

Dull as the kitchen knife was, with how hard he was trying to pry it into the small opening between the scallop’s top and bottom shell, it had no trouble sinking deep into Rylan’s thumb.

Rylan hissed, sucking in a breath as the pain hit him. Unfortunately, the fly chose that moment to attempt a landing on his lips, and ended up sucked into his mouth.

Hacking and coughing, Rylan managed to spit the blasted cretin out, only for it to buzz away happily.

Seth lost it, having to hold himself up on his station not to sink through his knees laughing. “Oh Great Spirits,” he wheezed. “That was perfect! Hey, maybe you could get a comedy Skill!”

Standing there, knife still in hand, the taste of copper on his tongue from the throbbing thumb he’d reflexively stuck in his mouth, Rylan saw red.

For one glorious moment, he imagined stabbing Seth. Then his eyes found a better outlet for his rage: the fly. It had landed on a bamboo sign hung on the wall about ten feet away, a stupid thing that read, ‘Watch your fingers; in this kitchen, it’s chop or be chopped!’

In that moment, Rylan wasn’t sure which he hated more: the fly or the sign. It didn’t really matter, because they had decided to align oh so conveniently.

A strange heat rose within him. Without another thought, he flipped his knife up, caught it by the still-bloodied tip, and drew it back over his shoulder. Then he stepped forward and, with a practised motion, hurled the blade at full force.

His knife spun through the air, performing a perfect one-hundred-eighty-degree turn as it passed through the centre of the kitchen. And on the other side, it pierced through the fly’s back point-first, before sinking into the soft compressed bamboo beneath.

The still-quivering knife came to a rest there, having neatly split the fly into two perfectly symmetrical halves, right on the dot over the ‘i’ in the word knife.

Cries of surprise rang out, and a rare hush fell over the kitchen.

“You... wait, you actually hit it?” Seth asked, sounding dumbfounded.

Rylan stood there, frozen in surprise, barely registering the question. Not because he’d hit it, though. To be honest, the moment the blade had left his hand, he’d known it would. He’d felt it.

No, what had surprised him, was the voice that had suddenly started talking to him, seeming to originate from inside him somehow.

《Quintessence anomaly detected,》a cool voice spoke, its gender hard to pin down.《Spirit mutation threshold exceeded, proficiency requirement met, Attribute requirements met. Congratulations. You are eligible to obtain the Skill: Knife-Throwing. Do you accept?》

I... I did it!

Rylan could feel his face try to split into two from the width of his smile. He turned to Seth, looking the bewildered boy dead in the eyes as he said, “I accept.”

《Initiating Skill Conversion. Please prepare for Ethereon integration in three, two, one...》

Rylan hastily sat down on the ground, leaned back against his station. The last thing he saw before his eyes rolled back into his head and everything went dark, was the growing understanding, sheer disbelief, and delicious, delicious envy in Seth’s eyes.