> Sword souls are born the very moment they are forged from flame and given a name. Many other weapons, armors, and sacred items have these very same souls. They are of the Spirit Path of the Six Paths of Hingsajagra. It is these sword souls that bind and create symbiotic relationships with their wielders. Consorting with weapon souls unlock the greater secrets of these weapons, known as evocations.

>

> From The Treatise On This World's Great Spirits

"Raxri!"

The unsheathing strike came out quicker than Akazha's rapid hand seals.

Raxri's Vajra Body exploded. Always meditating.

Without looking, depending not on instinct but something greater, transcendent awareness:

The dakgatana slammed into Raxri's catching hand.

Burning with combined might of Whorl Guard and Heavenly Lightning Deflection. Hands iron.

The earth around Raxri exploded upwards. A shooting star crashed into the earth.

"Calm!" yelled Raxri straight to Sintra Kennin.

Sintra Kennin was already midway through a second slash.

Raxri turned to catch the second blade. Their hand slammed like iron against it, stopping it. They moved forward and swung Puksa out of their sheathe. Sintra Kennin swatted it away with their dakgatana, turned around, and unleashed another attack. Raxri dodged that one this time, weaving low.

The Heaven Dancer unleashed Adamant Lightning Strikes, cutting 12 different ways in a breathspan. Sintra Kennin raised their dakgatana to parry. Yet the slashes came too fast.

Rapid, rushing, the river.

They clashed, exchanged blows. Dodged, wove. Sintra Kennin thrust too low and Raxri stepped on their blade, cut three times, knocked Sintra Kennin with a kick.

The River Dragon Prince cried out. He gripped his dakgatana. His lifeline. He raised it up just as Raxri came in again, Puksa flashing. The River Dragon Prince powered through Raxri's lightning assault--multiple plates of their bringandine struck off, cut and shattered.

He swung his dakgatana. Slashed Raxri's upper right shoulder.

The Heaven Dancer was clad in protective tattoos, so the slash did not bisect Raxri outright like what the dakgatana would've done. Instead, the blow sent Raxri hurtling to Sintra's left, tumbling and dragging through the muddy riverbanks.

Akazha stepped in, like bouncing lightning. Akazha was even shorter than Raxri, but their wrath overpowered Sintra's own vanity. She leaped in with nothing but her fists, flurrying alongside a burgeon of cloth. This perplexed the grand River Dragon Prince.

They exchanged blows, quick dakgatana cuts being parried and deflected by Akazha's bare hands, which shone as if they were steel. In the silent instants where Akazha saw an opening, she would rapidly summon her kalis and send it piercing straight into that opening. A few the River Dragon Prince deflected. This sent the kalis twirling away in a glint of light, though it never hit the ground. It was sheathed again in the sun's rays...

...only for it to be summoned in Akazha's hands again when another opening revealed itself.

The few that did get past the River Dragon Prince's spirit-amped defenses struck deep and true, though thanks to Sintra Kennin's mien they were more than capable of weathering a few sword stabs, which were also mostly blunted by their brigandine armor.

But after a few of those stabs, and a few more of those rapid, brutal, kinetic exchanges, where the two of them looked like evenly matched kung fu masters, Sintra Kennin felt the sudden, random jolts of pain when exerting with their dakgatana strikes.

After a few rounds of this violent back and forth, Raxri began to rise from their impact crater. Desparate, Sintra unleashed a relentless slamming attack: dakgatana raised high and then slammed down suddenly. Five times in quick succession. The beat resounded like a war drum.

Akazha uttered a mantra and perfectly blocked each one. Every block she did, her hands shuffled into a different mudra. By the fifth mudra, she uttered a magic spell, slipped in close to Sintra Kennin's muscled torso (which at that point had showed due to Akazha blowing away chunks of brigandine) and lightly tapped Sintra Kennin's stomach.

The light tap blasted Sintra Kennin back by five tails.

He hurtled backwards, tumbling and dragging across the ground. He managed to find his feet again eventually, sticking down, blade up. But his eyes eyes betrayed true surprise. Though his eyebrows blazed, his eyes flickered with uncertainty. Nay, not uncertainty. That is a word for non-warriors. Fear. It was fear in Sintra Kennin's eyes.

And then Raxri Uttara was there, sending a Devastating Red Hand straight into Sintra Kennin's right side. He groaned in pain. And then Akazha was there to his right, sending a savage twirling kick straight into Sintra Kennin's jaw.

The River Dragon Prince stumbled, reeling, towards Raxri. Raxri grabbed Sintra Kennin while he was reeling and swapped places with him, blew him wide open with a fierce get off me, and then struck ten times with nothing but their fists, wielding their knuckles like daggers.

Akazha cried out from behind: "GING GING!"

Ice shards crashed into Sintra Kennin's side. Frost burgeoned from the struck areas.

Sintra Kennin staggered.

Raxri flickered forward. Flicked out their hand; blood scattered across Sintra Kennin's eyes. Dashed forward, slammed into Sintra Kennin's lower half, sent them crashing into the ground.

Akazha somersaulted through the air. Slammed onto Sintra Kennin's sword hand. Hand cracked opened.

Akazha twisted and performed the telekinesis mudra. Telekinesis flung the dakgatana away, clattering uselessly against a nearby boulder.

Sintra Kennin roared.

Raxri clambered on top of the dragon-man, Puksa unsheathed, and pointed it straight at Sintra Kennin's throat. "This will be your last spear of compassion," said Raxri, and their voice was both resolute and desparate. As if to say: please, I don't want to kill you. "Swear that you will not consume me. Swear that you will journey with us, and you will be able to fight with greater prowess than any of us."

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Sintra Kennin scowled.

Then, he grinned.

A mad grin.

A ferocious, competitive grin.

"Your skill in violence exceeds mine. A dragon of the river. With nothing left to give but my life, I accept, Raxri Uttara. For staying your hand, I pay with my life. I am your servant, your guardian, your sentinel. Until my final days, I will keep you safe from harm. This will be my penance, for attempting to strike you down."

Akazha stared intently at Sintra Kennin, slightly hovering above ground. Witches and wizards loved defying standard Earth Laws.

Raxri nodded, leaping off of Sintra Kennin's chest. Sintra Kennin sighed. Defeated. A few moments passed.

Raxri turned and offered their hand. Sintra Kennin accepted. "We will grow stronger together," said Raxri, a slight smile now back in their face. "And then you will return to your father and become the god of this river."

Sintra Kennin smiled and nodded.

Akazha caught their breath. In truth both she and Raxri were berathing heavily. This one took a lot of their stamina. Then, she said, eyebrows furrowed: "You're... weaker than I would have expected from a Spirit of a River. You seem well fed, however. How is it that you have not cultivated your strength?"

Raxri blinked, turned to look at Sintra, wondering.

Sintra Kennin winced at their wounds, sat up. "I have already told you. I did not cultivate my martial skill nor any violent system. I cultivated my painting skill."

Raxri smiled. "I think that's better than cultivating a martial art!"

Akazha shook her head. She took medicinal water bottle gourd from her pack and gave it to Sintra. "Here. Drink this. It will mend your wounds quicksome."

Sintra bowed deeply to Akazha. He stopped midway through, groaning from the pain. "This River Dragon Prince thanks you."

Akazha drank a few of their own medicinal waters as well. So did Raxri, after realizing that they had sustained a few injuries.

"You forgive far too easily for someone who has just been sucker punched," noted Akazha, after drinking a big gulp. While drinking, Raxri, eyes wide, pointed at themselves questioningly. As if to say: Refer you to me? Akazha nodded.

"Sintra Kennin is simply uninformed," said Raxri. "I cannot fault anyone for being uninformed." They turned to Sintra Kennin. "I have lost all my memory, great Sintra Kennin. I have no knowledge of whatever thing I've done to the Heavens. I've no knowledge of who has arranged the 108 Glaives of Heaven against me. I've no knowledge of any of these things. I am simply a warrior lost from time, shorn of memory and remembrance. I do not even know if I am the Raxri Uttara from before that you so claim to know."

Sintra nodded. "Then forgive me. I no not of anything of the grand scheme of the world. All I know is that consuming your flesh will grant the consumer certain immortality. And who does not want to become an immortal? Even the gods wish to become immortals. Only the High Gods, the Brahmas, do not wish this so. And that is because they have deluded themselves into thinking they are immortals already, due to their excessively long lifespans, which range for kalpas!"

Raxri asked: "How long is a kalpa again, if you would be so kind?"

It was Akazha who answered: "16 million years."

Raxri nodded, in seeming understanding but not in actual understanding. They could not fathom the true depths of that time-chasm. "That is quite a long time."

"Indeed it is," said Sintra. "But that is besides the point. A demon of torn attention befuddles your thoughts. All I wish is to be able to accrue power and strength so that I may prove to my father that I am all that he wishes me to be, and much more."

Raxri pouted, thinking. The three of them sat down in a crude triangle. Raxri said: "But why would you want to please your father when he is so hateful towards you?"

Sintra Kennin only smiled. He looked at Akazha, whose eyebrows were furrowed as they looked at Raxri. Shrugging, he said: "It is not as easy as just denouncing my father. The momentum of time and history is the greatest violence made to tread upon my being. I must become the next God of Wetan River, lest all the offerings made by the people of the river be in vain."

"I see," said Raxri. "That is unfortunate."

"You do not remember who your father and mother are?" asked Sintra.

Raxri shook their head. "I do not. This is my sorrow. To atone, I treat everyone as having been my father and mother at least once. In so doing I ground myself in compassion."

Akazha smiled and said: "Your training in Mount Jura has truly skewered you through with javelins of enlightenment. You speak like an insufferable yoker."

Raxri laughed at that. "I like being insufferable at times. It helps me forget that I have forgotten all my memory." Akazha rolled her eyes, though with a playful smile on her face, and lit a pipe.

"You are cultivators of the Law then?" asked Sintra Kennin.

Raxri and Akazha nodded. They shared a pipe between them. "What about you?" asked Raxri. "What do you cultivate? What do spirits cultivate?" Akazha's long, knife-tipped ears twitched in anticipation for Sintra Kennin's answer.

"Well, generally, we spirits cultivate and follow the same Ways that humans do," Sintra Kennin. "I've done River Blade Cultivation and Samadhi Water Cultivation."

"Samadhi Water Cultivation?" asked Raxri.

"These are Paths to Power," said Akazha, pointing it out. "The Law is a Path to Enlightenment."

"Right! The Abbot told me about that," said Raxri.

Sintra Kennin nodded. "Samadhi Water Cultivation is the appropriate use of Samadhi Water. That is to say, the ability to generate, control, and annihilate the element of Water, which is present in the rivers, the rains, the seas, and even the body. Everyone in our family has been inducted into the Samadhi Water Cultivation pathway, and I am quite useful with it. However, we also have our own bloodline cultivation Way: the Wetan River Dragon Cultivation. This is a cultivation system that grows as we grow. It is our inherent capability to do the things you would think a dragon of a hallowed river should be able to do: summon rains, transform into fishes, serpents, and naka forms, and be able to exercise godly control over their devotees."

"I see." Raxri tapped their chin. "So all the gods' inherent powers are nothing but Bloodline Cultivations?"

Akazha nodded. "Remember, as with all things, the gods are empty beings. There is no essential thing that makes a god. And since a god is essenceless, defining a god as having the capability to control their dominion is in truth a worthless description. Some gods have control over their dominion, others do not, others are simply gods without dominions. That is the truth of this world."

The River Dragon Prince nodded. "Though, I suppose, as with humans, not all gods and spirits have this understanding, I would think. I only knew about it because my family is a fierce adherent of the Scarlet God, and they hold a similar doctrine. Everything without essence but Ksewran."

Raxri breathed out a puff of smoke. "I see. How do you cultivate your Way, then, Sintra Kennin?"

"In the same way that you do," he replied. "By mindful training of it, understanding the ways, concerting with masters and manuscripts and manuals. Condensing and strengthening my Will Furnace through it, as Will is the flame from which all beings are wrought, and it is the very thing that will bring us transcension through cultivation."

"So drinking Will Elixirs will help you too, I take it?" asked Akazha.

Sintra Kennin nodded in confirmation.

"And for my bloodline cultivation," continued Sintra. "That gets stronger too the more offerings we get, and the more we eat soma. Hence why offerings are so useful for us gods, though it is not the only way to cultivate, and is truly just a miscellaneous addition to the primary way of cultivation through honing skills."

"I see. What complexities will I unveil next?" asked Raxri, mostly to themself.

"This is a complex world," said Akazha. "That is a facet of violence, I'm afraid."

A silence passed over them. Then, Raxri turned to Sintra Kennin. "So you are going to do it, then?"

Sintra tilted their head to the side. They truly did look like a fierce hermit warrior who has gone into the forests to perfect their martial skill. Is this the power of shapechanging? "Do what, great Raxri Uttara?"

"Walk with us. Journey with us. Attain glory and strength with us?"

Sintra smiled. "You two seem like adherents of the Law, while I am a faithful of the Scarlet God. How will this pan out?"

"It is no problem," said Akazha, shrugging. "The Law recognizes Ksewran."

"Right. In the Infinite Law, Ksewran is even considered the Termaganat Buddha!"

Sintra Kennin raised an eyebrow at that. Then, shrugging, he said: "If it is all right with you, then I share your goals. To get stronger. Ever upwards."

"To go beyond!" said Raxri, rising to their feet and pumping a fist into the air. "Until Ultrastrength is achieved!"

"Ultrastrength?" asked Akazha, stretching as she stood. A look of bemusement on her face.

"Yeah! Strength but... ultra. Forgive me, I keep hearing the word ultra being placed before words, such as Ultramystic. Does that not mean 'strongest'?"

Akazha smiled and shrugged. "It might as well. Until Ultrastrength, then."

Sintra Kennin rose to his full height, completely dwarfing the both of them, overshadowing their two pumped fists. He punched the sky and a gust of air flowed upward. He bellowed: "Until Ultrastrength!"