Sesako immediately pulled one of the javelins he bore from its enchanted storage, and he hurled it at the emperor in an instant.

The weapon slid through him harmlessly, though Sesako knew his aim was true, and he had not seen the emperor move at all.

“Tut, tut, tut. And in my own mansion.”

The spear clattered harmlessly against the glass. The haft exploded into fire, while the metal head immediately began to melt.

“Sesako, the youngest to achieve a profound soul in centuries. The favorite of the Dragon Matriarch. One of the seven great cultivators of Yatamo. I have long longed to meet you. Such an impressive young man — how ever did you break through and live. I had quite suspected that none of you silly youths trying to become a celestial would succeed. But you have! My friend! You have.”

The simple problem was that Sesako knew that he would lose if he tried to fight this man.

No.

No. No.

He stared past the emperor at the massive magical pane of glass, and the huge array of thin cylinders below.

“And Kisiko! — My son! But get out of here. Kisi, my darling, you are too old. Go back out. You know that you are beaten, and —”

“My father, I have chosen this fate.” Kisiko spoke in a quiet, almost pained tone.

For the first time the emperor’s smile slipped.

He stared at Kisiko, his expression willing his once son-in-law to simply go elsewhere.

The emperor added, “My forces have fully occupied the exit lines you descended down. You cannot get out of here. Please, surrender. I take no joy in —”

Sesako launched a defensive array between himself and the emperor, constructed out of blue power, since he could not project the crimson power at any great distance from himself, since his fourth core was still in its earliest stages.

And then he hurled himself towards the glass.

“Uh, uh. Uh, uh.”

The blow was carefully layered right on top of his breastplate.

Bang.

Sesako could not even see where it had come from, but it felt like a kick.

He was pounded into the glowing red metal circle above them.

He banged into it at enough speed to leave a dent, and then bounced off.

He felt quite wobbly and as though he was weakening. It was from too much of that damaging essence which radiated from the power cylinders.

Both Kisiko and Takue had spread out and pulled out spears to face off towards the emperor, though Kisiko had a resigned expression. He expected no victory.

Sesako shook himself.

He began to float downwards towards the emperor, though he did not know how they could win, maybe if all three of them struck him at once…

Sesako realized as he stared down at the emperor, that the location he seemed to be in was an illusion. Sesako spoke into the telepathic connection that was still active between the three cultivators. I can see him.

We all can, Takue replied sharply.

No, said Sesako, that is not him. An illusion. The real source of the red power is seven feet to the left. It is where the force that strengthens the glass barrier actually is.

Ah! Kisiko had a delighted tone.

He won’t expect a strike to hit where he actually is, Takue said. Maybe we can pin him, and Sesako, you will have a few seconds to break through and destroy the thing down there.

The three of them descended, circling the illusion of the emperor, but always aware of his true position.

Sesako prepared himself to attack the glass while his partners pounced once more on the emperor.

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The emperor would win. Of that no doubt could be held. But Sesako hoped that he could fatally rend and rip the vital organs of the device before the emperor defeated his companions and stopped him.

As they descended, Kisiko's face changed, hardened. Sesako had a sudden jolt in his gut, as though the old man was about to betray them, like secretly Sesako had expected from the instant he volunteered to be part of this operation.

Sesako pretended to keep all his attention on the illusion of the emperor, but his mind raced.

Then Kisiko spoke to the emperor, “Why? I asked you so many times. I must ask you again — why kill the Great Ones?”

The emperor shrugged. Arms wide out. He smiled a smile that did not reach his eyes. “Why not?”

“Is there a prophecy? I beg you. I beg you upon Yanai’s soul. Upon her name and memory. Upon everything holy to you, and upon — I beg you. Tell me the truth. No — I know you cannot, and you will not. I beg you then: Tell me this, is there a reason which I might respect and honor if I knew?”

The emperor stared at Kisiko.

Sesako’s breath caught.

Kisiko, trapped in some weird moral compunction, and his enduring, and stupid belief in the emperor had come here. And he would betray them at the emperor’s word. Nothing more than that.

He should have known better than to bring Kisiko on this venture — their third should have been Fitzuki even though he was needed to lead the battle, or maybe Dairuke, or —

“No.” The emperor slowly and solemnly spoke, shaking his head. His tone was very sad, “A problem exists that must be solved. But you would claim that my particular method is selfish. And maybe you are right. It is far more convenient for me than any other.”

“And I cannot convince you, not by appealing to the memory of your daughter, nor of our friendship, nor —”

“No, fucking no!” The emperor shouted at Kisiko. “You damn fool of a peasant. Don’t —”

“-- by appealing to the beauty of life? I cannot convince you to choose to be less selfish? To choose this time to become a better man?”

“Kisi, I beg you. Don’t. It will —”

And Kisiko, without further words tore his third core from his chest, and he hurled himself towards the place the emperor actually stood, instead of where his illusion was.

As far as Sesako knew this had never been done before

When they fought with each other, profound cultivators had powers at their disposal of greater reliability than a suicide attack which would dissipate into nothingness if it did not succeed within fifteen or thirty seconds of being initiated.

Without waiting to see what would happen, Sesako dived towards the glass, his crimson wreathed fist drawn back.

The emperor had somehow known that Kisiko meant to attack his true place, and he leapt backwards from the glass surface, and up.

Sesako’s enhanced ears could hear the emperor saying as he dodged. “No, no, no, no, no. You dear, dear old fool.”

CRACK.

The whole mighty pane of glass shattered. It was not actually glass; it was a metal charmed to be transparent. Sesako had poured most of the power in his body into that single hit.

The water beneath the pane had been kept under enormous pressure, and it exploded out, in a giant spurt that was vastly hotter than boiling water.

Takue flew up to stay above this giant spurt, while the emperor was already high above, dodging with his greater speed Kisiko who chased after him.

The surge of boiling water tried to force Sesako up into the air, and Sesako’s power boiled off his skin as he poured it out of himself to keep from instantly being killed and destroyed by being surrounded by water filled with such heat and pressure.

Sesako knew he was being terribly burned despite his magical power.

He had to go downwards to the cylinders.

Before Kisiko died, and the emperor could freely attack and stop him.

He swam through the thick boiling water. His magic propelled him downwards, and in just a few seconds he was at the very bottom of the pool.

The dragon scale still could not be penetrated by the wrongness that radiated from the thousands of hot cylinders, but the rest of his body was absorbing an intense poison, and if he remained this close to the array for long, he would become so sick that he might die.

The fight above would end fast.

Sesako looked helplessly around the giant field of cylinders, covering a circle more than a hundred feet around.

He lashed at one with a bolt of power.

The cylinder was knocked over. There was an extra sizzle of power and heat that flowed from where it bounced against another.

What to do?

Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

Kisiko might already be dead. No time to think. Act.

The other in the back of his mind was gibbering with terror. They might die in any instant. They very well might.

That memory: Seeing something strike one of these, and then an explosion.

Sesako desperately tried to speak to the other with all of his intention: Will it explode if I compress it sufficiently.

No, don’t, we’ll die.

That was enough of an answer.

A sense of fading, nothingness, thought broken. Sesako felt it through the telepathic link.

Kisiko was dead.

He had an image in his mind from Takue of the emperor diving towards him in the water.

It was time.

The battle magic made this instant stretch out forever. He would kill the emperor with him.

That was all he’d ever wanted from life.

Sesako gathered once more in his fist the flickering crimson power, more than ever before, pulling all that was in his body out, as the other had ceased to feed him additional power through the fourth dantian.

Traitor and coward.

But such an angry thought was unworthy of Sesako’s soul in this hard moment.

Rather he thought upon those who he had loved, his father, his mother, his mentors, the Great One, the whole land of his birth, and beyond them all Hinete.

And he found that he was happy for their love.

He thought of Kisiko, always speaking of his intent to live, but the old man had unhesitatingly sacrificed himself to give Sesako this opportunity.

Fist drawn back, full of power.

It would be enough.

The emperor was far away, and he could not reach him in time to do anything.

And then, as Sesako began to deliver his punch straight down onto the rod —

Honking horns. Screams of others. Tall buildings constructed from glass and steel all around.

Surprise.

Squealing. It was on the wrong side of the road.

A giant yellow van, with: We Deliver, and a phone number written on the side.

Instant of knowing.

Scream of refusal.

And suddenly, inevitably, the other seized control of their body from Sesako.