"You should not go after this Lord Azinu," said Heart of Fire and Spirit of Twilight Death. "Your mastery is not so complete as to challenge one on the cusp of ascension."

"What have I to fear? I have you, I have Death Shadow, and I have the soul of a phoenix. Surely whatever this Lord Azinu has is as nothing in comparison."

"No. Your power is very great for one so young as you - I have never met another in all my millenia of being who attained a perfect Core Formation stage without at least twenty years of grueling study, and that is after spending another twenty years to attain a perfect Foundation. So know that I do not put you down when I say this, but that I am assessing your strengths truly.”

“And?”

“You are unbelievably powerful. The strength of your soul and the purity of your qi and spirit are unsurpassed. But it will not be enough. It requires a thousand years of practice and hard effort to cross through the remaining stages and reach the level of near-flawlessness required to truly ascend. Though you have accomplished in years what takes most decades, even if your progress continues at this rate, it will be at least two hundred years before you are ready to challenge Lord Azinu."

"That is too long to wait," Zu insisted. "I will not take so long as that. You have been locked away in our family's storage vault for too long, Heart of Fire and Spirit of Twilight Death. You do not know as much about the world as you think."

"I am well aware of my own ignorance regarding current events," commented the sword wryly. "I am forever reminded of my long absence. But you should not underestimate the wisdom of a former immortal. I alone know how hard and long the path truly is which stretches before you. I can show you secrets to improve faster, to attain more perfect clarity, but I cannot teach you to become the match of Lord Azinu in anything less than a hundred and seventy three years."

"Then I will not rely on your teachings alone, but will find my own way to advance."

"Finding your own path is part of advancement. You cannot advance without finding your own way."

"Then I'll find two ways and do them both."

"Dual-path advancement is powerful," agreed Heart of Fire and Spirit of Twilight Death, "but it is slower and more arduous. At every stage it becomes more complicated to balance the twin paths."

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"Then I'll find five paths to attain true balance," Zu promised.

"That would be harder still. No one person in all history has ever found five paths, though from the sound of it Lord Azinu has found four."

"I will be the first, then."

"But to increase your struggles that long? To master a single path takes a lifetime and then some! It will truly be a thousand and a half years before you are ready, and Lord Azinu will by then have ascended long ago."

"Time means nothing to me. I will do it whatever the cost, however long it takes."

Something slammed into Zu like a thunderbolt, tearing his body from Death Shadow's grip and hurling him to the ground. He landed with enough force to form a new crater, branches shattering as he smashed through them and trees falling in a circle around him.

"Time means nothing to you?" taunted an unfamiliar voice. "It means a great deal to me, so stay out of my way!"

Zu leapt to his feet and gazed up to where his assailant stood in the air far above. Even as he watched, the attacker leapt forward and snatched Death Shadow from the sky. Zu felt his familiar's sudden panic as the stranger tore off one of the owl's wings, Death Shadow screaming and flapping in futile attempt to escape.

"How dare you!" Zu activated Striding Wind Sustaining and ran upward through the air.

The strange man tossed Death Shadow aside like refuse.

Zu frantically urged his Phoenix to lend Death Shadow its strength as his familiar fell toward the ground.

A spectral wing of flame formed in place of the one that had been torn off. Death Shadow caught himself and flapped into the air, his fear calming though pain still pierced him.

The stranger turned to fly away, paying no more attention to the pair he’d so causally torn from the sky.

"You will pay for that," Zu bellowed, chasing after the man. "Vile coward! You’d flee from me?”

The stranger stopped and turned back. “I’m not fleeing anyone, I’m in a hurry and you were in the way.”

“Face me properly, or I, Zu Mari, will never forgive you!"

"Zu Mari, is it? Fine. Go ahead and try. I am Ozyri Tori, last scion of the Tori clan, and I welcome your feeble attempts at vengeance."

Zu ran at him, unsheathing Heart of Fire and Spirit of Twilight Death as he did so. Ozyri Tori swooped away, gliding through the air on an unseen wind rather than running through it like Zu did.

Zu cursed his family's pathetic library, with its limited techniques. He should be soaring too, the wind carrying him at his command, not forced to rely on something so weak and basic as air-firming.

"Let me help," Death Shadow said, and swooped down despite his pain, bravely willing to face his fear in Zu's service.

It made Zu's heart swell with pride. His dear familiar had come so far. At one time Death Shadow would rather send Zu away than even speak to him. Now he was willing to risk his life on Zu’s behalf.

“Yes, come,” Zu told his faithful owl. “Together we will avenge you.”

Death Shadow lifted Zu and together they flew at Ozyri Tori.

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