Eventually, I woke up, and I felt like absolute garbage.

Like someone had taken me, wrung me out like a towel, then flung me into the wall a couple times for good measure. I felt every single bone in my body ache and creak. My heart felt like it was about to burst from simply beating. Opening my eyelids was so straining I thought they were about to cramp.

It was all worth it to wake up to Ann’s face.

“Hey gorgeous,” I croaked, my voice raspy and almost silent to my still ringing ears.

And despite all that, I saw my love’s face light up, and I thought that all the pain in the world might not matter that much. “Fio!” she yelled, wrapping her arms around me for all of half a second, before she saw my grimace and drew back.

“I- I’m so sorry, I-, I-” she stammered, struggling to catch her breath. “You must be hurt, I didn’t think, I’m just so glad that you’re, you’re…”

“You’re alright,” I croaked, managing a crooked smile for her. My lips cracked open, the skin horrendously dry after the cold. “I’m… also alright.”

Cass was buzzing about in the back of my head. She made it clear that there were things going on, but that she had them handled until I was ready to interact with them. For now, Ann deserved my attention so, so much more.

She teared up a little as I talked. “Thank you, Fio. For surviving. For holding on.” She was wiping at her face as she spoke. The tears dropped to the floor in liquid form, and I never thought I could be so glad to see someone cry.

I felt warm, on the outside and the inside.

“Always. Gonna always… come back for ya…” I said, smiling.

Ann had the decency to chuckle at that. She pulled up a waterskin and laid it against my lips. “There,” she said, “you must be thirsty.” And I was, horribly so. I’d lost a lot of liquid from all the bleeding I’d done. Probably more than enough to kill an ordinary person thrice over.

It still smelled like iron. How long had I been out? I wanted to gaze at my cores, but they were… full. Which wasn’t exactly helpful for telling the time. The fusion with the gateway must have filled them up. Also, they were larger than what I remembered. Considerably larger, too.

I grimaced, another wave of pain wracking my body and coughed some of the water Ann was slowly giving me back up. I should stop being distracted while drinking. She seemed about to apologize when I waved her off.

“My bad,” I croaked again, though my throat already felt considerably better. “Looked… at cores. Dumb.”

Ann let out an exasperated giggle, like she was completely done with me, shaking her head and crying some more. “I fucking swear, Fio, you’re crazy… All this. You could just ask me how long you were out, dummy!”

I stared at her, and her smile turned crooked.

“Of course I know what you’re thinking. You only tell me half the things inside that thick skull of yours, so I’m left to figure out a good chunk of it myself. What did you expect?” she asked.

I had to suppress a chuckle at that. My abs felt like someone had ruthlessly dragged a cheese grater over them, so I didn’t exactly feel like straining my core.

“You were out for two days,” Ann finally supplied. “Two days, fully unconscious. The twins had been using special spells to keep you satiated. Meant that some of us got less healing for minor scrapes since Divinity to nutrient conversion is apparently low. But even Matt said he was fine healing, as long as they kept you alive.”

“What can I say, I’m a man of honor!” the swordsman yelled. The volume hurt against my ears, but it let me estimate how far he was away. Maybe… 10 metres? Other side of a decently sized room.

When I focused, I heard a lot more noises. The scraping of a whetstone on a knife, for example. Some fletching. Armor being polished. And the simmering of food in a pot.

I felt myself salivating, and Ann let out another chuckle. “Yes Matt, we’re all very proud,” she said, before turning back to me. “Ah, you must be hungry,” she immediately noted. “We’re making stew. Plenty of water in melting the snow. Boiling things is the easiest thing we got available. We’ve been taking apart some of the furniture to keep up the fire. Small tunnel at the top for the smoke to escape.”

“Yeah,” I croaked, nodding slowly. “Hungry.”

Ann flashed me a small smile and ducked away, letting me see the rest of the room. Liam was sharpening his knives, Emilia maintaining her armor, Marie making new arrows. Reya and Eric were cooking stew, and Matt looked about half as bad as me, propped up against a wall.

“You look… like shit,” I rasped out at the swordman, my lips twisting into a grin, despite the fact that my face hurt.

“I’d say to look in the mirror, but I think this place only had one, and you ate it, ya big glutton,” he quipped back. His voice sounded full and healthy.

“Glad you survived,” I said.

“You too.”

Silence filled the room again, only interrupted by Ann pouring some of the stew into a small bowl from her inventory, then chilling it with a spell. Given that my stomach had been torn open, I thought that having the food be at a comfortable temperature was probably a good idea, too.

She quickly shuffled back over to me, sitting down. I was leaning on a wall, padded with a couple blankets. They were clean, surprisingly, which told me that they’d probably been replaced once I stopped bleeding.

“Open wide,” Ann said with a smile, bringing a spoon to my mouth, and I swallowed the food.

It tasted good. Which was more of an attest to my hunger than the quality of the stew. Boiling the stuff from our rations only really made for emergency food, and I don’t think I would have enjoyed this any other day. But, you know, being fed by Ann in a quiet, cool room, while covered in blankets… Maybe I could’ve gotten used to that.

After the first swallow, I felt the food settle in my stomach. It ached a little, but it was more of a distant pull, letting me know not to overeat, for now. So after just three quarters of the bowl, I’d had enough. Ann nodded, and finished the rest herself.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Throughout the rest of the day, the twins slept a lot. They’d been running their Divinity empty for two days just to keep me alive. I was grateful for that, and they deserved to sleep more. They awoke again during the evening, pouring a couple more spells into my wounds, and the pain wracking my entire body got a bit better.

I chatted quietly with everyone, about everything and nothing at all. Emilia, especially, seemed bitter that I’d gotten so hurt again. I smiled and waved her off. I was alive, that was all that mattered.

This little experience also made me well and truly grateful for iron mind. I don’t think I would’ve woken back up if I’d fallen unconscious while being pulled around. And even now, being able to push the pain aside in favour of talking to the others was nice.

By the time evening rolled around, our talks quieted down, and people slowly went to sleep. Or meditated, or cultivated, or whatever. I’d talked with Cass about how I felt before, just to keep her some company and make her feel included, but then I finally asked her to give me the rundown.

[Alright!] she said. [Gateway integrity is now at 50%. Projected to reach 70 or 80 by the time we get back to Renvil.]

I nodded. That was good, something I could work with. Sounded like I’d get around 2, maybe 3 weeks back on the other side. Depending on the time differential, that was, and whether my gateway healed at the speed of the body I was currently inhabiting.

Last time I’d gotten injured and returned to the other side, I’d spent two months there, and only three weeks or so had passed in Eden. But that was summer. In autumn, that difference slowly shifted to be around the same, then in winter, more time would pass in Eden compared to the other side.

Which fit my plans quite nicely. I’d spend quite a bit of time in Eden, after all, and if I spent a couple months here, and only half or less of that passed on the other side, my family would hopefully not miss me too much.

[The gateway has begun repairing itself quicker, now, since your mirror core has grown.] Cass continued.

“Grown?” I asked her.

[Ah. You might want to check your status window.]

I opened it, as she suggested, giving it a mental command to show me anything which changed.

[Name: Fiona Bellum

Class: Spearwoman (7) / Gateway (4)

* - Techniques

* * + Spear Techniques

* * - Qi Techniques

* * * + General

* * * - Golden Core

* Spear Qi (Intermediate) (Manifest your Qi outside your body and on your weapon)

* Golden Body (Low -> Basic) (Flood your body with your Qi to temporarily improve all physical attributes)

* Weapon Resonance (Low -> Basic) (You and your weapon are one. It resonates with your Qi, amplifying its effect.)

* * * + Mirror Core

* - Stats

* - General

* Strength: Low (Superior) -> Medium (Inferior)

* Agility: Medium (Lesser -> Basic)

* Endurance: Medium (Greater -> Superior)

* Resilience: Medium (Basic -> Greater)

* Manipulation: Low (Superior)

* Capacity: Medium (Lesser -> Basic)

* Absorption: Medium (Inferior -> Basic)

* - Qi

* * * - Gold

* Purity (Intermediate)

* Realm (Golden Core)

* Stage (4th Step)

* Path (Voyage through the Golden Shores)

* - Mirror

* * * * Purity (Perfect)

* Realm (Mirror Core)

* Stage (2nd -> 4th Step)

* Path (Imprint upon infinite Self-Similarity)

* + Disposition

Current Status: Wounded.]

I marvelled at the improvements. Strength, especially, was incredible. Crossing a major realm, like from low to medium, was an insane step. I suppose the amount of force I’d been putting myself through must’ve made a difference there.

But even absorption and resilience each improved by two minor realms. I understood why resilience would, since I’d had a quite significant wound to heal, but absorption? Maybe it was all the snow Qi, combined with absorbing enough power from the lost gateway to take my mirror core two steps up at once.

Which was insane. The fact that it already stood on the same stage as my golden core was simple madness. Then again, I felt voyage burning in my chest, begging to be used. The lost gateway had also supercharged my golden core, clearly, and I’d seen and fought a lot, which was exactly something voyage profited.

The only stat that hadn’t increased was manipulation, which was to be expected. My skill in manipulating Qi had drastically improved, especially since I started suppressing half of it, but it still didn’t increase, which was more of a testament to how hard major realms were to cross than anything else.

I did grimace a little at my stats. Agility used to be my second highest, and now it was a far cry from that. My master would have chided me for this by now. He’d always valued the flexibility that came with the stat.

You didn’t need to hit hard with a weapon, usually just scoring many hits was enough. It also allowed you to dodge, which meant you needed less resilience if you had a lot invested in the stat. It was why he’d made me prioritise it so much.

That was another bit of catching up I had to do, then.

Though I was glad to see my Qi techniques levelling a bit.

Weapon resonance was quite passive, but I’d been feeling like I was getting a better grip on it recently. [Golden Body] on the other hand still felt kinda unnatural, like I had to flick that mental switch, though I did manage to somehow keep it up throughout the entire battle with the kamaitachi. That was probably what had taken it from low to basic, the fact that I maintained the ability for the entire fight.

As for weapon resonance, it felt a lot more instinctive. I’d gotten it once I got a bound weapon and learned how to channel my Qi into it. Since then, it had stagnated a little, but with recently repairing my spear, and reinforcing it by depositing Qi in it, I guessed that was enough to bring it up by a notch.

Spear Qi still sat at intermediate, one level above the other two. Techniques always started at low, then advanced to basic, then to intermediate, then high. I didn’t know what came after that, since my highest techniques were at intermediate, and my master said there was no point in telling me about something that was so far away.

The progression was similar to stats, but a little different after all.

Well. While I was healing, I suppose I might as well get to it, then. Imprint had used up most of the progress I’d made by seeing the world, and cultivating there would only lead to a bottleneck, meanwhile, voyage was rearing to be used. Gently, I partially suppressed my mirror Qi - if the kamaitachi weren’t held off by the wards that supposedly still stood, why would anything else be repelled - and began to cultivate.