Akari followed Kalden down the crowded train aisle. Puddles of melted snow covered the floors, and she had to grasp the rail to keep from slipping. Fortunately, she’d been wearing Hana’s old combat boots all winter, and these had better traction than her Traverse shoes.
The first few cars were bustling with people. But they all stepped aside when they saw His Goldship, Kalden Trengsen, strutting through. Kalden didn’t even notice the special treatment. But why would he? People did the same thing for him at school.
At first, she’d expected them to ride the free cars to White Vale. But Kalden kept on walking toward the front of the train. He stopped at a private cabin, glanced at his ticket stub, then slid open the wooden door.
“We could have boarded up here,” Akari told him.
“Sorry about that.” Kalden threw his bag on the plush leather seat and sat down. “I don’t travel by train that often.”
Akari took the seat across from him. It was wide enough for three people, and she could easily stretch out and take a nap if she wanted to. “I thought your family traveled . . .” She trailed off, remembering his fancy car. “Never mind.”
Some Silvers like her foster parents owned cars, but they rarely used them for longer trips like this. Fuel-grade mana might be the cheapest type per ounce, but it would still cost you a few silvernotes to cross Arkala. Golds didn’t worry about stuff like that.
“My mom usually rides with a private driver,” Kalden said. “We could have used one today, but then we’d risk someone tattling on us.”
“Bet this cabin wasn’t cheap though,” Akari said as she glanced around. At this point, she half-expected an attendant to knock on the door and offer them wine and chocolate. She met Kalden’s eyes again. “Did your mom finally stop snooping on your bank account?”
He shook his head. “I told her about the trip.”
Her eyebrows shot up at that.
“I said I was going to White Vale to forage ingredients for an alchemy project.”
“And she believed that? I thought Golds just bought everything.”
He waggled a hand. “Most commercial ingredients are farmgrown, and farms aren’t known for their ambient mana. Especially compared to the Contested Area.”
Akari leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “So we can explore beyond the wall?”
Kalden hesitated. “Depends on what Apprentice wants from us. But yeah, I got a license just in case.”
That was a good start. Apprentice’s last few messages had been vague, but he’d hinted at a trip outside the walls. In his own words, he could mop the floor with most mana beasts, but he needed someone to cash in the bounties at the Hunters’ Guild.
Akari had wanted to visit White Vale ever since their tunnel excursion last Hexember. This was shaping up to be a great weekend, assuming Apprentice didn’t betray them.
“So your mom won’t let you learn mana arts,” Akari said, “but she’s cool with dangerous trips like this?”
“I told her I’d hire some hunters for protection,” Kalden said. “So I wouldn’t be in real danger. I could technically pay someone to forage, too, but she considers this an acceptable hobby.”
“And what’s so wrong with mana arts? What’s she have against it?” Akari never would have pried this much before, but she and Kalden had known each other for a while now. And after what she’d shared last weekend, he owed her some secrets in return.
Kalden didn’t answer for a while. He just sat there with his brow furrowed. Eventually, the train rolled forward on its iron rails, and Elegan’s skyline became visible out the window.
No sooner had they started moving than an attendant knocked on the cabin door with beverages. Kalden took a glass of water while Akari got a coffee. It wasn’t half as good as Jumpstart’s, but at least the cup would keep her fingers warm.
“I had an older brother,” Kalden said once they were alone. “His name was Sozen.”
Akari looked up from the cardboard cup. He’d mentioned his father many times, but never an older brother.
Kalden glanced out the window as the city faded into farmland. “Sozen was training to be a combat artist like my parents. He was better than some fourth-year students when he joined the school’s mana arts program. By his third year, he could beat the teachers in a duel.”
“What was his aspect?” Akari asked. Probably not the most tactful question, but aspects had been on her mind all week, and beating teachers sounded awesome.
“Metal,” Kalden said in a distracted tone. “Same as my parents. Sozen also had dreams about the outside world. He became obsessed with the idea of leaving the Archipelago.”
“Dreams,” Akari echoed. “Sounds familiar.”
Kalden gave a slow nod. “He argued with my mom a lot back then. He said he wanted to join the next expedition to Cadria. Not just that, but he wanted us to go with him. He mentioned ranks beyond Gold—ranks we couldn’t reach if we were ‘trapped’ here.” He rubbed his forehead. “It’s been so long—I don’t remember all the details. I might be conflating these memories with the Grandmaster’s videos.”
Or maybe Sozen had seen the same videos? Even if Apprentice brought this latest batch, the videos had clearly been around for a lot longer.
“My mom wouldn’t budge, so he went behind her back and funded his own trip. He found a boat, hired a crew, and disappeared one night.”
“How’d he get past the guards?” Akari asked. Probably another rude question, but she couldn’t help herself. Some of the best Martials guarded the shield gate in Keylas. People like Emberlyn Frostblade’s father.
Kalden shrugged a shoulder. “We never found his body, but his badge washed up on shore a few weeks later. The Martials returned it to my mom.” He took a drink of his water. “That was a year and a half ago.”
Akari took a sip of her coffee and considered. “You think he’s still alive?”
“The Inner Sea’s always been dangerous,” Kalden said. “Some of the tides can reach over a hundred feet high. But he had three water artists on his crew. Part of me wants to believe he’s still out there, but I’m not getting my hopes up.”
“And your mom blames mana arts?”
Another shrug. “She thinks Sozen’s training caused his dreams. Not true, of course—I’ve been having the same ones for years. But I never told her that.”
They continued their journey west, passing miles of farmland along the way. Two hours passed, then the train turned north along Ironhaven’s suburbs. A cluster of tall gray buildings dominated the horizon, and Kalden pointed out landmarks along the way. These were mostly buildings his mother owned, along with the surgeball stadium and the university where Hana studied.
Apparently, Kalden had been accepted into IU’s alchemy program the following year. He didn’t sound too excited about it, though.
As the train reached Ironhaven’s northern border, she caught glimpses of a glowing blue mana beyond the skyline. This wasn’t half as tall as the one around the island, but that made sense. This wall was built to keep out mana beasts, not ten-story tidal waves.
Their surroundings turned to farmland yet again. But instead of flat fields, they passed terraced rice paddies that looked like giant white staircases beneath the snow. The mana wall grew more visible over time, and Akari spotted smaller military outposts every five to ten miles.
She and Kalden spent the remainder of the trip training. Once they’d hammered out their deal with Apprentice, he’d sent them the Grandmaster’s advanced shaping video in good faith. Akari had expected this video to focus on Missile techniques, like how she’d been weaving her mana through the trees.
But that would have been too easy. Instead of Missiles, the Grandmaster had them moving physical objects with smaller bursts of mana. It was like their early lessons with the surgeball, but much more precise.
Today, she and Kalden worked on levitating bottle caps above their outstretched hands. This was harder than a Missile in many ways. It was one thing to release a burst of raw power, but this required a slow, constant stream of mana. If you pushed too hard, the cap would fly up and hit the ceiling. Too light, and it would fall back in your hand.
Fortunately, Akari had seen enough mana arts movies to trust this process. Someday, these supposedly useless techniques would translate into badass combat moves. At least, they better. Otherwise, her whole childhood was a lie.
They trained in silence for another hour until the train reached White Vale. The town itself was nothing special. Just some restaurants and tourist attractions that looked suspiciously like gift shops. What did they even sell there? Stuffed mana beasts?
Only the Hunters’ Guild Hall caught her eye. The massive wooden building looked like a cross between a hotel, a shopping mall, and a log cabin. At five stories tall, it towered over the rest of the town, including the mana wall to the west.
The train stopped on a raised platform above the parking lot, and they stood and shouldered their backpacks. After spending almost four hours on a train, it felt good to stand on her own two legs again.
If only she could say the same for the weather. Bursts of icy wind struck her cheeks as she stepped outside. Akari huddled in her hoodie and glared up at Kalden. His teeth weren’t chattering, and he looked far too warm in his scarf and gloves.
They stepped through a pair of glass double doors into the Guild Hall’s main lobby. This shared the outside’s aesthetic with polished wooden floors and rustic walls. A brick fireplace filled one corner, surrounded by decorative weapons and hunting trophies.
A desk sat at the end of the lobby, which was probably where people checked in at the hotel. She and Kalden ignored this for now and stepped into a busy concourse. Various colorful shops lined the edges, selling weapons, clothing, and other mana arts gear.
They passed dozens of hunters along the way, ranging from teenagers to grizzled old veterans. Most carried Missile rods at their belts and wore sigil-enhanced clothing. At least a third of them wore Gold badges, which was a higher ratio than she’d seen anywhere else on Arkala. The rest were all Silver, including the shop employees. Needless to say, Akari stuck close to Kalden as they walked.
What would Apprentice think? Would he see her as weak and useless? This was someone who could knock out Gold Martials with a flick of his wrist.
He didn’t ask about your rank, Akari reminded herself. He would have asked if it mattered.
They reached the dining area a minute later. Once again, they’d modeled the style after an inn’s common room, but it also reminded her of a food court. Various restaurants lined the far wall with a sea of tables and booths spread out in front of them.
Alright, she thought. Time to meet the most dangerous person on this island.
~~~
Kalden’s stomach growled as he inhaled the scents of the food court. He and Akari passed more than half a dozen restaurants as they walked, and each one smelled better than the last.
The first three were the usual food-court fare. Jumpstart was an Espirian chain restaurant that specialized in coffee and breakfast foods. Interlude and Elements were similar but with a focus on sandwiches, soups, and salads.
They also passed two Shokenese places he didn’t recognize—one sold ramen while the other served stir-fry dishes. Kalden’s stomach protested even more as the scents of sesame oil and garlic hit his nostrils.
Whose idea was it to schedule the meeting right at lunchtime, anyway?
He hadn’t eaten since his protein bar on the train, and that was two hours ago. He’d actually packed two bars for the trip, but then Akari had eyed his first one like a sad puppy, and one thing led to another.
After making a quick lap around the tables, Kalden noted the security camera placement and found a corner booth out of range. They removed their backpacks and slipped into one side of the booth.
No sooner had they gotten settled than his stomach growled again. Was that hunger or nerves this time?
They’d talked about helping Apprentice, but potential crimes weren’t crimes. He’d even researched the laws to be sure. If the Martials closed in right now, he and Akari wouldn’t get more than a slap on the wrist.
And if Apprentice planned to hurt them . . . well, that was the real benefit to meeting in a crowded room. The Hunters’ Guild didn’t allow fights inside their walls, and every member had the authority to stop them. Judging by how this crowd carried themselves, most would jump at the chance to test their skills against a troublemaker.
They waited in silence for a few minutes before the clock finally struck noon. When it did, Kalden unclipped his badge from its silken ribbon and reclipped it backward with the smooth side facing out. Akari did the same beside him. They’d all agreed on this prearranged signal beforehand, which made it the first doorway of no return.
Kalden kept scanning the crowd as he waited. No one knew what the Fugitive looked like. Otherwise, they never could have risked a public meeting.
A young woman approached the table with her gold badge twisted around. She was a bit older than Kalden, but probably no more than eighteen. She had pale skin with a cluster of freckles that ran across the bridge of her nose. Her long red hair was pulled back in a thick braid that fell over her left shoulder.
“Empty seats are so hard to come by in here.” She smiled at them both, resting her hands on the chairs opposite their booth.
That was the passphrase, but who was this? The real Apprentice, or a proxy?
He eyed the girl for several seconds before answering. She had a confident smile, but her green eyes betrayed a hint of desperation and uncertainty. Surprisingly, that matched the person they’d messaged with on the dark web.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“This one’s all yours,” Kalden said, repeating the end of the passphrase.
“Oh, thank the Angels!” A sigh of relief escaped her lips and she sank into the nearest chair. “You had me worried there.”
Akari cleared her throat to Kalden’s right. “So you’re—”
“Just one second.” The girl reached into her jacket and pulled out a palm-sized device. Shaped like a small dome, it had a shiny metal surface. “You guys familiar with this?”
Kalden leaned forward, and it didn’t take him long to recognize the sigils. “It’s a sound suppressor.” His mother kept these between most rooms in their house. They weren’t cheap, but they kept the staff from eavesdropping.
The girl pressed the button in the center. One minute, Kalden’s ears were filled with the sounds of music and the low roar of conversation. But as soon as her finger touched the device, everything snapped into a sudden silence. He felt Akari jump beside him, and his own heart skipped several beats.
“Yes,” the girl said to Akari’s unspoken question. “My name’s Relia, but you know me as Apprentice. Or the Fugitive, depending on who you ask.”
Kalden and Akari exchanged a glance.
Relia fidgeted with her red braid. “Hey, it’s not like I ever claimed to be a forty-year-old man.”
True. The media had described the Fugitive that way, despite having no evidence. Like everyone else, Kalden had latched on to that narrative without a second thought. Even so . . .
“You don’t look like someone who’s been living in the wild,” he said. Aside from her freckles, Relia’s pale cheeks were smooth and unblemished. She was also wearing lip gloss and eyeliner. Nothing about her screamed ‘power’ either. Despite her gold badge, she wore a red flannel shirt, blue jeans, and an olive military jacket.
Relia laughed at that. “I’m not trying to look like the Fugitive.” She gestured around the food court with one hand. “Quite the opposite, in fact.”
“Fair enough,” Kalden said. Anyone who showed up in White Vale dressed as a barbarian would be high on the Martials’ suspect list. The same went for anyone who looked too armed, or even too competent.
“Still wouldn’t say no to some proof,” Akari said.
“Look at me,” Relia said, “and I mean really look.”
It took Kalden a second to catch her meaning, then he relaxed his vision, letting his Silver Sight overlay the physical world. A sea of mana sprang to life around the room. He saw hundreds of Silvers and Golds throughout the food court, their souls shining like moons in the night sky.
Then, Kalden stared down at Relia’s chest. She’d given him permission, which hopefully made it less weird. At first, he didn’t see the glow of mana he’d expected. If anything, she had even less than a Bronze. Then a faint light blossomed from her soul like water shooting from a geyser.
Over the next few heartbeats, the light’s intensity grew from Silver to the peak of Gold. Before, it had been the size of a marble. Now, it must have been as wide as Kalden’s fist. Most Golds never reached this height.
Her soul widened further until it exploded like a supernova. The light burned Kalden’s eyes, and he had to look away.
“What are you?” he finally asked as he blinked away his growing headache.
Relia just smiled. “Apprentice isn’t my name. It’s my rank.”
Chills crept up Kalden’s arms. So, there really were ranks beyond Gold? The Grandmaster had implied as much with his own title, but it was one thing to hear about powerful mana artists. Quite another to find yourself sitting in front of one.
“Wanna let me in on the secret?” Akari asked. “Can’t see a thing over here.”
Kalden looked again, and the light in Relia’s chest dimmed to an ordinary level. Did that mean she could veil her power?
“Her soul,” Kalden said. “It’s twice as bright as the strongest Golds.”
Akari frowned. She still hadn’t gained the ability to see mana, so he understood her frustration.
Slowly, she undid the strap of her mana watch and slid it across the table. “I like numbers better than flashy lights.”
Relia didn’t hesitate before unbuttoning the top of her flannel shirt and pressing the device to her chest. The LCD screen lit up and showed her mana counts: 2154/2154.
“Holy shit in Talek’s beard,” Akari muttered.
Kalden wouldn’t have phrased it that way, but he shared the sentiment. His own mana count was just over two hundred, and eight hundred was supposedly the peak of Gold.
Akari closed her mouth, then opened it again. “How the hell—”
“Let’s take a step back.” Relia slid the watch to Akari across the table. “You’ve got your proof now, but I still don’t know your names.”
“Sorry,” he said with a quick shake of his head. “I’m Kalden.”
She raised her thin eyebrows. “Just Kalden?”
“Just Relia?” he retorted.
She grinned. “Relia Dawnfire.”
Dawnfire. That sounded like an older clan from Northern Espiria. As if her pale skin and red hair weren’t already a dead giveaway. Did that make her a fire artist, the same way Frostblade hinted at Emberlyn’s ice techniques? Kalden wanted to ask, but he owed her his own clan name first. He hadn’t wanted to give this away, but he and Akari had rejected the idea of false identities. Better to build trust where they could.
“Kalden Trengsen,” he said, returning the girl’s smile.
She nodded and turned to Kalden’s right. “Guess that makes you Akari?”
“That’s me. Thanks for the scare last week. Really helped me sleep at night.”
“Oh.” Relia winced. “Sorry about that. I didn’t know how else to get your attention. I’ve been on this island for a while now, and no one else will listen to me. The news has everyone thinking I’m a dangerous killer.”
Kalden blinked. At first, he’d assumed the media found out about Relia by accident, but this made even more sense. If she was trying to contact people, then the media was the quickest way to turn them against her.
“But you are dangerous,” Akari said. “Right? You didn’t get that strong by planting flowers and raising chickens.”
“I can handle myself,” she said with a small shrug, “but we didn’t come here to fight.”
“We?” Kalden asked.
“Me, my master, and the rest of our crew. We came here to investigate your island—to talk to people, and try to help them. We knew it might be hard, but we didn’t expect to get backstabbed so soon.”
Kalden gave a slow nod, still trying to fit all these pieces together in his head. “What happened to your master? Where is he now?”
“Or she,” Akari offered.
“It’s a he,” Relia confirmed. “You should know. You’ve already seen half his videos.”
Kalden’s eyebrows shot up at that. “The Grandmaster? He’s here? On Arkala?”
Relia nodded. “We got separated the first day. He’s been researching these islands for years—trying to figure out what happened. Our boat landed on the beach in Hexember. It was on the northwest side of the island, near the place you call Keylas. My master went into the forest by himself and talked to the guards. That’s when they attacked him.”
“How do you know what happened if he went alone?” Kalden had a hundred other questions, but this one seemed the most relevant.
“He was wearing a body camera on his jacket.” Relia gestured to a spot on her own shoulder. “I saw the whole thing from our computer on the beach.”
Kalden struggled to imagine a camera small enough to fit on someone’s jacket or a computer that worked on a beach with no outlets. Maybe they had more advanced technology where they came from.
“My master told the Martials about the outside world. They pretended to care at first, then they lured him into a room with some kind of toxic gas.” She bit her lip before continuing. “We lost the camera feed a few minutes later. That’s when me and Moreno—the knowledge artist—went after him. We tore that whole place apart, but he was gone.”
Relia wasn’t exaggerating about tearing the place about. The news reporters had mentioned hundreds of goldnotes’ worth of property damage. But they hadn’t killed any of the Martials, strangely enough. That implied a great deal of control on her part.
“Wait,” Akari broke in. “You said you could mop the floor with Gold Martials. Now they captured your master?”
A flash of color rose to Relia’s cheeks. “They took him by surprise!”
“Still,” Akari said, “not so smart to turn your back on an enemy.”
Kalden wouldn’t have phrased it so bluntly, but she made some good points. If the Martials brought down the Grandmaster, then they were far more dangerous than Relia pretended.
Even Golds had a higher resistance to toxins than the lower ranks. That much Kalden knew from his alchemy classes. If people like Relia and her master had mana counts in the thousands, they should have been immune. Clearly, the Martials had anticipated that and prepared accordingly.
Relia let out a long breath. “See, that’s the thing—we had no reason to suspect the Martials, or treat them as enemies. We came here to rescue your people.”
“Rescue us?” Kalden asked. “From what?”
She tapped her fingers on the wooden table, considering her next words. “That’s where things get complicated. Everyone here thinks the outside world is gone. But you guys have it backwards. Nothing happened to Espiria, Shoken, or Cadria.” She raised two fingers to point at them. “You guys are the ones who dropped off the map.”
Kalden blinked several times. He heard Relia’s words, but his brain struggled to process them. He’d already accepted that people might live outside the Archipelago. After all, what was so special about this place? What made them the only survivors on the planet? Sure, they had a mana shield, but so did every other island and coastal city. The whole narrative had always seemed too clean and tidy to be real.
But the entire world . . . alive and well?
No way.
“We dropped off the map,” Akari echoed with the same skepticism. “What’s that even mean?”
Relia unbuckled her satchel, which sat on the chair beside her. She pulled out a thick brown envelope and poured a stack of papers onto the table between them.
Akari grabbed a sheet at random, adjusting her glasses to read. Kalden leaned over the table and began scanning the others. Most were encyclopedia articles, and they all related to the Archipelago in some way.
One particular title caught his eye: Arkala’s Destruction.
The text went on to describe how Arkala’s mana shield had failed on Quintember 58th, 850. Four years before Kalden was born. The failure happened during a storm, and that storm sent a devastating tidal wave from the northeast, destroying every city in its path.
His eyes settled on a few photos of Tidegate with its streets submerged underwater. Cars sat piled up against the buildings like scattered leaves. The buildings themselves didn’t fare much better—just metal skeletons of their former selves.
A chill crept up Kalden’s spine as he took in similar photos of Ironhaven and Shoken Port. No survivors.
“These pictures are fake.” He looked up from the article. “They must be. I mean—these cities are still here.”
“I know,” Relia said in a gentle voice. “My master wouldn’t be here if he believed this.”
“Still—” Kalden started to speak, but he found his mouth dry. He unscrewed his water bottle before he spoke again. “There are more than a quarter-million people here. You can’t just cover that up.”
“You thought the rest of the world was dead,” Relia pointed out. “Which scenario is more likely? A storm destroying three tiny islands, or the entire ring of continents?”
Kalden narrowed his eyes as he scanned more papers. They weren’t all about the Archipelago, he realized. Others described world events from the last decade—from wars in Creta to smaller countries breaking free from the Shoken Empire. They even covered entertainment, from the latest games and movies to the last few surgeball championships.
Beside him, Akari rummaged through the pile, revealing a list of technological breakthroughs. One Espirian company had invented a mobile phone that could fit inside your pocket and draw power from your mana channels. The next article described a thin, foldable computer that also ran on mana batteries. The list went on, from cars to airships to mana Constructs.
It was too much to take in, so Kalden looked away, taking a deep breath and considering Relia’s last question. Despite the mountain of evidence, his brain still rejected these ideas. He’d spent his whole life believing this was humanity’s last haven.
What now? It was all a lie?
He tried imagining this as an outside observer. It did seem more likely for three islands to vanish as opposed to all of human civilization. However, he could also turn Relia’s logic against her.
He looked up and met the red-haired girl’s eyes. “You’re saying that billions of people were fooled?” He grabbed one of the first papers and held it up. “You’re saying they all believe this story?”
“Billions?” Relia shook her head. “No. The Archipelago is the whole world to you, but most people have never even heard of it. There are ten thousand Islands in the Inner Sea, and twice that number in the outer oceans.”
In other words, no one had been fooled, because no one actually cared. Kalden leaned back against the booth’s cushion, feeling suddenly trapped. Relia was right—this had been his whole world. Now, it felt far too small.
“What really happened twenty years ago?” he asked.
Relia spread out her hands in a helpless gesture. “We don’t know.”
“Seriously?”
“My master had some theories, but we had no idea what we’d find.”
“But something happened,” Kalden pressed. “My mom remembers picking up the phone and calling people in Espiria or Shoken. We used to see passing boats, and spatial artists could make portals to the mainland. That all stopped one day.”
Relia took a deep breath. “You’ve got a mana wall around your island, right?”
Kalden nodded.
“Most coastal cities have the same thing,” she explained. “These shields glow like Midwinter trees at night, and a passing boat can spot them forty miles away. But everything was pitch black when we came here. My master didn’t see the shield until he was standing ten feet away from it.”
“So there are more Constructs?” Akari gestured to the sound suppressor. “We can stop sound from escaping. Why not do the same for light and radiation?”
“Maybe,” Kalden said slowly. “But think of how much mana we spend to keep the regular shields running. Plus the thousands of state employees who maintain it. Who’s keeping these other Constructs from falling apart? How do they keep them a secret?”
Akari furrowed her brows at that.
“You guys might be on the right track,” Relia said. “My master mentioned dream mana as a possibility. That could affect light and sound. No clue how they kept it running though.”
“A better question is why,” Akari said. “Wouldn’t it be less work to destroy the island for real?”
“Good point,” Kalden said. If you wanted to block all light and sound, you would need a dome that covered the whole sky. That would take exponentially more mana than a simple wall. Then there was the cost of converting it to the proper aspects.
Like Akari said, if someone could manage that feat, they could have killed everyone for real.
Of course, there were other possibilities. History was filled with tyrants who isolated their territory so they could rule unopposed. Was that happening here? Unlikely. Bronze were treated unfairly, but he doubted there was some evil overlord controlling things from the shadows. Their leaders were all elected, and they changed every term. Kalden’s stepfather, Genkai, was one of them.
“It makes no sense,” Relia agreed. “And it gets weirder.” She fingered the golden disc that hung from her neck. “You know these badges you all wear? No one’s worn this sort of thing since the fifth century.”
Kalden could have sworn they’d worn badges more recently than that, but he’d have to double-check the history books to be sure.
“This makes it seem like you’ve been isolated for a long time,” Relia said, “but the rest of your tech isn’t that far behind. Plus you’re all fluent in Espirian.”
“Speaking of badges,” Akari broke in. “You said ‘Apprentice’ was your rank. How high is that? And how do we reach it?”
Kalden gave her a sideways look. After all those earth-shattering revelations, her main concern was advancing her mana arts?
On second thought, that sounded exactly like Akari.
“Apprentice is the first rank after Novice,” Relia said.
“And what’s Novice?” Akari asked.
The other girl blinked in surprise. “You don’t know?”
“Wouldn’t be asking if I knew, would I?”
“The Grandmaster mentioned it in his videos,” Kalden explained, “but he never described what it was.”
“Right, sorry. Novice is what you two are.” Relia turned over a piece of paper, revealing the blank side. “Um—do either of you have something to write with?”
Kalden reached into his backpack and pulled out a pencil he’d been using for his shaping exercises.
“Thanks.” Relia took it and sketched out a vertical rectangle—three times as tall as it was wide. She wrote the word ‘Novice’ on top, then divided the shape into thirds. She labeled these ‘Bronze,’ ‘Silver,’ and ‘Gold.’
“Everyone’s born somewhere in the Novice realm,” she explained. “You start at the top if your ancestors had lots of mana.” She tapped the Gold section of the rectangle. “If not . . .” She slid the pencil down to the Bronze section.
“But ‘Bronze’ and ‘Gold’ are outdated terms,” she said. “Novice is technically three ranks, but we usually just number them these days. Especially since ‘Bronze’ has so much stigma attached.”
“Tell me about it,” Akari muttered.
Relia gave her a sympathetic smile. “If a mana artist’s journey has a hundred steps, then Bronze to Gold is only the first. There’s only one way Golds could rule an island like this.”
“They can’t reach the higher ranks,” Kalden said. His own father had been a general stuck at the peak of Gold for years. And somehow, this eighteen-year-old girl was stronger. Something was affecting them all—preventing them from advancing. What did that mean for Akari’s goal of reaching Silver? Would more mana and training even be enough?
“And the state’s been lying through their teeth,” Akari muttered.
“You’re assuming they know all this,” Relia said.
“They must,” she said. “You got in. That means the Martials could get out. Why wouldn’t they try to leave?”
Relia pursed her lips, considering.
Akari gestured to the stack of papers. “Anyone who shared this would get arrested for disturbing the peace. Then they’d wind up dead of ‘natural causes’ if they kept at it.” She made air quotes around the last phrase.
“That doesn’t prove they know anything,” Relia said. “Think of how a flock of birds flies in formation. Does every bird decide to change direction?” She shook her head. “They follow what the others are doing. And complicated conspiracies are more likely to be false. Sometimes, the simplest answer is the most likely.”
Kalden mulled that over. “You’re saying our government actually thinks the world is gone? No way they’re that incompetent.”
“I can think of a simpler answer,” Relia said. “Everyone else is just like you guys. They know something’s up, but they can’t prove it. They think it’s in their best interest to stay here, so that’s what they’re doing.”
“Then why’d they try to kill your master?” Akari asked.
Relia deflated at that. Despite her ridiculous mana count, she was clearly just a college student echoing other people’s ideas. She knew the arguments well enough, but she hadn’t updated them for their current predicament.
When she finally spoke again, it came out more tired than before. “My master always said it’s easy to fool people. But convincing them they’ve already been fooled? That’s one of the toughest things in the world.” She shook several strands of red hair from her eyes. “He should have known better than to walk through that gate alone.”
Before they could say anything else, Relia glanced down at the stainless steel napkin holder, and she must have seen something in the reflection. “They’re here.”
Kalden glanced over her shoulder to the food court’s entrance. Sure enough, he spotted a man in a sharp black suit with a gold badge around his neck. Kalden’s blood froze for a split second. Was that Emberlyn’s father?
No . . . this man had a similar haircut, but it wasn’t him.
Relia packed up her papers and stuffed them back into her open satchel.
Kalden raised an eyebrow. “You said none of the Martials have seen your face.”
“And I’d rather keep it that way. Besides . . .” She fingered her badge. “This belonged to one of their friends. They’ll realize that if they scan it.”
He nodded. “And what about the real reason we came here?”
“The videos for a favor,” Relia said as she snapped her satchel shut. “There’s a bounty office back near the lobby. I figure I can handle most of the fighting, but I can’t cash in the cores without a license. That’s where you guys come in. Just grab me the most expensive jobs, and we’ll go from there.”
Kalden glanced at Akari, who gave an eager nod.
“Sounds simple enough,” he said.
“Great!” Relia stood from her seat and pushed her chair back. “Meet me outside the gate in half an hour?”
“An hour would be better,” he said. “We still haven’t had lunch yet.”
“An hour it is.” Her lips broke into a wide grin. “Then I’ll show you guys some real mana arts.”