I awoke in the cottage we had tea behind. It was a truly humorless place that was so functional that fairies had to create a bed of leaves for Kline and me, considering that the bed was just an elevated block of wood with grooves for horns and a large man’s body. But seeing the way the wood was knotted and grooved told me that Brindle wasn’t a human under the clothing.

Beyond the bed, it had a small table with a single chair, a coat rack, and some storage containers. The rest was an alchemy lab. I expected to see fairies flying around it, but when I ran my fingers over a cauldron, it felt cold and unused somehow. I had the impression the equipment hadn’t been used in centuries.

I turned to Nethralis when she entered. “This’s Brindle’s home, isn’t it?”

“It is,” she replied. “He helped build and hide Serenflora after a great war. This is the location he chose.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“It is…”

I nodded and sat down at the table. Kline hopped onto the bed and turned to Zyphrael, whose soul force was visible. Everyone knew he was there. No one mentioned it.

“We’ve decided to help you,” Nethralis said. “To trust in Brindle… Yakana. Do you understand?”

I ran my hand over the gnarled wood table, surprised to find it had a natural texture. I nodded. “Yes.”

“Well…” Nethralis opened a box and pulled out a number of vials. “You have a three-day visa before Kyro is set to start off on your journey. Until then, we need to build your body and mind. If you take that Teelia elixir, your core would have exploded.”

I stopped sliding my hand. “Would’ve been nice to get a heads up.”

“He didn’t tell you?”

I shook my head. “Doesn’t seem like the type.”

“Guess not.”

“Now then, this one…”

I looked at the elixir in her hand. It looked like coconut milk in a shooter-sized bottle, but I could see threads of soul force within it, shifting around like oil in water, creating a hypnotizing tornado.

“This is called an alibista elixir,” Nethralis explained. “It’s a form of nearan elixir… like the Teelia elixir… but this one focuses on the brain and nervous system. Since you rely primarily on your acceleration spell, this should magnify its effects multiple times over… at your level.”

I wanted to say thank you, but I knew there was a catch.

“This one,” she continued, pulling out a pink vial. “This is a channel sensitivity elixir. It dilates channels and repairs them during evolutions. It lasts twelve hours. With this, you’ll be able to make the most of your core.”

I nodded.

She pulled out a third and smirked at me. “And this… this is a tightening elixir. This takes the mana wound around your core to fill in the cracks, pushing out impurities. Since you’re on the precipice of obtaining a mythical core, it’d be a shame if it was just a little too loose.”

I frowned at her thin smile. “What’s the catch?”

“I want you to create a soul pact—”

I looked away and shook my head and laughed bitterly. “You know… I ended up here because I wanted to live life on my own terms. I came here to study plants. And since then, I’ve yet to study a single plant or live life on my terms. And I’m getting really bitter about it. So while I’m grateful… and I genuinely starting to feel kinship with this forest and its denizens… this type of thing is just pushing me away.”

“To not dismantle the Bramble and structures like it,” Nethralis completed.

I raised an eyebrow.

Nethralis threw a vial into the air and then froze it with telekinesis before spinning it. “We trust you, Mira. We will support you. But… you’re unique in that your master created this forest’s defenses with soulmancy. If left to your devices, you could remove the Bramble and other similarly constructed defenses in this forest. Then… it’s over. Do you understand the severity of your power?”

I nodded.

“That’s why… I would like you to create a pact stating that you will not dismantle the Bramble… or at least, that you will not take actions against the Brambles with the intention of weakening the forest’s defenses. Do that, and you’ll have all three of these, your companion will get one to drastically fix the rush job on his core…”

Kline’s ears picked up, and he lay down, watching the elixir spin hypnotically—waiting to pounce.

“And you’ll obtain normal elixirs and training.”

I thought about it for a few minutes before thinking, It doesn’t conflict with any of my obligations… Brindle was my patron and my contract with Elana specifically stated that she couldn’t do anything that would willfully danger the forest. Since I couldn’t find any conceivable reason that I would aid hordes of people conquer and destroy a forest for its secrets, I didn’t see it as a problem. And if there was a need later where I did join that side for a purpose that I agreed with, I wasn’t too restrained.

“What if I need to make it through the Brambles?” I asked.

“Let’s negotiate. Tell me about your obligations.”

I told her about my agreement with Elana and how I was to collect ingredients and send them out as tribute. I explained how it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing and explained how Brindle wrote his books to ruin people’s sense of romanticism. I also argued that auction houses would still want to keep supply low for rare plants. So if we provided them the quota and more, companies wouldn’t push people to participate in the harvest. Supply and demand. Controlled opposition.

Nethralis considered it and agreed. Then we began negotiating going through hundreds of scenarios. The deal ended up being more of a guardrail than anything else. In the end, we agreed that I would not do anything to permanently weaken the Bramble and that I would not aid groups more than fifty each year through the Bramble or escort groups more than ten that I explicitly knew had the intention of conquering the forest or making it to the seventh domain. That was it.

It sounded weak, but there were hundreds of scenarios where aiding people could damage the forest or where my attempts to advance and Rings would be hindered by my inability to use soulmancy. In some cases, there could be a need for an armistice agreement that required an escort, and I wouldn’t be able to do anything. I also could’ve been unable to travel through Brambles, and in the event that I needed to disassemble the Bramble in areas for security reasons, I wouldn’t have been able to do it because it would have killed me. So, the final pact was extremely flexible and focused more on damage control and establishing goodwill.

It was very reasonable.

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So we went through the process of tying our souls, and then my training began.

“Now that that’s done…” Nethralis clapped. “Let’s take you to the spring. For the next day, you’re going to focus on your mana core exclusively.”

“Okay… I have some third ev cores. Should I use those? Or the teals?”

“Teal… and when it’s time, this…” Nethralis pulled out a core that left me in a state of wonder. It was a polished marble that was blue and various shades of orange, like a sunrise cresting an ocean. “I assume by your suggestion that you know the value of transitional cores. Yes?”

I nodded. “I think so… teal is a pure core that’s naturally moved from the green to blue. So it’s a gradient.”

“Precisely. The power within such a core is remarkably pure and flexible, like silk thread. It’s easier to work with and is more powerful. That’s why you should always seek them out and why you should push for your core to do the same. And right now, your core is so pure that it’s almost blue. What we’re going to do is push it into the blue, and when you evolve, we’ll have you thread this core as you’re evolving. Such a thing would usually be harmful, but you’ve already almost evolved. If you pull it off… you may achieve something fascinating.”

My heart pulsed and my lower back lost its rigidity.

“The same is true of Kline,” Nethralis said. “We have one for him, too. These, along with…” She pulled out elixirs. “These channel and soul healing elixirs and training are our shows of goodwill.”

“I thank you.”

“Repay us this harvest. I know there will be… incidents.”

I nodded. “I’ll prepare myself.”

“Good.” Nethralis stopped spinning the hovering elixir, put it into a box, sealed it, and put it onto a shelf. “Let’s get you to the spring.”

2.

The hot spring was a classic fairy tale location. Green nymphs bathed on lily pads as sprites flew around in the mist, lighting it up like fireflies. Fairies bathed in the open air with strange soaps that smelled like apricots.

As I walked up, the area buzzed with nervous excitement, and fairies, sprites, and nymphs flew into the trees, surrounding us, peaking between branches and leaves and rocks as we walked past.

“This is Mira,” Nethralis said. “She is our treasured guest.”

A barrage of fairies said, “A human?” in twenty tones, quizzical and flabbergasted and fascinated and amused. It didn’t seem that the Drokai’s thoughts on humans were set in stone.

“Forgive them,” Nethralis said. “Most of them are young and have never seen the outside before. Though, I suppose young is a relative term. Get undressed.”

I purified myself and stripped and followed her to the hot spring, trying to stave off the curious stares from the other fairies.

“Hey!” a cheery fairy said, flying up to my ear. “You look like us!”

“But bigger!” another chimed.

I opened my mouth but found no words.

“Don’t heckle her,” Nethralis said. “We’re actually related. Both our species derive from Vina, who look like us Drokai, only larger than this human. Some lost their wings and became human, while others of us became smaller to adapt to our environment.”

“Woooooow!” The fairies and nymphs fluttered closer. I wanted to be excited with them, as I just heard the most intense example of evolution in the world, but I couldn’t because of their intensity.

“Quiet down,” Nethralis said as she waded into the water with her tiny legs. “We are circulating. If you wish to learn and join, gather ‘round but stay silent.

The fairies squealed with excitement, keeping mum as I walked into the water. The sand was soft as cotton and the warmth of the water healed all the ailments I didn’t know that I had. I passed Nethralis, moving deeper into the water until I found a ledge and could sit down.

“When you’re ready, I want you to circulate mana,” Nethralis instructed.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, pushing everything out of my mind as I did my best to remember what I learned when Yakana melded in my body. It wasn’t time to be good enough—it was time to show off.

I began circulating, moving the mana in complex pathways to the best of my memory. It left me feeling frustrated. There were things that I was doing that I knew I was doing wrong but didn’t know how to fix, and other things I was doing right but unable to do because of blockages.

Despite that, I heard gasping and dead silence. That was a good sign, so I kept pressing on.

3.

Nethralis watched Mira circulate in a state of disbelief. Her pattern was familiar—it was Yakana’s. Many had learned it with the aid of the Lumidra flower, but the difference was that most never learned it.

It was too complicated. As a result, the Drokai only learned what it felt like to circulate at a higher level, learning the nature of it so they could apply the nuance to their current techniques. As for the technique itself, it was something that only entities like Kyro practiced in the upper domains.

But Mira. Mira had actually learned it somehow. Mana danced around her body, cycling between her chest and back and arms, twisting and warping and spinning in the air in complex and beautiful ways.

It was far from perfect. The beauty and fascination came from her learning the pattern. The execution was extremely poor, choppy and undisciplined and wobbly, negating the fluidity of hers or Kyros or Emael’s. There were also massive deficits where some areas limped along like a beast with a broken hoof or altogether ignored. But…

There were some deficits that looked like they simply lacked the ability to breathe.

“Hold that,” Nethralis said. Then she signaled to one of the fairies, gave an order, and ten minutes later, the courier returned with an orange elixir. “Mira. Drink this.”

Mira opened her eyes and saw the elixir and stared at it hesitantly—

—but she nodded and drank it. Her body shivered and she coughed out flem in the water and asked what Nethralis gave her, but Nethralis said it would pass and then asked her to continue.

Mira did—and that’s when the Drokai queen was convinced.

The moment that Mira took a dilator, the mana functioned properly like a clogged nostril that couldn’t breathe. Mira’s body couldn’t keep up with her knowledge.

“You learned that from Yakana,” Nethralis stated.

“Yes.”

“How did you remember it?”

“Because Yakana blended within my soul to use it,” Mira answered. “It was also… sink or swim. I’ve recently discovered that the first core I threaded was a peak second evolution core. Teal.”

A deafening silence cut through the area, and all the fairies turned between Mira and Nethralis. “How?” Nethralis whispered.

“Sink… or swim…” Mira repeated with a deep breath. “I only used blue cores after that. I’m pretty sure it prevented me from slacking.”

Nethralis’s heart fluttered. If Mira was a guardian, she would be a serious asset—or a serious enemy.

He must trust her or we’re very desperate… she thought. This girl…

Nethralis was afraid of what Mira could become, but she already committed. “I see… well. The problem you’re facing is that your cores and channels are clogged. Let’s unclog them to increase their power. Kline… come join us.”

Mira opened her eyes and looked through the mist. Kline was slinking to the side, watching them through active camouflage like a predator, stalking them—preparing to strike. Kyro was in charge of him, but even Kyro didn’t have the indecency to invade the female spring. In fact, he probably shooed Kline to the spring as a way of shirking his duties. Degenerate.

“Is it okay he’s here?” Mira asked as the Drokai covered their breasts.

“It’s ideal,” Nethralis said. “We’re training, so if anyone has a problem, they can leave. If they stay, they can learn the chant.” That changed the tune in the atmosphere, and fairies and nymphs and sprites dove into the spring like bombs dropped from planes.

Nethralis opened the dilation elixir and poured it onto a rock. “Drink,” she said to Kline.

Kline, who watched Mira drink the same elixir and could smell it, walked up and drank it without worry and lay next to Mira in the water keeping his eyes on the Drokai.

“Now follow after me,” Nethralis said. Then she began chanting with Mira speaking the chant aloud, snapping to her words with surreal efficiency. Soon, it came into effect, and the spring rippled from the warping pressure, and the clogged mana in Mira’s core broke loose, sending a wave of magic pressure into the area. A few Drokai screamed and giggled as water splashed on them.

Next came Kline whose core was even more powerful. Once it unclogged, it released a shockwave that sent the Drokai crying out in laughter as they took to the canopies to watch from above.

As for Nethralis, she watched in fascination, thinking for the first time that Mira's presence could change everything. These two were given everything to succeed, and they used their talent and perseverance to make the most of it. They were an experiment—and Nethralis couldn’t help but want to be part of it.