24th of Season of Fire, Year 16 AL

  Newt and Ruby had returned to make their report, and the exalts’ reactions were mixed.

  “That was a needless risk, Newstar,” Greenthorn spoke first, and the Tidebreaker exalts nodded in agreement, as did the Everfrost Order’s exalt.

  “He did find two more exalts and a host of mageknights to add to our force. That’s not a negligible contribution,” the Swordpeak patriarch countered. He gave Ruby a piercing look, but the woman shook her head.

  “I have no merit in this. I told him to ignore them and to focus on the mission.”

  There was a round of nods. Ruby’s decision was the sensible one, and the exalts had no intention of risking their greatest asset anymore. Newt’s desire to help people could easily be exploited to set a trap, and the exalts had reached their decision through telepathy, without voicing their words.

  “You two are dismissed. Lord Greenthorn and I will escort our airships north in four moons to collect our newest comrades,” the Swordpeak patriarch said.

  Newt opened his mouth to object, but his master spoke first.

  “That’s the final decision, Newstar. You have wasted moons of your time on this mission, you should focus on meditation and realm sculpting.”

  Newt felt like he was being pushed out of the operation. He didn’t quite feel resentful about it, but he wanted to see things through to the end, and being forced away didn’t sit well with him.

  “Is there anything else I can do?” he asked.

  “Yes, focus on yourself,” Greenthorn said, “build your foundations. You still have one hundred and forty years before you’re supposed to make your next breakthrough. Make them count.”

  Newt was silent for a moment before he nodded. “Yes, Master.”

  He turned around and left.

  ***

  Blaze was firmly at the third realm, and he counted himself lucky. He had known his older brother was powerful for years, more powerful than their parents, and one of the most respected people in the new city humans had made for themselves in the weald. Newstar, despite being powerful, always acted kindly and obviously tried not to become a shadow over his younger brother’s heart.

  That effort proved enough to protect Blaze from heart demons, but presented a challenge in other situations. Whenever Blaze asked for advice from Newstar, all he got was to ignore all advice anyone had for him and to make what he thought was right for his realm.

  Still, Blaze listened to everyone who had advice to offer. His father had suggested how to approach gathering fire mana and that he should focus on making a good, old-fashioned field of swords to improve his swordsmanship. Newstar’s master, an exalt, offered a few pointed tips on combining air and fire, since he wielded those elements.

  But then, listening to their advice meant he was ignoring Newstar’s. And out of all three, Blaze’s big brother seemed the most competent and accomplished mageknight. So, Blaze took his picks of things he thought he could use. Newstar openly told him his realm was composed of spell seals, which made sense—Newstar was a spell scribe after all.

  Blaze lacked the talent for seal scribing, but he was a talented musician. And thanks to his mother’s efforts, he was quite accomplished, considering he was a third realm awakened not twenty-five years old. So, he built his realm around instruments. His mother played the lyre, but Blaze preferred the winds - flutes and reed pipes.

  At the third realm, there was a limited amount of magic he could wield, but he hoped to one day use music to summon wind and flames to fight. That sounded like something even his big brother couldn’t do.

  But at the third realm, what Blaze craved the most was recognition. So, he had joined the hunting party heading for the weald around the city.

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  The weald around Soaring Freedom was curated to introduce the youngsters to solo hunting, which had become the norm amongst the awakened. The seniors knew that not everyone could do it. Most couldn’t, and it was better to filter out such people at a low realm in a relatively safe environment than to pay the price later.

  The trip was Blaze’s third, with him having successfully hunted a spiketail and a raptor on his two previous excursions. The dropout rate was high, the death toll low.

  Around three in five failed in their hunt; another one in ten got the advice from the fifth realm expedition leaders that they should consider other professions.

  Blaze watched a new girl struggle against a macetail without much empathy. Like spiketails, macetails were easy. They had only one weapon to threaten you with, and you could render it useless with enough mobility. While the girl was earth-aligned, that didn’t mean she had to face the saurian head-on.

  She did, however, and the macetail capitalized on her foolishness. The tail swung, and Lady Everlast threw a barrier of ice, catching the blow before it could pulverize the young woman.

  “Stand down!” Lady Everlast shouted when the fool wanted to continue the fight.

  There were always one or two of them, despite getting clear instructions that the battle was over once the leader intervened. The girl scowled at Lady Everlast.

  “It was just a slip of my attention; I can still fight.”

  “No, you can’t,” Lady Everlast said with ice in her voice. “You’re dead; dead people can’t fight.”

  The macetail was still hissing, but weary of the higher realm awakened Lady Everlast had revealed herself to be.

  Lady Everlast sighed, took out a vial, and before the saurian could act, stuffed it into its mouth, shattering it in the process. The confused beast, like most others, tried to retch until it realized the potion was benefitting it.

  The accords demanded that any life saved from the saurians needed to be paid with resources equivalent to what the saurian would have gotten by devouring the awakened.

  The macetail just stared at her, and Lady Everlast flared her mana. The creature scampered, and she sighed in annoyance. Whether it was at the young woman, the macetail, or her job in general, Blaze couldn’t say.

  “You’re next, Blaze.”

  He stepped to the front and took the lead, looking for prey of his own.

  ***

  Woodhopper was doing her best to raise her trihorn; it was a project of decades, and the creature would sadly always lag behind her, that was assuming she managed to advance her realm.

  A hundred and sixty years wasted in the sixth realm translated to a bit over two biological years for her, meaning she was approaching forty. Wrinkles had crept in, and they would stay there, and more than one gray hair peeked out of her lush hair.

  She felt old, and she looked older than some of the exalts in Soaring Freedom, who dwarfed her in age. Still, the retreat to the saurian wilderness was a boon for her.

  She got up from meditation and went outside her home at the edge of the city.

  Freckles was basking in the sun. The trihorn had reached its full size after ten years of careful nurturing. She was still two decades away from entering the sixth, but with enough time and care, Woodhopper would see her there.

  The problem was Woodhopper herself. She had long since fully expanded her realm, and the extra century and a half meant her realm was better sculpted than most, but… But once she advanced, she would lack the resources she would need to keep expanding her realm.

  She had never been the most powerful combatant, and teaming up with her tamed beast to hunt wasn’t an option with the new rules. Humans might have considered her a solo hunter, but saurians would take the trihorn more seriously than they would her.

  Woodhopper approached her companion and patted her on the flank when something entered her perception. A ten-year-old boy darted towards her.

  “Auntie! Can Freckles play?” Little Whiteflame made the cutest face he could, and Freckles looked down towards him.

  The two of them were the same age, one weighing twenty thousand pounds, the other around fifty, and not a shred of fear in him. Freckles snorted as if Whiteflame was a chore, but blood rushed into her still-developing frill, revealing her true feelings.

  “Hey, Woody,” Alabaster trailed after her spawn. “Sorry to impose. He insisted, and I told him I would let him see Freckles if he completed all his exercises.”

  She helplessly gestured at the excited boy climbing all over Freckles. “And here we are.”

  “It’s not a problem.” It was. “How are Ax and little Searingpebble?”

  “They stayed home, bonding in quality father-daughter time. I never expected living in the middle of the wealds meant you had more time to spend with your children than you did back at the order.”

  Woodhopper nodded. Spare time was something most high-realm awakened had in ample supply. The top talents of their fields were busier than ever; those more on the mediocre side did their jobs, earned their keep, and had hours of spare time every day.

  Some meditated, like Woodhopper, others raised children, investing in their futures.

  Woodhopper didn’t want to think about it. She was happy the way things were, her and Freckles against the world.

  “So, have you seen El recently? How’s he doing?”

  The world was weird, but weird had become the new norm, and as long as things remained stable, it would all turn out all right.