An ear-piercing cry came from behind me, and I turned to a lamprey straggler. The monster circled around me and kept its distance so that I couldn’t strike with my sword.
“Let’s see how Ethan handles this.” Vesma put her spear over her shoulder and folded her arms.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Kegohr said. “You got any more new tricks?”
“I can think of one,” I said as I raised my left palm and produced a thorn the size of a baseball. Making the technique produce such a large projectile took a lot more Vigor, but I still had a little more left in the tank.
I punched the air with an open palm, and the giant thorn flashed toward the lamprey. The monster’s attempt to jump out of the way failed as the projectile pounded into its stomach with all the force of a crossbow bolt.
Vesma walked over to the corpse and inspected the thorn protruding from its abdomen. “Impressive,” she said.
“Not bad at all,” Kegohr said. “I’d like a technique like that. Why can’t I be a bloody elementalist?”
Vesma flicked lamprey blood from her hands. “Because you weren’t born that way.”
“Seems kinda unfair,” he commented.
“It’s life,” she said. “Some people are born special; others aren’t.”
“Let’s not get into that whole philosophical debate,” I said. “Good job with your technique, Kegohr.”
“Which one?” he asked.
“Spirit of the Wildfire,” Vesma answered.
“I wasn’t even trying to be smart by using it. Those damned beasties just got me all worked up.”
Vesma laughed. “You idiot!”
Kegohr squatted over a dead lamprey and tore the skeletal corral out with his bare hands. “So, I guess Effin’s the only one who can use the cores. He’s the only elementalist.”
“If it means more power on our side,” Vesma said, “then Ethan can have every last core. They’re no use to us.”
I’d found out that my ability to use more than one element was somewhat rare in the Seven Realms. Kegohr and Vesma were fire Augmenters, so they couldn’t absorb any of the lamprey cores.
“What if something goes wrong?” Kegohr cautioned. “You had tutors to help you get started on an element before.”
“He’s the Immortal Swordslinger,” Vesma said.
I half-expected to see her smirking, but her expression was serious.
“Not just yet,” I reminded her as I grabbed my knife from my belt. I pulled a skeletal corral from inside a lamprey and pried out the core.
“Soon,” Nydarth promised. “When you obtain the other Immense Blades. Then, you can have me whenever you like. My true form would bring you to fruition with little more than a glance.”
“She’s speaking to you again?” Vesma asked.
“Yeah.” I wasn’t sure how she’d known Nydarth had spoken, but I must have had some kind of tell.
“What did she say?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Kegohr said. “How about we get to work, then we can chat about spirit swords, slingers, colossal blades, and whatever else you fancy.”
Vesma sighed before we started the process of retrieving cores from the monster corpses.
One by one, we cut open the bodies of the monsters, removed the skeletal corrals that protected the cores, and extracted the glowing orbs, bright slivers of power that held magical essence.
“We should move on,” Vesma said after we’d gathered all the cores. “I don’t want to find out what carrion monsters are inside this glade.”
“They could provide interesting techniques,” I said with a sly smile. “Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad?”
“We have a mission, remember?” Kegohr spoke up. “Xilarion wants us to deliver the scroll to the Guild of Resplendent Tears. We’ve already taken a handful of detours. The Qihin Clan and the guild could have destroyed each other by now.”
“What I don’t get,” Vesma started, “is why Xilarion thinks a simple letter will make them suddenly hold hands and—”
“Sing kumbaya?” I interjected. When Vesma and Kegohr frowned at me, I burst into laughter. They didn’t understand a single reference I’d used since I met them, but that only made it all the funnier.
“Let’s move,” Vesma said. “Ethan, you lead.”
I gave her a playful slap on the ass as I walked past her, and she thumped me in the arm.
“Ow, “ I said. “You know it’s wrong to hit your boyfriend, right?”
She hurried to keep up with me. “Boyfriend? Is that what you are now?”
I shrugged. “If that’s what you’d like.”
“And Faryn?”
“I can be her boyfriend, too.” I hadn’t seen the beautiful elven tutor since I’d left Radiant Dragon, and the reminder of her made me realize how much I missed her company. I enjoyed the presence of Vesma equally, but Faryn’s mature guidance added another quality that couldn’t be replicated.
“Hmm. . . I suppose I can share you. For now.”
We crossed the palm-filled glade and paused at the shore of a small pool. Moonlight reflected off the crystalline surface, and water trickled over small stones. The sounds of insects and nightbirds assured me that we wouldn’t come upon any monsters. As much as I wanted to farm water cores, my Vigor was running low. For the last week, I’d become more skilled at meditation, and I found I could spend the still hours of the night refining the pathways within me. The more time I spent on internal meditation, the faster I could summon a martial technique during battle. These nocturnal sessions had helped me produce the bright flash version of Untamed Torch.
After we made camp, I offered to keep watch. “You two get some sleep.”
Within minutes, they’d followed my instruction, and Kegohr’s steady snoring rolled out across the clearing.
I sat looking at the pile of cores in my lap. Lampreys
