“Good morning, class,” Ishigara called from her place at the lectern. “Today, we are going to dig into the advanced discipline of technique stitching. While it can be risky, and limits your flexibility in how you deploy your abilities, it provides some unique benefits. Please pay close attention.”
Ishigara turned to the board and drew three concentric circles in white chalk. She tapped one of her fingernails against the innermost ring and faced the class.
“Dawson, what does this circle represent?” Ishigara’s red nail flashed when she stabbed it toward a fourth year in the front row.
“In relation to?” The girl seemed shocked by the question, and she tugged nervously at the neck of her Thunder’s Children robes as if they’d just tried to choke her.
“Hungso?” Ishigara snapped at a third-year member of the Disciples of Jade Flame.
“The core?” The student answered hesitantly.
“That is correct,” Ishigara said with a cold smile. “Warin, what are the other circles meant to suggest?”
“The body and the aura,” I said.
“Also correct,” Ishigara said. “These are the threefold aspects of sacred energy manifested in every Empyreal. While your core is the heart of your being, and your aura is a projection of it, your body is the vehicle that carries and directs your powers. For most of us, the freedom to use any technique we wish, at any time we wish, is one of our greatest strengths. While our core has power, our abilities also have power. In some cases, though, it can be useful to trade versatility for strength beyond what our core can provide.”
My heart raced, and I hung on Ishigara’s every word. She’d found something to help me.
“This should be good,” Hagar whispered to me. “Now I know you came early to beg Ishigara’s help.”
“Yep,” I said. “Maybe the answer to my problem has been under my nose the whole time.”
“I don’t know if I’d trust her,” Hagar said. “Ishigara was one of Grayson’s friends. Be careful around her.”
My clanmate’s words splashed over my enthusiasm like a bucket of cold water. She’d echoed everything Niddhogg and Hahen had warned me about. I’d wanted so much to believe that the answer to my problem was close at hand that I might have swallowed whatever line Ishigara was prepared to feed me.
Maybe it wouldn’t work.
Maybe it was a trap.
“... This discipline will not give you access to techniques you don’t already know,” Ishigara explained. “It will, however, let you use those techniques without expending jinsei.”
Her eyes were locked on mine when she said those words, and excitement crept back into my heart.
Ishigara had to be playing it straight with me. If the dragons won the Empyrean Gauntlet, she’d be under their thumbs right along with the rest of us. She needed me to win.
I hoped that was reason enough for her to put aside our differences.
The professor explained the process in exacting, painstaking detail. While the theory of stitching was surprisingly simple, it involved direct alterations of the jinsei channels. If it wasn’t done exactly right, there was a very real risk of severe bodily harm.
“The first step is to gather an appropriate vessel,” Ishigara said. “For a lower-level technique, any small metal item will do. For more powerful techniques, however, I’d suggest larger items. Copper and silver are good materials, though gold and more valuable metals are even better.”
“Why do I feel like she’s about to sell us vessels for a very special price?” Hagar snickered under her breath.
That wouldn’t have surprised me at all. One of the things I’d learned about Empyreal society was that those with power and wealth wouldn’t hesitate to use it for their benefit, even at the cost of those below them on the social scale. Honor, it had been made very clear to me, was more of a useful tool to keep the lower classes in line than an ideal to be adhered to.
Even knowing the truth of that thought didn’t prevent me from aspiring to be honorable, though. There was a right way to live your life, and I wanted to follow that path rather than just do whatever was easiest or most profitable.
“This vessel will hold the scrivenings for your technique,” Ishigara continued. “Once you have inscribed the vessel, you will no longer be able to power the technique with jinsei from your core. The sacred energy must come from the vessel’s stores.”
“How does jinsei get into the vessel?” I blurted the question out before I raised my hand. For the first time, I was actually excited about what Ishigara was teaching me.
“It’s good to see you taking an interest in what I have to say for once, Jace. The item will naturally charge with jinsei gathered from your surroundings over time, usually within a single day.” Ishigara pushed her glasses up on her nose, gripped the lectern in both hands, and leaned forward until her elbows touched the wood in front of her. “There is a significant downside to this discipline. While the scrivened item exists, you cannot use the stitched technique with any other jinsei. This means you will normally only have a single use per day.”
I gnawed the inside of my lip as I considered that. The good news was that I could use my most powerful techniques without splitting my core in half. The very bad news was that I could only use each technique once per day.
“Once the scrivening is complete, the real work begins.” Ishigara returned to the board and hastily sketched a diagram of the primary jinsei channels on the board. “In order to complete the process, the vessel must be stitched to your channels. And this is where you can cause significant damage if you are careless.”
Ishigara drew circles around the intersection of the major jinsei channels of the torso, arms, legs, and head, then added enormous X’s over each one.
“The stitches must never interfere with these junctures,” the professor said sternly. “If you do stitch a vessel in one of these locations, remove it immediately.
