The man and woman landed in front of me, their feet crashing to earth with such force that stones buckled beneath them. They threw their heads back and roared, ready to unleash the deadly aspects stored in their auras.
They’d misjudged me. My serpents appeared and went to work, plucking the most dangerous aspects away from my enemies. A ball of fire and death formed in the air between me and my attackers. It swelled like a malignant tumor, growing as I robbed my enemies of their weapons. They sagged to their knees, weakened by the loss.
And then I wove a sorcerous spell and blasted them apart with the same forces they’d planned to use against me. Their bodies glowed white-hot and vanished in puffs of steam and ash; dust danced away from the explosion and fell from the surrounding buildings.
But the man and woman I’d killed were a feint. The heretics had formed a wider net around us and were closing in. They drove my friends before them, until the four of us were trapped inside their noose.
Some of our enemies held fusion blades, others carried the weapons they’d stolen from Grimaldi’s forces. All of them glared at me and my friends, their eyes narrowed to slits, their mouths twisted into angry sneers.
“I gave you a chance, Son,” my mother said as she floated above us on wings of pure jinsei. “But you spat in my face. If you won’t let me help you, then I have no more use for you. You’ve become a tool of my enemies, and I can’t have that.”
And then the world went crazy.
The Defender
A SLAB OF STONE PLUMMETED from the ceiling. Blood, hot and sticky, splashed onto my face and robes. The cave-in had flattened three of the heretics and thrown two others to the ground. The impact sent seismic rumbles through the cavern’s floor, which triggered the collapse of more buildings off to our left. A cloud of gritty dust and sand gusted around us, blinding friend and foe alike.
“Jace, run!” Sanrin’s voice exploded through the chaos.
My mother screamed at her followers to stop us. The heretics tried to follow her orders, but only managed to trip over one another and the fallen stones. Blinded by the stinging grit, they were utterly ineffective.
There was no time to waste. I didn’t understand how Sanrin had found us, or if he’d brought allies. I also realized it didn’t matter. My only concerns were getting my team out of this disaster and reaching the Umbral Forge. Nothing else mattered.
I hooked my arms around my friends and pushed them forward. In the same moment, I activated Vision of the Design and followed the path it showed me. The glimpse it gave me of the future only lasted a few seconds, but that was enough to guide me out of the dust cloud and down a side street that was clearer.
“Who was that?” Clem gasped as I herded my team away from the mayhem.
“My clan elder,” I spat through a mouth filled with dust. “We can talk about it later. When we’re back at school.”
More of the ceiling collapsed as we headed deeper into the ruins. Enormous sandstone boulders streaked into the ruins like comets, leveling one building after another and kicking off a domino effect of collapsing structures. The ground jolted beneath us as we fled. Cracks raced along the edge of the street, and pieces of it snapped and rose above the level surface. I tripped and caught myself against Eric, and Abi braced him before we all fell on our faces.
Flashes of silver light erupted like fireworks behind us, throwing our shadows across the street. Screams and battle cries echoed through the ruins, only to be swallowed by the tremendous din of more buildings falling and the earth’s groaning protest. I expected a bullet or a technique’s blast to catch my team at any moment.
“I see the way!” Abi shouted. “Hurry, we’re close.”
He bolted ahead of us, raising his own jinsei lantern to push aside the darkness. Abi ran with utter confidence, his head down to follow the path his special senses had picked out. He guided us around corners and down narrow alleys, through buildings that looked like they could collapse at any moment and over piles of shattered stone that had already fallen into ruin. Abi drove ahead with the determination of a bloodhound on the scent, and his single-minded focus was almost his undoing.
“Abi!” Clem shouted. “Stop!”
A fault line had yawned open mere feet in front of our pathfinder. Ruddy light billowed up from the gap, and a gust of hot wind blew sand into a whirlwind above us. Abi skidded to a stop, and the crack grew longer and wider, cutting us off. As it spread, the chasm tore down buildings and swallowed slabs of the earth.
“We have to jump,” I told them. “Right now. If it gets any wider, we’re dead.”
I backed up a few paces, then hurtled forward with all the speed my jinsei-fueled legs could manage. The crack seemed to widen with every step I took. The heat from the depths battered my face and plucked at my robes. Sparks rose from the chasm as I threw my body into the air.
The tear in the earth gaped beneath me, a stony maw eager to devour anything that fell into its fiery gullet. It was impossible to tear my eyes off the chasm as I crossed it. How far would I fall if I missed the far edge?
I hit the ground hard and rolled with the impact. I flipped over onto my back and stared up at the ceiling falling toward my face. A slab the size of a bus plummeted through the dust and shadows. Not even my core would save me if that thing landed on my skull. There was no time to get back on
