“The stronger those weapon spirits grow, the more influence they have over you,” Saruqin said. “I can almost hear them, young Augmenter. They twist your mind and convince you that their growth in power is a good thing. Did you ever think about what would happen when they finally transcend their chosen housing? Do you really think that they’ll stand by you, rather than leave you behind, impotent and powerless?”
He sounded so reasonable, I was almost tempted to believe him. After all, I was new to this world, and he had clearly lived here for decades. He knew its magic, knew its politics, knew its powers. Of course he understood it better than I did.
The swords had certainly shown a yearning for power, a desire to have me lean on them. What else was their eagerness to fight if not a longing to taste more of my Vigor flowing through them and to prove their value to me, to make me rely on them more and more?
But I wouldn’t be fooled by the truth of his words. Every falsehood contained some sliver of truth within it.
I channeled the power of wood. A spray of Stinging Palm thorns shot through the air, each one a hard, sleek, and deadly dart, some of the best I’d ever made.
Fire flashed from Saruqin’s hand. The thorns flared, blackened, and crumbled into ash.
I sank to my knee and punched the ground. A Ground Strike rippled out all around me. The incense pots rattled, and one fell with a crash onto the ground. But around Saruqin, the Ground Strike vanished, leaving him standing, the area beneath his feet unaffected by my technique.
As I rose, I pointed at Saruqin’s face and channeled acid, that strange and deadly combination of water and fire. A green miasma began to form around the priest’s head. He clicked his fingers, and there was a flash of flame that evaporated the cloud before it was even fully formed.
I’d never faced an opponent who could so easily dismiss all my powers. My shoulders tightened. and sweat ran down my back as I tried desperately to think of what might get through. This was power beyond anything I’d faced before, far greater than Horix or the Radiant Dragon Guild’s clan enemies. This was something from beyond the normal limits of Augmenting.
“You absorbed the core of the Gonki Valley Vigorous Zone, didn’t you?” I said. “It wasn’t for the guild or Targin or your fellow Augmenting priests; it’s all gone into you.”
“How passably observant of you,” Saruqin said. “Which is what I would expect from someone in your position.”
In the eery quiet of this hall, I could hear the sounds of the fighting outside. The crash of weapons, the screams of pain, the desperation in the voices of my allies as they faced Saruqin’s seemingly endless horde.
“So many have stood where you have, young Swordslinger,” he said. “Arrogant, so full of imagined power and this thing you call destiny. The dragons in your hands simply need you as a vehicle to get back to their realm. They couldn’t care less about you. And your friends, outside? They only follow you because of the power. Look at little Mahrai. She only chose you because you have power, and she wants a piece of it. Yono and Nydarth give you power, and you hand that illusion of power down to your servants. The cycle continues, over and over. You will always be a conduit, never an Immortal. A stepping stone for others to use, rather than taking the steps yourself.”
He was so proud, so full of confidence in his own grandeur and in my weakness. His Augmenting might be powerful, but he had his limits, and I could use them against him.
I lowered my hands and let the trident droop toward the floor. I opened my mouth as if to speak, then hesitated, frowned, and hung my head.
“What are you doing, you fool?” Nydarth snapped. “You need to deal with him.”
“Go forward,” Yono urged. “Raise your guard, lunge at Saruqin, finish him off.”
“Destroy him before he can destroy you,” they said in unison.
Saruqin gave a soft, sinister laugh. He stepped closer to me, his footsteps barely audible. The smell of him was all around me, as was that deep, hypnotic voice. I had to look away, not let myself see the mask and the eyes flickering behind it, to avoid being drawn in despite everything that I knew.
“Yes, young Swordslinger,” he said. “Now, you see the futility of the Wandering Path. Its weakness, its circularity. There is no escape from it.”
He stepped closer, only a few inches away from me.
“Well, Swordslinger? What do you have to say for yourself?”
“Nothing,” I replied. “At least not in words.”
The Vigor flowed through me, then through my feet and into the ground. It burst back up beneath Saruqin as a Mud Geyser that erupted right beneath his feet.
The mud drenched Saruqin and spattered me as it sprayed from the floor and came raining down all across the hall. I’d expected the force of it to knock Saruqin flying, but apparently, surprise wasn’t enough to overcome his magical defenses, and he whirled around with his hand out, like a child catching rain.
I channeled Crashing Wave and used it to reshape the mud. I slammed it into Saruqin, hitting him with an eight-foot-tall wall of muck. This time, he staggered back, slipping across the mud-slicked ground, but managed to brace himself and remain upright.
He laughed, the same hollow, joyless sound I’d heard before.
“I’m impressed,” he said. “You’ve learned a lot in your travels.”
“You talk too much,” I replied.
As the mud splashed down, I raised my hand and launched an Untamed Torch. The ground opened beneath Saruqin, and he vanished into a Hidden Burrow while the flames shot past where his head had been.
I looked around the room, watching to see where he would reappear. He
