I looked from the carnage to Kest and let out a low whistle.
“I can’t do that in real life,” she explained. “I’d have to have some sort of Gravity Spirit. But I can do it in a dream.” She pointed at my smashed kneecap. “Repair that and let’s go find my twin.”
As soon as she said it, I realized it didn’t even hurt like a real injury.
“Oh, uh, right.” I pictured sending a ton of Miasma to freeze the joint so I could stand on it, then realized that was stupid—it would take away that leg’s mobility and not even solve the problem. Instead, I imagined the knee popping back to perfect health.
Just like that, it was better. No healing script tattoo, no effort.
I hopped to my feet. “You’re a genius, Kest. Way to game the system.”
She blushed, black lace fading in on her cheeks again. “It’s just taking advantage of the opportunities put in front of you.”
“Little help?” Warcry yelled.
All the students in the hall were gone, and fifty more ninjas had taken their place. Even more black-clad warriors were running out from behind Kest’s locker ball like there was a magical portal on the other side. Warcry was trying to hold them off, but he couldn’t keep it up for long on his own.
“Got it,” I said, digging deep into my Spirit sea and sending out a tsunami of Miasma. “Mass Grave!”
The turquoise Spirit burst off me in a wave, dropping every ninja dead in their tracks. Fresh Miasma rose from their bodies, and I pulled it in, then started the Three Corpses cultivating their own Spirit seas, too, so they wouldn’t have to draw off mine next time.
Past them, Sushi was standing with one hand on the gym doors and waving the other at us to hurry up already.
We sprinted up the hall, hurdling dead ninjas, and finally made it to her.
Sushi shoved open the gym door.
“Through!” she ordered, pressing her hands to the painted metal casing. “Save Rali!”
Kest charged through first, not waiting for anybody. Warcry and I followed half a step behind her.
I sat up, my heart racing like somebody had just slapped me awake.
I was in the canteen of the Eight-Legged Dragons’ transport ship, sprawled out in one of the hard metal chairs bolted to the floor. Rali and I had been cultivating here earlier. I must’ve fallen asleep. All the chairs except for mine and the one Rali had been using were stacked on the tables for the night, and the white lights had been lowered to create a sort of twilight glow. Kest and Warcry were gone, and Sushi was nowhere to be seen.
Shapes moved next to me.
“Be on your guard,” a haggard voice said. “The Lost Mirror world-walker shook the other three from my grasp.”
Creeping through the half-lit canteen was a group of beggars, dressed like the stereotypical ascetic gurus in threadbare loincloths. A couple of them were missing limbs, and one guy had huge masses of dreadlocks tied back from his face, exposing empty scarred-over eye sockets. Every one of them was carrying a walking stick.
Levitating along beside them was Rali, fast asleep and flat on his back like he was rolling on an invisible gurney. A bald beggar with liver-spotted arthritic hands limped alongside Rali, gray Air Spirit flowing from his palm down to my friend.
“Stop!” I lurched to my feet, my chair dumping over behind me. “Where are you going with him?”
“Stay out of this, child.” A beggar with one leg hobbled forward, using his walking stick as a crutch. “We wish you no harm, but if you try to interfere, we will be forced to defend ourselves.”
The beggars spread out, surrounding the arthritic guy who was levitating Rali.
Running footsteps echoed down the hall from the sleeping quarters. Kest rounded the corner.
“Put him down!” she yelled, raising her metal prosthetic arm.
A chunk of cinnabar flew off the hand, stretching out into the rolling silver bolas she’d used during our Wilderness Territorial matches. The dreadlocked guy with the empty eye sockets sidestepped the chain and snatched it out of the air.
“Give me my brother back!” Kest grabbed the closest chair, ripping the bolts out of the flooring, and went Hot Metal. The air in the canteen turned into an inferno of invisible heat, and the chair melted to slag in her hands.
“You do not understand, young one,” the blind beggar said.
But Kest wasn’t listening. With a flick of her wrists, she shot handfuls of molten slag at the beggars. They dodged and tried to knock the little burning bits of liquid metal away with their walking sticks, but the slag splattered wherever it landed. Skin sizzled and cloth and hair melted as the droplets ricocheted onto them.
The blind beggar gave a signal, and all these scrawny, missing-limb and -eyes dudes dropped into kung fu fighting poses.
Kest called out her machete again. I hit the Ki strength and speed enhancements, shooting into the fight to take some of the heat off her.
Warcry ran into the canteen just in time to see the Thunderdome erupt.
“Who’re these geezers?” he yelled when he caught my eye.
“I don’t know, but they’re kidnapping Rali.” I threw out Death Metal to block a swing from the blind beggar’s walking stick. The force of the blow shoved me backward a good ten feet, my sneakers screeching on the canteen floor.
The Lunar Scythe probably would’ve been a better weapon against all these walking sticks, but I’d been trying to avoid it until I learned more about the devil corruption I took every time I used it.
Sushi swam over to my side, back in her fish form.
“Grady doesn’t fight! Grady saves Rali! Go to Rali in Dream attack!”
“How?”
“Through!” She swam over to the shuttered window to the kitchen and pressed a little purple pectoral fin against it. “Go through!”
I glanced from Warcry and Kest, who were busy getting wrecked by the old, injured, blind beggars, to the solid metal shutter pulled down over the window.
“But Rali’s right
