All my joints felt rusty and locked up as I went over and knelt down beside Kest. I braced myself for getting yelled at, shoved away, being hated, then put my arm around her.
She didn’t throw it off.
“That idiot,” she whispered in a broken voice. She sniffed hard. “How am I supposed to know when this tantrum’s over and he wants me to come pick him up? Who’s going to pay for his food? How’s he going to do anything without a HUD?”
“I don’t know,” I said, because it was easier than trying to tell her that I didn’t think he was going to get over it this time.
Rali’s favorite sword legend trope came back to me then—the hero’s best friend starts taking devil corruption, becomes evil, and eventually the hero has to kill him in a heart-wrenching scene.
Maybe the writers of the old sword legends got it wrong. Maybe the hero’s friend never actually became evil. Maybe there just came a point when the friend outgrew the hero and started to see how things really were in a way the hero couldn’t.
A ray of uncertainty cut through the coiling black in my chest. I looked toward the tree line.
If I was wrong, and Rali was right, then I hoped he found hakkeyoi and ended it quick. Like he’d said, it had to be him.
New Weight Class
THE YELLOW SHINOTOCHI sun climbed to its apex over the jungle before we decided it was time to go back to Ryu. Kest suggested it. Neither me or Warcry wanted to be the one to say it was time to leave Rali behind. After some messaging around to find a ship in the area, one of the Eight-Legged Dragons’ interplanetary shuttles picked us up.
The two-day return trip to Ryu felt like a death watch. Kest didn’t cry again, but she stared out the back window a lot like maybe she would see her twin signaling for us to turn around and come get him. Every now and then, Warcry flared up, fire running down his shoulders and arms while he let out a string of curses directed at everything in sight.
Whenever I boiled over, I made sure to go somewhere Kest wouldn’t see or hear me punching the bulkhead. She didn’t need the extra drama, and it wasn’t like I deserved to be upset anyway. I’d only lost my friend; she had lost her other half.
We got in to see Emperor Takeshi the same day we landed. Surprisingly, the Emperor wasn’t mad that his Ketsu-level Sown Dream cultivator had been picked off by a sniper. He was more excited by the fact that I’d killed an entire camp of Technols in one swipe to take down the Jianjiao who’d killed her.
“Is very impressive,” Takeshi said, perching on the corner of his huge wooden desk. “From pitiful five-digit Spirit reserve to four hundred thousand. Death cultivator has come long way, yes?”
“Kest’s is still higher,” I said, looking up from where we were kneeling. She hadn’t been distraught enough not to want to compare stats on the shuttle.
“Takeshi notices.” He shot a toothy smile at Kest. She didn’t return it. “You are excellent additions to Dragons, all three.”
“What’re ya gonna do about your dead 002-rank?” Warcry asked.
The Emperor waved a scaly hand. “She will be replaced in time. Takeshi would have had to deal with Sanya eventually. Such is Ketsu problems.”
I glanced at the suit who’d led us into the meeting, wondering whether he was one of the candidates jockeying for the newly vacated slot, but his face wasn’t giving anything away.
“Is shame you have to kill some of our Jianjiao allies, Death cultivator, but in war one expects collateral damages, yes? Takeshi will smooth things over with Jianjiao Emperor.”
He watched me like he was expecting shock or outrage, but I’d been waiting for him to play that card. Kest, Warcry, and I had talked about it on the flight back from Sarca and decided that an alliance with the Jianjiao was the only thing that made sense. That was the reason the Shogun hadn’t wanted Fugi to kill me outside the Tikrong dance hall, and why Takiru had stared me down and said, “He doesn’t know.” They had been under orders from their Emperor to work with the Dragons, not against us. If they’d killed me back then, before we had the artifact, they probably would’ve been executed by their own gang for the screwup. After they knew where the artifact was, they were good to take out anybody who got in their way.
Seeing he wasn’t going to get the reaction he’d been hoping for out of me, the Komodo Emperor nodded at Kest. “Metal cultivator. You not only progressed to Ten, but mastered artifact and kept it out of Technol hands. Very ambitious, yes?”
“Yes,” Kest said. “I’m also very attentive to my bank account. My salary is two days late, but I’m willing to overlook the tardiness with your generous consignment of the artifact to a newly advanced Malleable Metal cultivator who’s capable of controlling it. For the Eight-Legged Dragons’ benefit, of course, Your Excellency.”
Takeshi chuckled, then did something on his HUD.
“How is this?” he asked, tapping his screen.
Kest’s HUD buzzed. She checked the notification. It must’ve been an obscene amount of credits, because she gasped. It took her a second to get the cool, unimpressed look back on her face.
“Higher than negotiated,” she said, a hint of suspicion creeping in at the edges.
The Emperor grinned, baring his sharp Komodo fangs. “Lifetime affiliation contract is very valuable when contractee’s lifetime lasts forever. New amount reflects Takeshi’s trust that Metal Selken will serve Dragons with the ferocity of a Varanusko now that she is invulnerable.”
Kest bowed like she couldn’t feel the shackles snapping shut around her wrists.
“Thank you for your generosity, Almighty Emperor,” she said.
I had to dig my fingers into my thighs to keep my hands from balling into fists, but managed to keep
