49th of Season of Fire, 57th year of the 32nd cycle

  Newt placed his hand on Obsidian’s trembling shoulder. The big man’s nervousness grew more and more palpable with each step they took up the stairs. Obsidian turned around and gave him an appreciative nod before opening the door with a quivering hand.

  The five-o-four’s common room was dark, but not pitch black, and no lights seeped in beneath the doors to the girls’ bedrooms. Obsidian’s chest rose as he took a deep breath.

  “Jas, Rose, Newt and I are leaving for a mission tomorrow.” Obsidian said, his voice nearly a shout. “If we don’t go, the sect will demote us to outer disciples, and basically cut off our cultivation resources.”

  Newt stared at him flabbergasted. Can’t you be quieter? It’s almost midnight.

  While everyone in the building was a cultivator at the third or fourth realm and rarely slept, shouting in the middle of the night still seemed like an uncouth thing to do. Before he got to consider how inappropriate the whole thing was, the door to Jasmine’s room opened with a bang.

  “You’re doing what?” she shouted.

  A wave of alcohol fumes rolled into the room, but at least she was decent. Apparently, getting a new roommate forced her into wearing pants and sleeveless shirts even when passed out drunk.

  “We accepted a mission, and we’re leaving tomorrow, with or without you.” Obsidian stopped shaking, his tense shoulders finally relaxed. Saying the words seemed to free him of his burden. Whether it was because his path of retreat was severed or because he was finally moving forwards, Newt could not tell.

  “You dumb rock! Why’d you do that? What’s wrong with that thick skull of yours?”

  While Jasmine screamed, Roselilly opened her door a crack, just as decent and just as terrified as her friend.

  “We have selected the mission because an elder told us we have forty days to complete one or we would all get demoted. You don’t have to join us, Newt and I can go alone.”

  “Like hell you are!” Jasmine glared at her brother, then turned towards Newt, murder in her eyes. “You! This is all your fault!”

  Obsidian stepped between them.

  “This is nobody’s fault. The sect rules state that we will get demoted if we can’t fulfill our missions or pass the tests. I don’t want to fail because of a technicality. I was just informing you because it’s the right thing to do. You can do whatever you want with that information.”

  Newt wanted to peek around Obsidian, to see Jasmine’s face, but Obi turned around.

  “We should grab some sleep, then get the compass and equipment we might need tomorrow.”

  Newt nodded, but Obsidian had already turned around, probably not even registering his acknowledgement.

  “We are going to the Valley of the Lost. Don’t look at me like that, gathering mist crystals was the only mission left.” This time, Newt did peek around, and saw the woman’s face frozen in silent horror.

  “You can’t go! Are you insane?” Roselilly opened her door all the way and stepped forth, flailing her arms. “You’re going to die.”

  “Rose,” Obsidian’s voice turned gentle, as if he were speaking with a child, “missions are dangerous. We were unlucky once, things spiraled out of control, and we lost a dear person, but that doesn’t mean it will always happen. We can’t stay holed up in our rooms. And if that is your solution, you should consider quitting cultivation altogether.”

  “And what?” she shrieked. “Your solution is jumping straight in the middle of one of the sect’s most dangerous locations?”

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  Obsidian hesitated, he agreed with Roselilly in principle. Heading into the Valley of the Lost after an extended break was a horrible idea. They needed something simple, like clearing velociraptor chicks from someone’s basement, but the stars seemed aligned against them, and the only thing they could do was toughen up, or surrender to their fate.

  He drew a deep breath and sighed.

  “I agree it’s not a good solution, but it’s the only way forward other than giving up, and I don’t want to give up. To cultivate is to go against fate and against the heavens. I’m afraid that giving up now means I’m forming a crack in my realm, maybe even creating an undefeatable heart demon, because I think there’s no going back after surrendering to fate. I’d basically give up cultivation, and I don’t want that. Do you?”

  Roselilly lowered her gaze, biting her lip. Watching things unfold, Newt felt like a stranger, an extra who should wait outside the room for this conversation to finish, even if he was the stone which created the ripples leading to this conversation.

  “I’m going with you.” Jasmine’s hard voice broke the silence. “I don’t know about my cultivation, I haven’t considered it in a long time, but I don’t want you to go somewhere so dangerous without me.”

  Yes! Newt’s heart raced as a grin escaped him. He had made a difference. He glanced towards Roselilly, but the young woman was still staring at the floor.

  “I don’t know.” The words were barely louder than a whisper, then Rose looked up, her voice growing louder, more certain. “I love you guys. I don’t want anything bad to happen to you. But… But, I don’t think I’m ready.”

  She bit her lips yet again, balling her hands into trembling fists. “I need time to think. Can we talk in the morning?”

  Obsidian nodded solemnly, and Roselilly retreated to her room after bidding them good night.

  Jasmine said nothing. She just stood there, glaring at her brother with hands on her hips.

  “You big, dumb kidney stone,” she grumbled. “I’m so angry with you. Have you any idea how dangerous this is?”

  “Yeah, I do. I mean, I know already.” Obsidian gave a mirthless laugh. “But we need to do something, otherwise it’s all over.”

  He glanced at Newt. “And Newt is freakishly strong. I sparred with him today—”

  “Did a scrawny little kid beat you up?” A lifetime of habit took over, and Jasmine’s words came out as a taunt.

  Newt resented the statement more than Obsidian. He had tried eating and overeating, but his cultivation had locked his general build into what it was. His skin was smooth and free of imperfections, his hair was healthy and glossy from all the spiritual energy coursing through it, but his three years of starvations were locked into his appearance for some reason.

  A normal human would have recovered in a matter of weeks or months, but a year had passed, and he was still gaunt.

  “He is freakishly strong! And don’t call him a kid. He’s seventeen.”

  Jasmine’s eyes went wide. “I thought he was at least thirty!”

  Why would you call a thirty-year-old man a kid?

  “Stop it, you’re embarrassing him.”

  “I’m confused, not embarrassed. Why do you think a thirty-year-old is a child?”

  Jasmine tilted her head. “At the third realm, you can expect to live up to eight hundred years. I’m seventy years old, even I’m a ten-year-old mortal child in the grand scheme of things, let alone you, a seventeen-year-old. You’ll see how time flies. The first realm is quick and easy, the second not so much, the third is already very difficult. No matter how fast and well educated you are, I don’t think you can build a stable realm in less than fifty years, thirty, if you’re some sort of genius or have taken pills to hasten your cultivation. And that’s without taking into account how long it takes to gather the energy to expand your realm up to the limits of the tenth layer.”

  Newt wanted to argue, but he could see Jasmine’s logic.

  What about using spirit gems? One per hour, I need to sleep an hour every day on average, and a couple minutes to eat…

  Newt guessed it would take about three to four months, but well crafted pills could achieve the same result in a matter of days. But as far as pills went, he had just heard information much more relevant to him.

  “There are pills which make it easier to cultivate?” he asked, confusing the siblings.

  “Yes,” Obsidian said. “Depending on their quality, they can quicken your innate speed by fifty percent, all the way to tripling the speed with which you cultivate your realm. Higher talent also plays a part, given your age and realm, you might be ready for advancement in ten to twenty years. The pills might shave off…”

  Newt chatted with them some more, Jasmine visibly relaxing in his presence as she shifted her perception of him from an invader into a junior in need of help and advice from a senior. Then, after half an hour, he went to bed. He was neither tired nor sleepy, but he needed to force himself to sleep. There was no telling how long they would have to wander the Valley of the Lost, and the less they slept inside it, the safer they would be.

  Sleep would not take him, so Newt started counting the lines of various spell formations he should scribe in his realm and passed out of boredom.