Chapter 205: The Azure Blade

  Nara’s aura senses had marked 5 silver rankers when the battle first began, but Minato had only reported 4. There was always that lingering doubt in her mind, that her senses were not quite right, but Nara knew enough not to dismiss her senses entirely, no matter her misgiving on the actual status of her reality.

  Even if all this was a hallucination, she should treat it as if it wasn’t.

  The fifth silver ranker lit up, a beacon against her aura senses, and a beacon of hope for the squad. Diya, swarmed by monsters and beaten by winds. Jameson, a broken ankle and a shattered calm. Yasmin, with depleting reserves and fraying concentration. Warthog, losing regulation to urgency. John, calm in chaos, but unable to tip the scales back towards stability. The situation was challenging all of them, and this time the balance tipped just on the side of lethal.

  Nara was wary of course—the possibility of an interfering enemy was more likely than an intervening ally. She prepared herself to teleport and parry, if necessary, and could only hope the wyverns would be incensed enough to keep chasing her rather than besiege the squad.

  The fifth ‘silver’ ranker came in like a shooting star, riding on what Nara could only describe as a jet-powered sci-fi flying sword hoverboard. Upon closer observation, the being was peak bronze, a sneeze and a hiccup away from silver. (So, Minato was technically correct on 4 silver rankers, even if the entity had been undetected).

  He looked human—but with metallic silver hair that resembled celestines, tied into a long braid secured with a ribbon. His aura signature was distinctly human, and if the massive, jet-powered sword swings were any indication, not one for disguise. (Appearances could be deceiving: John didn’t look like one for deceit, but had one of the best disguise abilities among them.)

  The shooting-star swordsman lunged, sword raised overhead, a monolith of blued metal and blue flame. He shot downwards, the combined power of hover-sword and engine-sword swinging down to combine accelerating power, far out speeding any zero-to-sixty any consumer vehicle could’ve hoped to accomplish. Car advertisers would’ve gnashed their teeth in seething jealousy.

  Nara heard the wyvern screech before she saw the damage—a mangled wing, severed at a joint, leathery membrane tattered and burnt.

  An ally?

  A second sword was conjured, less heavy than the enormous jet powered bladed slab of before, although this was equally ‘powered’—a sword chainsaw, teeth wicked with blue flames. He swung again, a trail of crescent blue and a roar of motorized metal. It bit a decent chunk into wyvern scale, and he pushed, jet engines flaring and shoving metal through flesh with sheer force of internal combustion, superhuman strength, and stubborn will. It didn’t bite through bone, but the interloper thought that initial attack was enough to disable the wyvern and yanked is sword outward, spraying hot blood and chunks of cooked flesh together with his blade.

  With the wyvern at her back distracted, Diya swirled into a stand, accurately shooting the various monsters nipping at her heels between the eyes with a high damage but single shot pistol. She reloaded, and all previously shot locations exploded, embedded bullets detonating.

  “I am Si Wuhao, the Azure Blade, disciple of the Four Seasons,” he proclaimed, blade pointed upwards at in a stereotypically heroic pose up at Nara, where she spared a side eye and a sliver of brain power for the drama between dodging wyvern spittle. “I request your immediate compliance to assist in your alleged offenses against the Farside Pact. Should you object to this voluntary compliance, I proclaim a duel, with your capitulation upon my victory.”

  That was a lot to get out in the midst of battle, but the peak bronze ranker clearly struggled less against his opponents. Leeway enough to yap about alleged crimes, or something. Nara admits to nothing!

  “Are you talking about me?” She dodged another snapping jaw. She didn’t really think Earth had these types, but 8th grade syndrome was an Earth concept; She shouldn’t be surprised.

  “Yes, you, pactbreaker—”

  “—Alleged,” she clarified. She had no fucking clue what he was accusing her of, but she wouldn’t let it slide without a fight.

  He sighed, and some of his frenetic energy brough on by the adrenaline of combat seemed to fade away. “You are the Wanderer, Nora Ambrose?” He called, still slaying monsters. She could appreciate his capacity to double task, at least. Was it still 8th grade syndrome if he had magic powers? She’d have to take it under advisement.

  “I go by Nara now!” She shouted back, projecting her voice with mana to carry it over the winds. Her proficiency with voice related aura and magic techniques had always been masterful, although she rarely had use for it. Sen and Eufemia had learnt a bit from her. “I had it legally changed!”

  Her not-old-but-no-longer-legal name. He was operating off of outdated information? That meant…something.

  “My congratulations!” The man shouted back. He paused, confused, unsure what exactly he was congratulating her for. “Have you changed your expression of gender?” He inquired.

  “No, I haven’t!” she responded with a shout.

  His face scrunched further. “I’m afraid I do not understand, my apologies!”

  Throughout this conversation, something about this man shone. Something she had forgotten was possible on Earth. His aura was clean of cores: Pristine and unblemished, it felt like a clear blue sky with a bright sun, hot and pleasant, a summer day.

  She learned more from that than his outdated name information; that on Earth, someone had figured out non-core advancement. Why didn’t the ASI have it? The man, Si Wuhao, was clearly not a part of the Agency, having avoided them in the volatile space, then proclaiming his affiliation as to...to..

  (“A disciple of the Four Seasons, benefactor”, Sage reminded her.

  Right, that. Sage was so nice, that was far kinder than the way Chrome would have reminder her. )

  “Could this…duel wait for after all this?” she proposed. She had finally worked down the wyverns enough, and her swords were slashing through scales with ease. They were more blood than bronze, and she had taken to the cyber swordman’s example, slicing through the neck to disable breath attacks. She cut through the muscles in the back, severing tendons that moved wings, and the first wyvern plummeted. This tactic wouldn’t always work with essence users, but sometimes monster abilities could be disabled through physical damage.

  “Acceptable!” he shouted. Nara didn’t know if he was just a shouty person or if it was the wind. “Await your judgement!”

  With Wuhao’s assistance (was that really his name?) the fight shifted back to equanimity. His silver rank wyvern had been badly mangled by his initial super massive jet-powered blow and wasn’t a lethal threat anymore, although its claw swipes and tail swings were still deadly. The remaining silver rank was one of the slinky snakes, and unanimously decided as the greatest threat. Flattening the landscape or stopping their movement with abilities to stop their powerful swinging would have made them much easier to deal with, but the group’s control specialist was glassy eyed and hobbling.

  With one of her own wyverns close to dead, ribcage crushed from its falling impact against rock that was just as unforgiving as it was to them, Nara had enough processing power to evaluate her opponent; if they were going to duel, she should evaluate his abilities as best she could.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  His jet-powered swings would reduce the effectiveness of her parries. She could parry the initial blow, but he could power through them and push past his defenses. His arms were encased in a cybernetic sleeve, with full flexibility similar to flesh, although it did not encompass his whole body. She spied a blade flip out from the side, cutting a monster from a different angle that his primary swing did not reach. She reasoned that his legs likely matched, as the arms had small engines to shift his movement in air for increased air control and boosted swing speed. He regularly unleashed super jumps and power slams, when he wasn’t outright flying. Unlike her, he didn’t require a solid surface to maximize the power of his swings, although at any point he could stand upon a sword to provide it.

  Peak bronze, with a few abilities in silver 0. It’d be a challenge; he was skilled, unlike the typical essence user of Earth she had seen. Her advantage were his strengths: his abilities were large, flashy, and powerful, and consequently unsuited for a duel against a similarly sized target.

  He flung a sword out. It spun like a top, powered by engines in a flaming whirl of death.

  “Diya,” she questioned over chat once the combat was starting to peter, “do you know who that is? Is he some sort of Special Forces Agent?”

  “He is not Special Forces, but I do know of people like him. I mentioned ‘black’ either integrators to you—”

  “Is he one of them?”

  “If you let me explain…” Diya exasperated. The fight was waning, and she had resumed her place in their combat formation. “Those of us who work for the Agency and its alternative organizations are considered ‘white’ EIs. We’re as official as an EI can get, with clear contracts with duties and salaries. Black EIs are the EIs governments deny having—” a scoff “—but we know exist anyway. The ones that aren’t officially on any payroll.”

  “The secret weapons.”

  “The assassins, the spies, so on,” she agreed. “The less-than-legals. We call ones like him grey EIs—they call themselves Farsiders—the Agency calls them Permanent Ether Occupants: PEOs.” She rolled her eyes. “Ridiculous, I know. They’re ones who have disavowed society and chosen to live in the ether realm permanently.” She scoffed, evidently disdainful of their decision.

  “Not a fan?” Nara guessed.

  “They cannot change society without participating in it. They’re running away from reality! Our system is flawed, but it is the system that we have. They may occasionally help out like this, and I can admit they’re usually more powerful than us. Now we know why!” she finished bitterly. “If only they shared their training methods. Selfish bastards.” She cursed and emptied a mag into a particularly large beastie.

  That was improvement. Diya had enough aura sensitivity to recognize the difference between them. Now that Diya and her team had the tools to improve themselves, Nara was sure that they’d become more and more skilled.

  The final monster horde had been reduced to monster meat spam, with a final dashing of stragglers that were easily picked off by Diya’s ranged pistol attacks. Guns were highly convenient for this sort of clean up, sparing them the effort of methodically chasing down monsters to stab them like some sort of serial killer of monsters. She spared a mournful glance for Nivana, whose gun form would never pack the same punch.

  Injuries and conditions were assessed; Jameson was in by far the worst condition, physical and mentally. He shivered on the ground, weak and clammy, coming off from an adrenaline high that peaked the worst methamphetamine hits. Diya was frowning at him, gauging whether he would be up to the standards of the squad going forward. To pass him onto another squad or to train him up, it was a decision she had to carefully consider.

  Yasmin and Diya were tied runners-up in the worst condition competition, although in opposite ways. Yasmin had remained well protected for the duration of the fight, but she was drained of mana, and tired out from maintaining a channeled ability for the majority of the fight. Mental and mental exhaustion dulled her features and weighed her every breath. Diya was battered and bloody, several bones fractured, although none completely broken. Her back would be one giant bruise from the wyvern’s tail swipe, and would blossom an angry, deep purple in the coming days unless it was healed. She wasn’t in any mortal danger, so she waved John off to attend to Jameson, who she wanted in some semblance of self-control. At least enough to haul himself up and walk.

  “So,” Nara began casually, gauging the interloper. “You want to do this match here, or somewhere else? This isn’t exactly the best place for it.”

  They were sheltered in a large-ish cave from the wind—which hadn’t magically turned off when they cleared the zone—although too narrow in space for a proper duel.

  Wuhao considered this, lips thinning in a considerate mien.

  “Wuhao, er, can I call you Wuhao?”

  “No, for a stranger and pactbreaker such as you, that is considerably impolite.”

  So, a cultural difference? Why introduce his name if she couldn’t use it? Was it just to let her know that she couldn’t use it?

  “So…” she trailed off, awkward. It was a first being told she couldn’t call someone by their name. That wasn’t usually the difficult question of a conversation.

  He sighed, “I forget the culture of Origin dwellers, and your lack of knowledge about ours. You may call me Azure.”

  “Right, about that whole pactbreaker thing. Alleged pactbreaker. I don’t remember breaking any pact.”

  “Your ignorance does not exempt your crimes.”

  Right, that was an argument people used. “I’m not a…citizen of the farside. I’m hardly beholden to its laws.”

  That gave Azure pause, and he seriously considered this. Crisis averted?

  “Indeed, your crimes are alleged, and I cannot expect you to conform to the laws of Farside. However, I still wish to investigate the nature of the accusations against you. Thus, I demand a duel, to balance our debt, with the same capitulation as previously proposed. I have saved your people, this, you acknowledge?”

  She nodded. Diya wasn’t exactly her team or her friends, but none of the other squad members could win against Azure. Without Azure’s interference, Nara wasn’t sure that all of them would have survived. If things went to shit, she would have prioritized extracting John, and if that had happened, the silver rank wyverns would have had the opportunity to kill squad members before she could have rescued them too.

  “In return for my assistance, we shall duel. Should I win, I shall escort you back to my sect, and they shall conduct their investigation and judgement. You will follow and comply.”

  She raised an eyebrow and glanced at Diya, who was way too tired to give a shit, and was staring with a blank, unreactive expression of ‘out of fucks to give’. “Not…a duel to the death?”

  He was affronted. “It is beyond my authority to deliver summary execution. Such a decision would be savagery.”

  “Then, what if I win?” she prompted. “I will accept your duel to clear our debt, if that is your price, but such a duel still has two possibilities of outcome.”

  His brow furrowed. “You will not win.” She felt a scan against her aura, and an echo of futility as it found nothing. Azure was peak bronze, so it was a fair assessment to assume he’d win. “However, it would be unjust to present a duel to you with no gain. Name your reward.”

  “If I win, I’ll go with you to your sect, but as a guest. I have no knowledge of my so-called ‘pact breaking’ offenses and would like to seek clarification from your people. No judgement or interrogation.

  “Shall we duel here then? Now?” Nara gestured outside, the winds still merrily ripping everything beyond to shreds. “We’ve delayed our exit to negotiate, but how about a rain check? Do you know The Big Beech?”

  “Pardon?” He tilted his head in confusion, and Nara found it somewhat adorable. He was so constantly serious.

  “Sorry. Uh…the massive Beech tree in the farside, somewhere around Copenhagen. 5 days time, I shall meet you there for the duel. On my word.” She performed Sanshi’s traditional greeting, which doubled as an oath of sorts, although it held little meaning to her opponent.

  He crossed his arms. “You are a stranger, and I cannot trust you merely on your world.”

  Reasonable, but: “Would you rather we fight here?”

  “I would rather duel here than not at all,” he said stubbornly.

  She evaluated him once more. The honest sort, to a fault, that believed in the inherent good of justice. Slightly foolish, but not exactly na?ve.

  “I cannot give you my weapon, as no one but I can touch her, but I can lend you leverage that I would hunt you down for, should you make off with it.” Her Path Seeker Lute manifested in her hands, and even the most tasteless redneck with no sense for the arts could see its master craftsmanship and expense in materials. “This is a lute, crafted for me by my mentors. A soul bonded instrument.”

  It was risky, handing over Path Seeker, although she would not let her instrument go unaccompanied. However, she needed an in into the society of the global astral space, which may hold answers to its existence and nature. Azure’s ability to progress without cores posed interesting questions about essence users on Earth.

  Azure traced his eyes down the instrument, noting its beautiful and intricate silver designs upon a lacquer of deep sky, too fine for mortal craftsmanship, and the string that shone of woven starlight, as if woven by a celestial fairy.

  “Is this? …A Mastercraft. This is suitable leverage,” he conceded.

  She handed it to him and snatched his wrist in a bruising grip, staring him down with the combined experience of what she was known for and what she had experienced. “If you damage it or abscond with it, I will find you and hold you accountable.”

  “I will protect it with my life,” he promised, solemn and the tiniest bit intimidated. She handed him a case for it, since it was clear he had no inventory of his own, and he slipped the strap around his body.

  Completely undetected, a body of Sage slipped by, shimmering into the air around him like a heat mirage, and settled into the material of the case.