There was just enough room to sit up in the bed without hitting my head on the stone ceiling. I sat with my leather boots dangling off the side while leaning against the hard wall. The mattress underneath me was made of a coarse tan fabric, and the reddish wood frame was sturdy enough not to shake even when I had leaped up into it. In the ceiling before me were two orbs of blue alchemical light, but they were spaced apart so that I wasn't staring right into either of them while in the middle of my bed.

I examined the jade bracelet in my hand. The bracelet's polished surface was a uniformly dark green shade and, unexpectedly, warm to the touch. Other than that, there weren't any other distinguishing features to set it apart from an ordinary piece of jewelry. The opening looked a bit small, but I slipped it onto my left wrist easily enough.

"Ow!" Naisha cried out. She was on the lower bed on the other side of the room. "It bit me."

I was about to ask about bed bugs, when the bracelet squeezed my wrist. Something sharp pricked the softer underside of my wrist. I flipped my arm over, but didn't see anything out of the ordinary. When nothing else happened, I sent a small trickle of qi into the bracelet, as I did with charging Terminus.

Blue letters immediately appeared in my vision.

Message from Ikari:

Welcome to the Sword System Academy. Make yourselves at home, as you are required to live here for the duration of your studies. You may leave the Academy and return as you please, but attendance at all scheduled classes and activities is mandatory. Your first class is tomorrow morning at seven. Your Index can tell you the time, lead you to your next class, and provide a host of other functions. Send a small amount of qi into the Index to activate it, then simply think a command to execute it. A list of basic commands is below.

Commands:

Bonuses.

Classes.

Directions.

Message.

Question Log.

Status.

Time.

I wasn't sure which command to try first. I ended up choosing the simplest one. Time.

Time: 1:31 p.m.

That was useful. Even the alchemists hadn't invented a time-telling device yet that was small enough to carry on your wrist.

I frowned slightly. It also meant that this Index was incredibly valuable. I didn't doubt that some alchemical researchers would pay anything to obtain one for themselves. I shifted the bracelet slightly higher up my arm so that it was hidden under my tunic's sleeve. I moved on to another command. Status.

Status

Name: Talen Koroi

Exam points: 1010

Bonus points: 2

Rank: Master

Swords: None

Implants: None

Techniques: None

Credits: None

I wasn't sure what everything meant, but I still winced slightly at the last four lines. I was starting with nothing as far as the Academy was concerned. Curiously, the Index didn't count Terminus as my sword. But what really caught my attention was the reminder of the so-called bonus points. What would they hold? Bonuses.

Bonuses

Note: You have the following unclaimed bonuses:

A) Qi pill, tier 1.

Use the Claim command followed by the selection to receive your bonus.

Bonus question (1/2):

Select your bonus from the list below using the Final Answer command. You may answer this question at another time by invoking the Cancel command.

A) Chip of condensed sword qi.

B) Access to the Scry command.

C) Access to the Alchemical Laboratory.

D) Small morsel of Void Beast meat.

I didn't know what the choices for the bonus question meant or exactly how the bonus questions worked. Besides, Ikari had warned that we should attend our classes first.

I did know what a qi pill did. They provided an influx of qi in a form that could be immediately processed into a core. To match the effect of a human-made qi pill, it normally took weeks or months of steady absorption and processing of ambient qi, a natural process that could be slightly accelerated through focus and meditation. The nobles relied heavily on such qi pills for their advancement.

I had never used one. The elders frowned on alchemical shortcuts, and I tended to agree with them. Strength that wasn't earned could be more dangerous than weakness.

But Ikari had promised advancement to the Grandmaster rank, which would require an almost unthinkable amount of qi. No alchemist had been able to craft such a pill, and even if they could, the cost would have been enormous. Surely the elders would concede to the Swordgeists in this.

I couldn't wait any longer. Cancel. The bonus question disappeared from my sight. Claim, A.

I held my breath. A moment later, a pulsing golden orb the size of a cherry appeared in front of me, floating in the space just beyond my bed.

The qi pill.

I snatched it out of the air. I nearly cried out in surprise when I touched it. My hand was still, but the pill shifted within my palm, vibrating slightly. It had an aura, similar to the ones that sword artists carried, rhythmically contracting and expanding to my spiritual senses like a heartbeat.

I had the feeling that I was about to eat a live creature rather than consume an alchemical medicine. I stared at my closed fist, steeling my resolve for the next step. My breathing slowed, and I delved deeper into my core, readying myself.

Message from Alanna Vox: Talen?

The blue words scrolled across my sight, breaking me out of my semi-meditative state. I looked up.

Alanna was sitting across the room on the top bed looking at me. "Did you get it?"

I nodded and held up my fist.

"No, the message," she said. "You didn't hear me when I called your name."

The message. She had sent me that message through the Index, as the Swordgeists did. I would have been amazed at that incredible feat if I wasn't already holding the qi pill within my fist. There were too many wonders here, too much happening at once.

"Yes," I said. "Sorry. I was preparing for this." I indicated the hand holding the pill again.

Alanna raised her own hand in response. A soft glow leaked out from between the fingers of her closed fist.

"I was thinking that we should take them together," she said.

I considered her suggestion. It would have been better to have one person on guard, but it's not like I completely trusted anyone here yet, especially not Five. Or Naisha. I wasn't sure about Alanna, either, seeing as she was a noble. Assuming that the Academy was safe from external threats, and that the qi seal on our room kept out unwanted guests...yes, Alanna's suggestion made the most sense.

"Good idea," I replied.

Naisha, who had been lounging on the bed below Alanna, shot to her feet. "You've got to be kidding. So long, suckers." She ran into the washroom and closed the door behind her with a loud thud. Something clicked.

Alanna frowned as she gazed at the washroom's door. "Didn't think of that." She sighed. "Are you two ready?"

Five's voice snaked out lazily from the bed beneath me. "As you say, Vox. A teambuilding exercise."

Well, that was one way of looking at it.

"On three?" Alanna asked.

I shrugged and held up my pill. The bunk stirred as Five shifted on the bed.

"One," Five said.

"Two," Alanna said.

I brought the pill to my mouth. The qi swirled furiously within as if demanding to be let free, and the pill's aura seemed to pulse more frantically as I brought it closer. It must have been my imagination or my nerves. I had never used a pill before, but from what I had heard, this wasn't pleasant, even with the less potent pills. Who knew what this one had in store? I took one final deep breath.

"Three." I pushed the golden orb into my mouth.

The physical boundaries of the pill dissolved instantly, the qi within spreading to fill my body. A burning pain raged through my body as well, as qi channels were forced wider, my core stretched, and my very soul broken and mended over and over again. It was as if tiny shards of crackling glass were being pushed through my veins.

The pain was more intense than the time I had been stabbed in the side, nicking my liver, in a training accident. The pain was more maddening than when Elder Gri, to harden my mind, had tied me upside down for a day in the hot sun with insects crawling over my sweaty joints. The pain gnawed at me, everywhere.

I could no longer contain the pain as it spun out of control. I usually focused on the qi coursing through my core to calm myself, but the qi within was thrashing about violently. There was no solace to be found within myself.

I shut my eyes and shouted at the top of my lungs. I was dimly aware of two other voices joining me, then a muted high-pitched shriek from further away. Soon, I was lost in a sea of agony.

* * *

I woke up with a start, unsure where I was, how long I had been asleep, or even why I was asleep. The stench of unwashed bodies reached my nose and my stomach lurched, sending up bitter acid into the back of my throat. My lips had a thick, salty taste, and when I touched them with my fingertips, dried blood rubbed away. My body burned with heat. I tried to sit up, but my muscles barely responded to my will. I had managed to put a few inches between myself and the bed, which only served to briefly chill the sweat-soaked back of my tunic before I fell back onto the puddle.

So, this was what a qi pill did. I sighed. Incorporating foreign qi into my core meant discarding two kinds of impurities: the incompatible residues of the qi itself, as well as the discarded remnants of my rejuvenating body. When done at the body's natural pace, such wastes wouldn't be distinguishable from matters of ordinary hygiene.

A qi pill accelerated the process enough to do this instead. I lifted and dropped one hand on the wet mattress. Naisha had the right idea. She was probably lounging in a bathtub at the moment.

I had delayed checking the results of the pill for long enough, trying to find some measure of equilibrium before proceeding. I closed my eyes and searched for the seat of my qi.

There. My core wasn't larger. If anything, it was more compact, or perhaps more focused would have been a better description. The qi within was also more vibrant, more dense. But most of all, there was just so much qi. I sent the qi circulating through my body to bring it out of its languor. And, yet, so much more qi remained swirling within my core, ready to send into my sword or use for another purpose.

This was what being a Grandmaster meant.

"He's back," a familiar voice said from below.

I pieced back my recent memories with my eyes still closed. Five. The pale boy. The soldier. The qi flowing through my body rippled. I didn't like Five.

I lay still on the bed for a little longer, resting in the comfort of my newfound core. It was then that I noticed an alien presence within my qi, a disturbance that quickly faded under my attention. I didn't sense any harmful effects, so at first, I assumed that my core was still processing some small amount of unincorporated qi. But no, that wasn't it. I knew my core, and my core had finished its task.

The foreign aspect wasn't disappearing. I was simply getting used to it, like the way I would stop noticing the altered weight of a new sheath on my hip.

What had the Swordgeists done?

The pill hadn't simply granted me an enormous measure of qi. Through the pill, the Swordgeists had marked me, or perhaps bonded a small part of themselves with my core, in the same way that I might mark a new sword with my own qi.

Extra insight. +5 xp. Total: 1015 xp.

More exam points. There were hidden questions, then, with hidden answers. I didn't find that altogether surprising, now that I was getting a clue into how the Academy operated. They didn't exactly hand out the answers for free here. Everything had to be earned, and I expected more secrets waiting for us to discover them.

"Did the clansman die? Should I stab him to check?" It was Five.

I opened my eyes and sat up. "I'm alive," I said in a flat tone.

Alanna was leaning against the wall. She had exchanged her silver robes with gold trim for a plain blue one. She pointed to a pile of fabric in the corner of the room.

"We're putting the trash there for now. Naisha says the washroom has something that can take care of it. If she ever gets out." Alanna sighed, then pointed to the storage cabinets built into the wall next to the washroom's entrance. "The lockers have fresh clothes and towels when you're ready. The seal's matched to one person's qi. Five and I already checked ours. Yours is probably the one on the far side."

"Thanks." I looked down at the dirty mattress beneath me. Luckily, the material was fairly nonabsorbent, so I'd be able to wipe it down later. I would need to get into the washroom, though, to clean up myself. Whenever Naisha was done.

I glanced at Alanna again in her clean white robe. A small blue belt tied in the front held the robe snugly in place around her waist. How had she changed into that if Naisha was still in the washroom?

Alanna moved to the washroom's door and knocked loudly. "Hurry up, Naisha. We're all waiting."

A muffled voice shouted some words that I couldn't make out, but I got the gist of the reply from the tone.

"Three more minutes." Alanna banged on the door twice. "Then, I'm breaking this down."

Something crashed against the door from the other side. This time, I could hear the words being shouted all too clearly.

Alanna turned to smile. "Since I share a bunk with Naisha, naturally, I should go next to proceed in an orderly fashion...?"

I shrugged. I had expected as much. I was the last one to wake up, apparently.

"Shall we fight about it?" Five asked casually.

Alanna looked shocked for a moment, then chuckled. "I didn't know soldiers were so funny."

Five gave a short laugh, which sounded more like a cough or growl. "No, I'm serious."

Alanna frowned. I expected her to tell Five to quiet down, but she glanced at her sword, a large two-hander still on her bed, then back at Five. No, Alanna was too sensible to--

Alanna leaped towards her bed, grabbed her sword with one hand, and spun to block Five's strike. Five's sword was shorter than Alanna's, and it had an unusual triangular tip with barb-like corners that extended beyond the main blade. A golden shimmer surrounded both blades, as well as the two bodies.

I couldn't blame them for wanting to test their new strength. I pulled my feet away from the edge of the bed, shifting closer to the corner to avoid being caught in the fight.

Alanna's sword flared with yellow flames, and she threw Five backwards with her greatsword. The greatsword's tip scraped against the stone ceiling, gouging a large crack in it. She lowered her blade with a sheepish expression.

"Oops," Alanna said.

Five had meanwhile twisted himself around to land in the middle of his bed, but his flailing sword had cut off a section of my bed frame in the process. He, too, put his sword away.

"I lost five points," Five said in a bored tone as he sat on the floor next to his bed.

Alanna chuckled. "Same here. I wasn't going to say anything." She glanced up at me. "I suppose I can share that much. We're on the same team, aren't we?"

"Did something happen?" I asked.

"There's a warning message about unnecessary damage to Academy property," Alanna said. "Five points off is the first penalty."

"I see." It'd be to Five and Alanna's benefit in the class standings, even a little bit, to keep knowledge like that to themselves. I nodded. "Understood. Thanks."

Just then, the washroom's door slammed open. Naisha strode into the room wearing a clean blue robe. She sniffed her nose.

"You guys stink." Without another word, Naisha left our living quarters. The front door slid shut behind her.

"My turn," Alanna raced into the washroom.

Since I had little interest in engaging with Five, and he returned the favor, I returned to studying the Index. I tapped the smooth green surface with my index finger. What were the commands again? I could try...Commands.

Commands:

Bonuses.

Classes.

Directions.

Message.

Question Log.

Status.

Time.

It worked. The original message from Ikari had all but implied that there were even more commands to discover. All in due time. For now, there were still a few that I hadn't tried. I would figure out the Directions command some other time when I needed them. That left two more. Question Log.

Question Log

Instructions: As new students of the Sword System Academy, you are granted admission on a probationary status. To continue on in your studies, you must become the disciple of one of the Swordgeists. You may choose your master after advancing to the Hidden Realm. You will not be able to make your choice in advance. Speak to a senior disciple of the appropriate master to confirm your acceptance. Your master must reciprocate your choice for this question to be answered successfully. The time limit for this question is at the discretion of the instructors.

Choose your master from one of the following:

A) Kizen the Warrior.

B) Shiah the Refiner.

C) Theus the Maker.

D) Hamu the Broken.

That was expected. One more command to try. Classes.

Classes

Swordcraft I: 0%

I had no idea what that actually meant. I was zero percent of the way to finishing something? What would happen when I was done? I would have to ask Ikari if he didn't explain it tomorrow.

The last things to explore in the room, other than the washroom, were the lockers that Alanna had mentioned. Four vertical storage lockers made of dark metal were built into the wall, two on either side of the washroom's door.

I hopped off the bed. Five was seated on his bed with his eyes closed, and he didn't show any signs of acknowledging my presence. I ignored him and approached the locker closest to me. The door had a smaller qi seal on it that was marked with a series of concentric rings.

I held my hand in front of the circle seal where the handle would have been and channeled a small amount of my qi into it. The seal glowed with a dim yellow light, and the door popped open.

Inside, was a nebulous gray area, a kind of spatial void. Neat piles of fresh clothes, towels, food, water, and other supplies filled a small fraction of the spatial void. The ordinary rules of distances and perspective didn't seem to apply within, as the area inside, based on the numerous objects there, was at least as large as the room itself. Yet when I cautiously reached into that gray region, I could touch anything within the room without stretching my hand too far.

Another alchemical trick. Alchemists didn't just transmute spiritual and physical matter. They could transmute the very essence of matter existing. Instead of a spatial bag, this was a spatial storage room, all within the confines of a small locker.

The Swordgeist did seem to have a strange relationship with geometry. The exam field had been larger than the golden walls indicated from the outside. Even the Academy itself was larger than it seemed based on the size of the gray structure, although most of it could have been hidden underground.

"Admit it, you're impressed, clansman." Five's snide voice interrupted my thoughts.

I turned to find him lifting his head up slightly off the bed to sneer at me.

"So? Your point?" I asked.

"Typical country boy," Five replied. "It's nothing special, really. No different from what an alchemical craftsman could make, just more expensive."

"Again, your point?"

"Your clans are backwards, out of touch. You know almost nothing about alchemy." He rested his head on the bed again, facing upward. "You don't belong here."

There was some truth to his words, that the clans' rejection of alchemical means was holding us back. With enough time, we would probably have come around, incorporating the new methods with the old, but time had passed us by too swiftly. Perhaps I could bridge that gap, if I succeeded here.

That didn't explain Five's behavior, though. Was he afraid of me? No, I doubted that was the case. There was something personal, irrational about his hostility. Not against just me. The Selai woman as well.

There was no reason to hold back against an opponent like him.

"What is it? Did a clan member hurt you?" I asked.

"Hurt me? Please, like any of you obsolete fools could touch me." Five laughed mockingly, but it felt forced.

A personal grudge, but not against another. He hated himself, then. "I see. You're a clansman yourself. That's unexpected."

The sudden flare of killing intent from his aura warned me before the hiss of metal flying through the air.

I ducked low as a shard of metal whipped over my head and into my locker's gray storage area, followed by two fine chains attached to it streaming behind. I spun to find that the chains connecting back to Five sword, which he now held in his hand as he stood at the side of his bed.

The triangular tip of his sword was a projectile weapon of some kind, an alchemical device. Golden light ran up the length of the twin chains, and they began to retract. I slammed the door of my locker shut, trapping a length of the chains and the sword's tip within the locker. From the way Five growled and tensed, I knew he meant to rip his sword's tip free.

"How many points do you want to lose this time?" I asked, gesturing to the locker door with a nod of my head.

Five stared at me, his pale face calm, but his black eyes brimming with fury. I truly wondered what had led him down this path, if he was in fact a former member of a sword clan. I would have been sympathetic, except I had to sleep three feet above him. A stray sword thrust in the night would be all it would take from him. But that threat cut both ways.

I put one hand on Terminus. "You started it. You can end it." I stared at him, waiting for him to respond one way or the other, but he just stared back in silence.

The door to the washroom slid open. Alanna poked her head out, water dripping down her long blonde hair to pool on the floor just inside the main room. Her blue eyes took in the entire scene at once without blinking.

"Talen, I do hope you're behaving," Alanna said finally.

I raised an eyebrow. She could clearly see that Five had his weapon drawn, not me.

"Because it sounded like we need a team to get through the Academy. I would really hate to get kicked out of here like those other two because we didn't have four members. I mean, it hasn't even been a day, and look what we've gotten already."

Alanna didn't take her eyes off me as she spoke, but I understood now that her words weren't for my benefit. It was her way of telling Five to stand down without loss of face. Eh, so the nobles and clans weren't too different in that regard.

"Of course," I replied. "Anything else?"

"Hand me an extra towel, will you? The ones I brought got grime on them." Alanna nodded towards my locker, which still had a piece of Five's sword stuck within it.

I glanced at Five, who was looking away now. The muscles of his jaw were still tense, but his aura had died down.

I opened the locker. Yellow light flowed down the length of the two chains streaming from Five's sword, and the sword's tip was yanked backward, reattaching to his sword with a clang.

I reached inside, grabbed a handful of clean white towels, and stepped over to the washroom to hand them to Alanna.

"Here, take several," I said.

A bare arm with qi etchings running along its length snaked out of the crack in the washroom's partially open door. Alanna gave me a polite smile, took the towels, then shut the door. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Five was already back in his bed, staring upward. He seemed to have calmed down, but I moved to the wall by the foot of the bed, where I could watch him better while I waited for my turn to clean up.

We had been in the living quarters for such a short time, and already, fights were breaking out. It wasn't that hard to predict what would happen when you crammed four sword artist strangers together in a tight space. I wasn't sure if the Swordgeists were that careless of what happened to us, or if they were intent on toying with us for their entertainment. Maybe both. They were watching everything, as disturbing as that was.

I sat on the floor and waited. Soon, Alanna finished and quickly left the room without saying anything. Five abruptly got up and left as well, seemingly not caring that he was in a filthy state. I debated whether to go after him, but I decided in the end that he was unlikely to harm her.

Fifteen minutes later, I was cleaned up and wearing a plain blue tunic and black pants I had found in my lockers, on my way towards the Academy's exit. I intended to update Elder Gri and deal with the bounty issue as soon as possible. When I reached the large stone doors at the front entrance, they opened before I even touched them. I stepped through the doorway, expecting to find myself in the grassy exam field again.

Instead, my boot landed on a hard, paved road. I heard shouts and the frantic sounds of men readying for combat. The transition from the dimmer passageway of the Academy to the sunny daylight left me squinting for a moment, and by the time I could see properly, I found a ring of men in black uniforms surrounding me with lowered spears.

A bald, older man in a black robe with silver highlights approached. The sword strapped to his side didn't escape my notice.

"Talen Koroi?" the bald man asked.

"Yes?" I replied.

"By imperial authority, I hereby declare you, Talen Koroi, to be under arrest," the bald man said. "If you wish to live, surrender your sword and come with us."

I tried not to sigh.