I spent the first hour of the night alone in a swamp getting eaten alive by insects. More of my blood went as an unwilling donation to a vampiric mosquito sect than I think I’d ever lost to them before. My only consolation was that my cellphone still had two bars of service. Not enough to make a call, but enough to send text messages.

Romeo ignored the three colorful messages I sent. Couldn’t blame him, if I got a text calling me a walking sack of alligator shit from my dumb nephew, I probably wouldn’t have responded either. Understand that, like a lot of things in my life, didn’t make me happy. So I chose not to consider things from his point of view.

Took about two hours for me to get desperate. After that, I asked Bruno for help, which the big guy was willing to do for me. Problem was, I didn’t know where Romeo dropped me off. All I saw around me was the dark swamp. It raised the question of how my Uncle planned to find me in the morning, especially since in my anger I stormed off from the spot on the road he’d left me. I had the sickening realization that I’d made things worse in my self-righteous anger. I tried to tell the big guy not to worry and that I’d manage, better not to involve him.

At the end of the day, I got myself into this. It was my problem to solve. Even if it meant spending my Friday night lost in a swamp. Awesome.

I let myself wander a bit more since it couldn’t make things worse. Puzzling over the point Romeo kept trying to drive in my head. He was right. It was a bit strange how the dice came up with triple fours every time I’d used Fickle Fate in the casino. I’d bet on triples—not a specific number. So why hadn’t it shown up as different types? Triple two’s, five’s—any other number. If Fickle Fate was just gambling, why would it have forced a certain number?

Moreover, why had the ‘luck’ worked to keep me from falling off the car and hurting myself? Why hadn’t it given me a way to stay on top of the car and still hit Romeo? Was it just the amount of energy I had? My foot began to slip, and I desperately wanted to stay up there to hit Romeo. After that need, Fickle Fate sprang outward to save me.

But what did that mean?

I was a far cry from a genius, and I didn’t have the patience to reflect on a problem I couldn’t solve too hard. So, for now, I chalked it up to a fluke. I had a weird ability with some odd intricacies. Because from a practical standpoint it didn’t change all that much.

Only it kind of did. Hadn’t Romeo gone out of his way to prove that to me? Annoying bastard. As much as I tried to tuck it away, the questions ate at me. But I kept coming up empty.

It was actually a relief to see a message from Eve, even if I didn’t like her much. Of course, the first line of her text called me a dumbass. But then she’d said Bruno called her, and Kayson. She told me to stay put with her own form of colorful language.

So it was, at two in the morning, that I sat on a muddy swamp road in the middle of nowhere, bored out of my mind. I’m not proud. About ten minutes in, I caved and sent an angry message back to Eve calling her a dick, just to try to start a fight for entertainment. Because it beat sitting here alone with nothing to do.

She kindly informed me it took balls to be a dick, and she’d rather have balls than to be a dumb bitch like me.

Girl had a way with words.

After a chuckle, I put my phone on vibrate and tried to clear my mind. Shoving my hands in my armpits under my jacket to stay warm. I was useless outside of a city. I didn’t have any survival skills. Ask me to change a tire on a bike? I knew that, if I ran into any real issues I could look details up online. Fix up an engine? Maybe stood a decent shot. If you needed to know which bus route took you Downtown, or what parts of New Valentine to stay outta, hell, I was the guy.

But this? Thrown in a swamp with nothing? I was fucked. Romeo knew how to get to me. There were also those concerning sounds from the water, the churning, and the occasional splash. I knew spirit beasts lurked out there. But it didn’t even have to be a spirit beast, I bet a normal gator could kill too. Spirit beasts were less common since sect members hunted them for bounty or materials.

I kept picturing an oversized gator darting out of the shadows to sink its fangs into me. Bad mental image. I shook a bit, not sure if it was the cold or paranoia.

What was the point of this training exercise? Romeo could’ve taken me to his apartment, shown me more fighting skills, and made the exact same point. I’d gotten some down already, but was nowhere near his level. Was this torture? Did he hear about the trouble with the sect? Didn’t seem like his style though, to just leave me. If he’d heard, wouldn’t he confront me and beat the crap out of me again for a ‘lesson’?

No, he’d kept going over that crap about my dao. Telling me I was wrong. But if I was wrong, why did it seem to thrum whenever I came across a good bet? That shock and thrill never failed to resonate with the Soul Seed. It ate that sort of thing up. Making me feel intoxicated, casinos were the ideal environment. All I’d learned about Soul Seeds pointed out that you needed to pursue the ideal place for your cultivation to grow. It’s what it wanted.

Romeo insisted that there should be a mixture of chasing those environments and closed meditation to consider your dao. Mental fortitude was an important component that only grew more valuable the higher one got in their cultivation. Reflection and a higher understanding of the soul are how you actually advanced at higher stages. I didn’t have a frame to doubt him, but it seemed pointless for me who couldn’t grasp it.

The only time my Soul Seed thrummed with power was when risk was tangible. I never felt more alive than in the moments that I bet the most important things. Each time was like I’d hit a crossroad. Not sure which way my life might go—hell, even if it might end. The different shapes it could take, all of it. It all hinged on those moments. That power when everything was left to chance. What was that if not gambling?

My Soul Seed shifted, the air taking a slight heady note—not as powerful as stepping into a gambling den and tossing all my money on a table. An echo of the same feeling. The change startled me, then it slipped away as easily as it came.

I sighed, my phone buzzed and I picked it up. It’d been an hour. Wow. There was no way in hell they’d find me.

There was a message from Kayson. Saying that once I heard the noise of a bike, I should start yelling my lungs out. I stared at the message. What did he mean? If I heard a bike? They’d have already found me if I managed that. Did running on no sleep screw with his head?

A revving sound tore through the swamp, almost alarmingly loud. Far more powerful than any bike I’d ever heard of. The sound grew stronger but there were no headlights in sight.

They came for me. They really fucking came for me. My pure bafflement receded as I remembered Kayson’s instructions. I cupped my hands to my mouth and shouted for all I was worth. The sound vanished, but I kept yelling. And then it started again, headed right towards me. There didn’t seem to be a limit on it, growing louder until the noise was almost maddening. Shattering the air with enough sound that I could no longer hear my yelling.

Then I saw headlights, the noise killed. I was staring at a slim girl on a slick yellow racing cycle. Eve leaned on her handlebars, looking bored.

“Found you, dumbass. How’d you even get all the way out here without a bike? Did you walk?” She sighed.

“No—of course, I didn’t walk, my Uncle dropped my ass off after giving me a lecture.”

“Really? That’s kinda shit. You do know I have better ways to spend my night than driving around looking for you, right?” Eve said.

“Well, I didn’t message ya, I reached out to Bruno. Tried to tell him not to bother when I realized there was no point. Because even I didn’t know where I was.” I scratched the back of my head. Trying to riddle out what exactly her Soul Ability was. Sound? “Were ya trying to blast out my ears?”

She paused giving a sheepish grin. “Maybe a bit. Scares off anything nasty out here. Kayson told me to do it since I’m the only one that had a shot at finding you. I saved your dumbass. You owe me.”

“Owe you?”

“Yeah, I got something in mind too. Get on the bike. We got a quick errand to take care of before I drop you off.”

I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Nervous? Still, I got on the bike and she kicked the engine to life. I sighed. Beggars didn’t get to choose. I’d much rather be driving back to my home. But because of her, I wasn’t doomed to wander the swamp paranoid about something coming from the depths and eating me. Eve leaned down and began to speed away.

My arms wrapped around her, and I felt anxious to be this close. Riding double with a girl who regularly took the piss out of me left me on edge and I couldn’t quite get my head straight. What Romeo said earlier still gnawed at me. I didn’t know what my Soul Seed was. If I didn’t know my own Soul, what else was I missing?

Then there was the suspicion I wouldn’t like Eve’s errand I’d gotten dragged into.

She pressed on the gas, speeding far quicker on these dirt roads than her bike should’ve gone. Her motorcycle was almost purring—less audible compared to before. “Wow—this thing—“I paused, my voice a lot quieter than it should have been.

Eve chuckled as she noticed me stumble over my words. Her laugh was light and airy, barely present. Slowly the sound of her bike and laugh faded closer in. The engine roared far closer to what I expected from a bike like this. Her mocking laughter rang out—damn, I hated being this close to her.

“Your Soul Seed controls sound.”

“Wow, put that together dumbass? I’d have thought you’d connect the dots when you saw me blow out the Crimson Eagle’s ears. Oh well. Were you being honest when you told Kayson about yours?”

I sighed. “Yeah, aint much better than a coinflip.”

“Well, that’s a bit shit, aint it?”

“Sometimes it’s a bitch.”

She laughed again, shaking her head. She flipped her stereo on, guess we were done talking. euro-rock flooded around us—louder than the engine and passing wind. Eve banged her head as she drove—adjusting the pace of the bike to match the tempo of the music. Her fingers tapped along to the rhythm. I didn’t know what to make of her. But, maybe, well, this night wasn’t as bad as I worried about. I let myself fall the music too—soon we loudly belted out songs while zooming down the highway.