Lord Braxand felt something was deeply wrong. He couldn’t put his finger on why, but he was certain that there was an intruder nearby. Even more strangely, despite that belief, he hadn’t risen from his bed yet–he could barely move at all.

He tried to force his heavy eyelids open, feeling weaker and more sluggish than he had in recent memory. Had he been poisoned? No. His mortal food-testers would have died instantly from a poison that could affect him this much. But then why did he feel so lethargic?

His eyes finally opened, only to discover that two impossibly sharp spears were plunging towards his gut–mere centimeters away from piercing him. As he extended his hands to catch the shaft of the weapons before they struck, he attempted to activate some of his most powerful attribute-enhancing arts. He cursed as each one fizzled out before reaching completion, and he was forced to rely only on the power of his impaired body to fend off his attacker.

As he caught the descending weapons and slowed their descent to a near-halt, a face emerged from the murky darkness above the spears–Samantha Cray. Her face was a mask of rage and concentration, snarling down at him as she put her full body weight on the weapons in an attempt to skewer him.

He tried to redirect the path of the spears so that they would strike on either side of his torso, but it felt about as effective as trying to push over a deeply rooted tree. Like immovable monoliths, the spears refused to shift their direction even the tiniest degree. To make matters worse, each time he split his efforts trying to alter their path, he lost ground against Samantha in their battle of strength. He couldn’t even use the rest of his body to defend against her since nearly every part seemed completely paralyzed.

He resisted as best as he could, but it was clear that it was only a matter of time. Thanks to the surprise attack she had gained an advantage, and the resulting momentum was difficult to counter. She was also freakishly strong for a Peak Copper, able to match or possibly even surpass his own power. He didn’t understand how she had managed to gain such strength or escape captivity, but he had badly underestimated her. Still, he had his pride as the Lord of House Braxand to uphold. Even if this whelp ended up killing him he would struggle until the bitter end.

Their fight lasted for several agonizingly-slow minutes, Samantha and he straining with all of their might for dominance against the other. But the deadlock couldn’t last forever. In a final burst of energy, Samantha opened her mouth in a silent warcry and her expression contorted into one of savage glee. The spears made contact with his body and seemed to suck away all of his meager remaining strength. His arms fell limply to his sides as the spears blasted through him, pinning him to the bed below and anchoring their barbed tips in his midsection.

Pain clouded his mind as he cursed his own arrogance and the insolence of this greedy brat. If he survived this, he was going to kill her. But first, he was going to destroy everything and anyone she loved while she watched.

Lord Braxand awoke from his nightmare in a cold sweat. He stood up and flexed his muscles, thankfully finding them to be no less limber or powerful than he expected. He extended his awareness to encompass his entire bedroom and confirmed that no one was present, even going so far as to quickly scan the windows and his doorway for any sign of entry.

No one had been in here except for him.

He took a deep breath to calm his frayed nerves. It had been years since he had dreamed, let alone had a nightmare. And this one felt so real, too. Even now he could swear that he felt the phantom pain of being stabbed, and his spirit was deeply unsettled after the experience.

Now wasn’t the time to let his mind become distracted by a nightmare like a scared child. With his plans so close to bearing fruit, he must be at his best, or else everything he had worked to achieve would be at risk of crashing down around him. Since he didn’t expect he’d be able to go back to sleep, Lord Braxand decided to try and be productive instead.

The head of the house reviewed outstanding business contracts, set up some requests for the job boards, and all other manner of administrative duties, but the sense of deep dread and unease never left him. He set down his pen and sighed, before getting dressed to go out. He wouldn’t get much more work done anyway with this feeling of angst disturbing his concentration.

His gut instinct had never led him astray before now. Perhaps the dream had been a premonition of some disaster to come, or his subconscious warning him of an unseen danger. In any case, he knew it had to do with Samantha. It had only been a day since he had left her with the Low Bronze mercenary in the safe house, but it was better to resolve the issue now instead of letting worries linger around him like flies on rotting meat.

Not wanting to appear paranoid or disheveled if it turned out that everything was fine, he left his estate and headed for the safehouse at a brisk jogging pace–which admittedly was still faster than a horse’s gallop. Despite his relaxed stride, with most of Yivesh still asleep at this time of night he made good time through the empty roadways and forest paths. The entire journey from the center of the city to his destination had only taken him 40 minutes.

As he made his way into the building and closed the disguised trap door behind him, he was greeted by the hired mercenary who offered him a folded slip of paper.

“What’s this?” Lord Braxand asked, taking the paper and unfolding it.

“I’m unsure, Lord. The girl slid it under the door and told me to give it to you if you visited today. I looked it over to make sure that it wasn’t anything dangerous, but I think the only danger she poses is to herself. She must’ve lost her mind.” he replied, gesturing towards the paper.

Both curious and wary about how Samantha knew he would be coming back so soon, he read the short note cautiously.

“Lord Braxand, below you will find my conditions. If you do not fulfill them, I will activate my contingency plan for being held against my will:

You must immediately, and with the utmost haste, present yourself in person to the City Lord of Yivesh. Once in the presence of the City Lord of Yivesh, you must loudly, clearly, and thoroughly confess your plans to overthrow him."

Lord Braxand looked over the note with disbelief, “What is this nonsense?”

The mercenary shrugged.

He read over the note twice more, analyzing it for some sort of hidden meaning or secret code. Finding nothing out of the ordinary–other than the note itself–he contemplated what Samantha’s purpose could be in giving this to him.

Whatever contingency she intended to enact, it couldn’t possibly be worse for him than confessing his intentions to the City Lord. Although it was concerning that Samantha had correctly guessed his future plans, she couldn’t possibly know enough to threaten his position. She would need indisputable proof to make such a claim against the head of a major family, which he found doubtful.

The only other realistic possibility he could think of was trying to cause some sort of infighting. Perhaps she naively thought that, like some evil villain in a story, he would instantly kill Alex for having this information revealed to him. Or maybe she believed that Alex, inspired by loyalty to the Ruler, would release her and they would form an alliance to try and take him down together. If so, maybe he really had given her too much credit. This attempt at manipulation was incredibly shallow, at best.

However, something still didn’t sit right with him. This note by itself would be laughable, but in combination with his disturbing nightmare, it showed that this was more than coincidence. He decided to question Samantha further to get an answer from her directly.

He made his way over to the metal cell door, inserted a thread of his qi to unlock the enchantment that held it shut, and tried to push it open. The door only opened about an inch before striking some blockage on the other side. The sound of wood scraping against tile told him that she had piled all the furniture pieces in the room against the door in an attempt to barricade it. He inwardly sighed–this was just sad.

“Samantha, you know this won’t keep me out. What is this about?” he asked, pressing harder on the door to force it open further.

“20 qi per task! I invested the maximum amount I could!” she shouted.

A horrible foreboding washed over him as an unlikely scenario crossed his mind. But that couldn’t be–he was of much higher rank than her, even if she had ranked up to Low Bronze.

“If you do not complete the tasks I wrote in the note, the two Geasa I forced upon you will activate!” she screamed, making the words impossible to ignore.

His mental meridian kicked into overdrive, connecting several odd events over the last day. The way she had jerked awake when he had used the antidote to cure her was unusual. She must have used that opportunity to brush against his hand. The kowtowing and begging she performed were just that–a performance to again touch him and place a Geas on him. The strange dream had not been a dream at all, it had been a battle of wills as she overpowered his natural qi defenses to force the Geasa to take effect. Two spears. Two conditions. And now the final nail in the coffin had been hammered in. She had fully informed him of the conditions of each Geas. She had even nicely numbered them for him.

She had played him perfectly.

As this realization hit him, the Geasa activated with their full power and removed any doubt that she could be bluffing. He felt the dense bombs of energy roil and rage within him with each passing millisecond that he stood here not fulfilling the conditions. Considering the 40 qi invested into the two techniques, if he didn’t leave right now he could actually be so damaged by the backlash that the Geasa could destroy his core and turn him back into a Copper. The madwoman had no idea the havoc such a large qi investment could wreak on a person’s system. His only chance now was to kill her and disperse the art before it could force him to complete the conditions.

He put 35 points of qi–half of his available pool–into his most devastating combat art, Focused Blast. On the surface the art was nothing fancy. It was a simple attack art that added an explosive force to any physical strike he performed in the next second. The beauty of the technique, however, was that there was no upward limit to how much qi could be invested in it at once–though the user’s body could easily be blown apart if it couldn’t withstand the force of the blow.

He released the full force of his killing intent around him, the power of it dropping the Low Bronze mercenary to his knees and hopefully stunning Samantha as well. He punched the semi-open metal door with all 30 points of his Strength and let the art fly freely into the reinforced cell beyond. The enchanted door first bent inward as his fist connected, then as Focused Blast activated, shattered into shrapnel like he had punched a glass pane. The metal flew through the air and the concussive explosion turned the wooden barricade behind the door into deadly confetti. He prayed it would be enough to turn her into paste.

Even expecting the blowback from the force of his strike, he was still thrown backwards through the air until he struck the opposite wall of the hallway. Unfortunately, the mercenary was also caught in the crossfire and tossed through the air like a ragdoll. The hired man bounced along the floor as clouds of dust and debris rained down from cracks that had formed in the ceiling of the underground structure.

Quickly, Lord Braxand checked his cultivation system and was dismayed to find that the Geasa were still in effect. In fact, they were on the cusp of blowing up since he still hadn’t complied with either condition–he had run out of time.

He screamed in frustration as he sprinted towards exit and past the dazed mercenary.

“KILL HER! NOW!” he ordered, using his voice amplification art to ensure that his command could not be missed. He couldn’t spend even a second longer here.

As he ran, his mind raced to address the now dire circumstances he found himself in. He quickly parsed the words of the Geasa in the search of some workaround, and found a loophole that would buy him some time to salvage the situation. The task demanded that he needed to “immediately, and with the utmost haste” make his way to the ruler, but most conditions in Geasa were at least slightly open to interpretation. For example, the task did not state that he needed to take the most direct route. In addition “utmost haste” could indicate a sense of urgency, but that didn’t necessarily mean that he had to sprint at his top speed all the way there. He would have to test the limits of his tasks to see exactly how much time he could buy.

As he experimented with the conditions, he pulled out one of his single-use communication artifacts to contact his top agent. The spirit beasts herds would still be a couple days out at this point, which was useless to him at present. However, Samantha wasn’t the only person who formulated contingency plans.

Activating the artifact, the scripts on the jade stone lit up with brilliant blue light and a female voice came from the rock, “Your orders, master?”

“Initiate plan B.”

“Understood.”

After a few more moments giving instructions, the jade turned to dust in his hand and he discarded it. He began to travel a long, circuitous path through the forest that led in the general direction of the city, hoping that everything would be ready in time. If he survived this night, he would ensure Samantha and her family suffered for what she had done. If he did not, he would not pass on into the next life before haunting her and bringing her down with him.

Samantha lay shaking on the cold tile of her room, sweating profusely from her exertions. She had almost failed to force the Geas on Ol’ Man Whisper.

She hadn’t properly taken into account the sheer qualitative difference between a High Bronze cultivation pattern and the Mid Copper cultivation pattern she had been using. Even though Samantha should’ve essentially been 4 times as effective in her intrusion attack against her opponent, she had still barely managed to eke out a success. She decided then and there that she would give up on trying to learn the High Copper version of the Vital Wellspring Cultivation technique, and instead would find a proper Low Bronze pattern to study.

She had been stubbornly determined to learn all the secrets that the Granvich’s tome held because the book was rare, but realized now that she would only be handicapping her progression if she continued that mindset at Bronze. Even an average Low Bronze cultivation technique would vastly improve her qi pool size and regeneration rate compared to the rarest of High or Peak Copper patterns. Instead, she would leave the tome with Thomas when she ascended, since he would get much more use out of it now than she would.

She spent several minutes taking deep breaths and recovering from the spiritual strain from the battle of wills, waiting until her body tremors mostly vanished to stand up. As much as she wanted to, Samantha couldn’t afford to spend too long resting in case her opponent came to see her right away.

The process of how to force a Geas on someone without access to system notifications was well documented, as it had been used against many mortals over the years. She needed to clearly communicate the conditions to her target before informing him of the art being forced on him. The only difference here was that Lord Braxand had an active cultivation system that would be damaged if he didn’t obey the Geasa. For mortals, in lieu of harming a dormant or inactive cultivation base, it would shorten their lifespan or outright kill them depending on the qi invested.

She fetched a pen and paper from inside the small desk and wrote everything out exactly as she had described it in her Geasa, ensuring that there would be no excuse for the art to not activate. She then knocked three times on the door and slid the paper through the small gap at the bottom so Alex could pass it along to Ol’ Man Whisper.

The last thing she needed to take care of was ensuring that she could survive long enough to communicate that she had actually placed two Geasa on Lord Braxand. If he found out what she was doing before she could properly announce her intentions, her plans could be ruined.

She looked around the room for anything she could barricade the door with and determined that the few sparse pieces of furniture would have to do. She pulled the bed and desk over to the door, angling them so that if the door was opened they would wedge together between the edge of the door and the nearest perpendicular wall. This would not do more than briefly slow the man down, but as long as she could get the words out in time he would be forced to leave the premises or risk breaking the conditions of her contract.

Samantha switched her mentality to Hyperfocus in preparation for the battle she fully expected would come. Now all she could do was wait for his arrival.

The next few hours were arguably some of the most anxious of her entire life. Even with Silas keeping watch to notify her of Lord Braxand’s appearance, she did not know if his intentions would be information-seeking or violent. This uncertainty put her on edge as she did her best to stay alert and be ready to act at a moment's notice. She imagined that his arrival would not take long, given that half-completed Geasa usually gave people an ominous sense of foreboding. He was clever enough that he would probably suspect her immediately, if he didn’t know that she was the cause of his discomfort already.

After Silas alerted her that Lord Braxand had arrived, she mentally prepared herself for multiple possible scenarios. When she finally heard his voice in the hallway after Alex had given him the note, she was relieved to hear that his voice was more confused than angry. That was one of the best cases that she could’ve hoped for, since it meant that he had not yet discovered exactly what she had done to him.

When she heard him unlock the door, that was when she put her survival plan into action.

First, Samantha used Cloud Step to plant herself in the most strategic ceiling corner of the room. On the same wall that the door was set into, on the hinged side of the door so the opening of the door would face away from her, she hovered in the air on a single qi platform. Next, She scrunched as tightly into a ball as she could and activated Translucence for stealth. Then, using her arms and legs as a shield for her vital organs, she sheathed each extremity with the power of Indomitable Body. Lastly, she screamed out the final words needed to enact the Geasa so that Lord Braxand would have no choice but to hear her and comply.

The killing intent that poured into the room in retribution nearly disrupted all of her active arts, and the explosion that immediately followed the wave of malice was catastrophic in its power. Samantha was battered by the air itself as everything immediately in front of the door was disintegrated into unrecognizable chunks of wood and metal. Even the ceramic tiles lining the floor and the stone walls did not emerge unscathed from the High Bronze’s fury, as many of those cracked or broke as well. If she had been standing anywhere inside that cone of destruction, she didn’t know if even her newly formed Rebirth Core could bring her back from that death.

As she had hoped, her corner of the room was the least affected by the attack–though she didn’t emerge completely unscathed. Samantha dropped to the ground and checked herself over for injuries. Her mundane clothes were completely tattered and ragged, but the skin beneath only suffered from mostly small cuts and bruises. Her fortified arms and legs had taken the brunt of the damage for the rest of her body. The one thing she did not account for protecting was her ears, which were freely bleeding and ringing with a loud high-pitched tone. Luckily, her passive healing immediately kicked in to repair the damage and her hearing quickly returned to normal.

Before the dust had even had a chance to settle in the room, she heard rapidly receding footsteps right before a baleful voice thundered through the complex, “KILL HER! NOW!”

The first stage of her plan had been successful, but the night was long and she had only just begun.

Samantha felt the first trickles of additional healing energy being passed to her from Silas, “Do you need more healing, or is this enough? The boom was so loud that the earth shook! Are you okay? Do you need help?”

They would need to develop a system to communicate to each other how badly they were hurt, since they now didn’t have a reliable way to keep track of the other’s condition. However, that was a problem for her to solve later.

“I’m fine, but we need to fight! Defeat the Dire Wolf, if you can.”

Samantha quickly peeked her head into the hallway to see if she could safely exit the room. It was difficult to see clearly through the dense cloud of dirt in the air, but she could make out the form of a man on all fours in the middle of the hallway. It had to be Alex.

She had a choice to make. Her first option would be to run past him while he was getting his bearings. He would likely follow her soon after and they would fight, but she wouldn’t be stuck in an enclosed space with him. This would allow her to make more use of her movement focused arts. The second option was to attack as hard and fast as she could, taking initiative and hopefully gaining an advantage by securing the first damaging blows in their battle.

She decided that if she had to fight the man either way, she’d rather do it while he was disoriented and injured.

Samantha had 46.8 qi available to her, having used 10 points to hide herself in the corner of the room earlier. She spent another 7 to prepare for her opening volley of blows–5 into Swift, 1 into Flurry, and 1 into Indomitable Body to fortify her heel. She rushed forward down the hall with an effective 33 points of Agility and jumped up into the air, lifting her right leg upwards towards the ceiling before swiftly bringing it down in an axe kick. She drove her reinforced heel deep into the flesh of his upper back near his spine, using the full force of her falling body to empower the strike as much as she could.

Alex let out a grunt of pain as the kick knocked him back down to the floor, but Samantha panicked slightly as there was not more of an effect. She hadn’t even felt a rib break.

Samantha immediately continued her assault, pummeling him across his torso, arms, and legs as he flailed on the ground and tried to get up. He was always careful to angle himself in a way where it was difficult to strike at his head or used his arm to soften blows, but this meant that the rest of his body was left relatively open to attack.

During this time, Alex scrambled his way over to the nearest wall and braced his back against it to support him and began using his legs to slowly stand while he continued to defend with his arms. Seeing that this would probably drag out into a more extended fight, Samantha reduced her qi expenditure while maintaining the pressure she was putting on him. With only half a qi point in Swift, and one in Flurry, the speed and impact of her kicks lessened slightly. However, she tried to make up for that fact by focusing solely on striking one of his thighs–attempting to cripple the limb before he could fully right himself.

Before the next second ticked over and she would need to spend more qi points to sustain her arts, her opponent gained his bearings and faced her with a solid defensive stance. He looked to be battered and bloody in some areas, but the fire in his eyes told her that he was far from defeated.

The lightning quick counter strike she narrowly avoided caused her to take a step back, and he launched himself forward into his own impressive assault. It was only due to a combination of her Translucence still being in effect and flickering her Sphere of Dominion on and off to speed up her perception that she was able to dodge effectively at all. He was incredibly fast, so much so that even by increasing her Swift investment back up to 5 points a second he still outpaced her. Now that she was facing him in a serious battle, the difference in capabilities between them was terrifying.

For the first few seconds she attempted to exchange blows with the man, but his punches and kicks felt like they rattled her bones even when she was using Indomitable Body. She went into a purely defensive stance in the hopes that Alex would make a mistake or give her an opening to deal a decisive strike. As she was waiting for an opportunity to present itself, Alex took in a deep breath and let out a qi-infused scream. Shockwaves pulsed through the air between them, causing a visible ripple in the suspended particles of dust. As the wave of sound reached her, every muscle tensed up in immobility.

*Ding* You have been affected by Bond Ability “Debilitating Cry”! Temporary paralysis is in effect.

Her eyes widened in fear as she recalled his Dire Wolf having used a similar ability against Silas when the two had fought for dominance during their first meeting. Her dread increased rapidly as Alex turned his back to her and pulled something from beneath a nearby pile of rubble–his straight sword. She did everything she could to break free from the ability’s influence, flaring her aura and trying to get her body to move again by sheer force of will. She actually felt the paralysis effect begin to weaken with her efforts, but the progress was too slow.

Alex grabbed her roughly by the throat and shoved her back against the closed wooden door of the study. Seeing the sword approaching, she invested two points into Indomitable Body to give 10 Resilience to her head and torso for the next six seconds, desperately trying to delay the inevitable as she fought tooth and nail to regain control of her limbs.

The sword tip met slight resistance as it was pressed against her chest, but after Alex applied more pressure to the weapon the art gave way to the force of the blade. It cut through her flesh, only stopping once it had slightly embedded itself in the bone of her sternum and rested just above her heart. She cried out at pain, the sensation fully breaking the hold that the paralysis had on her.

The primal, animalistic survival instinct within her took over her mind as rational thoughts left her. She reached up and grabbed the double edged sword with both hands, vainly striving to pull the metal out of her. Blood poured freely from the deep cuts she received as her palms and fingers slid across the naked blade edge, but she hardly registered the fresh injuries as her entire focus was upon saving her own life.

“Call off your bond now!” Alex growled, pressing the blade deeper.

With her mind still in disarray from terror, Samantha didn’t immediately understand what he was asking for. Dissatisfied with her lack of response, Alex tightened his hold around her neck until the edges of her vision became splotched with darkness.

“Call off your bond’s attack NOW!” he yelled, a hint of genuine panic in his voice emerging.

Samantha looked into the man’s eyes, still struggling to process his words as the sound of her racing heart drowned out all other sounds. A moment later, his expression twisted into a grimace and he breathed in a shuddering gasp. He suddenly looked sickly, his skin turning ghastly pale as a fresh sheen of sweat coated his face.

“I did it, Samantha! I killed the Wolf!” Silas cheered, unaware of her precarious position.

Before she could form a coherent response, Alex looked up to her with hatred in his eyes. The sword was thrust forward and cut through her with ease, not stopping until the blade had sliced through the wooden door behind her and the hilt slammed into her chest.

“Your bond… will not have such an easy death.” he said darkly, his voice ragged with rage and grief. Then, as cleanly as he had skewered her, he pulled the sword directly back out and released his grip on her throat.

Samantha looked down at the neat, bloody line that was pouring bright crimson blood like a waterfall and felt her back become wet with warm fluid. For a moment she tried to staunch the flow by covering the injury with both hands, but her arms had completely lost their strength. Her legs wobbled as she tried to maintain her balance and take a step forward, but she only succeeded in slipping in the rapidly expanding pool of her own blood. She fell face down, her arms failing to catch her before she struck the ground. Everything suddenly began to feel very, very cold.

The last thing she saw before her vision went dark was Alex’s rapidly receding footsteps as he ran towards the exit.

*Ding* You have died! Cause of death: Heart Laceration. Healing required for survivability: Minimal-No significant loss of body mass. Estimated time to revival: 10 minutes.

Samantha's sight returned to her as soon as she finished reading the notification.

She took in her new surroundings with wonder and awe as she saw what she instinctively knew was her dantian from a completely new perspective. Instead of looking inwards while cultivating and seeing the semi-solid sphere of energy from the outside, the inside of the orb was completely different. She looked to be inside of a grand library with countless book-filled shelves making up the walls of the sphere. Although the shelves followed the curvature of the core, and some hung upside down far above her, all of the books remained perfectly in their place. Samantha noticed that most of the tomes appeared dim and muted, like all the color had been drained from them. The rest of the books visually fell into one of three categories: mundane looking, shining with blue energy, and a single book that was completely blackened as if charred or carved from obsidian. At the center of the library, suspended in mid air, was a small sun of condensed power that lit the space with bright light. There were no floors, stairs, or ladders in the space to navigate, but Samantha found she had no need of them. She floated freely in the air and could quickly move throughout the library with a small exertion of her will.

She wanted to explore the area and examine the mysterious shelves, but suddenly recalled her situation. She had really just died, and if she didn’t do something quick then Silas would be next.

“Silas, run! Alex is coming right for you!” she shouted into the open.

“Sam? What happened? You sound–different.” Silas replied.

She wasn’t the only one that sounded different. Silas’s communications previously had felt similar to her own thoughts–streams of concepts, words, or images that conveyed meaning. Now it was like he was physically speaking to her in this space. She could hear his voice as clearly as if she was speaking with her parents or Thomas. But, she didn’t have time to dwell on this strange phenomenon.

“You need to hide and stay away from Alex, do you understand? He just killed me and he’s coming after you next. Can you try sending me some healing energy to speed up my revival process? If that doesn’t work you’ll need to last for at least 10 minutes until I can come and help you.”

Silas took a few seconds to process this information, “I’ll take the strongest pill we have. And don’t worry–hiding is what I do best. Without his beast to help sniff me out, he’ll never find me.”

She felt the confidence in his words as if the feelings were her own, yet another strange side effect of being in this space. On the tail end of his words came a surge of healing energy from their bond, and a new notification popped up in the air in front of her.

New estimated time to revival: 5 minutes… 4 minutes 59 seconds … 4 minutes 58…

She floated around the notification in fascination, trying to look at the rectangular sheet of info from different angles. Unlike when she received system messages previously in her mind’s eye, this notification was physically present in front of her and looked similar to a piece of signage. The side that had the constantly updating message written on it automatically followed her line of sight, making it so that it was impossible to miss. Curiously, she reached out and grabbed at the edges of the object, and it settled into her hands like a stiff piece of cardstock or paper. She turned it over and around, seeing nothing else written on it, then decided to carry it around with her for a while just to easily keep track of the countdown written on it.

Not wanting to waste the limited time she had here, she rushed over to the nearest glowing book to take a closer look at what it was.

The spine of the leather bound tome had the word “Geas” clearly written upon it. Not knowing what would happen if she disturbed its position, Samantha first gingerly poked at the book. When nothing terrible happened, she slowly pulled it from the shelf. As she picked it up, she noticed that two glistening, yarn-like threads connected the bottom of the spine of the book to the back of the shelf. The length of these strings readily changed based on how close or far away the book was held from the shelf.

Samantha opened to the first page of the book and was surprised to see the following:

Target: Godric Braxand V

Contract Type: Forced

Investment: 20 qi

Condition/Task: Immediately, and with the utmost haste, present yourself in person to the City Lord of Yivesh.

Status: In Progress

Current Compliance Level: Low

The rest of the page was filled with a continuously changing, incomprehensible string of numbers, letters, and mysterious symbols. As she tried to understand what the purpose of the writing was, she started to get a headache similar to when she had her Sphere of Dominion active for too long.

Samantha shook her head to free herself of the mental pain, then turned to the next page instead of trying to analyze the text further. On the next page was the terms of her second Geas, as she expected:

Target: Godric Braxand V

Contract Type: Forced

Investment: 20 qi

Condition/Task: Once in the presence of the City Lord of Yivesh, you must loudly, clearly, and thoroughly confess your plans to overthrow him.

Status: Pending

Current Compliance Level: N/A

She did not bother trying to read the rest of the page this time, only noting that it was not shifting and changing like the previous page had been.

As she tried to turn the page for a third time to see what lay further in the book, the paper resisted her efforts. It was as if the rest of the pages in the book had been glued together into a solid block. Not wanting to risk somehow damaging her Geasa by trying to use force, she simply accepted she wouldn’t be able to read it further and placed the book back into its position on the shelf.

She checked how much time she had left before her revival and saw that 3 minutes and 22 seconds remained.

The next glowing book was quite far away from her present location, so she opted to try and read a mundane book instead. Unlike the Geas book, the titles listed on all the spines of these books were unrecognizable glyphs and sigils. Not having a preference for any book in particular, she pulled one down from the shelf at random and tried to open it. The book stayed stubbornly closed this time, and she was unable to even open the cover to see the first page. To make sure this wasn’t a fluke, she attempted to open a different mundane book with the same result, and then a third. In her attempts to pry open the third book (with perhaps a bit too much strength), a new notification appeared before her.

Prior Knowledge (Mid Copper) available for purchase

Third Eye Insights Remaining: 1 (Low Bronze)

Would you like to spend a point of insight to unlock this knowledge?

She read over the message with confusion. She hadn’t ever heard about anything like this before–but perhaps that was because she, unlike most people, wasn’t going to stay dead. She knew from reading the books on ascending to Low Bronze that she would gain more control over opening and closing her third eye, instead of it being forced upon her like at the Copper levels. However, to her knowledge opening her third eye to scry the threads of fate was still a hectic and dangerous process where she wouldn’t know exactly what she would get out of it. Being apparently able to use it for something like this was intriguing, but she didn’t know if it would be worth spending her only point on whatever was inside this book. She didn’t even understand what “Prior Knowledge” meant.

She only had about two minutes left, which wasn’t enough time to make an important decision like this. She placed the book back on the shelf and the notification vanished as she refused to spend her insight.

Next, Samantha reached for the nearest muted-looking book and attempted to pull it out to read it. Unlike the other two books, this one did not move in the slightest no matter how she tugged at it. Just before giving up and moving on to looking into the blackened tome instead, she received yet another new notification.

Prior Knowledge (Peak Bronze) currently inaccessible

Third Eye Insights Remaining: 1 (Low Bronze)

With just over a minute and a half left now, Samantha moved as quickly as she could to the singular darkened book she spotted on the far side of the sphere. This book, like the last one, could not be removed from the shelf at all. Furthermore, she received no notification from interacting with it. When she read the title on the spine, “Energizer”, she felt she was getting a clearer picture of what was going on.

She didn’t know if this space was literally what the inside of her dantian contained, or if it was some representation her spirit was crafting so that she could comprehend it. What she did know was that it contained at least some knowledge that she currently possessed, had lost access to, or could possibly learn in the future if she spent Insight on it. What was most amazing was just how many books there were here–too many for her to count. She needed to find a way back to this place to explore further… but hopefully without dying again.

With only 20 seconds left now, Samantha decided to try one last thing before she revived. She shared senses with Silas.

He appeared to be hiding in the hollow of a tree trunk while remaining perfectly motionless. She could tell Translucence was activated by the way his body felt, which made him practically invisible. She heard Alex scream in frustration just a handful of yards away, which led her to believe that he had some way to track the general position of Silas somehow. A powerful blast of killing intent caused Silas to twitch with anxiety, but he did not give away his location by moving from his spot.

“Silas, I’m reviving right now. I just need to find a weapon and I’ll be right there–hang on.” she encouraged, feeling her spirit return to her body.

Samantha opened her eyes and gasped, pain shooting through her body. She stood and discovered that the cuts in her back, chest, and hands were barely scabbed over, and would likely reopen if she exerted herself too much. Her neck also felt sore and bruised from being choked, but this was a minor concern. At least her heart felt healthy and strong.

She ran through the underground complex and opened every door she could, doing her best not to agitate her injuries too much. In the third room she checked, she had to resist the urge to be sick as she entered. The space was clearly a torture chamber, with a restraint rack caked with old, dried blood dominating the center of the room. On the walls were a variety of saws, chisels, pliers, and other unspeakable instruments, but Samantha only needed something sharp she could use as a weapon. On a table near the restraint rack she found a long, curved knife with a wickedly sharp edge and decided that it would work for her purposes.

She grabbed the weapon and followed the binding thread that connected her to her Silas, feeling that he was not too far from her location. As she ran, she passed the corpse of the Dire Wolf, Torak, that Silas had defeated. It had a spear-like antler going straight through its gut and protruding out of its back, and was covered in punctures and lacerations that Samantha imagined Silas inflicted after his initial attack.

“He’s going to find me any second, Sam! What do I do?” Silas asked.

Samantha felt that she was still a few hundred feet away, and wouldn’t be able to reach Silas before Alex did even if she started using Swift right now. She needed to improvise something–anything–and quick.

“Run towards me as fast as you can, but don’t run directly at me. Pass within 30 feet of me, and then turn around to face Alex when I tell you to. Can you make it without being hit?”

“He’s faster than I am, but he can’t turn as well as me. He won’t be able to catch me right away.”

A sudden shout echoed through the trees and Samantha could feel Silas drawing nearer as she continued running to meet him. As he was coming within range, she hid behind a bush and activated Translucence. She needed to time this perfectly.

When Silas passed her position, she instructed, “Turn and face him now!”

Silas obeyed without question, trusting in her fully.

“Oh, so you finally stopped running, rat? Stupid beast–I’m going to skin you alive before I eat you and use your core for cultivation.” Alex snarled, raising his still-bloody sword.

Silas pulled back his lips and bared his teeth at the man in response.

Samantha began fueling the transport skill of Jackalope of All Trades until she felt the ability begin to activate at 5 qi. Then, to ensure that the swap happened quickly, she put an extra 5 qi into the art. Time seemed to stop as Alex froze in place. Her binding thread, which normally she could only sense with her spirit, became visible to her as it stretched out from her dantian. She watched as energy began to pour through the thread, and the thread twisted and bent itself so that it avoided obstacles on the way to Silas. As soon as the energy reached Silas and the thread had determined a clear path of travel, she felt herself be inexplicably pulled along the route at incredible speed. Silas too flew through the air along the thread, and they narrowly avoided colliding with each other as they swapped places.

Samantha raised her head so she could meet Alex’s gaze, then canceled Translucence. He stopped his strike mid swing and backed away from her, his mouth dropping open in shock. She had never been a very good liar or actress, but she hoped that in this situation she wouldn’t need to be convincing–only confusing.

She jerked her head to the side and brought out her arms at odd angles. She then slowly stood from her kneeling position, moaning and groaning in what she hoped would be a very intimidating impression of a ghost or ghoul.

“The godssss have sssseeeennnn your treacheryyy…” she gasped dramatically, curling the fingers of her left hand into claws as she stiffly held up the knife in her right. She extended her left arm forward until she was pointing at him, “You have been judged and found wannnnting… coward! Murderer! Traitor!”

Samantha arched her back and rolled her eyes back in her head, cackling into the empty air.

“Shoot him! What are you waiting for??” she pleaded with Silas, fearing that this idiotic ploy wouldn’t distract the man for long.

“Just a little longer! I need to make sure it hits him hard!”

Alex bent down cautiously while keeping his sword pointed at her and picked up a small pebble from the ground.

“Oh–oh! Woe are the lords above! Woeeee on theeeee….” she moaned, running out of material quickly, “...AND the lords below!”

Alex tossed the rock underhanded at her and it bounced off of her thigh.

Trying to buy even a second or two more, she looked down at the leg as if it perplexed her, then looked back up at a now smirking Alex, “You dare attack this divine vessel? For shame!! Blasphemy!”

“I don’t know how you survived, Samantha Cray, but I must say that I am pleased. It isn’t often you get to kill someone twice.” he said menacingly, “But I am curious as to how you aren’t dead. I know the wound I inflicted was fatal.”

“I will tell you exactly how I survived your fatal attack!” Samantha said, “But first, I need to explain to you the origins of my path of immortality. It all began when…”

Suddenly, Samantha was sprayed with blood as an antler spear punched through Alex’s chest from behind. He stumbled forward as he began to cough up blood, looking down at the protruding object in horror. She steeled herself and put 10 points into Swift, raising her agility up to 43 points to ensure Alex wouldn’t be able to dodge. Just as he looked back up to return his attention to her, she blurred forward and executed a horizontal slice with her knife, cutting his throat.

He dropped his sword and brought both of his hands up to his neck to close the gaping wound, the crimson river flowing unceasingly between his fingers. Not wanting the man to suffer unnecessarily, and wanting to make sure that she finished the job, she circled around towards his back and slashed towards the nape of his neck. The knife effortlessly sliced through his spine, the speed of her strike severing the rest of his neck and completing the cut she had first made. His head flew free of his body and rolled into the nearby bushes, his body crumpling to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

He was dead, and he would no longer be a threat to her.