“In effect, splitting is nothing other than possible paths for you to take,” Vend said. “Think of it as the flip side of markers. Markers give you options you react to. Splits show you the result of actions you take.”

The proper term is simultaneous reality selection, Nil said in snobbish fashion. Honestly, learning from him is like learning from a caveman. At least, he’s putting some effort into it. Of course, disregard most of what he’s saying, I’ll explain things better once you’re here for your training.

And why didn’t you explain all of this earlier? Dallion grumbled.

It would only have confused you. It’s not like you actually gave any thought to the way you improved your attributes. What was it again? I want all tens because it’s a round number?

Dallion felt he could strangle Nil. However, since doing so would destroy the echo, he would have to restrain himself.

“Okay, let me try explaining this way,” Vend said, looking at Dallion’s annoyed expression. “Think of it as going back in time and doing an attack differently. Then, seeing the results you get to choose that attack of the two, that’s better. Makes sense?”

“Yeah,” Veil replied.

“Perfectly,” Gloria nodded.

“Eh, sure.” Dallion straightened up. He felt as if he were back in high school and was caught whispering with a friend during class.

Vend gave him a suspicious look, but then went on.

“No one knows the precise number of splits you can make, but increasing your mind, lets you do more.”

In fact, the precise number a person is capable of is usually the level of the mind minus ten, Nil said. Occasionally there are exceptions, but—

Shut up!

The reaction was a bit harsh, but there was nothing worse than having an echo second guessing someone during an explanation. Nil, apparently got the hint, for he stopped with his commentary.

“Splitting is a way to gain an edge in battle. Just one note of warning, until you get really good at it don’t rely on it blindly.”

“What happens if it’s used on us?” Dallion asked. He had gone through a few such instances and the results were nearly always bad. “Is there a way to use splitting to defend against splitting?”

There was a moment of pause. Thanks to his music skills, Dallion could see that Vend was somewhat taken aback, but also impressed with the question.

“In general, yes. Though it takes passing through the next gate to do it effectively. Either way, you need to increase your mind a lot for that.”

So much for that option. As things stood, mind was of Dallion’s lowest attributes. At present, he was focusing on improving his perception as much as possible to be able to see marker layers. Now it turned out he also had to improve his mind to actually see the markers on time. Apparently, Nil was right when he had warned Dal not to go along that route. High perception seemed to be a gorgon’s thing.

“Another little-known fact is that splitting can also be used in real life,” Vend said.

“How?” Veil immediately asked.

“Have a coin on you?”

Veil nodded.

“Toss one over.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Veil took a silver coin from his pouch and tossed it to Vend. The elite caught it, then closed both hands.

“Any guesses?” Vend asked.

“No need to guess. We saw in which hand it is,” Vend smirked.

Dallion had to agree. There didn’t seem to be any tricks involved. However, if it was so obvious, why was he asking? For a split second, Dallion considered asking Nil what the trick was. Quickly, he changed his mind. For one thing he didn’t think the echo would provide assistance, especially considering this was a “teachable moment.”

“Right hand,” Gloria said.

“It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Vend asked. “It’s easy since you’re using your perception. And even if you didn’t you had a one in two chance of getting it right. Using splitting, there is no guessing.” Vend opened his right hand. To everyone’s surprise, there was nothing there. “I’ve been splitting myself all this time. In one instance I caught the coin and moved it to my left hand, in another instant I didn’t. That way any hand you picked would be wrong.”

I thought you couldn’t do that in the real world? Dallion asked.

Dear boy, you can use all your skills in the real world. The only difference is that they are real. Markers, health rectangles, weapon summoning, all those are merely concepts so they can only gain form in the awakened realms. The skills, on the other hand, can be used anywhere. Aren’t you using your music skills on him right now?

That was a fair point. Dallion was indeed using his music skills a lot lately. While he couldn’t see the emotional vibrations with the same clarity he did in the awakened realms, he definitely had a sense of them.

“This is just an example to prove the point,” Vend tossed the coin back to Veil. “The moral of the story is, don’t gamble with awakened unless you’re prepared to lose.”

“Does that mean if we get good enough, we can redo past mistakes in the real world?” Dallion asked.

If you had read a few history scrolls, you’d know the answer to that, Nil sighed

“No,” Vend looked at him. “This is the extent of my ability and I’m mind focused. Given your development, it would be extremely difficult. At most it might help you with split-second decisions. That doesn’t mean you can’t use splitting in the awakened realms.”

Vend cracked his fingers. The sound made Gloria wince.

“One more thing you won’t find in any scroll. Focusing on more attributes or skills isn’t always a good thing. It won’t be noticeable until you become a double digit, but each focus takes from the rest.”

That’s completely disproven, Nil protested.

“Any questions so far?”

No one said a word.

“Good. Now we get to the important part.” Vend took a step forward. “Join me inside the garden realm.” He extended his hand forward.

It didn’t take long for all three of his trainees to grab hold of it.

AREA AWAKENING

The surroundings changed as the four entered the realm of the stone garden. Rocks and rock pillars were everywhere as before. This time, though, there was no black smoke to be seen.

“You did a pretty good job here,” Vend said. “A bit reckless for my taste, but it worked for the most part.”

“Are you saying we missed something?” Gloria asked in a semi-indignant tone. Now that they were in the awakened realm, her emotions were much more visible, vibrating brightly in shades of blue.

As far as Dallion could say, there was no indication the realm wasn’t flawless. Then again, given this was a large city, a lot could have happened since morning. It would be some kind of record for someone to have trashed a part of the garden so fast, though.

“I’m saying that you took more effort than you had to. Getting achievements is fun, but it’s not good in the long run. Trust me. Seeing how easy you took out the first crack settlement, you should have gone along the longer route. You had a week to complete your job, so there was no point in rushing it.”

Strictly speaking that wasn’t true. As Estezol had pointed out, Dallion wasn’t allowed other tasks until the completion of this one. Maybe there was some deep point behind that, but the way things were presented to him, there was absolutely no sense in not getting it done as quickly as possible.

“That’s for another time, though.” Vend changed the subject. “We’re here because the lord mayor has given the guild another request. Since we’ve done such a good job mending the gardens, he has asked that we improve the garden as well.”

Dallion could see the shock in the Luors as if they had openly gasped.

“I’m sure you two know how it’s done, given that you have done it before. This time, there’s a slight catch. The garden is part of the mayor’s domain and must remain that way. This is something common in sanitation jobs. We often get requests to improve an area, but must be careful not to become the new owners of it.”

“So, we must improve all the guardians, except the key one?” Veil asked.

“Not quite. This area is a bit different. It’s not a district or village, so there are no other area guardians. In order to improve the area, we must defeat him.”

“That’s impossible,” Veil said with absolute certainty. “If we defeat a guardian, we become the owner of the area.”

“No, there’s a way, but it isn’t pleasant.”

When it became clear what the way was, Dallion and the Luors had to agree. Initially, Dallion had hoped that the area could be treated as an item: all they had to do was transfer it to the city—or the lord mayor—and everything would be settled. That turned out not to be the case. Area guardians were an entirely different matter. Maybe due to their size, or maybe because they didn’t physically change hands as much as items, they remained loyal to the person who defeated them. Just handing them over to the city wouldn’t be enough, and would definitely not be accepted by the local nobility. Instead, the solution was to have a member of the Nerosal’s ruling household participate in the fight itself. By participating, however, it meant that they were to perform the final killing blow. That wasn’t the annoying part, however. In order not to waste a noble’s time, the party had to beat down the guardian to such an extent that a simple attack would finish him off. Also, everyone from the group had to escape from the area before the final blow took place. What that meant—other than the humiliation—was that none of them would receive any rewards for the work they’ve done. Instead, it would be the noble who would level up and become the new de facto owner of the garden.

Finally, Dallion had a good idea why so many awakened guilds preferred not to take on city jobs. Sanitation was bad enough, but at least there was a chance that someone might be lucky and get an achievement of some sort. Improvement of city property was guaranteed to have no reward other than the money spent on the job. As an awakened, Dallion felt himself being robbed.

After a few more explanations and a bit of chit-chat, the group set off through the realm—there was one more annoying task they had to do before the battle could take place: scout out the guardian and determine its strength and attacks so they could form a strategy for the real thing.

“This definitely isn’t how we did things back home,” Veil grumbled. Next to him, Gloria nodded a few times in silent agreement.

Dallion couldn’t help but smile. Apparently, there was spoiled, and then there was outright rotten. Back in the days of the former village chief, there was no question that members of the Luor family were spoiled beyond belief. Nothing they had done, though, could compare to an actual noble of Nerosal. So far Dallion hadn’t even seen one, and that was very deliberate. High-ranking nobles didn’t mingle with the populace, except on a few rare occasions. That was another reason why the festival was so popular—it was a chance for a common person—awakened or other—to get a glimpse of the illustrious owner of the entire county. In a sense, it was literally the event of the year.

I know it sounds cliché, but it’s actually an honor to have a noble join in on an improvement, Nil said. The guild master had to be quite convincing to make it happen.

Really? Dallion asked.

Well, no. Even the guild master doesn’t have that much sway. We’re a small guild, after all. It was a bet.

What?!

Apparently, you finishing the job in record time prompted some nobles to bet that you couldn’t improve the area by the end of the day. Given the amount of favor such a request carries, it was impossible for the guild master to refuse.

Just great. So not only will we do all this for nothing, but we’ll have an angry noble on our backs when we’re done.

Don’t be so dramatic. Nobles can be petty, but not about things such as this. It would be the same for someone to hold a grudge against a coin because of fell heads instead of tails.

That didn’t make Dallion feel any better. If anything, it illustrated the rift between nobility and everyone else. It also further explained why the Dame couldn’t compliment him directly during the chainling hunt. However, one question remained. If Falkner was part of such a world, what was he actually doing in the Icepicker guild? Despite what he claimed, there had to be more to it than getting to train under March.