Zaiver was not looking forward to the climb up the stairs. While the courtyard was well insulated from the wind due to its walls, the stairs were nearly one hundred steps long and completely exposed to elements. There were no more walls until the building doors at the top of the steps. Frostbite could strike in the time it would take to reach them and Zavier had enough wounds. As they reached the foot of the stairs, Arigo lifted his left arm outward and made a rotating motion like he was unscrewing a lightbulb. His left hand had a faint white glow. The first thing Zaiver noticed after this was the quiet. He could only hear the wind in the distance. It was like they were indoors now. Arigo had essentially created a vacuum that encompassed the stairs. Walking up was a surreal experience. Zaiver could see the edges of the stairs, roughly twenty feet away from his either direction, had an energy barrier blocking the wind. It had a blurry visual effect not unlike a heat mirage. The trippiest thing was how artificially still the air was. Zaiver imagined this was like how moving through outer space was, except with gravity.

As they reached the top of the stairs, Arigo’s hand glowed white again, and the large door responded with the same light glow. Zavier heard a clicking noise and the massive double doors swung open. The inside was incredibly spacious but rather empty. It was like a church without pews. In both of the back corners of the large space were stairs that winded behind a wall heading up. In the back center of the room stood a door connected to a stone quartercyclindar enclosure that rotated down in the mountain, clearly an entrance to a basement. The doors automatically shut behind Zaiver as he completed his walk in. Arigo motioned to the left back corner stairs and Zaiver followed him to them and up them. As they reached the top of the circular staircase, the door opened to a plain room with a bed and several chairs. It was not much different than the rooms Yafu and him were staying in. Arigo sat down and Zavier took the seat directly across from him.

Pointing to the unoccupied chair, Arigo spoke, “Lift it.” Zavier began to get up to walk over but Arigo stopped it, “No, do it our way. Focus your mind on it.” Zavier sat back down and readied himself. Hopefully after he failed, Arigo might be able to help rediscover the magic he had blocking the first attack from Shen. It would probably be needed if he was going to survive the way things were going. To his astonishment, the chair glowed blue and rose six inches off the ground. He could feel the same deep tightening in the back of skull and his hands glowed a soft light blue. It was unclear to Zaiver what he was doing differently.

“You’ve got too much juice to not be able to do that after a few days of first contact.” Arigo commented. “The second you were used as an anchor, your powers began to wake up. It will take time but I suspect you will continue to make meteoric gains in the coming months. I just don’t want you to be suprised out there.”

Zavier looked at Arigo. He had to ask the difficult questions now. He was still in shock but this was his best chance to get real answers. “Will I ever be able to come back?” The question was raw and straight to the point.

Arigo sighed and looked towards the opposite wall, “Right now, the answer is no. But you have an opportunity these next few months. Anenna will be watching you and how you react to your powers. Your ability to handle it psychologically is being noted. I can’t have you back here unless I’m absolutely certain you will not give in to temptation.”

“If you want me to stay quiet, I can do so. I’ll just go back to my life, take the heat for being missing for a week, and never bother with this stuff again.” Zavier knew there was no chance Arigo would let him do this, he had his mind made up. He was fishing for a better explanation that might open the door for him to go home eventually.

“Well, first Radia has to find out how you even exist, so I can mitigate you as a threat, whatever that may entail. That will be the easy part, she is the most brilliant mind in any world, you will be amazed when you meet her. The harder part is if you can be trusted not as an anchor but as a man.” Arigo had now moved his gaze back to Zavier making stern eye contact. “I believe you when you say you will not ever reveal any of your powers or anyone else to the world. I think as you are right now, there is no desire inside you for that. But life is long and sometimes difficult. You followed Yafu to near death out of dissatisfaction, despite knowing better of it. You gave into the temptation. Into ego and power. As much as you hate all of this right now, life will wear you down again. Do you really think there won’t be a day where you will want to feel spectacular despite the consequences?” Arigo took a long pause after this, letting Zavier mull the question internally. “When those days come, do I know for sure you’ll keep your head down. Everything I know about people, and I’ve seen a lot, says it’s only a matter of time. And much like you are discovering now, once the veil of ignorance is taken from the people of this planet, there will be no helping even good people from the worst of their instincts.”

Zavier felt discouraged from asking again. There was a deep seriousness in Arigo’s tone that made Zavier feel petty and childish for worrying about his problems. They talked a little bit more after that, mainly just some instructive things on soul energy. Zavier got the fundamentals of three basic skills. The universal translating power Yafu had been using, an ability to grab objects across the room, and a small discharge. It was surprisingly straightforward to acquire these skills in an afternoon, although he was clearly at a beginners level with these. He would still be hilariously overmatched against anyone he had seen in action so far. After getting the skills to a point where Arigo believed he had a good base to improve as time went on, the two men got up and descended the stairs.

“Return here tomorrow morning. Try to be ready to leave. Whatever you might need to do.” Arigo said as he ushered Zavier to the main doors.

“One more thing.” Zavier blurted out.

“Hmmm.” Arigo mused.

“Who are you? What made you get into this?” Zavier asked.

“I love Earth, Zavier. That should answer both questions.”

Right before he walked out, Zavier gave a hard look at the door in the back center of the room. As the day had gone on he had become more sensitive to soul energy, not just his own, but that which was around him. As with his combat skills, he knew there were higher levels. The fact that Yafu could pinpoint Shen from outside the hotel had a new level of impressiveness to Zavier. For Zavier, even the energy swirling directly around him was blurry and confusing as he felt it. Despite that, he felt an incredibly strong repulsive force coming from that door. He was not being physically pushed backwards but he felt a tug pulling him in the opposite direction that he could only feel more after an afternoon for practice. Arigo noticed he had stopped to stare at the door and motioned for him to keep walking.

“What’s in there?” Zavier asked as he reached the exit.

Arigo’s hands glowed white as he opened to door and parted the winds blowing over the stairs. Shutting the doors quickly before Zaiver had a chance to respond he uttered simply, “Never go through that door.”

Zavier hurried down the stairs. He did not want to wait to see how long Arigo would keep the winds at bay. As he got to the courtyard, he headed back to the room he had woken up in. Opening the door, he marveled at how fast his shoulder had healed. It definitely wasn’t a natural timetable. Whether that was some healing factor he now had or it was some manipulation by Arigo or Anenna, he was just grateful it was less painful to move around especially in the cold. Once he got to his room, he practically dived into his bed and fell asleep.

Zavier was suddenly on a rock formation sticking out in the middle of an ice sheet. Had he wandered outside? That amount of sleep walking would be a startling personal development but at this point nothing would really surprise him. Zavier tried to move around but he could not. In fact, he could not feel himself standing on the rock cropping at all.

Looking around, Zavier saw no evidence of his body anywhere. No arms, no legs, no anything. It was like he was floating, a disconnected consciousness in the icy wasteland. Zavier tried to look around. He could not move his position but he had 360 degrees of rotational freedom. Using this, Zavier got a panoramic view of his surroundings. It was hard to make anything out. The snow was coming down relentlessly. It had to be a pretty nasty blizzard. Near the end of the rotation something finally caught his eye. About ten feet away from the rock formation something was sticking out of the ground.

At first Zavier thought it was a root, but upon closer inspection there was no doubt that it was a sword lodged into ice. How bizarre to just be left here. Suddenly, Zavier’s point of view was violently zoomed into the sword. He was now staring directly at it up close and personal.

The blade itself was pretty standard but the hilt was thick with a bulge in the center of it. Ornate animal designs had been carved into it. Zavier couldn’t quite identify the species, but it was a carving of a bird, perhaps a hawk. Suddenly, in the same manner as before, Zavier’s view was forced up from looking down at the sword as if someone was lifting his chin. For a split second there was the same view as before, just miles and miles of empty ice and tundra. Then, like a jump scare in a horror movie, a man appeared out of the air in front of him.

This man was tall and thin, but had broad shoulders. He had thick, healthy brown hair that fell to his back. His face was sharp with a large sloping nose as its most prominent feature. His eyes were small and high up on his face. They had a kind green color to them. Despite that, this man gave Zavier the most saddened look he had ever seen. Zavier kept looking into this face of genuine sorrow and wanted to say something but could not. He did not appear to have a mouth, much less a way to talk. The man and him just stood there in the blizzard and said nothing.

Bang! Bang! Zavier woke up suddenly to two hard knocks to his door. He was going to circle back to that dream sometime later. Rubbing his eyes as he did, Zavier gave his shoulder a mild stretch. He did not have his full range of motion yet but he was stunningly close. There had been some excitement to check on his shoulder after another night of superhuman healing and the experience did not disappoint. Bang! Bang! Two more knocks, again rather loudly.

“I’m up, I’m up!” yelled Zavier, making sure the person on the other side of the door knew their knocks were no longer necessary. It was like he was in middle school again. Zavier had fallen asleep in the winter clothes he had been given and seeing no other ones around he rolled out of bed and walked to the door in those clothes. His hygiene was at an all time low anyways. Hopefully, Yafu’s world had a shower. Opening the door, he was not surprised to see Anenna as the source of rude awakening. Finding a way to make peace with her would be a priority going forward.

“Can’t you give me a little more time? Kids my age struggle with the early morning stuff.” Zavier said in a playful tone.

“We’re the same age and we need to go meet with Arigo now. It’s late enough already.” Anenna replied. Zavier shrugged. It was worth a try. Anenna turned and began to speed walk towards the stairs. Zavier fell behind initially, surprised at the rushed pace, but quickly caught up and matched her.

They reached the stairs and they were brutal. Anenna, for whatever reason, did not do the wind breaking thing Arigo had done, so they trekked up the stairs in the freezing wind. It burned Zavier’s face and he would have said something if it hadn’t been a thirty second endeavor. There was not enough payoff in averted suffering to complain to her. Anenna did use the unlocking spell to move the large double doors open. Zavier doubted he would ever be taught that trick. It would be above his pay grade here.

As they entered the main room, Zavier’s eyes went straight to the basement door. There was still something pulsating from there, he could definitely feel it even across the room. For his own sanity, he decided to just ignore it. A ‘whatever gets me home’ approach would be his strategy from here on out. Anenna and him were the only people in the main room currently. Anenna had gone over and leaned on the rightward wall, so Zavier assumed that they were to wait here for Arigo.

After about ten minutes or so, a sound of an opening door was heard from the upper right corner of the room, presumably the same room Zavier had been in yesterday. About five seconds later, Yafu came strolling down the stairs. He was still heavily bandaged around his face and limping slightly. Despite this, his recovery may have been more rapid than Zavier’s considering the extent of his injuries. Shadowing behind him was Arigo, who quickly locked eyes with Anenna and Zavier, confirming they were here.

Coming over with Yafu to where they were, Arigo pulled out a letter and handed it to Anenna. “It is critical that when you get to the Revival City, you find Ms. Regir and hand her this letter. She will get it to the people who help you to cross the Warm Planet to Radia. You remember how to find her, Anenna?”

Anenna took the letter and nodded. Zavier felt the need to speak up. “Why aren’t you transporting us directly to her?”

“That leads me to my next instruction for you.” Arigo responded. “It is critical that no one there ever hears anything about Earth. It is a fairy tale there and it is important that that never changes.”

“That’s why we're going to Revival, there’s so much traffic between worlds there that you won’t leave a trail someone could notice. Plus it is incredibly dangerous to use the transport ritual to anywhere else on the Warm Planet” Yafu interjected.

“Precisely.” Zavier was surprised Yafu got away with interrupting without so much as an eye roll from Arigo. “The only person who is allowed to know anything personal about any of you is Radia. Trust no one else. This means Zavier and Anenna should only use their powers in emergencies or in private.”

“Why is that?” Zavier complained. He had just spent the prior afternoon having this man teach him some of these party tricks and now he was being told to not use them.

“Because of your color.” Yafu said, clearly taking Arigo’s earlier reaction as an invitation to step on when he had something to add. “My color yellow is by far the more common color of the two worlds, especially the world we’re going to spend our time in. The only other color people have seen is the rarer Red, predominantly on the Cold Planet which we won’t be on at all. You and Anenna lighting it up with your blue would draw crowds almost anywhere.”

“This is going to be Yafu’s role. He has lived in these worlds so he will help you with the cultural adjustment enough to avoid unwanted attention.” As Arigo spoke, it dawned on Zavier that Yafu had been told about his role privately already making his interjections a little less bold than Zavier thought. He might have done it anyway, though.

“In terms of miscellaneous items, do not veer off your course. Get to Radia as fast as you can while remaining discrete. Every second you are not in her care, there is tremendous risk. If groups like the Poison Fang discover you, they will mercilessly hunt you. Again, trust no one. Finally, even though there would be no reason for you to be anywhere near here at all if you are following your mission, the Interior Jungle of the Warm Planet and the End Mountain of the Cold Planet are places to stay away from. Those plus anything to do with the Church of the King should be avoided at almost any cost. Just use the help the letter will give you and get to Radia. Once you are with her, things will be fine.” Arigo did not seem like the type to repeat points unless they were incredibly important. Zavier knew his own personal goal lied with convincing this man he was fit to return to his home and a smooth journey to Radia was the best way he could prove it.

Arigo gave each of them a stern staredown as he finished. It was not one to be taken lightly. Zavier felt his skin crawl as he got his staredown. Arigo accomplished his goal. Zavier had a renewed sense of fear of failing this man. After finishing with Anenna, Arigo turned toward the front center of the room by the double doors. His entire being erupted in a strong white glow. Zavier felt the sensation of a very strong wind blowing him backwards from Arigo, but his clothes and hair did not move as they would if the wind was an everyday gust. Zavier would have thought the breeze was imaginary if he did not feel it so strongly and see Yafu brace himself against it as well. A person sized, white energy ring formed almost instantaneously on the floor.

Yafu went first, walking over to the ring and dropping in. Anenna followed quickly behind. Zavier had a little trepidation as he walked up to this circular pool of white. It was the feeling of diving off the high diving board as a kid on steroids. His fear of making Arigo impatient outweighed this fear rather quickly. Taking a deep breath and holding it in, Zavier did a short hop and pencil dived in.

Arigo quickly closed the portal once it was clear to him that all three of them were en route to Revival City. He felt a small amount of guilt sending them away but was convinced it was for the best. Zavier was a startling development. Arigo was shocked that he had no idea at all how anyone on Earth could have slipped his gaze with that amount of aura inside them. The truly astounding part was that it was someone like Zavier. Arigo had spent the vast majority of the last several days trying to find what he was missing about this kid. He had initially been convinced that there was something and despite coming up empty combing through the kid’s memories, he was still sure there was something out there. He had just missed it.

It would be on Radia to find it now. While Arigo considered himself to be a much more powerful user of aura than her, he held a more functional and performative power. Where Radia bested him was in an academic sense with her deeper understanding of the underlying mechanics of soul energy. If there was anyone who could unravel this mystery, it would be her.

It also happened to be rather convenient for Arigo in regards to Anenna to have this incident occur at this particular moment. Arigo quietly viewed it as a silver lining. He had reached the end of his obligations with her. She would be twenty-two if she was a normal person on Earth and almost fifteen cycles old on the Biterrain. Despite the dangers that exist on those planets, she was a grown woman and he had promised to keep her safe only until she had reached maturity. In Arigo’s honest evaluation, she had been ready for nearly a year now.

It was just difficult to let her go. Especially after they had lost her sister and adoptive brother a few years prior. After that moment, the consequences of her isolated upbringing became more severe. Despite his resistance, Anenna made attempts to see him more and more as a father figure after that, clinging to the last fragment of family she had known. Arigo could not tolerate this. He was unfit for this role and could not spare the effort for it. But he empathized greatly with her and had dragged his feet on sending her back even though he knew he needed to. Enter Zavier and his situation.

Now Arigo had to send Annena to the Biterrain to watch Zavier as Arigo could not go himself. She would be with Radia at the end of this journey and as an indirect consequence all he had to do now was tell her to not come back. He had done just that earlier this morning. Anenna knew it was coming so she showed no outward ill-will or distress to the news. Arigo matched her stoicism but felt the shame of his choice privately. Despite his guilt over her abandonment, at the very least Radia was the best place to have her go. Not only was she the next best person to protect Anenna, she also may be more receptive to being a surrogate mother to her than Arigo ever was going to be a surrogate father. He just could not go there. Arigo would never let something that got in the way of his mission distract him. He was committed as he always was to keeping Earth away from the Biterrain and its dangerous inhabitants. But part of him wondered if he would have ever sent Anenna back without this happenstance.

Despite the rather cruel decisions he had made in the last few days, Arigo had one choice that stood out as a counterfactual to his perceived lack of humanity. He should have killed Yafu. The arguments for his inclusion on the journey were real. The kid was quite resourceful and his knowledge of the Biterrain, specifically the Poison Fang, were immensely valuable to the cause. But Arigo always killed interlopers who managed to make it to Earth pretty much on sight. There was no doubt that some of these pilgrims meant well but confirmation of Earth being real would spread like a contagion back on the Biterrain. Ultimately this meant Yafu was not worth keeping alive even as help.

It was going through Yafu’s memories that changed Arigo’s mind. The kid had seen tragedy. He had lost everything. One of the aspects Arigo hated the most about people was their ability to move on from what they lost. It was likely the healthiest thing to do but he thought it was disrespectful and cowardly. It showed a lack of true desire and commitment. A fickle subservience to what was available over what should be valued.

Arigo hated the first time he saw it and he never relented in how he felt. Yafu did not bow to this capitulation to convenience, much like Arigo. His memories proved a reliant commitment to what he lost. Not only did Yafu refuse to seek out replacements for the pain in his soul, he consistently valued their echoes over his own life. He made this selfless sacrifice over and over again with every decision he made. For this reason, Arigo felt his story could not end here. Arigo would not help Yafu beyond sparing him, but from a distance, he wished for his success.