The next day, we decided to come in and watch Lament and Wren's match. They were set up in a different arena, but they were in the second day's lineup, so we were able to come watch their fight. Zeke actually came along too for some reason, and I was curious as to why. As we settled in to wait for the match to start I decided to just ask. "So what made this fight interesting enough to check out with us?"

Zeke turned to look at me with a smile. "Lament. Not many people manage to train their soul strength to that level out here in the boonies. There's three or four kids here who made it to the same point, and that's solid talent without any sort of heritage or guidance, though it isn't something you can do further up. At least not nearly as easily. There's a reason that even at G-rank they call them Master Candidates."

The way he was talking made it sound like they'd hit some kind of standard. "Is there a method of gauging soul force comparatively? Like some kind of metric people can use?'

That got me a grin. "See, that's the kind of question you should be asking." He was clearly pleased I'd brought this up. I was guessing it was basic cultivation info he was allowed to share, but only if I asked. "Yes. There is. Soul strength is gauged through color. I-rankers have an ivory soul. H-rankers are pink, G-rankers have a red soul, so on and so forth. To clarify, you're maybe ten percent into red. It's MUCH easier to train your soul at low levels, and the hammering method you and the others here use only really works well at red."

"So Abel and the others are at the peak of orange?" It made sense that since they were almost Experts they would be at the top of the orange soul strength bracket.

Zeke just laughed. "What? No. They're BARELY orange. Listen, kid. Soul strength is incredibly important, for reasons that won't become apparent until you get much more powerful. Most people however, never cultivate soul strength. Despite that, even basic ass cultivators are able to rank their skills up to a single rank ahead. Intermediate at G-rank isn't impressive, not like PEAK Intermediate. Orange can take you to the peak of Intermediate, but it's impossible to break through to Expert without breaking through to F-rank unless your soul reaches yellow grade."

"So they're at orange, barely, which means despite being right up against the barrier they can't push through that last little bit without WAY more effort than you'd expect?" I asked uncertainly. Abel had made it sound like his soul was just a drop away from strong enough, but it seemed like that drop was the difference of an ocean.

He nodded. "Sure. And when they rank up that process happens naturally. The process of ranking up is a sublimation. The weight of your stats condense your being and you become heavier, your Impact rising. In the process your soul becomes tempered and categorically rises on rank."

I frowned at that. "So there are ten ranks of soul strength, just like cultivation ranks?" Well, eleven but I wasn't counting gods because who knew how the hell you became one of those.

"Not exactly." He said wryly. "But don't worry about that for now. As far as you're concerned there are ten for the moment. Tempering at red can be done through your current method, it's called hammering. Being able to hammer your soul to orange is no mean feat. All those kids are geniuses. Maybe not monster level existences, but they have a natural strength of heart that most people can't match. The soul gets harder to temper through hammering as it condenses, you're at maybe ten percent, like I said, but it's going to take you years to get to orange even with all your advantages."

My displeasure at that must have been obvious, because he just laughed. Undeterred, I pressed on. "Ok, if hammering isn't the way to temper your soul, what is? Is it really something that only large clans can do?" I wasn't resigned to being relegated to a space hick for the rest of my life. All the powerful combat techniques in the world were useless without the soul strength to mobilize them.

That seemed to be the right thing to ask. "No. Other people can d-" The symbol on his forehead flared, and he gritted his teeth, forcing his breathing to even out. "Shit. That's too much. Fine. There..." He stopped to think over his words. "There is a PLACE, where anyone can temper the soul. I can't tell you more. But I can tell you this. After your soul reaches Master rank it becomes too sublimated to change. Blue is when tempering stops."

Something about that was important. He couldn't say what, but it was clear from the geas flaring that he'd been about to tell me something related to cultivation secrets that were outside the scope of the competition. I tried to puzzle it out, but Callie got it first.

"It's important that we go to this place early. Probably during F-rank. You mentioned people able to support Skills two above their rank before. If we can only go up two ranks, then if we wait until we're E-ranked we can't go up two full ranks, we'd stop at blue." She caught the crux of it before I did.

Zeke beamed. "I knew there was a reason I liked you." Then he winked. "Not that I can, of course, confirm the statement you just made. That would be beyond the scope of my role. But I feel a completely unrelated need to comment on your cleverness at this seemingly random time." His eyes flicked to the pit. "Anyway, enough talking about soul strength, your friends are coming out. I want to see what the spear girl can do. She and your little buddy are the most interesting two here."

Lament, Falken, Wren, and Lestri came out onto the sand as a unit. Lament was in the lead, with Falken dragging behind. I didn't know what Falken could do, but I was pretty sure he was strong. Apart from Lament he seemed to be the strongest team member based on how the others acted. Not a Master Candidate most likely, but still powerful as hell. "Who the hell are they fighting by the way?" I asked Callie.

"Blood Fiend Society." Said my girlfriend with a grimace. "Nasty bastards. Sacrificial abilities that can induce temporary berserk modes. Finding information about them was actually really easy, since they aren't exactly subtle. Of course, that's just their core heritage. How much each person uses their faction's unique Skills and methods and how much they rely on inborn abilities is up in the air, as we saw in our last fight."

The other party did kind of look...Blood Fiend-ish. They all wore deep crimson robes and stylized demonic masks. Couldn't tell anything about their appearances except their eyes were red like fresh blood. As they stepped out, they glided over the sand, not literally, but with dramatic swooping strides that trailed their long robes across the ground. Sadly, the isolation barrier stopped us from hearing what was said, but judging by Lament's bored expression, it wasn't anything too interesting anyway.

The society members spread out around the Spear Legion, taking up a four corners position, before two of them dashed in, transforming mid stride into some sort of slavering red furred beast. Lestri and Wren stepped in to deflect them. The larger brother whirling out his massive spear to keep them at range. Lestri used a rapid fire stabbing technique that relied on the spear sliding through his hand like a pool cue, driven by the grip he had on the base with his other palm.

The other two members of the society raised their hands and called forth a storm of sanguine energy. Crimson fire and blood red lightning, that pooled together above their heads in a vortex. As that happened, the sand in the arena began to glow an ominous red, and energy started to flow out of it, siphoning up into the vortex. The more energy that fed into it the more terrifying it became, growing in size and ferocity even as the red sand dimmed.

"What the fuck is THAT?" I asked in horror. That attack was much stronger than it should be coming from two G-rankers. At this point that vortex had firmly pushed into the realm of F-ranked attacks.

Zeke whistled. "Crafty. They used the vortex invocation as a focus for a blood sacrifice art. That arena has had a LOT of blood shed in it over the years. It's baked into the ground at this point. Shouldn't be able to take all of it though. Even both their souls together shouldn't be able to handle that kind of pressure. I expect they're just about done with the buildup."

True to his words, the siphon of sanguine energy cut off. Rather than charge it more, the two casters raised their hands and pushed, slowly forcing the cloud of roiling energy to shrink. They condensed the power slowly and steadily, and as it shrunk it started to shape itself. By the time they finished there was a giant head that resembled the creatures the first two had turned into.

It became obvious that the two creatures were playing distraction for the casters, and I expected Lament and Falken to take the time to attack, but neither did. Lament just watched the huge head of bloody fire and lightning form in the air, and Falken appeared to be napping, held up only by his spear.

The hooded figures threw their hands forward, and the head began to descend, its giant mouth opening in a soundless roar. Or soundless to us, based on the way the sand moved it wasn't soundless to the rest of them. Lament cracked her neck, smiling confidently, and started to spin her spear. One rotation, two, hand over hand as she whirled it in a slowly accelerating circle. The shaft of the weapon began to spark.

Each pass made the electricity gather more densely, and after a minute or two the spear was a blue glowing blur in front of her. She'd closed her eyes as she did it, ignoring the descending head, but as that terrifying blood monster approached her eyes snapped open, and her grip CHANGED, the spin turning into a brutal upward thrust with every ounce of her body behind it.

She grabbed low and dipped as she got under the blow, and the rising spear traveled from low to the ground up to full extension in a flash, ascending like a pillar of heaven. Above her head, the image of a colossal spear formed, driving upwards with all the momentum of a blue volcanic eruption. The spear manifestation smashed into the howling beast head, and impaled it right through, the spear rising past it and smashing headlong into the dome over the area, which rather than just block sound apparently protected the audience. The dome fucking CRACKED.

Thankfully it didn't break, but the head did, exploding into a massive conflagration of bloody flame and blue and red lightning. The two casters clutched their heads and fell to their knees, and Falken's eyes snapped open, his spear snaking out as his form blurred, smashing into the monster Wren was fighting and sending it hurtling into the wall of the arena as Wren seamlessly turned to attack the one besieging his brother.

Everyone just stared in wonder as the match came to an end within only a few minutes of starting. I'd certainly learned a lot. Firstly that Lament had a lightning ability, second that these people had been STRONG, even without a master candidate, and they'd been able to force her to, if not go all out, at least put in effort, and thirdly that Lament was way more terrifying than I had expected. I swallowed hard as I turned to look at Callie, muttering. "We...should probably train some more."