“The name was Jez,” said Kaya again, licking a puff of cream from her upper lip. “‘Least, that’s what the priest said…”

She paused between munches, then squinted. “Um. Why’re you staring at me like that?”

Dorian was lightheaded. Hells, this Jez guy is fast! How many Lower Realms did Gerard say he’d run over? A third of them?

The chance that Dorian ended up in one such world was one in three. A fact that seemed blatantly obvious now, of course—but somehow he’d assumed he’d gotten lucky, and skirted this mess. Jez seemed like an issue that Dorian could treat much like he treated every other so-called multiversal threat: that was—point and laugh at the idiots who had to deal with it, and then go about his business as usual.

Even still Dorian was still a little incredulous. In his head the Jez ordeal was still filed as a headache meant for people very far away. All he wanted to do was go about his runs, screw around, and all was dandy. All he asked of the world was to be left alone! Was that really too much?

He sighed.

Absurdly, it seemed unfair. It would’ve been more absurd to expect fairness from the multiverse, but still!

This changed everything. Again.

“Uh…” said Kaya. “Are you okay? You look like you just shit yourself.”

Dorian grinned sardonically. Well, I’ve just found out this mysterious force coming to kill me is not only much faster and stronger than I’d once thought—it’s also backed by a Godking-level power! Forgive me for feeling a little miffed.

What he said aloud was, “I’ve just remembered I’ve got some errands to run, actually. I may not be back until very late. See you tomorrow for Tournament Day 2, alright?”

“Oh. Okay!” Kaya went back to happily munching.

A weird thought struck him. The fact that she’d become a node of Jez’s network…he might even find a whiff of conspiracy in it. The coincidence wasn’t that she was branded—Dorian strongly suspected Nijo—who he now knew as an agent of Jez—was behind it—the conspiracy would be the full picture of the facts: that Dorian got put on a plane Jez was active on, and that he’d interacted with one of the man’s agents early, and that his sister had now been drawn into the network… did he have grounds to suspect some kind of divine interference? That it was no coincidence that he—not Io, but rather Dorian the Godking of Time—was put in this position?

…Nah. That’s a stretch. It was stretching things just to consider this string of events as anything more than chance. Dorian shook his head. Let’s not be paranoid. In isolation none of those things were that unlikely, and look hard enough and you could find suspicion in anything. The fact was this: she’d gotten a dormant soul fragment; that was all. It’d give her some strength, sure, but it made her like Pearl, another grunt-level shard among possibly millions. Dorian would keep an eye on her—there were things he might like to test now that he had a free sample of Jez’s methods on hand. But first…

He had to get stronger. And much faster than he’d anticipated.

***

Dorian remembered how, a month ago, he’d chanced upon an elixir formula during the Festival. It was called the Devil’s Promise. Its premise was simple: self-immolate. Trade your lifespan and Bloodline for quick qi gains. It was stupidly wasteful, and wreaked havoc on a cultivator’s foundation.

He’d given the formula some tweaking, optimizing it, stripping out the chaff, and made a brew of it.

Then, naturally, he’d given it to Kaya to test it. He’d seen her burn up with qi. He’d seen her make a quick advance. And then he’d sworn off it; it wasn’t worth it. A speedrun was primed for speed, of course, but it was still a marathon. Abusing this thing meant you’d sprint until you couldn’t move your legs anymore! Kaya’s advancements were likely something around 10% slower ever since she’d taken it.

Dorian was certain he would never resort to it. At least, nowhere near this early.

Then the last twelve hours happened.

Dorian was not up against just any God. He was up against a Godking-level threat! He had to get stronger, as fast as humanly possible—even if that meant screwing up some of his future. Even if that meant burning up his lifespan.

And here was the hardest pill to swallow. Even if it meant burning his ridiculously hard-won Scales.

To go this route would mean dropping his Bloodline Density. The mere thought of it left him squeamish. Yet…

It was seeming more and more necessary. Dorian’s resolve was firming with each step as he strode briskly down Main Street, making for a Heilong barracks.

There was one more matter of great concern.

He needed all the help he could get. This meant he had to win whatever ‘Relic of the Old Gods’ was the Tournament’s prize. If they’d fished that thing out of deep storage, Dorian had to believe it served some use. Was it Dweller Blood Essence that gave him a glimpse of the future? Or something else entirely? Whichever, there were two things that were true.

First. It’d probably serve him well to nab it.

Second. He was almost certainly not getting it.

Standing in his way were some absolute chunkers. There was Ma Yun, who by virtue of sheer durability might just steamroll Dorian in his current state. There was Young Master Fang, ranked third—one above Eudora Azcan’s fourth. If she’d almost wasted him, and he’d only won because of a highly favorable matchup—since his Spirit Weapon basically nullified her own—

How screwed was he against them?

To say nothing of the Rat-King, who Dorian had never seen fight. But the man was, he gathered, a threat on the level of Bin Heilong.

Dorian was not winning a battle against Bin Heilong. Early Profound to Peak Earth was far too big a power gap.

Which was all to say that desperate times called for desperate measures. And it was quite lucky, he supposed, that he’d asked for Bloodline scales as his payment.

The Barracks stood before him, a squat, ugly, nearly windowless stone building streaming with soldiers. Dorian merely had to nod to gain entrance.

Mere minutes later he’d settled into a cultivation room, and locked the door shut behind him. Outside, Heilong Guards were positioned to ensure his privacy.

Cauldron. Ladle. An assortment of gnarly, bruised-looking plants, a noxious root, and bottles of qi-rich waters lay scattered on the floor.

With a fierce light in his eyes, Dorian grimly picked up the ladle.

Time to get to work.

***

A few hours later it was done. The brew, at his current power and skill level, was a simple affair.

He held the lip of the vial between two fingers, swirling it about and squinting at the dark liquid.

Guild and Family heads alike might weep to see him here, contemplating an act tantamount to heresy. This was the Oasis’ heritage! These Scales were jealously guarded, even more jealously won, and each seldom passed hands without a storm of Blood. They were enormously useful, enormously powerful. What he was about to do was the equivalent of burning a priceless manuscript to warm his hands.

Dorian mulled it over one last time.

Was he really about to do this?

There’s only one salient point here, isn’t there? Foundations could be mended. Bloodlines could be replenished. It’d be tough as hells, perhaps, but it was doable.

Dead was dead.

And if he did not act—and fast—dead was what he would be when Jez’s army came knocking.

Besides. I can think of quite a few places in this Oasis from where I can snatch some more Scales. It was time, not his Bloodline, that couldn’t be replaced.

He downed the liquid.

It went down like hot coals slithering down his throat; he hissed, felt them crawl down each inch of his body, leaving in their wakes a stinging, throbbing burning feeling.

It coiled up in his Spirit Sea, seeking the mouth. There it found its target: the Evernight Basilisk’s Bloodline.

Already Dorian’s skin was slicking with sweat, his hands clammy. It took all his mental effort just to keep his Bloodline from rebelling, from shucking off the Elixir, as it went about its nasty work. Then the burning sharpened like a white-hot needle wedging itself inch-by-inch into his brain; he hissed.

[Bloodline Density]

[8% -> 7%]

[7% -> 6%]

[6% -> 5%]

It hurt like hells to see it drop—not literally, though that definitely hurt something vicious, but also mentally. It went against every fiber of his being to go back.

Yet he wasn’t really going back.

A few seconds later the deluge struck.

Qi. The Earth and the Heavens had opened up, and all the world inside was a thundering of qi, an outpouring so vast he could hardly keep hold of it all. He gnashed his teeth, making sure to hold shut the exit to the rest of his body as the flood rushed out. His body wasn’t under stress, only the Sea, which was crying out with it—it felt like he was holding a storm in his core.

It was a dense, thick qi, with that regal heaviness and moody darkness which were signatures of the Evernight Basilisk, and, to Dorian’s vast relief, it followed the path of least resistance. Straight into Dorian’s stores.

[Spirit Sea Saturation]

[23% -> 36%]

Just like that—his qi stores grew by 50%.

But it wasn’t done. The Scales were still dissolving; and with each bit the Sea was flooded anew.

[Spirit Sea Saturation]

[36% -> 49%]

Still it kept coming. Dorian felt a sizzling deep within him as a huge chunk dissolved all at once—

[Spirit Sea Saturation]

[49% -> 73%]

In sum, Dorian had had five Scales’ worth of qi within him. Three of them, which roughly made 5%, could not be dissolved; they were fixtures of his Spirit Weapon.

Now he had four—soon to be three, as the last big glob of Scale fizzed out.

[Spirit Sea Saturation]

[73 -> 98%]

There it was. Peak Profound, in all its glory. He now stood but a half-step from the Earth Realm. With one elixir he’d more than quadrupled his qi reserves. And more, his Javelin was powered by his qi. If it was fast before, with the amount he could stuff in it now? He wasn’t sure there was a thing in Azcan that would match him for speed.

Dorian took a moment to bask in it all. The simple feeling of fullness humming through his Spirit Sea. It was bliss.

Peak Vigor to Peak Profound in the space of days. Done, like that.

He smiled a guilty smile, the sort of smile an addict might have upon relapsing; he knew he’d done something naughty. But hells if this didn’t feel good in the here-and-now!

He felt for his Spirit Sea, and now it truly was a sea, a great, churning, viscous mass; there was so much of it little whirlpools formed along its breadth. So this is a filled Perfect-Grade Spirit Sea. There was so much qi he could've filled ten early Profound-Realm cultivators, and then some—there was more qi than he knew what to do with! It was as though he were a lean mortal, who, in a blink, transformed into a mass monster so burly his muscles could hardly fit on his frame. Qi was, at its most base level, power. It let you hit harder, move faster, last longer. And Dorian would easily bet his raw, brute power was now top five in all the Oasis, including the Earth-Realms with their Golden Cores. He had a hunch it was even higher than that.

There was so much qi it nearly overflowed the bounds of the Sea.

But that was for the Earth Realm. Next time.

For now… he breathed out, exhaling a silvery mist of qi, and stood, grinning with an assurance he felt to his very core. He had a Tournament to win.