When he saw that, Lindon sighed. “Okay. Everyone go sit by a different wall and start cycling, if you don’t mind.”
Kelsa and Jai Chen ran off immediately, leaving Jai Long standing alone. This was stupid. Even tips from someone more advanced than him wasn’t worth this. This was just giving Lindon a chance to show off.
Lindon looked to him again, and Jai Long suddenly thought that he didn’t have anything better to do anyway, so he might as well follow instructions.
When all three of them were cycling, with Lindon standing in the center of the room, Lindon’s veil slipped. Just a little.
His spiritual perception filled the room like an overwhelming tide. Jai Long’s whole spirit shivered, but only for an instant.
“Jai Chen, you’ve been focusing on using your techniques with your contracted spirit as a medium. You don’t have to do that; not all your madra is taken up by him anymore. I’ll give you four basic techniques you can work on, and you can refine them on your own, but for now start cycling your madra separately from your dragon.”
Jai Chen looked startled, but Lindon had already turned to Kelsa.
“You’re practicing the techniques I gave you correctly, but you’re too slow. Don’t learn to walk by taking one step and stopping to evaluate. Walk. You could spar against some clan elders, but for now…”
He whispered something to the blue spirit leaning against his neck, and then Little Blue hopped down from his shoulder and walked up to Kelsa.
“…she’ll be your opponent.”
Little Blue put hands on her hips and whistled a challenge.
Kelsa looked like her brother had told her to kick a baby off a cliff. “Uh, Lindon…”
“Blue.”
The spirit shoved her palm forward. A Forged blue-white handprint manifested in front of Kelsa’s body and slammed into her midsection, driving the air from her lungs and blasting her back into the wall. Her spirit was disrupted at the same time, and Jai Long winced. He’d been on the receiving end of that technique before.
Kelsa’s body crumpled to the ground and she groaned.
Little Blue gave a deep flute note of concern.
“She’s fine,” Lindon said. “Just wait for her to get up. Now…”
Finally, he turned to Jai Long.
“Why haven’t you advanced yet?”
Jai Long stopped himself from saying something he would regret. Lindon could talk like advancing to Underlord was so easy, but it was a barrier that stopped virtually every sacred artist in the entire Blackflame Empire.
“I have not received the necessary insight,” Jai Long said stiffly.
Lindon didn’t scan him with spiritual perception, but Jai Long felt as though he were being examined thoroughly nonetheless. “What have you tried?”
“Tried? I have isolated myself, I meditate on the nature of my madra every morning, and Jai Daishou ran me through a number of personal trials.”
Lindon nodded as though he’d expected as much. “He didn’t know what the Underlord revelation was, did he?”
Jai Long didn’t even understand the question. Everyone knew that every Underlord’s transformation was triggered differently. It had something to do with insight into your own Path, but some people achieved the knowledge in battle while others needed isolation, or even conversation.
“He was enlightened when he visited the birthplace of the Path of the Stellar Spear,” Jai Long said. He didn’t know how else to respond.
Lindon rubbed his chin. “I wonder why this isn’t common knowledge. The Underlord advancement is caused by an understanding of what started you on your Path in the first place. Why did you start practicing the sacred arts?”
“Because I was one of the most gifted in my clan,” Jai Long said immediately.
Of course, no transformation began. He hadn’t expected otherwise.
“It’s easier to sense in an environment with stronger vital aura. I’ll give you some treasures. You’ll want to open yourself to the resonance of aura while you try and discover what your original motivation was.”
Lindon’s gaze grew distant. “It’s not as easy as it sounds.”
It sounded pointless, but Jai Long had attempted less likely things when he was first trying to reach Underlord. He could give this a shot, especially if it came with free natural treasures.
“I’ll try it.”
He was being sincere, but Lindon seemed to sense some skepticism.
“This is the way it works.”
“I believe you.”
“You have to give this your full attention.”
“I will.”
Lindon still seemed doubtful.
A crash echoed as Kelsa slammed into the ceiling, and then another as she fell back to the ground, groaning.
Little Blue warbled a question, pointing at her, and Jai Long somehow understood it perfectly. She was asking Are you sure this is okay?
“…maybe take it easy on her,” Lindon allowed.
6
On Windfall, Lindon had finally finished construction of a new building. It was a large, wooden, one-roomed structure that resembled a barn, and he had carved an intricate set of protective scripts into the foundation.
This was his Soulsmith foundry, and for the most part it stayed empty. He kept his tools and materials in his void key.
But now he and his mother were together in the center as he very delicately pulled Dross apart.
While Dross hadn’t responded for weeks, he was still alive in Lindon’s spirit. Just…faded. Lindon had cycled plenty of madra to him, and still Dross hadn’t recovered.
Now, Lindon had manifested him as a spinning purple ball almost as big as Lindon’s head. With great care, Lindon controlled the madra that made up Dross’ form in order to view his insides.
This wouldn’t harm him, though Dross would have been disturbed to see it. Spirits generally didn’t rely on a specific physical structure to remain alive. If all their parts existed, they should be fine.
Though that didn’t mean that Lindon couldn’t cause problems by accident. He was reluctant to mess with Dross’ internal configuration, but he needed a better look.
Dross expanded, his external layer of “skin” vanishing. Now he looked like a mass of organic rings, all spinning in time with one another. Between these interlocking circles was a recognizable system of madra channels, the hazy dream madra moving in gradual loops.
Seisha’s brush froze in her hands as she was about to take notes. Her drudge gave a whistle that Lindon thought sounded hopeless.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” she breathed. “It’s like a Remnant with another unique, independent spirit of its own. I can’t even begin…”
Lindon’s one hand was occupied with directing Dross’ madra—his right arm still in its sling—so he split his attention to summon a brief spark of fire aura to point out a specific part of Dross’ soul. One of the major rings at the top was faded in a particular spot, as though it had broken and begun to return. “This is one of the connections that broke when he exhausted himself. I was thinking if I could reinforce it—”
She cut him off with a look of wide-eyed horror. “What? You want to splice another spirit inside him?”