The Fourth Gate: Chapter Twenty-Two

An instant after Corra vanished, I faded away as well. This time, I was conscious – more than my fight against Liz, at least. Despite my physical and mental state seeming better, though, I was worried. The debt was already growing, eating up all of my mana regeneration, and if I didn’t start getting more mana in me soon… 

Well, if this hadn’t been a tournament, then I might have just signed my own death warrant. 

I appeared in a room that wasn’t the metal table I’d appeared in last time, but rather a private viewing box, rather like the one the contestants were in. Only, instead of the contestants, there was a collection of people far stronger than I was. I immediately recognized Meadow, Orykson, and Ikki. Darius was obvious, standing near the window, watching the tournament, as well as the Craftsman standing in a corner, inhaling from a bag of chips and dip. After a second, I recognized Atsila and Ama, the Sun and Moon Queen. They were some of Meadow’s personal friends, and they’d gifted me the healer’s heart – an item I would undoubtedly have died twice over without. 

There was a man with bright purple eyes. He was perched like a gargoyle atop one of the chairs, only the balls of his feet touching it, and he looked up at me, staring with eyes that were entirely too wide. The Dreamer, it seemed like. I supposed it made sense for a man who spent more time in dreams than reality to be a little strange. 

Finally, there was a man with white wings that paired well with his ruddy skin and braided hair. He stood out to me as the Healer, his face a calm mask of neutrality as he walked over and raised a hand. Greenish gold light swirled through me, and he spoke quietly, his voice low and rich. 

“I can repair all of the physical damage without issue, and will excise the excess mana and energetic debts, but removal of the soul mana debt is more difficult. Hold still.”

“I’m surprised you’re allowed to do that,” I said, still scanning the room, but I couldn’t find Dusk anywhere. When I reached into myself to look for her through my bond, I found her sleepily working to repair the damage, and the Healer’s power soaking into her as well, somehow moving through the spellbound. 

“It’s actively damaging you. I won’t pay your debts in their entirety, but I’ll bring them down to a level they won’t kill you. I don’t like people dying. Not if I can help them. Now, stop talking and hold still.”

He took my hand, and I felt his healing magic repairing a hundred thousand tiny things. Golden light fueled the debt in my spirit. Title slide into me, pervading my body and soul, and then… weaken. It wasn’t much, but in pouring so much of his Title into fixing the soul mana debt, he’d grown weaker, at least for a short time, until his own soul mana recovered. 

The debt wasn’t gone. Far from it, in fact. By my estimation, it had been cut back just enough so that if I put all of my regeneration and the spare energy of my plants toward the debt for the next three days, I’d just barely pay it off. That did massively diminish the odds that I’d win a top four slot, since I wouldn’t be able to train or practice, but that had always been a long shot. 

As soon as he’d finished, he stepped back, and Meadow gestured for me to take a seat in an empty chair. I did so, while the Healer pulled a key from his pocket and vanished, presumably off to treat Corra. Unless he was already there, and this had just been a simulacrum? I wasn’t sure.

“Normally, after making it into the top eight in either tournament, a Magi would introduce themselves in a more overt manner,” Meadow explained. “We would let you in on the existence of Titles as more than simple epithets, their role in prevention of slaughter spirits in order to build society, confirm the existence of the twelve living Magi – the nine dominant ones, and the three who work underneath existing magi.” 

“Indeed,” Orykson said, swirling a glass of whiskey. “Anyone who makes it to the top eight is going to be a major military, political, or industrial asset moving forward, and they need those facts in order to operate more effectively.”

“But I already know that,” I said. “I’ve been fortunate enough to have all that for a long time. Does that mean I get to know why you keep the existence of the Magi secret?”

“Secret,” Darius said with a snort. “Vivian parades about, admitting it openly.” 

Atsila tossed her hair back and grinned. 

“Simple, kid. Because of us.” 

I turned and looked at her, and she winked at me, while Ama sighed and ran a hand over her face. 

“We are still limited on what we can say. Per the terms of the pact, you are only to be told much about Titles when you were actually able to form one, stumble into certain secrets on your own accord, or defeat someone who has a Title,” Ama said. “Speaking of forming one, though. In all of recorded history, there is only a single example of someone forming a Title before ascending to seventh gate. Trying to force it before then will only result in death or injury. Better to only let it happen naturally, or when you are a true Occultist.”

“And that instance was before even my time,” Orykson said. “You’re good under pressure, but even if you were my apprentice, I wouldn’t expect you to form one until you broke into seventh gate.”

“And the one who managed it was at the peak of sixth gate, and possessed the most powerful soul-aligned Nascent Truth, Dominion, and Authority I have sensed,” Ikki said. “And even so, their Title killed them after two days. Do not try it.” 

“Buuutttt, to get back on track about why Magi are kept relatively under wraps? I wasn’t lying or exaggerating,” Atsila countered. “We’re part of the reason that the pact was formed at all, or at least amended to be stricter. There haven’t been many Magi throughout history, so for most people, it’s more rampant speculation than anything.” 

“Given your record, and your contacts, I expect that you will find some truths on your own, or earn them in battle,” Ikki said. “I have argued that your bond to Dawn quali–” 

“Oh, speaking of bonds, check this out!” the Craftsman said, rushing over. He held out his hand, revealing a sphere in it, which felt… weird… to my senses. It was clearly a growth item, but its effects were deeply strange. It didn’t have any spells, and felt almost alchemical, but also enchanted, and pseudo-biological.

“What is it?” I asked, rolling it between my fingers. 

“I’m calling it a Resonance Splitter,” the Craftsman said excitedly. “It places roughly as much spiritual weight on the soul as an ordinary growth item, and it allows the user to incorporate a Nascent Truth into a Domain Weapon or True Staff. Its efficiency is middling – your staff grants seventy-five percent staff power, and twenty-five percent of three different Nascent Truths, putting your total at one hundred and fifty, when all work together, close to a Grand Array. This grants roughly six percent of a Domain Weapon or True Staff, and about two percent of a Nascent Truth. I’m confident that with iteration, I’ll be able to create versions that are better – according to the math, a perfectly lossless crafting of the design should give closer to eighty-thirty. But most importantly, it’s replicable! It’s not an item from a starfall, it’s not legacy-crafted. It’s a design anyone of sufficient skill could potentially create!” 

He spoke so fast that my head was spinning, but after a second, I parsed his words and nodded. 

“How long do you think it will be before someone other than you can create a Resonance Splitter? And how long until you can bring the prototype from to combined hundred percent or more?”

“Oh, uh. Hm. I think a while? I’ve only slept…”

“Thirteen minutes since the start of the tournament,” the Dreamer called in a sleepy voice. “You’ve even deactivated the sleeping simulacrum. Dangerous, that. Humans Aren’t Meant To Exist Without Dreams…” 

“We should get back to what’s going on at present, the placement of the top eight,” Darius said. “In the Arcanist tournament, that would have qualified you to enter Elysia.”

“Who else has managed it so far?” I asked. 

“Ivy won the next two rounds,” Orykson interjected. “It’s good for him to learn his lesson now, rather than when his death would be permanent. I just hope he doesn’t forget it.” 

“There was a delay in the next round, since the judges were arguing over Kiran’s hacking of the wards,” Darius continued. “They eventually decided to count that round as a win, but forbade him from further interference. He lost round two, but won round three by the skin of his teeth. Lost an arm in the fight to block a Glacier Dragon’s Breath.” 

“Cai Dao won between your rounds,” Meadow said. “He was forced to cast a handful of simple spells – Force Shield, Stone Arrow, Force Armor. But he’s still yet to use his swords.” 

“Currently, Skoira the lava elemental is fighting,” Darius continued, and I wandered over to the window to watch. She was battling the flying mage who seemed to use gravity and magnetic fields to fly around. When I’d seen him fighting the talisman mage, I’d thought he was a middle of the road contestant, but as their fight ramped up, he pulled on a set of goggles, clearly made with some kind of magical mineral in the glass lenses, then began dropping rocks on Skoira. 

Though, dropping rocks might be an understatement. He’d used some sort of self-compressing granite that expanded out into massive boulders, and in conjunction with his gravity and mineral magic, they hit like the strikes of a meteor hammer. The entire time, he made jokes about rocks falling and killing her. Against a human opponent, it likely would have been very effective. If I’d had to fight him, I would have had a difficult time. He was fast and hard to hit, but he hit with a lot of power. It likely would come down to who could hit the other first. Skoira, being an elemental of solar and telluric mana, however, was able to hold the attacks long enough until she eventually caught him before he could fly away. Her overwhelming tide of lava struck him down instantly.  

To my surprise, the next fight was between people I recognized. Bijuli, the lightning mage who had been on my team for the top thirty-two fight, was facing off against Ming. Ming had changed. There were scars on her hands, scars that looked to have been painted with black ink: a resolve imprint. 

I leaned forward, hoping to see some dramatic action. Bijuli wasn’t a dueling specialist, his endless streams of lightning a better fit for a battlefield than a ring, but he could still output near endless streams of the stuff. Ikki also stepped up to the glass, watching me, and even Orykson seemed a little more intent. 

“Begin!” 

Ming flicked two fingers, and there was a flash of silver. Blood spurted from Bijuli’s neck, before he vanished. I let out an impressed whistle, while Orykson let out a snort of sheer contempt. 

“The idiot boy didn’t have any defenses. She could have been a full two inches closer with her blade and still slit his throat without any issues. At least her range has expanded, thanks to the pills she purchased for the Analyze spells.” 

“Specialists on a single spell are incredibly powerful, but they almost never survive long enough to make it to higher gates,” Ikki said. “At least Ming has dedicated her power to expanding the utility of Silvery Blades.” 

Skoira won again, cementing her place among the top eight, and the fight after that was between two contestants I didn’t recognize. One of them was tall and pale, and spoke with a thick Aergarde accent, while the other was a dark haired and skinned woman from Kijani. She used a sort of living shadow, one that was able to fold in and out of three dimensions for attacks, was able to detach from her body, and could change space. It almost seemed more like a shadow elemental familiar than a spell, and I eventually realized that she’d bound a lunar shade within the shadow. It was basic, but it had effectively doubled her standard lunar magic amount, output, and more. In the end, all she needed to do was find a small crack in force constructs and abnegation barriers that the Aergarde mage put up, and when she did, her shadow ate him whole. 

The final matchup had at least one person I recognized: Aradia, the solar and mental mage from the Hallowed Orrery city-state who specialized in hard light constructs. She was facing a bog standard fire mage. For all that I disdained much of the traditional path and walked my own, watching him fling around massive quantities of fire at such intensities, I had to admit that there was a reason traditional paths existed. Unfortunately for him, Aradia used her mind magic for more than just giving complex mental programming to her constructs, and with few mental defenses, she was able to stun him long enough for her constructs to win. 

The repeat rounds with Ming, the Kijanian shadow mage, and Aradia followed a similar pace, though with some more fighting, and as Aradia scored the final hit from the round, Meadow rose from her chair, dusting herself off. 

“Well, I suppose it’s nearly time to go before the River Lord and request your prizes. Ivy and Kiran will go first, of course, but then it will be your turn.”