PSTH2: Chapter Six

What’s up with the Terrible Three? After their sleepy winter break, Laurel has been spotted in the swamp north of Silica City, presumably hunting for a Primal, or perhaps on the search for the elusive 1200 pound alligator – though that only is based on the fact that her uncle was a alligator preservationist. As seen in our late winter edition, the wildman Aiden has remained buddied up with essence hearts and Primals, working on the new site found off the coast. But for all our superfans out there, I’m sorry to report that mysterious Gawain has yet to make his re-appearance. If he doesn’t appear soon, we might have to conclude that he got whatever he was looking for on his walkabout! 

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Up and Coming section in a tamer gossip magazine, early-spring edition

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“Aiden! Over here!” 

I turned, spotting Laurel and River waving at me from a small ice cream parlour, and immediately dashed over – not using the spell, we were in public, just ordinary quick movements. Both of them looked good, their essence stronger. Gauging the strength of tamers was hard, and I wasn’t as good at detecting magians as I was Primals, but both were powerful. I thought that River had to be in the high level twenties, while Laurel was likely a bit behind, having focused more on her Primals than herself. 

“So good to see you!” I said. “I didn’t think I’d see you until we got to Silica City.” 

“We took a train from Calcite to Silica, and it has a stop here,” River explained. “We realized we’d likely be here at the same time, so we just got off the train here, and thought we’d try and see if we could find you.” 

“Oh, I didn’t realize that the train made a stop here, but it makes sense,” I agreed, taking a seat in the wrought iron chair across from the pair. “How was your break? I can sense you made some good progress.” 

“Yeah, Vince came by a few times and taught me some things,” Laurel said. “We got some good training in against him, and River completed his most recent courses.” 

“Just one more year until I get my degree,” River said with an easygoing smile. “The last year of training is pretty rough, though.” 

“Well, I’m sure you can do it,” I agreed, then turned to Laurel and pulled out my augpad. I flicked to my Tamer Consortium profile, then sent her a far less censored version of it. Normally, I had my name, Primals’ types, and Primals’ names all available, but kept anything else censored. The version I sent her kept my Primals’ spells hidden, but made their gifts and levels visible. Laurel lifted her augpad and checked it over, then sent me the same thing of her own, shaking her head. 

“I don’t see how you advanced this much in your village. With nobody to fight with, and nowhere with a higher concentration of essence than your level, I figured you’d be around twenty-two, maybe twenty-three.” 

“We have our ways,” I said, winking, then glanced over the profile she’d just sent. It was as impressive as my own, which made sense if Vince really had been training her. Zaza the Serest was her strongest at level twenty-six. That put her one level beneath Scales, but that was made up for by the fact that Pop the Canistone and Ella the Procella were both level twenty-five, while Beak the Kirow was level twenty-three. The average level was a tiny bit lower, but not enough to actually matter in a fight, and her team was more well-rounded. 

“You did an absurdly good job yourself,” I said, putting my pad down. “I’m definitely going to spar with you. I think you might be surprised by a few tricks I’ve got now.”

“Same to you!” she said, and River rolled his eyes, muttering something about meatheaded tamers under his breath. 

“Hey, the brain is a meat too,” I shot back. “What did you think you’re getting when you suck a prawn head?” 

“When you what?” River asked, blinking. “That…” 

“Bah. You’re not from the sea. It’s a thing. Prawn head butter is what it’s called sometimes. And if you use the heads to make a seafood stock, you’re getting brains in it too.” 

“I find it more concerning that when he called us meatheads, your immediate response was to jump to talking about eating brains,” Laurel said. “Have you been hit with a zombification spell?” 

“Bah, zombies are just a myth,” I said, waving my hand dismissively. 

“Well, there are some reports of bones absorbing enough ambient essence to move, though it’s even rarer than an essence plant,” River said. “They also didn’t animate or move around… okay, yeah, zombies are a myth.” 

“Exactly!” I said. “And anyways…” 

We sat outside the ice cream parlour for a while, catching up on what we’d been up to during our time. I revealed how I’d trained with the essence heart, while Laurel talked about how Vince had her Primals fight four on one against his Copycat, and used the training to show her Primals ways to use their magic more effectively. River’s own training had largely involved working on some of the absurdly finicky and complex spells that were used to create local networks, connect them to other networks, and integrate them with the global net. 

The following morning, we set out on the train to Silica. The landscape around us began somewhat similar to what I was used to, lots of palms and mangroves, but as we moved further down, it grew increasingly marshy, like the outskirts of the village along the sea. From there, though, things became increasingly diverse. The trees grew thicker, and the water became more stagnant, barely going in or out with the tides. Low tree branches moved around the train, which had to cross a raised platform. It moved at a slower speed than most, to avoid damaging the environment around it too much, and I could see the sprawling heat of the swamp causing ripples in the air. In a few spots, the water rose high enough that someone would need a boat to move through it. Vines and moss were everywhere, and Pyreflies flitted among the other, more mundane creatures. 

A Pyrefly wouldn’t be a bad pick for my team, honestly. Fire element Primals, they were common and could be found just about anywhere warm and wet enough to also have the mundane fireflies. But having a common Primal wasn’t a bad thing – Beak and Bagel Thief were both common, after all. They were natural fliers, and their essence was dedicated nearly entirely to anima. The only problem was their reliance on their gift. It wasn’t as bad as something like a Darkwisp, which would become essentially powerless without its gift, but inflicting a lingering burn on those who hit it with a physical attack was one of the only things making up for its paper-thin defenses. 

I considered it, before shrugging and moving on. If I wound up with a Pyrefly, I’d wind up with a Pyrefly. If I didn’t, then I wouldn’t. The train continued to chug along slowly through the swamp, until at last, we emerged from the swamp, mostly. The waters here were still more brackish than I was used to, and the temperature was definitely hotter for early spring than it would be back home, but it was still more familiar territory, lots of seagrass. With the swamp cleared, the train began to pick up speed, blitzing across the flat landscape, until more swampy sections appeared, and slowly, Silica City came into view. 

I’d heard it called the city in the marsh, or the city on the ocean, and a dozen other things and as we pushed through, I could see why. It was a sprawling city around a river delta, where a massive, long, slow-moving river filled with seagrass and cypress trees met the ocean. Half the city was on stilts, similar to Galena Town, but it didn’t have the same circular layout. Instead, many of the stilts were actually trees, mangroves and cypresses, and some of them were so large that they had to have been enhanced with wood magic. House boats were cluttered around the ocean, linked together with a variety of spells, and there was a series of  massive pillars of stone that had been dropped to form a ring around the ocean of the city. They were inactive now, but in one of the countless hurricanes that the city experienced, they’d activate, drawing in power from the storm, converting the wind and waves’ kinetic energy, along with the electrical potential, into anima to protect the residents. 

I wasn’t sure how I felt about it, honestly. On one hand, I felt like people should live with nature, rather than trying to control it, and these definitely felt like spitting in the eye of nature. On the other hand, hurricanes would never have gotten to the level of extremeness that they did if it weren’t for the pre-arrival people’s worship of their proto-kings. On top of that, the power that was stolen from the hurricanes served to protect countless villages up the coast, including my own, and reached all the way out up to Rainforge, protecting their coastline too. Not every hurricane hit Silica City, of course, but most did, and the effect those massive pillars had was important in keeping the climate from suffering the full effects of the pre-arrival people’s damage. And that wasn’t even touching on the complex economic factors – hundreds of magians and tamers were employed with steady work to maintain the pillars.

“What’cha thinking about? Ready to see your boytoy again?” Laurel asked, nudging me with her hips. I blinked. 

“No, the economic and environmental impact of the pillars,” I said, before the fullness of her words finally hit me, and I flushed red. “He’s not my boytoy!” 

“Whatever you’ve gotta say to yourself,” Laurel said, and I groaned. But, almost without intending to, I pulled out my pad and checked to see if Gawain had said anything. To my surprise, he had. In our group, he’d said that he was waiting near the riverside markets. With it, he’d sent a temporary live location to help us track him down. My stomach flip-flopped, and as soon as the train pulled into the station, I was rushing around to grab my bike. Walking the bike through the city was inconvenient, but I pushed through with less politeness than I would normally have had. Eventually, River clapped my shoulder to draw my attention. 

“Go on ahead. It’s clear this is burning at you. I hope he’s doing alright, but this has really gotten to you. I’ll take your bike.” 

“We’ll catch up in a bit,” Laurel said, nodding along with her boyfriend’s sentiment. 

“Thanks!” I said, then leapt over to enter an essence-powered lane. This city kept the lanes uncomfortably close, separated only by a tall concrete barrier. Technically, there were stations to change in and out of the lanes, but the barrier was so short that I was able to scale it with a burst of pnumea empowering my physical motion. 

As soon as I hit the other side, I began to cast the Dash spell. With no core, no assistive enchanted tech, and only a simple Dash spell, I was one of the slowest people in the essence lanes, but I was still moving far faster than I normally would have. As soon as my anima ran dry, I scaled to the other side, then moved as quickly as I could without hitting people. I shot down a ramp that led to a floating pier, and nearly got tangled up in a knot of people who were looking at all of the artist’s stalls placed around it, and was forced to slow down again. 

I felt him before I saw him, the strange sensation of his essence washing over my senses. It was also stronger than before, and if he were a magian, I’d have said he was roughly level thirty. Maybe a few levels lower. A moment later, I spotted his tall, lean form, with sweeping, long dark hair, and lavender eyes. He was scanning the crowd, and then we locked eyes.