Honor is the foundation of our culture. Honor your family, honor your ancestors, honor your masters, honor your enemies. However, do not let honor block you from doing what is right. In the name of saving lives, sometimes a little dishonor can be overlooked. -Nie Lisai of the Stone’s Triumph Sect

  The Reavers opened their jaws, their silver eyes fixed on Lin, Xinya, and I. With the power of the Void on my side, escaping the blast was simple. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a streak of violet. At Silver, Xinya was more than able to keep herself out of danger. She raced around the battlefield, circling behind the Moon Reavers faster than they could follow.

  “Already, one of your companions is hit by my master’s holy light,” Song Qiu crooned in a sing-song voice.

  I glanced at Lin, but he just shrugged. It was a glancing blow. The green veins of his adaptation glowed along his arms, with silver strands along his arms. Knowing what I did about his techniques, he probably sidestepped the ray of silver light, only to reach out and touch it so that his Wood qi could begin analyzing it. Knowing that it was intentional helped me to relax.

  Lin’s adaptation and the absorption technique he developed in his early days of Silver were robust. Though I would always worry about Lin, given just how important he was to my continued existence outside the Labyrinth, it was reassuring to see such a poignant display of his strength. He was no delicate flower, nor was he the weed he believed himself to be. He was a hardy lotus, with roots grown deep to survive any hardship thrown its way. If the defenses of Half-Moon Manor weren’t enough to down him, then this pathetic cultivator didn’t stand a chance.

  “Was that the best you can do?” I called. “Your ‘guardians’ are so pathetic that even my disciple can take them both, without even breaking a sweat.”

  “The child? You expect a child to-”

  Song Qiu was cut off by a crash of lightning slamming into the Moon Reaver on the right. The monster shrieked in anger, spinning around to find the source of the savage bolt. Xinya darted away, leaving trails of lightning in her wake.

  The Reaver hissed and scuttled away. Dazzling Moon qi flashed from its pale, stretched skin. All around, reality began to warp and twist as the Reaver’s illusions began to take hold.

  “Yoru…Yoru help me,” Chouko’s voice echoed. Before me, qi solidified into the image of my sister’s shade. She was dim, almost completely transparent, as the qi that kept her anchored to the mortal world faded.

  I knew it wasn’t real, but before I had a chance to destroy the illusion myself, Xinya beat me to it. Lightning tore into the fading shade.

  “You dare use such paltry illusions in my presence?” Xinya shouted. “My lightning will sunder every one of your lies and leave behind only the truth of your defeat!”

  In the wake of its illusion, the Reaver vanished from view, but Xinya’s eyes tracked the subtle warping of light that betrayed the creature’s presence. By the time the Reaver appeared, already ready to skewer the girl on one of its long limbs, she was ready for it. Lightning sparked from her fingertips. The Reaver had no chance to correct course before the bolt slammed into its jaw. It howled as the lightning ripped through its body it shimmered slightly and popped. The qi that made up its form dissolved into thin air.

  “Excellent work, Xinya,” I praised. “My disciple’s all grown up and slaying Moon Reavers. I couldn’t be prouder.”

  “Thank you, Uncle, but there’s still one more.” The Lightning artist’s eyes sparked with fury.

  Lightning craved the destruction of the wicked. I couldn’t think of any creature more wicked than a Moon Reaver.

  I nodded my approval. “When you’re finished, help Satoro with the rest. The old man could use a helping hand.”

  “Yes, Sir,” Xinya answered, her voice laced with malice. With a flash of violet lightning, she was gone.

  “Now,” I turned back to Song Qiu, “what was it you were saying about bringing a child to the battlefield? That girl has more potential than your entire lineage put together.”

  “Heretic!” the elder spat. “You will bow before me. When I’m through, you will beg for mercy, and I shall not grant it until you kowtow at my feet! You will respect me as your elder and superior!”

  “Then, may fortune favor you, because I certainly won’t,” I growled.

  Lin smirked, catching the irony in my words.

  Song Qiu’s qi sparked silver and gold an instant before another blast of qi cut through the earth. Lin and I easily dodged to the side. A blade of blue-silver qi erupted from the ground at Song Qiu’s feet, forcing him to twist aside. With his momentum, he hurled two disks of light, one at each of us.

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  The technique was extremely similar to my own disks of light. Lin and I batted them both aside without issue.

  Seeds infused with Lin’s wood qi arced across the field, taking root easily in the overturned earth. Everywhere our enemy walked, vines grasped at his feet, slowing him down. I drew an arrow back on my string, infused it with voidlight, then fired. He reacted quickly, snatching the arrow out of the air mere inches from his face.

  “Your arrow is slow, boy,” he said. “Do you really think something as meager as this can damage me?”

  I shrugged. “I’ll be honest, the damage isn’t so much in the arrow as it is in the light.”

  “What? This pitiful little night light?”

  My eyes narrowed. Surely, he wasn’t this stupid. Didn’t he know the first rule of combat? If a technique appeared to do nothing, then you were missing the point. No cultivator would waste qi on a meager light in the middle of combat.

  I snapped my fingers, pouring more Void qi into the technique, even from this distance. Corrosive Voidlight fell on Song Qiu’s skin, and it began to blister and burn. Yet, he looked down, as if bored.

  “Pitiful. Is this the power you claim is descended from my master?” he scoffed. “You aren’t even close to his level.”

  Yeah, thanks for the reminder, I thought viciously.

  Song Qiu jumped as Lin tapped on his shoulder. While the elder was taunting me, the Wood artist had walked through his vines with the casual ease of someone walking through the Blushing Rose Sect’s gardens. With a sickening crack, Lin’s fist slammed into Song Qiu’s nose, sending the older cultivator stumbling back. With the vines at his feet, he barely managed to keep his footing.

  “Did you forget that Yoru isn’t your only enemy?” Lin asked. “I’m hurt. Now, draw your weapon. You interrupted our feast, and I’d like to get back to the celebration before they serve dessert.”

  Song Qiu had no choice but to comply. Sparks flew as his blade clanged against Moon Rose. Lin drew back before lunging, his blade aimed squarely for the elder’s heart. The old man twisted just enough to prevent the lethal blow, but his movements were hindered by the vines crawling up his legs. Gleaming ironwood was stained red with blood as Moon Rose won the first blood of the bout.

  I lowered my bow and relaxed the bowstring. Song Qiu stood no chance. Two on one was hardly an honorable fight, but even fighting each of us individually seemed to push the Branch Leader to his limits.

  The situation was not lost on the Elder. He fought viciously to keep Lin at bay before gaining enough ground to slam his sword into the ground. A shockwave of energy coursed through the grass and uprooted stones. Reality began to warp and change.

  My feet no longer stood on the grass of the Black City, but rather a small rock in the middle of the ocean. I could feel the spray of the water against my skin. It felt almost real. Lin was on a similar rock outcropping a few yards away, but Song Qiu was nowhere to be found.

  “What just happened?” Lin called over the crashing waves.

  I glanced down at the rock, not entirely sure myself. Dipping my sandaled left foot in the water, I felt the cool touch of water against my skin. It swirled in exactly the way I expected, felt exactly the way it ought to have.

  “It’s a reality trap,” I answered. “Like inside the Labyrinth. He actually shifted reality around us to be in the ocean.”

  “So, it’s not real?”

  “No, it’s very real. He actually bridged the gap between illusion and reality.” I revised my opinion of the elder slightly. He was an irritant and as morally corrupt as they come, but I had to admit that he surpassed most Moon artists.

  Without warning, the rock beneath my feet began to shake. The sky above turned a pale yellow. I yelped as blistering sunlight burned into my skin, revealing the other aspect of Song Qiu’s core. He was combining the reality warping of the moon with the raw power of the sun, to dangerous effect against any yokai or spirit who was sensitive to sunlight, like me. There was nowhere for me to go.

  “Yoru! Jump!” Lin shouted.

  “Are you crazy?! That’s water!”

  “And I taught you the basics!”

  “In the river!” I protested. “The ocean is a very different beast, and I will definitely drown!”

  “You’ll burn to death if you stay there! Jump!”

  I couldn’t deny that, but fear tinged my heart at the idea of willingly jumping head-long into the ocean. “I swear, when I find that bastard, I’m going to make him suffer for this!” With all my courage, I threw myself into the ocean.

  The freezing water provided a nice break from the burning heat of the sun. Though my chains dragged at my limbs, I pushed forward, trying desperately to keep my head above water. A moment later, Lin was with me. He hooked an arm around mine to keep me afloat.

  “That way!” I gasped. “He’s only Gold! The trap can’t be that big! Qi cost would be too high!”

  Lin nodded and pulled me forward. Soon, I could feel the edges of the technique, just as I’d always been able to feel the edges of the Labyrinth. A blast of void qi drilled into the technique, unraveling it until it cracked and shattered entirely. Lin and I fell several feet onto solid ground.

  “How did…but my master taught me that trap!” Song Qiu screeched. “How did you break it so easily!?”

  “Someone’s giving you a bad name if they’re teaching the Shattered Moon Sect,” Lin muttered.

  I didn’t think about it. A worrisome thought was growing in the back of my mind, but I shoved it away. There was no way it was true, and I couldn’t afford to be distracted.

  Two dripping wet arrows were nocked to my bowstring and fired without a second thought. I didn’t wait to see if they hit their mark before I nocked another arrow and raised it to the sky. It twinkled and fell like a meteor, splitting into nineteen qi copies that rained down on the earth around Song Qiu.

  Lin took my sudden aggression as a sign to do the same. He pulled a seed from his soul. It glowed and pulsed as he hurled it at Song Qiu. If the elder thought he was going to weave around the arrows of Heaven’s Rain, he definitely couldn’t avoid the explosion of bark and Wood qi that erupted around him from Lin’s seed bomb.

  He screamed. When the dust settled, he was haggard. His clothes were ripped, and the advanced regeneration of a Gold struggled to keep up with the arrows and shrapnel sticking from his body.

  “Two on one isn’t very honorable.”

  “Neither is four on two, but your sect teaches its disciples to fight that way,” I countered.

  “We fight for our master,” he took a single step forward, clutching his side. “I will show you his might.” From his sleeve, Song Qiu pulled a black talisman written with silver characters. It erupted in silver flame.

  A tremor passed over the ambient qi. A black tear opened up over Song Qiu’s head. He cackled maniacally, but my heart seemed to stop beating in my chest.

  Song Qiu threw his arms wide as he beheld the tear. “Prepare yourself! For the arrival of a god!”