Shade's First Rule

by A F Kay

  So he pictured himself as an empty flask, void of anything, and then pulled his point of darkness down into this empty flask. The familiar calmness wrapped him like a blanket, and then his point exploded, and light filled his mind.

  “I’m blind!” Sift screamed.

  And just at the edge of his hearing, he heard Blapy’s laughter and then her voice. “And so the avalanche begins.”

  Chapter 27

  “I can’t see,” Sift said again.

  “It will be okay, Sift,” Padda said. “Ruwen has Cultivated all the light in the room. Your vision will return when the light does.”

  Ruwen heard this through the roaring sound of energy traveling into his body. It scared him, and he pulled away from the blazing white ball that surrounded him.

  Madda’s grip tightened. “Don’t stop, Ruwen.”

  His heartbeat increased, and his breathing became more rapid.

  “Release your fear,” Padda said.

  Ruwen didn’t know how to do that. He pictured the fear outside himself, and to his surprise, the sphere immediately consumed it. His heartbeat slowed, and his breathing became more even.

  “Good,” Madda said. “Relax.”

  “It is getting cold,” Sift said.

  Padda spoke in a different language. “He is dipping into the lower energies.”

  “Should I move him somewhere safer?” Blapy asked.

  “Yes, please,” Madda said immediately. “Ruwen, stay in your center until the energy stops rushing toward you. Feed your fear or anything you don’t want to keep, into the flow.”

  Why did they need to move him somewhere safer? Was he in danger? Did Cultivating make him vulnerable to some form of attack? The warmth of Madda’s hands around his wrists disappeared. Was he alone now? He didn’t think he could stay centered if he opened his eyes or talked. In fact, all his thinking made him feel unbalanced like he might start spinning. He focused on the rush of energy as it flowed into his growing ball of light and kept his mind clear.

  Eventually, the flow of energy slowed to a trickle. A gigantic ball of energy now surrounded Ruwen’s center. He felt like the pit of some enormous fruit. Wondering where he was, he opened his eyes.

  Jumping to his feet, he turned in a circle. He stood on a footbridge at the edge of a vast ruined city. In the distance, at the city’s center, a large pyramid stood like a needle piercing the sky. Outside the city, fog roiled and turned violently as if tornados were locked in battle. Fires burned around him, and all the vegetation had died. Looking down, he noticed his body steaming.

  “What happened?” he whispered.

  “Six hours of you,” Blapy replied.

  Ruwen jumped and turned to find Blapy sitting on the edge of the footbridge, her feet dangling over the edge.

  “Me? What did I do?” Ruwen asked.

  “What happens when you remove heat from the air?”

  “It gets colder, water condenses…”

  Blapy pointed toward the fog.

  Ruwen laughed nervously. “Are you saying I did that?”

  “Well, it was sunny when I put you out here.”

  Ruwen checked the time. It had been over six hours. His last clear memory was sitting with the Addas and Sift.

  “Did I hurt anyone?” Ruwen asked.

  “The sudden movement of energy caused some fires, and you killed all the vegetation, but this destruction happened long ago. Everyone in the Pyramid is safe.”

  Ruwen sat down. “I don’t understand what happened.”

  “Me either. Your meridians should be blazing like suns and sitting here next to you, I can’t even tell you’re a Cultivator. How is she hiding that?”

  Blapy pushed herself off the bridge and Ruwen lurched to try and grab her before she fell, almost falling off himself. Blapy stood in the air and pushed him back onto the ledge.

  “You’re the most incompetent Champion I have ever met, but your heart is pure terium. Your heart…”

  Blapy tapped her teeth with a finger and then paced back and forth in front of him thirty feet off the ground. She suddenly stopped and faced Ruwen, her mouth open.

  “Pull your shirt up,” Blapy said.

  “That is a really weird –”

  “Do it now, or I’ll surround you with centipedes. Starting in your pants.”

  Ruwen jerked his shirt up. Blapy looked at his chest, smiled, and held out her hand. A square piece of paper formed on it and she pressed it to his chest before he could react.

  “What do your notifications say?” Blapy asked.

  Ruwen opened his notifications only to find he had a stack of them. What had caused all these notifications? Terrified Blapy would stick a centipede on him, he closed the notifications and opened his log instead. He read the most recent entries.

  Tring!

  The Black Pyramid has rewarded you…

  Name: Fleeting Tattoo of Grotesqueness

  Quantity: 1

  Location: Torso

  Quality: Rare

  Durability: 1 of 1

  Weight: 0.01 lbs.

  Effect: Charisma -10.

  Description: Place on your torso to activate effect. Effect valid until tattoo has faded. Please put a bag over your head.

  The next notification confused him.

  Only one torso tattoo may be active. Remove current tattoo and try again.

  “It says only one tattoo can be active at a time,” Ruwen said.

  Blapy clapped her hands and ran around in a circle. Ruwen’s body still steamed, and the tattoo had stuck to his chest. The thought of that tattoo activating made his stomach turn and he peeled it off. Blapy was jumping up and down talking to herself, so he stuck it in his Void Band.

  Ruwen looked down at his chest. The only thing remotely odd on his torso was his birthmark. He triggered Magnify and studied it. The red lines came into focus, and Ruwen gasped. The birthmark was actually thousands of fine lines that formed multiple complex patterns. Looking at them gave him a headache, so he deactivated Magnify and rubbed his eyes.

  That was definitely not a birthmark. Ruwen looked up to find Blapy right in front of him.

  “She’s a genius. And it doesn’t break any of their rules.” Blapy clenched her hands and squeezed her eyes shut. “The brilliance and craftsmanship of it defy comprehension.”

  “What is it?” Ruwen asked.

  “At first, I thought it was just a concealment tattoo. Complicated to begin with, and never successfully used to hide a Cultivator. That would be fantastic enough. But it also hides your soul bond with Uru from your center. It’s like a wall separating your center from your bond while masking your meridians from the outside world. It’s why you can Cultivate even though you’ve Ascended and no one can see your Spirit.”

  “That’s what my birthmark is?”

  “An external and internal tattoo. It never even occurred to me to try internal.”

  “That sounds complicated.”

  “Impossible even for a god had I not seen it for myself.”

  Blapy grabbed his cheeks. Her black eyes were filled with small bright lights like he was looking at the night sky. She smelled like peppermint.

  “Tell no one, absolutely no one, what that mark does. Uru’s last three Champions disappeared. Almost three hundred years without a Champion made me wonder if she had faltered. The other gods think her weak. But this reaffirms everything I know about her. She is a true Navigator. Think about this. For you to bear that mark means you were chosen before you were born. Her ability to see the path is terrifying.”

  Ruwen swallowed hard. “No pressure or anything.”

  “THIS IS SO EXCITING!” Blapy shouted.

  “Wait, the Addas said I’d kill myself if I meditated. What if I’d read a book on meditation a year ago and tried it? All this planning would have been for nothing.”

  “No, she wouldn’t take a risk that large. If it were me, I would have blocked your ability to meditate or Cultivate, and then removed that blockage during Asce
ndancy when you reformed. Then I’d get you to a safe place to learn as quickly as possible.”

  Ruwen rubbed his birthmark. “Actually, it did look smaller after I Ascended. I actually wondered if Uru fixed people’s blemishes sometimes. And I was here less than twelve hours after I Ascended.”

  “That is scary. I wonder how far back this planning goes. There has never been anyone like you. Did she give you some way to quantify your power?”

  Ruwen glanced at the corners of his interface and immediately noticed a change.

  “I have a new bar called Spirit,” Ruwen said.

  Ruwen opened his Profile.

  “I have a Cultivation level now, too. I’m level 19, and my Spirit points are –” Ruwen choked, and he forced himself to finish. “Three hundred and fifty-two thousand one hundred sixty-four.”

  “Interesting. Let me see if I can reverse that calculation. You were Cultivating for about six hours in the visible and thermal ranges. You affected everything in front of you for about a mile. That means the most likely solution is…you’re gaining around 0.001 Spirit per foot Cultivated for light, and .002 Spirit per foot Cultivated for the red energy.”

  “That is some impressive math,” Ruwen said. “Is that a lot of Spirit?”

  Blapy shrugged. “I’ve seen higher.”

  Ruwen’s shoulders slumped. He checked his other tabs, but his Abilities, Spells, and Skills, hadn’t changed. Whatever his Spirit did, it didn’t look like there was an easy way to spend it, and it sounded from Blapy like it wasn’t that much anyway.

  “Now what?” Ruwen asked.

  “We need to make sure it’s safe to take you back. Cultivate again and let’s see what happens.”

  Ruwen closed his eyes and evened out his breathing. This time he didn’t have to descend into his center, the white ball of energy already surrounded him. He imagined himself as the vacuum flask, and like before, he felt the energy flow to him. But this time, his center resisted the new energy. He concentrated on pushing the walls of his sphere outward to make more room, but after a great effort, he hadn’t absorbed any of the energy around him. Cultivating now would be safe because he’d reached his capacity for his current level. He could now meditate while in his center without harming himself or those around him.

  “Good,” Blapy said.

  Ruwen opened his eyes and stared at the maelstrom he’d created. He wouldn’t put himself in a coma now. Instead, he had a terrifying ball of energy that he didn’t understand, sitting like a bomb inside his body. None of that seemed good.

  He focused on Blapy. “What do I tell the Addas?”

  “That‘s complicated. Obviously, you can’t mention the birthmark. They know you Cultivated, but they won’t be able to sense it. This will confuse and worry them. They can’t help you further anyway. Tell them a partial truth. That whatever happened seemed to have filled you up and that you can’t Cultivate any more energy. That will allow them to sleep.”

  Ruwen remembered Uru asking him if he could swim in a sea of lies if it brought him to the shore of truth. It was easier to agree to that when you didn’t have to lie to the people who just helped you. Plus, he had no idea what this new ability did for him. It seemed useless right now.

  Ruwen took a deep breath and let it out. “I hate secrets, and they just keep piling up.”

  “Tell me about it,” Blapy said, pointing at the Pyramid. “Look at what I had to build to hold mine.”

  Then she disappeared, and a portal opened on the footbridge.

  Ruwen walked to the portal and wondered how many other things weren’t what they appeared to be.

  Chapter 28

  The explanation to Padda and Madda was difficult, and Ruwen could tell they knew he was hiding details. But they congratulated him on his success and let him go without an interrogation.

  Sift bounced with excitement as they left the rock garden, and he wanted every detail Ruwen could remember. Ruwen knew Sift was desperate to fix his own Cultivation issues, and Ruwen wanted to help his friend. But Ruwen didn’t understand what had happened and didn’t have anything to help Sift.

  Ten minutes later Sift was still asking questions. They’d been climbing stairs the entire time, and Ruwen’s curiosity forced him to interrupt Sift.

  “Where are we going?” Ruwen asked.

  “Since you wasted our whole afternoon, I’m doing what Ky told me to do.”

  Dread filled Ruwen. “What was that?”

  “She wanted me to show you what the Blood Moss did.”

  Ruwen relaxed. He’d forgotten he’d taken that. That felt like weeks ago, but it really had been less than twenty-four hours here.

  “This is probably high enough,” Sift said.

  Instead of continuing up the stairs, they took a hallway, and in less than a minute, they exited on to a walkway that wrapped around the Pyramid. A three-foot stone wall served as the only protection from falling to your death. Sift walked to the edge and leaned out. Ruwen shuffled to the wall and peeked over. The ruined city looked tiny from this height, and his stomach turned. He immediately stepped back.

  “What’s wrong?” Sift asked.

  “I hate heights.”

  “I wish I could fly.”

  “Can’t you? When you jumped to fight that Blind Nightmare, it looked like you were flying. It certainly wasn’t natural.”

  “I know. Mom yells at me for the wasted Spirit. But I just can’t help it. As soon as I’ve absorbed enough Energy, I use it to glide around for as long as I can.”

  “You used Spirit to do that?”

  “It’s a gigantic waste. I know I should be using it for internal things, and I do. But if I had my parent’s power, I would jump off this ledge right now and fly.”

  “That fire roasted your brain. There is never a good reason to jump off a perfectly good balcony.”

  Sift looked wistfully out at the city for a few seconds and then focused back on Ruwen. “Anyway, let’s talk about the Blood Moss. Blapy is pretty valuable because her loot goes all the way up to Legendary. Nobody knows how deep or far she goes. For all we know it might be this entire planet. She has levels that even challenge the gods. A city formed around her to trade with and prey on the people raiding the Pyramid. This created a lot of wealth. So, of course, someone else wanted it, and there was a gigantic war. As the city was about to fall, someone had the bright idea to launch their secret weapon into the invading army.”

  “The Blood Moss.”

  “Yep. It ate the entire advancing army. Then it ate all the survivors in the city.”

  “Blapy didn’t stop it?”

  “Not right away. I don’t know if she was sick of all the people around her or if she just wanted to teach everyone a lesson, or who knows why?”

  “That moss killed everyone?”

  “Not just people. Over a million people, animals, insects, plants, everything.”

  “What stopped it?”

  “Blapy pulled some sort of flammable gas from deep in the earth and then ignited it. This Pyramid is the center of a ten-mile circle of charred earth. If the Blood Moss missed anything, Blapy’s fire didn’t.”

  Ruwen really regretted taking the Blood Moss now. When he was on his way out, he would put it back. There was no way he wanted to carry such a destructive thing around.

  “It’s a plant, though. Doesn’t it grow like an inch a week?” Ruwen asked.

  Sift shook his head. “You have Blapy’s mark, so you’re protected. If you’d stepped into that room without it, it would have covered you like a living blanket before you’d taken two breaths. You can’t outrun it.”

  They walked around the Pyramid. The sun was a fist from the horizon, and the heat of the day had dissipated. This high up a gentle breeze cooled the air, and Ruwen relaxed a little.

  “Whoa, look at that,” Sift said.

  They had arrived on the east side of the Pyramid and columns of black clouds twisted at the distant city wall. Rain streaked the sky, and the ground looked white
.

  “I’ve never seen it hail here,” Sift said. “I wonder what caused such a gigantic storm.”

  Ruwen had been a little vague on what had happened after Blapy took him. He’d told Sift Blapy took him out into the city, but not about anything else. In fact, he still had a hard time believing he’d caused that storm.

  “They probably happen a lot. You’re just inside,” Ruwen said.

  “No, I come up here almost every night. It looks like Blapy is blocking the storm from passing into the city.”

  They felt a faint vibration as giant hailstones crashed into the ground just outside the city. Each one looked to be the size of a house.

  “Wow, how long do you think those had to stay in the air to get that big?” Sift asked.

  It had been twenty minutes since Blapy had opened the portal that brought him back. Lightning arced and thunder rumbled as the rain turned into a torrent.

  “We should go,” Ruwen said.

  Sift reluctantly moved away from the edge of the walkway. “Okay. Are you hungry?”

  Ruwen realized he wasn’t hungry or tired. In fact, he felt fantastic. Was this some byproduct of the Cultivation?

  “Not really,” Ruwen said. “I kind of just want to go back to the room and work through everything that’s happened today.”

  “Sounds good. I’m going to get something to eat. I’ll see you later.”

  Sift held out his fist, and Ruwen stared at it.

  “You put your hand on it, palm down. It’s a Clan shortcut, so we don’t always have to bow to each other,” Sift said.

  “What happens if we both put our fist out?” Ruwen asked.

  “Look at the over-thinker at work. If that happens, the lower-ranked member changes to the palm. If they don’t, that means they want to challenge you and try to advance in rank.”

  “Okay, so I’m basically always palm.”