Ash descended over Vale Ridge in a pale, unhurried fall, veiling the distant horizon behind a curtain of drifting grey.
"Another Ashrain?" One of the miners paused with his pickaxe resting against the stone and stared upward. "Wasn't there one two days ago?"
"Yeah," another replied, wiping the sweat from his neck. "Barely Rank Two, though."
"The world is getting uglier by the day." He glanced toward the substitute, then added in a low voice, "That useless bastard wouldn't be able to save himself, much less us, if this one turns out to be Rank Four."
Lyn stopped working long enough to study the ash. What had begun as a light drizzle was already spreading across the ridge, softening the outlines of men, tools, and exposed stone until everything beyond a short distance seemed half erased. He directed his intent into his Vessel Realm and focused upon a cat-shaped fragment of green glass. As he poured Essence into it, the Shard absorbed the energy and glowed like a green gem within his Sea. His vision sharpened immediately. The haze thinned in his perception, and the softened outlines of the ridge snapped back into sharp, almost painful focus.
"Twice in one month?" he murmured.
"Hey, you!" the substitute shouted from farther along the excavation. "Stop staring and get back to work. Light-refining ore doesn't dig itself!"
Lyn felt the air suddenly change. A faint smile crossed his face as he let go of the pickaxe.
"This is..." The substitute's voice died with the last of his confidence.
A man to Lyn's left stiffened as though his breath had caught upon an invisible hook. His fingers tore at his throat while his chest strained for air that would not enter. Someone behind him attempted to call for help, but the effort produced only a dry scrape before his knees struck the stone. The coughing spread through the excavation, each voice weakening at a different pace until the ridge filled with the uneven rhythm of men suffocating where they stood.
Lyn glanced at the dying substitute as he spoke. "If only the overseer were here. What a shame he stopped coming to work and left us with this useless substitute."
The substitute turned toward him, his face twisted as every breath burned through his lungs, yet anger still burned in his eyes.
"You—" His knees suddenly gave out. He crashed to the ground before the word could leave his mouth. Soon after, the last choking cough on Vale Ridge faded, and the entire ridge fell silent.
"Unaffected again." Lyn sighed as he extended his right hand.
A translucent fissure formed before his palm, thin and irregular, like a crack spreading through an unseen sheet of glass suspended in the world. Lyn guided it beneath the falling ash, allowing the glowing flakes to slip through the fracture and enter his Vessel Realm. Beyond it stretched an inner world, with an endless Sky suspended above a Sea without visible shore. The fragments descended into that vastness one after another, carrying the red glow of the Ashrain with them. Lyn continued gathering until a subtle tremor passed through the Sea.
That is enough. Any more would risk my Sea going unstable.
He withdrew his hand, and the fissure dissolved. More than forty fragments now rested within his Vessel Realm. Their value would cover two weeks of food and bring him closer to purchasing the Shard he had wanted for months.
The Fleet Step Shard.
He thought bitterly about it. He had wanted Fleet Step so he could work faster and perhaps earn more Contribution Tokens. The Rank One speed type Shard, spoken of among the miners with reverence, required an entire month of labor. Even that estimate depended upon the Sect leaving its price unchanged, something Lyn had learned never to expect for long.
And if a Shard meant only to quicken his steps already cost so much, what hope did he have of obtaining one capable of protecting his life?
A combat Shard?
Lyn laughed to himself. Only a few months earlier, a woman living one street away had discovered a Rank One Iron Palm Shard within her dead husband's Vessel Realm. Before his death, he had taught her how to extract it so that one day it could be passed to their children. Her brother arrived soon afterward.
That night, her screams reached Lyn's house. By morning, her brother was gone and the neighbors were already outside sweeping their doorsteps.
Lyn did not bother thinking about a combat Shard any longer. With his current circumstances, something like that was far beyond his reach. And the Fleet Step Shard? He had no need for it anymore. Vale Ridge was practically gone, and with it, the reason he had wanted the Shard in the first place.
He sighed at the thought and watched the ash settle across the silent ridge. After a moment, he crouched beside the nearest body and began searching it. The miners had carried little worth stealing. Lyn recovered several Contribution Tokens from among their belongings. The sects issued small golden pieces of glass as currency throughout the territories under their control. For men like the ones lying dead across Vale Ridge, even a few pieces represented hours of labor, yet bought barely enough food to keep them working.
After reaching the final miner and making certain he had overlooked nothing, Lyn turned to the substitute's body and searched every pocket. When he found the attendance paper, he focused his intent and a translucent fissure formed beside him he then tossed the paper through the fracture. Inside his Vessel Realm, the document was swept along by the ash streaming through the air like wind. With another thought, Lyn directed the ash toward it. The paper was consumed, burning away without leaving so much as a trace. With everything taken care of, Lyn set off toward Hazelrun, which lay only a short distance from Vale Ridge. He would claim that he had overslept and failed to report for work. The sect would deduct Contribution Tokens from his wages, but that minor loss was preferable to explaining why an Ashrain had killed every miner on Vale Ridge while leaving him untouched.
As the excavation disappeared behind the ash falling over it, Lyn directed part of his awareness into his Vessel Realm. Three Heavenly Shards rested within the depths of his Sea. Light Reflect remained intact, though the amount of Essence required to sustain its defense made ordinary use wasteful. Light Cat Eyes drew steadily from his reserves as it sharpened his view of the road beyond the haze. Light Information remained silent, incapable of offering anything unless Lyn already understood enough to ask the correct question.
If I exchange the ash too soon, the elder will ask how I harvested it without Fire Truth Carvings. I will have to depend on him overlooking it or forgetting the matter.
He still lacked any explanation for his ability to collect materials without possessing the corresponding Truth Carvings. Weather phenomena presented a similar mystery.
Lyn suddenly felt his eyes begin to burn. Only then did he realize that he had forgotten to deactivate the Light Cat Eyes Shard. Although it consumed little Essence while merely maintaining its effect, keeping it active for so long had placed considerable strain on his eyes. He immediately cut off its Essence supply, and the Shard's glow faded within his Sea. Rubbing his temples, Lyn frowned at his carelessness. Even such a small loss was unnecessary. In the distance, the Ashrain still hung over Vale Ridge. It remained far from his position and moved in an entirely different direction, posing no immediate threat to his journey toward Hazelrun.
With the Ashrain posing no immediate threat, Lyn continued toward Hazelrun. Some time later, hunger tightened in his stomach as the village gate emerged faintly in the distance. He had nearly reached the gate when a faint vibration passed through the ground and entered the soles of his feet. The sensation was too deep to have come from footsteps. Lyn held his breath and turned his attention instinctively toward the sky behind him, where a golden glow had begun spreading through the clouds. The radiance spread rapidly, growing brighter until the entire sky shone with golden light. Pressure descended with it, and warm blood slid from Lyn's nose across his upper lip. He attempted to wipe it away, yet the command never reached his arm.
The force bearing down upon him intensified until pain entered the roots of his teeth. It pressed from every direction at once, holding his body beneath an invisible weight while wind roared across Hazelrun and dragged dust, straw, and loose debris into violent spirals. Lyn forced his gaze upward through the pressure. Symbols of many colors had begun emerging across the golden sky.
What is this?
He tried once more to move. His legs remained fixed beneath him as tremors passed through his ribs and joints. His will reached for his body and found nothing willing to answer. More symbols emerged, shifting before any shape could settle. Their meaning remained beyond comprehension, yet their presence flooded Lyn with dread.
Screams spread through Hazelrun.
Some attempted to flee, only for their movements to slow as though the air had thickened around them. A few managed several stumbling steps before their bodies collapsed beneath the pressure, while others froze where they stood, imprisoned before they could understand why their limbs had failed.
Several died without ever understanding what had occurred.
SCREETCH!
A thin, unbearable sound tore across the village, like a broken violin forced beyond the limits of its strings. The sound seemed to drag against the world itself, stretching each instant until time began to unravel.
Color drained from the surroundings like water leaving cloth, leaving only the symbols untouched.
RING!
At the bell's first toll, time stopped completely around Hazelrun. People froze mid-movement. Falling bodies stopped before reaching the ground, screams hung unfinished in open mouths, and dust remained suspended in the air.
Yet Lyn could still see it all unfold before him.
Only Lyn and the symbols remained outside the stopped time, though the force controlling him still held his body in place.
Something within Lyn reacted before he could form another thought. His right arm rose without permission, and a translucent fissure formed before his hand. Lyn drove his intent toward it, attempting to dissolve the fracture or interrupt the Essence sustaining it, yet the Shard Gate ignored him. Neither his fingers nor the muscles of his arm responded when he tried to pull away. Whatever had formed the Shard Gate was using his body as if it belonged to someone else.
A single golden symbol separated from the others.
Its edges sharpened. The pressure surrounding Lyn deepened until a continuous ringing filled his skull. Blood spilled from his ears as the strain clouded his sight, yet even through the blur, he saw the symbol surge forward and disappear into the fissure.
Silence consumed the world for what felt like the span of one breath.
Then a burning pain seized Lyn's chest with such violence that he believed something had pierced his heart. His awareness plunged into his Vessel Realm, where every trace of color drained away, reducing everything to dull grey. A single golden star appeared above the Sea.
Its radiance spread across the entire inner Sky, turning the heavens gold while everything beneath them remained colorless. The Sea began to boil beneath that light, its surface churning violently before the water evaporated from the Vessel Realm. Emptiness opened beneath the golden star, but it did not remain for long. Golden liquid began falling from the Sky in immense, heavy masses, each descending like a blazing meteor. The liquid gathered within the emptiness and replaced the vanished Sea. As it spread, its golden radiance sank beneath the surface, leaving behind a black expanse deeper than any night. Entire galaxies appeared across it, each stretching farther than Lyn's awareness could follow. The new Sea flowed endlessly toward the north, carrying their reflections through the darkness. Color returned to the rest of the Vessel Realm as abruptly as it had disappeared. The golden star remained suspended above the newly formed black Sea, its radiance falling across countless galaxies reflected upon the surface. Nothing within Lyn had ever resembled it.
SCREETCH!
RING!
Color rushed back into the village while the wind continued from the exact instant at which it had stopped. Dust fell, bodies completed their collapses, interrupted screams carried on without any awareness of the silence that had divided one breath from the next. Hazelrun stood in stunned confusion. Villagers staggered beneath the returning motion, while others touched the blood beneath their noses and ears without understanding when or why it had appeared. Lyn gradually regained control of his raised arm and lowered it to his side. The golden star remained suspended above the transformed Sea. As the instinctive dread receded, the blood on his face and his complete lack of answers became impossible to ignore. He wiped away as much blood as he could before suppressing the Essence within his body. His presence faded beneath that restraint until he appeared no different from a Rootless villager returning home late. In such a state, even a Rank Four Dao Chosen might overlook him.
Voices sounded in the distance as sect envoys hurried toward Hazelrun to investigate the disturbance. Lyn adjusted his clothes and entered the village without changing his pace, preserving the appearance of someone who had noticed nothing beyond the confusion surrounding him. He would claim that he had overslept. His plan required no alteration. While moving deeper into Hazelrun, Lyn directed his awareness inward once more. He avoided reaching toward the golden star and instead focused upon the Light Information Heavenly Shard in the depths of his Sea. Its glass surface remained still, suspended within the vast darkness between the countless galaxies reflected across the transformed Sea. Lyn directed his intent toward it, and the Shard began absorbing his Essence. Golden light spread across its surface, making it shine like a solitary star amid those distant celestial formations.
Light Information. Question: What entered my Vessel Realm?
The Shard offered no response.
Lyn was surprised. Even when he lacked sufficient context, black words would usually appear across its glass surface, informing him that he did not possess enough knowledge. This time, however, nothing was engraved upon it. The Shard remained completely blank.
Light Information. Question: Is it hostile?
Nothing.
Light Information. Question: What are its properties?
The silence persisted without even the faintest pulse of recognition. Tension entered Lyn's jaw as he changed the structure of the question.
Light Information. Question: Is it a Truth Carving?
The Shard stirred. Cracks spread through its surface like lightning trapped beneath ice, accompanied by a thin grinding sound that echoed painfully across the Vessel Realm.
If it were a Truth Carving...
The question pulled at the fragments of knowledge already available to him, forcing them into an arrangement the Shard could barely sustain.
...then it is different. A Truth Carving is a dwarf star, compact, dense, and contained. They gather within the Sky like families, with dwarf stars orbiting other dwarf stars.
Light Information trembled as the cracks widened.
Lyn immediately moved to sever the flow of Essence.
Before he could cut it off, a second fracture tore diagonally across the Shard. The divided sections shifted apart, held together for only a moment by the fading golden glow of the Heavenly Shard's remaining power. Then the light went out. He withdrew the Essence he had used to activate it, but the damage had already passed beyond recovery. Light Information crumbled within the surrounding darkness, releasing a small burst of force as its fractured body collapsed. The fragments were propelled outward and began drifting farther into the vast space between millions of galaxy-like reflections. They floated through the darkness as though cast into an endless night sky before vanishing.
He sighed. Light Information had always depended upon knowledge he already possessed, and the golden symbol simply lay beyond all of it. The Shard had broken without giving him anything he could use.
Lyn had only one option: to monitor the symbol and try to learn more about it. Mourning the destroyed Shard would not restore it. The memory of how much he had paid for the Shard still left his expression numb. With dried blood still on his face and a golden star suspended within his Vessel Realm, Lyn continued walking until the familiar outline of his home finally came into view.