The conversation with Ragna about Rinvara went nowhere useful.

  We had returned to the palace after the temple visit, and I'd cornered her in the guest wing's small sitting room while Elayne went to report to the Count. I wanted some answers.

  How long had she been able to speak to gods? Was it just Rinvara, or others? Did Mara himself ever whisper in her ear? She had never bothered to tell me.

  She frowned, thinking harder than she did in most fights. “I don’t know,” she said at last. “It’s not like there was a System notice. One day I was bleeding out in a cave after a hunt went wrong and she just… showed up. Well there was a plum blossom tree inside that cave, strangely enough, maybe she lived there. Anyway, she stood over me, soothed my wounds even though I asked her not to. We argued. Then I woke up back in my hut and the wound wasn’t nearly as bad.”

  “That’s it? No visions or something?”

  “She said I had potential and that boring deaths annoyed her, so she saved me,” Ragna scratched her cheek. “We talked more later sometimes. When I was hurt or when she was bored, I guess. You know how old people are.”

  I stared at her for a few breaths. The girl had direct conversations with a being most people prostrated themselves in front of, and she summed it up as “old people get bored.”

  That was what I loved about her, I guess. She did not care about the mundane rules.

  “Do you talk to the Demon God Mara too?” I tried. “Or any of the other ones?”

  She shrugged. “Mara never. But the old wolf sometimes sends dreams at chieftains and shamans, and one time we had a fight and she got all annoyed at me. She's weird. Anyway, mother might know more, if you care that much. I never thought about it.”

  “Which one's the old wolf?”

  “Goddess of Beasts Lyrienne, titled the Pale Throne of the Predatory Moon,” she said, and shrugged. “No idea what these ‘civil’ people call her. Although I can't really imagine if someone like her can even have a civil image”

  “A scary god, then.”

  It was still hard to believe sometimes that Gods were real in this world. I guess until I get to see one such deity with my own eyes, I wouldn't truly believe.

  We talked for a bit more, and she said the reason she never told me about this was because the topic never came up. Which made sense since it was Ragna… She genuinely didn't think much about this.

  To her it was as natural and unremarkable as her own strength.

  I sighed and let it go. There was no point pushing when the other person didn’t see what they had. I’d have to dig into this from another angle later, maybe in a library instead of a barbarian’s head.

  The rest of the evening blurred into small comforts. The room House Marcellis had given us was solid and warm, with thick rugs and a real fireplace. The bed was wide enough for me and Ragna without either of us ending up on the floor. The linens smelled faintly of herbs instead of mold.

  It wasn’t anywhere near Isolde’s palace. Solstara’s royal halls had open arches that let sea air in, the constant background taste of salt, and the cry of gulls somewhere above. Maricall’s keep was smaller and heavier; stone and earth and the faint smell of grain from the storage yards beyond the walls. A place built to outlast sieges, not storms.

  Still, it was clean and no one tried to stab us on the way to bed. After the last few months, that counted for a lot.

  Ragna was asleep in her own chambers, breathing deep, one arm flung over her eyes. I returned to my room and lay awake a while longer, watching the fire die down and thinking.

  I thought about gods, droughts, and a little System box that had decided our next month for us. Eventually even those thoughts ran out of energy, and I drifted off.

  ****

  I woke before dawn.

  My barbarian body didn’t need as much rest as the one from my previous life, but my mind refused to waste quiet hours when the rest of the world was still snoring. Old habits stick.

  I yawned a little. The corridors outside were empty when I slipped out of our room, and the only sound was the soft murmur of servants in far-off kitchens.

  I wondered if I should wake Ragna, and decided against it. She'd wake up on her own.

  I made my way towards the training yard, and my hands moved to my Spatial Pouch. I pulled the mirror.

  It was cool against my palm, the silver frame etched with the Thalassarian crest. Isolde had given it to me expecting daily reports. I didn't do it daily, but Ragna did, so she was up-to-date with the events.

  I touched the surface and drew a slow line with my fingertip.

  A faint trail of light followed the touch, forming a crude shape in the glass. At the same time, I knew the same shape was appearing in the mirror on Isolde’s desk, wherever she was.

  {Morning,} I traced, the letters clumsy and uneven.

  It took a moment. Then, new lines bloomed in reply.

  {You’re up before dawn again?}

  {Look who's talking. A queen should be sleeping more. I’m up to train.}

  {I know. You’re always up before dawn.} The letters formed neatly. {Still trying to outrun your limits, or just avoiding Ragna’s snoring?}

  {I didn’t share a room with her,} I wrote back.

  {Yeah, she told me. She’s mad you didn’t. Are you the Count’s training yard? I hope it is as fine as my castle's,} The letters formed neatly, unlike my own scrawl. She knew it wasn’t. {Ragna told me you're enjoying your time there, staring at girls.}

  {She’s lying.}

  {Is she?} A pause. {Or are you just being a good barbarian and pretending to be innocent? I’m joking. How’s the city?}

  I leaned against the cool stone wall and thought about the answer.

  {Quieter than Solstara. There are two big walls surrounding it. The differences between commoners and the wealthy is ever so obvious. Ah, and a lot of grains here. Fewer gulls.}

  {You’re terrible at descriptions.} The text in the mirror shimmered slightly. {But that’s fine. How is the heiress? The one Ragna and you are supposed to be guarding?}

  I thought for a moment.

  {Sharp,} I wrote. {She seems to be… I don't know, scheming something.}

  {Is she?}

  {Can't be sure yet.}

  {Well, don’t let her scheme something you can’t get out of. You're my smart barbarian, you'll be fine.} The next line appeared quickly. {Ilyra Marcellis, right? She is clever, as far as I recall. Waybound taught her well. Hmm, if she realizes your worth, she'll try to bind you with favors and soft words. Don’t let her.}

  I almost smiled.

  {You sound jealous,} I traced.

  The next reply took longer than the others.

  {Excuse you, I’m not jealous. I am a Queen, she's a Noble. I just don’t need a foreign heir trying to recruit my favorite barbarian.}

  {Favorite? Ragna will be unhappy.}

  {She won't believe you even if you tell her.} The letters were sharper this time. {Just be careful, Thorvyn~ And don’t let her feed you too much lamb. I heard the lamb there tastes too good.}

  I glanced at the empty training yard, then back at the mirror.

  {Noted. Time to train.}

  {Already?} A pause. {Go on then. Stay safe, Thorvyn.}

  The light in the glass faded. The surface went dark. I slid the mirror back into my belt and rolled my shoulders, letting the cold air fill my lungs.

  Elayne had shown me the training yard the night before so it was easy enough to find again. Through a side hall, down a short flight of steps, out into a walled square open to the sky.

  The air was cold enough to nip at the lungs. Torches guttered low in their brackets, casting long shadows across packed earth. Wooden dummies stood in a line, their straw guts spilling from old cuts. Racks of practice weapons leaned against the walls, scarred by use.

  No one else was there which was great.

  I started slow. Stretching to loosen hard muscles that didn’t really need it given its speciality, but it appreciated the attention. I followed a light workout for the first couple minutes.

  There had been a time when I couldn’t do this. Not without panting and a dull ache settling under my ribs like a stone.

  I guess a big reason why I'd even started working out, learning different fighting techniques, was the weakness. I didn't want to submit to it, always stubborn to surpass it. Which was ironic.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  A hospital bed flickered at the edge of my memory as I recalled that. White walls, the beeping of machines, doctors talking about lung capacity and “accepting limitations.”

  A body that betrayed me every time I asked it for more. My father who kept shouting at my stupidity, although he meant well, and my mother who just shrugged and said, “Let him do what he wants. Is he dead? Since he's alive, he's stronger than what the machines say.”

  I understood my father's worry, but only because of my mother's encouragement had I managed to continue my shenanigans.

  This new body was a gift.

  Valtherian blood. Whatever my… well, Thorvyn’s mother had given me on top of it. The System’s constant little pushes whenever I leveled. All of it added up to something my old self would have sold his soul for.

  So I trained. Because not training would have been an insult to the young man who always fought to surpass his limits.

  Valtherian Physique sat at A-rank now. But since it still said I hadn't reached the true rank, that means S-rank and beyond existed on that path. That was my goal. I didn't know what it'd take to reach, though...

  I picked up the pace. Breath in, strike out, pivot, and step. I let Aura lightly touch my limbs without fully flaring it. Although I didn't really know how to improve Aura, I had a feeling it wasn't too different from training muscles. So I focused on clean movement rather than showy power.

  “You’re up earlier than most of my knights.”

  The voice came from the archway.

  I completed the combination I was in the middle of, taking a minute, and only then did I turn.

  [6th Ascension].

  Ilyra stood at the edge of the yard, hands folded behind her back. She’d traded her formal coat for a simpler tunic and baggy trousers, practical enough that I believed she’d actually meant to train, not just watch.

  “Couldn’t sleep longer,” I said. “Your yard is quieter than the inn’s back alley.”

  She walked in, boots crunching softly on the hard ground.

  “I’m glad someone is making proper use of it. When you moved, it looked as if the training yard was made for you,” she said. “Most of my knights grumble if I schedule drills before dawn.”

  “Most of your knights aren’t being hunted by some Outer God Cult,” I said. “It does wonders for your motivation.”

  “That it does. I still have a difficult time believing anything about that cult, but I have no reason to doubt you either.” Her eyes flicked over me, assessing the way I stood and breathed. I’d seen that look on drill sergeants. “You have a great body. It looks like a refined body.”

  “...Thank you,” I was a little confused at what she was getting at.

  She giggled, “Mhm. You move differently from my men. Less like a shield line, more like a Destruction Spell that expects to be the one doing the breaking.”

  I nodded. “Valtherian styles are built on the assumption that if we reach you, you are dead and your bones are now dust. But you'll notice more of that in Ragna's fighting style than mine.”

  She laughed at that. Then her expression turned more curious.

  “What is your Class, if I may ask?”

  I stared at her. “I was told in Thalassaria that it’s bad manners to ask someone's Class outright. Is Ethenia different?”

  “Ni, it's still bad manners,” she admitted easily. “I’m choosing to ignore etiquette for the moment. Consider my curiosity a character flaw.”

  “What’s yours?” I asked instead. “Since we are ignoring etiquette, the barbarian should do his part.”

  Her mouth quirked. “Turnabout. Very well. Why don't you take a guess first?”

  “I don’t know about Class, but it’s something related to Earth affinity. I know you’re a Mage, heard some gossip. So… Earth Mage?” I said. I think her entire House is like that. Their walls are too good and the farmers are too loyal; the growing crops also speak for themselves. Her bloodline is likely full of people who command earth and stone.

  She hummed. “You think so? Good guess.” She didn't sound impressed. “Well you’re not entirely wrong. Earth is in the blood. But my Class isn’t purely that. It… branches.”

  “Sounds interesting.”

  She walked over to the weapon rack and took down a wooden staff, testing its weight with a few easy swings.

  “Why don’t we do this properly, then?” she said. “A light spar. Nothing serious. You can try to push me, and I can see how a Valtherian fights up close. If you do well enough, I’ll show you.”

  “Does your father know you pick fights before breakfast?” I asked, cracking my knuckles

  “He told me to learn everything I can from you guys,” she said. “So I’m just being dutiful.”

  Hard to argue with that.

  "Fine," I said. "Light spar."

  I didn’t bother with a practice weapon. My fists should be enough. Ilyra took her place opposite me, staff held loose but ready. She looked relaxed, but the set of her feet said she’d done this a thousand times. Probably against knights who flinched when she frowned and fellow Mages who were nervous.

  I moved first.

  There was no need for meaningless circling and posturing. Just three steps and a right hook aimed at the air where her ribs would be. I pulled it gently since this was practice, but she didn’t know how much I was holding back.

  Her eyes widened. It wasn’t fear but recognition. She’d misjudged the speed of a man she’d called a weapon.

  My punch was supposed to slam her ribcage tight, but something shot out of the dirt.

  Not stone or packed earth. It was living wood, pale and rough, erupting from nothing to form a wall between us in the heartbeat it took my fist to travel. My knuckles slammed and cracked against it like a thunderclap. The impact jolted up my arm hard enough to sting. The wall held, cracked but standing solid.

  I pulled back, shaking out my hand. I hadn’t used full strength, but she couldn’t have reinforced it properly either. Impressive. Annoyingly so.

  "Hey, now," Ilyra said from behind her barrier. Her voice was steady, but her knuckles on the staff had gone white. "When I say ‘light,’ I don’t mean punch through my chest on the first move. How barbaric of you."

  "Thank you. You stopped it too. Good sign."

  The wood sank back into the ground, leaving only packed earth. Ilyra stood there as if nothing had happened, though her eyes gleamed now with something sharper. Irritation, maybe, that her secret that she had me bargain for had been seen through so easily.

  "So we've got ourselves a tree girl," I said. "This is going to be a fun spar."

  She looked shocked and bothered that I’d forced her cards so fast. But she quickly hid her emotions behind a smile, "Tree girl?" she repeated the words as if I'd insulted her mother, even while smiling. "That’s what you’re going with?"

  "You grow wood out of the floor," I explained. "It fits. If you want something more noble-like… how about Lady Ilyra of the Tree? I don’t know, words aren’t my selling point."

  Her lips twitched at the stupid words of a barbarian. Not with a smile. But in the simple type of twitch that a pampered princess might think when deciding whether to laugh or have someone executed.

  "If someone else called me that in front of the court, I’d have had them thrown out of the city, but I understand your culture," she said. "Let’s continue, I haven’t told you my Class name yet, you’ve simply seen just what type it is."

  She moved her hand. Vines pushed up from the ground around my boots, slow at first, then faster. Testing if I’d panic.

  I didn’t. I just looked at the green coils, then back at her. "That’s the best you’ve got?"

  Her jaw tightened. She’d wanted to make me work for her Class’s name, and although I didn’t learn that yet, what more was needed than “Wood Mage”? I’d learned enough and given her a nickname she couldn’t shake.

  That, I figured, was the real spar. And I’d just landed the first clean hit.

  I jumped back when the vines chased me, more green lines breaking the earth in a widening circle. She didn't bother to play defensively, trusting the gap in our levels.

  I cut through one with a quick stomp and closed the distance again. Her staff came in low toward my knee, shining with Mana. Just because she was some wood-type mage didn't mean she couldn't resort to using pure mana to blow my flesh off.

  So I dropped my leg out of the way and swept a hand toward her ribs. She rode a root to the side, letting it drag her a step with no effort, then snapping the staff up toward my shoulder.

  The blow landed across my forearm. It hurt. Reinforced wood, grown denser by whatever Class she carried.

  “You aren’t doing very well, no offence. You do have some good qualities though. You’re not just swinging, you're trying to think. Good battle IQ.”

  “Force without aim wastes energy,” I said, sidestepping another reaching vine and answering with a jab she barely avoided. “And mages who keep all their tricks at long range end up dead when someone reaches them.”

  “Mmm.” She planted the end of her staff, used it as a pivot to change direction, then sent a cluster of roots up at my back. “You’re not like the imperial brutes they like to parade at festivals. That’s good.”

  “You comparing me to festival brutes now?”

  “Come on, it's a compliment.”

  We traded like that for a while. Her roots and vines tried to take my balance, my breath, my ability to move. I answered with speed, short bursts that carried me past her guard, and forcing her to grow defenses quicker and closer each time.

  I nearly clipped her chin once. She nearly knocked me onto my back with a hidden root under my heel.

  In the end, the plants won.

  A thick vine snapped tight around my right ankle just as another coiled around my left forearm.

  In the half-second it took me to adjust, two more wrapped my other wrist and knee. Then they tightened together, pinning my limbs in place.

  I tried to move and found there wasn’t room. My muscles pushed, but there was nowhere for them to go. Every attempt to flex just made the vines bite deeper.

  Muscles meant strength, but if I couldn't even move those muscles, it didn't help much. Her vines were insanely durable.

  If this was a real fight, I could have just burned them. Aura and fire would have turned the bindings to smoke. A bit of lightning would have done something similar.

  The Mantle would have shredded the lot.

  But this was a simple spar. She had asked for “light,” and I’d already treated that loosely enough. No point turning her yard into a bonfire.

  “I yield,” I said. “Another minute and I’d have to burn them.”

  She looked really satisfied hearing my surrender, but quickly schooled her expression. What a spoiled brat. The vines slackened and slid back into the earth. Ilyra let her staff rest across her shoulders, both hands hooked over it, looking pleased.

  “Yeah, for sure you could have done that. Sage of Verdant Lands.”

  “Hmm?”

  “That’s my Class name. So don't be so down, you gave me a good workout,” she didn't seem to believe my words. “Not many people force me to use more than a few branches, you know? You're pretty good for a 5th Ascension. Your turn.”

  I rolled my shoulders, working out the dull ache where the vines had held.

  “You have a strange fighting style,” I said. “Most mages need time to chant or gesture. Your roots just… listen to you. Must be nice, Mother Nature’s favourite. My Class is Draconis Stormborn. I can use lightning and stuff. So I wasn’t joking, I can burn your trees.”

  She didn’t answer at first, and I saw calculations happen behind her eyes. She walked back to the weapon rack, set the staff in its place, and turned. The movement was precise, economical. Like she’d just closed a ledger.

  “Your Class sounds impressive. Huh. I thought it’d be some strength type…” she said finally. “As for my roots listening to me, my father believes a lord’s magic should serve a lord’s duty. Not the other way around. So I trained until the land understood my orders.”

  She moved her hand in a small gesture. Vines pushed up from the ground around my boots, then sank back down. What an annoying show off.

  “Do you have time this morning?” she asked. “After you clean up, we could go out for breakfast.”

  I just looked at her.

  “Just the two of us,” she added, a little too quickly. “There’s a place in the inner city. Decent bread, strong tea. I think you’d like the food. And I’d like a conversation.”

  Her tone was light, but her posture was a straight line. This wasn’t a request. It was the first move in a different game. Yes, of course, she hadn’t just come here to spar.

  “Breakfast is hard to say no to,” I said. “I’ll need a wash.”

  Her eyes flicked down my sweat-slicked chest, then back up. A single, assessing glance. “I’ll meet you at the east gate in an hour.” She gave a small nod and left, light on her feet.

  I stood in the empty yard, flexing my hands where the vines had held me. For a moment, I wondered. Then I turned toward my room.

  You can visit the Patreon if you want to read the next chapters right away, the next 10 chapters! Don’t forget to check out our Discord too, where you can hang out with us, ask questions about the story, among other things.

  Patreon |