Running in the halls is forbidden. Speaking out of turn is forbidden. Respect one’s elders, in age and cultivation. Speak succinctly and without embellishment. Gossip is forbidden. Boasting is forbidden. Do not consort with evil. Give aid when it is asked. Do not partake of liquor. Eat only rice and vegetables. Cycle qi once every hour. Rise with the sun. Sleep with the night.

  -A passage from the Blue Stone Sect’s 4132 rules of righteous cultivation.

  My vision cleared quickly, as I settled into the first version of the reality which I so vehemently opposed. Every detail burned into my mind as I stood in the throne room, a coy smile creeping onto my face behind my fan. Threads of Voidlight lay poised like a web of silk spun around my enemies. They didn’t know half the danger they were in. Even if I was only Gold to Xue Bashi’s Quartz, I was still confident that I was a threat.

  Xue Bashi was on his feet. Crimson qi swirled around him as he latched onto a nearby disciple of his sect. Without even touching the younger cultivator, he yanked him across the room to kneel before him.

  “What’s going on?” he hissed.

  “D-d-don’t know, Sect Leader! This one has b-been here with the masters and venerable sect leader the whole t-time!”

  “If you are so incompetent, then your only use is as a component.”

  The disciple only got half a word out before Xue Bashi closed his hand. Bloody qi snapped around the disciple’s neck, and I heard the crunch of bone as his neck was broken. Qi filled the body until it could stand once more, but when the disciple turned, none of the light of life shone in his eyes.

  At least his death was quick, I thought. That had to count for something.

  The rest of the masters were rising to their feet as their Sect Leader stepped down from his dais, the dead disciple following just behind. His eyes had darkened to a nearly black hue, and his fury echoed into a chaotic song of rage within my Echo Chamber, to the point where I was forced to suppress the technique, lest I be overwhelmed by his pure hatred.

  “What little plot is running around that little head of yours, Darkened Moon,” he growled. “Do you really think you’ll get out of here alive?”

  “Oh, I’m quite confident in that.” I snapped my fan shut before spinning and hurling it at Xue Bashi. Reality warped around it, fashioning it into a blade of pure light. “In fact, I’m even confident that the Heart will be mine by the end of the day. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

  There’s a secret to every Ascendant that none at the rank will ever admit. Power is only half the equation. The strength to rip a mountain in half or shatter reality itself can help, but no Ascendant reaches that point in their cultivation without honing the people skills to back it up. The performance is half the battle.

  It worked, too. Rather than risking being hit by a technique he knew little about, Xue Bashi shifted his weight to the left, letting the moonlight dart streak past him rather than touching him. He narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing me.

  “Where do you get this confidence from. You’re only Gold! I could crush you in an instant.”

  “Am I only Gold?” I asked. “I was a king among Ascendants once. Do you really think I am so easily defined by your pitiful rankings?”

  The Sect Leader’s qi surged between him and the corpse of the disciple he’d felled. Lacerations blossomed red across the fresh skin, and blood erupted from the body to form a long thin tendril that Xue Bashi gripped like a whip. Once the weapon was formed, the corpse dropped to the ground, completely spent.

  “Then let’s see if you’re all talk and no bite!” he snarled.

  The whip was already in motion, but so was I, thanks to Flash Forward’s warning. However, even with the aid of my technique, the weapon moved with a speed far greater than my own. I was barely out of the way when the barbed tip cracked against the stones where I was standing only half a breath before.

  Voidlight wrapped around my arms, surging downward into my hands to form the shape of a bow. I pulled back on the bowstring as a silver arrow formed from the moonlight. Xue Bashi was already ready by the time the arrow launched forward, and knocked it out of the air with a crack of his whip.

  “Not going to use your sword?” he mocked. “Or are you afraid that we’ll see that the blade is a fake?”

  “You haven’t proven a worthy challenge for it.”

  The whip shot forward like a viper, striking straight for my face. It was all I could do to bend backward to keep the wicked end from slicing through an eye. Pain flared on my forehead, but I ignored it as I twisted around, forming and throwing a disk of voidlight in the same breath as two blades of light erupted from the ground around him.

  A keening cry of fury filled the air as Chiho leapt from my ponytail. Blood dripped down my cheek from the cut that arced up into my hairline, and several long strands of hair drifted to the ground, only to be swept away a moment later by the wind that filled the room.

  Chiho’s wrath was rarely invoked, but when it was, the distraction was useful. I used the opportunity to back away from Xue Bashi to rejoin the Fate’s Eclipse Disciples.

  However, only four of the original six still stood. Hei Shenshou cast gleaming silver flames at one of his comrades whose eyes had turned a dark and terrible red. Another lay on the ground, her body being feasted on by a monstrosity made entirely out of congealed blood.

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  “Highness!” Shenshou called as he spotted my return to the group. “Highness, we have to flee!”

  I sighed. Originally, I’d intended to herd the disciples away while the Blood Stalking Demon Sect was distracted by Chiho’s fury. Yet…

  Of the masters in the room, only a few had joined the fight. The rest laughed as Shenshou shoved back his former comrade. One was even eyeing the one fallen disciple, and I was worried she’d soon join the depraved feast as one of the entrees.

  Cold fury filled my heart, freezing my blood. This was unacceptable. Glancing back at Xue Bashi, I began counting back the seconds. Qi surged around my hands, forming the symbols for Flash Back.

  “You’ll never make it out alive!” Xue Bashi screamed. “I will feast upon your bones! Your fate is sealed!”

  I grinned. “Fate? I don’t think you understand, Sect Leader. Fate is mine to dictate.”

  Silver and blue fractures spread across reality, and everything vanished.

  Xue Bashi yanked his disciple across the room, but I didn’t bother waiting for his death. Fighting Xue Bashi was a waste of time, not if I wanted to keep the six yokai in my care alive.

  I snapped my fan shut, this time spinning on my heels and directing my reality-altering qi into the stones at my feet. Sparkling voidlight surged across the tiles, warping and replacing reality as they went. Where blood and filth once covered the hall, pristine white stones took their place. Even the tables were purged of the fetid feast that the masters so enjoyed.

  “Your highness!” Hei Shenshou called as I stumbled, my vision blurring for just a moment. He caught my arm, but I quickly shrugged it off to stand on my own.

  It had been a while since I’d altered reality on that scale. The qi requirement for the technique was commensurate to the size of the area and the likelihood of the reality I wanted to create. The odds were good these tiles hadn’t seen a good cleaning in days or weeks, if ever, making the likelihood that they were cleaned just before we arrived extremely slim. However, that was the only reality that would provide the space we needed to flee.

  The Blood Stalking Demon Sect masters squawked and protested at the sudden cleanliness of the area, but I just flashed them a smile. “Nice try. Good luck summoning blood abominations without a source.”

  No doubt they had options. These masters were each powerful in their own right, having partaken in the sect’s depraved cultivation for so long. However, this fight was less about winning and more about escaping. The more I could delay them, the better.

  Xue Bashi screamed in outrage. The poor disciple he’d killed in the first iteration struggled right up until the moment the sect leader plunged his hand into the boy’s chest and pulled out his still-beating heart. Crimson qi swirled as he hurled the organ at us. It exploded with far more blood than the organ should have had within it.

  “Your Highness! Behind me!” Hei Shenshou darted forward before I could stop him. Silver flames erupted before him, and suddenly, I was looking at a copy of Hei and myself being covered in blood from the Sect Leader’s attack. Though the illusions were exactly where we’d previously been standing, we were several feet back, with a shimmering veil of Moon qi obscuring the two of us from view.

  “Good work, Shenshou,” I praised softly. “Now, everyone run. Before they see through the illusion!”

  The disciples of Fate’s Eclipse needed no encouragement. They turned and fled, taking the stairs two and three at a time. I followed, stopping at the threshold of the hall just as Xue Bashi ripped through the illusion with a clean strike from his whip.

  As the illusion fell, the shimmering veil over the real version of me vanished. A wisp of Lin’s emotions reached me through our connection, despite my closed off techniques. I couldn’t quite make out what it was, but it reminded me of something he’d given me. I reached into my sleeve, pulling out a pouch and a piece of paper.

  “I think it’s best if you stay here, Sect Leader. I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other soon.”

  With one hand, I hurled the pouch at the ceiling over Xue Bashi’s head. With the other, I threw the talisman at his feet. The pouch slammed into the ceiling, bursting into a shower of glittering green seeds. As soon as they fell, the talisman took effect. Lin’s qi burst out of the page, feeding the seeds as they grew into a thorny tangle around the sect leader.

  It won’t hold him long, I noted. A few extra moments if we’re lucky. But we’ll have to make full use of it.

  Eclipse leapt from its sheath and darted for the stairs. I followed, leaping off the stairs and landing on the blade as it dove after the fleeing Fate’s Eclipse disciples.

  I was suddenly quite grateful for my foresight in cleaning the stairs. The masters of the Blood Stalking Demon Sect were quick on my tail, but my disciples were already halfway down the stairway.

  “Where are the guards?! Where are our disciples?!” cried one of the masters as he glanced around at the unusually vacant promenade.

  Another master pointed to the left, where a plume of smoke was rising from another part of the estate. There was no doubt in my mind as to the source of that damage. Between Xinya’s bolts and the Chikara fire techniques, I was more surprised that more of the Domain wasn’t already aflame.

  “GET THEM!” screamed Xue Bashi, who was still inside the receiving hall.

  The masters scrambled to follow the command. They lunged down the stairs like a drove of pigs jumping at their next meal. One more flash back vision and a tally on my arm warned me just how quickly they would catch up with my charges.

  I flew low, firing voidlight arrows into their midst to delay them, but even that wasn’t enough. They were delayed, yes, but Xue Bashi would soon break from the trap and follow.

  I flashed back again, three more times, until I was back at the top of the stairs with the masters shortly behind. There, I turned, ready to face them directly if I had to in order to give Fate’s Eclipse the chance to escape.

  Threads of voidlight still twisted around their limbs as they glared at me.

  “What are you going to do, fake Ascendant?” huffed one of them. “You were doomed the moment you stepped foot in our domain!”

  Frustration overwhelmed me. Black blood already dripped from the tallies on my wrist. At Gold, the risk of experiencing acute backlash from all the shattered realities was slim. My body could take much and more of the pain reflected back at me from the broken edges of lost worlds. That didn’t make it any more fun or entertaining to watch the bloody pigs before me gleefully cut down Hei Shenshou and the others.

  “You dare to challenge the Demon of Misfortune?” I growled. Black smoke and blue-silver threads curled around me as my qi reacted to my frustration. “Your pitiful claims that my fate was sealed mean nothing to me. It is not Fate’s whims you should be worried about. It’s mine.”

  The voidlight fan was still in my hand in this iteration. In a frustrated display of unbridled qi, I slammed the object into the ground, letting my qi surge uncontrolled through it.

  In truth, I didn’t expect anything to come of it. In fact, I was halfway through the starting motions of Flash Back before I even realized what had happened.

  With my rage and anger, the voidlight threads twisting around the masters tightened and flared brightly. For the first time, the threads of misfortune seemed to react to my wishes…

  Not that any of the masters could see that. They laughed at the seemingly hollow threat. I stepped back onto Eclipse’s blade, curious to see what they’d do. This time, one of them drew a blade of their own to give chase.

  As he flew out over open air, the voidlight thread around him flashed. His foot slipped on the blade and he tumbled through the air only to land on the stairs, tripping another master.

  I knew those stairs were a hazard, I thought to myself, stunned by what I’d just done.

  Though I wasn’t quite sure how, I’d commanded the threads of fate. For the first time, I’d truly spun misfortune.