A four-storey-tall concrete wall with rings of barbed wire at the top separated the Centertown District from the Blended District. It was a hindrance to monsters and any low-tier cultivators who might want to cause trouble, and the only proper way through was one of the gates or checkpoints along the wall.

  But most people weren’t as good at climbing as Blake.

  Blake had never scaled the district wall before, and he wasn’t sure if he could do it now, but there was no way any of the checkpoint guards were going to let him through the gate. While they were probably on the low end of Body Tempering, he still couldn’t fight them.

  For most cultivators in the city, they only ever made it to Body Tempering, and if they were lucky, they broke into Foundation Establishment. Maybe they would do better on a world with more ambient mana, but Earth and whatever it had been combined with didn’t have impressive mana fields.

  He perched on the roof of a collapsing building in the Blended District, looking over the wall. Within the district, most of the old buildings had been torn down. Longhouses replaced them, along with a few stave churches, and a few Cohong-style pagoda-like buildings were scattered about. It wasn't in perfect condition, but it was better than the Blended District.

  Blake inhaled sharply, then sprang off the edge of the roof, holding his length of rebar in front of him. When he reached the edge of the wall, he wedged it in a crack between two blocks of concrete, then hoisted himself up.

  Pole vaulting might have been his best event when he was younger, but he’d had plenty of time on the uneven bars, or simply with tumbling. He could do this.

  He launched himself off the rebar, then sailed clean over the wall. He flipped around, trying to right himself, and got his legs under him just in time to land on a vine-covered thatched roof inside the wall. It’d been a while since he’d practiced, but he landed in a crouch, cushioning the impact and softening the sound.

  As his staff fell out the crack on the other side of the wall and clattered down to the ground outside, he made a mental note to come back this way on his way out to pick it up. No sense leaving it behind.

  Still, he dropped to his stomach in case anyone was watching. When he heard no commotion for the next few seconds, he jumped back to his feet and continued on through the city. The sky was still dark, and the manaship blocked out most of the stars. This was the best view of the ship Blake ever had, and the closest to it he’d ever been.

  The manaship was where the truly powerful lived, not in Centertown. Even now, so late at night, hovering ships (called longboats by the cultivators) zipped around in the sky, flitting between distant docks like birds. Stacked city buildings glimmered in the angular cutouts in the manaship’s hull. Up there, where the ambient mana was more concentrated, there were plenty of Core Formation cultivators and a few Nascent Souls. Sometimes they came down to the world below to hunt monsters and fiends, but that was about it.

  He shook his head, then whispered, “Focus, Blake. Focus.” Tomorrow’s auction items would be stored at the auction house, specifically, the building situated on the far side of the town square. That was his target.

  From here, Blake could only see the peaks of the auction hall roof. He crossed Centertown at a sprint, bounding over the rooftops. Most of the longhouses were about three storeys tall, used for housing or offices. Some were sect headquarters and administrative offices for the regional government, and some were housing blocks.

  The streets below were dead quiet. There were only a few people wandering about, but none looked up.

  Though the guards wouldn’t be expecting anyone to come steal, if someone spotted him and raised the alarm, it'd make this significantly harder. He could, of course, head down to the streets, where it’d be less suspicious, but the moment anyone noticed he was a Blended? Especially a fiend-blend? They’d be just as suspicious.

  Blended could take a job in Centertown, but for one to own property here was almost unheard of. There was no reason for him to be here so late at night except to cause trouble.

  When he arrived at the auction hall, he laid down on the eave of a nearby roof, looking out over his target. The auction hall was a long building made mostly of wood, but the roof was shingled instead of thatched. A stone chimney stood in the center, huffing out smoke, and it stood a little taller than the rest of the buildings.

  A weed-infested promenade ran around the base of the hall, and trash blew by in the faint summer breeze. Although Centertown was a ‘better’ district, there were still plenty of mortals and near-mortals, and it was nowhere near as fancy as the manaship. There were no windows on the ground floor. The hall had a set of open windows near the top, letting out warm air. If he could just…

  He sprang off the eave and sailed toward the auction hall. He caught a wooden ornament halfway up the hall’s side, then scrambled up over ledges and an intricate system of gutters designed to handle the mildly acidic rain that sometimes assailed the city.

  When he reached the upper window, he swung a leg up over the sill, then pulled himself inside. Rafters supported the roof, which made an excellent jungle-gym to climb around. He crossed the hall, walking on a thick wooden beam, until he reached the center and looked down.

  On one side, in front of the doors, there were rows upon rows of seats, where cultivators and traders would gather to bid on any of the artifacts, arcane pelts, and other loot the adventurers brought back from the merge-mists and beyond. At the moment, they were empty.

  On the other side of the hall, the loot was on display. It seemed awfully open and unprotected, but then again, most people didn’t have the ability to climb the district walls and hadn’t spent years climbing the mist-rigs, as if practicing for this very moment where he’d have to swing in the rafters.

  The only light came from a single lit chandelier on one side, and from a brazier at the center. Two guards tended to it, poking it with sticks and tossing new logs onto it when needed. It was hard to tell from up here, with Blake’s unenhanced eyes, but they looked like they had first or second stage Body Tempering rank seals on their armour.

  These two men wore the hardened leather armour of the Green Bear Sect enforcers—the bear-shaped etchings on their pauldrons gave them away. The Green Bears were the de-facto rulers of the town, and the current sect in control of the regional government, so it was only natural that they’d control the auction hall, one of the greatest sources of artifacts and treasures in the city. Though Svarikson wasn’t technically part of their sect, he’d made agreements with them, which allowed him to be the premiere landlord of the city.

  Blake traversed the rafters until he reached the back half of the hall, where the auction items were kept on display. There were rusty swords, musical instruments, cooking pans, animal pelts that shimmered an entire rainbow’s worth of colour, and other less practical items like lizard-scale jewelry and decorative dagger sheaths made of foot-long animal teeth. Knowing cultivators, though, they probably still afforded their user some sort of advantage in combat. Each sat on an individual pedestal, prepared for the early morning crowd to survey it before bidding.

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  Blake wouldn’t have much time. He’d jump down, snatch an item, then run to the back door. There was only time to grab one item, no matter how enticing the thought of grabbing more trinkets was.

  He bent down and squinted, looking for anything that looked like a ring. It might not even have been the best item here, but something about it just made Blake want to get back at Svarikson and snatch the prized treasure from beneath his nose.

  Near the edge of the room, there was a pedestal that looked empty from a distance, but when Blake drew closer, there was a thin silver ring. It was the only ring he’d seen so far, but something about it drew his gaze. It made the edges of his vision blur, so that he could only focus on it.

  It shouldn’t have done that. His mana perception was horrible. None of the other objects here (which had to also be spiritually powerful) drew his attention like that. Was it that much stronger than the others?

  Blake swung down to the bottom of the rafter, then leapt toward the wall. Digging his heels into the slightly-sloped wood, he descended until he was only an arm’s length away from the ring.

  Then he sprang off the wall. He tried to keep his footfalls quiet, but he wasn’t a mana cultivator yet. In the otherwise silent hall, they echoed.

  He’d been ready for this. He snatched the ring up off the pedestal. It was ten times heavier than it looked, and up close, even Blake could see the runic carvings running across its surface.

  He stuffed it into his pocket, then he sprinted toward the back door. If he looked back, he’d probably have seen the guards closing in, but he just needed to go fast enough to get outside. On the rooftops, he could outrun them. He was more nimble than them.

  Pushing open the back door, he sprinted out into the night air.

  He only made it three steps before skittering to a halt. Svarikson and his two thugs stood right in front of the door.

  For a second, the three of them looked taken aback, but Svarikson shouted, “Grab him!”

  The two cultivators lunged forward, snatching up his arms and holding him steady before he could dart to the side. They weren’t much faster than a regular human yet—they were only at the first stage of Body Tempering—but they were fast enough and strong enough to catch him.

  It was Svarikson, who was at the fifth stage, who could do the real damage.

  Svarikson punched Blake in the gut. The impact would have sent him staggering back into the auction hall, but the others held him upright. He choked and coughed, wheezing for breath.

  The two Green Bear guards from inside the hall raced out, then stopped and bowed to Svarikson for a moment. One said, “Honoured Land-Master? What are you doing here, at this hour? If you’d like, we can drag this ruffian to the administration hall, where he can wait for a sect judge.”

  “No need,” Svarikson said. “These fools made the mistake of mentioning the Honour Ring to a tenant. I didn’t think the fiend-blend scum knew what it was, but I didn’t want to take any chances. Seemed I was right. Clever boy, but I’m more clever.” He put on a gloating smirk and puffed out his chest.

  “Indeed, esteemed Land-Master,” the guard said, trembling and averting his gaze. “What did he steal?”

  “What did you steal, hm, thrall?” Svarikson said, leaning over and staring into Blake’s eyes. “Anything, or did you get spooked? You weren’t coming for my ring, were you?”

  Blake’s heart was racing, his mind was churning, and his lungs were wheezing. He couldn’t come up with a reasonable excuse. Instead, he said, “This one humbly requests…that you eat shit.”

  Svarikson laughed and patted his belly, then struck Blake in the side of the head, hard enough to drive him down to the old city pavement. The other cultivators let him fall.

  “Go back inside,” Svarikson told the Green Bear guards. “I won’t bother a judge with this one. I’ll deal with the vermin myself.”

  “Yes, Land-Master,” the guards said, then backed away. Blake didn’t really know the hierarchy, or if the sect members should have had more authority than Svarikson, but Svarikson was stronger than them, and almost everyone knew who he was.

  But Blake wasn’t just going to give up. He scrambled away, boots scratching on the pavement. His head stung, and he felt like throwing up, but he kept moving.

  Until a hand clamped down on the back of his shirt.

  Svarikson hoisted him up, then pushed him back up against the auction house’s wall. He pulled back his free hand and flexed his fingers, then said, “It has been a while since I’ve had a chance to try out my Harvesting technique, but no one’s given me a good enough excuse up until you. I don’t suppose you have much mana, but I will take what I can get my hands on!”

  “Easier than cycling it yourself…” Blake gasped. “Asshole.”

  The Nord cultivators had developed a fourth class of technique beyond the usual Shaping, Augmentation, and Smite techniques: Harvesting. They were quite proud of it, and told the Earth-born kids about it many times in the reeducation schools. Almost every Path had some form of Harvesting technique now.

  “I’m not about to go into the woods and Harvest a spirit beast, no!” Svarikson laughed again, then planted an open palm into Blake’s stomach. “Leave that to the adventurous folks!”

  “You can’t!” Blake shouted. Desperately, he added, “Dynasty laws prohibit Harvesting sapient life!”

  “Oh, so now you care about the laws?” Svarikson sneered. “Wait until you hear what was originally planned for your desolate world.” All the muscles in his arm clenched and tightened.

  A spike of pain blasted through Blake’s body, and he choked. He’d never been Harvested before, and he’d never even seen it happen—only heard of it. It felt like the air was sucked out of his lungs, but it travelled downward. For a second, his blood stopped circulating. There was a sense of despair, but he couldn’t voice it. He couldn’t even yell.

  He pushed his attention down to his gut, and to the well of black mana circulating inside him.

  It rushed out, flowing away and out a distant point in his body, moving without control. His ears rang and his body screamed, but he couldn’t make any noise.

  The mana gathered in Svarikson’s hand. He clenched his fingers, trying to draw it in, but he began grimacing, too. It wasn’t responding to him either.

  There wasn’t much of the oily black mana. In the real world, it barely manifested as a mist in the air.

  The mist shuddered and compressed, forming into a tiny sphere, before blasting outward into Svarikson’s hand. It tore his skin, and an explosion of raw force flung the man backward. The mana gobs splattered on the ground with a crackle and a hiss, before dissipating entirely.

  Blake slumped down to his knees. He blinked. The cultivators shouted, demanding to know what he did to Svarikson, and he couldn’t tell them. His mana was probably toxic…or something. He couldn’t explain it. His horns throbbed, his neck itched. Everything about him was incompatible with the mana cultivators’ ways.

  But the meagre well of mana he had accumulated was now gone. He wheezed, trying to catch his breath. His ears were ringing, and Svarikson was shouting something at him. But Blake was empty. Entirely empty. If he got Harvested any longer, he’d probably die.

  He still would die, Harvested or not. Svarikson was climbing to his feet and prowling back toward them.

  Then the ringing in Blake’s ears halted.

  What’s all this noise? came a voice. It sounded like it was inside Blake’s head, but simultaneously, coming from his pocket with the Honour ring. It was a man’s voice, old and weathered, and utterly disgruntled. Who’s waking me up? It has been a great long while since there has been anyone remotely close to awakening me…wait, wait, no mana? But he hears my voice, doesn’t he? I can work with that, oh yes, I can work with that.

  Blake blinked. “What?” He winced. A headache was coming on. Maybe he was just imagining things, but…

  But Svarikson was getting up. The other cultivators were preparing techniques.

  There is no time to explain. Put on the ring, and accept the call. Or cast it away, and let them have their way with you. But I think I know which one you’ll choose.