Val, Foofy, and Tavras walked on land for a long while to reach their destination of the village. In the meantime, Tavras spoke on what she could expect.

"When we reach New Gate, there will be some manner of competition for the demigods who are coming of age this year."

"I will have another trial," Val murmured, supposing that at least Tavras had done a decent job in preparing her. "Is sixteen the appropriate age for this?"

"Anytime between fifteen and twenty is an acceptable age."

"That's a big difference." At eighteen, Val was lucky enough to be on the older end of that spectrum. If there would be any sort of violence involved in these trials as she suspected, she did not want to imagine how a fifteen-year-old child would face off against a twenty-year-old adult. Then again, she supposed everyone had the luxury to wait until they were older, given that fluid time range.

Tavras shrugged. "It is sometimes difficult for us older immortals to realize how quickly you kids grow up, so there are no rigid time cut-offs. Besides, a weak demigod is a weak demigod. Usually the older ones tried to wait until they have gotten stronger, but in reality, they just have thin blood. The younger ones who start their trials tend to have thicker blood. It is alway fun to watch some teenage girl run circles around some adult man just because she had been able to develop a better ability set."

The grainy beach merged into a rocky ledge which gave way dirt and grass. Then, a forest rose up. The evergreens were powdered with frost while the deciduous trees had frost caked onto one side of their trunks. Their small party moved through the trees on a narrow path. Occasionally Val had to watch her step behind Tavras, not that he flung a branch back into her face or anything.

"So, aside from my competition varying in skill level, what else can I expect from these trials?"

"I honestly cannot say. The test will vary wildly depending on the god or goddess running the trials this year. The first time that Herrick ran the trials, Suvier had to put in a rule that he wants at least half of the demigods to survive."

Her face could be felt going pale as she balked. Only half of the participants would be guaranteed to live. Val had not the slightest clue of what to expect from these other demigods and demigoddesses on the Summit, so she could not be certain that she would come out in the strongest half without invoking her ego.

In all her life, she had only ever known Rosamer, Gina, and Percy as fellow demigods. Rosamer had the amazing ability to see the future, but aside from that, he was admittedly kind of useless. As for the other two, she had no way to know how strong they truly were, but she suspected that Percy was innumerably stronger than Gina. Just as well, Gina would not even be the sort of demigoddess who would make it to the Summit, so Val was looking at a smaller, stronger pool of demigods that she would have to best.

"What about demigods and demigoddesses who might have really cool and useful abilities, but do not have much application in combat?" With this question, she was thinking specifically of Rosamer.

"That is the biggest oversight of Suvier's regime. They only care about hard power, so non-violent immortals suffer under his rule." Tavras added on, "You could still get a task that you are ill-suited for, so do not get too comfortable, Val."

"Okay. What if that happens?" Obviously, she would do her best, but she wanted to know if there would be any recourse in the event that she could not pull through the challenge.

Tavras spun around and continued walking backwards. One thumb jutted into his chest. "That is why you have me here. If for some reason the god or goddess in charge picks out a bad trial for your skill set, I will convince them to give you another assessment. You will see that any parents who care about their offspring will be here to make sure that their kid does not get shafted."

While she nodded along, Val thought that she had a reasonably diverse and useful ability set for having only four abilities currently. Realistically, she would triumph no matter the situation.

Tavras continued describing possible challenges. "One year when Ludo ran the trials, he had the demigods do a baking competition. Only one person died, but it was actually pretty intense. The losing half was banished from the Summit."

How did someone even die in a bake-off? Admittedly, her cooking would probably be bad enough to kill somebody. Val coughed in response and could only hope that she would get a trial that involved a more militant task rather than domestic.

Tavras was of the same mind. "If the way that you cooked fish in my Paradise was anything to go by, I would assume that I would have to intervene for you in that situation!"

Val darted ahead to slap her fist into Tavras's back, though she paid for that by him deliberately letting a tree branch go in her face. "Ack!" Thanks to her quick reflexes, Val caught the branch on her arm. The switch on her forearm still stung as much as a stick could irritate skin.

They continued on through the woods, seeming to wander around endlessly. All of the trees looked the same, but Val could have sworn that she had seen some of these trees before. "You do know where you are going, don't you?" Val huffed as she blew her breath into her chilly hands. While she knew that she could trust Tavras to know the way, she was feeling quite thoroughly bored.

Only Foofy seemed not to mind the long walk as he strayed from them and took in all of the new sniffs.

"So long as nothing has changed since Iharu and Fang were kids, yes, I remember."

"That was over a hundred years ago, though," Val whined. Maybe she should not trust Tavras to know everything.

"Not much changes on the Summit, even in one hundred years. Look! Here we are." He stepped out of the last thicket and for once, Tavras stood and held back a branch for her.

Val picked her legs through the briars and looked on at civilization for her first time in months.

Compared to her hometown of Brillion City, New Gate was nothing more than a speck of scattered buildings. The small town still set her alight with excitement. There looked to be enough buildings within the thick walls to have everything that she needed: an apartment for a real roof of her head, a grocery store for a variety of food, and most importantly, a metallic structure which looked to be a cell tower was located near the walls.

"There has to be electricity here!" she cheered. A skip entered her step as Val ran down the hill.

"Wait up!" Tavras called. "Val, I said wait!" His voice boomed with undue urgency.

All wariness had abandoned her, so she did not think to respond to Tavras at once. Besides, Foofy had taken up a run beside her. Together, they frolicked towards the first place that they would explore on the Summit of Ascension, the place where they had always aspired to go.

"We did it Foofy!" Val breathed. When she slowed as she approached the walls, Val wished that she had not run so far ahead of Tavras.

The great walls rose many times over her head so that she presently stood in their long-cast shadow. Veiny cracks rippled throughout the stone, almost lighting up in a red haze before diminishing back to the dull, sandy brown. A soft thrumming sound emitted from the walls with the glowing and fading light. The walls almost sounded like they possessed the distorted pulse of a heartbeat.

Her own heart started to race, outpacing the thrum that could be heard from the walls. For some reason, Val felt compelled to reach her mind out to these walls, of all things. While she did not expect to feel much from an inanimate object, the intensity of its feelings knocked her breath away.

Doubled over, gasping, Val managed to spit out, "It feels twisted with hate." If she reached her mind back out to the walls, but this time with Keep the Peace laying over them, would that result in anything useful?

Tavras's arms latched onto her and yanked her back. "One last note about the trials," he said cheerfully. Tavras beckoned her away from the wall, practically dragging her out of some desperation. In a low whisper he said, "Never speak plainly around Suvier's walls. It is said that he can discern the words spoken near them, even sense everything around them."

"Those are Suvier's walls?" Val asked.

"Yes." Tavras nodded gravely. "You do know what the God Supreme reigns over, right?"

"Suiver is the god of construction and destruction." The corners of her eyes flitted back to the walls. "You mean that Suvier created those walls with one of his abilities?"

"Yeah."

Suvier's walls were decidedly creepy, Val concluded. The agonizing wrath and resentment that she had felt within the brickwork made her wonder. What type of state was the God Supreme in right now? Given the extreme hatred that she had felt, Val could only hope that something terrible had happened to Suvier, as odd as that was to wish ill on the God Supreme.

Barring any sort of extreme circumstance, that meant that they would have to have an angry god who ruled over the world. She liked to think the best of their overlord though, going off of the countless glorious things that Val had learned about the God Supreme throughout her life. Nonetheless, she had a skeptical enough mind to consider that perhaps all of the wonderful things that she had heard about Suvier might be too good to be true, even for a god.

"Tavras, I think that the God Supreme might be in trouble right now." Her hands fumbled around as she tried to put words to what she had sensed from the walls. "The walls are so twisted in hate and pain that something has to be wrong!" While her voice heightened with concern, Val made sure to keep her volume down to a low whisper.

With a snide laugh, Tavras said, "Indeed, something is wrong. That is just how wickedly evil Suvier is. I am not sure if I should be glad or concerned that you can sense this." His narrowed eyes glared at the walls, staring them down as if he could see something through them, or perhaps the God Supreme was staring back at them.

"I need to keep it a secret," Val said at once. With a finger pointed at a temple, she said, "I will protect this understanding behind my Mind Shield, so that no one will know that I ever thought ill of the God Supreme."

"Good," Tavras said with a sigh of relief. "I did have one last thing to say about the trials, actually," he continued. "You want to do well enough to pass, obviously, but do not show off. You want to skim by unnoticed if you can. Any powerful demigods who look to have potential will gain the attention of Suvier's state. While that offers some interesting opportunities for advancement, trust me when I say that you want to stay as far away from Suvier's ring of influence as you can."

Val considered this. While she wanted to gain power as quickly as possible, especially since she had made that deal with Tavras, she knew that it would not make sense to rush things. As a demigoddess interested in a god, the two of them had all of the time in the world for them to eventually work out. It probably made more sense for her to quietly gain power in the shadows, especially given her ultimate goals. With a nod of her head, she said, "I will do my best to lay low."

Together, they turned back to the archway in the wall that led to New Gate. Val walked at Tavras's side, and she looked down to Foofy at hers. A smile peeled onto her lips, because she never felt more ready in her life.