The top of the wall was smooth, maybe slick as well, given the amount of rain that happens in this part of the world. The drizzle was a near constant, only interrupted by the occasional mist or fog. Okay, maybe there was some exaggeration in that – there seemed to be a five-minute break every couple of days.

One of the Do’orn - I had not caught his name – was leading me around the rim of the wall in complete silence. The lack of chatter was fine by me, as I was actually pretty nervous. The Earthen Sky wanting to test us was not completely unexpected, but I had been hoping they’d show us around first. I was not keen on another few days of getting my Experience back, and even though I would be limiting myself to my Focus, that concern was still there, given how quickly I burned through energy.

After a few minutes, we came to a stop and the sect member turned to me, his expression unreadable, given that I was not adept at reading goat facial expressions.

“What is your Focus? A suitable challenge will be found.”

I blinked in mild surprise; I had thought I would be fighting him, but it seemed that I had been mistaken.

“Uh, lightning-based speed.”

It was a bit reductionist, but it was mostly correct.

“Good, I know the perfect challenger.”

I did not like the sound of that; I had come across a couple of hard-counters to my abilities since I had received them, and I had no interest wasting energy on one now. I sighed and shook off the irritated feeling as the Do’orn walked away, hooves tapping lightly against the stone.

I looked around the wide top of the wall, looking for my friends, but to my surprise I could not see them anywhere. The opposite side was pretty far away, but I should have been able to make something out against the otherwise featureless surface. It was possible they had been led off the wall in some way, but then, why had I not been?

I looked again, harder this time, focusing as much as I could until I could feel the strain around my eyes and it was starting to give me a slight headache; I was about to give up when I caught a slight shimmer in the air and just for a moment, I thought I saw Reff standing with his muscled white arms folded in front of his open burgundy jacket.

The sight faded as I relaxed, and it occurred to me that the reason we had been unable to see anybody atop the wall was that there was some kind of intrinsic property, technique or array in place to prevent seeing anybody at any distance. I wondered if the sect itself had some method of seeing past the illusion, or whether it simple excluded them; as a defensive measure, not being able to see the enemy more than a couple of dozen feet away was more than a double-edged sword, it was holding a razor by the blade.

That minor mystery mostly solved, I settled back to wait, my concentration going to recover the tiny amount of energy I had used to stabilise my steps as I travelled. It did not take long; it would not have taken that long even before I had completed my Core, and despite the faster rate at which I ran, the fact that my completed Core automatically converted Experience to Praxis was a huge timesaver.

I was long done by the time I caught the return of my personal Earthen Sky member and another much shorter figure. Walking alongside the furred figure was what looked sort of like a classic dwarf, in that he was about four and a half feet tall, almost as wide and solid about the trunk. The figure also sported a huge braided beard, but that was where the resemblance ended. Dwarves were – generally – swarthy, with red, brown or black hair that was thick and coarse. This example sported delicate platinum blond hair that ran in a single straight wave to his waist, and the complex braid of his beard was woven with golden wire. His metallic grey eyes were lined in golden eyeliner and eyeshadow and his lips were painted silver. He wore flowing and layered robes of silver and turquoise that were belted in a woven rope of what looked like white gold. It was not at all what I expected from a dwarf, but then none of the supposed fantasy races I had met had been anything like their mythological counterparts. Elves had been either just normal people or... rapacious omnivores. None of the giants I had met had made any moves to grind my bones to make baked good, and this dwarf was... different.

“Aspirant, this is your Challenge; Gan, the Bright Strike. Gan, this is Hunter.”

The presence of a cultivation name meant that my opponent was a Path stage cultivator, meaning he would have a clear advantage over me, if I was restricted to my Focus, at least in theory. Of course, my Path had no actual visible manifestation, so if worst came to worst, I could always tap my Exemplar. Not that I thought that would happen, as this was after all a test.

I snapped my right fist into my left palm and dropped Gan a sharp bow, keeping my eyes on his. The dwarf nodded back to me, a slight tilt of his head; it was not necessarily a mark of disrespect, as in his eyes I was at least a stage below him, meaning I was actually marginally below average for my apparent age.

The Do’orn nodded and stepped away, soon vanishing into the haze of illusion and not knowing what else to do, or what was expected, I dropped into a defensive stance. Gan looked vaguely amused, quirking a perfectly groomed platinum eyebrow in my direction.

“Do not kill him. Fight.”

The words were clearly directed at Gan, rather than myself and I almost smiled, but even as the impulse bubbled up inside of me, Instinctive Precognition howled and I felt myself Focus as hard as I could and take a half-step to my right, twisting my body as there came a flash like a too-bright camera and I felt the air tear as the heel of a foot dragged itself across the very tip of my nose, hard and fast enough to take the skin off.

I did not have a chance to counter, or even really react to the sudden burning pain in my nose as I again felt myself contorting to avoid another blow, bending over backwards and reaching back, my body driven by the surging electricity in my channels as it arced along my nerves, the Praxis-generated impulses travelling faster than thought to my brain and back as the air in front of my face almost seemed to ignite momentarily as another kick passed over my arched form.

I felt the weight of my body transfer to my hands as I jerked my legs to the side, throwing myself into a sideways somersault and landing on my feet and immediately cartwheeling left as Gan – the apparently outrageously fast dwarf came at me in a series of blinding flashes, seeming to move instantly from place to place and attack to attack. Even with my Focus running at max capacity – which tripled my base speed – the only reason I was staying ahead of the little monster was because I was reacting ahead of his attacks. But even then, if my Instinctive Precognition had not grown in my time on this world, I felt like I would have simply reacted too late to the very first blow.

There was no way I could counter or attack as things stood; the Bright Strike was simply faster than I was when using only my Focus. From his name, and the strobing light, I assumed his Focus – or Path – to be based on light, which was, unfortunately, significantly faster than my own choice of lightning. I could let the destructive arcs fly free to punish him for drawing close, but that would mean a drop in my reaction times and speed, which might just end things for me.

Despite my earlier thoughts about the use of my Path, I had not been planning to use it at all, thinking that my speed would provide a clear advantage against whatever I was faced with, but as I had thought to myself so often, speed was king. Still desperately dodging the incoming attacks and losing the occasional layer of skin – and further destroying my robes – I pulled Praxis through my Exemplar and stepped onto my Path.

The world slowed around me and the dwarf appeared, his arm already swinging even as it faded into view out of the light, slowed, but not enough. I stepped around the blow and with a mental sigh went all out, forcing as much Praxis as possible through my Focus and Exemplar.

The world around me halted, grinding to stillness apart from Gan who was coming at me about as fast as I could expect a normal person to, which in my accelerated state was truly shocking. Not wanting to drag the fight out, I stepped and I saw his painted eyes widen in the moment before we began to fight in earnest. My Instinctive Precognition was no-longer directing my movements, as I could not perceive his attacks, but it still warned me of danger as I moved to block a punch and instead chose to dodge, throwing my own punch past his, only for him to drag an elbow up to block me. For several subjective seconds, this continued, with neither of us able to gain a clear advantage over the other, though as fast as I was burning my stores, I knew there was a definite timer on my side of things.

Unwilling to let myself simply drain, I forced myself on the attack, and taking a chance, decided to accept an attack to make one of my own, hammering a fist into the dwarf’s face and taking one to my upraised right arm in turn. It was not a good trade.

I saw blood spurt from Gan’s nose, but only had a split second to enjoy it as I was blasted back off my feet, my arm breaking and bones protruding through my skin as I was sent skipping along the hard surface of wall, leaving behind small streaks of red as the stone ripped my skin further.

Ignoring the pain, I pressed my crystal hand against the floor and flipped myself around and to my feet, absorbing the remaining momentum even as Gan appeared before me again with a flash, blood running down his face, and into his beard where his wide smile sat mocking me.

He was already attacking, his right leg coming around in a blinding arc towards my head. Knowing I could not take that blow, especially with my Lesser Regeneration otherwise occupied, I raised my artificial arm and with a flex of will, triggered its Designed function, even as I concentrated my Frog-derived power on my own right leg, losing control with a frisson of sensation as I sent it the instruction to kick my opponent in his grinning face.

There was another flash of light, and a snap of thunder as I regained the use of my limb and Gan was sent skidding across the wall in a skidding journey of his own. Not certain whether he would be coming back at me, I quickly re-distributed my focus and will, marvelling at my remaining functional arm; I had not felt a thing at his kick, it had simply stopped dead as it met its own force reflected back

I watched my opponent tumble out of view and into the illusion, and after he did not reappear for several subjective seconds, stepped off my Path and dropped my Focus, wincing as the pain from my very broken arm hit me again.

“Impressive; Hunter is victorious! Healers!”