The healers spent most of their attention looking at Gan, who was apparently a Pretty Big Deal, at least as far as those below Foundation went. They had not ignored me, of course; I had won my challenge, and as far as they knew I was looking to join their sect. They’d tossed me a pretty serious looking healing pill that I would have been worried about swallowing if the distracted healer had not pushed an accompanying flask into my hand along with it.

Popping the pill into my mouth, I opened the flask and took a swig of the liquid inside to help wash the huge ball down. The clear liquid tasted vaguely medicinal and left the taste of aniseed and cloves behind as I felt the solid lump of the pill slide down my throat.

Not wanting my arm to heal in some weird shape, and not knowing whether some combination of the pill and potion would correct the jagged bone sticking through my skin, I set my hand painfully between my feet and pulled the bones back into alignment with a loud groan, the pain intense, but my scale had been somewhat altered by my experiences. That did not stop the world whiting out on me for a moment though, and when I came back to myself, I saw Darina walking towards where I sat, her own clothes ragged and torn but she was otherwise pristine.

“Did you win?”

“Of course. Did you? It looks like you tried to lose another arm.”

The healer gestured at my still injured arm, one blond eyebrow quirked up.

“My opponent was... really fast. Tried to block and it didn’t go well.”

“You returned the favour?”

“Yeah. I hope I didn’t hurt him too badly, actually. Though, I’m not certain I’d have survived the kicks he was aiming at my head, so...”

“Do you need healing?”

“If you have the Praxis to spare, that would be great. Definitely missing my healing.”

“I have plenty of energy. Once I told them I was a healer, they had me take a few attacks and then heal myself, there was not a great deal to it.”

“Doesn’t seem fair, but I guess healers are way more uncommon compared to general fighters.”

“I would have preferred to fight. Hold still.”

Darina crouched and set her hands to either side of my wound and I felt her energy flow into my arm, but I did not feel the strange sensation of knitting flesh.

“Hmph. It looks like whatever ‘medicine’ they gave you is interfering. We’ll need to wait for it to be out of your system before I can do anything more.”

I looked down at the flask in my hand and frowned at it; I half-wondered if it was on purpose, to weaken us for an ambush in the event we survived our trials, but unless the sect was only a few members – which seemed unlikely, given the scale of the place – they could always just overwhelm us, in theory, once we entered.

“Well, that’s great. Whatever they gave me seems pretty slow, but that could just be because I’m used to healing so much faster.”

“I’m not surprised, with the lack of Associated Alchemists in the area.”

Darina’s tone was dismissive; while the rest of us made frequent use of medicinal pills, the apprentice healer had always relied on her own abilities. It was however the first time I had heard her use that tone when discussing them.

“Do you not like alchemists in general, or is it non-Association alchemists?”

“Amateurs.”

I was not sure I would consider independents intrinsically amateurish, but I had not been trained in my field by an Apex.

“Do you feel that way about their healers as well?” I kept my voice low, not wanting it to carry, but I still looked around before speaking to make sure there were no sect members within the limited distance the array or whatever allowed me to see. Darina paused for a moment at my question, her face twisting back and forth as she appeared to consider it, glancing back to the barely visible Gan and the crowd around him.

“I would need to observe them directly; they do not seem like they would welcome my presence at this moment.”

I shrugged, wincing as it jostled my arm.

“I’m sure they’d appreciate a pro lending a hand.”

It looked like she might actually smile at me, but something caught her attention behind me and I turned – wincing again – to see Riffa approaching alongside Toria. Riffa’s tunic was damp, but otherwise unharmed, but Toria’s breastplate was covered in dents and cuts. A trickle of blood ran out from under one arm, where it looked like the armour had torn and dug into her flesh.

I took a deep breath and stood, groaning as the pain rose and faded.

“Hey, you guys alright?”

“We seem to be in better shape than you... Hunter. You must have held back a great deal to reach such a state.”

“With mild concern, you do seem to be more seriously injured than the rest of us, Hunter.”

“Yeah, there wasn’t much holding back on my part, my challenge was fast. I think he was actually taking it easy on me, but I had to use my Path and we ended up pretty evenly matched. Luckily, my Path seems to come with more bells and whistles.”

“What do bells and whistles have to do with anything, Hunter?”

“I... I actually have no idea. Never mind, I guess? The point is, it was a tough fight. Darina got off easy, how about you two?”

“It is remarkable they had a member capable of matching you, Hunter. Speed is not that uncommon, but your degree is. I had a much easier time; I was pitted against a woman that manipulated the air to create invisible blades. It was a challenge, but the speed provided by using my flames as a propellant allowed me to gain victory before too much damage could be done.”

“The fire is your Focus then? What’s your Path... if that isn’t rude to ask at this point.”

Toria shrugged and glanced around, I assumed to make sure nobody could hear.

“Causing them to persist and solidify is my Path's major ability. I mostly use it to create the flame wires you have seen, but there are other uses for it. Luckily, I did not require my Path.”

I spent a moment trying to determine if that was a mild criticism, but if it was, I was unable to see any sign of it.

“You’re bleeding,” I gestured at where it looked like the jagged edge of her amor had pierced her shit, “did they give you healing?”

“It’s nothing, it would be a waste to heal.”

Darina rolled her eyes and turned to inspect the wound, causing the Fire Weaver to raise one eyebrow and a small smile to quirk the corner of her lips.

“We need to fix your armour, or at least stop it impinging on your wound. Can you take this off, is there a... hinge?”

While Toria allowed Darina to fuss over her wound and remove her damaged breastplate, I turned to Riffa.

“How about your challenge, everything go ok?”

“In considered contemplation, my opponent manipulated water into focused jets; it would have been dangerous, but I was able to interpose my puppets, and while I was unable to give them autonomy due to our... agreed upon strategy, my control is fine enough to repair the damage manually as it occurred. I was able to eventually corner and defeat her, only being impacted by the spray. I spoke to her afterwards, and it seems she is going for further manipulation for her Path, allowing her to re-use the spray in the event she meets another opponent like myself.”

It seemed like everyone had an easier time of it than I had, though we were still waiting on Reff. I hoped I had simply been unfortunate rather than there being anything more to the level of challenge. I was not worried about my giant friend, not only was he the highest stage of all of us, but his abilities provided more pure defence than anyone... unless you counted healing to be defensive.

“Nice, it sounds like you had the opposite experience to me – you were your opponent's hard counter, and so was mine.”

“With amused understanding, I am not familiar with the particular terms you used, in this context at least, but I believe I can intuit your meaning. It is fortunate my puppets are made of sand, rather than stone; with stone, I may not have been able to reshape them quickly enough. I may have hinted that I manipulated stone.”

I laughed, but looked around and covered my mouth with my crystal hand, doing my best to hold it in. Riffa had a slightly quirked mouth, the risi equivalent of a wide grin. She was generally pretty against lying directly, or at least misrepresenting the initial statements she and her brother made, but it seemed she was able to work around that, when she had to. I was glad it had worked out, as it had not occurred to me that the giant siblings’ general unwillingness to mislead might interfere in our plan, but it should have, given the purely deceptive nature of it.

“Aren’t you a sly fox, Riffa! Nice.”

“With slight confusion, I am not a fox, Hunter.”

I moved my hand and grinned at her, though she only continued to look at me in confusion.

“You’re completely right, Riffa. Don’t know what I was thinking.”

There was a soft tink as Darina set Toria breastplate down on the stone and I leaned down to snag it, supressing my accustomed groan as I straightened with it. I braced it between my elbow and side and rotated it until I could see the point where it had been pushed out of shape and gripping it between my artificial fingers, tried to bend it out and somewhat back into shape.

I had expected it to be easy, since I was just above fifty times as strong as a normal human, but as I strained against the metal’s resistance, it came to me that a metal that was easily bent with one hand by a Core or Path stage cultivator was likely completely useless as armour.

I glared for a moment at the shaped metal before looking around; luckily, Darina was not paying attention to me, and neither was Toria. Riffa was looking around, presumably for her brother, so it seemed like nobody – at least nobody I could see within our section of the illusion – had seen me making the attempt. It did however mean I was looking in the right direction when Reff appeared out of the haze, his dark jacket and vest missing, leaving his torso bare and making the bright red lacerations on his white skin apparent.

“Dee!”

I ran off, not waiting for a response and knowing that they would likely spot him before I had chance to say anything else. I reached my friend in a moment, and stood looking up at him in concern.

“Reff, are you alright!? What happened?”

The others caught up to me almost instantly, Darina slapping her hands against the risi’s leg while his sister began to inspect his wounds.

“With mildly pained confirmation, I am fine. My opponent was a spatial manipulator, and his attacks bypassed my armour somewhat. I am afraid I may have lost my temper, they still provided healing though.”

“He’s taken the same thing you did, Hunter. There’s nothing I can do until it’s out of his system.”

“With contained worry, I am glad you were victorious, brother, but there are many wounds.”

“She’s right, man. You look like your cat went nuts.”

“In pained confusion, I do not have a cat, Hunter.”

“Never mind. I wish we’d both taken our own pills, the stuff they gave us seems really slow. Do you need... bandaging or something, to stop the bleeding? I think one of the vials I got from V helps replace bloo-”

“Congratulations, challengers. You have passed the initial trial of membership.”

Initial trial? I thought to myself as the goat-man that had followed from the same direction from which Reff appeared.

“You may follow me; you will be given lodgings until Elder Yo is able to confirm the truth of your cultivation. He is in seclusion, but should emerge within a day or two. Before that, you will be provided an escort, to ensure you able to find your way around, of course.”

Damn, that meant that not only did we have a clock on how long we would be able to stay, but we would be watched the entire time. And I was down at least a third of my Praxis.

Great...