Climbing the rope had been harder than I had imagined prior to my little stunt, the winds were pulling with surprising force and I swayed and circled wildly while I tried to pull myself up. Also not something I had ever done before. But I was a gifted climber and prevailed in the end, injuries and all.

Arriving in the Broken Lands proper felt like coming home. The rock formations towering over me, the wind in my hair, and a view to praise whatever gods you might fancy. I had missed the clear air so much. My short journey over the hillsides near the Divide, after I had emerged from the Abyss, came not even close to the elation and freedom I now felt. I carefully stowed my rope away and let Zero hop into a pocket of my cloak. I would not have survived long without this little friend of mine. I often forgot that we had first met in mortal combat when he tried to break my skull in my fight with the Regicide. Lily had informed me that he was now a [Sentient Adamantium Chain Golem], lvl. 5. Every bit of it well deserved, even if I did not know what adamantium was. His new Skills were [Constrict] and [Adaptive Metal Forming]. The latter would let him change his configuration depending on the situation. He could for example make the spikes bigger or form them into small blades. Most importantly was his head. He could change into what he wanted, but a grappling hook, a scythe blade, and the head of a morning star were his favorites so far. All of them very tiny and kind of adorable, because he was still only 5 rings long.

Immediately after securing myself on the mountain, I grasped the nettle and meditated to buy and weave [Reinvigoration]. I felt fine and had been greedy, but trying to climb the rope under these conditions with my injuries on top had been beyond stupid. And I had felt the pain every inch of the way up. [Reinvigoration] was a healing spell that did not close wounds or any of the sort, but it drastically sped up natural healing, gave new energy and strength, and rapidly replaced dead flesh and lost blood. I immediately spend all the mana I had on the Skill and actually gasped in pleasure as the pain faded and new vigor rushed through my body. When would I learn? I just had to learn to be less stupid. Was that something you could learn? Every damn time greed took over and made me save my Essence up, I ended up regretting not getting something that would have helped me along the way. I needed to be out of harm's way for just a godsdamned moment, was that too much to ask?

With that done and out of the way I could finally do what I had wanted to do since I laid my eyes on the floating patchwork mountain. Climb it.

It was a marvel beyond anything I had ever seen, I daresay beyond anything most mortals have the chance to lay their eyes upon. A wonder merging the smooth stone of the boulders, rocks, and mountain with the rich and vibrant vegetation of the Wyld. The influence of the Dragon of Life, which had to be close, was noticeable every step of the way. The area of the Broken Lands was big, a couple of dozen miles across the chasm, and the mountain was as high as any I had known in the Divide, four to five miles at least.

But the majesty of giant rocks floating in the air, connected to the others via tendrils, trees, and vines was something I would never be able to put into the right words. Traversing the terrain was not hard for me as a child of the mountain and a climber with my [Favorite Terrain: Mountains] Skill. Were the journey would have been tricky, like sudden gaps and holes, cliffs, and plants growing over nothing, I felt the danger and the layout of the land instinctively. And wherever a gap was too wide or a cliff to steep and high to comfortably cross, I used [Airwalk] to give me that little bit of extra boost.

I spotted two different kinds of animals on my way up if you could call them that in the Wyld. One was an insect-like creature as big as a dog. It had powerful hind legs it used to jump to the different rocks. It was always gone too fast to see more. The other kind of animal I saw were flyers. Birds and insects, gliding reptiles and furry mammals with wings under their arms. Most of them slightly larger than normal. A few of them of impressive and intimidating size. Some of the monstrous, big-teethed, and scary. I put Zero in my collar to keep his eyes on the skies while I was busy and told him to pinch my ear if there was something coming and to smack my ear if I had to immediately dive for cover. Just a gentle push at the wrong time could mean a fall to the death in the Broken Lands.

And I kept finding signs that Wyldlings had been here.

A stomped out campfire here, rope bridges and knotted ropes there. The ropes were spanned where the vegetation did not do the trick in connecting the floating isles. Not only were there signs of traveling Wyldlings, what they built indicated that they wanted to use this terrain in the long term and that they prepared a convenient way to cross the mountains. Instead of just using knotted ropes to go up and down two different heights, they had taken the time to install a rope bridge with wooden planks to cut on the travel time it would take to go back and forth.

I avoided them for the time being. I first wanted to see what there was to see, before I started a war I was ill-prepared to fight. I took me most of the day of climbing to reach a vantage point from which I had an unobstructed view of the Broken Lands and onto the Shattered Sea. What I saw took once again my breath away. I could see the waterfall ahead, cutting through the sea with unbelievable majesty as far as my eyes could see. But the waterfall itself was cut in two by a giant and tapered rock, a little too small to call it a mountain, that loomed over the Waterfall and the drop behind, reaching even the floating mountains over the chasm. Almost a natural bridge, but as it stood it was an unnatural bridge with the help of a couple of floating boulders. From my vantage point, I could see beyond the rock and on to the sea and even to the shores behind. In the distance were more mountain tops towering over woods and hills intensely dense and green. But at the foot of the rock and the formation that surrounded it, basically, a breakwater or a pier protecting the bay from the forces of the waterfall were dozens of shipwrecks smashed together. They looked like a mother had swept the toy-boats of the son onto a pile in the corner, to discard later. They were pressed into and over one another, sometimes keel up, and looked like a complicated fort or formation.

Behind them, in the strong current of the water, tied to the mooring and straining the ropes like a dog running into its leash, laid a couple of ships that seemed to be ready to set sail at any moment. Two longboats, 30 oars or more, as well as a couple of smaller dinghies clearly belonging to the much bigger frigate that anchored farther out in the bay. There were a lot of people, hundreds of them, around the ships and the pile of shipwrecks, working in orderly lines.

I needed to get closer to see more, but I could not descent now and still find a secure place to rest, so I instead went even higher, to lessen the chance to stumble over a Wyldling, and found myself a cave with the help of [Favorite Terrain: Mountains].

The next day confirmed my worst worries. Hundreds of chained humans slaved away with pick and shovel, overseen by Wyldlings who did not seem to be shy with using their whips and clubs to spur the humans on even more. I could make out four distinct groups of workers. One was working at the pier, reinforcing the bay, and the improvised harbor, against the currents and the elements. Another one was climbing over the Shipwrecks, hammering and sawing, preparing the ships to be quarters, or a town considering the number of ships and the scale of the ship pile. Others were led over the rock needle into the Broken Lands, where they built bridges and worked on several mining sites. And the last one I could not immediately discern what there were trying to do. They were climbing down the Needle, as I called the dividing rock, with the waterfall to either side of them. They were let down on ropes, built scaffolding and cranes and hammered steps and little plateaus into the stone itself as if they were trying to find or build a way to reach the bottom of the chasm.

And while I watched, if it was an hour I was estimating generously, dozens of humans died. Were thrown down the chasm by a Wyldling or slipped and fell in the terribly dangerous conditions they worked in. They were swept away by the waves on the pier, they fell down the waterfall or tripped somewhere above on the floating boulders ad tumbled to their demise. They were badly secured, badly prepared, and weak from malnourishment and mistreatment. And more than one of them was picked off by one of the flying creatures that hunted around the mountains. I even saw a shadow grabbing and pulling down one of the slaves into the darkness of the ocean.

This had to end.

The Wyldlings in the mountains were either experienced hunters and warriors, who oversaw the slaves and the constructions or younglings who wanted to make a name for themselves against the creatures of the Wyld and escape their guard duty. I evaded the bigger groups, my last clash with them had taught me to never underestimate them again.

And thus I made the mountains mine. I had the home turf advantage, presumably, because of my Skill, but the Wyldlings and especially the [Hunters] were far more knowledgeable about living and fighting in the wild in general. But there were a few things they just would not expect, no matter how keen their eyes and how silent their steps if they had no experience in the mountains. You had to have an eye for the rocks that were easy to set loose or steady enough to climb, an eye for the spots you could hide in and those to take a short cut through. And you had to be good at climbing at speed if you wished to catch the man with the longbow shooting at you from higher elevation. And you would have to avoid the sentient chain laying in wait and disguise which sought to catch your neck and throw you over the edge. It had taken Zero 4 days and 5 ingots of adamantium to reach his old length. After he was restored I became more and more creative with my traps and more reckless at the same time, because Zero was excellent at keeping me from falling down.

Oh, the [Hunters] came close. More than once I escaped by the skin of my teeth. In addition to the one I wore, 12 Dragonamber amulets were safely stored away in my chest. 12 Wyldlings I had killed in cold blood, after a weak of hunting and playing cat and mouse with the [Hunters]. Just one of them had been from one of the experienced [Hunters], and it was the one Zero had surprised and killed by hanging him.

These were the people that had killed my father and the rest. I felt nothing.

Until I sat in wait, one of my last four arrows in my hand. I was not a terrible shot with a bow, but nowhere near good enough to rival a bowman of Ravenrock. I had hit twice. None of them had been a kill. And I had lost ten arrows. But it was a remarkable weapon to bait reckless aggression or even panic. And that was what I used it for. I hunkered behind this rock and looked over the line of humans that were smoothing out a stone path. That was when five Wyldlings came around the boulder, stepping on the path and ruthlessly pushing through the humans. Four warriors were accompanying a female Wyldling, short hair, and stout build. Kara. She looked torn and tired but had a face full of calm authority as she marched her guards straight on towards the harbor.

Now I felt something.