“Don’t search for me, Rook.”

“Sarah?” I called out. I was lost in a field of mist, the cold, damp air clinging to my skin. “Sarah? Where are you!?”

“Don’t Rook.”

I could hear her voice. I was sure she was so close, just beyond the wall of mist.

“Don’t torture yourself this way.”

“Sarah, please!” I was desperate. Knowing she was so close, but somehow so, so far away.

“We’re never going to see each other again, Rook.” Her voice was sturdy, but I had known her long enough to know when she was putting up a front. “Just… let me go. Live your life.”

“But Sarah!”

“Don’t.” I could hear her scoff, just out of sight. “You’ve always been pigheaded, but just listen to me for once. Soon, I’ll forget my life as it was, I think. Every day, the memories grow dimmer and dimmer. But, before I forget it all, I’m happy I got to talk to you one last time.”

“Sarah…” I wanted to say something more, but what was there to say?

The landscape hidden within a sea of mist stirred, and before me, the fog parted, just long enough that I could make out a figure standing away from me.

“Sarah!”

The figure turned around, and there was no doubt about it.

It was Sarah. She was wearing clothes I was unfamiliar with, but it couldn’t be anyone besides her. I ran with all my might towards her, a sad smile crossing her face as she watched me. Before I could reach her, though, it was as if I had slammed into an invisible wall.

“Sarah? What’s going on?”

“I told you already.” She shook her head, still smiling sadly. “But we won’t be seeing each other again.”

I pounded on the wall with all my might, but I couldn’t break through the invisible barrier.

“Rook.”

I looked up, tears streaming down my face, to see Sarah pressing the palm of her hand against the wall. I wiped the tears with the crook of my arm before slowly raising my own palm, pressing it against my side of the wall.

So close, and yet so far.

“Thank you, Rook.”

“Yeah.” I snuffled, my heart hurting. “Yeah.”

I pressed my forehead against the invisible barrier, the sensation cold to the touch. On the other side of the wall, I saw Sarah copying me.

“I’ll miss you.”

“No,-” Sarah whispered. “-you won’t.”

------------------------------------------------

When I woke up, I felt at my face, my heart hurting.

Tears. There were tears on my face.

Was I crying in my sleep?

I put my face in my hands, the aching in my chest slowly fading.

I’d had a dream. A sad one, I was sure.

But of what?

I lost someone.

I was sure of that. I must have lost someone special to me in my dream.

But who?

The only people in my life I cared so for about were my mother and –

-and who?

I couldn’t figure it out. Whenever I tried to think back, it was as if I was looking into a black mist in the shape of a person.

Who?

I rubbed at my eyes, and as I did, even the thought of the black mist in the shape of a person from my memories faded until I was squinting out the window, staring at the sun’s morning rays shining through a faint morning mist.

Wouldn’t expect mist in the desert, but what do I know.

I stood up, stretching as I thought about my plans for the day. We would be setting out for the Ring Gate, but I still had to pick up my clothes from the thread shop before that.

That’s right. The wacko tailor kicked me out.

I grabbed my travel clothes, taking a moment to reminisce over them as I looked down at the tunic in my hands before I quickly got dressed.

This would be my last time wearing them, and something about the thought hit me harder than it should have.

Whatever Rook. It’s just some clothes.

Perhaps I was feeling overly sentimental today. Maybe the desert air was doing something to me; I wasn’t sure. I quickly got changed, grabbing my sword from where I had laid it beneath the cot I had stayed on for the night.

Oooh. That’s not great.

Inspecting my blade, I noticed chips forming on the edges, the sword suffering under strenuous wear and tear.

The thought frightened me. Not because I expected my blade to last forever, but because it hadn’t suffered enough to be in this state by all rights. Something had caused my sword’s integrity to degenerate ahead of schedule.

Perhaps…

If it weren’t regular usage that had caused my sword to weaken, then the only thing I could think of out of the norm was my quick jaunt through the rip in space created by the past Sages when they had sent from the Pond all the way here.

If it did this to my sword, just what did it do to me?

I shook my head, putting the sour thoughts away. Pondering useless things that I couldn’t answer would lead me nowhere fast.

Let’s just focus on the day for now.

Changed and with my sword belted on within my cloak, I made my way towards where the Red Foxes were lodged, giving the door a quick knock.

Nothing.

Must be out taking care of stuff already.

I turned around, making my way to the stairs as I took them two at a time until I was back on the main floor. I looked about; the pub portion of the adventurer’s rest was empty, save for a single man drinking at the bar.

Isn’t that the same guy from yesterday? How early did he start? Did he ever even stop?

It was impressive in a sad sort of way but nonetheless unimportant. I had already paid for my cot for the night, so I was free to leave as I wished. Walking outside, I took a moment to let the early desert rays shine down on me uninterrupted. The way the air shimmed was mesmerizing, an uncommon sight back home. Much of the small city was clearly still asleep. As minor as it may be, the usual ruckus of the city was quiet and subdued.

Now, where was Sinbad’s again?

------------------------------------------------------------

The good news was, it took me far less time to find Sinbad’s the second time than it had yesterday.

The bad news was it was closed.

You’re kidding me, right?

I stood in front of the shop, staring at the sign set out.

Closed 'til noon.

Noon. I stared up at the sky, looking for the answer I already knew.

None. Otherwise known as a good six hours from now.

I sighed, looking for a place to sit. It was my fault, really, I hadn’t taken the time to find out when they opened, and here I was, out too early. By leaving my room at the inn, I had forfeited my rights to it, so unless I wanted to pay for another night, I was out of luck there. Unable to return, I considered the rest of my choices.

I go…. On second thought, I’ve got nothing.

My list was short and empty. I had nothing to do. I didn’t know the area, so it wasn’t as if I could go to somewhere that was open this morning, not without getting lost.

Returning to the inn is out of the cards, and so is exploring…. Guess that leaves one thing at least.

I found a nearby block of sandstone a little shorter than waist height. I had no idea what it was there for, but I sat down doing what any sane person would. Settling in, I crossed my legs, closing my eyes.

And… breath.

The great thing about early mornings is that they are one of the best opportunities to be left undisturbed. During the day proper, you have to deal with the everyday activity of daylight hours. At night, you risked running into less than favorable individuals or being mistaken for one.

But in the morning, you could be left alone for hours.

Breath.

Eyes closed, my senses stretched as my mind stilled, active but calm.

Breath. Sense the mana around you.

Deep in concentration, I wasn’t sure how much time had passed. I could feel as the world seemed to extend every one of my senses, gaining another dimension of depth to them as the world of mana lit up before me.

Good. Now, what do we feel?

As with last time, much of the mana was of earthen or thermal nature, but early in the morning as it was, I could sense a greater concentration of fluid mana.

Now that that’s taken care of let’s begin.

I stretched my arm out, slowly pulling the abstract earthen mana into my body through my arm, condensing it, and sorting it piece by piece.

Crystallization is the act of taking mana from around us and giving it physical form. All rings of a Sage must be created through primary crystallization of mana into the material, but the first ring requires crystallization of the most basic degree.

I had read those words within the pages of the Living Tome, and even after reflecting on them, the practice they spoke of, of taking mana and creating a physical form of it, seemed… alien. It wasn’t the same as simply using mana to create a spear of stone or metal, a temporary act, but of permanent formation.

Take the mana, put it together like building blocks, using those building blocks to build form. Easy.

Sure. As easy as waving your arms to fly.

I continued imagining the earthen mana forming into the tiniest of beads within my mind before rearranging them in neatly ordered rows. Credit where credit was due, unlike the last few times where my mental capacity had failed after only a few neatly ordered rows, this time, I made it nearly four dozen lines in before I gave out, the beads of earthen mana breaking down and escaping my body with a pained groan as I opened my eyes, bent over as I clutched at my right arm where I had been trying to form the foundation of the first ring.

“Ow.” I muttered, gritting my teeth as my arm felt like it had been battered by a hammer.

I’d made progress, but the thought was of little comfort. I had managed a few dozen lines worth of organized structured mana, but I would need thousands of times that to begin to form the ring. If just a few dozen lines of mana escaping me caused this much pain, I could only imagine what it would feel like if my mental concentration failed with several thousands of them.

Damnit.

I was stuck. Without a core to store mana in the first place and a body that wouldn’t reject external mana, I would be forced to create the band in entire segments rather than slowly over time. If the progress of the Sages of the past could be measured as a gently sloping line or hill, I would be an erratic stack of blocks from which you would be forced to jump from one plateau to another.

Damnit. Damnit. Damnit.

The worst part was the first ring was supposed to be the easiest, as my master had once told me in passing. Thousands had obtained their first ring in the time of the Sages, but as you climbed the ladder higher and higher, only a handful had ever reached the very pinnacle of ten rings over their thousand years of lost history.

Or at least that was what my master had told me. He could have been exaggerating one way or another for all I knew.

Still, the point stands.

I was stuck, lost, clueless. I had no mentor, no lost tome of the past, nothing.

Just me, myself, and whatever I had managed to pick up from the Living Tome in the short period I had been allowed to read through it.

Damnit.

I closed my eyes again in frustration. I may not have known the answer, but if there was one thing I’d picked up over years of practicing with my sword every single day, it was that there was no such thing as wasted effort.

“When in doubt, try until you can doubt no more.” I quietly mouthed words that my mother’s old party member had taught me as a child, laying the foundation upon which I built my sword skills.

Feel the mana.

I felt the fourth-dimensional depth return instantly, my perception of mana only minorly shaken after opening my eyes.

I was about to begin the process over the same as before, but I stopped myself, holding my hand close to my chest. Just trying to build the structural skeleton of the first ring was a wall I was trying to smash through by bashing my head directly into it.

But what if I was thinking about it wrong? Building a house didn’t start by throwing up the walls. It started even before that, laying out the blueprints first and foremost.

So why don’t I do exactly that?

If earthen mana was required to build the structural skeleton of my first ring, I needed something to form the blueprint of that structure, something which to construct the frame upon. I pulled my hand back down to my side, eyes still shut, taking a deep breath.

Feel it.

When I drew earthen mana through my arm, it felt as if my arm was turning solid, whereas the fluid mana I drew in made me feel as if I were floating, my physical form deteriorating.

Focus.

I forced myself to ignore that feeling of melting away and instead drew the fluidlike mana together. Where earthen mana was heavy and slow to move, fluid mana was the opposite, free-flowing and challenging to keep from moving too much.

I needed a way to help reinforce my focus. Letting my mind wander for a second, I sifted through my thoughts for something that would give me that extra mental push needed.

Fluid… Water... Think.

Something that was both fluid and structured.

Oh. Oh, that works.

The diagram of the human body, which had first puzzled me what felt like ages ago, ended up being my source of inspiration. Our veins, the channels for our lifeblood which had been neatly labeled, Aulous just off to the side.

And Aulous just happened to be the word of power used to encapsulate fluid mana as magic itself.

Storing the mental image of miniature channels just below my right wrist, I pushed the fluid mana I had drawn in through my mental image. The mana responded instantly as it began to circulate, faster and faster. As it did, I had to resist the urge to open my eyes and scratch at my arm, the feeling of the mana rapidly swirling beginning to cause my wrist to itch.

I let the mana swirl like that for as long as I could mentally hold it together, but as with every time before, I eventually hit my wall, unable to withstand the taxing mental effort. When the mana invariably rushed free from me, rather than the painful hammering feeling that accompanied the escape of earthen mana, I felt as if I were gargling water, lungs filling up.

Then it was gone, leaving me awkwardly clawing at my throat.

Well, that was…. Something.

I stared down at my wrist. Physically, it appeared the same, but focusing on my perception of mana before it completely faded, I could picture the tiniest of carved tracks, the beginnings of a place for which I could build the foundational structure of my first ring.

It was barely anything.

But barely anything was still something.

“Someone seems pleased with himself.”

I jumped in surprise, the source of the voice sneaking up on me from behind.

‘Sneaking up’ implies I was paying attention in the first place.

Turning around, I was greeted by the smiling face of the thread store owner.

“Sinbad?”

“Considering you’re parked out in front of my store, who else would you expect?”

“I thought you weren’t open until noon?” I questioned, squinting my eyes in confusion.

In response, the man merely pointed up towards the sky. My eyes followed the path of his finger until I was shielding my eyes and looking up.

“Oh.”

I had lost track of time. What had felt like an hour at max had turned into six, the sun high in the sky directly overhead.

“Would you like to see your clothes?” Sinbad was smirking at me as I struggled to smother my look of shocked apprehension after losing track of so much time.

“Umm…. Yes?”

“Good.” The man gestured me forward to his store, flipping the ‘open’ sign to ‘closed.’ “In truth, I’ve been done since this morning.”

“And you’ve seen me outside this entire time?”

“Yes.”

“And you couldn’t… I don’t know, give me them so I could be on my way?”

“Well,” Sinbad shrugged. “I was enjoying watching you struggle.”

“I wasn’t struggling.” I lied, realizing it sounded an awful lot like I was admitting to something a second too late. “I was just, uh, sitting there.”

“If that is what you wish to say, then that is what I shall pretend to believe, my dearest customer.” The man gestured me towards the back of the store, leading me to what looked to be a small closest.

“And here we…. Are!”

Thrusting the door open, I was greeted by the sight of a small table with needles and threads strewn across it. Directly next to the table was what looked to be a mannequin in vaguely my height, wearing what could have only been my clothes.

“And how do we feel?” Sinbad poked me forward, prompting me to step closer as I inspected the garments.

“I….” I was at a loss for words, unsure what was proper to say. The clothes were beautifully made, day and night between the run-of-the-mill clothes hanging from hangars and racks out on the store’s main floor. “How much do these cost?”

“Free of charge.” The man proudly exclaimed.

“Free of- what?”

“Free. Do they not have free things up north?”

“No, that’s not what I – why?”

“Because you are an interesting case.” The man circled around me once before gesturing towards the clothes. “Clothes should reflect the wearer for most, boring clothes for boring people. But you, you are no boring person. I can see that much.”

“You think I’m somehow going to bring you more business or something?” I questioned with my eyebrows raised.

“Bah.” Sinbad shook his head as if tasting something sour. “To those who appreciate clothes, it is an art, a story written of threads, not paper. My goal is to write the greatest story, which can only be achieved by finding the proper tapestries for my paintings.”

“You know you just mixed metaphors?”

“Do you want your clothes free, yes, or no?”

“Thank you for the clothes.” I bowed low instantly. I still had two golden rosts left over from what my mother had left me, but I doubted if two rost would even be enough for garments as fine as these. As with the general fashion of the desert, they had the same billowy pants that tightened around the ankles. They were pitch black, and before I could point out to Sinbad that black was probably unwise for a desert, he brushed me aside.

“I know what you may be thinking. ‘Oh, great Sinbad, why dark garments in the desert.’”

“I don’t know about the ‘Great’ part.” I murmured.

“The answer-” He continued, either never hearing my comment or choosing to ignore it. “-is in the threads. Go on, give it a feel.”

I reached out, grazing the material as my eyes widened.

“Ahah, you see! Yes, these are no ordinary threads. Desert Silk, light and loose flowing, but without trapping the heat within. In fact, the Desert Silk draws heat in from one direction and exudes it out the other side.”

“That’s amazing. But, uh, what’s with the shirt.”

Or rather, the lack thereof. The upper half of the mannequin was covered only by an unbuttoned vest the color of evergreen pines that clung rather snuggly to the mannequin’s chest.

“Ahh, yes. You see, as it is made of the same silk, it does not matter whether it clings tightly or not. You will remain cool all the same.”

“I meant, why is it so…. Showy?”

“Art!” Sinbad put his hands on his hip as if hurt that I would even ask such an obvious question. “True art, true storytelling, is a blend of both the threads and the person wearing them. Just as I must make the clothes stand proudly, they must also accent the wearer. Though-” He gave me a quick once over. “You will grow into it eventually.”

“What’s that supposed to me?”

“Now, no worries. I also have this, as you seem fond of the cloak style.”

Grabbing something I hadn’t noticed from a rack behind the door, he threw on another garment onto the mannequin, a grey cloak of a considerably gruffer-looking material.

“Stone Wool.” Sinbad answered before I could answer. “Temperature-wise, it functions much like ordinary clothes, but the wool fibers react to physical trauma, helping to disperse the energy of an impact.”

“And what makes you think I need something like that?” I questioned.

His answer was to merely raise his eyebrows at me.

“Fine.” I couldn’t deny that I did enjoy the look of the cloak. It was neither overly showy, but even in its simpleness, there was a refinement to it, capable of being brought forth in such a simple manner by only a master threader.

“Anything else?” I asked after a moment of admiring.

“My, aren’t we just demanding.”

“That isn’t what I meant.” I raised my hands in pleading.

“Relax. But yes, in fact, there is one more thing.” Pulling something out from a drawer of the desk, he showed it to me.

“Is that… wrapping?”

“Extend an arm, would you?” Sinbad pointed towards my right arm, to which I did as he asked.

“Hey, what are you-” Sinbad cut me off as he used the cloth to quickly wind around my arms, covering everything from my wrists down to my elbows, and as a finishing touch, he gave a single wrap around my knuckles.

“Why?” I questioned after looking down.

“I’ll answer that in-” The man tabbed a finger against his cheek. “About fifteen seconds.”

“What happens in-” Once again, before I could finish my sentence, he stuck a hand in my face.

“You’ll see. Now hush.”

I did as he instructed, counting down in my head.

3…2….1.

Right on cue, the cloth wrapped around my knuckle and arm began to warm, the fabric melding together until it was a single uniform fabric while still keeping the outward appearance of a roll of simple cloth.

“What, what just happened?”

“It formed a soul tether.”

“It- what?”

“A soul tether. Divinical hand wraps. Only able to be cut by a select few things in the world, not just that, it can mask mana beneath them. You wouldn’t believe how long it took to get my hands on that. Not just that, send some of mana into them.”

“What do you me-”

“Let’s not play stupid for a moment.” The man rolled his eyes at me. “Just do as I said.”

Begrudgingly I nodded, letting the few sparks of mana within me travel from my body toward the hand wrap.

The first thing that surprised me was that the clothes felt as if they were part of my body, what little mana I did have capable of traveling from me and into the wrap as if it were any other part of my body.

What surprised me next, though, was that the wrap vanished, or at least appeared to vanish upon receiving the mana, though I could still sense it there.

“With practice, you can make them manifest or disappear at will, but for now, I would suggest keeping them out at nearly all times.”

I narrowed my eyes, staring hard at the man.

“What?”

“Who are you?” I finally questioned. “I thought it was strange that you could make an entire outfit in a single night, but now this.” I waved towards my arm as the wrap reappeared. It wasn’t just that, though. The man had shown an uncanny degree of intuition, boarding of precognition of things he had no right to have any knowledge of, and perhaps most importantly, the fact that he was giving this all away for free.

“I am the simple thread weaver.” Sinbad’s eyes twinkled.

“The?” I didn’t miss the strange phrasing. “Not ‘a simple thread weaver,’ but ‘the simple thread waver.’”

Sinbad was still smiling at me as he looked past me.

“I do believe you have places to be, young Rook. I’ll tell you what, return once you begin on your sixth ring; I will prepare a second divinity wrap for you.”

My jaw dropped.

He even knew about the rings.

Meaning he knew about Sages.

Just who, or what, is he?

“Time to go.” Sinbad clapped, and just like that, I was outside, falling on my butt as the door slammed shut behind me.

“I think,” I murmured to myself as I got up, dusting my butt off and looking over my shoulder at the tightly closed door. “I just ran into something incredible.”