The soulstone robbed me, and then it separated me from Corin. I was having second thoughts about its sanity. If it was as old as Corin suggested, then maybe it really was insane and was just trying to lure us into a false sense of security like a cat playing with a couple of mice.

I sighed and glanced at my surroundings. I was on a small ledge of mossy stone. Water trickled down from somewhere above me and then fell from the ledge into the ravine below. The green moss was everywhere that I could see, which was good because it was the only source of light. I shuffled back from the edge. I saw more protruding sections of stone on either side, and I bet I could follow them to the exit. But I had to jump across gaps, and I couldn’t see any hint of the bottom.

“Right. Thanks and all, but I’m not doing this one.”

I heard nothing but the trickle of water and my own panting breath.

“I’ll take almost anything else. Send an ogre and I’ll fight it.”

I waited some more. I was getting thirsty, so I cupped my hands under the water to get a drink. Then my skin touched the water and I jerked my hand away, clutching it to my chest. That wasn’t water. It was some kind of acid.

“Alright then. Fine. I’ll just … wait right here.”

The soulstone would have to get bored watching me just sit here indefinitely, right? I waited for a long time. I didn’t have a watch and there was no way to tell the time. It must have been hours and hours by now. I tried to sleep, but doing it next to that drop did not sit well with me. I thought about many things, most of them inane and others boring. I wondered if there were other magic systems in this world that didn’t involve Aelon, Awakened, or Domains. I reminded myself to ask Corin when I saw him. I thought about my old life, and found myself missing it. Based on how my new one was going, I’d been a fool to leave it. Even alien blue dragons wanted to live there. Our technology was pretty good and we didn’t have monsters coming out of every hole in the ground. It’d been comfortable. Still, though, even if I missed it I couldn’t bring myself to regret leaving. Not yet, not when I could learn magic. Besides, the blue dragon had all but said I could come back eventually if I got enough power.

Eventually, the ravine got old. It went from scary to boring, and I even let myself scoot up the edge. Then parts of my ledge crumbled into the void below and I scurried back. It was no use. That seemed to be the trigger. Somehow, my ledge was no longer structurally stable.

I heard the trickle of acid and slowly turned toward it. That was it, wasn’t it? Acid dissolved rock. It had slowly undermined my safe ground, and now I had no choice. I moved to the edge with tiny steps and stopped right before the section that was crumbling off. There were more protrusions from the ravine on either side of me. I judged the left one to be closer, but hesitated. Maybe I could figure another way out.

An ugly crack came from behind me. Nope, it was time to go. I leaped, and—

I’d misjudged it. I missed. I missed. I was falling, falling, falling, hands extended and grasping, catching, pulling—

I was stuck hanging onto the side of the rock I’d meant to land on. If I were stronger I could just haul myself up, but as it was my arms were going to give up eventually. My legs kicked beneath me as I scrambled for another hold and found nothing. My arms quickly tired. Too quickly.

“Get me out, please, just get me out, I don’t want this,” I pleaded. No response.

And I was slipping. Something wet trickled from above. It touched my hand. I screamed and recoiled on instinct. Then I realized what I’d done. One hand now held me up, and it wasn’t enough to anchor me. My burned fingers rejoined it in clawing at the rock, pain be damned.

It didn’t work. I was falling, I was going to die, the soulstone wasn’t going to save me and I was going to die—

My descent grew faster and faster as I slipped inch by inch until something inside me uncoiled. It stretched out and filled me. I felt it moving around, circulating like blood. My hands caught on something as I dug in as hard as I could. I looked up and saw blue light playing around them as they sunk into the rock.

I’d done it. I was Awakened.

Too early for celebration, though. I made my way up onto the ledge one handhold at a time. I collapsed to the stone as relief hit me, but still careful to avoid the acid. I expected to fall asleep right then and there, but I felt … good. I was still tired, but it felt more like the result of some light exercise than clinging to a sheer piece of rock for dear life. My hand was fine, the burn from where the acid had touched it entirely gone. I took a chunk of rock and crushed it between my hands. It took effort, but I turned it into powder. Right, so I could do that now. I eyed the next ledge. It was being deluged by a rain of liquid from a waterfall above. If that was all acid, my boots would only shield me for so long. Maybe I could shield myself now that I was Awakened?

It was worth a try. There was a puddle of acid on my ledge. I thought about how much it would suck if it burned me, or my robes for that matter, clenched my teeth, and stuck my hand in it. My hand glowed blue. The acid acted like water until I picked my hand back up, and then it slid off, leaving not a trace of moisture. The glow faded. Cool.

Now that I had protection, I crouched down and aimed at the ledge with the waterfall, and jumped.

I underestimated how far I could go and flew straight toward the waterfall. I braced for impact, but flew straight through it and into a chamber behind it. Then there was a blue flash and the surroundings changed from mossy stone to a gilded hallway decorated and white and blue.

“Hey. I was wondering when you’d show up.”

I whirled around and saw Corin, covered in slime and goo and splattered blood.

“What happened to you?” I said.

“Misjudged a jump. Something slowed me before I hit the ground, but then I was stuck in complete darkness with sewer frogs all around me. I could still see, but only sort of. Some things are blue when it’s dark, and other things I can’t see at all, or they’re so faint as to make no difference. I thought I was going to die there, but now I can do this.”

At the last word, Corin threw his fist forward as if throwing a punch. His hand glowed blue. Then the glow left his hand and traveled at the same speed until it hit the wall. It made a dull thud and cracked the blue stone.

“I can only do it a few times in a row before it drains my mana,” he explained.

“That’s so cool. Teach me!” I said.

He frowned and flexed his hand. “I don’t really know how I’d do that. I just sort of … will it to happen? I’m pretty sure Awoken can’t share abilities with each other anyway; only Aelons can. We all have strength, speed, healing, and a bit of shielding though.”

Huh. So he’d basically leveled up. And I’d have to almost die to do the same. Apparently I hadn’t been as close to death as I’d thought, since Corin had fallen and been fine. Well, not fine exactly. He really needed a bath and he could’ve collected any amount of injuries before he healed. I felt a twinge of uncertainty, a hint of regret that I hadn’t tried to be an Aelon first. Their power was based on knowledge, not the amount of times you survived certain death.

“Anyway, I’ve been thinking,” he continued. “We’re pretty strong now. We can probably reach the Azure Empire if we have enough mana to run the entire way. This part of the world is barbaric. If you want to come with me, I still have a position in the court and enough money stored away to live comfortably.”

I paused. It was hard to put my thoughts into words at the moment. I settled for a simple question. “Why?”

“Why not? I’ll need allies to keep my old position. Someone else will be holding it ‘in trust’ while I’m presumed dead, and they’ll be reluctant to relinquish it. You’re Awoken, and that represents power. I’ll have an easier time of it.”

“I’ll think about it. For now, let’s just get out of here.”

He nodded. “Fair enough.”

We went cautiously down the hallway. Nothing jumped out at us, literally or figuratively, until we reached the end. Heavy wooden doors stood there with iron rings sticking out of them. I’d just reached out to pull it when they swung open with a bang. I jumped away and stood face-to-face with the biggest frog I’d ever seen. It was huge, green, slimey, and had red eyes. Its tongue shot out at me, probably because I was closest.

I dodged and ran forward. I caught Corin punching the air out of the corner of my eye, and saw a flash of blue dart at the frog—only to swerve in midair and enter its mouth. I stopped my charge. Corin hadn’t said anything about being able to aim his mana punch thing.

The frog opened its mouth and the blue blur shot back out in the opposite direction. Corin tried to dodge, but his own punch hit him dead on. He flew into a wall with a crack and a flare of blue light, then collapsed to the floor with a groan. He’d be alright, I just needed to keep the frog busy enough for him to gather enough mana out of the air to heal himself.

Its tongue missed me again and I jumped on top of the frog, then started pummeling it. It screamed. The sound was shrill and piercing, and startled me. I froze just long enough for the frog to fling me into the ground. There was a blue flare around me, and for the first time I was conscious of my mana dropping. I didn’t feel any weaker, but somehow I knew I only had about half my reserves left. I was slowly regaining them, but it would take a minute for me to get a noticeable amount back. And that was a minute I didn’t have.

Once again, step-step-dodge-jump-hold onto it, punch with the free hand, brace for the scream, keep punching. It was durable. The frog stood up to a half-dozen punches from hands that could crush stone into powder before something broke. Then I was up to my ankles in frog guts.

Corin stood up and looked me over. “At least I’m not the only one covered in frog insides.”

I let out a snort of laughter and waved him over. “Come on, let’s look at the loot.”

The chamber we stepped into was remarkably similar to the one before it. A chest flashed into existence in the middle of the floor. This one was twice as big as the one before.

“I think we’re supposed to share this one,” Corin said.

“Let’s see what’s inside, first.” I tossed it open.

There was a scattering of those same copper and mana coins, but also a decent amount of ones alloyed with silver and a few with gold. Those would be good sources of mana in an emergency provided the soulstone didn’t decide to take all our stuff again, but the real prizes were the shields. There were two, one for each of us. I picked one up and twirled it around. It was exceptionally light and had the crystallized sheen that meant it was part of a mana crystal, but darker than tin. Titanium? At the bottom of it all was our former stuff. I snatched it up and then Corin and I split the money.

And that was when the soulstone finally deigned to talk to us.

Time to go.

After that we found ourselves at the entrance to the Domain. The original soulstone, the yellow crystal, appeared with us.

Big demon coming. Who knows how to navigate?

After I almost held back a scream at the sight of giant ants, I thought about the question. I certainly didn’t know how to navigate this alien world, but Corin volunteered to lead us to the Azure Empire. I shrugged. Why not? I certainly didn’t want to stay here.