News from the other systems came on a delayed timeframe, but it was confirmed that similar incidents took place in the other systems of the trifold alliance. Weos managed to drive off the attempted intrusion near the border of their system, with their occupance stretching to all of their planets and their fast moving fleet.

It was actually Ceretos that suffered the most. One day, Anton got a message from the Order- with the news repeated through various other avenues- of a small planet named Medao. The distinction of it actually being a planet was debatable, its small size and its eccentric orbit making scholars disagree. The news was that Medao had been taken over by the Sylanis cluster, though to what purpose it wasn’t clear. The day after, he got a message from Everheart saying the matter had been dealt with. The day after that he was bombarded with messages indicating that Medao had been destroyed.

The timeline and circumstances were pretty clear to Anton. He didn’t suspect Everheart of working with the Sylanis Cluster or anything. Nor of hiding anything, really. Everheart claiming that the problem had been dealt with was likely exactly as he thought it, and he simply wouldn’t have considered that destroying Medao was anything of note. And in the grand scheme of things, perhaps it wasn’t. There wasn’t anyone living there- until the Sylanis Cluster very briefly took up a position- it wasn’t particularly interesting, not even as space rocks went. Even so… Anton wanted to have a talk with the man about how he dealt with problems. If the word had come that he’d also removed a Worldbinding cultivator then maybe that would be different, but that particular attack hadn’t had one involved. Perhaps it was a test to see if Ceretos could send someone to stop them from messing with outlying planets.

The trifold alliance’s response was still being discussed. Pressing their victory seemed like a good option, but retaliating against the Ivory Maw in particular was risky. They had three of the Sylanis Cluster’s Worldbinding cultivators, and it wasn’t clear if Bala Sykora was the strongest among them. Chances were that as their leader she was, but that didn’t mean the other two were far behind. The loss of a hand- and three toes- might not be a significant detriment for a cultivator of her kind. It was risky enough to face her alone, Anton wasn’t pleased with the idea of going into Ivory Maw territory even if he had the leeway to bring Nthanda, the Great Queen, and Everheart. And at least he or Nthanda needed to remain with Rutera since they didn’t have their own Worldbinding cultivator and their super secret ship wasn’t complete… yet.

-----

Nthanda clutched her bow tightly. Compared to any of Anton’s, hers felt strangely dead. The metal that made it up was refined from various disparate sources and combined later. It wasn’t made from a Worldheart- Nthanda really didn’t want to think about the destructive excess that led to those being harvested to begin with- or from a giant tree or the bones of a powerful creature or thrice blessed skymetal. It was just a carefully concocted alloy with very straightforward enchantments. She liked it. It had a strong body, just like her.

The first arrow came at her neck. A flick of her wrist smashed it apart with her bow, more than durable enough to deal with something so insignificant. After the next half dozen Nthanda was no closer to having a proper target, so she kept her hand free to slap away the bolts of condensed natural energy. Actually, if this pattern kept up, she could just keep absorbing the incoming attacks and never get fatigued. Which of course meant the pattern shifted.

Ascension energy was surprisingly terrifying, given that Nthanda found herself at an equivalent of a strength where she could be using it. Maybe it was the unfamiliarity, or the particular manner in which Anton used it. Its speed and power were no joke, and the former meant it was rather difficult to make sure it impacted any of her manufactured chitin. Her faux void ant developments were just as capable of dismantling ascension energy as proper natural energy, maybe moreso. When she tore it apart and no longer had to fear for her life, and then she ate it. It was… crunchy? Spicy? Prickly? Some combination of all three.

It took a bit of effort, which meant a dozen of Anton’s regular shots were more able to find their target locations on her body. Most of them shattered uselessly, causing little more than bruising on Nthanda’s extraordinarily tempered body. It was debatable whether over the course of a battle if that would be better than someone getting their natural energy defenses constantly bombarded, but Nthanda didn’t have much of anything to spare on defense. Since it wasn’t really a choice, she just accepted it- if she had to take a hit, at least.

She finally found him, leveling her bow towards the horizon. Anton had said he’d be within her range, otherwise this wouldn’t really be much of a competitive exercise. Maybe if Nthanda had a few more decades of experience she’d be able to compete with him in range- though she didn’t have the advantage of energy senses that could pick out a target beyond hundreds of kilometers. Normally the horizon was a dozen kilometers at most, but Nthanda was currently on a platform in space. Given that she was moving in an orbit towards him, gravity, and how she expected him to dodge, she fired her first shot, shaking the platform beneath her as it dealt with the force thrusting the arrow towards her destination. Nthanda’s natural energy went with it, not as a propellant or defense for her arrow, but because there was really no other way to redirect it otherwise- and an arrow that didn’t change trajectory would never hit Anton in a million years. Not unless Nthanda figured out how to get them up towards the speed of light, or at least a tangible fraction thereof.

For the first twenty minutes Nthanda thought the exchanges were going well. Sure, her supplier was going to be very upset with her for launching hundreds of arrows out into space- unless Anton had caught them- but she’d protected herself adequately and launched counterattacks. Then one of his arrows hit her in the wrist. It wasn’t supposed to have any effect, that being one of the places covered in chitin. Even if it had broken through, Nthanda wouldn’t have expected anything to affect only the inside of her wrist. But that wasn’t the only mysterious injury she got. Perhaps mysterious wasn’t the right word- Anton had told her he’d be making use of spectral energy, but Nthanda was ill equipped to combat the mostly intangible energy. It wasn’t fair, which was of course why she needed this training.

The barrage of arrows stopped when Nthanda found herself unable to draw back her bow, her arms and back riddled with wounds that didn’t make sense. And yet… she knew they could have been so much worse. She was going to need to do so much work to figure out how to prevent this sort of damage in the future. And to recover from it now.

“How come you get something like this along with your fancy flying and range, huh Anton?” Nthanda asked when he came to get her.

“I traded away reincarnation,” Anton answered seriously. “Also, everything has its counter. Void ants counter pretty much every cultivator. You counter them. This counters you.”

“Pretty sure spectral energy is also bad for void ants.”

“The fact that void ants can be injured at all by spectral energy does not necessarily make it a proper weakness,” Anton shrugged. “Something had to be able to kill them besides physical force or tossing them into the sun.” Left unsaid, of course, was that only applied to the top tier- the youngest and weakest members were at best a bit more durable than any other ant of their size, which meant being squished between the fingers of a small child was a possibility. “If it just so happens that spectral energy is the most powerful force that cultivators in the lower realms can call upon, it makes it even more important to derive proper counters.”

“I’m pretty sure some of my bones are liquid.”

“That’s just your brain trying to interpret inconsistent feedback. Your body is still just as solid as before. Now then, I imagine your body will begin to recover soon enough without your input… but guiding it in the right direction should be more valuable.”

Nthanda nodded, “I get it. But I would like to be somewhere with air, please.”

“You can jump,” Anton grinned, gesturing. “But I suppose we don’t want to damage wherever you land.” He held out her hand, as he had always intended to. “Let’s get you down.”

Nthanda had methods to move about in space or low gravity environments, but they weren’t optimal or easy. “Thanks. Also, I don’t suppose you happened to catch any arrows?”

Anton pulled out a storage bag. “Less than half. Your accuracy was too good to fully devote myself to the task.”

-----

Ty Quigley looked down at his hands. Wrinkled. It clutched Elder Intan’s sword, a shallow curve that still ended in a point. Not far from him stood Elder Vasu. “I need you to take this seriously,” Ty explained.

“You know what that means for the Million Sword Vault,” Vasu nodded. He stretched out his hand over the sands of the Scorching Mirror Desert. Sparkling shards of glasslike sand swirled around each other, forming in his hand a plain looking straight sword, ordinary in every way except for its mirrored surface. At least, it appeared that way until Vasu shifted slightly. Every time it moved, it seemed to break down into an endless number of separate reflective surfaces without losing its form.

Vasu didn’t wait for Ty to indicate further readiness, or give the younger man the pleasure of making the first move. Instead, he took a step forward, the sands beneath him supporting him at whatever level he pleased, raising and lowering or being firm or soft as convenient. One step, and then he was behind Ty swinging his blade horizontally.

Ty Quigley fell forward away from him. He didn’t dodge, or lean forward. Nor did he suddenly thrust himself with a burst of energy. No, he simply fell as gravity changed directions for him alone. Yet only long enough to bring him out of reach of the blade that instead of bisecting him simply grazed the outer edge of his spine. The blade itself hadn’t touched him, of course- that was simply Vasu’s energy extended beyond it.

Without turning around, Ty lowered his stance, preparing a thrust. Vasu appeared on his left, a slash coming down at an angle. Ty’s body was already twisting and tilting. His head nearly touched the sand as he angled himself almost upside down. No, that was simply Vasu’s perspective. Perhaps it was Vasu and the desert itself that were upside down. The sword thrust went between Vasu’s thighs, turning into a slash for any of the various blood carrying parts of the body in the thighs and groin.

Several moves later the battle had taken to the sky, Vasu standing upon floating disks of mirrored sands, and Ty standing on nothing. Currently he was oriented ninety degrees perpendicular to Vasu, who was almost beginning to doubt his own sense of gravity.

Two moves later, Vasu had the tip of his sword entirely through Ty’s windpipe. The young man just grinned, the wrinkled skin on his face stretching tight with the motion, his hair changing from a dead gray to a vibrant silver. “Got you,” Ty gargled through the blood in his throat.

Elder Vasu looked down to his ankle, where a single drop of blood was trickling from the tip of Ty’s sword. Given the entire realm between them, that was good enough to count as a victory. Elder Vasu nodded. “Good.”

Ty continued to grin. The cut on his windpipe would stitch up nicely, clean as it was. “Next time… use all of the swords.”

Elder Vasu raised his eyebrows. He hadn’t even told anyone about that. But perhaps he should have expected a young genius to figure it out.