65.5 Tempering the Mind (Part 2)

A mental prodding pulled him from his sleep, pulling both eyes open. While his second mind wasn’t able to see around the room, memories of sounds and smells came back to him in an instant, and he knew that Aisha and Robert had come down the hall and were attempting to talk quietly just outside of the large room before waking him.

He pushed the furs off himself and stood, still dressed from the night before. The air around him moved as he stood, wafting the stench of sweat and blood to his nose.

Glancing down at his clothes and then feeling bad that he likely dirtied the furs, he held out both of his hands.

Threads of mana fell down to the ground as he wove a spell circle. He formed the spell faster than he’d ever been able to before; the cleansing rune fell into the area spell circle in a second.

When he activated it, his eyes went wide, the effect so pronounced that a ripple of radiant golden light flooded out from where he stood at the center of the circle. In a single pass, his clothes and the blankets were cleaned of grime and dirt. Slightly more alarming was the floor, which was made of stone and naturally had several layers of dirt atop it. At least, before the spell went off, it did.

After the cleansing wave passed over the surface, all layers of age-old dirt were gone, floating into the air in small sparkles of light.

He unintentionally raised an eyebrow at the display of magic. The spell was flashier than he remembered it being, visible to the naked human eye and not at all subtle.

The light show caused Aisha and Robert to both poke their head into the room.

“You’re up,” Robert said.

They both entered then, eyeing the floor beneath his feet with interest.

“I am,” Alex affirmed. “The rest was needed. Thank you for letting me get some sleep. We really shouldn’t waste too much time here, though.”

“What’s the rush?” Aisha asked.

He looked at her, quickly processing how much her attitude had changed toward him in the last couple of days. “Two reasons. The first is that a lot of the people who were stuck in here with you made a break for the exit almost as soon as they were released. It hasn’t been a full day yet, but all of them can find the exit, since the Rift exit seems to call to all awakened. That means very scared and likely traumatized people are showing up in the normal world right now.

While I gave the HA a heads up, I don’t want any of them to snap at someone or cause issues for themselves because they don’t know how much the Safe Zone has changed. If we can get there and play a bit of middleman, or at least explain the situation better to the HA, they’re more likely to get the help they need. We do have the benefit of the time dilation in here, compared to them out there, but still, the more time that passes, the more chance there is for something to go wrong.”

Robert nodded along with him. “And the second thing?”

Alex looked at Aisha again before shrugging and following his gut. “Aisha, I have a skill that allows me to make a clone of myself. The three teammates you saw me with when we first met were all my clones wearing disguises.”

Her eyes slowly grew larger.

“That means the teammate who went with Danae and Anthony to wait outside the Safe Zone was a clone. Unfortunately, when I did the body tempering, the System automatically ended the skill. That means whatever they were doing, it’s likely that Scout’s armor just fell to the ground and his body poofed out of existence.” He made a little gesture with his hands to emphasize poof.

“Wait… so that means?”

Alex nodded.

“Walter was just a clone. You weren’t leaving him to die?”

A shake of the head.

Aisha sighed and rubbed her face. “Then why didn’t you—”

“He doesn’t want to share his secrets any more than we want to share ours,” Robert said gently.

There was an awkward moment of silence. “I’m sorry,” Aisha said simply.

“It’s okay. I’ve still got a lot to learn about using this. I’ve only been thinking of the advantages so far… a situation like this clearly pointed out a downside to keeping the clones a secret. Though I will need to ask you to keep the information to yourselves. Only a very small group of people know that I have the ability to create them, and some of that value will be lost if word begins to get out.”

“Don’t worry, the secret is safe with us.”

“Yes, of course,” Aisha answered along with Robert.

Alex nodded and contemplated taking some time now to create the clones, but dismissed the idea. With the immediate goal being to exit the Rift, he’d need to recreate them to leave anyway.

He coughed, feeling a bit awkward at their looks and serious response. “So, should we get going?”

“Ah, about that,” Robert said, his eyes darting to Aisha. “Just as a heads up, some of the Koru who stayed and want to follow you— well, I just wanted to prepare you.”

“For?”

“Well, they’re going to treat you like the new Chief.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “That’s uh, interesting. I guess it’ll work, though. They’re going to swear an oath to me and come back to live at my place, so them thinking of me as their boss is fitting.”

“About that,” Robert looked a bit pained. “How do you plan to house them? They don’t live in normal buildings like we do. I mean, I guess they could, but they don’t build normal constructs. They carve and mine, a lot of their culture is based around worshiping and singing to the earth.”

Alex rubbed his hands together. “I have a plan for that, don’t worry. Come on, let’s get moving. We have a decent walk to the Rift exit, and we can always chat more then. Let’s get out there and start organizing some of the Koru and humans who want to come with us. Those who want to can swear the oath. The Koru’qai will be required to swear it, since it’s the only way that they can leave the Rift. I want you guys to spread the word that the other humans don’t have to, but if they want to, I won’t stop them. Just make sure they understand it’s system-enforced and is binding.”

“Right,” they both said, falling into step beside him.

Several hours passed as he administered oaths to nearly forty Koru’qai. The group was larger than he expected, and the implications of stepping out of the Rift with such a large group of non-humans started to settle on him.

Plans would need to be made and steps taken to prevent them from being harassed or worse. He let one line of thought think through possible solutions and worst-case scenarios, while his main mind taught them how to swear the same oaths that the mana spinners had sworn.

All thirteen humans asked not to swear the oath, but agreed to follow him and swore loyalty in a more formal manner.

Alex didn’t blame them and stressed that fact while they all prepared to move on from the village. They’d only just gotten their freedom back, and it was likely that the idea of swearing a binding oath to someone else in such a way would feel like they were giving it all up again before they even got out of the Rift.

Many of the Koru’qai that didn’t swear to Alex were still helpful and deferential to him. They helped prepare supplies for moving the large group across the Rift section, setting aside even more once they learned about the trip that they’d need to make from Philly to Jersey.

He was just beginning to review the stockpile when he was approached by a small group of the Koru’qai. He recognized Shael’quir and the large, darker colored Koru that had been close with Droq’shan during their testing assault.

Looking past them, he saw many of the others watching.

“Hmm, Chief. The People have prepared a gift for you.”

“A gift? What do you mean?”

“Mmmore of a fulfilled promise,” hummed the bulky one.

“Yes. A promise. Droq’shan was one of our most powerful singers, and it saddens me that he did not get to see the removal of the old Chief. The air is rich with rhythm once more.” There was a pause, and several of those present hummed a low tone. “Come, we show thanks with Droq’shan’s promise.”

Confused, Alex followed behind them. He expected to walk a short distance, but instead, they made their way toward the mine shafts one last time.

“Can I ask what all of this is about?”

“We don’t know what your intention is. But as a show of gratitude, the entire tribe has participated in the song.”

More confused than he was before, Alex followed silently. Knowing that all of his questions were likely to be answered shortly.

When they turned a corner down a tunnel, the side opened up to create a ledge overlooking an open cavern. The sides of the space still had old mining equipment and raised wooden platforms. Though his mind barely registered any of that.

There, in the middle of the cavern, was a twenty-foot-tall, jagged blue crystal. To his normal eye, it was a brilliant blue, with small lines of a lighter white that seemed to move diagonally across its surface. It reminded him of the beach foam on the tops of waves crashing near the shore.

As they descended, he couldn’t take his eye from the stone.

His left eye saw the mana swirling in the air monolith. Approaching it on ground level, he took in its massive size. It was easily ten feet in diameter, and perhaps even taller than he’d originally thought. The height was difficult to gauge in the dim light of the cavern.

“Hmm, Droq’shan promised to sing you a stone if you freed The People. He could not sing you a stone, but the tribe was willing to grant his wish.”

Alex’s mouth dropped open as he realized what this was.

Well fuck me, that’s a little big to be a mana battery.

He thought of trying to carry it around in his spatial item and dropping it on the ground in the middle of a battle as a portable mana source. The thought almost made him laugh, but the seriousness and genuine gratitude in the Korus’ voices made him keep it in.

“Thank you,” he said seriously, his eyes roaming back and forth across its surface.

He rested a hand on the stone and released a slight amount of mana. Without an enchantment or any testing, there was no way to know the efficiency. But the stone accepted the mana he gave it, and through his left eye, he could see it ripple outward, joining the moving waves beneath its surface.

He exhaled at the wonder of the gift. “Thank you,” he repeated. “Is it okay if I take it now?”

“Hmm, it is yours,” Shael’quir said.

Alex closed his eyes and willed the stone to enter his bracer. It took an effort to do so, but the stone vanished in the blink of an eye, stunning several of those gathered.

Before moving, Alex sent his mind to the bracer, curious to ‘see’ inside the spatial warehouse.

The stone took up a massive portion of the available space. It would greatly limit the amount of supplies he could carry while it was in the bracer, which changed his immediate plans for the group.

“I think we’re going to need the Koru to carry some of their own supplies,” he said a bit guiltily.

“Hmm, that will not be a problem. Pulling carts is a part of life that all people know.”

Alex scratched his head and smiled at them, thanking them again as they all began to leave the mine and make final preparations to leave the Rift.