Serenity waited for a moment to see if Daryl was going to say more, but unfortunately the archer seemed to think better of it. However much Serenity wanted to pry, he wasn’t certain he should. On the other hand, he also didn’t want to have someone who might turn out to be working against him with them.

Come to think of it, that was the answer, wasn’t it? He simply needed to make his position clear. “You don’t have to tell me now, but I’ll need to know before we head out of Takinat. Secrets are poison, and something like this…” Serenity shook his head. He wasn’t sure how to finish that sentence, but there was one other thing he could say. “I need to know we have the same goals and that you aren’t somehow working for the other side. Betrayal is really unpleasant.”

Serenity had some very bad memories of times when he’d been betrayed. It’d happened more than once to Vengeance and was a large part of the reason he eventually became the Final Reaper. He didn’t think the same circumstances would make him the same person, but he knew the same rage still lived in him. There had to be a reason he’d become a Greater Demon of Righteous Retribution instead of simply a Demon of Wrath, after all.

Fortunately, he wasn’t angry now; the memory of the betrayals mostly made him feel sad and tired. It wasn’t important anymore; those people didn’t exist. They might never exist. Certainly Vengeance wouldn’t, and wouldn’t be there at the wrong time. Perhaps he’d be betrayed in the future, but at least it would be different.

Naomi walked over to the chair. She was clearly still listening, but her attention was on the chair more than the argument. Serenity had the feeling that she wanted to go next and he didn’t see any reason to stop her. It might even be wise; he had no idea how the chair would react to him. It ought to be fine, but that wasn’t a guarantee.

Daryl met Serenity’s eyes. He seemed defiant, but after about a minute he dropped his eyes. It didn’t look like he’d been intimidated; it was more like he’d realized something. Serenity couldn’t tell what it might be. “It’s nothing like that. Master Zany told me a way to ask for help from some of his friends, if they’re nearby. He said to send whoever answers the call instead of going after him ourselves. I won’t tell you where it is or how it works, but I can tell you that much.”

Serenity nodded. It was definitely convenient to be the one who knew where to go. “I’ll want to meet them, of course, but as long as we can come to an agreement, that sounds fine.”

“Don’t leave without us,” Gabriel interrupted. “If there’s a chance to kill whoever attacked Takinat, I want in on it. I won’t be the only one, either. I can get a bunch of local mercenaries together for a raid. We just need to know where to go.”

Naomi took a seat in the chair. It looked like she’d decided she no longer needed to pay attention to the argument.

There was no way Serenity was going to be able to hide many people if they headed towards the target at once. Legion was already an issue. On the other hand, they could probably scout the area then set up a portal. If Ita did it, it would drain her and she’d only be able to get a limited number of people through at once, but if they could set one end of it up in a ley line, Serenity could handle the portal. It might strain him a bit, but it wouldn’t run him out of mana as long as he could refill periodically in the ley line.

The question was how to explain that to Gabriel. Would he accept “wait here while we scout the area”? Well, nothing was lost by trying. “We’re going to need to have a small group scout the location,” Serenity started. “Once we have that, we can put a plan together. I think we can pull a large group in after that if you can gather them up. We’ll need to plan for it, and I won’t know what to plan until we see what’s there.”

“And coordinate with Master Zany,” Gabriel added.

Serenity dipped his head to acknowledge the point. “If we can, yes. Another high-Tier person will help. Is he Tier Nine or Ten?”

Gabriel shrugged. “Ten, I think. He never said, but he’s stronger than I am magically. So he has to be a higher Tier.”

Serenity raised an eyebrow. “Not necessarily. Affinity and Concept matter a lot, and if he happens to have an Aspect, that’s a whole different game. There’s a reason I’m as strong as I am, and it’s not because I’m using Tier Eight Skills.”

“You’re not?” Gabriel sounded shocked. “I know you have a high Affinity, but how can you put that much power into a Tier Seven Skill?”

It was probably better not to mention that the Skill Serenity was using was actually Tier Four. “I’ve been Tier Eight for all of three months,” Serenity said with a grin. That was barely any time at all for that Tier; most people wouldn’t even have the first Utility Skill unless the Path was exceptionally well aligned with what they did. “It shouldn’t be a surprise that I don’t have my first Tier Eight Combat Skill yet, so I’m stretching the ones I do have. It helps get variants later, so it’s worth doing anyway.”

“Stretching a Skill risks breaking it,” Gabriel repeated what he’d clearly been taught. He wasn’t wrong; it did.

Serenity nodded. “Broken Skills hurt, but they can also be healed. I have one; it’s Tier One and I simply can’t limit myself enough to use it without breaking it. I’ve been hoping to get a higher Tier form of it, but I haven’t. I think there’s a good chance of it on my next Path, but I won’t know for sure until I get there. I’ve been avoiding some … most of the related Paths, but my next Path will definitely be closer to that Skill.”

Serenity couldn’t see any way that a Path related to “Incarnate of Death” wouldn’t have a Skill similar to Adept Aspect Form. It would probably be Incarnate-related instead of Aspect and would probably limit him to Death magic, but they both shared the root similarity of taking up the mantle of a particular Affinity. That was usually enough to give related Skills and often enough to get direct upgrades. It would be nice to have an Aspect Form available again; it wasn’t something he’d ever used often because they always had a price, but there were times when it was worth paying the price.

Gabriel shook his head. “It’s not just the pain. That Skill you can’t use is a great example; what happens if I break a Skill I actually need and can’t use it after that? I’m not a hybrid; I don’t have a bunch of extra Skills.”

Serenity didn’t actually have all that many Skills for a Tier Eight, especially not a Tier Eight hybrid. On the other hand, he did have a lot of vestigial Skills that he hadn’t upgraded because of how his Core Tiers and Paths interacted; normally, you’d make sure that your most commonly used Skills were upgraded every Tier. Serenity ought to have at least one weapon skill per Tier, for example, and he only had one at all. Admittedly, there really hadn’t been time to train in more than two or three, even with the time in the Tutorials; he was definitely coasting on Vengeance’s training and practice at this point.

Serenity shook his head at Gabriel and chuckled. “It is a big advantage to have a broad base, but it’s not that hard to stretch a Skill. You just have to push it only a little past where it wants to be in the direction you want it to go. If it feels like a strain, you’re pushing too hard. It can be hard to figure out at first and you may break some Skills, but eventually you’re going to have to learn to stretch Skills.”

Gabriel looked at Serenity skeptically. “When is eventually? If it’s not until my known Path ends, I think I’ll skip the pain and the risk for the next few centuries.”

Serenity shrugged. “Up to you. I’ve already told you I want my Path, not someone else’s, but if you’re happier following someone else’s I won’t tell you not to.”

For some reason, Gabriel looked like he’d swallowed something sour, but when he didn’t continue the discussion, Serenity let it drop as well.

This time, Serenity didn’t occupy his attention with pictures. He was far too impatient; the discussion made him want to get out there and do something whether or not there was anything to do right now. Serenity paced around the room until Naomi stirred on the chair. She seemed less drained than either Gabriel or Daryl.

“Did you get what you tried for?” Gabriel asked Naomi as soon as she stood up. “I don’t think we ever talked about what you were going for.”

Naomi smiled. “It’s nothing big, not like what you two wanted. I remembered what you said about the chair; it’s best used for things you can’t get elsewhere. So I asked it to merge two of my Skills. I’ll have to practice with the new Skill, but I can already tell it’s mostly the same, there are just some …” She paused, clearly needing a moment to think. “Some rough edges that have been polished off; the Skills sometimes conflicted when they were used together, the new Skill won’t. That’s all.”

That seemed like a reasonable choice; merging Skills that didn’t quite match was a pain. It was the most important for people like Naomi, who probably had a good number of Skills that were more about guidance or teaching how to do something, like weapon-use Skills. They were much easier to get early on for melee types; early magical Skills tended to be more automated.

It was possible to merge Skills on your own, but most people had trouble doing so; a teacher or a Path that helped with the merge was immensely helpful. Vengeance had managed it, but Serenity hadn’t yet. Of course, he also hadn’t needed to; he hadn’t had trouble finding Paths that did it for him and he didn’t have the plethora of related Skills that usually made it worth pursuing.

Serenity wasn’t sure what he was going for when he took Naomi’s place on the throne. He didn’t need Attribute points and he didn’t have two Skills he wanted to merge. He probably didn’t want to use the Death Affinity Stone to give himself a Death Affinity secondary core; it just didn’t seem necessary. He was already tremendously skilled with Death magic.

On the other hand, he didn’t know what to do with the Affinity Stone. It was valuable and ought to be valuable to him, since it was a relatively pure form of Death Affinity that almost lined up with his Concept. It was far too valuable to use in a single spell, yet he couldn’t come up with anything he’d really want to have made with it. Everything he came up with was no better than simply turning it into a secondary Affinity core.

All of which meant that Serenity wasn’t really that interested in most of what they’d told him the chair could do.

Serenity’s swirling thoughts stilled as he thought about Gabriel’s use of the chair. Could it help him find his daughter?

Lillene

I wonder just how many of the people Gabriel and Daryl think ran away actually ran towards the danger instead?