Chapter 61: The Flying Aegis and the Crane's Reins (Part One)

Nathan had figured his strength was plenty to run wild in the Hourbound Grove—after all, he held a Blood Lord-tier war-beast in the Phantomveil Vine.

Never had he imagined the Hourbound Grove held four "awakened weapons" this nasty. The Phantomveil Vine's tendrils couldn't take a single hit from them; without the Adamantine Body, he'd probably have died right there.

After a scare that size, Nathan lost all appetite for Drakefern and Hourlost Blooms. He wanted to leave the Hourbound Grove but couldn't quite accept it—then suddenly remembered that among the eighteen Sealing Platforms, one seemed to seal a beast of the same weapon type.

He opened the chain-quest scroll—and sure enough, he'd remembered right: the third Sealing Platform sealed the Flying Aegis.

This Flying Aegis had originally been an abandoned shield that caught a wisp of its former owner's aura and thereby became a spirit. It had fallen into Elderrow along with the fragment of the Hourbound Grove, having already become a spirit back in the Nine-Sphere Citadel—but objects-turned-spirits tend to be dull of consciousness: spiritual awareness, yes, but terrible thinking power, and no command of its own bond-power. So when the Concord people built the training ground, they'd sealed it up in passing.

The chain-quest scroll never said so, but Nathan was convinced this Flying Aegis and the four "awakened weapons" at the two ruins had to be one crew. He just couldn't tell why the Flying Aegis had gotten sealed while the other four "awakened weapons" roamed free.

Nathan paged through the third Sealing Platform's walkthrough until he had the subjugation of this Flying Aegis down cold, then thought privately: "The Flying Aegis's own bond-power is fierce, but it's innately dependent on a master—only in a host's hands does it bring its full power out. The trick to subduing it is getting it to accept you as master. But then why do the other four awakened weapons seem so cunning? Could they have had artificial spiritual consciousness implanted? And been built into some other quest?"

He turned it over carefully and still rated his guess as very likely. After all, the Hourbound Grove had long since been converted into a training ground by the Concord teaming up with the Order of the Deathless—best at practicing plant-type bloodborn creatures—Order of the Eastern Sky—best at raising war-beasts—Mythos—broadest in technology, richest in patents—and the most mysterious the Order of the Primal One, hoarder of vast troves of ancient wonders. Nothing inside was natural warding array.

The third Sealing Platform sat a bit farther from the two palace ruins—about sixteen or seventeen hundred meters out, in a small mountain hollow ringed on three sides by hills a mere seven or eight meters tall, overgrown with dense trees and wormwood.

Without the quest scroll's map, Nathan could have spent ten years in this Between and still might never have found the place.

Nathan again released a few dozen black beetles and warily circled outside the two ruins, discovering that as long as nothing came too close, the "awakened weapons" inside wouldn't stir at all. Once he'd confirmed the Sealing Platform's distance counted as safe—beyond triggering those "awakened weapons'" attacks—he relaxed.

A small provenance note: this page copied the chapter without the author's permission. The author's publishing page carries the published version.

Nathan's Nine Shadowlashes had now reached the fourth change, able to erode the essence of any living thing. He charged into the hollow holding the third Sealing Platform and drove his vitae whips with finger-ease, coiling up every plant in sight—and plants were also checked by the Transform-Erode change: one wrap of the whip and they withered, rotted, and fell to pieces.

Whipping his vitae lashes around, Nathan gave the hollow's whole plant life a quick clear-out, then spent another ten-odd minutes searching—until, in the empty pit where a great tree had been moved from, he finally found the third Sealing Platform.

Last time's experience in hand, Nathan didn't stand on ceremony: he drove the Star-Swallowing Form, and in moments had eroded the Sealing Platform down into another ink-gem game piece.

He tucked away the second ink-gem game piece, pointed a finger, and the Phantomveil Vine reached several tendrils out of the void and gave the deep pit beneath the platform's suppression a vicious twist—cracking it wide open on the spot.

The third Sealing Platform shattered; the Flying Aegis inside gave no movement at all, but the Phantomveil Vine popped out a light-screen, and the combat system's transparent display now showed three treasure-chest markers.

Overjoyed, Nathan left the motionless Flying Aegis for later and had the Phantomveil Vine drag all three chests out.

All three were bronze chests. As they popped open one by one, Nathan's eyes locked onto one of them—inside this chest lay a gray scroll. This was already the third scroll Nathan had ever seen; he didn't so much as glance at the several pieces of equipment in the chests, grabbing that scroll first.

The combat system's transparent screen popped up again, displaying a line of white text: Learn the ascendant-path spell: Crane's Reins!

Below it came the explanation: this ascendant-path spell lets one control weapons at long range against enemies, doubles as the marvelous ability to seize enemies from across the air, is suitable only for those below bloodborn-warrior-tier, and comes in nine layers.

Nathan was over the moon. Master the Crane's Reins, and even without the Flying Aegis he could go a round with those four "awakened weapons"—all he'd need was one weapon sturdy enough.

Only, Nathan genuinely had no weapon that sturdy on hand. Those dark-gold spears born of Goldspear Thistle were fine against ordinary bloodborn beasts, but they'd never stand up to the four "awakened weapons."

Only now did he feel a stab of regret over trading the Crystal Twins away for the Orbis war-beast. The Orbis's uses were endless—but it wasn't built for fighting.

Nathan learned the Crane's Reins first, swept up all the starlings from the three chests, and only then tallied the haul.

His luck wasn't bad this time: besides the Crane's Reins skill scroll and a few hundred starlings, the three chests had actually produced four pieces of equipment.

Two of them were Orbis backpacks: one a canvas hiker's model, the kind trekking tourists love best, the other a little pink double-strap pack of the sort only a girl could carry off—strap it on as a guy and, if nobody called you a creep, they'd definitely take you for a sissy.

The other two items were a crude, heavy iron staff about two meters long, and a crystal dagger—apparently the same material and same workmanship as the Crystal Twins, just shorter; its transparent blade seemed to hold drifting water-vapor and curling mist, gorgeous in the extreme.

A little thrill in his chest, Nathan packed the four items away too, thinking privately: "I've got the Orbis, so I don't really need these backpacks—but keeping one as a spare isn't bad, and I'll give the other to Wren. This heavy iron staff, I could swing it, but it's really not my taste—sell it. The dagger, though, I can steer with the Crane's Reins against those awakened weapons."

He tried the Ennead Crucible and the Titan Godslayer Canon both, and still found the black-light vitae the smoothest for driving the Crane's Reins.

He was gradually coming to understand: a martial art or spell only delivers boundless power when driven by vitae that suits it. Mismatch the aether's attributes, and at best the power drops off a cliff; at worst they clash outright—force it anyway, and you're either coughing blood or dead on the spot.