After Hiral’s sisters got started on footwork practice again with Loan—and the rest of the people in the crowded training yard finally found their own feet once more—Yanily looked at Hiral.

  “So?” the spearman asked. “What are you testing?”

  “Before that,” Seena said, holding up a hand, then gently placing it on the Rune of Eclipse on Hiral’s chest. Almost immediately, she snapped that same hand away, then chuckled. “Tingles.” Her hand went back to his chest. “Are you okay using this? You’re not going to drop to the ground the second it goes away?”

  “It’s kind of part of what I’m testing,” Hiral admitted. “I should be fine. Fighting Vorinal, it forced me to use Eclipse. It’s also like doing that forced a door open. Not all the way, but enough I can sort of sneak through partway. I’m calling this a… partial eclipse.”

  “Of course you are,” Seena said. “Is it safe?”

  “Like this? Yes. It’s probably less than half its power, and it’s not putting much of a strain on me. Like my pseudo-aspect—with a bit more practice—I’m hoping I can keep it ‘on’ all the time.”

  “How strong does it make you?” Yanily asked, then tilted his head like he thought of something. “Actually, what does it do?”

  “Nothing and everything,” Hiral said. “In a way, it’s like an extension—or an evolution—of the Rune of Dreaming.”

  “The one that makes things more or less real,” Seena reminded the spearman.

  “Yeah,” Hiral said. “But, Dreaming requires something to already exist. Like, I can’t create fire on my own with it, but I can make Seena’s fire hotter. Burn brighter.”

  “Make stuff explode better,” Seena added. “Let’s not forget the most important part.”

  “And definitely make stuff explode better,” Hiral agreed.

  “And this new one,” Yanily poked beside where Seena’s hand still lay on Hiral’s chest. Like the party leader had at first, he jerked his hand away in an instant. “Wow, yeah, that does tingle. Anyway, Eclipse won’t make for bigger explosions?”

  Hiral thought about it for a second before he half-nodded, half-shook-his-head. “I guess, in the right circumstances, maybe it could. Eclipse is kind of special among runes and Edicts, in that it doesn’t control a fundamental force or rule of the universe. Gravity controls—as you’ve seen—gravity. Mainly in a limited sphere around me.”

  “Didn’t Li’l Ur say the Edicts are really big though? Couldn’t you control gravity anywhere if you really wanted to?” Yanily said.

  “Not yet,” Hiral said. “While the Edicts are all-powerful, I am not. In some ways—when I use the Edicts—I act like a conduit to their power. If I used enough of it to do what you’re suggesting, I’d be a Hiral-shaped pile of ash on the ground in less time than it takes for Right to steal one of your pastries.”

  “One of my…?” Yanily started, then looked over at where the double was stuffing flaky goodness into his mouth. “Oh, that bastard! I just got those.”

  “Stop putting them in Shared Storage,” Seena said with an eyeroll.

  “It keeps them fresher,” Yanily said while glaring at the double who just licked his fingers. “And warm. Damnit,” Yanily cursed one more time, then forced himself to look back at Hiral. “Tell me whatever you need help with involves punching him.”

  “Do you really want to get into a punching contest with Right?” Hiral asked.

  Yanily’s face blanked out for a second before he visibly shuddered. “How about stabbing?”

  “Let’s just get back to Hiral’s explanation of his rune,” Seena said.

  “Thanks,” Hiral said. “Like I was saying, Eclipse doesn’t have its own ‘force’ it controls. Creates? The relationship with Edicts and effects is so confusing. Anyway, sorry, what Eclipse does that’s different is that it can influence any other effect. Actually, maybe it does have its own force, and I wasn’t thinking about it quite right…”

  “What’s the force?” Seena said.

  “Odds?” Hiral half-said-half-asked. “The odds of something happening, or not. Like I’ve said before, it makes the impossible possible. I can use Eclipse to influence other runes or Edicts to do something they may not normally be able to do. Not something completely new—like make fire—but something adjacent.”

  “So, you can make gravity do less… gravity-things?” Yanily asked. “Why not just use the Rune of Gravity for that?”

  “For that,” Hiral said. “I would. But Eclipse works on a bigger scale than any one concept. It works on all the other Edicts at the same time. On reality itself. It lets me overlay my version—based on what Edicts I control—for a short time.”

  “You can alter reality willy-nilly?”

  “To an extent,” Hiral admitted. “I can’t—easily—alter people, or anything that has its own will. Like, I can’t will you into being a frog.”

  “That’s a relief,” Yanily said with a straight face. “Not a huge fan of frogs. Better than spiders, but not by much.”

  “Noted,” Hiral said.

  “If you can’t affect people, though, what can it do that’s better than your other runes?”

  “It can affect people,” Hiral said slowly. “Just not directly. It can affect reality immediately around them. It was how I made it so The Archwizard stopped flying, or how I was able to combine us with Nivian’s Aspect when we fought the 0M3G4 W34P0N. It makes the impossible, possible. Though, it does take some creativity, because I still kind of need the other Edicts to make it work. On its own, it wouldn’t really do anything…”

  “This is getting confusing,” Yanily said. “Was your Rune of Eclipse what you wanted my help testing?”

  “Not… exactly.”

  Seena laughed, finally taking her hand off his rune to poke him in the chest. “So, what did you want his help with?”

  “There’s another thing Eclipse makes possible,” Hiral said. “It lets me transform the other Edicts into a weapon.”

  “That blade of unmaking or whatever you called it?” Seena asked.

  “Exactly,” Hiral said. “I’ve only really been able to use it twice. Once against the Ex-General back when it attacked our fortress, then against Vorinal. It’s powerful, but hard to control. If I’m going to use it in the coming battles, I need to get better at wielding it. At calling on it.”

  Yanily took a step back from the pair, spear twisting in his hands for a few warm-up spins. “Okay, let’s do this.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Seena said, stepping in between the two men. “You,” she pointed at Hiral, “Are not swinging anything that could unmake Yanily at him. And you,” she pointed at Yanily, “are not going to encourage him to.” Then she looked around the crowded training area. “Is this even really the place to do that? There are a pair of massive scars carved into the Cradle of Tomorrow from the two times you used that.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  “I admit, having you be able to pull that thing out whenever you want would be great, but…”

  “You’re just worried he’ll muscle in on your role of the overdoing-it-damage-dealer,” Yanily said.

  Seena slowly turned her head, glared at Yanily, then looked over at Hiral. “I changed my mind. Feel free to unmake him as much as you like.”

  “I wasn’t going to swing at Yan,” Hiral informed her. “Or even spar. I agree it’s way too dangerous.”

  “Then what did you want him for?” Seena asked.

  “Because,” Hiral said, looking from Seena to his friend and back again. “When it comes to figuring combat-related stuff out, there’s nobody better. How many Yanvolutions have we seen? If anybody can help me make this work, it’s him.”

  “What do you even need to figure out?” Yanily asked. “From what I hear, it’s already pretty damn effective.”

  “Oh, it is,” Hiral said. “No doubt about that. Problem is, it’s hard to summon, and even when I do manage to bring it out, it only lasts a few seconds, if that. I’ve—at most—only been able to use it for one attack before I’ve had to release it again.”

  “Heavy toll on your body?” Yanily said at the same time he dropped the butt of his spear to the ground so he could lean on the weapon.

  “Not so much that as… unstable? I guess that’s the best way to explain it. You know how I said Eclipse let’s me alter reality to a degree?”

  “Complicated yet overpowered,” Yanily said. “I remember.”

  “This blade of unmaking—my name for it, it’s not an ability given by the PIMP—requires me to use Eclipse to shape the Edicts into something they aren’t naturally. A physical weapon. That kind of breaks down reality around me. If I keep it out too long, I worry very bad things will happen.”

  “Sounds it,” Yanily said. “I like reality. It’s where I keep all my stuff.”

  “I thought that was Shared Storage?” Seena offered with a chuckle.

  “Pretty sure that’s part of reality,” Yanily said sagely, and Seena didn’t really have a counter to the point. Then he turned back to Hiral. “Why do you think the blade is doing that? Do you want it to?”

  “No.” Hiral shook his head. “I keep all my stuff in reality too. I’d like it to stick around. I think it’s happening because the blade is composed of Edicts, the natural laws of the universe. When they’re so focused like that, it starts unraveling things. To be honest, it’s just that powerful, either I can’t contain it, or reality can’t. When it’s in my hand, it feels like I’ve leashed one of The Pack, and they are very unhappy about it.”

  “Do you think getting to S-Rank will help you solve the problem?” Yanily continued his probing questions, and Hiral was happy to answer them.

  “Definitely,” Hiral said. “As will getting more Edicts.”

  “Didn’t you just say the problem was the blade being too powerful because of Edicts?” Seena said. “Won’t getting more of them just make it more out of control?”

  “I know this sounds counterintuitive,” Hiral started. “But more Edicts actually help balance each other out. The more I unlock, the easier it is for me to use them. Combined with our A-Rank, improved evolution—thanks to the Edict of Eclipse—it’s already making a big difference. Hells, I think those things are the only reason it’s even possible I can create the blade in the first place.”

  “So, let me see if I understand here,” Yanily said. “Right now, the blade is too powerful for you to control, at least for more than a few seconds, but that problem might sort itself out as you get stronger. On the other hand, because we’ve got some tough fights likely coming up, and this is a powerful weapon, you’re trying to find a way to speed up this control thing. More a now, instead of a later.”

  “Correct.”

  “One last question then.”

  “Let’s have it.”

  “Have you tried creating a less powerful version of the blade?”

  Hiral blinked. “I… no…? The whole point of it was for it to be powerful. Why would I summon a weaker one…?”

  “Hiral,” Yanily said in a voice that sounded very much like he was talking to a child. “I’ve seen the results of the two swings you made with this blade. Each of them altered the landscape. Carved a mile out of the Cradle of Tomorrow that hasn’t repaired itself. You could probably cut the top off a mountain—and not a D-Rank one—if you wanted with this…

  “And, actually, that would be amazing to see. Can we test that?”

  “This is why I can’t leave you two alone,” Seena interjected. “Let’s stay on topic. No cutting mountains.”

  “Says the lady who blew one up,” Yanily said.

  “Not my fault it was behind the General.”

  While part of Hiral’s mind listened to the two banter back and forth, the bigger part of it lingered on Yan’s question. On his point. Did Hiral need the blade of unmaking to be that strong every time he called it? Yes, it was amazing when he needed one big hit, but both times he’d been able to pull that out, it was while he didn’t have to worry about accidently hitting the others.

  Seena had made a good point, in that the blade would unmake any of his friends just as easily as it would his enemies.

  Swinging it around with any of them close came with risks. He was pretty sure he could mitigate them—thanks to his Dex and Atn—but maybe there was also some merit to Yanily’s suggestion. Hiral had the Greatsword of Amin Thett for regular usage, and it was already an incredibly powerful weapon. Did he even need the blade of unmaking?

  No… but… yes?

  Like his runes, it would be a weapon he would never be without. And, more than that, it would be a step along his path. The Greatsword—wonderful as it was—was a relic of the Emperor. A reward from the PIMP in its attempt to make Hiral more like that Emperor, for whatever it needed him for. Yes, he’d come to a grudging acceptance of having the same goal as the PIMP, so they’d work together, but it somehow still irked him when it tried to control him.

  He wasn’t a puppet. He wouldn’t be.

  Maybe he was being childish about it, but creating this weapon—this blade of unmaking—would be his. Not a reward from the PIMP. Not a hand-me-down from the Emperor. His.

  Even if there was a good chance the whole point of the Greatsword of Amin Thett was to teach the wielder to do exactly that kind of thing.

  Gah! I’m going in circles here.

  Hiral pushed the concerns out of his mind for the moment, he could needlessly dwell on it later, on his own time. Right now, he had Yanily’s question to consider. To answer.

  And, frankly, as usual, the spearman had a point.

  “I think you’re on to something,” Hiral finally said to Yanily. “I have been trying to create it at full strength each time, and maybe that is a bit of overkill. It couldn’t hurt to try out weaker versions of it.”

  “Don’t think of it as weaker,” Yanily said. “That’ll be the wrong mindset for what you’re trying to do. It’s all about the right tool for the job. When you’re dealing with a nail, sure, you want a hammer. But, if the job in front of you is mending a torn pair of pants, a hammer isn’t going to get you very far. In that kind of situation, a needle is far stronger than a hammer would be.

  “Reining in your blade, making it more focused or controlled, is making it into a tool for a different kind of job. If you need to cut up a mountain, whip out the old one-shot version. The rest of the time, well, that’s a different tool.”

  “And this is exactly why I asked you, Yan,” Hiral said to his friend, already focusing on the Edicts circling at his back. Instead of calling on the entire weight of their power, could he shape just a portion of it into the blade?

  With the Rune of Eclipse on his chest, he could.

  Concentrating on the Edicts—the symbols floating within small cocoons separating them from reality so they didn’t fracture it—Hiral created the tiniest breach in the seal. Almost like letting off steam from a boiling pot, the pinprick-sized jets of energy caused the air around him to ripple before he grabbed hold of those streams, and directed them to the open palm of his right hand.

  Up and over his shoulder, the small ribbons of energy followed his double-helix down his arm, across his elbow, past his forearm and wrist, until they settled where he closed his hand. Black energy sparked within his fingers, just the smallest fraction compared to the waterfall of it he’d held before, and he continued pushing it. Shaping it. Forging it.

  He knew what he wanted, but even with the Rune of Eclipse helping him tip the odds and enforce his will on reality, the blade didn’t simply appear.

  Come on, he told himself, bringing his other hand over to grasp his shaking wrist. Another squeeze of his hand—and his will—extended the energy up in a blade almost three-feet long. Rampant black energy sizzled and leaked off it, the weapon already breaking down no matter how hard he tried to solidify it.

  Then, just like that, it shattered. Black shards fell a few inches before vanishing into the nothingness they came from, though that wasn’t actually true. The power of the Edicts had returned to where they orbited at Hiral’s back.

  “Damn,” Hiral said.

  “You almost had it,” Yanily said, patting him on the back. “That wasn’t bad for a first try.”

  “I really thought I could do it,” Hiral admitted.

  “Nothing wrong with it taking a few tries,” Yanily said. “End result usually turns out better when it does. Means you’ve gone through a few versions of what you want, gotten rid of the bits that don’t help you, to be left with just the best parts.

  “Don’t rush it.”

  “You always make it look so easy,” Seena said to Yanily.

  “I’m glad to hear it looks that way,” Yanily said. “It isn’t. Not always.” He amended. “Look how long it took me to figure out my Aspect, and that was only because I got some help along the way with my advanced class. Then, look at how great it is, because I was able to refine what I wanted from it before it finalized. Really, don’t feel like you have to rush it. Make it perfect for what you want, then polish it.”

  “Yeah,” Hiral said. “I think that’s what I’ll have to do. Even pulling the energy out from the Edicts to forge the blade was a lot tougher when I wasn’t just taking all of it. I’m going to need to do this a step at a time.”

  “And we both know you’ll get there,” Seena said, though she looked past Hiral as she finished her sentence. “Might have to wait though. I think Gauto is here to see us.”

  Turning, Hiral did indeed find his friend standing at the entrance to the training yard, a man in black armor—one of Tomorrow’s PIRSAs—at his side. A wave meant he was clearly there to talk to Hiral and the others.

  “Guess we should see what he wants,” Hiral said.

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