Shrill, ear piercing shrieks kept ringing in the broken forest, drowning out the sounds of the flames roaring towards the skies. Yet, it was not the sounds that were annoying Alnea the most. He had already heard similar sounds before. And though the memories that those sounds evoked were not very pleasant, he could still suppress them with his Clear Heart. But he could do nothing about the sea of Fire trying to burn him alive.

  The scorching wind blowing on his face, the sweat building up on his forehead, and the prickling sensations climbing up his back, were just one of the few things that the flames brought him. There were countless other sensations that he had never paid attention to before, which kept flooding his senses, trying to distract him from his target. And if not for the Blade within his Heart, they might even have succeeded.

  Might. His Wanderings in the Origin Sea were not just for show. And the sensations that the flames were bringing were far from being comparable to what the Origin Sea often tried to drown him with. Then again, there was also a difference between Wandering the Origin Sea and fighting with his life on the line. That too, against nearly a dozen Enthralled Wanderers. Not to mention the Fire Servant, who kept glaring at him with Fire burning in his eyes. Literally.

  Though the Fire was not just in his eyes. It had spread to his entire body. Just like the abominations who had turned into flaming pillars after experiencing the Sorrow of Night. But unlike those abominations, he was not covered in flames. He was Fire himself. Or rather, its Servant. Still, the Fire did not seem to bother him much. And neither did the shrieks. So, Alnea thought that he should help the man become a little uncomfortable.

  “What happened?” Alnea said, raising the edge of lips in a smirk. “Is the surprise not to your liking? Or did I hit some nerve?”

  “…You are playing with Fire, Tresting,” the Fire Servant said, as he turned back towards the pillar of fire closest to him. The one tainted with the breath of nearly a hundred Mysteries and burning in a kaleidoscopic flame. Same as the wisp of flame staining the flames on his arms and chest. “Daring to push nearly a dozen True Wanderers into being Enthralled…”

  “Calling them True Wanderers would be an overstatement,” Alnea said, observing the flaming pillars in detail. Ten of them, the ones burning at the edge of the circle, were barely a metre across, and did not seem to be much stronger than the flames that any normal Peak Stage False Wanderer could conjure. The only thing special about them was that they seemed to be tainted with a few other colours. But the pillar at the centre of the circle was different. And not just because its different shade.

  Burning with a vortex that was at least two metres across, the pillar was nearly four times as large as the others, and ten times as ferocious. So much so, that it could burn even the Fire Servant, who himself was made of Fire. Or at least, that was how it seemed from a distance. In any case, the kaleidoscopic flames did stain the flames on the man’s arms and chest, and he did not seem to be able to get rid of them right away.

  “At best, only the fluctuations coming from the Wanderer next to you can be considered have reached the True Rank. The rest are just some False Wanderers. Stronger than most of our peers, and with a greater reserve of a Spirit Power, but False Wanderers, nonetheless.”

  “…Sometimes, I admire your ignorance,” the Fire Servant said, following Alnea’s gaze to glance at the smaller pillars of flames, and the chains extending from them to the pillar next to him. “For Wanderers who have been Enthralled, the most important indicator of their strength is their Spirit Power.”

  “And the Mysteries and Aspects they mastered before being Enthralled,” Alnea said, shrugging his shoulders. “I may be ignorant, but I have faced Enthralled Wanderers before.”

  “Yet you still know nothing about them,” the Fire Servant said, turning back towards Alnea after he had restrained his overflowing emotions. “Even if we assume that they have not really reached the True Rank, can you handle ten Peak Stage Enthralled Wanderers at once? And even if you can, what about the one next to me? Do you have the confidence to deal with him?”

  “…I think you may have a misunderstanding,” Alnea said, widening his grin. “For Enthralled Wanderers, what matters most is the obsession in their Hearts. The things that forced them to despair, pushing them in the Origin Sea’s embrace. And for these Wanderers, that person happens to be you. Sure, they may hold a grudge against me for killing so many of their clansmen, but it would be nothing compared to the grudge they hold against you.

  “Betraying them under the guise of fulfilling your promise, using them as a stepping stone for your own advancement, and then not even letting them die peacefully, using underhanded tricks to control their bodies… Tell me, Whitebud, who would these Wanderers hate more, you or me? And what would they do once they complete their transformation, and see you standing in their midst?”

  “…I underestimated you, Tresting,” the Fire Servant said, glancing at the pillars of flame surrounding him. “Both your Arcana, that can force them out of my control, and your ability to plan, using my own companions against me—

  “Your companions? Does saying those words not hurt your conscience?”

  “…You cannot understand the bond we share.”

  “Since you share such a close bond, how about you accompany them to the Origin Sea?”

  “…You seem to be very relaxed,” the Fire Servant said, turning back to Alnea. “Leaving aside the question of whether or not my former companions can defeat me, do you think that they will leave you alone? Do not forget that when Enthralled, Wanderers lose all their reasons, and become just an instrument of spreading chaos and destruction, attacking anything and everything within their sight, let alone someone whom they hold a grudge against.”

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  “So?” Alnea said, shrugging his shoulders. “Do you think I will just stand here and let them lash me to death with their Mysteries?”

  “…Only an ignorant kid like you will think of fighting against eleven Enthralled Wanderers of a higher Rank, that too, all at once…”

  “One of a higher Rank,” Alnea said, correcting the Fire Servant. “Ten of them are just of a higher Stage, and would not pose much of a challenge. Only the one next to you will be a problem. Though, when did I say that I was going to fight them anyway?”

  “…It does not matter where you run away. As long as you are still in the Final World, they will catch up to you, and they will kill you in the most gruesome way possible.”

  “Then I will just leave the Final World,” Alnea said, letting out a light laugh. “Thank you for reminding me, Whitebud. I just asked all my teammates to leave the Final World. And I will do the same the moment these Wanderers complete their transformation.”

  “Then you will fail your Final Trial—

  “And? It is not as if I have someone hounding on my back to complete some stupid mission. At worst, I will just be expelled from the Lost City. That is much better than losing my life fighting against something that I have no chance of winning against. The only reason I have not left yet is to see the look of despair on your face when you are being besieged by the abominations you created with your own hands.”

  “…You are celebrating too early, Tresting,” the Fire Servant said. “Do not forget that your entire plan rests on me not leaving this circle.”

  “Huh,” Alnea said, deliberately increasing his voice, before crossing his hands, and holding his chin with his right hand, pretending to be in deep thought. “You do have a point. If you leave the circle, then my plan to see you despair will be for nought. It might even cause some of them come after me. Not to mention that I will also have to guard against you…”

  Alnea trailed off, as he shifted his gaze back to the Fire Servant, looking at him in silence for a few moments, before shaking his head, and separating his arms to shrug his shoulders.

  “Forget it. Since I am going to fail my Trial anyway, I might as well leave the Final World right away. It makes no sense to put myself in needless risk after all.”

  “…You made your point.”

  “What point?”

  “There is no need to pretend,” the Fire Servant said, narrowing his eyes. “Since you have not left yet, you must still have a reason to fight.”

  “…I do not know if I can call it a reason, but whenever I see your face, I get this urge to just bash it in.”

  “…Wasting our time would not do either of us any good, Tresting.”

  “Not quite. It would not do you any good. For me, there would not be any difference. But for you… The more time I waste, the more precarious your situation will become. Unless you give up on your mission and leave the Final World, just like me. You would never do that though, unless it is your last resort. Am I right?”

  “…What do you want?”

  “What does the Lotus clan want from me?”

  “…That is not something I can know.”

  “Then I am afraid that I must—

  “But I do know something that you would be very interested in.”

  “…I am listening.”

  “…Not like this,” the Fire Servant said, shaking his head. “If I tell you the information, how can you guarantee that you would not just run away?”

  “…That is a risk you would have to take.”

  “…Let us make a bet,” the Fire Servant said after a moment. “I will tell you the information that you want to know, but only if you defeat me.”

  “And how can you guarantee that you will not go back on your word later, or that the information will be useful to me?”

  “…That is—

  “Do not even think about asking me to take risks. This is not an equal deal. Either you prove the importance of your information to me, and make me believe that you will not go back on your word, or I will leave the Final World right away.”

  “…The information is related to the things that happened to you in Anneve. That is all that I can tell you right now. If you want to know more, you must defeat me. As for making you believe that I would not go back on my word…”

  “Just take an Oath in the name of the Origin Sea.”

  “…That would be enough?”

  “Do you think I am talking about a normal Oath?” Alnea said, sneering at the Fire Servant. “Is Mathias Whitebud your true name? Do not try to lie. Trust me, I will know.”

  “…Yes.”

  “Then repeat after me,” Alnea said, and reached out to his Roots, tugging on it, not to borrow Oren or summon Mysteries, but to use one of its abilities that it had always kept hidden away from him. An ability, that he had never even imagined he had, until he saw the Fire Spirit use it.

  “I, Mathias Whitebud…”

  “I, Mathias Whitebud…”

  “…under the witness of Alnea…”

  “…under the witness of Alnea…”

  “…the bearer of the Chains resting in the Sea of Origin…”

  “…the bearer of the Chains resting in the Sea of Origin…”

  “…am taking an Oath in the name of the Origin Sea…”

  “…am taking an Oath in the name of the Origin Sea…”

  “…that if Alnea were to defeat me in the Final World…”

  “…that if Alnea were to defeat me in the Final World…”

  “…I will give him the information he wants…”

  “…I will give him the information he wants…”

  “…And I promise…”

  “…And I promise…”

  “…that the information will be useful to him.”

  “…that the information will be useful to him,” the Fire Servant said, and felt the Mysteries of the Origin Sea descend around him, wrapping his Spirit in their chains. And though the force those chains exerted on his Spirit was not strong, for some reasons, he knew that they were inviolable. At the very least, he did not have the strength to bear their backlash.

  “…Are you satisfied now?”

  “I am,” Alnea said, narrowing his eyes at the Fire Servant, as he shifted his right hand to the hilt of his sword, and the left to its sheath, while urging his Aspects to surge out of his body and flow into the blade hiding within the sheath. “So, when are we going to begin?”