[Voidknight Ascension] Chapter 247 – Paths

Matt looked over at Raiko. “Why is he doing that? Is he having a stroke?”

“No,” Raiko said grumpily, “he just got something good. Really good.”

“I got a ‘Skill Talent’,” Xero told them excitedly.

As Xero explained what the Shardscript told him about it, Matt’s mouth hung open.

“Paths can do that?!”

“So it would seem,” Raiko said tersely. “Of course you would get a lucky break.”

Haman looked between them all quickly, then adopted Raiko’s grumpy expression to comical effect.

Xero grinned toothily. “I’m going to put it into my [Blade Rush] ability,” he said with all the enthusiasm of a child who had just unwrapped a stellar Christmas gift and was hunting for some batteries to put into it.

Matt sighed wistfully, thinking of getting his first Gameboy. His very first action had been to raid the kitchen junk drawer for batteries.

Good times, Matt thought to himself.

“So you can increase the efficacy of a specific skill,” Matt mused aloud. “That sounds pretty badass.”

Xero’s eyes had glazed over as he was perusing his skills. He clearly heard nothing that Matt just said.

“Possibly comparable to stat talents,” Raiko said thoughtfully.

“I don’t know if they are,” Matt admitted. “One makes you better no matter what. The other makes a specific thing better. However, if you were to keep putting it into just one skill, how much better would that skill get?”

“Only time will tell,” Raiko said, studying Xero intently. “It makes sense for a Samurai, which I’m fairly certain that’s what he is. Or some variation thereof.”

Matt could see the gears already turning in that head of hers. She clearly had something brewing already. Matt saw no reason to beat around the bush. “Got any ideas about Paths then?”

“More than I had before,” she admitted, her tone a bit distracted. Though not distracted enough to stop petting Haman’s tiny head. She did that as easily as breathing.

His grumpy expression had long since smoothed away to peaceful contentment.

“Do share with the class.”

Raiko shook her head, her dark locks bouncing across her shoulders. “It is only an idea. However, I believe that the Shard guides people to certain Paths. Before, when we were discussing them, I wondered if all Paths were mana types.”

“Honor could be a type of mana,” Matt pointed out.

“True. It likely is, but not in the way you think.”

Matt scrunched up his face trying to work out the meaning of that. Finally he said, “What?”

“I doubt Xero is about to blast Honor mana out of his palms like Sam might with Void mana,” Raiko said. “Void mana is largely a magical, outward force. Something like Honor? Seems internal.”

“That’s still not telling me much,” he admitted.

She glanced briefly at Matt before Xero leapt unceremoniously into the air. In one smooth, swift motion, he unsheathed his blade. It radiated so much pressure it bent back the surrounding grass in a perfect circle.

The drow held it aloft, charging some kind of energy, before he dashed forward in the blink of an eye toward the great tree then back again just as fast.

It was hard for Matt to make out anything more than a dark streak.

“I think it’s best that Xero explains his new power,” Raiko said, watching the drow.

Xero looked at their expectant faces with a wide grin of his own. “You’re no doubt wondering how this works.”

“The suspense is killing us,” Matt said dryly.

Raiko made a noncommittal noise. Haman looked up at her and tried to do the same, but it came out like an unflattering honk.

“Ho there, mate, don’t get twisted!” Xero said cheerily, clearly feeling quite full of himself.

Matt crossed his arms and waited. The Samurai would explain in due time. Surely.

At least with Raiko here, I’m pretty sure he will.

Sensing no further attention forthcoming, Xero rolled his eyes dramatically and said, “So it’s like internal fortification. I can use Honor mana to embolden my body. Any skills I have can also be enhanced, but the skills that I spent a Talent on become even stronger.”

“Is that because their baseline is stronger or you can invest more Honor mana?” Raiko asked.

Matt hardly followed the conversation that followed. It flowed back and forth between the two and he struggled not to make a joke about them being nerds.

Not as if I have much room to talk.

Despite his shallow understanding of mana, Matt listened intently. These two people had grown up with magic and mana. They understood it as simply as Matt understood basics about English or the imperial units of measure. Things that he took for granted, but another person would be absolutely confused by.

Even the pobul grasped more than he did.

What he could glean from their conversation was that the more of those Skill Talents Xero used, the more that skill could be empowered.

Honor mana worked differently than Raiko’s Chaos mana, and just as differently from Sam’s Void mana. Neither of them seemed to work the same, which meant that Paths were unlikely to be something as simple as an elemental affinity.

They still could be from what he understood, but it would be rare.

What does that leave for me? What kind of Path is right for me?

Matt wasn’t exactly the most honorable guy around. He tried to be a good person. Doubly so ever since Sam saved his neck and brought him back from the brink of death.

It was the least he could do to repay the man who he had never been that kind to in his past life.

Most of the time, he was acting out of survival. Though not just for himself, but his whole group.

What was there when you stripped away the survival of the day-to-day?

Xero and Raiko continued their conversation. Even Haman chipped in from time to time. They all but forgot about Matt, but he didn’t mind. He was content to hang around as the third wheel, picking up what nuggets of information he could.

As much as he respected Sam’s grasp on his new life, he doubted the man knew even a tenth of what Raiko and Xero were talking about. If he could learn something that might be of use to Sam, he would sit through an entire PowerPoint presentation.

“It is curious that our kingdom functions partially on honor, and yet your Path is Honor,” Raiko remarked.

Xero perked up at that. “Does it? Huh. News to me! I did not intend to stay here for long. I doubt that has much to do with me.”

Raiko frowned at that.

Matt looked over. “You’re leaving?”

The drow shrugged his broad, muscular shoulders. Tattoos rippled like mirages on his dark skin. “My task is done, ain’t it, mate? I said I would bring Haman home. I did that. What’s here for me?”

Matt looked at Raiko, then back at Xero. “What’s out there for you?” Matt countered. He gestured toward the display of violent lights as the Maelstrom casually lashed out at their shielded Skyshard.

Was it Matt’s imagination or did the Maelstrom slow its attacks ever since they lost Sam?

“I suppose you’re free to go where you wish,” she said curtly.

Matt rolled his eyes. “Oh come on, as if we’re not on a floating island! What’s he going to do, walk right off the edge to the bottomless blue?”

“You don’t know!” Xero said petulantly.

“Are you though?” Matt pressed.

Xero huffed and blew out a strand of white hair from his face. The man was handsome. Like, cover of GQ magazine handsome, and he acted like it didn’t matter. Matt didn’t consider himself ugly by any stretch, but he would never be blessed with the genetic lottery that graced Xero’s tall frame.

It was honestly a bit of a comfort that Raiko didn’t get all moony eyed over him.

Still, she seemed a little hurt. Then again, she was already dealing with Sam up and disappearing into the Maelstrom.

He assumed that was why she didn’t have a ready retort. Something was off.

“Doesn’t sound very honorable to me,” Matt said. The words had a greater effect than he would have thought. Xero backpedaled a step as if he had just been slapped.

“What do you mean by that?” he demanded.

“You brought Haman here, sure, but what’s next? What is honorable about leaving people who could use a good strong sword arm? Sam is gone.” Matt winced, forging ahead. “And while I’m not suggesting you are a replacement, there is no way we are not made weaker as a result. Would you consider it honorable to leave a group of people, including refugees, to their fate?”

Haman looked up at Xero silently. Even Matt was stalled by those bottomless, soulful brown eyes.

Damn, he’s better at this than me.

Xero looked between the two of them, pointedly avoiding Raiko. A decision that Raiko mirrored.

“What’s with you two?” Matt asked. “You’re both from Islegard! Friends with each other even. You should want to stick together.”

Raiko looked down, scowling to herself. “It’s true. We need you, Xero. To say the First Layer is wildly dangerous is an understatement.”

Xero rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “Well, when you put it like that…”

“You don’t have to stay, and certainly not because of me, but you have a place here,” Raiko continued, unable to look the drow in the eyes. “You are welcome and wanted here.”

Matt looked at Xero. “You’re clearly very skilled with that katana,” Matt told him. “You could at least teach people who are interested. Help train people who could use it. I don’t think the Maelstrom is done with us yet. We’ve got a temporary reprieve, nothing more. There will be more fighting before we’re done with the First Layer. Bet on that.”

Xero looked at him thoughtfully. “What’s a ‘katana’?”

Matt pointed at the blade at his hip.

“Oh, this old thing? We call this a digery doodah.”

“You’re shitting me.”

Xero’s gaze flicked over to Raiko. “He talks funny.” Turning to Matt, he said, “I would not shit in your pants, Matt. I’m not a horxnax.”

Matt teared up from the effort of struggling not to laugh. “A what? That can’t be a thing. Please tell me that’s not a thing.”

“A horxnax…unfortunately is,” Raiko admitted reluctantly.

Haman looked up at Xero. “There are, and will continue to be, many opportunities for one joining this land, my friend. And for what it matters, if you go, I will miss you.”

Xero sighed and lifted his hands in defeat. “Fine. Fine. You got me.”

“So you’ll stay?” Matt asked.

“I’ll stay.” Xero looked at him. “I’ll even train any bugger that has an inkling of talent and a desire to learn. Least I could do now that I’m living here. I am living here, yes?”

Raiko looked at him curiously. “What do you mean?”

“As Matt so clearly pointed out, you are down a member. I do not deign to replace him, but it sounds like you have a spare bedroom away from the riffraff–”

Raiko’s response was harsh and stern. “No.” To Matt’s surprise, she took a deep breath, modulated her tone, and added, “We will make another room for you. Sam’s room is his. He will return.”

Xero nodded solemnly. “Of course. Any man that can lift an ironwood tree like that and club an ogre is not a man easily stopped.”

When they walked back toward the settlement, Xero draped his dark arm across Matt’s shoulders. “By the way, mate. I know what a katana is. I was just pullin’ yer leg.”

“And the horxnax?”

“Very real,” Xero said seriously. “You ever call a bloke a horxnax, you better be ready to swallow your teeth. That’s about the worst thing you can call somebody else where I’m from.”

“Good to know,” Matt said, suppressing a shudder. Not at the threat, but that their culture had a word for somebody who did something so reprehensible and yet so fucking oddly specific.