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"First, you must show us Ecala’s seed," Nethralis said calmly. "Without going into detail, we will all accept your intentions as legitimate upon seeing it."

"One sec." I closed my eyes and activated my thought-shielding spell, earning a few pleasantly surprised smiles from some of the council members. Then, I got a notification that said:

-

Warning: Guide functionality will be suppressed for the next 24 hours if you continue your thought suppression spell.

-

I ignored it, then unzipped my backpack, pulling it out of a preservation chamber that contained the seed. As soon as they saw it, even the scowling fairies lightened up. Even Zephrael lightened up when he verified the seed was genuine.

"That’s enough," Nethralis said. "We all know what this means, yes?"

They nodded.

"With this in mind, we’re offering you permanent residence for a full colony on two terms. First, the residents must make a soul pact that prevents them from speaking of us, and also prohibits them from harming the forest," Nethralis explained, "subject to soulastic limitations."

A group of the Drokai elders grumbled, but the others remained unfazed.

"Forgive my ignorance, but what does that mean?" I asked.

"Unlike laws, soul pacts work upon intention. If I say we want your help to reinforce an area of the Bramble, and you do it, but later I claim that you’re bound to reinforcing it forever, it won’t be soulastically sound and the spell will warn the offending party instead."

"Oh… that’s cool."

"It is. In this case, signing a pact wouldn’t prohibit you from seeking retribution if we or the forest turns on you. Soul pacts do not offer immunity to offending parties."

"That’s… reasonable.

And the second request?""That everyone, including you, will sign a soul pact that prohibits you from taking any action where you will benefit from you or others conquering the forest unless you are soulastically provoked."

I frowned. "What if there’s a justifiable reason to do so?"

Zephrael and the hardliners scoffed, but Nethralis put up her hand and pointed at the seed.

"It’s a valid question. And it has the same answer. So long as there’s a soulastically justified reason for you to conquer the forest that isn’t for the sake of personal wealth, prestige, or ambition, I see no reason to deny you access. These provisions aren’t to deny you freedoms; on the contrary, it’s to create trust so you can expand your influence without our permission."

I released my grip on the teacup, then gripped it again hesitantly.

"Why? What prompted this sudden change of heart?"

"To encourage you to stay," Nethralis said.

"Even though…" I glanced at Kira.

Nethralis glanced at her as well. "It’s because of her. See, soul cores are rare, even for Drokai elders. Your ability to hide your soulmancy will not last, and the glaves will come to investigate. That’s a certainty, whether you live or not. But since they’re coming, we will need strong allies, and this soul, in addition to your proven talent for soulmancy, proves you are up to the task. Therefore, we seek to improve our alliance, not through trade, but simply by letting you enjoy your life. Kyro said it was what you seek most of all."

I glanced at Kyro, who shrugged and drank liquor from his tiny cup.

"Well… he’s right. And that’s really all I want. And yet… the only people that’ll come here are the people who can benefit from the forest’s riches. That’s a logical fact. And the person I wish to invite, aside from my family, is named Felio Hellara. She’s an alchemist from one of the legacy families."

The Drokai’s faces scrunched in.

"But she’s not like them. She loves plants and horticulture and is very kind. Her guards adore her. She’s not like the legacies I killed last year. I really want them to stay a year, but their family would never agree to a soul pact that prevents one of their own from conquering the forest."

"I see…" Nethralis said. "Just to clarify, you were the one who killed the Melhans with the freeters, correct?"

"I was."

"Why?"

"Because they threatened me and my family," I said. "I could also tell they would be trouble, just like the other families. I won’t claim to be a shrewd judge of character, but I will say that Felio is very different than the others."

Nethralis turned to the others, who seemed pacified after my admission of killing the Melhans. Then she turned back. "Then what would you propose?"

"I will gladly require soul pacts to live here. As for spending a year here to visit, I think that a soul pact that prevents visitors from releasing any information or secrets that could be detrimental to me or the forest would suffice. The requirements would not only include keeping quiet about you, but all significant secrets. At the same time, it would encourage people to come, learn from me, pick plants and perhaps even stay. A soul pact is a soul pact, and that one would be more flexible and easier to enforce."

Nethralis leaned back and communicated with the Drokai telepathically. Many were visibly unpleased. After a few minutes, she returned her gaze.

"Forgive us, but agreeing to let legacies—of all people—live with you seems like a contradiction to our mission. We are flexible, but we must have certain assurances."

"Hmmm…" I pondered it. "Soul pacts are quite powerful. One of my rules would be that the person who joins cannot do so with the purpose of obtaining information to later harm me or conquer the forest. That would be a critical test to ascertain someone’s motives."

"That’s true, but… it’s not enough."

I looked downtrodden at the table. "What about a contract? I’ll help to police the Harvest, within reasonable expectations and my abilities, for nine years. In exchange, I can have that provision."

Nethralis narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. "Why nine years?"

"Because that’s when my family’s protection services run out. After that, I’ll need to do whatever I can to protect them. They are my priority."

"Nine years…" Nethralis turned to the council members and then back. "Please leave us to deliberate, and we’ll reconvene in an hour or so."

I nodded and left the room, leaving them to chat amongst themselves. An hour later, Kyro found me drinking tea at my table nervously, and said, "They’re ready."

I nodded and returned to the room, standing before the council.

"We agree to your terms, subject to your promises," Nethralis said. "As a sign of good will and honoring our investment, we will offer you teachers and elixirs to build your strength. Do you accept."

I nodded quickly. "I do."

"Then let’s make the pact."

We did, and within an hour, I stood before a council of clapping fairies. Kyro then sacrificed two full glasses of brandy to get me tipsy in celebration. It was a fun night, mostly with me getting to know the friendly Drokais and winning over the skeptics, and it ended with an unexpected twist. Just as I was leaving, I found Zyphrael sitting on a rock outside my house.

We stared at each other, waiting for the other to speak, but neither of us did, so I said, "Good night," and opened the flap of my home, but he said, "Wait," so I paused.

"What is it?"

"Just five months ago, you told us you had no plans to be a guardian—and you meant it. Now, you’re claiming that you’re planning to police the Harvest for nine years? That’s a big shift for a couple months."

"It is," I said.

"What changed your mind?"

I scoffed and turned to my door. "You guys left me alone. Good night, Zephrael."

I opened the flap, and Kline strutted past the fairy with a smug expression, jumping into the tree. Then, I followed him, shutting the flap and preparing for my Mental Shielding training. It would be interesting while I was tipsy.

2.

The next morning, after a long breakfast and early afternoon conversation, Nethralis asked to go on a hike with me—alone, to Zyphrael’s dismay—to discuss my training regiment. After an hour of idle chatter, she finally asked, "What type of magic teacher are you looking for?"

"I’m not sure…" I answered. "I’ve have powerful skill options, but the moment I choose an area, I’m stuck with it for life. I’ve been crying about it all winter."

"Can I ask what they are?" she asked.

"They can be anything, but…" I stopped under the shade of a tree, sitting on a rock while opening The Guide, which had only recently unlocked from my thought-suppression penalty. "I’ve narrowed down the two that appeal to me."

"Interesting…" Nethralis fluttered to a tree and sat on a large knot, crossing her leg elegantly as if it weren’t the cutest thing I had ever seen. Then I returned to my options, then I winced and read.

"The first skill’s name is Tears of the Fallen. The description reads: By virtue of your grim fascination with Hadrian’s Icicle Dance and your sudden, violent shift to a life of bloodshed, the Oracle has offered you one of its demigod grand arsenals.

"Tears of the Fallen—a skill that extracts blood from your enemies and uses it to create blades to kill them. It not only gives you a flashy arsenal of grim visuals, but it’s also practical. The spell extracts mana and aura from your enemy’s blood, so the only cost is your ability to control blades with telekinesis.

"It’s supremely powerful, but the limitations are obvious, namely that you must wound your enemy to use it, and the number and size of the blades are contingent upon how much they bleed. That said, blood is the ultimate conduit of spiritual energies. You can sharpen even the smallest blades with aura and mana, and by mixing your neara or a soul into the blood, you can give blood a mind of its own.

"The potential blending with soulmancy would be fascinating. Just be warned: blood manipulation, like soulmancy, is a primary area of study. It’s recommended that you only choose one other primary magic. Otherwise, you risk failure for all paths."

I looked up and saw Nethralis’s eyes staring at me blankly, mouth agape, lost in realms of empty thoughts.

"Is that… bad?" I asked.

"Obviously not," she said sharply. "We wouldn’t have anyone to train you, but such a skill… I wouldn’t announce it."

I gulped.

"What’s the other?" she pressed.

"Oh… right. The other one’s called Dreamscape, also a demigod spell. It’s an illusion magic that utilizes my soulmancy to simulate real entities… I’ll just read it. It says:

"In a truly bizarre turn of events, you have suddenly and unequivocally gained the ability to create physical manifestations with your spirit aura using your spirit guardian as a conduit," I summoned Kira and turned her into a majestic eight-point elk and pet it, "and you seem to enjoy it. This opens you up to the path of a spiritual illusionist, a person who can bring wide-scale illusions to life with ethereal forms and nearan independence, giving them dominion to act independently on a battlefield as a physical object."

"As a soulmancer, you’re not limited to mental cloning. You can fill the world with aura and neara, making it truly indistinguishable from the real world. It will also teach you how to capture your changes in arrays, sigils, and enchantments, allowing you to create the worldscapes that drive the Oracle crazy.

"Naturally, this is an advanced skill set that requires extensive practice and surreal levels of mana and soul force, but with your knack for traps and ambushes and Kline’s One Beast Army, which works in a very similar way, you can become an unstoppable team that can survive even the bleakest situations with guile, tactics, and raw force."

I expected a similar reaction to this spell, but I got a different one entirely. Nethralis’s eyes were sharp and determined.

"What’s One Beast Army?" she asked.

"I…" I looked at Kline, who was slinking off into the woods. "Kline. This’s serious."

He turned back sheepishly, then smiled creepily.

"What?" I asked.

Suddenly, Kline’s body split into three, and they circled the tree, each crunching twigs under their feet.

Nethralis stumbled off the knot she was sitting on and touched them, examining them carefully. "Ethereals… how?" she whispered. "Are you a soulmancer, too?"

Kline rolled his eyes.

"I’ll check," I said, opening the One Beast Army spell and reading. "In a striking reversal, by reading this spell’s description, you’ve proven you don’t have the imagination necessary to…" My eyebrow twitched, and I skimmed forward. "One Beast Army allows Kline to create an army of ethereal clones, breaking up his power to fight as a mass. The skill injects copies of his nearan pathways into each clone, allowing each to work independently. The more resources Kline gives to each, the closer they will be to his original strength, making it flexible in intense battles with powerful enemies and wiping out large armies of weak foes. It truly is one of the most devastating available skills used by gods."

I looked at Kline, who had created a fifth clone to show off the potential. His face expressed exhaustion, and I knew it was just a matter of time before he gave out.

"You’re literally going to be an army…" I whispered.

Kline puffed out his chest with pride.

"Choose that one," Nethralis said. "Dreamscape."

"Huh?" I said. "But…" Her decisiveness caught me off guard. Dreamscape was the cool spell, but I felt like Tears of the Fallen had a far more brutal impact and practical value. Hearing it dismissed outright was jarring.

"Mira. The Drokai have existed a hundred thousand years without being caught because we are masters of such illusions. Not only do they have immense usefulness in protecting your secrets, but they also have immense battle capacities. With a large enough illusion, you can single-handedly change the course of battles. And with Kline’s skill, you will effectively become an army. If you go this route, we can teach you."

It will also be vital for passing through Misty Row, she added in my thoughts.

I activated thought suppression immediately.

What does that mean? I replied with my thoughts.

Brindle created misty Row upon his exit from the Fourth Ring, she said. It’s a maze of fact and fiction, built upon illusions and traps of nearan origins. If you want to survive Misty Row, understanding illusions is a critical aspect.

Wow… I considered her admission and the spells. After some reflection, I asked, Can’t I just learn both? You can teach me, right?

You’re stretched thin as is. Splitting your time further would result in failure.

I swallowed hard. I’m just not sure… simply because some people are just good at things and others aren’t. Anyone can learn anything, but some people have to work twice as hard to achieve the same results. I would rather have something that I can do twice as well with the same amount of work. You know?

I understand, she said. But you still must learn it if you want to reach Aelium. That’s where Escala wants you to take her seed, yes?

My eyes widened. How…?

You said she gave you the seed to clear your name, yes? Aelium is the place to do that.

I see… Well… can’t I try it out? See if I just want to bargain for the cliff notes?

That’s respectable. I’ll send an illusion master and an alchemist to train you by week’s end. You can decide then. She smiled and turned toward camp. Come, let’s head back.

I agreed, and we returned, eating lunch and chatting one last time before they announced their departure. I said my goodbyes and saw them off, then took the rest of the day off to relax.

"On second thought…" I muttered. "Maybe I shouldn’t bring people here. It’s exhausting…"

Despite saying that, I enjoyed having people to talk to, and I was already counting down the days until my teachers arrived.