Wish upon the Stars chapter 484

I was in a fantastic mood as we gathered around a big tree in the  middle of the valley. "That was awesome." I said happily. "We totally  crushed them. That new Path of yours is pretty scary, Cal." I glanced  over at my mentor. "And Abel you were really killing it with the cannon  fodder. I didn't kill Mel, by the way. I figured it was an opportunity  for her to be here. She still had plenty of soul refinement she can get  from this place. I did break her arms and legs though."

He  shrugged. "It's just a soul fragment, she'll get over it. Besides, I  saw the fight, she was trying to burn your face off. Speaking of, how is  your leg? I thought I saw her get you."

I glanced down to  see my still smouldering calf emitting a faint whiff of smoke. "Huh.  I'm buzzing on soul energy, didn't even notice that was still there." I  triggered a heal burst. I only had one left, and getting more would be  tough until this all ended. Still, it beat limping around on a badly  burned calf once I could feel it again. I wondered if the soul  refinement energy felt different because I was a soul myself right now.

"Ok,  so we need to get ready to move." I said with a laugh. "Everyone rest  up and we can get started looking for the next flag. I don't know what  the next two trials will be, but I want to be prepared."

Callen  raised an eyebrow at me. "You don't?" He asked incredulously. "Because  they're always the same. The first five are variable, but the last two  trials are the soul crushing stairs and the twelve palaces."

I  froze, wheeling around to look at him. "Ok, apart from that first one  sounding extremely unfortunate, I thought all the trials were random. No  one mentioned the last two being stable things to me before now?"  Killian or Zeke should have said something.

He shrugged.  "Most people don't mention it. Five of the seven are random, knowing  what the last two will be doesn't mean much in terms of strategy. That's  how people know about the keys though. The twelve palaces at the end  are MOSTLY accessible to anyone. The first second and third palaces  though, the highest ones, those are sealed by the keys. The rewards that  you can gain from this are in the palaces."

It occurred  to me that I hadn't considered how people seemed to know more about the  keys than I did in some cases. They'd been mentioned, but their use  would have to apply to some static portion of the trials. I could see  their point though, knowing that the last trial was a set of palaces  (and it was a trial so there had to be more to it) didn't help me at  all.

Bethy looked annoyed. "Daddy didn't tell me anything  either. He's so mean, he was just gonna let me run off and get into  trouble without knowing everything. I'm gonna feed all his shoes to my  cats. Last time he was mean to me I threw all his capes into the  planet's core. He got so mad." She giggled at the mental image.

"Didn't  you say your dad ATE one of your siblings for being annoying?" I asked  Bethy incredulously. "Aren't you worried he'll get mad and...punish  you?"

She snorted. "Please. I'm daddy's favorite, and  mommy is his strongest bride. He would never do anything to me. Besides,  he likes that I'm not scared of him. All my brothers and sisters are  ass-kissers, daddy says I'm his only child with a backbone. My oldest  brother Lucas was pretty offended when he heard that, he's daddy's main  war general. It's his own fault though, he never stands up to him."

I  suspected the possibility of being murdered and eaten had something to  do with that, but her family stuff was none of my business. I shouldn't  have broken my rule about not asking her things like that. It was my own  fault. "So...the soul crushing stair sounds...horrible. What is it?"

Callen  seemed as relieved as I was to change the subject, apparently Bethy's  disturbing nature even applied to people like him. "Well, you know how  the prizes are things like new abilities, or bloodlines or skills or  whatever you're interested in? In order to have those effects, you have  to be physically here to be altered. At the moment we're only here in  soul form. The trials prepare the soul to act as a bridge between the  real world and this place."

"So our bodies are going to be  pulled in for real?" I asked in confusion. "Won't we be  stuck...wherever we are? That seems risky."

"Not at all."  He said, waving his hand. "Just as a fragment makes its way here while  our bodies stay behind, the transfer leaves a fragment behind there as  an anchor. The soul crushing stair draws in the body, using the circles  we're sitting on as a ritual. Each step on the stair takes you through  an emotion. The emotions become stronger the higher you walk, and the  body is slowly shifted between locations."

It was a bit  confusing, but I basically understood. Every step was like progress on a  loading bar, and once the download was complete my body would be here  and my ghost or whatever would be left sitting in the circle to hold my  place. "What about the landings, what do they do?"

"Same  thing the islands did in the first trial." He said with a shrug. "The  stair isn't just danger, it's opportunity. The faster you can walk, the  more you can endure and the faster you can refine your soul. It's the  reason for the purifying trials leading up to now. Those vary, but  they're always there. The more you've purified your mind and heart the  faster you can walk. Anyone who can't even pass those trials would just  collapse and shatter on the stair."

I shook my head in  amazement. "Who the hell made this place? Creating some kind of virtual  space and pulling a person inside for real? Could the gods make  something like this? Is that what all the heritages I hear about  actually are?"

"An attempt." He confirmed. "But no, not  the same. We don't know who made the Ruined Soul Temple. At least I've  never heard of anyone knowing. All I know is that the place is  mysterious and very old. It predates anyone still living that I know of.  The gods are the oldest beings I'm aware of, for the most part, so if  anyone DOES know it would definitely be them. If you do find out, I'd  love to know myself."

Blinking in shock, I just stared at  him. "It's just...here? Do you think one of the vanished gods made it?" I  knew they were old as hell and could do weird things. It wouldn't be a  shock for this to be some ancient divine ruin the gods had taken over  when they tossed the rest of the divinities out.

"Doubtful."  He said with a sigh. "The gods have been unable to create a proper  replica of this place. The heritages of the various divine factions and  S-rank families are TECHNICALLY soul cultivation methods, but they're  frightfully slow and not nearly as thorough. Don't assume that everyone  who goes in can break their shackles, or that they can manage it  anywhere near as easily as here when they do. The soul is a mystery,  even to the gods, and the ability to purify and refine it is one they  haven't mastered."

Come to think of it, I'd never tried  granting a wish to empower the soul, and no one had brought it up. I  think some part of me just instinctually understood that my power was  different from the soul. They interacted, but they weren't the same. If  anything, that seemed to be what the Path was. A medium that allowed the  soul and stats to interact. My soul refined much faster while on my  Path. What part would that play in later ranks?

Callie cut  in. "So, these emotions. What exactly are they? And are we supposed to  like...throw them away? Because I don't really like the idea of  abandoning my emotions."

Callen chuckled. "No. You don't  abandon them. The trial is to experience them to the highest level  without abandoning yourself. There are seven stages, and each one puts  an obstacle in your path. Greed, hate, delusion, vanity, confusion,  doubt, and sloth. Each emotion will try to temp or scare you off the  steps, make you turn back, and if you do, the spirit body shatters and  you're ejected from the trials."

I sighed in relief.  Callie had been dead on, I didn't want to be an emotionless robot, but  resisting those emotions sounded fine. I could see how the forest and  the maze would prepare someone for that, actually. Speaking of Callie,  she was waiting eagerly to hear what I had to say. As the last person to  get a flag, I had a hint for the next one, which would give us a head  start on finding it.

"Anyway,  good information to have, but I need to find more flags if possible.  Even if some people break their shackles on those steps, they still need  the soul energy to complete their refinement, and I doubt the stairs  will take me through one and a half soul ranks." I wanted to get as much  done here as possible. Plus I wanted the next key fragment. I still had  to fight Adrian for the one I missed in the maze (assuming it was him)  but the more I got directly the better.

"Well..."  My girlfriend said, nudging me in the ribs. "What was the clue? I hope  something more specific than 'in a cave or underground'. Mine was pretty  damned lazy."

I  grimaced, sighing before admitting. "It's by water." Callie clapped her  hand to her head in exasperation, and I hurried to add. "I  mean...running water? Probably? Could be a river. Or a waterfall.  Granted it's not exactly a map like we had for this one, but given the  welcoming committee here, it's probably smart just to head for the next  flag from here. They get further out, and running all the way back only  to run all the way out here and then further would be stupid."

Granted,  it might not be along a straight line, hell it almost definitely  wasn't, but it would be past where we were now by a decent amount. And  the water clue mixed with my Eye of Revelation would give us a much  better chance of finding it that any other teams. Probably. And I wanted  to find it. It and every other flag possible before the end of this.

Knowing  what was coming later, I was pretty set on beefing up my soul as much  as possible. I wanted to face those steps with the strongest resolve I  could muster, because I had a feeling I'd need every ounce of  wherewithal I had. They don't call a place the soul crushing stairs  because it's a pleasant day out with your pals. Just the thought of  having to endure the extremes of emotion Callen mentioned was already  making me nervous.

With  a sigh, everyone got ready to move, having healed up where they were  injured, or in the case of my leg, at least becoming mobile. Then I used  Eye of Revelation to find the nearest river. Finding something huge  like that was easier than locating a small flag in a big forest.

Weirdly,  despite the soul pain and everything coming, something else was  bothering me. The fact that no one knew where this place came from added  another layer of weird to what we'd been through. I glanced over at  Biscuit, where Bethy and Callie were riding on the back of the squirrel.  Was he really just a construct? A soul shard of some random squirrel?  Or was something else going on here I hadn't considered yet. Because if  it was the latter I needed to be on guard. That kind of thing rarely  worked out well for me.