Wakespire (The Weirkey Chronicles Book 7), page 26
There were far fewer teams than the first round they'd entered. He spotted the combined Terefilia team and nodded to them. The dark-winged group didn't look particularly sociable, but they did nod back. As non-Dortorus teams, they had at least something in common. It was odd to note that none of the Dortorus teams were present. He doubted they had dropped out, so most likely they were intentionally entering late as part of a strategy.
More of the other groups, those he didn't know, seemed highly prepared. Many wore specific armaments or tested techniques that seemed designed solely for the Wakespire. Or perhaps not; he didn't want to assume they weren't building useful techniques they could use in the long term.
He couldn't help but analyze what it would be like to actually fight them, though. A few he thought were professional competitors, earning a living in artificial challenges instead of real combat. Others had been given sublime materials from adolescence and guided to Ruler or Authority by their lineages. But there were a few grim veterans or real talents among them as well.
"This time you'll see!" The angry voice took him off guard and Theo turned to see a man he only vaguely recognized. "I'll be on your heels the entire time, trust me. I'll repay every humiliation you heaped upon me!"
It took that reminder for Theo to place the man: he'd been the false Gatrium Authority who they'd defeated in the first round. The man wasn't wearing a mask anymore and looked like he was truly an Authority. He was putting his soulhome on display, but it wasn't impressive. His cantae was only partially liquid, more misty wind than water, as if he'd used some method to cheat his way through the ascension.
"Sorry about that, but we had to fight you seriously to have a chance at winning. Do you want your mask back?" Instead of scorning the man, Theo smiled broadly and bowed to him. "Congratulations on reaching Authority, by the way."
"I... I have no need for such toys anymore." The Gatrium Authority looked as though he hadn't expected that reaction and stared at him. "But I'll still avenge my loss, if we ever end up in the same room."
"If it's a fair fight you want, we're available any time."
"Then you'd better be ready."
Theo kept his smile plastered on his face as the other man stomped off. He could have humiliated the new Authority, but there was nothing to be gained by that. Let the man keep some dignity. Maybe this way there would be one fewer group throwing curses in their direction, or maybe he could even avoid another vendetta.
He still hadn't seen any Dortorus teams and the princes were about to open the portals. They gave another speech to announce the beginning, but Theo wasn't really listening. Instead he looked over his teammates and thought about all the strategies they'd prepared. Nauda was more optimistic about Isorales than Theo was, but his presence didn't cost them anything.
"Begin!"
The very instant the Wakespire started, Theo wrapped his cantae around the group and flew them directly into the portal. This time, they were holding nothing back.
By chance, the first chamber was just like their original attempt: the second stage demons. With four fully trained soulcrafters, there was no reason to apply longer strategies. All four of them leapt forward immediately: Fiyu cut through her demon's neck, Nauda crushed one's skull, and even Isorales didn't do too badly slicing through them with his floating rings. They were across the chamber and into the next portal with barely any time lost fighting.
The second chamber was the spiral room. Already? There had been no time to pull ahead of the other teams, so there were other groups already climbing their own stairs. Everyone on Theo's team had started running automatically, but this surprise arrival had ruined their strategy.
"Theo?" Nauda ran at his side with a nervous glance. In seconds they'd be unprotected by the glass and would be taking fire from the other teams.
"No offense or defense," Theo told the group. "Just run."
Thankfully they trusted him enough to listen. As expected, when they sprinted ahead of the other teams, they immediately drew everyone's attention. But as cantae bolts flew in their direction, Theo cast the most powerful point of anti-mass he could. It hovered at the end of his finger, generating an unnatural effect that pushed everything away from itself.
Dozens of cantae bolts flew toward them, but they all arced to the sides. Some of the teams thought he was using a simple shield and kept attacking, hurling more and more. As the rain intensified, Theo could actually see the edges of his anti-mass as the cantae arced away from them. The sphere would have shrunk over time, because his power couldn't redirect cantae forever, but the attacks felt surprisingly light. It more than lasted until they reached the next portal.
He stumbled into the next room, which was one of the offices. That was good... until he saw that Fiyu was the only one with him.
"They sent us both past the room of darkness," she confirmed sadly. "I hope the others are alright."
"They broke their word about other abilities being permitted and didn't even tell us they'd changed the rules, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised." Theo scowled toward the young woman at the desk. "Can we make our decision now?"
"Uh, I don't think so." She shrugged awkwardly. "Blocking people from rooms is new, but I don't think you're really here until your entire team arrives."
Fortunately, it didn't take long. He had discussed this possibility with Nauda, just in case. She and Isorales burst through the portal, surrounded by cantae auras. They both looked a little worse for the wear, but it seemed like they'd been able to fly through with brute force.
Fiyu turned to check on them, saying something about how they'd done a good job, but Theo marched to the woman running the desk. "Blessing or curse?"
"Curse."
"Then... the highest Dortorus team." Even though they hadn't been present at the starting time, there were three Dortorus lights on the tower now. More concerningly, one of them had progressed just as far as his team. How were they catching up already?
It didn't matter. No matter what the other teams were doing, the best strategy was to keep moving forward. Since there was no avoiding being the topmost team if they wanted to win, there was no reason to wait. Theo didn't even need to urge the others on, they were already running into the next portal.
As he'd expected, this one was the first cantae puzzle. It had a slightly different layout, but these challenges were trivial. To avoid any time wasted working against one another, Theo took the lead while Fiyu moved the switches near the corners. Nauda and Isorales just walked to the portal so they'd be ready the instant the puzzle was complete.
Five rooms down, with opponents on their tail and many more to go. The real Wakespire had begun.
Chapter 31
Isorales was an Authority now, so the early challenges should have been nothing to him. Yet he found that he struggled to keep up. Not because of the pace itself, aggressive as that was, but because it was so radically different from his previous three attempts.
Currently he was watching the others grab the colored spheres and deliver them to their places, occasionally helping but mostly just trying to keep his jaw from going slack. Isorales had entered this chamber three times before along with his close allies, all of them capable of flying. And these foreigners were flying circles around him as they demolished the room.
Even with his ability to fly perfected, Isorales struggled to keep up. The strange lack of weight Theo could produce seemed insane, though Nauda and Fiyu had clearly adapted to it. He was forced to just control his own movement with cantae in order to keep from bouncing around the room.
With the falling sphere challenge finished in record time, they moved on to a circular chamber and Isorales immediately winced. The golem.
Every prior round, this was the room where he'd lost someone. They'd already been worn down from injuries in the darkness, so an opponent who could ignore many of their attacks and reach so much of the chamber was daunting. It was already unfolding as they entered, revealing those long arms and blades from within its torso.
"Another team has applied a curse," one of the officials informed them. "The golem's strength has been increased."
Isorales groaned as he watched new power flow through the chamber and reinforce the golem. He had been hoping that one of his newly empowered techniques could blow through its armor, but now it was using Authority-tier cantae. This was likely to be the first failure point and he regretted that he hadn't spent more time discussing strategy with his new allies.
Before it could fully unfold, Nauda leapt in, pinning one of its arms against its torso. The other blade swung around to impale her and Isorales realized too late that he was hesitating instead of acting. But Fiyu, the shy little eyeless one, jumped in immediately. He'd seen her mostly rely on invisibility, yet she charged to cut the golem in the elbow, slicing off its arm. Nauda hadn't even flinched, instead using her position to wrestle the golem downward.
Theo appeared beside them the next moment and delivered some kind of modified cantae bolt to the weak point. The entire torso blew apart as if a strange force had grabbed hold and twisted. All three of them walked over the falling golem before it even settled.
"Sorry about leaving you out," Nauda said as they went to the next portal. "We'd just been developing a plan for the three of us."
"No, that's... completely alright." Isorales swallowed and retracted his rings just a little.
When they entered the crushing labyrinth, Isorales couldn't help but swallow again. This challenge had eliminated him in the very first round, when he froze too long between blocks. Even afterward, it was so resistant to damage that he had never gotten through without sacrificing one of his teammates. He turned toward the others, assuming that they had to have some solution.
Instead, he saw that Theo was standing very still, focused on the other side. He'd proven smart enough that Isorales assumed he knew that the pattern had no easy pathway through. As the tension rose Isorales wanted to ask what they'd do, but Fiyu spoke up first.
"Can you see the other side, Theo?"
"I have it, I'm just waiting..." He was silent a moment longer, then another voice entered the conversation.
"Another team has applied a curse," an official said. Isorales thought he recognized the voice as a distant uncle, not that it helped them. The crushing labyrinth reinforced itself and began moving even faster, yet Theo only grinned.
He raised a hand beside him and somehow... opened a window in the air. When Isorales looked through, he saw the wall and floor on the opposite side of the blocks. Somehow the two points in space had been linked together? It reminded him of weirkey travel, yet playing out wholly within a world.
"Alright, it's stable. Just like we practiced." Theo stepped through the portal, and though Isorales could see him clearly through the hole, he was standing on the opposite side of the room. Nauda and Fiyu followed, so Isorales couldn't let himself be left behind and followed them into the strange technique.
It felt like nothing. Just taking a step like any other. Yet he found himself on the opposite side of the labyrinth, completely unharmed. The others seemed a little relieved as well, which was small comfort.
"You enjoyed waiting for that curse, didn't you?" Nauda asked Theo.
"A little bit." He smiled thinly and spoke more to the ceiling than Nauda. "The judges thought I couldn't participate in the dark room either, just because I learned a new skill. I wonder if by the end they won't let me do any part of the Wakespire?"
Through the next portal, they faced a blessing room. According to the model spire, one of the Dortorus teams was still in hot pursuit just behind them. That, combined with how ineffectual he had been, nearly made Isorales clam up. But he saw that the others were hesitating as they realized they needed to make a choice, so he forced himself to speak up.
"We should bless Ugustial Beta," he said, poking at one of the lowest points of light.
Theo's gaze shot to him immediately. "Why?"
"They're a community team that just wants lesser materials from the legacy. I made a deal that I would bless them if they returned the favor. No one else would pick them, so-"
"Good enough." Theo seemed to have already forgotten about the issue and marched past the desk. The official looked between them, as if uncertain what their answer was. All Isorales could do was shrug at her, gesture at the spire again, and hurry after the others.
When they entered the next room, he breathed a sigh of relief. It was the mountaintop range again, the one place where he had been certain he could help his foreign allies. Another curse was announced, increasing the number of targets and the distance. That shouldn't stop him.
"You can handle this, right?" Nauda asked. Isorales managed to grin at her.
"Absolutely. Just a second." He raised one of his rings and aimed precisely at the target before firing a cantae bolt through it. His blueprint didn't have space for any special bolts, but his ring armaments could enhance his cantae. The shot transformed from a blob of power to an arrow of light that streaked over the sky to destroy the first target.
It had been easy at Ruler, so it was effortless at Authority. Isorales had already been moving his other rings into place, so all he needed to do was pivot in place and release more bolts. He picked off all the targets, one after another, and ended with firing a bolt from both hands at once. Immediately after he felt awkward, like he had been showing off in front of other children, and looked up at his team.
"Thank you," Fiyu said, "this room has always been draining for us."
Nauda was smiling too, but she was also urging him on. Theo was already marching toward the next portal. Isorales sighed and accepted that was how things would go with them. None of the others had been complimented for playing their part, so he needed to do what his parents always shouted at him and grow up.
The next challenge they faced was the more advanced cantae puzzle. Isorales immediately hesitated, remembering all the time lost in past rounds. The blueprint and flow had been different each time, and far more challenging than it appeared. His guards, who were strong and capable soulcrafters, had actually struggled to solve it at all. He had needed to control his anxiety and solve it himself.
In theory he could resolve the logical problems with the complex blueprint, but it took him some time. His new teammates didn't hesitate in the slightest. Fiyu and Nauda tackled efficiency-damaging tangles while Theo unraveled the broader puzzle. How could he solve it so fast? Isorales had been wildly hailed as a genius as a child and could follow the steps, but he always struggled at the beginning of a problem. Theo was working as if he'd already solved the puzzle before.
After so many rapid completions, they had to be at least some distance ahead of other teams. But when their group walked into the next chamber, they all froze. Instead of a cube or familiar structure, they stood in another tower. There were wooden walkways around this one, spiraling similar to the glass tubes but with no protection whatsoever.
"You seen this one before?" Theo asked. Judging from his pause, he definitely hadn't.
"They aren't supposed to add new rooms except beyond twenty," Isorales said, "so this must be a higher challenge that randomly appeared lower."
"We'll assume it's another competition room, but advance slowly. Fiyu, go ahead."
Fiyu extended her stealth technique around them and Isorales shivered as the world outside rippled. Unless the sphere included defensive abilities, Theo must be presuming that the room contained sight-based traps. Isorales thought that was an unlikely possibility, but couldn't bring himself to say anything.
"What were you saying about twenty rooms?" Nauda asked. She spoke quietly, but not as if concerned her words would escape the sphere.
"There are twenty established challenges in the Wakespire," Isorales explained. "Most of the time, no teams make it that far. But if they do, the judges have created some original chambers. They don't want the contest to go on forever."
While they spoke, the team had made its way up to the top of the stairs. There appeared to be a portal in the ceiling, but Theo raised a hand for them to halt. Again, a strange decision. The Dortorus Gamma team had been advancing at a blistering pace, so they couldn't be far behind. These rickety walkways were a terrible place to fight, so waiting must fulfill a different goal.
"Sorry we never got a chance to explain the new strategy," Nauda said. "Can you use that beam with all three rings here? As soon as they-"
Before she could finish, another team emerged on the parallel walkway. Isorales only caught a glimpse of Dortorus Authorities before they were enveloped in a storm of bright bolts from Fiyu. One of them started to raise a shield, only to be grabbed by Nauda's binding technique and pushed into the others. Finally Theo used another of his strange twisting bolts to destroy the stairs beneath their feet.
There was no time to arrange a full beam, but Isorales moved rings in front of his hands and added his own cantae arrows to the barrage. The enemy team clearly took a beating before they began summoning auras, burning large amounts of cantae to shield them from future attacks.
"Good enough!" Theo stopped using his techniques and gestured upward. The others immediately followed him and they all ran the remaining distance to the portal.
Behind them, the Dortorus team survived, but they had been bloodied. Thinking about the ruthlessness of the surprise attack, Isorales was more worried about the people in front of him than behind.
Chapter 32
Though her companions' performance had been admirable, Fiyu was concerned about the enemy. At every point so far, they had been keeping pace. She had anticipated that other teams would adapt to the Wakespire as well, but didn't like having them at her heels.
After their ambush in the previous chamber, she should have felt somewhat more secure. They had struck a blow against their opponents while taking no injuries themselves, after all. But her senses had observed a different set of wings than the usual, and there had been too many Authorities. Because the Dortorus lineage could not have ascended so many soulcrafters, it seemed likely that they had grouped all their Authorities into one team. They had abandoned the strategy of advancing three teams: instead the weaker two would feed blessings to advance their leaders.
