Chapter 96: The Long Way Home
The world outside the Serpent's Coil was a blur of panicked shouts and confused torchlight. The City Watch, busy with the aftermath at the main entrance, paid little mind to a few more blood-soaked figures fleeing a different service alley. We didn't stop. We didn't speak. We just ran, a single, desperate organism driven by the base instinct to put distance between us and the nightmare.
I half-dragged, half-carried Briza, her breath coming in ragged, pained gasps. Laron clutched Elara's arm, the cartographer stumbling in her fine dress, her face a mask of shock, her precious tool case held against her chest like a shield. We didn't head for the main gates or the trade road. That was the first place Silas would look. Instead, we cut north, away from the city's glow, and plunged into the rolling farmlands that surrounded Silveridge.
We didn't stop until the city's walls were a distant, hazy line on the horizon and the only light came from the moon and stars. We found a shallow creek, its banks lined with willow trees that offered a veil of secrecy. We scrambled down the bank, collapsing onto the cool, damp grass, our bodies screaming in protest.
For a long time, the only sounds were our ragged breathing and the gentle gurgle of the water. The adrenaline that had been a fire in my veins cooled, leaving behind a cold, leaden dread. In the quiet dark, the images of the last hour played against the back of my eyelids in brutal, high-definition.
Evander. The look of triumphant cunning on his face, the brilliant feint. And then, the red blur. The silent, impossibly fast cut. The line of crimson. The head… toppling. The body crumpling.
I squeezed my eyes shut, but the image was burned into my brain.
His death was an annihilation. The Patron was gone. The funding, the distribution network, the political protection, all of it, gone in a single, silent swipe of a dagger. Dragon Ball, the one thing I had built that was truly mine, was now a ghost, a target with no one to shield it. Silas wouldn't rest. He would turn the city upside down to find us, to claim the quill and the artist as his rightful spoils of war.
And then there was the other ghost haunting me, glowing in the periphery of my vision like a stubborn, annoying bug.
*MISSION 3: THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE.**
*PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: ???*
*REWARDS: ???*
A familiar, bitter frustration welled up in my chest. Again? Of course. Why would the System ever give a straight answer? It was just like Mission 2, another cryptic title dangled in front of me like a carrot on a stick that was also a stick of dynamite. The "Philosopher's Stone." On Earth, it was a legend about eternal life and turning lead to gold. Here? It could be a rock, a person, or a damn recipe for all I knew. The vagueness wasn't a shocking new cruelty; it was just the System's standard operating procedure, and it was just as infuriating the second time around.
A soft groan from Briza pulled me from my thoughts. In the moonlight, I could see her trying to sit up, her face contorted in pain.
"Don't move," I whispered, my voice hoarse. "Your ribs."
"We can't stay here," she gritted out, every word an effort. "They will send trackers. Hounds, maybe."
"She is correct," Laron's voice quavered from the darkness. "Silas's reach is long. By morning, riders will be on every road. Our descriptions… my ears… we are far too memorable."
Elara said nothing. She just sat, hugging her knees, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs. The reality of it all was crushing her.
Briza was right. Laron was right. We had to keep moving.
"Torak," I said, the decision solidifying as I spoke. "It's the only place we have any footing. But we can't take the main roads. We go the long way. Through the plains, following this creek south, then cut east through the backcountry. It'll take twice as long, but it's the only way we might not be seen."
A fresh wave of exhaustion went through the group at the prospect of a long, cross-country trek with no supplies.
"It is that, or wait for Silas to find us," I said, my tone leaving no room for argument. "We have no money. No allies. Our only asset is the quill and our lives. We run, or we die."
There was no dissent. The truth was too stark.
After a few more minutes of desperate rest, I forced everyone to their feet. We drank from the creek, the cold water a minor blessing. Using torn strips from the hem of Elara's already-ruined dress, I helped Briza bind her ribs as tightly as we could. It was a pitiful effort, but it was something.
Then we began to move. We stayed in the creek for a while to throw off any hounds, the cold water soaking into our boots, before climbing out onto the moonlit plains. We were a sorry sight: a beaten adventurer, a wounded bodyguard, a terrified merchant, and a haughty artist, trudging through the empty grasslands under a blanket of stars, with nothing but a cryptic mission and a crime lord's vengeance at our backs.
The path to Torak was long. The path to the Philosopher's Stone was unknown. All we could do was put one foot in front of the other and survive the night.
The moon, one of sometimes 3, was beginning its descent when we found a suitable spot: a small, rocky outcrop that broke the monotony of the plains, offering a windbreak and a place to hide a small, smokeless camp. It wasn't much, but it was concealment. Exhaustion had long since overpowered fear, and we collapsed in the lee of the largest rocks.
Laron and Elara were asleep almost instantly, their breathing shallow and uneasy. Briza sat propped against a stone, her eyes closed, but I could see the tension in her jaw, the pain keeping her from true rest. I took the first watch, my back against the cold rock, staring out at the vast, silent darkness.
But my focus wasn't on the horizon, waiting for Silas's trackers. It was turned inward.
The fight in the Coil replayed in my mind, not as a montage of terror, but as a brutal critique of my own inadequacy. I saw Jax's unstoppable charges, his rune-hardened skin turning my best strikes into slaps. I saw Silas's movement, not just fast, but efficient. A single, perfect step, a minimal arc of the dagger, no wasted motion. A killing blow delivered with the cold precision of a master craftsman.
And what did I have?
I had power. The Ki was real. The Acceleration Loop was a genuine superpower. The Ki Blast, when it worked, was a force of nature.
But I had no skill.
My fighting style was a patchwork of brawling instinct and half-remembered poses from a thousand hours of watching anime and movies on a screen a world away. I was all raw force and desperate improvisation. I blocked with my arms because I'd seen it in a movie. I threw a punch because it felt right in the moment. Against goblins and untrained thugs, it was enough. Against a disciplined Martial Mage like Jax? I was a child swinging a sledgehammer, dangerous, but clumsy, predictable, and ultimately, ineffective.
I looked at my hands. They could channel energy that defied this world's understanding of magic. But they didn't know how to throw a proper jab. They didn't know how to parry with economy. They didn't know the first thing about real, structured combat.
The determination that settled over me was colder and sharper than the night air. Getting stronger, raising my Ki reserves, that was a given. But it was no longer enough. I needed to learn how to fight. Not just brawl. Not just survive. I needed to wield my Ki with the same deadly precision that Silas wielded his dagger.
Torak was the answer. It had to be. It was a frontier city, a hub for adventurers and mercenaries. The Iron Fangs, maybe Freya's unit… they were soldiers or guards or whatever but maybe they had actual martial arts. They had to have trainers. Drills. Systems. There had to be someone, or something, that could provide the foundation I so desperately lacked. Maybe a retired weapons master. Maybe a manual in some forgotten corner of the guild library. I didn't care if I had to pay through the nose or beg on my knees. I would find a way to learn.
This wasn't just about surviving the next mission or evading Silas Vane. This was about closing the fundamental gap between what I was and what I could be. The power was there, a wild river inside me. Now, I needed to learn how to build the dam, dig the canals, and direct the flow. I needed to become a warrior, not just a man with power.
As the first hints of dawn tinged the eastern sky, the plan was cemented in my mind. We would get to Torak, by the long and hidden path. And once there, my real training would begin.