“Anyway, the important part is that the preservation enchantment isn’t as brilliant as I thought. It contaminated the liquid inside with some of my mana. And drinking something with someone else’s mana in it is dangerous. Potentially fatal. But if we’re siblings, your mana type might be close enough to mine—”
Sera looked straight into my eyes, took a deep breath, and then extended her open hand.
I understood.
“The waterskin is in my belt pouch. I don’t think I can reach it.”
Sera moved to my side, opened the belt pouch, unstoppered the bottle, closed her eyes, and began to drink.
And, within moments, she began to glow.
I hadn’t turned my attunement back on.
As she continued to drink the fluid, her aura flickered yellow, orange, red, yellow — and began to spark.
She bent over forward, retching, but only threw up a mouthful of ichor.
And, as I watched, that ichor froze into ice.
Sera stood up, reopening her eyes.
They were ice blue without the faintest hint of white.
I’d never seen anything close to it.
Sera spun at the sound of another crack from the doorway, lifting a hand. “Wall. Wall. Wall.”
Her voice was strong again, unwavering, as the broken section of the doorway was filled with ice. More walls sprung up behind it, thicker than the ones she’d conjured before.
Sera turned back to me and shivered before speaking again. “We should go. I will forge a path.”
Sera took one more drink from the flask, grimaced, and restoppered it. Then she put it back in my pouch.
“Woah, nice work there, Sera!” Vera arrived with Selys-Lyann in hand and my other sword in her other hand. “That a mana potion or something?”
Apparently she hadn’t been able to hear the conversation from where she was standing. That was probably a good thing.
“Something like that,” Sera replied. “Corin, may I borrow your mana watch?”
I nodded and handed it to her.
Vera took a step back. “Uh, your eyes, Sera—”
“I’m fine for now. Wasn’t an ordinary mana potion.” She reached back to press the mana watch against her attunement mark. As she did, I got a look at it.
It was no longer a Summoner Attunement.
It was like nothing I’d ever seen.
Attunements always changed in complexity when they grew more powerful. Normally, it was just adding an extra line or shape to an existing design. This was a completely different style, and nothing like any one I’d seen. Not even foreign attunements.
She shivered again as she looked at the watch, then handed it back to me.
It read 968/112.
It hadn’t increased her mana capacity properly. She was filled with mana that her body couldn’t properly contain.
“Sera...” I started.
“I know, Corin. I’ll use it as quickly as I can.”
I balled my hands into fists. I couldn’t do anything else.
“Wall. Wall. Wall. Wall.”
“The way is clear,” Jin pronounced. “We should proceed.”
I reached into my bag and withdrew my etching tool again. “Bring me next to the door, then the rest of you get inside.
They complied. “Okay, turn me around so I can draw on the door.”
“I’m not sure we have time for this, Corin,” Jin noted.
“It’s going to buy us time.” I reached forward, and Jin grudgingly turned me toward the doorframe.
I scratched a rune I’d never actually powered before across a combination of the door and frame. It would only be whole when the door was closed.
“Sera, you’ve got a lung attunement. Can you charge the air near the rune with air mana?”
“Easily,” she replied, and she blew into the air near the rune.
I turned my attunement on, watching the air mana coalesce. It was fascinating. Being in the tower was improving my ability to see mana, just as I’d expected, and I hoped that would be enough to help me manipulate it as well.
I brought my hand up to the mana cloud. For a moment, I could feel it. And in that moment, I pushed it into the rune.
The rune’s halves flared, charged with power but inactive while they were apart.
“Okay, Jin. Take us in and close the door.”
Everyone was inside the room when he slammed it shut. The rune-halves met, forming a wind rune.
The door shook as the rune sent a continuous stream of wind toward where Derek was still working at demolishing the walls of ice.
I hope that’s enough to slow him down once he gets through the wall.
I kept the etching tool in hand, scratched an anti-teleport rune into the back to the door, and then charged it with my own mana.
“Okay, we can move now.”
As we moved forward, I scanned the room. Sera had been very thorough.
All four walls of the room were encased in ice. The statues were still active, breathing their fire, but the ice was thick enough that they’d barely made any progress at melting through.
We moved to the center of the room, finding the square that indicated the presence of another stairway.
Vera knelt down, touching the tile. “There’s a mechanism somewhere that moves this tile out of the way. Staircase is right under it.”
“Move out of the way.”
Vera moved.
“Ogre, I summon you.”
An ogre appeared at Sera’s side, shimmering with an icy aura across its skin. “Master,” it groaned toward Sera.
“Ogre, break through this floor tile to reveal the stairway.”
We all cleared the way.
The ogre smashed through the tile in a single blow, then took a few more moemnts to clear away the rubble. “Please the Master?”
“Yes, ogre, you’ve done well. Now, stay here and guard the top of the stairway. Don’t allow anyone to follow us down here. Don’t kill them, just incapacitate them.”
“Yes, Master. I good at stop people.” The ogre nodded happily.
I was pretty impressed. Being a powerful Summoner was useful.
“Okay, let’s head on down,” I pronounced.
“I’ll go first and check for traps,” Vera offered, heading down the stairway. After a few moments she returned. “All clear.”
My back was still in a great deal of pain, but I was starting to feel a tingling sensation — accompanied by periodic spurts of pain — in both legs. I thought that was probably a sign that I was recovering, but I didn’t know how much longer the process would take.
Jin carried me down the stairs, and Sera followed last.
“Wall.”