The Edge of Star Dou Forest – Noon
The transition was abrupt. One moment, they were walking on a dirt road surrounded by rolling hills and chirping crickets. The next, they stepped across an invisible line, and the world became green, dark, and silent.
The trees here were old. Their roots coiled like sleeping dragons, and their canopies blotted out the sun. The air was thick with the scent of wet moss and predatory intent.
Arthev stopped dead.
Thump. Oof. Hey!
The Royal Team crashed into each other behind him like a line of dominoes.
"Welcome to the classroom," Arthev said, spreading his arms.
"It's dark," Osler whispered, looking around nervously. "And damp. My fur is frizzing."
"It is the Mixed Zone," Qin Ming said, appearing from behind a tree munching on a pear. "Beasts here range from ten years to five thousand years. Occasionally, a ten-thousand-year beast wanders in for a snack. Keep your eyes open."
"Teacher Qin," Dugu Yan asked sweetly. "Since we are in the danger zone, will you be setting up a defensive perimeter?"
Crunch
Qin Ming took a bite of his pear. "No."
"Will you be setting up the tents?" Yu Feng asked hopefully.
"No."
Grumble. Shi Mo clutched his stomach. "Will you be cooking?"
Qin Ming tossed the pear core into a bush. "I am an observer. Observers observe. They do not cook."
He leaped up, landing lightly on a high branch, and proceeded to take a nap.
The team looked at Arthev.
Arthev sat down on a flat rock. He pulled out a book titled Structural Integrity of Canvas in High Winds.
"Don't look at me," Arthev said without looking up. "I am not your maid. Set up camp. Two tents for the boys, one for the girls. Dig a latrine fifty paces downwind. Gather dry firewood. Secure fresh water source."
"But... we don't know how to set up these tents!" Osler cried, holding a bundle of poles. "The instructions are entirely in diagrams! I don't speak diagram!"
"Figure it out," Arthev turned a page. "If you can't build a shelter, you sleep in the rain. And looking at those clouds... it will rain in forty minutes."
-----------
For the next thirty minutes, the clearing was filled with the sounds of chaos.
"That's not a pole, that's a peg!" Yu Tianheng shouted, wrestling with a canvas sheet that seemed to be fighting back.
"Stop hitting me with the hammer!" Shi Mo yelled at his brother.
"I'm trying to hit the ground, but you keep moving the earth!" the other Shi Mo yelled back.
Dugu Yan and Ye Lingling were staring at their tent bundle.
"It looks like a giant, dead spider," Dugu Yan noted with disgust.
"I think this pointy bit goes ...here?" Lingling guessed, jabbing a metal pole forward.
Riiip.
Lingling winced. "Oops."
"Great," Dugu Yan sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose.
"Now we have a skylight."
Nearby, Yu Feng was trying to tie a rope to a tree branch.
"Don't worry! I'll secure the roof!" he announced, flying up. He tied the knot, let go, and the entire tent collapsed on top of Osler.
Whump!
"Mmph! I'm trapped! The canvas is eating me!" Osler screamed from inside the fabric.
Arthev sat on his rock, watching.
'This is painfully pathetic ,' Shukaku commented. 'The turtle is trying to hammer a screw. The bird just tied himself to the tree. Are these the future pillars of the Empire?'
'They are specialized combatants,' Arthev replied internally. 'They know how to destroy, not create. This is the lesson.'
Finally, after much cursing and one minor case of Osler almost strangling himself, two lopsided tents stood in the clearing.
They looked sad. They leaned to the left. But they were standing.
"Done!" Yu Tianheng panted, wiping grease from his forehead. "It's ugly, but it's home."
Drip.
Drip-drop
The rain started.
"Into the tents!" Osler shrieked, diving for cover.
The team piled inside. Arthev stayed outside. He simply channeled a bit of soul power, and the leaves of the tree above him wove together, forming a perfect, waterproof umbrella.
"Absolute show-off," Dugu Yan muttered, zipping up the girls' tent.
------
High above, Spark sat on a thick branch, rain dripping off his nose. He was wearing a camouflage cloak that looked like moss.
"They finally built the tents," Spark whispered into his comms, suppressing a laugh.
"It took them a whole hour. A blind toddler could do it faster."
"Are the structure secure?" Whisper asked.
"Secure? A sneeze would knock them over,"
Spark snickered. "Also, they forgot to dig a drainage ditch. The rain is going to flood them in ten minutes."
"Good," Whisper said. "Discomfort breeds mistakes. Keep watching."
Spark clicked his tongue. "Watching is boring. I want to see them dance."
He reached into his pouch. He pulled out a small glass vial filled with a pink powder.
Sweet-Scent Pollen.
It wasn't poison. It was a potent attractant for insect-type soul beasts. Not dangerous ones, just... annoying ones.
"Oops," Spark whispered, dropping the vial. "My hand slipped."
The vial fell, smashing on a rock near the boys' tent. The pink powder puffed into the air, carried by the damp wind.
_______
Inside the boys' tent, it was cramped.
"Move your elbow," Yu Tianheng grumbled.
"That's not my elbow, that's my knee," Shi Mo replied.
"Gods, who took off their boots?" Osler gagged. "It smells like dead cheese in here."
Suddenly, a sound cut through the rain.
BZZZZZZZ.
It wasn't one bee. It was a thousand.
"What is that?" Yu Feng asked, his bird hearing picking it up first.
"Arthev said we'd be learning about local bugs," Shi Mo said nervously. "Maybe he's giving a lecture?"
RIIIIIIP.
The canvas roof of the tent was sliced open. A massive, hairy leg poked through.
"GIANT WASP!" Osler screamed.
The boys scrambled out of the tent, tripping over each other.
Hovering above the camp was a swarm of Iron-Sting Wasps. They were the size of cats, with metallic yellow stripes and stingers like daggers. They weren't high level, maybe ten years to a hundred years, but there were dozens of them, drawn by the sweet scent.
"Formation!" Yu Tianheng roared, instinctively summoning his lightning.
"Rule 1!" Arthev's voice cut through the noise. He was still sitting under his tree, dry and calm. "No Third Skill. No Dragon Fury. Basic attacks only."
"But there are so many!" Yu Tianheng argued, dodging a stinger.
"Then aim better," Arthev said.
The fight was chaotic.
The wasps were fast and small. The Graphite Brothers swung their heavy shields, but it was like trying to swat flies with a door. They missed, spinning around and getting stung on the butt.
"OW!" Shi Mo yelped. "My gluteus maximus!"
Yu Feng took to the air, but the rain made his wings heavy. A wasp latched onto his back.
"Get it off! Get it off!"
"Don't move!" Dugu Yan shouted, aiming a puff of green mist.
"Not poison!" Yu Feng screamed. "You'll melt my jacket!"
CRACK!
"Thunder Claw!" Yu Tianheng punched a wasp, frying it. But three more swarmed him. He couldn't unleash his area-of-effect lightning without hitting his own team in the chaos.
"Focus!" Arthev commanded. "Shi Mo, stop swinging. Be a wall. Osler, stop running in circles screaming! Lure their flight paths into the wall. Yu Feng, use wind pressure to suppress their altitude, do not engage them physically!"
The team paused, listening to the voice of logic.
The Graphite Brothers moved as one.
Clang!
Their massive tortoise shields slammed together, interlocking to form an impenetrable wall of heavy bone and soul power.
"Hey, ugly!" Osler shouted. He darted out from the cover of the trees, aggressively swatting a dive-bombing wasp right on its thorax, then instantly pivoted and sprinted back.
The furious swarm took the bait, dive-bombing straight for his retreating back.
Smash!
Dozens of the giant wasps crashed headlong into the wet turtle shells, dazed by the impact
"Now, Captain!" Arthev ordered.
Yu Tianheng didn't use his third ring. He used his first. Thunder Claw.
But instead of punching, he grabbed the wet shield of the Graphite Brothers.
"Take it!" Yu Tianheng roared
He pumped lightning into the shield. The turtle shell became an electric fence.
ZAP-ZAP-ZAP.
The swarm that was pressed against the shield was instantly fried. Dozens of wasps dropped to the mud, smoking.
Silence returned to the camp.
The team stood there, panting, wet, and covered in bug parts.
"We lived," Osler whispered.
"My tent," Yu Tianheng mourned, looking at the shredded canvas. "My home."
Arthev stood up. He walked over to the spot where the pink powder had fallen. He sniffed the air.
'Synthetic pheromone,' Arthev noted. 'The rat is playing games.'
He looked up at the trees. He couldn't see Spark, but he knew he was there.
"Good reaction time," Arthev told the team.
"But terrible spatial awareness. You seriously didn't smell the lure?"
"Lure?" Dugu Yan sniffed. "I smell... strawberries?"
"Exactly," Arthev said. "Why in the would there be strawberries in a pine forest?"
He kicked the dirt over the pink stain.
"Pack up the ruined tent. The boys are sleeping under the stars tonight."
"In the rain?" Osler cried.
"The rain washes off the wasp venom," Arthev said cheerfully.
"Consider It medicinal."
------
Midnight
The rain stopped. The clouds parted.
Most of the team was asleep, exhausted.
Yu Tianheng sat by the dying fire, keeping watch. He was shivering slightly, his clothes damp.
Arthev sat nearby, whittling a piece of wood.
"You led them well at the end," Arthev said softly.
Yu Tianheng stared at the fire. "I panicked. When the swarm hit, my first instinct was to just use brute force again."
"It is a hard habit to break. You are a Dragon. Dragons like to roar."
Yu Tianheng looked at his hand. Blue sparks danced between his fingers.
"I feel... stuck, Arthev. Rank 39. I have been Rank 39 for four months. My soul power is full. My cup is overflowing. But I can't break the lid."
"The bottleneck," Arthev nodded. The transition from Soul Elder to Soul Ancestor. It is a qualitative change, not just a quantitative one."
"How did you do it?" Yu Tianheng asked. "You hit Rank 30 and absorbed a 10,000-year ring. You don't have bottlenecks. You just... expand."
Arthev looked at Yu Tianheng.
"You rely on your bloodline. The Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon is undeniably strong. It carries you. But to break through to next tier .... you need to be stronger than the dragon."
"Stronger than the dragon?"
"Dominate it," Arthev whispered. "Don't just channel the lightning. Order it. Compress it. Make it uncomfortable. Growth is uncomfortable."
Yu Tianheng closed his eyes. He focused on the energy in his core. Usually, he let it flow like a wild river.
Now, he tried to squeeze it.
He imagined the lightning not as a river, but as a solid bar of iron. He tried to bend it.
Bzzt.
A spark jumped from his shoulder, scorching the log.
"Careful," Arthev said, standing up. "If you're going to explode, do it away from the girls' tent."
Yu Tianheng didn't answer. He was deep in meditation. His brow furrowed. Sweat beaded on his forehead. The air around him began to hum.
The blue lightning didn't flare out. It turned inward. It became denser. Darker.
Thrum... Thrum...
Arthev watched with his Shinragan. He saw the energy in Yu Tianheng's meridians coiling tight, like a spring ready to snap.
"He's close," Arthev murmured.
High in the tree, Spark watched the blue glow intensify.
"Whisper," Spark said. "The Dragon kid is glowing. He looks like a blueberry about to pop."
"He is breaking through," Whisper replied. "This team... they are evolving too fast."
"Should I throw another grenade? Disrupt his focus?"
"No," Whisper said. "Let him break through. A stronger team leads to bigger targets in this forest. And bigger targets will eventually lead us to the Truth."
Down below, Yu Tianheng grit his teeth. A low growl escaped his throat.
CRACK.
A sound like a dry twig snapping echoed inside his body.
The blue light suddenly retracted, sucked into his chest.
Then... silence.
Yu Tianheng opened his eyes. They weren't glowing. They were deep, dark pools of blue.
He took a breath.
A ring of blue electricity expanded from his body, controlled, sharp, and terrifyingly potent.
"Soul Ancestor," Yu Tianheng whispered, looking at his hands. "I need a fourth ring."
Arthev smiled in the shadows.
"Congratulations, Captain. Now the real fun begins."
To be continued...