When they returned to the valley, dawn had yet to break.
Haeru was already waiting at the valley entrance.
It raised its head, sweeping its golden eyes over Linley, Sessler, and Bebe. Only after confirming that all three were unharmed did it lie back down.
"Thanks for your hard work." Linley nodded.
Haeru closed its eyes without responding.
Bebe landed on Linley's shoulder and grinned. "Haeru, you didn't sleep all night?"
"Keeping watch," Haeru replied coolly through mental communication.
"I've kept watch too." Bebe puffed out his chest. "Though I usually don't make it to midnight."
Haeru opened its eyes and glanced at it.
Bebe immediately shut his mouth.
In the valley, the campfire had gone out, leaving only a few dark red embers. Lina and Rebecca sat beside a rock, still meditating. A gray-black bone fragment lay before each of them, covered in tiny engraved patterns.
Sessler glanced at the sisters and said, "Their soul power is too weak. For now, they can only sense low-level undead. It will take more time before they can truly use Necromancy."
"As long as they can protect themselves," Linley said.
Sessler sneered. "You certainly don't ask much of them."
"They've only just started."
Sessler stared at Linley for a moment, then turned and walked over to the sisters.
"Open your eyes."
Lina and Rebecca opened their eyes together.
Sessler put away the two bone fragments and replaced them with two slender white finger bones.
"Necromancy is neither a plea nor a command." His voice was dry and rasping. "You must first hear the voices of the dead, then let them hear yours. If your souls aren't strong enough, the undead you summon will turn on you. If your souls aren't steady enough, your spiritual energy will be tainted by death energy."
Rebecca asked quietly, "Teacher, what should we do?"
"Sense."
"Sense what?"
"The earth beneath your feet."
Sessler pushed the white finger bones into the soil.
"Magical beasts have been buried here, and so have people. Every set of remains leaves traces. Don't rush to summon them. First, learn to distinguish them."
The sisters closed their eyes again.
Linley did not disturb them. He walked to the other side of the valley.
The Black Jade Heavy Sword stood embedded in the rocky ground.
He sat cross-legged and pressed his palm to the ground.
The earth was silent.
Tiny insects crawled through the soil, water moved slowly deep within the rocks, and distant tree roots stretched deeper into the ground. Those sounds mingled, faint but never ceasing for even a moment.
Linley closed his eyes.
He did not seek out any single sound.
His awareness gradually sank, as though his entire body lay pressed against the earth.
Thump.
An exceedingly faint vibration came from far away.
Thump.
Another.
The interval between the two vibrations was exactly the same.
Linley stood up.
He drew the Black Jade Heavy Sword and thrust forward.
There was no battle-qi.
The heavy sword pierced the air with nothing but a sharp whistle.
Linley withdrew his sword.
"I failed."
Doehring's voice sounded in his mind. "You're imitating the earth, but you haven't truly brought your own power into step with its rhythm."
Linley frowned.
"I already sensed it."
"Sensing it and doing it are two different things."
"I know."
"You know, yet you still rushed to strike."
Linley looked at the Black Jade Heavy Sword in his hand.
"If I don't strike, I'll never know how to do it."
Doehring fell silent for a moment.
"Then keep going."
Linley nodded.
He raised his sword again.
This time, he did not thrust immediately.
The valley was quiet.
Wind swept through the treetops, stirring a broad rustle of leaves. Haeru lay in the distance, occasionally opening its eyes to look around. Bebe sat on a rock, propping his chin in his hands as he watched Linley practice.
Linley's steps grew slower and slower.
One step.
A pause.
Another step.
The Black Jade Heavy Sword moved with his body, like a heavy rock slowly tracing a path through his hands.
The earth's vibrations came again.
Linley raised his sword.
Thrust.
Hiss!
A sharp burst rang through the air.
Linley's eyes lit up.
The space before the sword tip distorted slightly.
Immediately afterward, a second burst rang out.
It was much deeper than the first, as though two forces had collided.
Linley shuddered, and the Black Jade Heavy Sword nearly flew from his hand.
Instead of traveling out through the sword tip, that force rebounded into his arm.
Linley immediately withdrew his sword.
His right arm went numb.
"Just a little short," Doehring said.
"The second vibration didn't get out."
"It did. Your own power simply knocked it back."
Linley lowered his head to look at his arm.
"Why?"
"You treated the two forces as two attacks," Doehring said. "They should have been a single force all along. The first vibration isn't the beginning, and the second isn't the end. What you need to do is make them build on each other."
Linley did not answer immediately.
He closed his eyes, recalling the instant he had struck.
When the first force thrust out, he had clearly felt the air being shaken apart.
But when the second force appeared, it was like a new heavy sword crashing out right behind the first.
Two heavy swords would naturally collide.
Linley opened his eyes again.
"I can't separate the vibrations."
"Keep thinking."
"The first vibration has to carry the second."
"Still not enough."
"The second vibration also has to push the first."
Doehring said nothing more.
Linley struck again.
Failure.
Again.
Failure.
The third time.
The Black Jade Heavy Sword pierced the rock wall, leaving only a shallow sword mark.
The fourth time.
The blade brushed a piece of bluestone. The stone cracked, but did not split in two.
The fifth time.
A burst rang through the air, and Linley staggered back three steps.
Bebe could not help saying, "Boss, this move looks like you're hitting yourself."
"Shut up."
Bebe immediately leaped away.
"I'm just telling the truth."
Linley ignored them.
He swung his sword over and over.
From morning to noon, and from noon to dusk.
His arms ached, and his battle-qi was nearly exhausted, but he never stopped.
That night, Lina summoned an undead for the first time.
A gray-white skeletal claw reached out of the soil, gripped the ground, and slowly crawled free.
It was the skeleton of a magical beast, with only third-rank strength.
Lina's face was pale, her forehead covered in sweat.
The skeleton had barely found its footing when it suddenly turned and lunged at her.
Sessler raised his hand.
A streak of black death energy lashed the skeleton.
Crack!
The skeleton was sent flying and slammed heavily into the rock wall.
"Why didn't you control it?" Sessler asked coldly.
Lina bit her lip. "It... won't listen to me."
"Your soul power is too weak."
"I can't do it."
"If you can't, you'll die."
Looking at the skeleton as it climbed back up, Lina held out her hand.
Her spiritual energy surged out once more.
Halfway through its lunge, the skeleton suddenly stopped.
Two ghostly green flames flickered in its eye sockets.
Lina trembled, the color draining further and further from her face.
"Hold steady," Sessler said. "Don't treat it as a living thing, and don't treat it as a tool. It is merely an extension of your power."
Lina clenched her teeth.
A moment later, the skeleton slowly knelt.
Rebecca stood nearby, watching her older sister nervously.
Sessler offered no praise, merely shifting his gaze to her.
"Your turn."
"Do I have to summon one too?"
"Do you think you can survive just by watching?"
Rebecca paled and immediately sat down.
Soon, the sound of churning soil rose through the valley again.
Standing in the distance, Linley glanced at them, then looked away.
"Sessler is too harsh on them."
"Being harsh is a good thing," Doehring said. "Necromancy is dangerous by nature. They have no power right now. Any moment of leniency could end in death."
"I don't want them to become people who know only slaughter."
"That is something they will have to decide for themselves later."
Linley was silent for a moment, then raised the Black Jade Heavy Sword again.
"At least for now, they need to be able to protect themselves first."
The next day, the map Sessler had brought back from Basil provincial capital was spread over a rock.
Several towns and cities were marked on it.
He drew a line beside Deke County City with a bone pen.
"Perry's memories were incomplete, but they were enough to confirm one thing."
"What?" Linley asked.
"In a month, the Radiant Church will send a prisoner escort into Deke County City."
Sessler pointed at the line.
"The escort won't pass through Basil provincial capital. They'll take a detour from the north first, then rendezvous with local personnel thirty li outside Deke County City."
"How many people are in the escort?"
"Perry didn't know."
"Who's leading it?"
"He didn't know."
"Who are they transporting?"
Sessler shook his head.
"He only knew they were a group of important prisoners. The Church never gave him the list."
Linley looked at the map.
"In that case, why go through Deke County City?"
"The Church has a secret base there. They can replenish supplies and replace the escort personnel." Sessler tapped the city with his bone pen. "Perry was only responsible for receiving the peripheral personnel. The person actually giving the orders isn't in Northwest Province."
"Can you find out who it is?"
"No." Sessler put away his bone pen. "That person's name wasn't in his soul."
Linley nodded.
This was as far as the intelligence went.
"We'll leave in half a month," he said. "Once we reach Deke County City, we'll observe the escort first, then decide whether to act."
Sessler said, "What if the prisoners they're transporting aren't the people you want to save?"
"Then we'll see."
"What if it's a trap?"
Linley looked at him.
"We can choose not to go."
Sessler's jade-green eyes flickered.
"Would you stay away?"
"No."
Sessler sneered.
"Then why ask?"
"I wanted to know whether you would go."
"I'm already here."
Their gazes met.
A moment later, Sessler rolled up the map.
"We leave in fifteen days."
The days that followed passed quickly.
Linley practiced his swordsmanship every day.
On the first day, he could only occasionally produce two vibrations.
On the second day, he succeeded once in ten attempts.
By the fifth day, that had risen to three successes.
On the eighth day, for the first time, he successfully delivered the second wave of force with three consecutive sword strikes.
On the tenth day, the third vibration appeared.
It was very weak.
So weak that it could only crack the surface of a fist-sized stone.
But that force truly existed.
Linley did not keep trying.
He withdrew his sword and stood there thinking for a long time.
"When the third vibration appeared, the first two waves of force nearly dissipated," Doehring said.
"I know."
"You haven't mastered it yet."
"I know that too."
"Then why did you stop?"
Linley looked at the rock face covered in sword marks.
"Because if I keep practicing, I'll remember the wrong feeling."
Doehring fell silent.
This time, he did not argue.
Linley sat cross-legged and sensed the earth again.
He no longer pursued those three vibrations, instead seeking the earth's own rhythm before the three vibrations appeared.
The earth never hurried.
The mountain rocks did not hurry, the rivers did not hurry, and neither did the roots of trees.
Only people hurried.
Linley's breathing gradually steadied.
On the morning of the fifteenth day, he stood before that rock face.
The Black Jade Heavy Sword was raised high.
Linley used neither Battle-qi nor magic.
The soil beneath his feet sank slightly.
Thrust!
Boom!
The first explosive burst of air rang out.
Boom!
The second explosive burst followed close behind.
Boom!
The third sound rang out.
The rock face shuddered violently.
Three cracks spread outward simultaneously from the tip of the sword.
The entire rock face did not immediately shatter.
The cracks stopped halfway across it.
Linley withdrew his sword.
"Did it work?" Bebe jumped down from a tree.
"Only three," Linley said.
"That still means it worked."
"I can only succeed eight times out of ten."
"That's already impressive." Bebe grinned. "At least you won't hit yourself every time."
Linley glared at him.
Bebe immediately hid behind Haeru.
Haeru looked at the cracked rock face and transmitted, "Not bad power."
Linley nodded.
Doehring's voice rang out in his mind. "The beginning is the hardest part."
"I know."
Linley slung the Black Jade Heavy Sword across his back.
On the other side of the valley, Lina and Rebecca had finished meditating.
Their faces were still pale, but their condition was much more stable than half a month earlier. A fourth-rank skeleton stood beside Lina, while two gray undead hounds followed Rebecca.
The undead hounds made no sound, simply lying quietly at her feet.
After checking their spiritual energy, Sessler nodded.
"The initial transmission is complete."
Rebecca let out a breath of relief.
Lina looked at Linley. "Can we come with you?"
"You two will stay in the valley."
Both sisters' expressions changed.
Sessler said coldly, "They're going."
Linley frowned.
"The fighting in Deke County City isn't something they can take part in."
"They don't need to take part," Sessler said. "They only need to see the enemy clearly and survive. If they keep hiding here, they'll never know what the things they've learned are good for."
Linley did not agree immediately.
Lina tightly gripped the hem of her clothes.
"We won't hold you back."
"That isn't the issue."
"Then what is?"
Linley looked at her.
"You aren't ready yet."
Lina lowered her head.
Sessler, however, said, "Whether they're ready shouldn't be for you alone to decide."
Linley looked at Sessler.
"If we encounter danger, I'll have to protect them."
"That's your choice." Sessler's tone did not change. "I won't shoulder it for you."
Linley was silent for a while.
Rebecca suddenly raised her head. "Teacher will protect us."
Sessler glanced at her.
"I'll only intervene once you've managed to survive on your own first."
The expression on Rebecca's face froze.
"Remember," Sessler said, "Necromancy isn't meant to make you depend on others. It's meant to qualify you to stand beside them."
Linley looked at the undead beside the two sisters.
A moment later, he nodded.
"You can come."
Lina and Rebecca both let out breaths of relief.
"But you must follow orders," Linley continued. "Once the fighting starts, you're not to leave Sessler's side without permission. If you encounter a Saint Realm expert, retreat immediately. Don't linger."
"All right." Lina nodded firmly.
"We'll remember," Rebecca said as well.
Sessler put away his bone staff.
"One more thing."
Linley looked at him.
"On this mission, I won't have the golden-haired zombie make the first move."
"Why?" Bebe asked.
"There may be a Saint Realm expert among an important prisoner escort," Sessler said. "The golden-haired zombie's aura is too conspicuous. If it's exposed ahead of time, the enemy will change routes immediately."
Linley nodded.
"Scout first, act afterward."
"Exactly."
Haeru rose, his enormous body pressing down a patch of grass.
"I'll take the lead," it transmitted.
"I'll cover the air," Bebe said immediately.
"You can't fly."
"I'll cover the trees."
"That works," Linley said.
Sessler watched them, his hard face expressionless.
"Let's go."
Linley took one last look at the valley.
Many sword marks remained here, along with traces of the undead aura from the two sisters' first summoning.
Half a month earlier, they had returned here simply because of a piece of intelligence.
Now, they were setting out for an escort party that had yet to appear.
Linley slung the Black Jade Heavy Sword onto his back and led the way out of the valley.
Bebe leaped onto his shoulder.
Haeru followed silently behind.
Lina and Rebecca followed close behind Sessler.
Doehring stood beside Linley, his moon-white robe brushing through the morning breeze.
The road ahead led to Deke County City.
And to a secret yet to be uncovered.