The western territories were three days’ travel from Valdenre by standard carriage, or one day if you paid for expedited transport through the Guild’s priority deploynt system.
Amaron paid for expedited transport.
He arrived in the western regional capital — a city called Thornhearth that served as the Guild’s operational hub for the territories — at the fourteenth hour on day two hundred and sixty. His deploynt orders directed him to report to Senior Coordinator Draveth, who was managing the cascading rift investigation from the regional Guild hall.
Draveth was a man in his fifties with the weathered appearance of soone who’d spent decades doing field work and had only recently transitioned to coordination roles. He looked at Amaron’s credentials, then at Amaron himself, and raised an eyebrow.
"S-rank. Age sixteen. Credentials issued six weeks ago." Draveth said this as observation rather than question. "You’re the Hunter from Valdenre who completed the Kell program and achieved S-rank threshold through the Threshold Trial."
"Yes," Amaron confird.
"Impressive. Also concerning, given how many people attempt that trial and fail. But your credentials are legitimate and your capacity assessnt shows operational S-rank capability. So you’re cleared for deploynt." Draveth pulled up a detailed map of the western territories. "Here’s the situation."
He marked five locations on the map. "Five Grade 5 manifestations in the past three weeks. All within a hundred-kiloter radius. All showing similar structural characteristics that suggest they’re connected rather than independent occurrences. Preliminary analysis indicates potential rift network developnt — which ans these manifestations might be nodes in a larger system that’s forming beneath the surface."
"Rift networks form naturally?" Amaron asked, even though his mory Index told him the answer.
"No," Draveth said flatly. "Natural rift formation is random and independent. Networks require deliberate construction or external influence. Which ans either soone is building this intentionally, or there’s a phenonon we don’t understand creating coordinated manifestation patterns."
He zood in on one location. "Your assignnt: investigate manifestation site three. It’s the most recent, manifested four days ago. We’ve stabilized it with temporary containnt, but we need detailed structural analysis to determine if it’s actually connected to the other sites and what that connection ans."
"Solo investigation?" Amaron asked.
"You’ll have support staff for equipnt and docuntation. But the actual structural analysis requires S-rank capacity to penetrate the deeper layers safely. The other S-rank assigned to this operation is investigating site one. You get site three."
Draveth handed him the investigation paraters. "Two weeks maximum. We need comprehensive data: rift structure, mana flow patterns, any evidence of connection to other manifestations, and threat assessnt for what happens if this actually is a developing network. Questions?"
"Who’s the other S-rank?" Amaron asked.
"Mordain Kell," Draveth said. "Your forr instructor volunteered for this investigation when the network pattern was identified. He’s at site one conducting the sa analysis you’ll be doing at site three."
— ◆ —
Manifestation site three was located sixty kiloters west of Thornhearth, in a region that had been primarily agricultural land before the rift appeared four days ago. The Guild had evacuated civilians within a five-kiloter radius and established a periter with standard monitoring equipnt.
Amaron arrived at the site on day two hundred and sixty-one with his support team — two B-rank Hunters who specialized in rift docuntation and a mana flow specialist who handled the technical equipnt. They’d been briefed on the investigation paraters and understood their role: support Amaron’s structural analysis while staying clear of any dangerous penetration work that required S-rank capacity.
The rift itself was exactly what a Grade 5 manifestation should look like — stable fracture point, high ambient mana density, entrance that led to an internal structure of worked stone and crystal formations. Standard paraters. Nothing imdiately unusual.
But when Amaron extended his mana sense into the deeper structure, he found what the preliminary assessnt had flagged: irregular flow patterns that suggested this rift wasn’t drawing mana from the ambient environnt like normal formations did. It was receiving mana from sowhere else. Sowhere below the surface manifestation. Through channels that shouldn’t exist in natural rift structure.
"There’s a connection," he told his support team after the first hour of analysis. "This rift is being fed by an external source. The mana isn’t generating locally. It’s flowing through established channels from a central node."
The mana specialist — a woman nad Enna — checked her equipnt. "Can you trace the flow to the source?"
"Possibly," Amaron said. "But it’ll require deeper penetration than we can do from the surface. I’ll need to enter the rift and follow the flow patterns directly."
"Alone?" one of the B-rank docuntation specialists asked.
"The deeper structure will be hostile," Amaron said. "Grade 5 at minimum, possibly higher if I’m actually approaching the central node. You’re all B-rank. Coming with would be dangerous."
"You’re S-rank," Enna observed. "But you’re also sixteen and this is your first solo S-rank deploynt. Are you certain you can handle deep rift penetration alone?"
Amaron thought about the Threshold Trial. About maintaining S-rank output for ten hours while his body broke itself. About the capacity he’d achieved and the eleven weeks of recovery it had cost him. About the fact that he’d done all of that specifically so he could handle situations like this.
"Yes," he said. "I’m certain. Set up monitoring equipnt at the entrance. Track my mana signature. If I’m not back in six hours or if my signature disappears completely, report to Coordinator Draveth and request S-rank extraction."
He entered the rift before anyone could argue with the plan.
— ◆ —
The rift’s internal structure matched the preliminary survey for the first three levels — standard Grade 5 layout with predictable threat patterns and normal mana density. But when Amaron descended past level three, following the irregular flow patterns he’d detected from the surface, the structure changed.
The passages beca less worked stone and more natural cave formation. The ambient mana increased beyond Grade 5 paraters. And the flow patterns intensified, suggesting he was getting closer to whatever was feeding this manifestation.
Level five was where he encountered the first real threat.
Not a standard rift entity. Sothing constructed. Artificial. A mana-ford guardian that registered at high Grade 6 intensity and moved with the coordinated intelligence of sothing designed rather than naturally manifested.
Amaron engaged it with S-rank combat technique — the kind he’d developed during the Kell program and hadn’t been able to use operationally until now. The guardian was strong. Fast. Adaptive in ways that suggested sophisticated design. But it was still Grade 6, and he was S-rank with eleven weeks of pent-up capacity finally deployed without restriction.
The fight lasted four minutes. When it was done, the guardian was dispersed and Amaron was standing in a chamber that absolutely should not exist in a four-day-old rift manifestation.
The chamber was large. Perfectly circular. With walls that showed clear evidence of deliberate construction rather than natural formation. And in the center was exactly what he’d been tracking: a rift node. An artificial construct designed to channel mana from a distant source and distribute it to surface manifestations.
This wasn’t natural rift formation. This was engineered. Soone had built this. Soone with significant resources, advanced knowledge of rift chanics, and unclear intentions.
Amaron docunted everything. The node’s structure. The mana flow patterns. The evidence of artificial construction. The destroyed guardian and its design characteristics. All of it went into his field report with the understanding that this was significantly more serious than a natural phenonon.
He was about to begin his return to the surface when his mana sense detected sothing new. Another presence. Not a construct. A person. S-rank capacity signature. Moving through the rift structure from a different entry point.
Mordain Kell appeared in the chamber thirty seconds later, looking entirely unsurprised to find Amaron there.
"Hunter Volg," Mordain said. "Following mana flow patterns to the central node. Encountering artificial guardians. Finding evidence of deliberate construction."
"Yes," Amaron confird. "Site three is fed by this node. I’m docunting for the investigation report."
"Site one has an identical node," Mordain said. "Sa structure. Sa flow patterns. Sa artificial guardian design. Which suggests whoever built these is operating at scale. Multiple manifestations. Coordinated developnt. Strategic placent."
He examined the node with the focused attention of soone who knew exactly what they were looking at and didn’t like the conclusion they were reaching. "This is the beginning of sothing significantly worse than five isolated manifestations. Soone is building a rift network. Deliberately. For purposes we don’t understand yet."
"Do we know who?" Amaron asked.
"No," Mordain said. "But whoever they are, they have S-rank level resources and knowledge. These nodes aren’t sothing a random Hunter could construct. This requires expertise, funding, and access to rare materials. Which ans we’re dealing with either a rogue organization or soone with significant backing."
He turned to face Amaron directly. "Your first S-rank deploynt and you’ve walked into what’s probably going to beco a major Guild investigation. How does that feel?"
"Like the tiline breaking in exactly the way I expected," Amaron said quietly.
Mordain gave him a sharp look. "Explain that."
Amaron hesitated. Then he made a choice about how much truth to give to soone who’d just spent eight weeks training him and had probably earned so degree of honesty.
"I have knowledge that suggests certain threats will appear at certain tis," he said carefully. "Rift networks were one of those threats. But they were supposed to appear two years from now in the eastern territories. Finding them now, here, in the west — that’s a significant deviation from what I expected. Which ans either my information was incomplete or the tiline is accelerating faster than I predicted."
"Interesting choice of words," Mordain said. "’Tiline.’ ’Predicted.’ You talk like soone who’s seen this before."
"I have," Amaron said. "In a sense."
Mordain studied him. "We’ll discuss that later. For now, finish your docuntation. et at the surface in thirty minutes. We’re reporting this to Draveth together and recomnding imdiate escalation to Guild central authority. This isn’t a regional problem anymore. This is sothing that requires coordinated S-rank response."
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