I smiled up at the first rays of sunshine, enjoying the warmth it lent my skin.
“Should we rescue them soon?” Maria asked, also facing the blazing orb as it peeked over the distant horizon.
I glanced to the side, checking up on George and Geraldine. After they’d had a few hours’ rest, we finally let Ellis out of his taphorical cage. The forr archivist was currently peppering them with questions about the manual they’d been using to cultivate.
“I still can’t believe the drama you put them through...” Maria said, her hair swaying as she shook her head. “The poor things.”
“The drama they were putting themselves through, you an,” I replied, unable to completely hide my smile. “I feel like I should have realized earlier that it wasn’t just social anxiety making George so nervous.”
“To be fair, you’d have to be a mind reader to realize he thought you were an auditor from the capital.”
I nodded, craning my neck to face Ellis. “Gonna be much longer, mate?” I called. “We’ve got fun stuff to be about.”
“We just got started!” Ellis replied, not raising his eyes from his notepad.
“It’s been twenty minutes!”
He took a deep breath, sighing it out dramatically. “Okay. I will leave you for now. Thank you for your information. Would you be free this evening?”
“Of course!” Geraldine replied, smoothing her dress as she stood.
“Wonderful, do you think I could perhaps peruse house Kraken’s manual—”
“Ellis!” I chided. “Enough! They can offer that if they like, but they shouldn’t be pressured, especially after joining us literally like… two hours ago.”
He opened his mouth and raised a finger to retort, but swiftly shut his trap and lowered the hand. “Fischer is correct. I apologize.” He jotted one more thing then slamd his notepad closed. “I will see you this evening.” He turned on his heel and strode away, power walking back to New Tropica.
“Sorry,” I said to George and Geraldine as they approached. “He’s super passionate about information.”
“It’s okay.” George looked out at the ocean, squinting his eyes as he took in the rising sun. “I still suspect I might be dreaming?”
Maria and I shared an amused glance.
“You’re awake, I’m afraid,” Maria said. “Fischer can be a bit annoying as far as powerful beings go, but I’m sure he’ll grow on you. Like a barnacle. Or a particularly resilient weed that just won’t stop growing back, no matter how many tis—”
“Thanks, Maria,” I interrupted, dramatically rolling my eyes at her before turning to the lord and lady of Tropica. “So, I was going to offer you so fishing lessons this morning, but I thought I should share one more piece of information with you first.”
“Oh?” George asked, his tone slightly hesitant. “What is it you wish to say?”
I pointed at his wedding ring, then at Geraldine’s. “I was thinking about what I felt from your cores. Without overloading you with information, I can get a good sense of people’s powers. Both of your cores feel... different. I’d assud Rocky did sothing weird to your cores, but now that I know about your house’s manual, it’s safe to say that its influence is why your chi feels so odd. The thing is, your wedding rings are likely suppressing your ability to beco cultivators. Without them, you’d probably have done so already.”
They both turned to each other, their eyes wide.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m telling you this now because if we go fishing, I’m almost certain you’ll beco cultivators. But, because of how much essence both of you already possess, I’m thinking it’s better if you ascend by doing the ditations you’ve already been doing.”
They remained staring at each other, having an unspoken conversation in the way only lifelong partners could. At the sa ti, smirks ford on their faces and they gave a slight nod.
“Thank you, Fischer!” Geraldine called, leading her husband across the sands.
“You can use my house if you like!” I yelled. “It’s closer, and you can co fishing after you ascend!”
Excited as she was, she didn’t even ask her husband if that was okay, instead veering left and jogging for my house as she gave a wide grin.
“I kinda love them as a couple,” Maria mused, watching them go.
“Right? Wholeso as heck.”
She scooted up beside , nestling into the spot between my arm and chest. “Should we go fishing?”
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“Soon.” The sll of her hair drifted up, filling my lungs and making feel weightless.
She started shaking, and after a mont, I realized she was giggling.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“I just rembered what you did to Rocky. Do you think he’s still flying?”
I barked a laugh, picturing him sailing through the stratosphere. “You know, I have no idea. With any luck, I sent him to the moon.”
She let out a content sigh. “He’ll be back soon, no doubt. Hopefully he learned his lesson.”
“Well, he’d better. Snips was even more pissed off than I was. I don’t think she’s going to forgive him so easily this ti.”
Rather than dwell any longer on the antisocial crab, I focused on Maria. Her body was just as warm and welcoming as the sun. I patted her hair and she snuggled in even closer, putting a leg over mine. Beneath the morning sun, we slipped into a comfortable silence, both content to just exist with one another.
“Thank you,” she said, rubbing my arm.
“For what?” I asked.
“Oh, you know.” She tossed her head from side to side. “Everything.”
***
Fueled by a burning hatred and the prospect of sweet, sweet revenge, a lone crustacean skimd across the ocean’s surface like a torpedo—if a torpedo could experience borderline apoplectic fury.
Suddenly, his spiky mistress's turned back flashed through his mind, driving a thorn of rejection deep into his core, his mighty carapace no match for the deadly barb. His flippers slowed as anguish overtook him.
He had failed his beloved matriarch...
Just as quick as sadness descended, his fury returned, scouring the anguish from existence.
Fischer. It was his fault. None of this would have happened if not for Fischer’s existence. George wouldn’t have fallen to his knees, so Rocky wouldn’t have had to punish anyone.
As his limbs sent him rocketing through the ocean, his thoughts drifted to the flight Fischer had subjected him to. It was one of the best and worst things that Rocky had ever experienced. Loathe as he was to admit it, Fischer’s strength was unparalleled. The man had held back, yet still sent Rocky higher than ever before. He’d soared so high that the world beca a giant orb beneath him. Much to his surprise, there had been multiple land masses visible, their different environnts breaking up the ocean’s monotony. He flew so high that he thought he may never co back down.
But Rocky hadn’t even been able to enjoy it, because it had been Fischer’s arm that sent him there.
Rocky’s eye twitched in disgust, rembering the way those fleshy fingers had restrained Rocky’s superior carapace. Despite his inferior form, Fischer’s hands had been like vices, stronger than even his beloved mistress’s clackers. It went against everything Rocky held dear, and the more he considered it, the more his anger blood.
Until the vision of his mistress’s discontent returned, anyway.
Rocky slowed again, lancholy washing over him. How could he go on without his beloved? What was the point in all of this if he didn’t have the respect and companionship of his spiky mistress? There had to be sothing he could do... but what?
Before he could consider it long, he cycled back toward fury at Fischer. He remained there for a beat, railing at Fischer whose fault all of this clearly was. When he arrived back at missing Sergeant Snips, he realized just how circular his thoughts had beco.
His emotions were turbulent, sweeping him this way and that like an ocean current. He focused, doing his best to find a solution. He had to not only win back his matriarch but also find a way to overpower Fischer.
There was only one possibility, and as he considered it, a devious grin ca over Rocky’s face. With a goal in mind, his emotions stabilized. He dread of vengeance and winning back Snips’s approval, and he knew how to et both goals.
More power.
There was only one place he could go, and though it would take him multiple days to return to Tropica at his current speed, it didn’t matter. He had a path now. He would follow it as long as need be.
When the sun was high overhead, an island ca into view. Rocky gave it a rude gesture. The thing had dared get in his way, so that was the least it deserved. Determined not to change course even if it would have been faster to go around it, he leaped up onto a shore of black stone, scuttling sideways toward a darkened peak. If he’d been paying attention to his surroundings instead of cursing the island’s very existence, he might have recognized the material the peak was made of. Focused as he may have been, however, even Rocky couldn’t miss what he found on top of the mountain.
The temperature had been climbing steadily as he approached the rise, but Rocky just thought that was his outrage becoming manifest. He learned the truth when he skidded to a stop and stared down into the gaping hole. An angry heat flowed from the opening, so vicious that it rivaled Rocky’s own internal state. He froze there, transfixed by the sight.
Hundreds of ters below him, gigantic sheets of black rock covered a ground of sorts, outlined by veins of glowing red. They reminded him of the underwater vista he was heading for—the place he’d originally used to ascend. To confirm his suspicions, he found a large black boulder. Hefting it with one claw, he threw it down into the pit. Ti seed to slow as it approached the sheets, and when it struck, it plunged right through.
The dark sheets caved in, the boulder passing through and disappearing into the abyss of magma. He’d expected the red-hot stone there to explode in response, just as the underground version he’d found did when disturbed. He held his breath, waiting for the reaction.
It never ca.
Cursing at himself—then Fischer, because really, it was all his fault—Rocky scuttled back so he could leap right over the chasm. But that’s when it happened.
The ground shook, the very world groaning like Rocky’s stomach after a particularly large feast. Hoping it ant what he thought it did, he eased back forward and peered down into the pit. The magma there bubbled and churned, and before his eyes, erupted. A gout of molten stone shot up into the sky, almost high enough to clear the cliff he stood atop. He could feel the chi running through each and every drop—it was the sa as the pit he’d first ascended in, the very sa essence that powered Rocky’s body.
He held his claws high, hissing with victory. The world itself had blessed him. It had heard his calls for retribution, and it had answered. Blowing bubbles of impending victory, Rocky leaped from the edge. He sailed down toward the magma, making dual rude gestures at the sky, for not even the heavens would be able to contain Rocky’s new form when he erged once more.
This mont of victory was short-lived, because the second he hit the surface of the active volcano, all Rocky knew was pain.
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