Don't Look Down

Retuning to the bunk she had occupied, Tabitha sits. Lifting myself with my arms from my mattress, I pivot in the direction of the white-haired girl. Rhythmic breathing our orchestra, I look beyond the girl to see Solomon and Emma asleep and in deep meditation respectively. Refocusing my attention on the cerulean eyes trained solely on me, I hold Tabitha's gaze and wait.

'Why would you even hesitate at my offer? The Enderich Clan is a high-tier Clan. You're no fool. You know as well as I do the limitations of a Tension Master outside of a Clan. Joining us is your way, no, your only way to reach the peak of the mortal realm'

'Oh? So you're saying I'm the one in need of you?' Words met with a snort, Tabitha's mouth twists into the unmistakable etching of derision.

'Perhaps you are a fool after all. You, a lone Tension Master with no background to speak of, have killed both the brother of a rank-five Clan leader, a man notorious for his brutality and strength, along with the lieutenant of a powerful guild. Do you think your actions have no consequence? Do you really believe, alone, you can weather the oncoming storm?' Repositioning herself on the bed, Tabitha lifts one leg atop the other and leans forward.

'Joining the Enderich Clan is your only way out. Only a Clan with the influence we wield could possibly shelter you from the weight of your own actions.'

Join you? Don't make me laugh. Was it not from your own mouth that you said your Clan would not offend the Yung Clan for your sake? How much less would they do for the sake of an outsider?

I'll admit, the resources that would become available to me were I to submit myself to the Enderich Clan is not something easily passed on, but to willingly become part of a Clan is to, by my own hands, erect a barrier from which I could never escape.

A Clan, even one such as the Enderich Clan, is both a level and a ceiling to all that serve under it. While they can guarantee a certain degree of benefits, no Clan could ever countenance the thought of one of their members growing beyond the whole.

The Clan system instituted in this world is nothing short of a factory for mediocrity, and a bulwark against the threat of excellence or equality. Given food, shelter and the illusion of authority, Clansmen are trained to look down and never to look up. They look down on the ones beneath them. They find contentment in the belief that while they too are looked down upon from above, they are, at least, superior to the ones below. In time, with eyes forever downcast, they forget that there is a sky above their heads. A sky they can never see because their eyes can only ever bear to look down.

Only by standing alone can one rise above the pack. Only alone is it possible to distinguish

oneself and reach beyond the sky into the heavens. Only when the stars are beneath my feet will I ever cast my eyes below. On that day, I will stretch out my hand and rain vengeance down onto the heads of the Xander Clan and all others that stand against me.

Until the day comes when I can look upon all of this world and call it mine, I will never look down.

With a soft clear of her throat, Tabitha breaks through my thoughts.

'Give me what I want, undo the Spirit Pledge, and I will make you an external Clansman of the Enderich Clan. From there, with your talent, you could even become an external elder.'

A chuckle bursts unwillingly from my throat. With narrowing eyes and gritted teeth, Tabitha radiates from her face a portion of the anger that has, no doubt, been building within her since she accepted the "humiliation" of becoming my tool. Sharply sucking air through her teeth, she exhales, regaining her previous semblance of control. But…

She's not in control.

I am.

'Tell me', I say. 'How is it that you, a Clansman of the beta branch of the Xander Clan can offer me a position? Disregarding the unlikelihood that you can, my place would be at the very bottom. An external Clansman of a beta Clan. How could I accept such an offer even if it is sincerely made? Considering the fact that your own advancement is fettered with Spirit Chains, why would I assume anything more for a lowly outsider? Why would subject myself to a life of such mediocrity?'

'I'm not offering you a place in the beta branch of my Clan, but rather, in the head. When I break through my Spirit Chains, I'll claim the rite of succession and become the leader of the Enderich Clan. I'll seize the blessings of Titania and create a new world. A world where suffering and war on this continent are confined to the annals of history.'

From my stomach to my chest to my throat to my mouth, waves of laughter burst past my lips to redden the cheeks of the girl before me. Echoing through the dimly lit cavern, my laughter rebounds and amplifies from the walls.

'Somehow, your dreams are simultaneously too grand and too little. Bringing peace to Aspire? Claiming the power of the fairy queen? What value is there in that when eternity can be contested for? What good is this patch of putrid soil when compared to the worlds within the Towers? What value is there in a portion of the might of a single immortal one, next to power Ember's Crown?'

Thrusting herself onto her feet, Tabitha stands. Tension pools around her, the very air she inhabits distorts. A typhoon of frantic energy spirals her body. With every thunderous pound of her breathing the Tension revolving the white-haired girl increases its velocity.

'Sit down.' My words a whisper, Tabitha struggles against the weight of the Spirit Pledge. Straining, and groaning, igniting her rage, she wrestles with the force of my command. Defeated, all outward manifestation of her wrath is suppressed, and the girl sits.

With a glance, I check to see whether the commotion stirred Solomon from his sleep or Emma from her meditation. Satisfied they remain unmoved, I refix my sight on the white-haired girl. Flared eyes soften, in their place, a half-smile of contempt masking the fury seething beneath the scornfully elegant façade Tabitha wears like armour.

'Ember's Crown?' she scoffs. 'You belittle my ambitions when yours are absurd? Is this not the pot, ensconced in flames, accusing the newly purchased kettle of blackness? Even if you somehow advance beyond the mortal realms of Tension Mastery on your own, even if you become powerful enough to withstand the uninhabitable floors of the Grand Tower, to step one foot inside of that Tower is to trigger a war unlike any this world has seen in millennia'

That much is true. I'm hardly the only person with their sights on absolute power in this world. Within the floors of the three-hundred-and-twenty-one Lower Towers, and the worlds of the nine High Towers dwell beings of incomprehensible strength.

Awakened ones; ascended ones; immortal ones; and transcended ones. Having shed the confines of mortality, to call them human is to call a mighty dragon the lowest of worms. Setting ambition against ambition, the looming threat they pose to one another has ensured that not since the rise of King Ember has anyone scaled the heights of the Grand Tower.

There have been attempts. They all ended the same way; catastrophe for the world and everything in it, failure, along with certain bloody death for the challenger.

'Abandon your lunacy and see what is being offered to you. I'm giving you the only chance you will ever have at true power. If that isn't enough, consider your situation. You murdered a Peace-Keeper. By now your crime has probably been discovered. What can you do alone against the might of an entire guild?'

My turn to scoff, I shake my head, amused by Tabitha's ignorance. 'Pray tell, who is it that breached the earth-bound Tower in this region?'

'That information is classified.'

'It's not classified, Tabitha. It's unknown.' Eyes flash wide, smile fades, lips part; realisation dawns on her face.

'Farsight is being suppressed in this region.'

'That's right. Anything that happens within the Oswald region, from the time of the breach until whoever caused it concludes their business, is beyond the sight of even the Golden Crest investigators. If that were not the case, the name of the maverick who caused this outbreak would already be on every lip.' Standing to my feet, I straighten my back to the satisfying crackling of my spine.

'How long has it been since we entered this cave?' Biting the inside lip, Tabitha stares up at me before lowering her gaze.

'It's been around half a day', she replies.

'Good. By now the abyssal wraith should be far enough away from here for it to be safe to leave. I have somewhere I need to go. You and the others are free to stay here if you like. If you prefer, you can head back to base camp, though I wouldn't advise you do until the wraith has been suppressed.'

'Where are you going?'

'That's not your concern. All you need to know is if you do choose to return, when questioned about my whereabouts, you don't know. I became separated from the party when the high-tier Tension Beast attacked. You haven't seen me since. Is that understood?'

Face scrunched by anger, Tabitha nods her reply.

'As for your offer, of course, I have to decline. I won't get in the way of your ambitions, but know this, if you stand in the way of my own, I will kill you.'

Without waiting for her retort, I turn and leave.

Passing through the tunnel connecting cavern to cavern, I arrive at the first chamber we had entered when we first ran into the cave. Pools of coagulated blood draw a variety of flying insects to their stain, yet the bodies of the fallen dark guild members and the body of Abbigale Smok is nowhere to be seen.

Copper and silver coins lay sporadically on the cave floor. I smile to myself.

I had ordered them to search the cave for anything valuable, I suppose I never instructed them to deliver it to me neatly. I'll need to be more careful with my instructions in the future. Without knowing the extent to which a Spirit Pledge will allow for alternative interpretations, it's best to be more direct with my commands.

Taking the Spatial ring from around my neck, I disseminate green fog above the surface of the stone floor. Allowing the murky emerald mist to seep into every crack and crevice of the chamber floor, I draw the diffused coins into the smog. Instructing its return, the phantasmal smoke creeps from the floor, back into its dimensional plane within my ring.

With not a single precious metal abandoned, I exit the cave.

The crunch of sand replaced by squelching, I walk from the beach to the planes, and from the planes to the gaping maw of a forest.

Cadaverous wood contorts around cadaverous wood, twisting itself to form titan structures stretching out to the sky. Blighting the tawdry fabrication of what passes for trees outside of the Towers, grey flecks of decayed plant matter limply hang on every branch I see.

For this perversion of nature, Tabitha fights?

Madness!

I have seen the majesty of the Towers. I have breathed of its nourishing air, walked in its green pastures, bathed in its clear lakes, and drank from its waters. Having beheld such wonders, can these dying lands be seen as anything other than worthless?

No.

Let the blind have their dark; I will bask in the light. Clans, guilds, academies, sects. They spill blood and die for what? For this? They take from the Towers what they need to survive, only to retreat back into their hovel.

Believing themselves to be rich they are blinded to their own destitution. Believing themselves to be strong, they cannot see how frail they truly are. Their aspirations are as low as they believe anyone who does not share them is. They wage endless wars so that they can reign supreme as the lord of the flies. They struggle to the peak of the mortal realm, uncaring that immortality lies beyond.

How could I bind myself to such foolishness?

If I gouge out my eyes, I would still hear the call to greater things. If I deafened my ears, I would stumble in darkness and silence towards sovereignty.

Only the Towers and the power therein is worth my attention.

As long as I am rising; until I've reached the top; until the day comes when I stand above all others; until I wield Ember's Crown; until vengeance is mine...

I will not look down.