Chapter 78

Chapter 78

2/2

Matt was surprised that his friends had gotten married, but their clear happiness was enough for him. He was slightly jealous, and had to make a conscious effort not to look at Liz. Marriage was a nice thought, if a little scary.

Melinda stuttered out, Matt, this is too much. Its... Its...

Her voice trailed off as he shrugged his indifference. It really was nothing to him.

Guys, take what you want. We already sold a bunch to the auction house. We dont really need them. These are just the more basic ones that we kept around to perform more rift experiments on when we got the chance.

Seeing their confusion, he explained. Rift making isnt just throwing mana into an area. Well, it is, but we learned that you can put stuff inside and use aspected mana to influence the rift and its rewards.

Looking for an example, he pointed at Taras quiver. We made that by using wind mana and putting a bow and arrow set into the area where we created the rift.

Liz poked him and said, Youre getting a bit loud, Matt.

Matt grinned in slight embarrassment, and after checking his volume, said, But yeah, we learned a lot while we were able to experiment. Got a lot of items and money from it. Even skills.

Liz added with a wry smile as she leaned into him, And investigated for cheating.

He enjoyed the little spike of fear that crossed his friends faces. It was what he felt in the moment, but now, after everything was fine, it was more funny than scary.

Kyle blurted out, Wait, what?

Matt waved it off. Oh, it was scary as hell at the time, but we got access to the Empire Market. Its like the contribution point market for the war, but with a seemingly more universal currency. You can buy some amazing things. The investigator was reasonable and heard us out.

He was going to explain more, but the air bubble popped as their waiter came in with two massive trays of food. He let the matter drop for now.

It smelled divine, and for its absurd price it had better taste as good as it smelled. It still stung to spend this much money, but he consoled himself with reminders that it was a special occasion, and kept the pain of his slightly lighter wallet off his face.

As the meal progressed, he started to rehash the adventures that had been through with Liz and Aster. Most were things that they knew already, since he had shared stories in their messages back and forth, but it was more fun to share in person. It was really nice to hear about how simple and calm their lives had been. It was fun to see the other side of being on The Path.

As the dinner wound down, with most of the plates only half-cleared, he suggested they move to a park and continue the talk there. He had seen the waiter pass by twice, and the restaurant was full. He didnt want to hog the table when they could talk long into the night in the nice city air, without bothering anyone else.

They chatted well into the night, and as it was winding down, Melinda stretched with an exaggerated sigh. Her party seemed to take their cue, as they started getting ready to go.

Matt said, We should spar tomorrow morning. Like old times. It would be great to see how you have all grown.

Melinda smiled, Well spank you around like we did at Tier 3.

He waggled his eyebrows and said, Ah, but I was only Tier 2 then. In an overly pompous voice, he said, We are now the same Tier. Now I have the power to defeat you!

As they said good night one final time, he smiled while thinking about how good it was to see someone from home. It had been so long, and they had all grown so much.

Aster was nearly asleep when he picked her up, and he walked arm in arm back to their room with Liz. She leaned on his shoulder as they walked back.

When they were halfway there, she said, Your friends seem really nice.

Matt resisted the urge to fist pump the air. He had been trying to make sure Liz was included in the conversations throughout dinner, but once he saw her talking to Sam about alchemy, he stopped paying attention.

He was unable to prevent his excitement from coming out in his voice. You like them? Really?

He had to make sure, but felt confident that he would get a good answer.

Yes, they seem kind and intelligent. They also treated me like one of their own, which was AMAZING!This chapter was first shared on the Ñøv€lß1n platform.

She shouted the last bit, which caused Aster to kick in her sleep. Matt felt like he was on cloud nine as he floated down the sidewalk. Things were looking up in the best way possible.

***

Liz wasnt sure that sparring was the best idea for friends that hadnt seen each other in years, but with how casual they all seemed, she didnt say anything.

She was just hanging back as they all talked, watching them. They all seemed so happy. Sam even made sure to smile at her as the others got ready to board the fighting platform.

The woman was knowledgeable with alchemy, and Liz wanted to collaborate with her to use the leftovers she had from the herb rift that Matt had made for her to practice with.

She was debating how to best ask the woman, when someone appeared next to the referee and shooed him off.

That oddity caused Liz to instantly go on alert.

The unknown man said, Ill be refereeing this match.

Matt looked irritated when he asked, And you are?

His attitude matched Lizs own. She didnt like unexpected occurrences like this. Something was off, and she could smell it.

Liz barked out, nearly at the same time, What authority do you have to do that?

The man seemed un-bothered and calmly answered, Im Baxter. Over Tier 40 and a healer in the employ of the Emperor. I can keep any secrets you might reveal in a fight just that. A secret.

Liz was about to start screaming and sending messages at the blatant lie. The Emperor had only one personal healer, not the multitudes that this man implied, and she knew the Emperors healers. He was her healer growing up.

This young man was not the Harvest Moon. Moon was old and wrinkly. She only knew him from her time in the palace, which wasn't an extensive period of time, but she had spent a few weeks visiting Uncle Manny now and then. She had met and interacted with Moon enough to know that this wasn't him.

As she was creating a message to call for help, she received a message from her Moon, Im undercover, so dont blow it for me.

Liz paused. It sounded like the Moon she knew, and faking messages was incredibly difficult. A quick check showed that the ID matched her Moons old ID, so she sent him a testing question.

How many times did I break my arm, and how many times did you heal me?.

The mans lip twitched as he replied, You broke your leg twice falling from the same roof trying to fly, once with a bedsheet after the first attempt without one failed. And you landed in my garden in the imperial palace. Twice. Don't try and test me child.

Liz swore she caught the slightest glimpse of a wink as she finished reading his message.

She smiled at the memory. Shed thought that if mom was a bird, then she should be able to fly as well. When the first attempt hadnt worked, she realized that she didn't have wings, and that had to be the problem. So, she grabbed a bed sheet to make the jump a second time. Her logic at three years old was flawless.

Moon was one of the few who knew that she had broken her leg trying to fly. Uncle Manny and her parents knew, but no one else. While he could still be a fraud, albeit one with a good information source, she found it highly unlikely.

His voice messages sounded right, and she trusted the little test she had done.

She said out loud for the benefit of the others, Oh, okay. Thats fine.

Liz was unable to stop the grin that crept onto her face.

Moon, or Baxter, she corrected herself, glared at her. She sent him on the side, Ill have dad flood your garden if youre mean to me.

His lip twitched for a second time. But he didnt rise to the bait and instead asked her, Now that you know who I am, convince your friend that I need him to do what I asked.

Matt laughed as he said something to his friends that she missed while talking to Baxter, but Liz messaged her teammate, You can trust him.

He paused and looked at Baxter questioningly with a raised eyebrow.

Liz shrugged and sent another message, Dont tell anyone else, but that really is one of the Emperor's personal healers undercover, dont tell anyone else who wasn't here. But you can trust him.

It was a long moment later that he seemed to reluctantly nod, glancing at Liz.

Taking her spot off to the side with Aster, she waved the foxs paw at everyone and called out, Have fun!

She watched as Matt exploded forward while casting [Hail] and shooting at one of his friends with his crossbow. The crossbow golem arm had taken up Matts free time while he tinkered over the last week, and he was as proud as her mother after a molt with his new toy.

They intended to sell them at the auction, but they were going to hold off until after he used them in combat at least once. They wanted to show their creations value to the Queendom and start a bidding war as the Kingdom, more specifically Juni and the Prince would already know their potential.

Matt had snatched a few dozen of the arms. But apparently, it wasnt easy to modify them for human use while keeping their enchantments whole. Still,he had figured it out after some tinkering.

Liz was surprised when her partner ran Mathew through with his sword, and started to shout at Matt for taking it too far, only to find that she was in a bubble of Concept. She raged at Moon through the soundproof wall of will. She tried to resist it with her own Concept, but she only got a headache for her efforts.

If she knew this was what he wanted from Matt, she wouldnt have agreed to push Matt into it. It also explained why he looked so unsure.

Seeing that she had no way to stop this shit show, she forced herself to calm down, and watched as Matt decimated his friends.

She cursed again at the healing downtime he was causing as he slaughtered his way through them.

Liz would have been impressed with how strong Matt was, but the stomping seemed to be more from a lack of coordination and training on her new friends part.

A simple [Hail] was able to shut down their archer, Tara, for nearly the whole fight, and Sam couldnt even pierce Matts armor with her dagger. She knew that [Cracked Phantom Armor] was strong, but that result fell far below her expectations. Matt had talked them and their achievements up all night. She expected to see Matt get slapped around, not to watch him toy with them.

And toy with them he did. She saw it as he fought with Sam and Kyle. Why Kyle used a ridiculous metal slab to fight, she didnt know. It looked incredibly unwieldy, even though he seemed to handle the weight better than she would have been able to.

She knew of other fighters that used massive swords like that, but not without a flight skill or a Concept to anchor yourself. The counter forces were needed to swing that much weight around, which meant it was an ineffective style until the later Tiers.

Matt took much longer to take down the duo than she expected, going by his earlier performance. He could have ended it with the skills enchanted into his blade with two swipes.

When she handed him the paper he just looked at it for a moment, and in a flash of moonlight it was gone. He gave her the finger and said, You're obsessive.

She didn't have a retort for that one.

They watched as the children started to spar while getting corrections from Matt and Liz. Their corrections werent perfect, but Melindas team didnt need perfection. She could see the mix of embarrassment and anger driving them, and made a note to check if they continued to push forward. She had to know if they would make the improvements she thought they could.

Shes going to change warfare for the Empire, isnt she?

He sighed next to her. She has that potential. More than we did.

Luna thought about that. She had created thousands of powerhouses, and he had forced the other Great Powers into a new agreement about healing stations after his was attacked. He slaughtered the attacking army in a single night during the planet's autumnal equinox. It was where he got his moniker from.

Harvest Moon was more literal than most realized.

I hope this little wake up call works as intended. She has an incredibly useful Concept that she refuses to use as well. I just hope she can use this to grow.

Luna moved them forward until she was in the blonde's face. She inspected her with both her spiritual sense and eyes.

She looks driven. At least right now she does. Well see if they can keep it up. War is coming, and she could be of use.

Harvest looked at her and bumped her shoulder. Your new ones are just as impressive. Maybe more so. I can see an endless list of things that his Talent could be used for, if it works how I think it does. Even the non-combat potential is wild.

She ignored his bad attempt at a pun, and moved them back to a higher vantage point.

He could be great. I intend to make sure he lives up to it.

Have you told Mara and Leon that youre managing their daughter?

That caused her to laugh. The airheads have been avoiding me after I critiqued their play fighting when it moved over my house. It covered my sun bathing spot so I went up there and put a stop to it. I made Mara act as my heat lamp for a week. Apparently, it brought back bad memories of their time under my tutelage, and theyve avoided me ever since.

She smiled at that. She was proud of her work with the duo. She was proud of what she had molded them into. Their daughter looked to be everything they were and more. Where they had amazing combat potential, despite their conflicting affinities, they had little room in their heads for anything serious.

Their daughter was both strong, and a thinker.

Luna intended to rub that into her once protegees and now friends' faces.

She turned into her cat form and curled up under Harvest's aura. Seeing friends help each other was enough to calm the raging desire long enough to get to sleep.

Sleep was so rare for her, but she cherished it. When she slept, she dreamt, and when she had dreams, she had Nora.

***

Matt moved around Kyles slash and slapped the flat of his blade into his inner thigh. Kyle didnt yelp, and instead tried to hit Matt with and aggressive backswing.

They were sparring and working on his style, as Matt was the only one who could match his pure strength.

He still felt bad for what he had done to them and had apologized to each of them. None of them seemed angry at him, but more so with themselves.

It also put their progress in another light for him. They had stalled, and while they were ahead of him in cultivation slightly, they should already be fighting like Tier 7s with their Talents. He knew it wasn't fair when you considered that they had limited mana to spend on delving, but they should have been able to fight up a Tier if they worked on their combat prowess.

Their fight had opened his eyes to the harsh reality. When he started the duel, he expected a challenging fight where he struggled to hold his own. When his starting crossbow shot and [Hail] took both Vinnie and Tara out of the fight, he was surprised that they didn't expect a quick opening.

When he was able to lift Mathew off his feet to negate the man's Talent and run him through, he was disappointed.

As Melinda stood there frozen, he understood what Baxter wanted from him.

He hadn't really believed the man when he said that they needed a wake up call, and had only done it because Liz had vouched for the man. While Baxter hadnt said it, Matt expected that he was filling in for the same thing as his own still forming management team, and was trying to push them.

So, he tried to show them exactly how far behind the power curve they truly were. He toyed with Sam, Kyle, and Tara. He hadn't liked playing it up; in fact, he hated it. But he had hoped that it would drive the point home.

He hadnt even needed to use his AI to predict their moves, as they didnt vary off of the most obvious choices. After the first few exchanges, he turned it off and found that it didnt hamper him at all.

Thankfully, they seemed to have learned their lesson, and were trying to improve. The team had taken the initiative to share their Talents and skills with Liz, who did the same. She was as shocked as he was at how well-rounded they were while being so weak.

They agreed that Melindas team should, in theory, be beating them more often than not. They had so much utility and damage to leverage. They simply relied too heavily on their cultivation and Melinda's healing. They had the essence, but not the experience.

Matt was determined to help them advance. He contrasted the team that worked so hard in the PlayPen with the team that was unable to do anything against his own. He saw the hurt looks in Sam and Vinnies eyes, and anger and pain in the rest of the teams. There was what he thought was determination, but he wasnt sure if he was just hoping to see that.

Still, he was determined to help them where he could. He contemplated throwing them into freshly made rifts, to help them get used to fighting without a guide. He understood using it to reduce danger, but apparently they needed guides.

Them being on the other side of the war was suddenly looking like a good thing. He knew their side had some powerhouses, just from the golem war. There were a lot of people on both sides that Matt could see them practicing their abilities and skills on.

He and Liz also decided to try and get the rest of their new war squad to come to a spar or two. It would mean hiding his and Melinda's Talents, but it would be good to show them other strong Pathers.

They sparred for hours, relying on Matt keeping everyone full of mana to burn, and [Endurance] to keep going when exhaustion would have forced them to stop normally.

Let's go get showered and meet up for the auction. I hear its going to be crazy.

Vinnie said while glaring at the floor, We dont even have points to spend. Whats the point?

Matt didnt like the defeatist tone his friend had. Things will be sold for mana stones as well. Also, its useful just to see what is for sale. Our point of contact and leader implied that the Kingdom was buying items to exchange for missions that had a high chance of death, as a form of compensation. You might see something you like.

He bumped Vinnie and grinned at him. Come on, if nothing else, it should be a nice little party.

Melinda stood and brushed her armor off. We only have the skills youre giving us to trade, and we can do that without being there in person. I think we need the night to ourselves.

She looked at him, and while she did look sorry, she also looked determined. Sorry Matt. Next time. And let's plan for some more sparring tomorrow. Okay?

Matt wanted to say he could buy them whatever they needed, but he was pretty sure that he was running close to what he was allowed to give as a seeker equivalent. He also didnt think they needed, or even wanted his money. Being there to help them train seemed like the better option.

While he didnt regret his gifts from the way Tara and Vinnie looked at their items, it seemed to only make them feel worse for not keeping up.

The last thing Matt wanted to do was replace one weakness with a dependency on him to keep them competent. He knew they could be great on their own.

Matt just hoped that he didnt do more harm than good with his gifts. His friends looked like deflated balloons after their fight, and they only seemed slightly recovered after their sparring.

With that settled, he and Liz quietly went back to their rooms. Their moods were somber as they walked away from where the arena platform dropped them off. Even Aster seemed to sense the mood; she didnt even beg for ice cream when they passed a shop.

Neither said anything until Liz asked, Do you think that could happen to us?

Matt looked confused. What do you mean?

I mean if we didnt get investigated and we didnt get the management team. Would we have stagnated? Liz clarified with a troubled look on her face. Matt wanted to immediately deny it, but he paused.

Would we have?

Because of Melindas Talent, they got sloppy. He remembered the time before they had their Tier 3 Talents. They were much more diligent. While Matts Talent didnt make injuries a non-issue, it did allow them to gain a large amount of essence in a very short amount of time, with minimal risk if they only delved at their Tier.

Now that he thought about it, they were already forming bad habits. If the manager hadnt forced their hands, they would have skipped out on this war. They would have stayed at Tier 5, playing with rifts and delving for growth items, simply for wealth.

Matt slowly replied, As much as I want to deny it, yes. During our break, I was already beginning to back slide. Without the manager, we would have stayed at Tier 5 longer than we should have. With Melindas Talent, they would really benefit from having a manager. Baxter seems like hes trying to fill that role, but maybe he doesnt have the authority to tell them what to do? Otherwise why would he be asking for our help?

After a moment of contemplation, Liz responded, Yeah. Youre probably right. I felt it too. Getting investigated was more of a blessing than I thought.

They walked in silence for another moment when Liz said, You know, I wanted to say something about my parents when Melinda shared her Talent. I just froze up and the moment seemed to pass me by. Sorry.

He grabbed her hand. He hadnt expected her to share until she was comfortable and didn't expect it that soon. She was working on it, but it wasn't as if she was cured of her fear just because she told him about them.

You have nothing to be sorry about, so don't worry about it. It's pretty understandable. When or if you feel ready, that's the best time to tell them. Besides, it's not like they really need to know.

I know, but it didnt seem fair to me. Melinda shared her big secret, and I just couldnt bring myself to reciprocate. But theyre good people. I can tell that much already. Ill definitely tell them. I just need to work up the nerve first. With her mind clearly made up, Liz squeezed his hand and pulled Aster from his arms.

When they arrived at their suite of rooms, they found Emily, Annie, and Conor lounging.

As they walked in, Emily called out, Weve been waiting for you. Are you coming to the auction?

Liz nodded, saying, We were sparring with some old friends. Well be ready in ten minutes.

Conor checked his watch, Should be enough time. I hear that it's being held in a special location, and that transports will start moving at the top of the hour. Thats in fifteen minutes, though. I don't want to be the last to arrive.

Annie popped to her feet and added, Yes! This is our first auction like this. I hear if you have more than 1000 points you can have a room for yourself. We can pool our points to stay together, right?

Emily rolled her eyes, and Matt noticed that Annie hadnt taken her eyes off of Conor, who still had the far off look of someone interacting with their AI.

Matt decided to help her in her ploy for the man's attention.

I think that's a great idea.

Annie grinned at him and threw him a thumbs up hidden away from Conor.

Well hurry up and go shower then. We don't have time!