Prelude to a Duel

Step 1: With equal portions of blood extracted from a beast and your own hand, mix together in a vial. Best results can be obtained if the beast possesses a spirit root similar to your own.

The first step was cracking the bone, and that was harder than expected. In the end Booker had to borrow a hand-drill, a chisel, and a hammer from a nearby workshop, boring a small hole in the bone with the drill and using the chisel to widen it. Sweat dripping over his face, he smacked the hammer against the chisel's base until that first hole widened into a crack that split the whole bone in half.

"God! That was more work than it should have been."

But at the same time, the toughness of the bone only meant good things. It meant he'd definitely found the blood of a powerful and resilient beast.

The marrow inside, he pulled out with a spoon and squeezed, mashing it into a bowl until the blood ran free. It wasn't much – but he hoped it would be enough.

He slid the knife across his hand, wincing at the strange feeling. It wasn't pain, not at first, but the sensation of his skin splitting open. Pain followed soon after, as he squeezed his hand and dripped out the blood into a vial.

He poured them together, mixing an equal amount. It seemed like such a simple recipe at its base. Human and beast…

Did spirit beasts really spring up in the wild, anywhere the two mixed? This world must have many more beasts than humans. Perhaps an impossible amount.

Step 2: To strengthen the resulting beast, add alchemical reagents. Reagents of beast cultivation or a chosen element will lead to the strongest results; beware, however, that your own blood or the blood of the beast does not react negatively to the chosen elements. For beginners in this art, it is often suggested to choose to cultivate a toxic spirit beast, as any highly toxic ingredient will suffice and there are few disagreements between the toxic form and other spirit roots.

Be warned, however, not to add too much. A few high quality alchemicals will produce a healthy and hale beast; many alchemicals of poor quality will produce a powerful beast that is short-lived in the extreme, lasting only ten or so minutes after being unbottled. Five is a good number for a bottle-beast in a small vial, ten for one made in a large urn, and twenty for one concocted in a vat.

Hmmm…

As he pondered, Booker took out the Wound Closing Pill he'd made and ate it. It was actually the first pill of his own making he remembered eating; he'd been so out of tune when he'd devoured the Spirit Blossom Pill that he didn't remember any flavor at all. This one had almost no taste, but an overwhelming aroma of pine resin, beeswax, and woodsmoke. As he swallowed it seemed to dissolve into a flame of warmth traveling down his throat, unfurling in his belly so that his entire body flushed hot, as if he was a furnace in which the pill was stoking flame.

Miraculously, the wound on his hand healed and vanished.

"Incredible…" Booker flexed his hand and examined it for defects. Other than a faint line of pink where the wound had closed, there was no sign at all of the wound.

But what to add in?

The book recommends a toxic spirit beast because that's easiest to find ingredients for normally, but with two materials boxes to open, that might not be the case…

I suppose I'd better see what I have.

Holding out his hand, he summoned the remaining two materials boxes he'd yet to open. Summoning them inside the Sect was somewhat risky – but the truth was, Booker had thought this through and didn't see an easy route.

He could rent a room somewhere in the city, but if he did, there wasn't really an excuse he could give that wasn't nefarious somehow. Anyone who accepted his offer would know he was up to something, and it would only be a small leap from there to them examining his rooms and stealing away with his treasure.

On the other hand…

Being discovered by the Sect might not be a death sentence. At worst, he could confess to having a special method of creating materials, and survive that way. With so many rare materials in his room, some the Sect didn't even have access to, who could doubt him?

The real risk is they choose to keep me forever as a slave, but with the need to complete quests, I might be able to manufacture an excuse to slip away…

Booker caught himself drifting into improbable scenarios, shook his head, and focused.

As long as I find a good place to stash my ingredients soon, I should be fine. Spider is too afraid of me now to try anything again, at least until his bruises heal.

Lifting his hand, he summoned the first materials box. It appeared from the floor this time, a golden glow suffusing the floorboards before the small, ornate wooden box simply rose from beneath the ground, at the center of the golden patch of light. It was much larger than the dull box, nearly an arm's length long and reasonably wide.

As he pried the lid open, treasures gleamed inside. There were vials, satchels of powders, dried bundles of herbs, pressed flowers, and more besides.

He went through them quickly, not too interested in their normal alchemical uses. Tomorrow I'll tally it all up and make more pills. For now…

Booker only wanted to know what was useful for the creation of beasts. That meant the Beast Cultivation property, and any elemental infusions he could find.

Soon he had sorted the relevant ingredients into three piles:

The first pile was materials for Beast Cultivation.

Virile Root

Intact // Dull Quality

A root prized by wild bulls for its… stimulating effects. Hunters use trained steers to root out clusters, selling them to cultivators.

Fertility 25% (-)

Beast Taming (+)

Beast Cultivation 5% (+)

Toxicity 20% (-)

Fossilized Beast Manure

Intact // Dull Quality

Transformed over a thousand years from waste to a valuable commodity.

Beast Cultivation 15% (-)

Toxicity and Potency 15% (+)

Severe Nausea (-)

Potency 5% (+)

The second pile, and the largest, was heavily toxic ingredients.

Senescent Mandrake Root

Intact // Earth Quality

A shriveled root in the shape of an old man's face. Viciously toxic, this plant is also deeply virtuous, as it absorbs poisons from the soil and purifies the earth.

Poison Purging (+)

Lethal Poison 40% (-)

Toxicity and Potency 10% (+)

Toxicity 25% (-)

Basilisk Sap

Extract // Earth Quality

The last hint of sap from a petrified tree.

Toxicity 10% (Earth)

Additional Effect: This pill gains Potency equal to half its Toxicity. Then double Toxicity.

Beast-Bone Meal

Powder // Dull Quality

Powder made from grinding the bones of vicious beasts. Frequently used to bind together cheap pills.

Toxicity and Potency 5% (-)

Aged Bile Gland

Intact // Dull Quality

A bile gland filled with stinging nettles and allowed to rot, giving it a unique character of poison. Remote tribes cultivate this as a method of poisoning their arrows.

Necrotizing Poison 20% (-)

Foul Odor (-)

Lingering Poison 10% (+)

Toxicity 20% (-)

Additional Effect: Poison derived from this source is incredibly resilient to purging and curing effects.

The third pile was simply anything with an elemental bias.

Wind-Song Palace Razorgrass

Intact // Dull Quality

Growing in delicate, glass-like stalks, this tough grass is sharp enough to cut through skin with ease. When the wind rises, it cuts against the grass and produces beautiful, mournful music.

Effects:

Cultivation Boost 10% (Metal)

Cultivation Boost 10% (Sky)

Sharpened Perception 25% (+)

Toxicity 15% (-)

Azure-Sea Coral Dust

Powder // Dull Quality

Powder derived from coral colonies, harvesting the collected lifeforce of countless coral polyps that have contributed their petrified bones to the mass of the reef.

Cultivation Boost 10% (Water)

Blue-Fire Glassfruit

Intact // Earth Quality

A translucent fruit, the structures of pale blue luminescence within resembling a frozen candleflame.

Qi Recovery 20% (-)

Cultivation Boost 10% (+)

Body Strengthening 10% (Fire)

Fire Resistance 20% (+)

Looking at the three, Booker conceded the tome was correct. He would try for a toxic specimen on his first attempt; it was just easier and less likely to backfire, since he didn't know the elemental alignment of his own blood to begin with.

And if that's the plan…

He quickly discarded the bone meal as the cheap filler it was, and selected a mixture of Virile Root, Senescent Mandrake, Basilisk Sap, Bile Gland, and the fossilized dung.

But before he began, he steeped two particular ingredients into boiling water. Those were the Virile Root and the Fossilized Manure. Steeping was a way to reduce both the Toxicity and Potency of a medicine – in this case, Booker wanted to lower the Virile Roots Toxicity so it wouldn't match with and cancel out the Bile Gland, and he wanted to reduce the Manure's Toxicity and Potency to 10% so it would match and combine with the Mandrake Root.

After all, this isn't exactly medicine but the same principles should hold true.

Once he'd steeped the ingredients enough to reduce the properties by about five percent, Booker began to combine.

As soon as he added the chopped up Bile Gland, the dark red mixture began to turn a deep black. When he threw in the peeled Virile Root and the Fossilized Manure, it had begun to spit, sizzle, and bubble. He winced as he tossed in the Senescent Mandrake, watching its weathered old face disappear into the boiling black concoction. By now the mixture almost seemed alive, strings of sticky tar-like goo crawling up the walls of the vial like it was trying to escape.

It was only as he poured the preciously small amount of basilisk sap in that he began to wonder…

Did I overdo it?

The mixture was twisting and writhing at the bottom of the vial, a lumpish mass of primordial sludge that seemed to be trying to grow limbs. A bubble swelled and popped on its back, and a drizzle of smoke shot out that immediately made the air turn sour.

Grimacing, Booker shoved the cork into place.

Step 3: Inscribe the following characters in a circle around the decanter in which you've begun the process. Proceed to draw the next three characters in separate circles, surrounding the first at triangular points. Draw lines between these circles, then inwards to the main circle. As you do so, incant the words and clear your mind, focusing on the breath. This will create a gathering array that draws additional strength to your creature as it forms.

The instructions were growing more and more arcane, and Booker's head was dizzy from the toxic fumes he'd accidentally inhaled. Going to cleanse his face of sweat with water from the basin, he took out the energy pill he'd made, the Bloodshot Energy Pill.

It was already past midnight – this seemed like the ideal trial run for his new medicine. It smelled of chocolate and coffee as he chugged it down with water.

Instantly, the need for sleep tugging at his mind receded, and clarity washed into his soul. He felt bright and refreshed like he'd just slept for hours. At the same time, there was a kick, a sort of rising need to move, and he quickly found himself pacing around the room to burn the excess energy boiling up inside him. His whole body was flushed hot with the power of the medicine, leaving him to grin as he wiped away sweat.

"Strong stuff…"

Getting down to business, he dipped his fingers into an inkpot and began to write…

— — —

Before the energy pill wore off, Booker not only completed the gathering array, but spent four hours training alone, his straw sleeping mat rolled up and propped against the wall as his fists slammed into the padding. By the time he was done, he was so physically spent he couldn't even manage to roll the straw mat back out – he passed out on the floor, gazing at the gently-rattling vial in the center of the array. The glass had begun to glow faintly, filling up with a moon-like and gentle light that made the dark contents seem all the more sinister. Booker remembered being in science class, watching his teacher light up an egg with a flashlight so he could see the embryo's shadow within the reddish yolk…

Earth.

I'll probably never see it again.

Not unless I start taking Blue Heaven Pills.

Or maybe…

Maybe I will. Maybe if I cultivate, it won't be impossible. After all, even Rain could send his soul there – maybe it's just such an ordinary world cultivators don't bother to visit.

Should I be sad? Sad I left home behind?

Now that I look back… I never put down any roots.

Even here, I'm not truly rooted down. I like my master, and Sister Mei, Xan and Zu and Fen. I like them. But I wouldn't stay just for them, not if something was calling me in a different direction.

I guess I'm a tumbleweed.

Maybe my soul was just prone to traveling – maybe that's how I ended up here.

— — —

When Booker woke up, the bell was ringing across the morning sky. He cracked an eye open.

The vial was broken into shards. A black bile had stained the floor.

"Goddamnit." Booker scrambled up onto his feet, glancing around frantically. Had it escaped? Had it crawled somewhere and died?

He was so distracted, and the creature was so utterly still and calm, that he looked right past it several times before his eyes focused.

Standing on the windowsill that overlooked the yard was a small, stick-thin creature. It had delicate limbs, translucent like blue glass, and an arrowhead shaped skull with two dark eyes and pale white mandibles. A mantis. It was a mantis, roughly the size of Booker's palm. Its scythe-arms were of a different color than the rest of its sky blue body, the blades colored a pale translucent purple.

It tilted its head as he looked at it.

"Hey there." Booker said, in the calmest tone he could. "Can you… understand me? Give me a wave if you can."

The mantis lifted a claw and wiggled it.

"Wow…" He briefly hesitated, remembering that it was probably venomous beyond belief, but the creature was displaying no hostility. Slowly, Booker reached out his hand and let the mantis climb onto it. The beast was totally tame towards him; it seemed to enjoy being near him. "You're a beauty."

He lifted it into his bag, moving things aside and using a small clay pot to make a safe space for the mantis among the cluttered contents. "I need to get going, but we're going to find you some friends to play with soon."

It let out a strange sound, a kind of hiss interrupted by squeaks, chirps, and clicks in a rapid bubbling sequence.

"Oh you like that? You wanna test out those claws of yours?"

From within the jar, the mantis climbed up and stretched out its arms menacingly, showing off its long scythe-claws.

"Yeah, you're a fighter alright. I'm going to call you Snips."

Tucking Snips away, he made his way into the hallway, catching up to the breakfast crowd just in time before the doors of the cafeteria were pushed closed. It was a crowded space inside, countless people lined up for their ladleful of congee from the massive cauldron. Up to the rafters, where birds nested, the sounds of people gossiping and arguing could be heard.

Sister Mei sidled up to him as he looked for a place to sit. "How is the search for a spirit beast coming? Did Brother Rain find a good beast blood to work with?"

"I did. In fact…" He gestured to his bag. "I have my champion."

Snips, as if sensing he was being discussed, pushed his way up from under the flap of the satchel bag.

Sister Mei almost squealed. "Ah! Not fair! That's such a good spirit beast!"

Booker could only smile.

As they sat down, they were joined by an older cripple, a man with a deeply lined face speckled with freckles and moles from long days in the sun. He slid his tray over and sat himself down. "I hear you're interested in joining our game tonight." His voice was smooth with a creaking undertone that instantly commanded attention.

And Booker couldn't help but notice that unlike the rest of the cripples eating plain rice stew, the old man's congee had bacon, pickled greens, and an egg on top.

He chuckled, catching Booker looking at his treasures. "Privileges of seniority." But he picked up some greens and bacon and passed them to Booker's bowl.

"Oh? Good to know I'll be taken care of in my old age." Booker said, bowing his head gratefully.

"Someone tells me…" He glanced at Mei… "You don't intend to be around for that long."

Booker looked up from eating and glanced between the two of them, trying to calculate what had been said about him. I can be pretty sure Mei likes me. But she's not one to go blind with affection…

"I don't intend to leave the Sect." He answered.

"Ah, so you must intend to leave our company of the damned. That's a dangerous dream." The old man was prodding at Booker for some reason – maybe just to see what he did in response.

"There are medicines that can accomplish it." Booker explained calmly. "And I intend to find them."

"See, what I heard about you, before you came down here…" The old man drank from his cup, making no rush to finish his words. "Was that you were addicted to Blue Dream, and bad. Let it ruin your whole future. But that's not the man I see before me – certainly that's not a man who turns little Mei's head – and I'm wondering what I am looking at."

Ah. That's it.

He's protective of Mei.

"Well…" Booker shrugged. "When you hit rock bottom, you find yourself with nothing to do but think. And sometimes, maybe, you find perspective."

The man chuckled, his rich voice hitching up with snorts of laughter. "Well, we've certainly got perspective down here. We can see the whole mountain – we're just at the bottom."

"I guess I just think… Whatever I need to do, it won't get easier by waiting for tomorrow. Wherever you are, that's where you have to start living."

"Start living… I like that." He nodded, and Booker sensed the questions were over. "And that's a fine spirit beast you've got."

Booker glanced over to his shoulder. Snips had crawled out of the bag and was now sitting there, his brilliantly colored claws held aloft. Lifting a piece of bacon in his chopsticks, he watched as Snips grasped it in delicate claws and began to nibble. "Thanks."

"How confident are you it will win?" Mei asked.

"Very." Booker replied.

"Compared to most spirit beasts I've seen, it has a more defined shape, brighter colors, and a more delicately-formed body. All of these are good measures by which to measure a spirit beast's natural power." The old man opined.

"Delicate is good?" Mei asked, looking at her own spirit beast with a furrowed brow and pouting lips.

"Delicate means the magic used to form it was unusually good. Think of it like a potter forming clay. A bad potter can still make a thick and lumpy plate, but only a skilled one can produce a thin, light piece." The man continued to explain. Booker got the sense of grandfatherly patience from him when he talked to Mei.

"I've got a good feeling about Snips here." Booker said. And I dumped in a ton of herbs and reagents that nobody around here has ever heard of. If the Dull materials from the random boxes seem to be on par with what the Sect offers to normal disciples, then Earth-level materials should be something even a higher disciple, a true cultivator, would prize. If everything went well, this spirit beast should be a grade above the rest.

"Then I'm going to invite a few friends to the game. Cultivators. They're the ones with money to lose…" The old man had taken out a small book and was leafing through it, licking his fingers to turn the pages. He glanced up, sharply, blue eyes fixing on Booker as if daring him to argue. "But I'll be taking twenty percent as my fee."

"Twenty percent and we eat dinner somewhere better than this. My treat."

"Heh-heh. That's what I like to hear." By now breakfast was almost finished, and the tables were clearing away. Cripples were expected to clean after they ate, so they had a moment more.

"What's your name?"

"This old nobody? Chen Jie." Together they picked up their bowls and deposited them into the washing trough, then began to clean one of the novice's tables. Other cripples washed the bowls and swept.

"Then, Elder Brother Chen Jie, share a little wisdom. I've noticed my master doesn't eat with us. Where does he go?"

"Your master, as far as I know, doesn't eat breakfast at all. He spends his mornings gazing up at the mountain by the little pond by the orchards. But I wouldn't bother him if I were you. Some things are sacred, and I can't tell you why."

Booker simply nodded. Before they parted ways, Chen Jie said to him, "Meet us by the lecture hall in the eastern wing, about an hour before the bell rings for dinner."

"Just make sure your cultivator friends have a sense of humor." Booker said.

As they parted ways, he hurried towards the alchemy labs, lifting Snips off his shoulder again and hiding him in the jar. "Stay there this time – I don't want my master seeing you." He's too smart not to wonder where I got the ingredients for such a fine spirit beast.

In the hallways, Booker caught sight of Xan's broad back shouldering through the crowd. Hurrying up, he tossed a grin Xan's way. "Hey Brother."

"Rain! You look… You look a lot better, Rain." Xan said with honest concern and hope for his friend. "Is your master treating you well?"

"He is." Booker confirmed. "And I'm not out of tricks yet. Meet me by the lecture hall, I've got something going."

Xan nodded, and that was as good as a promise.

With that out of the way, Booker broke off and headed for the alchemy hall.

— — —

As he arrived at the alchemy hall, the smell coming from the pill furnaces filled the broad space of the workshop; the workshop was arranged in two tiers, with the workbenches and tables and jars of ingredients all along a wooden balcony that overlooked rows and rows of furnaces set on a stone foundation.

Today, alchemists in heavy protective gear used broad paddles to reach in and draw out the rows of pills being refined within.

Each pill was packed into a small weighted mold that would shape it into a perfectly round pellet. One by one, the alchemists cracked the molds open with chisels and the cultivation pills spilled out. Every third mold yielded, instead of a perfect saffron-gold pill, a messy spill of glittering black ash. The foul odor of spoiled pills mingled into the perfume of the completed articles, the base undertone of black earth and ash somehow making the aroma even sweeter.

It looks like it's all hands aboard today. Wherever he looked, the alchemists were busily sorting pills into large glass jars. And this is only the lowest-level workshop the Sect has…

"Rain." His master greeted him. "Come here. Today we're learning something that doesn't need skills with a knife – so your master finally has a chance to instruct you."

Stepping up to the table, Booker saw pills laid out on a small mat. His master picked up one in a pair of chopsticks and held it out. "Smell."

Leaning in, Booker inhaled the fragrance.

"Now, depending on the outcome of the furnace and the skill with which a pill was made, it might be of several qualities. There are devices that can test a pill's potency, but they are rare and valuable compared to the senses we are born with. If you can determine a pill's value by smell alone, you will have acquired a treasure every alchemist desires." His master explained patiently.

That makes perfect sense, but… The book will just tell me the quality…

Already the pages had started to flip.

Saffron-Sunflower Cultivation Pill (Dull)

2% Potency // 6% Toxicity

Effect:

A simple pill for the purposes of accelerating cultivation.

Ingredients:

Mountain Poppy Seed

Deepest-Color Saffron

Still I can't shine too brightly or it will be suspicious. I'd better flub this one.

"Is it… A good pill?"

His master snorted. "I'm amazed it isn't ash." But he seemed to be happy to have a chance to explain things to his apprentice further. "This was made by another apprentice as practice. If you examine the aroma, it has deep, earthy bitterness and a lack of floral complexity. These aren't things just anyone can pick out, however, and especially without experience. The best way to learn to judge a pill is simply to get it wrong, many many times."

"I'll get started, then." Booker said.

"That you will."

— — —

It was incredible how many pills the Sect really went through. Every disciple got one a month as a base stipend, and then more for completing requests. It meant that just this one workshop was responsible for nearly five hundred pills a month. The sheer volume of processing work placed on individual alchemists was immense. While Booker struggled along, purposefully suppressing the book's knowledge so he could attempt to guess the pill quality by his own merit, his master barely needed to look at a pill to sort it into one of the three jars. For every ten his master sorted, Booker was expected to sort one. Even then, without the book it was grueling and repetitive work.

After hours of meticulously sorting the pills, Booker was released, his head spinning with the deep and powerful aromas of the pill foundry. He paused only to switch into a new set of robes in his room, then hurried on towards the arranged meeting place.

The Mantis Sect's lower reaches were largely arranged as long rowhouses placed in a square, four each around an inner courtyard where plants and flowers grew. Larger buildings bridged the individual courtyard-squares together. Here and there, however, the Sect would open up, and there would be a large expanse of trimmed green grass, ornamental trees, and beautiful flowers growing in mandalas, with small pagodas scattered about for training and meditation. It was in one of these open spaces that the lecture hall was situated.

As Booker approached he saw a small crowd already milling about, and Chen Jie immediately broke away from talking with the other cripples to hurry over.

Booker could already tell what was bothering him – the crowd was larger than it should have been. Several well-dressed cultivators had arrived, and they stood together like a cohort of soldiers, looking out on the cripples with contempt. At the center of them was a handsome youth with long black hair pinned back by an ornamental needle, and sky blue robes.

"Our luck is poor, Brother Rain. We're going to have to chalk tonight up as a loss." Chen Jie said. "They've brought in some silkpants with a powerful beast. It looks like they plan to rake us over the coals, and it will go worse for any complaining."

Booker nodded. "I'm not worried. We have help on the way."

Coming across the green stretch was Xan, followed by Fen and Zu. As they arrived Booker gave them a small grin. "Are you ready to get drunk tonight, brothers?"

Xan snorted. "If you're ready to pay."

"Hmmm." Chen Jie glanced the three of them up and down. "Well, at least we won't have to worry about them being poor sports and forcing their way, but… How confident are you, Brother Rain? This silkpants will be bringing out a proper fighting beast."

Reaching into his bag, Booker took out the glass jar containing Snips. The mantis eagerly scrambled up onto the back of his hand. "So will I."

"Hmm." For a moment Chen Jie considered, and then he grinned. "Fuck it. Brother Rain, you're a man I'd like to bet on. I'll go take their money and we'll get this underway – I'll need twenty liang from you to get the pot started, but don't go in at once. Let Sister Mei work them into a mood to up their bet before you rake the money in."

"My master gave me a wound sealing pill in case I run into any trouble. That should suffice, right?" Booker wagered.

"Put me down for a bet. Ten liang on Rain." Xan added.

"Twenty for me." Fen bid.

Chen Jie nodded, and went over to the blue-robed cultivator, talking briefly and being passed a purseful of silver coins.

"Alright!" He called. "The buy-in is twenty, twenty liang to play. The rules are simple – no interference, the fight goes until one side calls for mercy or their beast is dead. We have a champion here among us, so don't step forward unless you mean business."

Sister Mei immediately stepped forward. "Me. I'll handle this rich boy." Taking the vial from around her neck, she allowed the ugly starfish-creature within to spill out, pouring the creature with its slimy body and flopping limbs onto the ground.

There was a chuckle from the crowd of cultivators.

As the blue robed boy stepped forward, he took out his own vial. Within was a dart-headed frog of a bright yellow color. As it hopped out, Booker saw that its back was covered in leathery craters, emitting steam like the caldera of a volcano. It let out a loud, boisterous blorp of a croak.

"Begin!" Chen Jie shouted, and the beasts rushed at one another. The frog took off with a long-legged leap, covering the ground of the dueling ring between the crowd's feet in a split instant. By comparison, the starfish had barely begun to move when the frog's arrowhead-shaped skull slammed into its center in a brutal headbutt.

The ungainly starfish was sent rolling back, limb flopping over limb. But as it did, it rolled with the momentum, gathering speed and beginning to tumble quicker and quicker. It pulled a wide turn and came rolling back towards the frog.

With a fleshy slap, its sucker-ringed tentacles grabbed hold of the frog and its toothy radial mouth sank a bite into the beast's shoulder.

In response the frog's throat sac billowed out, inflating into a yellow bubble and then–

Fire vented in jets from its back, exploding upwards in a spray of yellow-red flames. The starfish shrieked and let go, flopping backwards with fire clinging to its limbs.

In the blink of an eye, the toad's tongue shot out, trailing a brushstroke of flame through the air. It scythed through two of the starfish's limbs, cutting them clear away and ripping the beast in half.

Mei screamed and dove forward, grabbing her beast and pulling it out of the ring. She moved so quickly she must have burned her hands, because the beast was still smoldering.

"Is it okay?" Booker asked, laying a hand on her shoulder as she forced her way through the crowd surrounding the dueling ring. But as she turned and he saw her face, it wasn't tears but a cheeky grin she was wearing.

"Ohhhh, Brother Rain is so concerned..~" She teased. "But don't worry. My beast isn't strong, but it can grow back anything it loses. When it comes to playing bait, there's none better."

Booker snorted. Serves me right for underestimating her. What an actor!

As he made his way back to the ring, Chen Jie was calling. "Someone, come on, step up. This young master didn't come all this way to watch you mill about – and don't forget, you're giving up your stake if you don't put up a fight. Surely someone has the backbone?"

"Oh, save the theatrics old man. I'm no mark." The boy called out, his face flush with a victorious smirk. He pointed straight towards Booker. "This is the one you're waiting on, right? He's the one who's supposed to beat me."

Shit. He's got us. Guess I'd better match confidence with confidence.

Booker shrugged, stepping forward. "That's right. I'm the one. All I'm waiting for…" He let Snips climb up onto the back of his hand. "Is for you to double down."

"Double?" The boy laughed gleefully, but his eyes remained cold and hard. "How about… Triple? Sixty liang on this match, on top of the pot."

"Sounds good to me." With a wave he sent Snips gliding down on buzzing, translucent-purple wings, landing on the floor of the little dueling ring. The frog hunched up, burping smoke as it sensed the approach of a new challenger.

Through the crowd, Booker caught Chen Jie's gaze, and nodded. The old man stepped forward and shouted,

"Begin!"