The Path of Ascension
Chapter 318

Matt wanted to feel good about their latest fight with the Harmony Accords, but considering they had only rebuffed their latest ambush, he didn’t feel as good as if they had wiped them out. He wanted revenge so badly, he could taste it.

Sadly, it was still out of reach and that made him feel like a coiled spring ready to pop at the slightest provocation. His being on edge made him keep his distance from those around him, and the different perspective helped him notice that Darrow was a little more quiet than normal. Matt knew why he was behaving that way, but he didn’t know what he should say to the man.

While Allie might disregard military orders, he, Liz, and Aster hadn’t done so before. Officially, they should be reprimanded for their actions with loss of rank, pay reductions, and time in the brig all being possibilities… but they were Ascenders. If they were punished according to the rules, Duke Waters would be in the brig for the next millennia. That knowledge didn’t make Matt feel any better about it. He genuinely felt bad about flaunting Darrow’s authority like that. It was rude and unprofessional in a way that reflected badly on Matt’s image of himself.

The moment they entered the rift, connected to the LocalNet, and got their deployment updates, Darrow gave them their leave. “You have seventy two hours of liberty then we redeploy to the frontlines, but orders aren’t yet settled and will most certainly be updated now that we know the Harmony Accords have a way to pierce our anti divination wards.”

As they exited Joy’s ship, Matt hung back and waited until Darrow exited.

Darrow immediately noticed him and raised an eyebrow at his unusual actions.

“I just wanted to apologize for ignoring orders. I—” Matt paused as he searched for the right word, but when he didn’t find it, he simply gave up. He was too emotionally tired to think right now. “I’m sorry for flaunting your orders so blatantly.”

Darrow’s third eye scanned Matt for a moment before he said, “I have come to expect such from Ascenders.”

Matt could hear the rebuke in his voice and accepted that as his due, but stiffened as Darrow ruthlessly continued. “Before you are so willing to disregard my future orders, I would remind you that I have many years more experience in battles than you, and I don’t call for a retreat because I am scared of a fight. I have no doubt that some more of us will die in the next decades as we clash in the twilight years of the war. As people get desperate, casualties will increase. If the Harmony Accords insists on chasing us down at every opportunity, more of us are going to die. Probably not the five of you, but the rest of us are affected when you ignore orders. I can’t reprimand you, and even an official complaint would do literally nothing, but I want you to think about the rest of the team next time you ignore orders. Right now, you can say you made the right call because none of us died, but next time? Will you still consider it the right call when another of us is sent to the incinerator? Think about that Ascender Titan. The rest of us aren’t so durable. Enjoy your time off, and be ready for deployment in seventy-two hours. I suspect our next orders are going to be testing the Harmony Accords response times, and that won’t be without risk.”

With his piece said, Darrow turned and marched off, leaving Matt standing there feeling small.

Taking a deep breath, Matt thought about what Darrow said and was forced to agree with his assessment. He didn't like it, but the team leader had a point. A month ago, he would have blown the reprimand off, content in the knowledge that none of them would die in this war. But that illusion had been shattered along with Eric’s life.

Matt hated being made to feel small. He hated to be reprimanded. But instead of reacting, he took a moment to process both the reprimand and the mentantly behind it.

Darrow wasn’t wrong. Matt and the others had been more concerned with their pride, their desire for revenge, or whatever other feeling pushed them into fighting in the last fight, when they should have been following orders.

At least, that was what the logical part of him said. The emotional side of Matt said he should keep throwing himself into fights, live up to his name and his Domain, and force the enemies to test their durability against his. Show them why he was an Ascender.

Looking down, he inspected his hands.

His left hand was utterly immaculate, now as always. He could count on one hand the number of times that he’d done more than scratched it since he’d applied Stygian Gossamer to it centuries ago. But his right hand was likewise in perfect condition, thanks to [Regeneration] knitting it back together and his Millennium Willow Lifesap helping him flush away all hostile influences from it. And nothing could stop that, not truly.

If he lost his hand, it would come back. If he lost his body, it would be put together just fine. If he lost his head, it would regrow with all of his memories intact. No sniper could take him out like they had with Eric.

He wanted to demand that he be given the opportunity to be thrown into Harmony Accord's path and given time to just wear them down, except that was still his emotions talking. He, like Gan Le, was vulnerable to being entangled and imprisoned. It might be harder to do it with him, but it was definitely possible, and he was sure that the Harmony Accords had something in reserve for him.

Matt had his own countermeasures to being captured, but they weren’t foolproof. And his willpower, unlike his mana, could be depleted. Was being depleted. He couldn’t afford the years or decades it would take to recover if it bottomed out. Bottoming out on willpower meant one needed to completely refill their willpower before they could safely use their Domain again. One could push through it, but that led to serious spiritual damage in the best of cases.

Having taken a few moments to process, he ran through his feelings once more before going to the hospital more centered and stable. Even after some ruminations, he wouldn’t call their previous decision wrong, but he better understood Darrow and the rest of the team's feelings.

Once Liz and Aster were taken care of, Matt accompanied them back to their house where they were able to finally spend some time alone. They mostly sat in silence, but conversations inevitably turned to Eric and their memories of him. That more than anything helped Matt’s mood. They might have lost a friend, but they had spent many good years with him and had the memories of their time together.

If they had been given their full break time to ruminate it probably would have turned morbid, but things were never that easy.

About seven hours into their break, Duke Waters came back into the rift bloodied and battered.

Matt raced over with Liz and Aster, but kept some distance as what was left of Aiden was rushed to the hospital. Unlike last time when he came back battered but able to banter, now he was spending all of his efforts on staying alive.

The healers stabilized him, with Melinda arriving shortly thereafter and stabilizing his wounds. It was kind of disturbing, watching his face re-form itself, like clay un-melting, yet still deeply fascinating.

Matt, Liz, and Aster hung off to the side, but they weren’t shooed away, which allowed them to get the debriefing. Aiden had fought Maya and they had thrown themselves into the fight with everything they had, resulting in serious damage on both sides. S~ᴇaʀᴄh the NovᴇlFɪre .ɴᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of nøvels early and in the highest quality.

Seeing how bad Aiden was, Matt had to wonder about what sort of condition he left Maya in.

Even with the damage, Aiden seemed ecstatic and loudly contemplated how he'd be ready for round two, even before he had a mouth. General Bell, the general Aiden had thrown through a wall last time he was this injured, was nearly tossed through a wall again at the suggestion that Aiden should stay inside the rift to accelerate his willpower recovery.

“You think I’m going to sit inside and twiddle my thumbs up my ass while the war is going on? Did someone replace your brain with a sponge? This is the time to hone myself.”

“Ascender Waters, you will be needed for the eventual defense of the Citadel. The regional capital can not be allowed to fall. Everything before that is—”

“Is valuable real estate which can be traded to buy time by making them bleed for every system. I’m not going to sit around when I can be out there fighting, honing my skills.” Aiden interrupted General Bell with a glare.

It was there that Matt noticed there was a major difference between Aiden and himself. Aiden enjoyed the fight because he was the only one risking his life. There was a freedom there. Fighting without someone else to worry about sounded… Nice. He’d never share the thought, but Matt almost wished Liz and Aster could sit out the rest of the war. It tied into his thoughts from before about the risks to everyone else, but when he fought with those he cared about he was vulnerable, whereas if he was alone, he could be more free.

Free like Aiden. Free to fight without a worry, without worrying about anything but the next battle.

He had trouble putting his finger on exactly why he felt that way, but as he watched Aiden, it clicked. If he was alone and he failed, he died, the only one to pay that bill was himself and if he was dead, it wasn’t his problem.

Everyone he left behind would be as sad at his death as he was at Eric’s, but he’d be dead, so what did it matter?

As General Bell spoke again, Matt jacked his perception back down to the Tier 17 levels everyone was operating at around Melinda.

“Ascender Waters, if Maya and Yun Me group up, you stand a substantial risk of death. That can not be allowed.”

At face value it sounded like Bell cared about Aiden’s life, but Matt knew that the general cared more about the asset that their sole “Tier 35” Ascender represented. And about the losses they would suffer if they lost said resource.

That, and their last battles caused Matt to pull up an overview of the war. The map of interconnected worlds that made up the Great Powers looked like eight balls of clay that had been smooshed together. Each had its own core territories mostly centered around their Tier 47 worlds, which were surrounded by thousands of worlds that had been inhabited for millions of years since The Shattering. When the Glorious Everlasting Kingdom of Prosperity fell and the various political entities who scrabbled for dominance emerged, they did so around the highest Tier planets, which became the capitals, and they took the former worlds of the Glorious Everlasting Kingdom of Prosperity as their core domains. But once the entities became stable, the squabbling started.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

As each Great Power had a Tier 50 to hold down the fort, all out war was expensive and never resulted in too much gain or loss, as a rogue Tier 50 could spell disaster for all. Which forced the Great Powers to look for other avenues to gain power.

Outward expansion via adding worlds to the tethered mass of worlds that were the Great Powers was the main method, but it was more haphazard than the mostly clean lines that had been the former lands of the Glorious Everlasting Kingdom of Prosperity, which caused the middle regions of the Great Powers to mix and tangle. Subsequent wars had smoothed those borders out to a degree, but in the three dimensional map of tangled worlds, the Great Powers seemed to protrude into each other more and more as one left the main region until the current borders. There, the space was less densely packed with worlds at the maximum distance possible with the teleporter tethers.

Currently, the Empire was being pushed in on all fronts that either the Sects, Federation, and the Republic bordered, with most of the fighting centered on the core regions of the Empire. But the outer regions which bordered the enemy great Powers were being occupied as well.

The Conglomerate of Guilds, despite nominally being engaged in the war, was only barely being pressed. Since the time they’d run interference in Guild space, back in the first few years of their Ascension, the other Great Power had barely been attacked at all. It was enough to keep them focused on defending their planets and unable to provide much aid to the Empire, but practically nothing past that.

There were even a few places where the Guilds had made headway, with their own forays into Federation space, but they never were able to push more than four or five planets deep before being repulsed. The light back-and-forth meant that the attacking Powers could focus almost entirely on the Empire, only occasionally sending troops to fight back the encroaching Guilds.

Instead, those troops were being redirected to the current push to King Rusty’s capital. That information threatened to crush something inside of Matt. They were already fighting daily, going from battle to battle to repel a single assault on the Tier 25, Tier 26, and Tier 27 battlefields, and still losing ground. And now there were even more troops coming?

It felt hopeless.

Except it wasn’t, Luna had made that clear. Team Zero, and by extension he himself, were making a difference. Ignoring the fact that the war might not have even started without them, if they weren’t there and playing whack-a-mole with enemy incursions, the war would probably be over. Doing your best and hardly treading water didn’t feel good, even if you knew that otherwise you would have already drowned.

But maybe there was an opportunity in that?

It was something he was sure Darrow would argue for, but Matt made a mental note to follow up with Chess to find a follow up question. While he felt the name was a bit on the nose, the war was, to a degree, a simple game of logistics similar to the board game, and they might be able to hit another supply depot or the like. They had tried to do so in the last seventy years of the war, but the enemy Great Powers had learned their lesson about sub standard defenses inside occupied territory. Except, now that they weren't really bothering to hide Allie’s Talent, they might have some opportunities open up.

Matt liked that idea. He liked it enough that after nodding to Aiden, he made his way to Chess.

Technically, as a Captain he didn’t really have the clearance to enter the deepest recesses of Chess, where the best planners worked, but no one stopped him. He caught a few odd glances, but when he saw one of the members of Chatter, the group that managed their images as Ascenders, he got them to bring him deeper.

There were several Chess planners sitting in a circle of chairs, their heads locked into oversized helmets with glasses, massive cables glowing with mana running to and from them, plugging them into what he realized was a genuinely massive formation integrated with the building itself.

General Cynthia Almora appeared next to him like a thundercloud. “Is there something I can help you with, Ascender?”

Matt nodded as he let the oddity distract him. “Originally I only came here to ask a few questions about possible deployments, but now I'm wondering about the formation. Is it some kind of amplifier?”

Cynthia nodded. “Yes, but that is only part of what it does. It enables our strategists and seekers to combine their abilities in unique ways. Their skills, talents, and domains are effective separately, but the whole is greater than the sum of their parts. A farseeing skill, enhanced with a natural treasure, can provide much information that a Talent can expand upon, and a Domain can inform us of the most relevant parts. But when each of those comes from different people, we must make do. It is, in truth, a fairly standard effect. General Darrow’s own Domain functions similarly, and our enemies utilize them in abundance. It is likely something quite similar to this which led the Harmony Accords to find you so quickly, though given how concentrated the warding is around you, any such arrays must be impressively large.”

Matt raised an eyebrow in return as a hunch settled over him. “How large is ‘impressively large’?”

“About five miles long, at least. Yes, from the reports about them arriving so quickly, we can almost guarantee that the ship is a mobile platform built around a divination amplifier. Before you ask, no I don’t know the exact specifications, but I do know they are horrendously expensive. Not just in mana, but exotic materials as well. That ship probably burns a cart load of Tier 25 divination based natural treasures every time it's activated. And if that's true, it also helps explain how our inventions haven’t picked up much about this team. Part of divining the future means isolating variables, namely oneself, meaning the amplifiers are the best divination wards.”

Matt caught on almost immediately. “So we are protected here, but not out on a mission, and yet they are because they remain near the ship and formation in question. Is there no counter? I find that hard to believe.”

“Your masks are some of the best counters we have, and your personal armor is built to the same standards, but if your question is if we can predict them, the answer is no.” When Matt gave her a level stare, she continued. “We are, however, not helpless. Part of their methods to divine you all has been to have Tier 25 leaders stop their anti divinations wards. That helps them know if they are going to die via Ascender and pinpoint your locations, but it also has created a massive gap in their defenses that we have been abusing. It also tells us where they expect you to attack. Things like supply lines are still protected by the wards, but the frontlines might as well be a written book for us.”

Matt liked the idea of being able to read the future. It seemed like being the Emperor for a little while. “And what does that book say? Can we use that to rewrite the ending of said story?”

“If you can pull ten thousand Tier 35 troops out of your ass, a few million Tier 25s, and hundreds of millions of Tier 15s, sure we could. In fact, it be downright easy. But at this point, the war is more a matter of logistics than anything else.”

General Almora said the last bit with a resigned sigh, but Matt disagreed. “Logistics only matter in an even fight, but like you said, logistics matter. If we are giving up on hiding the capabilities of Shadow’s Talent, we can widen the range of attacks. What are we able—”

The General shook her head as he asked. “That is beyond your paygrade Ascender.”

Hearing that, Matt let his expression go flat and he stared down at the General. She could toss him through a wall thanks to their Tier disparity, but he didn’t care. His anger still simmered at a low level, and that made him disregard the consequences. So for the second time today, he threw his title around.

“I wasn’t asking, General. What are our plans and where are the highest value targets we can possibly hit. I want a list and I want it now. As for what I do with it, that's not your problem.”

“Ascender Titan, I assure you that High Command have already considered all the possible missions with far more information than you can get from us. In fact I—”

Matt cut her off with a glare, letting his true feelings leak through, meeting her tone with hardened steel. “And what you and High Command believe is impossible might be limiting your viewpoint. It's time we, the Ascenders, take a look.” Not wanting to burn this bridge completely, Matt let his expression and tone soften. “I do appreciate what you and your people do. It's not easy and is incredibly valuable work, but we do the impossible.”

His piece said, he waited, letting the moment grow.

It dragged out long enough that Matt was sure she was going to refuse, but in the end, General Almora gave him what he wanted.

Scanning the information packet, Matt nodded. “Thank you.”

Despite wishing he could go and inspect the divination amplifier, he read the general's mood and made his exit.

Instead of going back to his house, he went to check in on Dena. He wouldn’t say he was worried she would hurt herself, but he also wanted to remind her that she still had friends who both cared and worried about her.

He was a little worried when she wasn’t in the camp, but he found her just a few hundred miles away, sitting under a tree and watching a waterfall.

Matt watched her for a moment, not wanting to intrude if she really wanted to be alone, but Dena waved him over.

“Hey.” It wasn’t his best opening, but it would hopefully gauge the waters without causing any harm.

“He loved this spot. He complained about it all the time, but he secretly he loved it. He tried to play it up like I was the one who wanted to come, and that each time we came here he was doing me a great favor. He liked how the water spray could just make it over here when the wind blew correctly. I hated it.” Dena hiccuped as she half laughed, half sobbed. “Now, I can’t wait for the wind to blow a little harder. Why didn’t I treasure those moments before? Why won’t the stupid wind blow over here. Does it hate him? Does it miss him? Am I not worthy? Why—”

Seeing that Dena was working herself into a spiral, Matt put an arm around her and just listened.

Eventually, she petered out and they sat there in companionable silence, just watching the waterfall. Matt tried to relax, but every time he did, he felt an overwhelming desire to move try to tear him apart, so he eventually gave up and just concentrated on being there for Dena. That was easier than dealing with his own grief.

They had been sitting there long enough that Matt was almost caught off guard when she chuckled. “I remember when we were Tier 7 and spent like a week and a half inside a rift because the apartment we rented had over booked. We found a waterfall like this. Ok, not really like this. It was small, ten feet or so, but similar. And on our third day after we cleared the rift, just when we were starting to go stir crazy, Eric went on this big adventure trying to figure out where the water came from and how the rift kept having more water to move through a waterfall. He was convinced the rift was cheating with a looped space where the river reached the limit of the rift. I didn’t believe it at all and was convinced rifts were just destroying and remaking the water. We spent hours arguing our sides just for something to do, each argument becoming more and more tangential to the actual point. When we left and looked it up, he lorded the fact that he was more right over me for weeks.”

From there, they just spent some time exchanging stories about Eric until finally Dena stood and brushed the grass she had pulled apart while sitting down off her legs. “Let's go to whatever planning you had in mind.”

Matt copied her sans brushing himself off. “How did you know that was why I came out here?”

“Because I had the same thought. Come on.” Just before they took to the sky, Dena reached out and pulled Matt into a short but tight hug. “Thanks for checking in on me, but I don’t intend to die until I rip that sniper’s head from their shoulders.”

Matt nodded, but wasn’t brave enough to ask her about what would happen after she accomplished her goal. Hopefully a little time and distance would, if not make the wound heal, let it callus over enough that it didn’t hurt so much.

As they arrived back to the base, Matt called a team meeting. It wasn’t official, and no one had to arrive, but all of them did. Even if Zack looked disgruntled at being pulled away from whatever he had been working on.

Even Darrow arrived, though he took a seat when he saw Matt standing in his usual place.

Looking at everyone, Matt took the opportunity to memorize their faces. Darrow's earlier words about their lives being more fragile than his had stuck with him. That made what he was about to suggest feel like murder, but they all knew the costs and had signed up for this. Even Eric.

“I don’t like our situation. We’ve been in a holding pattern, just running around trying to plug holes in a leaky ship with our fingers. The moment we leave, the leak continues. I went and got a list of the most vulnerable targets in the enemy Great Powers. As was pointed out to me, High Command has most certainly already gone over all of these missions and disregarded them for whatever reason. Part of that, I’m sure, is them not wanting to give away Allie’s Talent, but another part might be them not believing in our abilities. Fuck that. As Luna pointed out, we do the impossible. What on this list is not just impossible, but our flavor of Impossible? The impossible we can do? Maybe it will amount to nothing, but we are already losing. It’s time to flip the board.”

Allie grinned wide enough that he could see her rubbing her incisors with her tongue. “Oh, I like this. What about you, Darrow? Are you going to run off to High Command and quash this little idea?”

General Darrow caught Allie’s gaze before looking around at the rest of the Ascenders. “I will, of course, inform High Command about all plans made here. But like myself, they have no way to stop an Ascender’s antics.” After a small pause, Darrow shrugged. “And General Raven would more than likely agree with any asinine plan we come up with, and he's our direct report. Besides, I’ve been trying to get the five of you more involved in tactical planning for the last seventy years. I won’t complain about the subject of said plans, so long as they aren’t truly suicidal. I do value my own life at least that much.”

Hearing Darrow wouldn’t actively hamper their planning, Matt grinned.

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