Ad Astra

Chapter 31. Closing In

That dawn they packed the bulk of their belongings into two trunks—which they then stashed into Dorian’s new interspatial ring.

“Thank Heavens!” said Kaya, laughing as she dragged out a sled from out a corner of the tent. It was a mess of wood which looked like it’d been designed and nailed together by a slightly stupid child; ha...

30. Moving Fast

Smoke puffed up from the sands, wreathing the kneeling Chosen. To the side Tuketu watched with a knowing smirk. Nobody moved. Dorian kept his hand held out, angling his palm to the light; sunlight glazed the pills in a golden halo.

Still nobody moved.

Dorian frowned. Had he miscalculated? There was a distinct strain of hesitancy as h...

29. Stick & Carrot

“You’re right.”

Confusion. Anger. Suspicion. Silence.

Dorian spread his hands, swallowing, and threw on a wide-eyed look. “What can I say? Most all of you worked really hard. Most all of you is deserving. You feel I’ve skipped over you—you feel slighted. I get it. I’d feel that way too.”

He went along the crowd ...

28. Loose Tongues

Dorian greeted the rising sun with a Kata. He spilled through the Daybreak Kata like fresh sunlight, light, fast, melting from one form to the next. His body hummed in tune with the universe; he breathed rare air. His head felt as though it were made of light and puffs and clouds and a chorus of cherubic voices, all drawn in a harmonic hymn. Qi ...

27. Interlude I

The sun was sinking below the horizon, red as a drop of fresh blood. Tuketu tracked its progress expectantly, his hands clasped behind his back, his back straight as a board. For the best part of half an hour he’d stood there, unmoving, letting the redness wash over him and all about him. His eyes were stern and narrowed.

The Chief was l...

26. Pill Bonanza

When Dorian arrived, he was greeted by an island of calm amid Hu’s usual dumpster of a shop. At the back left corner, past rows of shelves stocked full of potions, pills, and random trinkets, was a lab workstation: a polished cauldron, a table, ladles, prepped ingredients, and books, all arrayed in a neat little pile.

“‘Lo!” said H...

25. Sinkholes

It felt like he was stepping on invisible mid-air trampolines. Up and up he went, buoyed by qi, until he was ten, twenty, forty feet off the ground. He took a second to stabilize himself and feel out his new scant weight. From here the tents looked like small flaps in the sand, almost blended fully into the sands, a landscape drenched i...

24. Fight & Flight

It was like Kaya was a kid again and the world was her sandbox. A very big, hilly, bone-studded sandbox.

She leapt around, catapulting and whooping. “Look!” She yelled as she bent down, coiling like a spring, and bounced into another leap. The sand at her feet shot out in a blast and she flew twenty feet in the air; twisting into a som...

23. Death & Rebirth

It took him half an hour to extricate himself.

At first Hu was ready to chain him down to a chair, slap a ladle in his hand, and force him to brew until he’d finished squeezing every last Lira out of Dorian; after a slew of excuses and placations—he was still an apprentice, still a beginner in regards to cauldron-brewing, still lacked ...

22. Buying It

Dorian took a breath. A deep breath, the sort he could feel all the way through his chest, up to his head, up to his spirit, even. Anger and annoyance surged in him. He felt it as a ball of twined energy in his chest, a quickening of his heartbeat, a shortness of breath.

He stepped back.

Admittedly he wasn’t always in comp...

21. Housekeeping

What bloodline was it? Dorian couldn’t tell by cursory inspection. Frowning, he leaned in and felt for the energy signatures. Then he tried channeling his qi in, feeling for a response; he got back a hot, unstable, angry essence. Some kind of bear, or boar, or bull, perhaps? Still he couldn’t tell. Interesting…

Kaya was stil...

20. Lucky Loot

Tuketu said nothing. His face gave away nothing. He looked at Dorian with a puzzled frown.

After a pause that was verging on uncomfortable, he broke out into a sudden smile.

“Of course. I did promise that, didn’t I?” He chuckled. “In the rush, it must’ve slipped my mind.”

“That’s okay,” said Dorian, nodding ag...

19. The Chosen & The Spurned (V)

The shards hissed and crackled into being in a small sphere around Hento—a spawning zone. Hento whipped out the embroidered sleeves of his silk robes in a flourish.

The shards shot out, arching like spears, and Dorian was reduced to frantic dodging. His eyes flitted between them, noting their trajectories and speeds as he screamed at his...

18. The Chosen & The Spurned (IV)

Tuketu raised his hand and all the other Chosen fell back. All around Dorian and Hento, a circle of runes rippled to life, hemming them in: a makeshift arena.

But before Tuketu could finish, Dorian stepped up. “Wait!”

“Hm?” Tuketu raised an eyebrow. The runes died down.

“One moment,” gasped Dorian.

Five second...

17. The Chosen & The Spurned (III)

Despite its fussiness, the first Kata was a neat technique. It was the first status-type move he’d seen in this world: it buffed the body and cleansed the spirit. There were echoes of the essence of the True Phoenix embedded within—distant, nearly inaudible echoes, true, but it made for a decent move nonetheless.

Plus, it had a nice ru...

16. The Chosen & The Spurned (II)

It was a pill, and it was literally lightning in a bottle.

The pill’s insides fizzed and jolted about, like it was trying to break free of the casing.

Dorian looked at it side-eyed, with a little apprehension.

“This,” said Tuketu, “Is a Vigor Spirit Pill. When the Tribe last docked at the Azcan Oasis, Chief Rus...

15. The Chosen & The Spurned (I)

Dorian jerked awake, one side of his face burning. He knew instantly he’d been slapped.

The slapper in question stood above him, grinning with all her teeth.

“Morning!” said Kaya.

Groaning, Dorian pulled himself up to his elbows. He felt sore and his head still ached, but not nearly as much as he’d expected. A ...