Grand Saint Alloy

Tristan froze and looked at Conni uncertainly. While it was not something he was opposed to telling Conni, he was not sure if he trusted either Bruce or Lesly. Both had emotional reasons to cause him some issues. After all, he had survived, and their father had not. There was also the issue that he and Lesly had never really seen eye to eye.

“What are you talking about? “Tristan asked.

Conni turned to Bruce and Lesley, "Is there any way I can get some privacy to ask some questions?"

Bruce looked at his older sister quizzically. Lesly frowned for a few moments before answering, "Yes however I need to know anything that's relevant to us afterwards."

After the siblings had left, Conni beckoned Tristan to follow him into one of the bedrooms. This room also had sleeping bags all over the floor, however, there were no children. Conni sat down on the floor and motioned for Tristan to join him.

"We need to talk about your ancestor blade," Conni said, "you are growing in power too fast and you need to know the dangers and risks of consuming an ancestor blade and the moral issues with participating in such an act.”

That statement caught Tristan off guard. Did Conni assume that he was consuming Vulcan like regular people absorb essence from artifacts? The thought had never crossed Tristan’s mind, though he assumed it should be possible. However, there was probably a dramatic downside to it. It would not be much different than when he tried to take essence from the elemental.

There was another problem with absorbing essence from Vulcan. One could only absorb essence from artifacts with a tier of their own, and only artifacts of an equal or higher tier would progress the consumer's kern. Vulcan was tier fifteen, meaning Tristan had eleven tiers before it would even be a possibility.

Still, it did bring up a question that Tristan sent to Vulcan, “is it normal for people to try to absorb you guys.”

“The really old ones yeah. Old soul tools have memories from before the false god sundered the worlds. If you were able to absorb one before that time and ended up with the dominant memories, you could potentially become one of the most powerful people on your plane, the actual progress from absorbing essence from a soul tool is identical to a standard artifact otherwise,” Vulcan answered, “neither I nor grandma Conni are that old.”

Tristan had already experienced the phenomenon before, mixing souls would allow memories to jump hosts and it was not pleasant. He had been lucky that he had to deal with mostly decayed memories with no real direction behind them. It would be substantially more difficult to overwhelm the active soul of a soul tool.

“I think there has been a misunderstanding,” Tristan said.

“Are you not consuming the ancestor blade’s essence?” Conni said he raised an eyebrow as if he could not see any other possibility.

“He’s a lamp, and no, I met him less than two weeks ago,” Tristan said, “Vulcan was in the same place that the Lord of the Underworld was.“

Conni seemed relieved, “That’s good, ancestor blades are important heirlooms, it is not proper to destroy them frivolously. Though if you are not using its essence then how are you progressing?”

Tristan almost gave the answer. He liked Conni and was grateful to him, however, it was not just Tristan’s secret. Luke also had a stake in it and it would not be proper to share without his approval. After all, Tristan would not be where he was today if he had not befriended Luke, however, the same was true of Conni.

“That is not something I can tell you about,” Tristan said with an apologetic smile.

Conni frowned, “Why not?”

“It’s not my secret to share,” Tristan explained, “As this conversation was predicated on a soul tool miscommunication. How did you get your soul tool?”

“Simple,” Conni summoned his sword in a flash of flame, “If someone with a law makes an artifact before they start dying, you will end up with an ancestor blade.”

“Law?” Tristan asked.

Vulcan was the one who answered, “Many people outside the Numitor Empire called forces heavenly laws. My uncle hated the idea of heaven having any say in his life and outlawed the term in his territories, choosing to use the word force instead.”

Tristan had to chuckle at the idea of using a law to outlaw the phrase heavenly law. Then he stopped when he realized that if someone achieved enough power they could assert power over people’s thoughts across planes and spanning hundreds of years for simple matters of taste. That was ludicrous. Then he realized something else.

“Conni, are you from another plane?” Tristan asked.

Conni simply raised an eyebrow, “Was it not obvious by now?”

“How? It’s not like you can just hop from one plane to another like some kind of Caldera border,” Tristan asked.

Shrugging, Conni explained to the best of his ability, “No clue, one day I was there, the next I woke up in some farmer's bed from the Lake Caldera.”

“Vulcan, how?” Tristan went to his next best source of information.

The lamppost sent over a red circle with a slash through it. Tristan had no idea what that stood for, but Vulcan’s words gave him a good guess, “That information will be off limits until tier six when it will help you. A developed kern is necessary before I push your development further.”

Tristan grumbled at that, “So, do you have a kern?”

It was a weird question. From Tristan’s point of view, everyone had a kern, it was like asking if someone lacked a liver or a heart. However, some of Conni’s past comments put that into doubt.

Conni shook his head, “No, I have an anima. It is stronger than a kern but lacks a way to replenish itself. I use my ancestor blade to recoup erased lost essence after she recharges in the primordial realm.”

“What does it do?” Tristan asked.

“A kern is the power of the blood while an anima is the power of the body. One promotes life, the other promotes power,” Conni said, “Though in practice both can be used to achieve similar results.”

Tristan was about to ask more questions when the front door was slammed open, he could hear Eve yelling, “Where’s Bruce, go get Bruce!”

Concerned, Tristan ran out to find Eve carrying about twenty bags of food. It almost blocked her from view and she had to set bags down to get through the door. Several of the roaming children came over to inspect the bags, a few of the older ones assisting Eve in hauling them inside.

“What is all of this for?” Tristan asked.

“You, you’re going to eat all of it,” Eve said excitedly.

Tristan was not sure he would be able to consume his own body weight in food, even if he had a week. These were all high calorie foods as well, meats and loaves of bread. It had to have cost a small fortune with the events occurring in the plains driving up the prices. Well, Eve had a large fortune, so Tristan supposed the cost was relative.

Bruce came barging through the door a short time later, “What’s wrong, I heard you needed help?”

He was dressed in armor that was clearly tower plate and was holding his spear. Tristan was not sure what Eve had told him, but he assumed the message had been misinterpreted as a call to violence. Bruce looked around and saw the room in chaos, but safe.

Gently leaning his spear against the wall, he cleared his throat, “You said you needed help and to bring my spear?”

Eve nodded proudly displaying a blue glove with luminescent white gems embedded at the knuckles, “Yes, we can use this to fix Tristan.”

“What’s that?” Tristan asked. Normally he had an easy time deciphering what an artifact did. Most of them were made out of a pseudo-metal substance which allowed the use of his metal sense. This one was made out of cloth and lacked even the barest traces of metal.

“It is an artifact that helps cure malnutrition!” Eve said, “The healer normally uses it to help the infants of the head families that refuse to take milk, so it is rarely used.”

“So, Elder River would not let us make use of his healer,” Tristan said, “Was the knowledge not valuable enough? Is it because of my kern?”

“No, it was not that,” Eve said, “Grandpa has very little enmity towards you, in fact, I would go so far as to say he has not paid you much attention since the sifting.”

Eve went on to explain how Kerri had gone to the temple to stop the Elder from helping. At least publicly, he had to remain antagonistic to keep the temple’s support. Especially now, as the Lord of the Underworld was being heralded as the champion of the gods by a flame wielding lunatic in the Forest Caldera. Supposedly Guider Daphan had already sided with the elemental lords, effectively ending the war while also filling the River and Lake Caldera with high value refugees. There were also some issues in the Stone Caldera, however Eve was unaware of what was happening there.

Tristan looked at the glove skeptically, “So, if I’m understanding you right, you want me to eat my way to health, while Bruce here stabs me with his torture spear.”

“Yes,” Eve nodded, “The spear heals the victim into a state of malnutrition by healing them around the incision, which is only an issue if you lack the nutrients. I bought enough to replace your whole body if we have to.”

“You know the fastest way to a man's heart is through his stomach,” Vulcan snickered, “I think she took it a little too literally.”