Noah had never been more thankful to have Sunder.

  That was, perhaps, a slight exaggeration. There had definitely been a few times where Sunder had bailed his ass out of a fire that nothing else could have saved him. But getting new runes without the presence of his original Master Rune would have been beyond infuriating. That went doubly so when since he didn’t currently have Grim to help store things.

  Being able to carve a monster’s runes apart and slice them apart to pull free the aspects that Noah wanted was invaluable.

  A part of him wondered if Obsidia had figured out a more effective way to get their hands on runes than walking around with a bunch of Catchpaper in your back pocket while massacring monsters in hopes of snagging one of their runes.

  He suspected they had.

  There hadn’t been a good time to check. Noah and Lee hadn’t stopped by a town at any point since leaving Banesbridge a little over a week ago. The nutjobs that had been chasing Lee were still very possibly on their tail, and Noah still didn’t know what the entire thing with the Hand had been.

  They’d decided that the smartest way forward was to largely avoid leaving too much of a trail to follow. Lee’s nose was more than good enough to make sure they were generally headed in the right direction. At this point, they’d somewhat figured out how to read the maps. Lee’s nose made everything much easier.

  Instead of actually stopping at any of the cities, all they had to do was get close enough for her to smell them. That was enough to situate themselves and continue on without anyone being any the wise of their passing.

  In the time they’d spent traveling, Noah and Lee had come across a frankly terrifying number of powerful monsters. The deeper they got into Obsidia, the more powerful the enemies became.

  Many of the fights actually became impossible. There were more and more Rank 6s that had combinations that were too powerful to go up against, even for Noah and Lee. Lee’s nose saved them from quite a few fights that would have been disastrous — but even with her incredible senses, more than a few fights ended up going poorly enough that they were forced to flee.

  The monsters in the heart of Obsidia weren’t just more powerful. They were smarter. There weren’t any more Rank 6 dragons that floated around trying to look cool in the storm while Noah cut them in half.

  That made for rather effective training. For the fights that they were able to take, the two of them were pushed to their limits. It had been quite some time since Noah had last gotten himself killed. He wasn’t about to let that streak get wasted on a stupid death.

  As the days passed, Noah’s soul found itself carrying a few good Rank 5 runes that he’d harvested from the fights. He technically had enough Rank 5s to reach Rank 6 at this point, but all the new ones he’d grabbed were far from suitable for his current build.

  He’d filled his soul well beyond the point that he should have been able to. Noah had absolutely no idea how many more Rank 5s he could squeeze in before he inadvertently caused damage to himself.

  He currently had 11 Rank 5 runes. 4 of those were his original runes. The rest were still just potential options that he was still debating over. There were a lot of different aspects that would suit his current path —Noah had found quite a few different fire, rock, and electric-based Rank 5s.

  There was definitely some kind of destruction-based Rank 5 he could make out of his current options. He just wasn’t sure which one he wanted to go with yet. Noah had tried a few different combinations already. He’d torn all of them apart just a short while after their creation.

  None had suited him.

  He didn’t even want to think about how much magical power he’d wasted over the past few days. It probably would have made an entire noble family back in Arbalest weep tears of agony.

  Noah shook his head. His thoughts were spinning in circles. He needed to actually do something. He glanced up, then nearly choked on his own saliva.

  He’d forgotten that Lee was soaked through with blood.

  They sat in a huge tunnel, in the shadow of the corpse of an enormous snake monster. Its scales had been made out of a thick, craggy stone that had somehow shrugged off almost all the magic they’d thrown at it.

  The fight had been harder than Noah had expected it to be. Even though the snake had only been at the peak of Rank 5, it had used the tunnels and its incredibly tough body very effectively.

  Its main strategy had been trying to just squeeze them into a bloody paste by grinding them between the wall and its rough scales. Unfortunately for the snake, it hadn’t been nearly fast enough to catch either Noah or Lee — and its scales hadn’t been nearly tough enough to withstand Sunder forever.

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  The monster managed to take two hits from Sunder before Noah managed to open up a big enough gap for Lee to land a good blow. But the moment he did make that opening, the fight had been over. Lee had dived in headfirst and literally burrowed into the monster, eating it alive from within.

  It had not been a pretty sight.

  That was how Lee had found herself drenched in monster blood — or, at least, the blood that she hadn’t licked up yet. She’d made short work of just about everything that hadn’t soaked into her clothes.

  “It’s like a buffet,” Lee said, noticing Noah staring at her. She pulled at her soaked clothes. “Do you want some?”

  “No,” Noah replied. “But thank you for the offer.”

  Lee shrugged. “Your loss. Did you know fancy kitchens cook with blood a lot? It’s very famous. Somewhere. I saw it in Arbitage at one point.”

  “That’s… good to know,” Noah said. “Though I suspect they don’t get the blood by sucking it out of clothes.”

  “That’s because you don’t go to the really fancy places,” Lee replied. “I heard rumors about one chef that made all the rich people that eat at his place lick the food out of a cup shaped like his mouth.”

  “I think he just had a fetish and managed to trick some idiots into funding it.”

  “What’s a fetish?”

  Noah grimaced. “You know what? Never mind. There’s good blood going bad over there in the snake, Lee. Don’t let it go to waste.”

  “Oh, yeah. Good point.” Lee popped to her feet and darted over to the snake.

  A relieved breath escaped from Noah’s lips. That had come dangerously close to a conversation that absolutely nobody was going to benefit from.

  His thoughts drifted back to his runes. A pensive frown pulled at his lips.

  “Firestorm?” Noah mused to himself. “Some mixture of fire and wind, maybe? I don’t really have much wind right now. But wind is a good magic. Very convenient. Lends itself to music quite well too. I’ve got a lot of aspects of it in my other runes already. It would fit. But it might make me a little too lopsided.”

  “Firestorm sounds lame,” Lee called through a mouthful of snake.

  “You can hear me?” Noah asked, blinking.

  Lee poked her head out of the snake. All her efforts removing the blood from herself had gone to waste. She was completely soaked red once more.

  “You’re very loud.”

  “Oh,” Noah said. He scratched at the side of his neck. Then he blew out an annoyed sigh. “Man. I miss Moxie.”

  “Me too,” Lee said. “She would have eaten snake with me.”

  “No,” Noah said. “I don’t think she would have.”

  “Yeah, but you never know. She’s not here, so we can only guess. The only person I know who won’t eat snake with me is you.”

  “That logic seems flawed,” Noah said. “What about something like fire and… lightning? Electric Flame?”

  “Why would you need to electrocute and burn something?” Lee asked. “That’s dumb.”

  Noah frowned. “It sounded cool. And destructive. And you can make some pretty interesting noises with electricity. Like tesla coils. I figure there would be some way to work that together with fire to get something interesting.”

  “I dunno. But it still sounds lame,” Lee said.

  She’s not wrong.

  Noah blew out an annoyed breath. “Maybe fire and rock, then? The snake gave me some good Earth and Stone runes. I’ve tried a few of those already, though. They haven’t worked well.”

  “Like hot earth?”

  “Yeah,” Noah said. “Magma. But the next level of it. I’ve got a volcano rune somewhere within Unraveling Disruption. But I think I can push a rune further. If I could figure out the right path for it, I think that would be pretty powerful. But I’ve already failed to make a good combination for that like five times now.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. If I knew, I’d have done it right by now.”

  “It sounds like you want magma,” Lee pointed out. “You just don’t know how to do it yet. So what’s the problem? Just figure it out.”

  Noah paused for a moment. Then he chuckled.

  “That’s a fair point, I guess. But I don’t want to waste even more runes messing up combinations. I’ve probably burned half a dozen Rank 6s worth of energy by now.”

  “And you’ll probably burn a hundred more of those reaching Rank 7,” Lee replied with a one-shouldered shrug. “You’re not a genius, Noah. You’re just really stubborn. Why are you trying to change that? Just be you.”

  Noah blinked.

  Huh.

  “I… thank you? I think?”

  “It was a compliment,” Lee said. “Geniuses are lame.”

  Noah considered her words for a few seconds. Then he let out a small chuckle. “I suppose they are. You think I should just keep smacking my head against this until I figure it out, then?”

  “Yeah. Why not?” Lee asked. “We can always kill more monsters.”

  “A sage take on things,” Noah said. “What about you, though? You haven’t taken any runes recently.”

  “Don’t want ‘em yet,” Lee replied. Her voice turned serious. “I’ve gotten a few already. But I don’t want to advance to Rank 6 too fast. I’m a lot more stable now than I was… but that could change as I get stronger. Taking things steadily is better for me.”

  “Fair enough,” Noah said. “It’s better to be safe with that kind of thing. And you’ve been more than keeping up. I don’t think you’ll have any trouble falling behind anytime soon.”

  “Especially not if you keep getting stuck on melting some rocks,” Lee said with a snicker.

  Noah sighed. “It’s a bit more complicated than that.”

  Lee arched an eyebrow. Then she carved of the monster’s innards free and held it out of the crevice she’d taken up residence in. “Snake?”

  “I’m good,” Noah said. “It’s all yours. I’m going to go melt some rocks. I’ll be back in a bit. Wake me up if something happens.”

  One more shot. Well, maybe a few more. But Lee’s right. I just have to keep at this. I’m going to make some kind of lava rune. I don’t care how many tries it takes me.

  “Kay,” Lee said. “Have fun.”

  Noah grinned. “Oh, I plan to.”

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