The rest of Seth's punishment passed without incident, and was relieved when he woke to find his robe's hem showing the initiate color again. That day, he went to the library, finding Therus with his nose buried in a history book. He smiled at Seth, and lead them both to a nearby building. It was not the building they had been using previously.

  The place that Therus had found was definitely an upgrade. There was still a large room they could use to spar, but there was also another room with a large table and five seats.

  Seth and Therus sat down across the table from each other.

  "How have the last couple...sorry, how have you been?"

  "Fine. Had a nice, relaxing vacation with the servants."

  "You are probably the only one I know who would find being a servant relaxing," Therus said with a shake of his head.

  "Far more relaxing than having to hide from enemies and wonder if an ambush is just around the corner."

  "Aren't you worried about falling behind?"

  Seth paused a moment to think. "Of course I'm worried. But I don't think I'm on the chopping block yet."

  Therus took a deep breath, and looked down, before looking Seth in the eye. "I wanted to apologize for accusing you..."

  "Don't apologize. You weren't wrong. I was being an indecisive asshole."

  "Then why? Why come back and fight?"

  "That's a long story."

  "We have time," Therus said, holding Seth's gaze, refusing to back down.

  Seth took a deep breath of his own, and swallowed his anxiety. "Before the sect's 'invitation', I was abandoned by my family. For years, I had rationalized my wife's decision. 'It was for the best,' I told myself. I guess I repeated it enough, I started to believe that behaving rationally was for the best. But, when it came down to it, I just..." Seth said, looking down, his hands gripping his knees hard.

  Therus simply stared at Seth, confusion written on his face. "Wait, why would your family abandon you? Did they not have resources for your constitution?"

  "Resources?" Seth laughed, "Where I'm from, there's no such thing as cultivation. Things like qi and mana were legends and fairy tales nobody believed."

  "Then how did you get here?"

  "A door opened up on my world, and I accidentally went through it. The sect found me, and since they were short an initiate, I got to take his place."

  Therus paused, taking a deep breath before continuing, "So your constitution..."

  "I'm sorry for not being completely upfront about that. In my defense, you were a stranger at the time..."

  "I understand. No reason to give a stranger secrets," said Therus.

  "Also, the more I read about constitutions, the more I think I can wring some benefit out of it. The problem is that it cultivates more efficiently than I do, which means,"

  "That you may be able to use it? If you had several organs in your body that were specially made for cultivating..."

  "It would be the advantage I need. As is, I'm falling behind."

  "It can't be that bad."

  "I'm barely holding my own in fights lately, and that's a mix of combat experience and qi control."

  "We'll figure something out," said Therus, "The sect usually has these initiations on worlds or planes that have been stripped bare of resources. Have you ever wondered why?"

  "I didn't know this world resource poor to begin with," said Seth, though he had some guesses.

  With a sigh, Therus continued. "Two reasons. First, people are less likely to come to a desolate world and start problems. Second, there were usually people who stripped the planets bare, sometimes leaving stuff behind."

  "That sounds like a longshot, with a lot of things that 'should' be the case," said Seth, frowning.

  "All we have are risky gambles at this point. It's clear that Johan has support from inside the sect, and I don't think he's given up."

  "About that. I learned something interesting," said Seth. Seth explained what he learned about the karmic seal from the servants, and the elder. Especially how the formation maintenance was falling behind.

  "It seems like you were busy with more than just chores the last couple weeks," said Therus.

  "I did, and I plan on taking advantage," said Seth, who then described the idea he had. It depended on Johan acting against them first. Once Johan acted, they would start attacking Johan's people in ambushes. The goal was to get Johan to strain his resources keeping his people healthy and on his side.

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  "The plan is sound," said Therus, a frown creasing his face, "not that I like it."

  "If you have a better plan, feel free to share. I'm not a fan of having to wait on Johan to act, but..."

  "He'll be able to simply say what brutes and savages we are if we act first. And you know that's not my problem with this plan."

  "What exactly is the problem, then? I don't see the problem with taking the fight to our enemy," Seth said.

  "And the people who are with him because they don't have a better choice?"

  Seth's voice started to get louder and louder as he responded. "There's always a choice. Even if there wasn't, does that mean we simply have to roll over and let them have their way?" Seth's said, frustration evident on his face.

  "No. I'm sorry," Therus said, sighing and hanging his head.

  Seth took a deep breath to calm down, before continuing. "I'm sorry too. I wish we could do this differently, but I'm not seeing any better choices."

  "Can we at least give them a chance to surrender?" said Therus.

  Seth closed his eyes and fell into thought about the question. Eventually, he responded, "I'll try, but if people surrender, and come back to attack again..."

  "No second chances," said Therus, determination in his eyes. "At that point, they've made their choice."

  Then they got up and started their routine sparring. His rust was showing, and he wasn't pushing past Therus' guard effectively. During one bout, Seth had slipped Therus' guard, but wasn't able to press quickly enough, allowing Therus to smack him in the side. As the staff slammed into him, he felt pain ripple out, but not from the strike. It was a pain from within, rearranging his organs as his cancer elongated and expanded. His vision turned red and his stomach heaved as he fell to the ground, clutching his abdomen. His world blurred for a few moments. When he came to, Therus was standing over him, panic clear on his face. He looked down at his hands, covered in blood. He pulled at his robes, exposing the new raised rope of flesh under his skin, making a line from his side to his belly button. He felt the new cancerous rope extending inward, ending too close to his dantian for comfort.

  Therus helped him to his feet, and they stopped sparring for the day. He knew the cancer had been too quiet lately for it to last. Eventually, he made it back to his room. Under his skin, he swore he could feel the tumors pulsing and twitching.

  The next three weeks until testing passed in a flurry of research, training, and cultivating. He had a few tense encounters with Johan's people, but they seemed content to watch and wait. Seth didn't want to strike the first blow, as that would force people to stick with Johan for defense. He wanted to punish them for acting against him and make them think twice about their loyalty.

  His research had borne little fruit, except to highlight that some sorcerous groups had once made this planet their home, and that they may have left some legacies here. He had also started learning the basics about formations and arrays. To his surprise, they were technically different things, even if they were both commonly referred to as formations. The difference being formations redirected naturally occurring qi for effect, while arrays took specific qi inputs to generate effects. Unfortunately, he lacked the materials to truly practice anything but the most basic formations. He did like the temperature control formation he found as it made sparring more bearable. It wasn't nearly as impressive as the name made it sound, though. Or maybe it was just a lack of skill on his part. It could only adjust the temperature a few degrees in either direction, and it was fiddly as well. There were days it seemed to fail if he sneezed at it wrong.

  The night before their testing, as he was laying in bed, Seth pulled out the photo of his kids. He wondered if they would be ashamed if they learned of the things he did here. Of the things he may have to do to survive. As he remembered them, he remembered his daughter Jess had always liked fantasy. Well, she kept on talking about authors like Tolkien and Jordan. Were the stories in her books as brutal and messy as the situation he found himself in?

  The next day, the initiates were gathered in the large courtyard. They lined up by groups, and each group's leader held a testing orb. The testing process was assembly line efficient, and the testing was complete within an hour.

  Another ten minutes passed as those in charge discussed the tests. When they finished, twenty people from within the crowd floated toward the stage. They were struggling uselessly against the force that held them. Some were crying and begging for mercy. Bacchus and another member with a green trimmed robe, pulling out a blood-red dagger, an emerald sphere, and a pill furnace. The went to work refining the first initiate into materials. Unlike the grandmaster's demonstration a couple months prior, they were not quick and efficient. The screams went on for about half an hour before they were finished.

  Seth thought that other members would switch out once Bacchus and the other disciple started to tire, but that never happened. They kept on slaughtering and slaughtering, the smell of blood and urine permeating the courtyard. This went on as the light faded to dark, and only ended a few hours after all light disappeared. Bacchus looked as if he had been wrung out, body and soul.

  They were half carried off the platform by other members of the sect, and the initiates breathed a collective sigh of relief.

  "This will be your fate, if you fall behind. Now that your training period is over, you may leave the compound. You will be given a life preserving treasure when you leave. If you die without one, we will find a suitable replacement for you from your family come the next cycle," said the Grandmaster. He let his words hang over the courtyard for a while before continuing.

  "You may also take on some jobs for sect merit, which can be exchanged for materials or opportunities. The next testing will occur in two months. One last thing," he said, before forty initiates floated up to the stage. They struggled, but they were forcefully turned toward the crowd. The grandmaster glided over the stage, until he stood in front of the initiates, and faced them.

  "You are currently the weakest here. If nothing changes, this will be your fate next time," the grandmaster said before vanishing. Everyone was frozen, as if time itself had stopped. After what felt like an eternity, an initiate took a step. That one action restarted everyone else's clock, and the gathered initiates started to leave.

  The next day, Seth woke up early to take a look at the job board. On his way, while going down a side-street, his path was blocked by four initiates. They made no aggressive movements, but did not allow him to pass. He tried to find another route, but he was soon blocked off by another group of initiates. Seth didn't engage, as four to one odds seemed rough at best. This game went on for about an hour, an unease growing in his stomach every time he was blocked. He did try and force his way through a couple times, but he couldn't slip by a group of four easily. Unwilling to force a fight, as well as risk major injury, he withdrew. The blockaders did not pursue, also seemingly unwilling to risk major injury.

  Eventually, the blockade ended, and he made it to the job hall. A few initiates were in the road in front of the entrance, and Therus joined them a few minutes later. Inside they found a plain, well maintained area that could house a couple hundred people at a time. The job boards were prominently positioned on the wall across from the door. All were empty, save the torn scraps of paper held by nails where the notices used to hang.