Stones crunched beneath his boots as Kael stepped onto the pebble beach.
This wasn't the final destination but it was one of the stops the expedition always made.
Luminaires stood around him stretching and enjoying the solid ground after the long time on the ocean.
"Soliad Island, right?" Yvette asked, picking up a rock and turning it over.
"Yes. Apparently one of the Paragons cultivated here for a period."
"Ugh." She tossed the rock back. "I'll wait on the ship."
Kael watched her stumble back up the gangway. She had drunk considerably more than she could handle.
The island itself wasn't remarkable to his eye.
This far north the forest was almost entirely coniferous, which gave the air a colder and more closed quality than broadleaf forests tended to produce. A primeval forest, most of its trees dating back to the era of the first Paragons.
Kael started toward the centre.
'It's said that simply setting foot on this island brings fortune to your cultivation.' He pushed a branch aside. 'I have a hard time believing that.'
He hadn't found any evidence to support the claim. But that wasn't why he hadn't waited on the ship. What he had found was reliable text confirming a Paragon had genuinely cultivated here. That alone was sufficient. Paragons were by far the most interesting humans who had ever existed, and trying to understand them was its own form of entertainment.
The island rose toward its centre like a small compressed mountain. The trees thinned as he climbed, replaced by boulders and low spreading bushes that clung to the rock.
When he reached the summit he sat down and took in the view.
Not long after, another Luminaire with the same idea arrived.
"Anything interesting up here?"
"Rocks and moss." Kael said with a smile.
"Ahh. Typical. Well. At least the view is good." The man said.
"Why do you think a Paragon cultivated here?" Kael asked absently.
The man crossed his arms and let out a thoughtful hum.
"Do you believe in spirituality?"
"Not particularly, no."
"Neither do I, but some do." He settled onto a nearby rock. "This is more of a widespread belief than a confirmed fact, but some people hold that humans have a deeper connection to specific environments at the level of soul, Will and Thoughts. Someone cold in nature might be drawn toward a literally cold environment. Someone warm toward warmth. The idea being that if you cultivate within an environment that matches your spiritual affiliation it accelerates the process."
"Do you believe that?"
The man shrugged. "I wouldn't know personally. But enough people believe it that it might just be true."
"Mmm."
The belief that widespread belief was itself a cause of factuality was, in many ways, a quiet poison.
Not just because it caused people to stop questioning things. That was the obvious consequence and the one most people would name if you pointed at the problem. The deeper damage was what it did to originality of thought before the questioning stage even arrived. If enough people believe something, the belief stops feeling like a belief and starts feeling like the texture of reality itself. The possibility of questioning it stops occurring to you because the question requires first noticing that you're inside something, and you can't notice what you've never been outside of.
This reached far beyond questions of fact. In truth, what was considered true, what was considered important, what was considered real, was in many aspects almost entirely a product of mass consensus rather than independent verification. Education was one of the clearest examples. For decades an entire civilisation could be taught that a metal was safe to handle and nobody would question it, not because the evidence supported it but because the teaching had been going on long enough that questioning it felt equivalent to questioning that the sky was above you.
And it reached further than education. A person's entire worth could be determined by it. The masses decided someone was dangerous, or dishonest, or a criminal, and from that point forward everything that person did was filtered through that conclusion. Evidence to the contrary was dismissed or reinterpreted. Evidence that confirmed it was amplified. Not through any deliberate conspiracy but through the simple mechanics of how belief that has become consensus processes new information. It keeps itself intact not through argument but through the prior shape it has already given to everything that follows.
Exiled from the city. Hunted and killed not because they actually did it but because people had decided they had.
Kael had no particular feelings about it one way or the other. It was simply how the world worked and had always worked.
He had, after all, built an entire identity on exactly that mechanism.
"Anyway." The man stood up. "Not much to look at, but at least it was solid ground for a while."
"It really was."
Kael made his way toward the northern part of the island. The ship was spending the night here as a rest stop, so there was no particular time limit on the exploration. Most of the others had grown bored by now and drifted back, leaving him alone.
It took almost half an hour to reach it, but the idea of spiritual affinity hadn't really left him. It was an intriguing idea. Everyone knew about paragons, yet no one could say they truly knew anything about them.This island for example. People knew a Paragon had cultivated here, but they didn't know which of the nine.
"Rather than spiritual I could see souls having affinities of some kind." He murmured to himself. "I'll have to look into it."
The northern beach was similar to where they had docked, the same pebbled shore,and the same cold light.
Just as he was about to step onto it he instinctively shot his arm out to the side.
His hand passed straight through a defensive aura, jade green sparks raining down around them, and into flesh. He pushed deeper until his fingers closed around two ribs.
Kael looked at the Luminaire with cold eyes.
"What are you doing?"
The man grabbed Kael's arm with wide eyes and groaned.
"I didn't want to. I promise." Tears filled his eyes.
"Then why did you?"
"I don't know. Please."
He was similar. Similar to the man from the mote shop. Somewhat absent, like his mind was moving through fog rather than air.
"Who sent you?"
The man tried to form words but the adrenaline was already leaving him. He whimpered and pulled against Kael's grip, but how could someone of his calibre move it?
"Let go. Please. I don't know anything. I had no choice."
Just as he was about to lose consciousness something shifted in his expression. His mind going blank in a way that was different from the pain. He reached into his pocket.
Before anything could emerge Kael tore his hand back. Rib and flesh gave way together, spattering across the ground. But the man didn't stop. He pulled out a small wooden knife and drove it forward.
Kael deflected it, raised his arm across his chest, and brought it down.
The Luminaire's head offered no resistance. It came apart across the ground in a long jagged streak.
Kael caught the body before it fell.
"Another low ranked assassin…"
He pulled another silver coin from the man's pocket and pocketed it. Then he hurled the body into the water.
Whoever was sending these after him had clearly made a point of keeping their assets uninformed.
"Valerian."
Kael turned.
It was the same man he had spoken with on the summit not long ago.
"I was supposed to kill you." He placed a cigarette between his lips. "But I got counter-paid not to." He lit it with a snap of his fingers, a small flame appearing at the tip. "Funny how quickly things can change."
"Don't let the money change you." Kael said calmly. "Attack me."
The man laughed and exhaled a slow puff of smoke.
"Money is everything, Valerian."
The two regarded each other in silence.
He was taller than Kael by a margin, wearing leather that had developed fine creases from years of use. Short beard, medium length hair worn in loose layers.
"Aurelion." He held the pack out.
Kael declined. "Valerian Eireindaile."
"I know. I know." Aurelion took another drag.
"How much is my head worth, then?"
"That would be a business secret."
"I can pay you."
Aurelion looked at him amused. "You'd have to outbid the contractor."
"Which is?"
"Twenty five thousand mindstones."
Kael turned his gaze to the waves.
"A little excessive, don't you think?"
Aurelion gave an agreeing hum. "It is. But you're not nobody."
"I'm not?"
"A pretend rank one who opened two businesses within a year, operating under the name of a family that no longer exists?" Aurelion narrowed his eyes slightly. "People are starting to notice. You're not some throwaway Luminaire. And the underpriced mote selling alone is causing real problems, among other things." He paused. "But I'm sure you're already aware of that."
Kael didn't bother pretending otherwise.
"That said, it's your lucky day." Aurelion continued. "Because the contractor also paid me to pass something along."
"Which is?"
"You can stop. You have a patron now."
Kael went still for a moment.
"Who actually sent you?"
"Ah." Aurelion dropped the cigarette and ground it out with his boot. "They also told me not to say anything more."