To survive the coming storm, we needed more than grit. We needed an upgrade.
Three days later, with the kill zone half-finished and the tension in the valley at a breaking point, I opened the portal again.
[DESTINATION: WORLD 12-ALPHA (CULTIVATION)]
[TRADE DEMAND: PURE WATER, UNTAINTED PROTEIN]
[WARNING: HIGH SPIRITUAL ENERGY]
Alex and I stepped through.
The transition was jarring. We went from the damp, grey gloom of the Mist to a world that hurt the eyes with its vibrancy. The sky was a violent, azure blue. The air was thick with Qi—spiritual energy—that tasted like ozone and mint on the tongue. It rushed into my lungs, burning, making my Plant Affinity stir restlessly under my skin.
We stood in a bamboo forest, but the bamboo was made of jade, the leaves chiming like bells in the wind.
"Feels like I'm vibrating," Alex muttered, rubbing his arms.
We trekked to the market, a floating pavilion suspended between two mountain peaks by chains of golden light. The beings here were human-ish, but they moved with a fluid grace that defied gravity. They wore silk robes and carried swords that hummed with contained lightning.
I approached the head merchant—a floating elder with a beard that drifted in the wind. He looked at our ragged clothes and Assault rifles with disdain, but his eyes narrowed when he saw the container of water I set down.
"Purified," I said. "Zero heavy metals. Zero radiation. Untouched by the death qi of my world."
He floated closer, dipping a jade finger into the water. He tasted it and sighed, a sound of profound relief.
"The thirst of the spirit," he murmured. "You bring water that remembers snow."
We negotiated hard. I traded ten gallons of our water and a side of Stage One venison—which they prized for its concentrated life force—for three critical items.
First: Spirit Stones. Raw crystallized Qi. To them, it was currency. To me, it was high-grade uranium for my Base Core.
Second: Vitality Salve. A green paste that smelled of crushed pine and could knit bone in hours.
Third: Ironwood Seeds.
"These are dormant," the merchant warned. "They require a cultivator's touch to awaken."
"I have a gardener's touch," I countered.
As we turned to leave, the merchant's voice cut through the chatter of the market.
"Girl," he called out. "Your aura... it is fractured. Like a vase glued back together. You walk between seconds. The Heavens do not like those who cheat the river of time."
I froze. I turned slowly. "I don't know what you mean."
"Tread lightly," he said, his eyes glowing white. "Or the current will drown you."
We stepped back through the portal, the warning hanging heavy in the air.