There was one thing Lysska had always kept under wraps—well, besides the dozen other secrets she hoarded like a kitsune with emotional baggage—and that was the path she walked. Not out of paranoia or vanity. There just wasn't any point in flaunting it. Her power wasn't the kind that dazzled; it whispered. But that whisper had once screamed loud enough to save her life—the day she turned her back on fate and walked straight out of Vor'akh.

And walked out with something, too. An artifact. Stolen, obviously. Because really, what else do you take when you plan to go toe-to-toe with destiny?

You take luck.

Absurd, isn't it? But to her, it wasn't just a concept or a force. No, for Lysska, luck was a substance. Tactile in its intangibility. The very foundation she resonated with as her affinity to light ascended—and got stronger with every step. Which, to be fair, explained why so few ever made it past the bottleneck of yellow core using light as their crutch. Everyone assumed the core concept behind light was purity.

Wrong candle, wrong shrine.

It was intervention.

A cosmic heckle. A shove at the elbow of fate itself. Luck.

And so she walked her path—The Path of the Prism Serpent. Lysska had known from the very beginning, felt it slithering in her blood like a melody only she could hum. One affinity. Just one. Evolved into 'Radiance' over time. But no one knew. She hadn't let anyone peek behind that particular curtain.

Same went for her current standing—sitting pretty at the top of red core. Not quite gold, not yet. But she knew that time would come. She didn't guess. She declared. That's the thing about those who meddle with luck: they don't hope for outcomes. They write certainties.

Was the path clear? Absolutely not. It was foggy, overgrown, and possibly rigged with banana peels.

Perfect. Just her style. Though she would never admit it to anyone.

Wind snarled past as she balanced on her familiar. Kraven, the crow, swiveled his head, fixing her with that avian stare—equal parts philosopher and petty critic. He likely felt the mental gymnastics underway in her skull.

He cawed. Brass. Bold. Brimming with avian sass.

Lysska snorted. "Oh, please. You doubting my knack for wriggling through chaos like a buttered octopus in a bar brawl?"

Hardly. Their bond ran too deep. Kraven wasn't just a bird—he was her smokescreen with feathers. Together, they'd knitted a network of spies, secrets, and strategic eavesdropping. She avoided fistfights; he compensated by being insufferably good at aerial espionage.

Today, however, demanded skyward scrutiny.

She reached inward, towards her core. It pulsed—warm, crimson, with a golden aura fluttering at its edges like a candle flirting with dawn. Luck, for her, was a strange beast. Unseeable for most, but she could practically bottle it now.

It had started simple. Back when she was low yellow core. Little things: finding coins on the street, enemies tripping over their own swords, dice always rolling in her favor. Back then, she chalked it up to… well, dumb luck.

But it wasn't dumb. It was deliberate. And it fluctuated. Never quite fixed, never quite fair.

As she climbed ranks, the patterns sharpened. She saw its fingerprints on events, even learned to nudge them slightly. But the real turning point came with her red core.

That's when luck stopped being a feeling and started becoming a fuel. A measurable resource. She could stockpile it by living just cautiously enough, walking the tightrope between mediocrity and madness. Over time, she learned to feel it pooling around her core like liquid gold waiting to be spent.

Over the past few months, Lysska had stockpiled so much Luck, she could almost swim in it. She was certain that even if a dozen other red cores were gunning for her, they'd have a hell of a time landing a hit—especially with her combat instincts backing her up. Not that she could do much to them either, if push came to shove, but… well, that wasn't the point, was it?

She wasn't here to win a war. She just needed time. Time to think. To dig. To figure out how the pieces fit. Maybe even how to save Jade.

The past few days had been… taxing. Not quite dire, but certainly dramatic enough to tempt her into spending some of that precious Luck hoard. She'd hovered near the edge more than once—but never stepped over it. Not once.

And strangely enough… she never had to.

Ever since she met her—Jade—it was as if danger politely refused to show up. And that, oddly enough, was what fascinated Lysska most.

Because on the day they met, something bizarre happened.

Her Luck reservoir surged. No rituals, no planning, no clever tricks. It just happened—automatically. She'd only ever experienced something similar once before, during an encounter so ridiculous, so chaotically fruitful, it had drained her Luck reserve dry in a single moment of karmic combustion. That one made no sense. But also, perfect sense.

This, though? This was something different. It felt like an opportunity. One she instinctively knew she couldn't afford to let slip through her fingers. She didn't know why, and to this day, she still didn't. But she had tried to find out. What else was she supposed to do—not snoop?

She dug into Jade's story. The papers she carried were clean—too clean. So clean they practically smelled like fresh ink. Forged, without a doubt. No way she was from the Bloodtide Sect. That part, at least, was easy to confirm. The forgers themselves wouldn't be too hard to trace either, but the moment Lysska tried to push further?

Her Luck started bleeding away.

Not in a flashy, dramatic collapse—but in a slow, stomach-knotting drain. Just the intention to investigate was enough to spook her Luck reservoir into evacuating. That should have terrified her. Rationally, it did. But emotionally? It only made her more curious.

Whoever was backing Jade… wasn't someone you looked up on a whim. They were no average player on the board. That much was clear.

And as for Jade herself… Lysska had stopped pretending she didn't care. Sure, the girl kept secrets. Who didn't? But her actions—those spoke louder. There was a sincerity in them. A flicker of affection. Respect. Maybe even trust.

And Lysska… well, she couldn't help but mirror that. Even if it meant putting a leash on her own curiosity. Because she'd seen it before: sometimes, it wasn't betrayal or blood that broke bonds. It was questions.

Yet somehow, Jade made her want to answer instead.

Kept tossing her keys. She'd confessed about Alice—the "cursed" artifact now serving her with cultish zeal. There was another… presence too, flickering at the edges of Lysska's senses. Mildly prickly, but manageable. A nuisance at best, and her hoarded luck stayed stubbornly inert—proof the threat wasn't hers to swallow.

Then there was today's event.

Once again, Jade had done something back at the banquet hall. Lysska had felt it—that pulse of presence, unmistakably unnatural. Heavy. Wrong in all the right ways. And then, just as quickly… gone. No trace. Not of the perpetrators. Not of the Vor'aks. Not of whatever had happened.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

It was like someone had swept the board clean mid-game.

She kept her curiosity in check—again. But ancestors, it was getting harder by the second.

She knew Jade was stronger than she let on. That wasn't even a question anymore. But Lysska couldn't gauge how strong. There was something off about her core—something veiled, like it didn't want to be seen. Maybe it was a decoy. Maybe it was something worse. Either way, it didn't matter anymore.

Because she now knew, without a shadow of doubt, that the silver-scaled Drakkari she'd glimpsed was Jade.

Because… inside the Tower? No trace. Not even a whisper. People were looking—everywhere. Lysska herself had been scouring the skies for the better part of two hours. If that filthy elf's info was worth anything, Jade must've shielded herself during the explosion.

Which meant she was still alive. Somewhere.

Lysska's eyes flicked across the horizon again—sharp, scanning—and there, finally, she caught movement. Shadows in the upper sky.

Kraven's fragments still watched from below, in case Jade slipped through the cracks, but with every passing minute, Lysska's theory was solidifying: Jade was up here. And she was surrounded.

No matter how powerful Jade was, even she couldn't go toe-to-toe with a sky full of red cores. Her poison might throw one or two off balance, but red cores were naturally resistant to that stuff. At most, it would dull their edge. At worst, it would do nothing at all.

She needed help. Not to win—just to run.

And that, Lysska could give.

There was a reason she'd come alone. Her Luck only worked for her. That made her the liability in a team fight, but the ace in solo missions. In situations where the odds were impossible, where numbers didn't matter because the other side had power—Luck was the one factor that flipped the board.

When the math says "impossible," Luck scribbles in the margins. And Luck's favorite (only(?)) client?

Her.

"Speed up, Kraven."

The giant crow let out a sharp, echoing caw as it surged forward, wings slicing the wind with renewed vigor. The shadows drew closer, details crystallizing: fast-moving figures, elves by the look of them. Bastards.

Lysska bit her lip. They were fast.

She just hoped she wasn't too late.

Then she saw it—a massive, cocoon-like formation floating in the sky. Not solid. Not stone or wood or magic glass. But air. Stormy, roiling, and tightly wound.

No. Don't tell me—

And the way the elves were guarding it? Hyper-aware. Eyes constantly shifting. Every move taut with focus.

That had to be it.

The barrier the elf had mentioned—formed at the instant of the explosion.

That was where Jade was.

Immediately, Lysska felt gazes snap to her. Some even funneled mana into their eyes—spiritual sight. Trying to discern if she was a threat.

And there was no real way to hide from that.

So she didn't bother.

Right at the center of this mess stood him. The foul-mouthed elf. The one who had unknowingly spoon-fed her half of this information like a good little spyglass.

She really ought to thank him.

But before she could get a word out, he snapped his fingers. Dozens of rings flared with necrotic energy—and then the air filled with them.

Specters. Wraiths. One. Two. Five. Ten. A whole damn flock of the things.

Lysska blinked, then smirked.

Wraiths? Against her?

A light magic caster?

That was a choice.

Then again… how would he know? No one did.

And that was going to make this a very short fight.

Matrices sparked to life across her hands, twin spirals flaring around her irises. With them, Lysska could see the true forms of the wraiths—even as they slipped into intangibility. At red core, she didn't need anchors or recall glyphs. She could burn them out raw.

One by one, she locked onto them.

With a sharp snap of her fingers, a beam of focused light burst from the matrix on her palm. It speared a shrieking wraith in the skull—obliterated. No pause. Another. Then another.

Rapid-fire. Two seconds. Every single wraith down.

Lysska allowed herself a sharp, toothy smile. Maybe she wouldn't need to burn through her Luck after all—if all they had were necromancers.

Then Kraven banked hard. Her legs slipped—barely—and a chunk of her Luck drained with it.

And just behind her head, a massive blade of wind scythed past, missing by inches.

"Shit," Lysska hissed, pulse hammering. She gritted her teeth, forced her senses to narrow, to focus.

The drain wasn't huge, but it was steady. And those bastards weren't going to run out of mana anytime soon.

That wind blade had been big.

So they had at least one red core wind mage. Perfect.

She hated wind users.

Unpredictable. Erratic. And once they reached red core, they started channeling something beyond mere air—something primal. She still didn't know what core concept wind attuned to at that level, and that made it dangerous. Unknown.

So she did the only thing she could do:

Head straight for the cocoon.

The storm-shrouded sphere loomed ahead, buffeted by spiraling gales. And somewhere inside—she knew—Jade was in there.

Spells erupted again—lightning bursts, fire arcs, frost spears. Kraven weaved between them, her commands flying fast and sharp, his massive wings cutting unpredictable patterns through the air. But the truth was plain.

They were burning through her Luck. Fast.

Even Kraven's survival relied on it now—because if he went down, so did she. And that would be a very final fall.

Below, the lead elf barked something at his mages—frustration twisted his face. She couldn't hear him over the howling wind, but the others were clearly fumbling. One nearly fell off his mount after a miscast backlash.

Her grin returned—short-lived, but satisfying.

A few more dodges, a few more near-hits, and she was finally face-to-face with the storm cocoon. Kraven leveled out, wings flaring wide to stabilize.

Another mage tried to tag her, but a rogue gust twisted his aim, wind slamming into his face. He recoiled, blinking—and Lysska felt another drain on her Luck.

Too much. Too fast.

And then the real problem hit her.

There was no way to escape.

Not without Jade.

And the storm barrier still held strong.

She hovered closer—just in case Jade was waiting for the perfect moment, watching, biding time. But the longer she stayed, the worse it got. Spells kept flying. Her dodges got tighter. The margin of error thinner. And Luck—her last resort—was running dry.

A few more minutes of this, and even she wouldn't make it out.

"Fucking hell, Jade!" Lysska shouted, voice ragged as the wind battered her. "Come the fuck out already!"

No response.

Lysska bit her lip, hard enough to taste blood.

The elf commander finally clocked the pattern—specifically, how Lysska hadn't so much as singed a hair.

He raised a fist, halting his squad mid-chaos.

Oho? Negotiations? Perfect, maybe she could buy time—

"I don't care what gutter spat you out," the elf hissed, voice like a poisoned stiletto, "but you'll rot alongside the whore in that vortex. Filth. Let's see how long your slippery jig lasts. KILL HER! EYES ON THE BITCH, ALWAYS!"

…Or not.

So much for diplomacy.

Most of the bastards were mages anyway—skyborne and flinging long-range spells from their mounts. No chance of melee. Which was a shame. Lysska had a few close-combat surprises she'd loved to test out.

For now, all she could do was keep dodging. She didn't counterattack—too risky, too costly. First, she was already juggling a thousand near-death evasions. Second… her Luck reserve was bleeding out. Fast. Third, she might need her mana later.

Or… She could…

No. Nope. Too dangerous.

Her gaze flicked toward the storm cocoon. Another surge of Luck drained from her core. She gritted her teeth. That option—the one she kept locking away—started feeling more and more like her only shot.

It was dangerous. Unpredictable. Worse than that, even. But if Jade was safe inside there… and if Lysska had just enough Luck left to survive the fallout…

It might just scrub these prissy leaf-lickers from the sky.

She veered behind the cocoon, dodging a hail of ice shards. The commander's shouts blurred into the gale. She needed one heartbeat. One opening.

Got it.

The runes on her core ignited, flaring deep in her chest like molten gold. Every red core user got a concept spell upon ascension. It wasn't element-based—it was path-based. Meaning no two were exactly alike.

Hers?

[Call For Calamity]

The runes throbbed as the spell flared to life—instantly draining nearly 90% of her mana. Lysska staggered, almost blacking out mid-air.

The spell did exactly what it said on the tin: it called for a Calamity. Something more dangerous than herself. Something overwhelming. Unpredictable. Deadly.

It didn't always choose what—mana storms, astral beasts, unstable spatial fractures. It varied. That was the gamble.

The only saving grace? It synergized with Luck. She could usually skirt the worst of the damage herself. Usually.

It was never ideal. Never precise. Definitely not something you used when allies were nearby.

She hadn't considered it before—for Jade's sake.

But if Jade was safe in that cocoon, and Lysska could just get clear…

The elves' survival odds just flatlined.

Her grin turned unhinged.

"Kraven—ascend," she croaked. "Let's see what the cosmos coughed up."

They climbed rapidly, dodging more spells as Lysska scanned the skies.

Mana storm? No signs. Spatial rift? Unlikely. Some high cored beast crashing through?

Nothing. Nothing?!

Her brow twitched. Had it failed? No—she'd felt it land. The spell had taken.

Then where the hell was—

CRACK.

A sharp, jagged sound tore through the air. Not just Lysska—everyone heard it. Even her pursuers faltered mid-flight, heads snapping toward the source.

Jade's cocoon.

It was breaking.

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