Veronika Houjo had long considered her mental fortitude one of her greatest strengths. She had constructed a fortress over the years, using the principles of virtue as a foundation and building on that with the teachings of ancient philosophers and her clan elders.

  But now, that fortress was under assault. She was experiencing all manner of emotions of late, and none of them were wanted. It was an attack, in a way, but an insidious one; hard to identify and combat, not unlike the kind of schemes her fellow nobles might attempt at times. To simply fight these intruders was, unfortunately, not a viable approach.

  It brought to mind the image of hosting a banquet and receiving uninvited guests, of a high enough stature that they could not, within the confines of proper etiquette, be turned away.

  One of them was an old acquaintance: regret. A bespectacled lady of advanced age is how she imagined this intruding emotion, walking slowly with hands clasped behind her back as she ruthlessly criticized even the smallest mistakes. Why didn’t you immediately retreat, when the auburn smoke came out to hide his movements? Why hadn’t you undertaken more efforts to prepare a counter to that ability in the first place? Countless questions and hypotheticals ran through her mind, but at least these were familiar and had the potential benefit that considering them might help her improve.

  The next unwanted guest was a stranger, and this one she imagined as a shadowy man in a long black cloak that advanced with slow inevitability. This dark stranger would walk into your mansion, eat your food, drink your wine and then sleep in your bed if he felt like it, and there would be nothing you could do about it. Such was the nature of despair.

  This feeling was entirely new for Nika; she’d never before been in a situation where defeat was not just a possibility, but the likeliest outcome. They were trapped in a place where people had hidden for generations, with a seemingly unbeatable foe and his minions waiting at the door. The more she considered their situation, the more that feeling would suck her in. That shadowy man would spread his influence through her mansion like a pool of tar, until everything was covered in the sticky substance and she could hardly move.

  But the final stranger was more disruptive still. Doubt, clad in impeccable clothes of a white so pure that it reflected the light, would walk up to her with a bright smile, fix her with two piercing eyes and ask only a single question: are you sure?

  For the other two, stubborn though they were, she could mark them as having ill intent and formulate strategies to deal with them. Regret could be turned into constructive thoughts, could be called in to help make her future plans all the more likely to succeed. From despair she could hide, averting her gaze from the likeliest scenario to focus only on the narrow path to victory until it became all she could see.

  But doubt was not pernicious like the others. It had all the purity of a bright-eyed child as it asked its simple questions. It sprang forth not from a weakness of the mind or body, but from cold clarity. The facts were clear and the questions flowed from them naturally; doubt was honest, in that way.

  But for all its purity and honesty, it was also incredibly destructive.

  Her sigh seemed to echo through the musty library with its cracked furniture and faded walls. There was a sharp, burning pain across her chest as she shifted her position on the uncomfortable cot, prompting her to start another cycle of running her Ki through the skin and muscles there in a pattern that would speed up the healing. She hoped to be able to move freely again in a day or so.

  Muted sounds of grunting and the harsh thwack of wood on wood made their way into the chamber. Dario was performing physical training, which she hadn’t seen him do before, though it felt more likely he was simply taking out his frustrations on some ancient training doll.

  There was, unfortunately, plenty of time to reflect as she waited for her wounds to heal. Plenty of time for doubt to advance.

  Two fights with that parasitic demon. Two bitter defeats. She’d never faced a foe that had both a better defense and a stronger attack. The complaints of her many sparring partners over the years that she was too fast and strong had always sounded to her like whining, but now she was finding some sympathy for their claims.

  Here, doubt’s piercing question paved the way for despair to advance: are you sure you can beat him?

  She wasn’t. Yet it would not do to let despair creep into her halls. That manner of unproductive thinking did not belong in the mind of a Houjo. Every style had a weakness and she would find it, then exploit it. The fragile old scrolls that surrounded her had not yielded any answers yet, but if there was something there, she would find it.

  From those same scrolls, however, came the second line of attack, this one far more straightforward and violent than the first. They provided further support for an uncomfortable truth: that her ancestors had fled this floor. Though, if she was being honest, she could see the cold logic that might lead to such a conclusion. She could even admire it.

  Any fool could shout their honor from the rooftops before running into a losing battle, soon to join the piles of forgotten corpses. Only a sharp mind could remove one’s ego from the decision-making process and find the optimal path.

  But there, white-robed doubt again waltzed through her gates and asked: are you sure the fight was hopeless?

  Most of the historical accounts she’d read suggested a lack of communication and trust between the Great Clans. There may have been more they could have done. If so, her ancestors may have violated their duty of upholding welfare and protecting citizens, as one of the leading clans on this floor.

  As she struggled with them, doubt’s destructive questions began to reveal painful truths. She was reminded of an old saying from the Hagakure, which said that a single pebble could cause an avalanche, if it was tossed down the wrong hillside.

  Doubt stood at the top of that hill while her fortress of beliefs rested at the bottom, kicking stones down with each question, each one of those threatening to bring more down on its way, risking an avalanche. Already, the first pebble felt more like a boulder as it fed that splinter of doubt in her mind, which whispered to her a truth that felt deeply uncomfortable to consider: the clan elders are not beyond reproach.

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  It was an unexpectedly painful thing, to consider that her idols would be less than perfect. Even merely weighing the thought had a shiver running down her spine. Investigating it more closely only fed more pebbles as ammunition to doubt’s assault, as immediately more questions came to mind. Which elders should be called into question? Which of their teachings should be cast in doubt? Surely not all of them..?

  She’d used more of those teachings than she could count, over the years, as pivotal building blocks of her fortress. If each of those was now suspect and in need of further investigation… Nika put a hand to her stomach as the feeling of unease and dread grew stronger. A hundred more stones would be sent rolling down that hill, each larger than a mere pebble.

  No, she thought, that would be going too far. The evidence was not enough to call all clan elders into question, only those ancestors involved in the decisions surrounding the calamity that occurred on this floor. That had been several hundred years ago, at the least, so she may never even have heard of their names.

  In fact, there was only one person in their clan that would have lived long enough, if not to have witnessed these events, then at least to remember them: the clan Patriarch, her grandfather. Though she called him grandfather, it was more like an informal title as there were, to her knowledge, at least four generations between them. But he’d been alive for a long time even before fathering children and was powerful enough to be privy to many secrets. Come to think of it, hadn’t Saigo mentioned that the floor had been sealed by stone?

  Nika wasn’t sure that any other Great Clan Patriarchs would even be capable of manifesting their Ki into solid stone. She grimaced as the unease in her stomach tightened further.

  And still there was another point to consider: none of the historical works she had read had mentioned a single word of this floor. Not a single one. That the information contained in those tomes was incomplete was now beyond doubt. In fact, she had to consider whether the information contained in those books may have been carefully curated.

  Again, doubt opened its piercing blue eyes and asked: to what extent had the information been filtered? By whom, and to what purpose? Those pebbles grew as they rolled down the hill and when they hit the walls of her fortress, they struck true, leaving gaping holes behind.

  Nearly everything she knew about important historical events, such as the Great Revolt, or the Sixty-Year Clan Wars that resulted in the annihilation of the Nanbu clan, she’d gotten from those books. Those accounts were now suspect and should not be taken as fact.

  That begged the question: what knowledge could she still depend on?

  It felt increasingly like she was lost, her fortress being swept away in that growing avalanche as she found that its foundations had been built not in deep layers of unyielding Boron, but in an ocean of shifting pebbles.

  At least there were a few books that she could, for now, leave beyond suspicion. The Hagakure, that honored old tome, or the Way of the Virtuous cultivator with its beautifully worded principles. Neither of those books mentioned this floor either, of course, but then they were not works of history, nor did they purport to describe the scope or nature of their world.

  Those two stood like steadfast pillars of her foundation that would withstand the growing avalanche, their teachings of virtue still untainted. Her walls might be damaged, but as long as she could cling to those pillars, holding on for dear life, she would not be swept away.

  From that position, she would begin to rebuild, even through a rolling avalanche if she had to. It would not be an easy task, nor would it be quickly done. Yet a critical goal was to break through to Talc as soon as possible, strange though that thought may be. In order to do that, as she had said to Dario, they needed to thoroughly investigate their desires, which were, of course, connected to beliefs.

  So it had to be done.

  Taking the principles of virtue to be true, Nika began to think through what she’d learned from clan elders, looking for more pillars to support her foundations. Only beliefs that were beyond a shadow of doubt must be allowed here. She would not rebuild with a shaky foundation.

  It didn’t take her long to come up with an example, since she’d struggled with those conflicts for years and had often asked clan elders for advice. Was it acceptable to be untruthful, in order to protect the name of the clan?

  Elder Riku had taught her that creating value for the clan and protecting its name were of higher importance than the virtue of being truthful in self-expression. He’d even given an example: one of the many smaller uprisings that had started the Great Revolt, had been caused by a cultivator of the Kassai clan who had felt compelled by virtue to reveal a scheme that exploited local citizens to increase the clan coffers. It had ended with many citizens losing their lives, while the Kassai clan’s name was damaged. “Look at the outcomes,” the elder had said, “only hatred and death followed that decision.”

  But until she found a reliable source, the accounts of historical events had to be considered suspect. The argument leaned entirely on lessons taken from history and so it had to be discarded. It left the conflict on a fundamental level: the principles of virtue did not take outcomes into account. If she followed her own logic, the conclusion was clear: disregard the elder’s lesson. Live by the virtue of being truthful in self-expression.

  But instead of giving way to relief and clarity, the unease tightened even further. Doubt was still there, bright eyes smiling at her as it asked: are you sure? And the answer was: no.

  She investigated further, imagining herself being presented with a similar problem, where she’d have to decide between upholding her virtue or protecting the clan name. Would she be able to hold her back straight and meet the elders’ gazes as she had to answer for the consequences? Even if she might be cast out and shamed by all?

  Her hands began to tremble and she let out a shaky breath as she imagined being judged by her peers and elders for such a decision. That much, she could perhaps still live with, but then the next question came: what of her parents?

  The image of her father looking down at her, shaking his head with a disappointed frown made her feel sick. Even if she had acted with virtue, that judgment was too much to bear. Enough even to crack those pillars.

  Unease and dread quickly turned to nausea as cold sweat sprang from her skin. She could feel her pulse running faster, her breath uneven. Was virtue truly not enough? Were the pillars not strong enough to withstand the barrage?

  When faced with clan judgment it felt like they were made only of obsidian and what she needed was the absolute certainty of boron. But without the principles of virtue, what else was there to hold onto? Without absolute certainty, how could she know how to act?

  Hoping she may have missed something, she went back to the start, once again asking which knowledge she could depend on. Where could she find the certainty she needed to forge her foundation anew?

  So it was that Veronika Houjo’s mind began to run in circles as she lay sweating and groaning on her cot.

  When sleep finally took hold, the nightmares returned.